You are a foodie, aren't you??

foodie: a person who has an ardent or refined interest in food

Today, for the first time in my life, I was labeled as a foodie. I took it as a great compliment. I am very interested in food, especially since I've been reading and researching about eating RAW foods and increasing my family's fruit and veggie intake while reducing processed foods and all the icky things that go along with them.

So, here's what this "foodie" had for dinner. :)

I made a huge amount of homemade hummus (from dried chickpeas) a couple of weeks ago, and after tiring of eating the hummus as a dip, I winged a hummus salad. Well, DH raved about it so that I decided to make it again.

First, I made the hummus. I normally soak my chickpeas for about 24 hours, then slow cook them in my crock pot or on the stove until soft, but since I didn't plan ahead, I dove into the pantry for a huge can of organic chickpeas DH had bought as a "backup" plan. I poured most of the liquid out of the can, and then dumped the chickpeas and remaining liquid into my Blendtec. Next I threw in every yummy thing I could think of and blended it until smooth: some roasted garlic cloves (from Just Tomatoes, ordered through a coop), some Just Onions (from Just Tomatoes, ordered through a coop), several whole sprigs of fresh cilantro, a chunk of jalapeno pepper, a sprinkle of red pepper flakes, some raw sesame seeds, freshly ground peppercorns, and pink Himalayan salt. I added and tasted and added some more until it tasted the way I wanted.

Then I made the salad. I put organic mixed baby greens onto our plates. Then I topped them with slivers of organic red onion and organic celery, and grated organic carrots. I sprinkled raw sunflower seeds over all of it, and then gave us each a big glob of the freshly made hummus right in the center.

Right before serving, I swirled olive oil over the entire plate, including the hummus and then drizzled balsamic vinegar over the greens (avoiding the hummus). Sorry, I didn't get any post-drizzling pics...I'll do better next time! ;)

DH loves this and I think it is great, too!


As a side, I made fresh apple sauce. I simply washed, cored, and sliced 3 apples using my handy dandy apple gadget


(I love how quick and easy this is. You can also have the gadget peel the apple if you desire. It does it at the same time it's coring and slicing. We eat apples raw as snacks a lot thanks to this gadget, and I've just found that it makes dehydrating the apples a cinch since it cuts really uniform slices.)

I threw the apples into my Blendtec and added a few ounces of coconut water and around a cup of water. I like to squeeze in as much healthiness as possible, so I threw in a couple of handfuls of greens as well; these could be omitted for a standard apple sauce, but we like it GREEN. I also threw in just a bit of cinnamon.

I blended until smooth (not long in this baby!)...

and served it up! Normally when I make this, I add spinach and the color is a much prettier green. This time, I used the same mixed greens as I used in our salads since that's what we had on hand, and it came out much darker, I think because there were some purple-y greens in the mix. It still tasted great, but looks much prettier when using spinach. DH ate two bowls!

After dinner, I was still craving something...something sweet...dessert! I had read Sheri's post about her version of Larabars on the Green and Crunchy blog, but had never even tried a Larabar myself. Earlier in the day though, I had been talking to another mama on one of the Diaperswappers' threads who was trying to eat more raw, and she had experimented with Sheri's recipe. So, I thought, why not??

I put a cup of raw cashews into the Blendtec. Most people do this in a food processor I think, but I don't have one, so I tried it out in my 3 quart Blendtec jar. I pulsed the cashews until they were roughly chopped (just a few seconds). Then I pitted and roughly chopped about a cup of Medjool dates. I added a few at a time and pulsed until things started to combine. I scraped the container down once to be sure all the nuts were getting mixed well. I also added some organic flax meal, organic chia seeds, and vanilla. I pulsed the blender until the mixture began to stick together like dough. Then I dumped it into a bowl with a flat bottom and pressed it down so it was even. I noticed the mix was a bit "damp" to the touch (Did I use too many dates??), so I threw some raw dehydrated coconut chips and more flax meal into the blender and pulsed until it was roughly mixed and chopped. I sprinkled the coconut flax flakes on top of the cashew bars, put a lid on the bowl, and stuck it in the freezer for about an hour. When we were ready to eat it, I pulled it out and cut it into fourths...

...and served us up a slice!

I was surprised how nicely the Vanilla Coconut Cashew bars came out of the bowl and how the pieces stayed together so well...very bar-like!

The taste was pretty darn yummy, too! These definitely hit the spot!

I'm looking forward to trying various combinations for these bars--using different nuts, trying different additions. I think my next version will have some raw cacao. Yum!

What do you think a fun combination would be?

Trail Mix

I am a snacker. Always have been. Probably always will be. One thing that has changed recently though is my choice of snacks. Instead of a whole sleeve (or two!) of Thin Mint Girl Scout cookies, I'll have something a lot more health conscious. This doesn't mean I have to sacrifice my chocolate or that it can't be delicious!

One snack I have come to really love (read: CRAVE!) is trail mix. I've had various trail mixes throughout my life, but really started to get into them when I found a couple of varieties I liked at the health food store Trader Joe's. Problem is, they're fairly expensive, and unless you buy different varieties, they're always the same. Since I have started buying in bulk and have begun to learn to use a dehydrator, I really enjoy creating my own trail mixes.

Here are some of the "pros" of creating my own mixes:
*I can whip up a snack in minutes
*I can have as many or as few ingredients as I want
*It can be a different mix every time or I can repeat my favorites
*I can include more variety than store bought mixes
*I control the ingredients, so I can be sure there are no unnatural additives or preservatives
*I can ensure my dehydrated fruits and my nuts/seeds are really raw for added nutrients
*Since I buy all my ingredients in bulk, creating the mix is much cheaper than buying a small bag of pre-made trail mix
*Because I buy in bulk, I always have ingredients on hand that make nice trail mixes
*I can make as much or as little as I want

When I buy foods in bulk, I take out a portion for daily use to keep in an airtight jar or canister. The rest of the food is stored away in an appropriate place (i.e. pantry, freezer). As my daily portion runs low, I simply refill from the larger portion that has been stored.

To make my trail mix, I simply pull out the containers with the ingredients I want to use and scoop the desired amount into a bowl. I mix the ingredients up with my fingers, and TA-DA! There you have it: instant (healthy) snack!



Today's trail mix consisted of:
*Raw Coconut chips (Wilderness Family Naturals -- I blogged about these yesterday!)
*Organic Raw Pepitas/Pumpkin Seeds
*Raw Sunflower Seeds
*Dehydrated Apples (Just Tomatoes, purchased through a coop)
*Dehydrated Bananas (homemade)
*Dehydrated Cherries (Just Tomatoes, purchased through a coop)
*Dehydrated Blackberries (Just Tomatoes, purchased through a coop)
*Organic Rolled Oats
*Raw Almonds
*Raw Cashews
*Organic Goji Berries (Navitas Naturals, purchased through Amazon subscribe & save)
*Organic Raw Cacao Nibs (Navitas Naturals, purchased through Amazon subscribe & save)

It only took a minute or two to throw together, but WOW was it yummy! And filling! I didn't produce any plastic waste that needs to be thrown away, and I ate a wide variety of fruits, nuts, and seeds. I even snuck in a few grains!

Now, this trail mix wasn't perfect. Ideally, I'd have liked for it to have been all raw, but I am just getting into this and learning more and more. To be as "green" and thrifty as possible, I feel I need to use up my on-hand ingredients first. I have purchased a lot from Just Tomatoes through coops in the past and actually have a large order on the way now. I am pretty sure these dried fruits (while super delicious) aren't dehydrated at temperatures that are considered raw. My goal now that I have a dehydrator of my own is to begin dehydrating my own fruits more and more; and actually the banana chips were dehydrated by me, but I'd better stop there because that's a WHOLE other post! :)

So, what do you like in YOUR trail mix??

Persimmon and Coconut Cream Parfait

I saw a recipe for a raw persimmon and whipped cream parfait the other day, and search though I might, I cannot find the link for it. If anyone knows where it is, please let me know and I'd be happy to give credit where credit is due.

The beautiful photos of the parfaits reminded me that I had several freezer bags full of pureed raw persimmons from my uncle. I first had persimmon last year when my son was still eating baby food. My uncle had given them to us and so I read about them online and decided to puree them for him. Well, DS loved them, but I found out that so did I! So this past fall, I mentioned to my uncle that we'd love to have more of his persimmons. Finding this recipe for a RAW parfait got my persimmon tastebuds churning!

I defrosted my frozen persimmons by placing them in a bowl of water. It didn't take long before I was able to dump them out of the freezer bags. I put them into the Blendtec for a quick spin to ensure no icy chunks were left. We wanted SMOOTH puree.

Then I searched swagbucks for a raw whipped cream recipe and found one that I modified to fit my needs and on hand ingredients.

Coconut Whipped Cream
*1 cup nuts (the recipe called for cashews; I only had walnuts, so that's what I used, though I'm sure cashews soaked for at least an hour would have made it much creamier)
*1 cup light coconut milk (canned from Trader Joe's)
*1/8-1/4 cup of honey
*1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
*splash of vanilla
*pinch of himalayan pink salt
*coconut oil (a good bit)

My cream turned out flat and runny, but tasted divine! For a thicker cream, you could try adding some thickeners: chia seeds, flax seed meal, etc. Or, it might also help to refrigerate or freeze the cream before serving.

To serve, simply put the pureed persimmon and the coconut cream in alternating layers in a pretty glass or serving bowl. You could also create a topping of ground goji berries or nuts to sprinkle on if you wanted, but we just ate ours plain. Yum, yum!

Raw Alfredo Sauce!

Last night, I had no beans pre-soaked for dinner (read: still getting used to the pre-planning needed for cooking from scratch on a continual basis) so we decided to have a pasta dish. Harris Teeter had recently had a buy 2 get 3 free on their whole wheat pasta, so I had bought quite a bit. I pulled out some whole wheat linguine noodles and asked DH what kind of sauce he wanted. I was sure he would say Ragu. A few years ago we fell in love with Mama's Secret Garden Sauce and never looked back. I think we have one lone jar left in the cabinet since we decided to eliminate as many processed foods from our diet as possible. I was fully prepared to pull it out and heat it up. But DH said, "Aren't you going to make a sauce?" That was all the motivation I needed!

My mind immediately went to alfredo sauce. Mmm...cheesy, yummy alfredo sauce. But, since we are trying to incorporate a more veggie, vegan, and raw lifestyle we've seriously reduced/eliminated dairy. So, my best friend Swagbucks and I searched for a raw alfredo sauce, and we found a yummy one!

The recipe called for soaked cashews and since I hadn't planned ahead, mine weren't soaked. The recipe turned out fine, just a little gritty, but it really didn't affect the taste at all. We ended up with leftover noodles though, so today I tried again with soaked cashews and the sauce turned out SO CREAMY!! Seriously, I don't think you'd be able to tell real alfredo sauce apart from this one!

First you make cashew cream. Here's the link for the recipe I followed. For my second attempt at this recipe (the one that turned out the best), I used a little more than a half cup of cashews rinsed, then soaked for an hour, then rinsed again. I put those into my Blendtec along with about a cup or so of water, a squirt of agave, and a little bit of pink Himalayan salt. I blended that twice until creamy.

Then I left the cashew cream in the blender and roughly followed this recipe. I added the juice of half an organic lemon, about a tablespoon of South River Miso (today, chickpea; last night, three year barley), a clove of fresh garlic, a chunk of raw onion, about a tablespoon of olive oil, and two heaping pinches of nutritional yeast flakes. The recipe called for 2 tablespoons of nutri yeast but I easily put double that. We like it CHEESY!

Then I just blended until smooth. It was ultra thick and creamy! Last night we ate it with linguine and lightly steamed broccoli. Today we had it with linguine and lightly steamed asparagus. Both meals were delicious!

All the yumminess of alfredo sauce without the guilt! And while very filling, this alfredo sauce doesn't leave you with that super heavy feeling after eating either! Eat up!