High Raw?

I have heard the term "high-raw vegan" bandied about.  I assumed these folks were raw foods vegans who were stoned high hippies or just on a natural high from all their raw vegan foods.  I have recently been told that the term high-raw vegan refers to folks who are vegans eating mostly raw food.  The term "mostly" is somewhat subjective.  A number of supposedly 100 percent raw vegans eat honey.  Honey, as I understand it, is not a vegan food.  It is made by the labor of bees.  Yet, honey can be raw.  Also, a food can be raw and not vegan or even vegetarian (think sashimi sushi).

It is a challenge to be 100 raw vegan.  There is too much thinking you have to do.  Is the product I purchased really raw as the label states?  Is it 100 percent raw, or is the word "raw" just a marketing tool to move high priced goods off the shelf and increase profit margins?  Has my raw food been kept at low enough temperatures during transport to still qualify as raw?  Does a supermarket scanner render it un-raw?  (I don't think so, as the seeds still sprout after being scanned.)

sprouted seeds grown in a jar

To simplify matters you could eat food you grow or harvest yourself.  Then, you know it is raw.  Barring that, you could eat only raw fruits and vegetables, and seeds and nuts that sprout.  If they are heated excessively, or  irradiated, they will not sprout.  Thus, if they sprout, they are alive and raw seeds.

You better get expert advice if you plan on being a long-term 100 percent raw vegan.  There may be hazards to your health.  One of the main hazards, assuming your sprouts are fresh and clean, is that the vegan (and sometimes vegetarian) diet may be woefully low in vitamin B12.  This can have serious health consequences.  I will give you a video link that explains it in more detail.  Personally, I take a good quality sublingual B12.
http://www.rawradianthealth.com/blog/?s=b12+
There is a lot of good information on this site, how to sprout, make almond nut milk (I just soak the almonds for 12 hours or more, drain the soak water and add 3 cups of fresh water, add 3 dates, blend all in a good standard blender, and strain through a fine strainer over a bowl; it tastes great in coffee, which I haven't had for 7 days!), other good, easy recipes, and interesting health related information.  Get the free e-Book of juice and smoothie recipes http://www.rawradianthealth.com/and stroll around the site for excellent free videos, easy raw recipes (save energy, use the stove less!) and info on the very well thought out, planned, and doable 7 Day Raw Food Challenge.


I have come to realize I AM (to coin a phrase) a high-raw omnivore.  The simple raw foods, fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, and raw oil have been good for me.  This week I AM a 100 percent raw vegan.  However, I cannot say that I will never spend time with Ben and Jerry again in my life.  They just aren't looking as attractive as they used to. 


Stay cool.  Have a nice salad, add few pieces of  apple, peach, nectarine, or orange and some walnuts. Add a few ice cubes to your smoothie.  It's easy.


I AM high-raw
Southwest Desert Blogger
C. (c)2011

Got Raw Food?

This week, starting Monday July 18, I am participating in a one week Raw Food Challenge.  I will be eating only raw food for one week.  The offerings are all vegetarian and vegan.  Generally, vegetarians do not eat meat, except for those like my sister in law who is a vegetarian who eats chicken and fish.  I did not want to argue with an in-law, so I let it be.  I am not sure her head is flexible enough to wrap around the concept that chicken and fish are meat.  Vegans, as I understand it,  do not eat animal by products such as eggs (from chickens), milk or milk products such as cheese and ice cream (from cows), honey (from bees), etc.  There are some vegans who eat honey.  Some eat maple syrup.  Usually these folks are very health conscious and do not eat sugar, or at least attempt not to eat it often.  It is hard to be a purist in an impure, fast food world.

Finally, there is the raw foods movement.  These folks eat only raw, uncooked food, or food that is cooked to 104 degrees (Fahrenheit) or less.  There are raw vegetarians (they can eat (or drink) raw milk and cheese, raw eggs, raw honey, perhaps raw grains, raw oils, raw chocolate, and other treats, in addition to raw fruits, vegetables, nuts, and seeds; raw vegans who consume only raw non-animal source foods such as raw fruits, vegetables, nuts, and seeds, perhaps raw grains, etc., and raw foodists who eat raw meat and fish, in addition to the fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds etc.  Got all that?  OK.  Lets move on.

This week I will be a raw vegan.  It is over 100 degrees every day.  Why would I want to cook?  I will save energy and keep the house cooler because the stove is not on at all.  There will not be any pots and pans to clean.  I am ready to have the salads, smoothies, cold soups (think gazpacho), raw vegetables and raw dips, nuts, seeds, fruit, and more fruit.  That's all folks.

In preparation for the week of culinary rawness, I had my goodbye ice cream and all the little samples of the soon forbidden foods (as there are no forbidden fruits).  This mini buffet was at the big discount warehouse store that I lovingly call "Costlo" because the quantities are big and the costs are...
sort of low.  On an average day strolling through Costlo you may sample breads (sometimes with olive oil drizzled over it), cake, pie, mini cream puff, crackers and cheese, ham and cheese, tuna salad sandwich (about 1 inch square piece per person), one ravioli, a 1/3 inch slice of tortilla wrap, small slice of beef, 1/4 hamburger, 1/4 veggie burger, a tempura shrimp, fish, tiny cup of chili, smoothie, spaghetti with red sauce, chocolate covered blueberries or pomegranate seeds, popcorn (caramel, kettle style, etc.) a piece of granola bar, chips, dried fruit, nuts, candy apple pieces, etc.  Today they also had bacon and chocolate covered toffee.  No, the toffee was not covered with bacon, they were two separate samples: one was bacon, the other toffee.  To be clear, all of the above offerings were not available today, but there was enough to have a cooked food farewell while stocking up on raw food.

What did I get?  I got 2 pounds of organic greens, 2 pounds of organic baby spinach, 5 pounds of organic carrots, 6 pounds of nectarines, I don't know exactly how many pounds of plums and  organic apples, 6 very large tomatoes, lemons, limes, oranges, 10 bananas, 6 cucumbers, almonds, sesame seeds, sunflower seeds, a melon, and a few pounds of organic blueberries.  Although the nuts and seeds are supposed to be raw, I am skeptical.  I was surprised that the almonds appear to sprout little tiny sprouts at their pointy end after being soaked over 12 hours.

I still need to get more vegetables such as celery, red onion, broccoli, and grow some sprouts.  I have the sprouting seeds soaking.  I am the one who got soaked at the health food store when I bought the organic sprouting seed mix at $11.99 (USD) for an 8 ounce bag.  I have a feeling it would have been cheaper to buy sprouts that had already been grown in the sprout factory.

The fruits and vegetables that are not noted as "organic" are conventionally grown, i.e., with who knows what added to the soil and applied to it at various stages of growth and transport.  I had a talk with the local organic food co-op produce man who said he had some delicious cantaloupes.  He said they were the best he had ever tasted.  He selected one for me and it turned out to be tasteless -- at three times the price of a conventional cantaloupe.  I think young folks may never have had good fruit.  Perhaps they do not know that fruit should taste sweet and fruity.  A good strawberry should have a natural strawberry flavor, a blueberry should be blueberry flavored, melon should be sweet and melon flavored, not just colorful water balls.  I don't care how supposedly organic it is; if it does not taste like fruit, there is something wrong with it.  Take it back! 

The co-op said to bring the cantaloupe back and they would refund my money, but it would cost more in gas to drive there than the cantaloupe costs. This season I still have not had a blueberry that tasted like a blueberry.  They are just blue water balls masquerading as blueberries.  The produce man at the supermarket told me all the mangoes are picked green.  We are told the bananas are picked green.  Peaches and avocados are hard as rocks.  Will they ripen before they rot in your kitchen?  Sometimes.  Will they taste good?  Flip a coin.

Back to all that raw food I bought:  It is only a 4 day supply!  Think about it.  There is no bread, potatoes, pasta, steak, burgers, dairy product, or pastry to fill up on.  No cookies and milk.  No french fries (is this a good diet for patriots?).  No breakfast cereal, eggs, toast, English muffins (sorry Brits), Canadian bacon, ham, waffles, pancakes, or any other(breakfast - let them eat) cake.  Not even any lowly oatmeal.  No dried fruit unless, I suppose, it has been dried at 104 degrees or less and thus qualifies as raw.  No crackers. No brown rice, white rice, rice cakes, rice crackers, matzos, wine, beer, or any other booze. No pizza unless you create a raw art project that looks like a pizza pie.  No traditional carb fillers.  And no coffee!  Ouch.  And kiss Ben and Jerry goodbye.  Adios.  Hasta luego amigos.  Vaya con dios.

Actually, there should be no caffeinated beverages of any sort in this raw diet.  Some allow raw cacao (chocolate) which does have some caffeine.  Coffee beans are roasted, tea leaves may be heated, and the water used to make coffee or tea is often over 104 degrees.  I have been decaffeinating myself for the past 4 days by substituting green tea for coffee.  It has been working.  I enjoy the cold green tea with lemon, in the morning, in large quantities.  At first I had nearly a quart in the morning plus some later in the day.  Today I had only 16 ounces of weaker tea.  Quitting coffee is big for me.  It is something I have wanted to do for a while.  I have discovered that I just want to drink something in the morning.  Tomorrow I will see whether water with some lemon juice will suffice.

Now, back to washing all the non-organic produce in the special produce wash that is supposed to remove sprays, wax, and soils.  I could rant about how I hate waxed produce, but this blog is long enough.  In short, if you hate it, don't buy it.  If it is wilted, don't buy it.  If it is tasteless or never ripens, return it.

Giving thanks for all the food we have in the Southwest Desert,
(nearly raw) Southwest Desert Blogger
C.
P.S.  If I leave the food out in the sun, in the heat of the day, it will cook to over 104 degrees.  Some say, "When it is hot here, you can fry an egg on the sidewalk" -- that is, if you are not a vegan.
P.P.S.  Here is the link to the site sponsoring the 7 Day Raw Food Challenge (I completed it! It was, as cliche as this sounds, life changing.).  Feel FREE to check out the FREE juice and smoothie recipe e-Book, and all the other goodies, info, FREE blog videos, etc. at this site  http://www.1shoppingcart.com/app/?af=1383344 .  Enjoy! 
Got plenty of raw food,
Southwest Desert Blogger
C. (c)2011

How Weather, Cooling, and Drink

It has been over 90 degrees (Fahrenheit obviously) for 2 days in a row.  The hard core desert dwellers try to see how long they can hold out before they turn on the air conditioning or cooler.  The hardest of the hard core never use AC or coolers.  There are the in between hardies who use an electric fan, perhaps with a wet cloth thrown over it to cool the air.  It has been stated that there would be fewer people living in the southwest desert if we didn't have air conditioning.  I say, turn off the AC and let's see who's the last one standing.

I have a passion for ice cold water during the hot weather.  Sometimes I add lemon and a straw.  Sometimes I add limes and honey making a limeade.  If I had one of the fancy cooking blogs, I would take photos of lemons, limes, and honey.  I would show a photo of cutting a lemon in half.  I might link you to a YouTube video of juicing lemons and limes with my $15 plastic electric citrus juicer and then pouring the juice into a quart of water in a ball canning jar.  I would remind you to add the ice cubes before the water and juice to avoid splashing your granite counter with the acidic juices.  I don't have granite counters.  Perhaps we could pan to a cactus outside.  I could educate you about the alleged health promoting properties of honey, maple syrup, and xylitol.  I could show you how elegant it looks to add a straw and a sprig of mint, and/or very thin slices of lemon.  And finally, my secret ingredient... a whole, dried or fresh, cayenne chili pepper.  I grew peppers 3 years in a row.  Last year's plant produced a very thick skinned chili which I did not like for cooking or eating, but it is good for visual presentation in lemon or lime water.  I leave a half inch of green stem on the bright red cayenne pepper and the visual is spectacular in a tall thin glass or quart jar.

I am fortunate to have purchased some beautiful, mild, domestic (i.e., USA) lemons at my local grocery.  These lemons have such a refined, graceful taste that they require no sweetener.  My water of choice is distilled because a mighty tasty mystery blend comes out of our tap.  A generous  white sludge remains in the distiller after distilling each gallon of tap water.  A trick my Texas relatives taught me is, if you are in a restaurant always order water with lemon and a straw.  If the water tastes "bad" the lemon will usually disguise the off taste.  The straw ... maybe you can drink from a glass that has someone else's lipstick on the rim?

If the lemons are bitter and I do not want a sweetener, I forgo lemons and drink simple iced or refrigerator cold water.  I like it.  It is cooling.  I also like traditional iced tea with lemon and a straw.  Once in a while I drink carbonated water, perhaps over ice, with lemon or lime; sometimes I add a cayenne pepper just to remind myself that I am in the hot desert.

Stay cool and well.