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