Sunday, October 24th, 2010

Food Journal – Sunday

by Kristen in cheezy hemp nacho sauce, food intake, food journal, holiday chia pudding

With all of my fresh organic produce, we’re having an amazing weekend full of delicious and healthy food!

Here is Sunday’s Food Plan

Green Juice (cucumber, celery, carrot)

Salad (romaine, olives, heirloom tomatoes, Herbamere, pepper, meyer lemon juice) and Sandwich (sprouted toast, hummus, heirloom tomato, lettuce)
Coconut yogurt (not raw)

Super Big Apple
Sun Warrior Protein Shake

Salad and Sandwich (same as earlier, but this salad also had orange bell pepper)

Veggies and Cheezy Hemp Nacho Sauce!!!! (Learn how to make this awesome recipe here)

And… I’ll whip up a batch of Holiday Chia Pudding! (see recipe here)

And… here is Kamea hugging her organic dolly that Lauren and Ginger bought her!

Kristen’s Raw 18th Awesome Giveaway – FREE CHIA SEEDS!

by Kristen in awesome giveaway, chia seeds, holiday chia pudding

It’s time for another awesome giveaway! The prize this time? CHIA SEEDS! WHOOHOO! I will be drawing the name of 1 winner, who will receive a 2-pound bag of chia seeds (courtesy of Chia Seeds Direct).

Chia seeds rock the house. Most of you already know I’m a big fan of these cute lil guys. Read my post about chia here, the “Dieter’s Dream Food.” Chia seeds are being praised for many things including their fantastic nutrient profile, which proudly boasts iron, boron, essential fatty acids, fiber, and more. Add to that the claims that they may improve heart health, reduce blood pressure, stabilize blood sugar, help people lose weight from giving them extra stamina, energy, and curbing hunger, and you might become a fan of these little guys, too. They’re superstars in my house and we consume them on a regular basis.

There are many wonderful ways to enjoy them, for example:

Plain, by the spoonful (be sure to carry dental floss… I’m speaking from experience – lol)
Roll a peeled banana in them
Add them to smoothies and Raw vegan nut/seed milks
Make chia crackers (like here) or chia bread (like here, this recipe doesn’t call for chia seeds specifically, but you can substitute the “twister” blend for ground chia)
Make raw jelly
And… drumroll please…. chia pudding (like Holiday Chia Pudding! Have you made this yet?) It’s the best!

Want the chance to win? It’s simple to participate! All you have to do is answer the following question in this post’s comment section. The contest will end Thursday night, February 4th @ 11:59pm. I’ll enter everyone’s name who answered the question into a drawing and announce the winner on my blog Friday, February 5th. *Please note: this month’s contest is only open to people living in the United States and Canada.

Question: If you win these chia seeds, what is the first thing you want to make with them?

Want another chance to win? Tweet a link to this blog post and come back to let me know in a separate comment. And… Want another chance to win? Facebook a link to this blog post and come back to let me know in a separate comment.

7 Free Awesome Raw Vegan Recipes – Must Make!

by Kristen in Blood Red Hemp Sunset, cheezy hemp nacho sauce, easy raw vegan food, harvest soup, holiday chia pudding, King Garlic Hemp Dressing, pecan spice delight cookies, pesto

Here are a handful of my favorite blog recipes. Enjoy! (And, yes, I’m still in NY)

Tuscan Sun-Dried Tomato Pesto (click here, scroll down to Aug 23 post)

This stuff is A-M-A-Z-I-N-G. I love showing it off at parties. People are always asking for the recipe.

Kristen Suzanne’s Harvest Soup

I get email after email from people telling me how much they love this simple soup. My husband’s and my favorite way is to prepare it with the pumpkin pie spice. Yum!

Holiday Chia Pudding

I always make a double batch of this heavenly scrumptious pudding and it’s devoured in a couple of days. I love it. My husband loves it. My step-dad loves it. My mom loves it. Need I say more?

Pecan Spice Delight Cookies

Ummm…. I don’t really have anything to say but… MAKE THESE!

Cheezy Hemp Nacho Sauce

My regular followers know I’m addicted to this sauce. I love dipping carrots and celery into it. I love dipping organic blue corn chips into it. I love dipping flax crackers into it. I love using it as a sauce on cooked or raw veggie burgers. I simply LOVE it! *Note: my favorite chili powder for this recipe is by Simply Organic.

King Garlic Hemp Dressing

This recipe is EASY PEASY! It’s extra delicious and is packed with uber healthy ingredients. Worried about garlic breath? No problem. Just make sure you serve some of this to people you’re going to be around. ;)

Summer Strawberry Cobbler

Refreshing, delicious, healthy, and awesome. And… it’s summer!

Monday’s High Raw Food Intake – Plus An Awesome Recipe

by Kristen in fruits of the earth, high raw, holiday chia pudding, New Chapter Organics, sauerkraut, savory garden veggie pasta, sun warrior rice protein, vitamineral green, wheatgrass

I get tons of requests to post my daily food intake. Here you go! :) Today was a very High Raw day for my husband and me, and it was awesome! Everything is organic – always.

~ Water with fresh squeezed lemon

I love starting my day with a big glass of fresh, purified water. I usually wake up feeling thirsty and this is the first thing I want. To make it extra nutritious, I added the juice of half of a lemon. Nice and alkalizing.

~ Strawberries

My breakfast was 2 cups of delicious strawberries that were locally grown (from the CSA). I added a teeny-tiny-itsy-bitsy drizzle of raw agave nectar on it to get them extra juicy. They were so good! Strawberries rock. They have fiber and they’re loaded with nutrients (phytonutrients, vitamin C, magnesium, potassium, phosphorus, and more).

~ Power Ick!

This is pretty disgusting and I can’t help but make some crazy faces when I’m drinking it. Ick! I plug-n-chug it and then chase it with water. It consists of 1 1/2 cups water, 1 heaping tablespoon wheat grass powder, 1 tablespoon Berry Greens, 1 tablespoon Fruits of the Earth, 1 tablespoon Vitamineral Green. When I finished drinking it, I looked over my shoulder, thinking for sure I had a cape on. Damn… no cape. I thought I might have taken on some super powers after drinking this.

*My husband had 2 big scoops of raw brown rice protein powder added to his.

~ Krautwich and Bell Peppers

I’m loving raw, unpasteurized sauerkraut lately. It’s so dang good for you!!! (Check out my post about sauerkraut here.) I made a little Krautwich for part of my lunch. It consisted of 2 slices of kamut bread (not raw) with sauerkraut in the middle. That’s it. Delish! The rest of my plate was filled with the slices of one red bell pepper and one yellow bell pepper. BTW, I never eat green bell peppers because they’re not ripe, which can cause digestive trouble.

~ Hypnotic Orange Juice

This was heaven in a cup. I went to my friend’s house and picked oranges from her tree today. I took them home and squeezed them . They were still warm from the sun and it was so amazing. My goodness… when someone gives you a hard time about loving the raw lifestyle, give them a glass of this heaven and they’ll understand why you’ve chosen this path. It’s hypnotic.

~ Savory Garden Veggie Pasta (recipe at end of post)

This dinner was so good! With every bite I felt like the cells in my body were getting stronger and stronger. By the end of the meal they were dancing for joy and struttin’ their stuff. Even though I’m giving you the recipe below, it was basically a bowl of zucchini noodles topped with veggies (broccoli, carrots, yellow and red bell peppers) that were marinated in a wonderful, savory sauce that my husband loved so much he was licking the bowl. We both are not crazy about the taste of raw broccoli, but when we have it like this – we LOVE it! We each had a bowl of this. (Leftovers will be my lunch tomorrow.)

~ Dessert Time

I was craving something sweet to follow my meal. I quickly downed a nice plump medjool date (I get them here – 11 pound box, baby!). Then, I was inspired to make my recipe for Holiday Chia Pudding (it’s so easy, recipe here). After I soaked the cashews and made it, my husband and I each had about 1/2 cup. Yummers in our tummers!!!

~ Late evening snack

We found ourselves a little hungry later on and we didn’t want anything sweet. We opted for another Krautwich. Mmmmmmm…

~ Pure Rush Chocolate

I decided to have a bite of chocolate (I always keep this stuff on hand in my freezer for just such occasions – grin). I ate a piece of Pure Rush Chocolate; it was about the size of a quarter. The recipe is in my latest book, Kristen Suzanne’s Ultimate Raw Vegan Chocolate Recipes. If you’d like a chance to win a copy of this book or ebook, visit here.

Savory Garden Veggie Pasta

By Kristen Suzanne of KristensRaw.com

Yield 3-4 servings

Marinade

1/2 cup olive or hemp oil

2 tablespoons tamari (wheat free)

2 cloves garlic, pressed

Juice of one lemon

1 teaspoon onion powder

1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

1/4 teaspoon mustard powder

2 pinches black pepper

Veggie Mix

2 cups carrots, diced

1 head broccoli florets, chopped into bite size pieces

1 cup red bell pepper, chopped

1 cup yellow bell pepper, chopped

Pasta

1 large zucchini (or 2-3 medium), spiralized

Directions:

Whisk the marinade ingredients together and set aside. Place the veggie mix in a large bowl and pour the marinade on top. Stir to mix and coat the veggies with the marinade. Set aside for 30-60 minutes, stirring every 10 minutes or so. (Alternately, you can make this a day ahead of time and put the marinated veggies in the refrigerator overnight.)

Put your spiralized noodles in serving bowls and top with the marinated veggies. Voila! Yummy, easy, extraordinarily nutritious, and delicious!

*For extra mojo, sprinkle on some hemp seeds and raisins!

Sunday’s HRAV food

by Kristen in brown rice protein, csa, Hemp, high raw, holiday chia pudding, hrav, miso

Today was a HRAV (High Raw, All Vegan) day and here is what I had… (all organic)

2 bananas
I love how easy bananas are for a light and quick morning breakfast. I know it’s not going to “stick” with me all morning, but it gets me going and is light on my digestion.

2 mugs ginger tea
I met mom at Starbucks to play cards and brought my own organic ginger tea (and my own mug from home, it’s a Starbucks mug).

1/2 cup Holiday Chia Pudding
This stuff is so dang good!!! I LOVE the texture with the coconut in it. And the flavor – dynamite!

Veggie Bowl with Buckwheat Noodles
This is my High Raw dish. It consisted of buckwheat noodles that I lightly sauteed with a tablespoon of sesame oil for only a few minutes to warm them up. Then, I put them in a bowl and added a bunch of fresh raw produce – red bell pepper, yellow bell pepper, carrot, handful of chopped cabbage (all the produce was from Doug, my favorite local organic farmer… I’m so excited because his CSA starts next week!!!)

1/4 cup sauerkraut (raw, unpasteurized)

3 cups Fresh Plant Blood
Pineapple, strawberries, and 1 tablespoon wheat grass powder

Miso soup
This is not Raw, but it is “living” and it’s wonderful for my digestion. I love miso soup. The only brand I’ll use is South River Miso. It’s top of the line!

1/2 avocado with a pinch of Himalayan crystal salt
I love avocado and they contain lots of fiber as well as B-vitamins

Protein Shake
This was made with my favorite protein powders (Hemp & Rice). I blended it with water, strawberries, banana, and raspberries

3 prunes

More Holiday Chia Pudding

If I get hungry later, I’ll probably have a Vega bar or some more veggies.

Raw Food Intake

by Kristen in holiday chia pudding, kale, Plant Blood, sauerkraut

Hi everyone!!! I hope you’re having a terrific day! Here is my food for the day. As usual, everything is organic. If I get hungry beyond what I’ve written, then, I’ll probably add an apple and/or protein shake.

2 bananas
~ One of the easiest breakfasts… ever!

Miso Soup with Chickpea miso by South River Miso
~ I love this stuff. It makes a delicious and warming breakfast.

1 quart Plant Blood
~ Refreshing and green… cucumber, zucchini, celery, lemon, ginger (It’s so bright and gorgeous! I feel full of life with every sip!)

Prunes
~ Found the most amazing fresh, huge, soft, chewy prunes at Whole Foods (they’re not usually this great when I buy them from there, but this batch… OHH LA LA!)

Raw, unpasteurized Sauerkraut
~ I’m on a sauerkraut kick lately. It’s so nourishing on the body and I love the zest of it. I’ve been doing some extra reading on the food and I’m committed to trying to get a little of this in my diet on a daily basis if possible. I ordered on of those fancy german crocks and will be making it myself soon. Right now I’m eating the kraut from Rejuvenative (and it’s good), but I prefer the kraut from Gold Mine.

1 large avocado, diced
~ Yum… full of vitamins and healthy fats. Love avocado!

Giant kale salad with flax crackers
~ with red bell pepper, carrots, raisins, and hemp seeds

Holiday Chia Pudding
~ I’m hooked on this stuff

On another note, I can’t wait for American Idol tonight!!! And, on yet another note… I’m having another awesome giveaway this week, so be sure and check back!!!

The Raw Food Diet – Is There A Right Way?!

by Kristen in avocado, chia, fruitarian, hemp seeds, holiday chia pudding, kale, Kristen Suzanne, raw vegan diet, sproutarian

I recently saw someone writing into one of the Facebook groups questioning what is the right way with the Raw vegan diet. She was confused because she said there was conflicting information out there and just didn’t know what to believe or which way to go.

My response to this is:
YAY! Rejoice! Hallelujah! This is the beauty of the Raw vegan diet. There are so many options and one size does not have to fit all. It can change by the person. In my humble opinion, this is exciting because it means variety. I love the idea that during one season I can follow some low fat Raw vegan principles and in another season I can nourish my glorious body with avocados, nuts, seeds, and divine Raw vegan desserts. In my life, I have spent time as 100% Raw vegan, and other times (like now) where I’m HRAV (High Raw, All Vegan). I’ve had expanses of time where certain nuts didn’t sit well with me. And, I’ve had other times where I thrived with them in my diet. Sometimes my level of Raw changes as I travel and sometimes I vary it with the changing moon.

I love this flexibility! I love this versatility! I love the options. You can be a sproutarian! You can love the fruitarian way of life! You can hug a life with green smoothies and juices and all things liquid! You can dive into decadence and nourish your body with loads of essential fatty acids and healthy fats from whole nuts, avocado, coconut, etc. You can tango with a natural hygiene approach (much like fruitarian) and eschew things like oils, garlic, and fermented foods. And, of course, if you’re not currently following a Raw vegan diet, you can choose to follow one of the aforementioned plans for a week, here and there, just to add more nourishment to the lifestyle you live now.

Congratulate yourself for taking your health into your own hands and trying this wonderful diet and lifestyle, no matter which path you pursue on the journey with Raw food. Be confident you’re feeding your body wonderful nutrient dense Raw vegan foods whether it’s avocado, hemp seeds, pineapple, kale salad, Cheezy Hemp Nacho Sauce (chuckling here, those of you who regularly follow my blog know of my addiction to this last month), a plate of gourmet Raw food, or a serving of Holiday Chia Pudding (munch munch… eating this as I write this post). Be excited and happy to know that there are many choices for you. There is no need to stress about it or feel pressed to subscribe to one plan.

You can change it by the month, or the week, if your heart and body desires. It’s all up to you… and you alone. Try on one of the plans for size and see how it fits. Or, heck, don’t subscribe to any of them and just mix it up meal by meal. :)

The bottom line is that you LISTEN TO YOUR OWN BODY! Pay attention to the inner god or goddess inside of you. Follow your intuition. Be patient. Feel excited. Recognize that we are all different… different ages, from different toxic (or non toxic) backgrounds, live in different parts of the world, experience different environmental toxins, have different levels of stress, pursue different levels of physical exercise, etc. What we all have in common is that we can all use some organic, Raw vegan whole foods in our lives no matter where we are on the diet spectrum.