Thursday, March 17th, 2011

3 Of My Best Friends For My Raw Vegan Kitchen – Utensils

by Kristen in bamboo hands, offset spatula, spatula narrow, tossed salad

There are three kitchen utensils that I absolutely love using. Each time I use one of them, it’s like, “oh yeah, so glad I have you.”

Please allow me to introduce to you, three of my best friends in the kitchen…

1) Long, narrow spatula
This is a beauty when it comes to cleaning out my high speed blender. It makes scraping out the blender that much easier and faster. I know, it seems like it wouldn’t make that much of a difference, but it does! Now, if I go to use it and it’s not there (it’s dirty) and I have to use an ordinary spatula, I make a sour puss face. A former student of mine bought this for me a few years ago. I can’t find one on Amazon. It looks like it is from Crate & Barrel.

2) Bamboo hands
If you truly want an amazing tossed salad, you’ll actually make a tossed salad… by tossing it! For that, I love my second hands. The best salads are truly tossed and as a result, your yummy dressing (ehem… 4-Ingredient Magic Dressing anyone?!) gets over every thing. And, in my opinion, you end up using less dressing this way, because you’ve helped the dressing go a long way by tossing it. I bought my awesome bamboo hands in California, but they are available on Amazon.

3) Offset Spatulas
When you want to smooth the top of your raw cheesecake perfectly or you want gorgeous flax crackers that look like a professional made them or you want to easily spread your almond pulp biscuits… Then you want to use an offset spatula. They’re awesome! I have many different sizes and highly recommend getting a few. On Amazon you can get various sizes here.

And… of course, my REAL best buddy in the kitchen is baby girl, Kamea. :) I can’t wait until she’s helping me ~~wash dishes~~ make smoothies.

What are your best friends in the kitchen?

How to Make Green Juice Pulp Crackers, Raw Vegan: (Video)

by Kristen in Breville, fruit scooper, green juice, Kristen Suzanne, Kristen's Raw, offset spatula, organic, raw, recipe, vegan, video

I’m not one to waste organic food… ever. So, when I’m done juicing, I make crackers with the leftover pulp, or I stir some into my dog’s food, or I give it to the bunny’s in my neighborhood.

Here’s a little quick video showing you the batch I made the other day.

I used my Breville to make the green juice (like only $99 bucks for this machine – so worth it). I spread the pulp mixture with an offset spatula (one of my other favorite tools in the kitchen, other than the fruit scoopers). And, I used my Excalibur Dehydrator to dry the Raw crackers (they’re the BEST on the market – hands down).

You can use any spices you have on hand. Be creative and try different combinations. And, use the juice pulp from any green juice you make.

The recipe I used below is:

For the Juice

2 cucumbers, 1 bunch Italian parsley, 5 leaves medium kale

This gives about 2 cups of pulp when using the Breville juicer.

For the pulp

1/2 cup flax* seed, 1 tablespoon tamari, 1 teaspoon turmeric, 1/2 teaspoon coriander, 1 tablespoon mesquite powder, and 3/4 cup water (as needed) *The lovely flax I used was from a sample sent to me by Flax Matters.