Rustic Pizzetta, Wild Blackberries, Vanilla Cardamom Cream Sauce and a Blueberry Pie!

Last week I was inspired by Carmella Soleil’s raw vegan Tuscan Pizza that she created for a catering job. CLICK HERE to see her post and photos on the RFC website. She also created another superb raw fermented cashew cheese recipe which I made for my pizzetta.  I knew this would be another great experiment for the weekend as my dear husband Scott loves raw vegan fermented cheese made from cashews. And I was so delighted that everything I made this weekend received a thumbs up from Scott! Now that’s something! ;-)

Joyce’s Notes: My pizzetta turned out excellent! (thank goodness!) Scott was loving these! Even the crusts  were well received which I will talk about soon. Scott preferred his pizzetta with more cheese, no pesto and topped with tomatoes. I loved my pesto so much and found it totally delicious on the pizzetta with a bit less cheese.

For the crust I decided to make something similar to a tart crust using very little ground flaxseed and no buckwheat which are both common in raw pizza crusts. Scott doesn’t like the flax or buckwheat tastes so I had to do something different! My result tasted really good, but this is a rather delicate crust. Scott & I both didn’t mind at all that the crust was fragile. We ate it with forks and also used our hands.

Here’s my crust recipe:

Delicate Italian Herb Crust

• 2 cups of cashew pieces, not soaked
• 1/2 cup of macadamia nuts, not soaked
• 1/4 cup plus one tablespoon of ground flaxseed (use coffee grinder)
• 2 medium crushed cloves of garlic
• 2 tablespoons of nutritional yeast
• 2 tablespoons of fresh lemon juice
• 1/2 cup of water
• 1 tablespoon plus one teaspoon of olive oil
• 1/2 teaspoon of sea salt
• 3/4 teaspoon of dried Italian seasonings
• 1 teaspoon of dried basil or more to taste

Blend all ingredients in the food processor using the S-Blade until well combined. Mine was a tad course for a more rustic effect.

I spooned out 4 small crusts on one teleflex sheet and then did the fifth one on another sheet a bit thinner just to experiment. I dehydrated these for a total of 9 hours, flipping over after about 4-5 hours.

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Here are my crusts before putting them into the dehydrator:

 

The Basil Garlic Cashew Cheese is an amazing recipe by Carmella! I’ve made raw cheese using rejuvelac but it’s extra work and I’m not sure that rejuvelac agrees with my tummy. Or possibly I’m just not used to it. So I made my cheese with probiotic capsules. Here’s my how I made my cheese:

1. Thursday morning I soaked 2 cups of cashew pieces
2. Later that night (around 10pm) I ground up the drained cashew pieces with enough water to turn over in the Vitamix. I also added 3 probiotic capsules to the Vitamix.
3. I had to use the plunger to get the mixture to turnover
4. When totally smooth, I spooned the mixture into a strainer lined with cheesecloth and also covered it with the cheesecloth.
5. I left this to ferment on my countertop for almost 24 hours which by then it was ready to use on Friday evening.

Check out my St Patty’s day post for more photos of my last fermented cheese project towards the end. CLICK HERE :-)

For probiotic capsules I went to the City Market Co-op and purchased this vegetarian brand (100 capsules for about $18):

Bluebonnet Milk-Free Acidophilus plus FOS

These worked like a charm! After almost 24 hours, my cashew cheese smelled like it was supposed to: a slight, subtle sour cream scent. Here’s a photo from from March when I made fermented cheese. It was taken before the 24 hour fermentation.

Once the cheese was done fermenting on Friday night, I used Carmella’s Basil Garlic recipe. Here it is with my very slight modifications. I also doubled the recipe as I had about 2 cups or so of cheese.

• 2 teaspoons of minced garlic (I used one big and one small clove)
• 2 teaspoons of minced chives or more taste (1/2 teaspoon)
• 2 teaspoons of nutritional yeast
• 1/2 teaspoon of lemon juice
• 1/2 teaspoon of sea salt
• 2 teaspoons of onion powder
• 2 1/2 packed tablespoons of chopped basil or more to taste

Combine all ingredients in a bowel with the fermented cashew cheese and mix gently. Then place in the fridge overnight or until ready to spread onto the pizzetta the next day.

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Because I used cashew pieces instead of the whole nuts, my cheese was very soft and easily spreadable on my pizzetta. This cheese rocks! It’s actually very simple to make. I am so pleased with the probiotics and plan to make more cheese this way! Raw fermented vegan cheese is sooooo amazing! I urge everyone to make this and show their friends and family just how awesome raw food is!

I make a very simple yet delicious raw vegan pesto recipe. Traditional pesto calls for parmesan cheese. My version tastes like the real deal surprisingly but without dairy! How cool is that! :-)

I bought a huge bag of fresh basil from the Richmond Farmer’s Market on Friday. So here’s my Pesto recipe. In the winter I cut this in half as basil is a very expensive produce item!

• 1 cup of cashew pieces, soaked for 15-25 minutes
• 6 cups of basil, medium packed
• your best cold pressed extra virgin olive oil
• sea salt

Using the food processor with the S-Blade, I grind up the basil and drained cashew pieces first until well broken down. Then I add olive oil and sea salt a little bit at a time until taste and consistency are right for me.

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Pizzetta with a Red Pepper Flatbread!

I’m trying to find successful raw bread or cracker recipes that don’t contain ground flax and buckwheat since Scott just doesn’t like the tastes. So I found a recipe on the goneraw website called Crazy Bread Crackers which doesn’t have the above ingredients! Here’s the recipe with my slight modifications and notes:

• 1/2 cup of cashew pieces, not soaked
• 1 medium sized red pepper (or try a yellow one)
• 1/4 cup of sundried tomatoes, soaked for an hour or so
• 1 tablespoon of nutritional yeast
• 2/3 of jalapeno pepper or more to taste
• 1/4 teaspoon paprika
• 1/4 teaspoon of onion powder
• 1/4 teaspoon of garlic powder
• 1/4 teaspoon of sea salt
• juice of half a lemon

Blend all ingredients in a Vitamix until smooth. Pour onto a telefex sheet. I made one medium sized square that was not too thick. I also scoured the square into 4 sections using the spatula. I made this on Friday night and dehydrated it over night. I flipped it over the next morning and dehydrated it for most of Saturday.

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Joyce’s Notes: This is soooo good! Wow, I was surprised at how it stayed together so well. It didn’t get crispy but was more like a flatbread. And this was not delicate like my crusts above!  It has a nice strong red pepper flavor and could be used to accompany raw Mexican dishes as well. This is a very versatile recipe! I would double it the next time and perhaps try a yellow pepper for a lighter color.

Now for some Sweets!

Wild Blackberries with a Vanilla Cardamom Cream Sauce!

Blackberry season is also upon us here in Vermont! Scott and I picked some wild blackberries along our mountain road. These are so sweet and luscious! I wish the season lasted longer!

I had one last young Thai coconut to use so I decided to make a cream sauce for the berries and also for a blueberry pie. I remember Heathy Pace had made some recipes using the spice, cardamom so I thought I’d give it a whirl. I was going to make one of her recipes using cardamom but didn’t feel like digging up the recipes. So I just threw some stuff together which worked great!

Here’s what I did:

First I blended about 1/3 cup of shredded coconut with about 3/4 cup of water in the Vitamix. To this mixture I added:

• 1/2 cup or so from one medium young Thai coconut
• 1/3 cup of dry cashew pieces
• 1/4 cup plus 1 1/2 tablespoons of agave syrup
• 2 tablespoons of coconut oil, soft but not melted
• 1/4 cup of coconut water
• 1/4 teaspoon of almond extract
• 3/4 teaspoon of vanilla extract
• 1/4 + 1/16 teaspoon of cardamom (start off with less first)

Blend until completely smooth and refrigerate.

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Joyce’s Notes: This was surprisingly wonderful! Next time I would definitely double the recipe as it went rather quickly! It was my first time using cardamom in a dessert and I can’t wait to use it again. It gave the cream a very exotic, almost Indian flavor.  This would also make a great ice cream I believe. Next time I might double the recipe and run it through the ice cream maker! Delish!

 

Blueberry Pie! Recipe is by Alissa Cohen and found in her book, Living on Live Food. You can also find the recipe posted on the Purely Delicious website. Just CLICK HERE! Anna from Purely Delicious Magazine has a lovely photo as well. This is a very simple and super easy pie which is perfect for blueberry season!

Joyce’s Notes: This is a winner! Both Scott and myself love this pie! I love simple recipes with few ingredients that actually turn out so delicious! Blueberries have a natural pectin that keep this pie filling firm without using coconut oil or Irish moss. It’s a brilliant recipe!

The filling is made of fresh blueberries, bananas and honey or agave syrup. That’s it! I used one cup of wild Maine blueberries that got mixed into the filling since they are nice and tiny. The crust is made up of almonds, dates and a pinch of sea salt. I also added a couple dashes of cinnamon which gave the crust a graham cracker flavor which I liked!

The only problem with the crust is that it is a bit gooey and stuck to the pie plate. Alissa instructs you to soak the dates. Next time I might not soak them. I might also use a different crust with different nuts. Eva from the Raw Freedom Community experimented with Alissa’s recipe and came up with a similar one. She uses pecans! Next time I might try her crust recipe! CLICK HERE to see Eva’s full recipe. Also I might freeze the crust first as the filling does seep into the crust a bit while in the fridge. But this is just a minor flaw.

Overall, this is a great summer-time pie! It’s delicious, easy and doesn’t take all morning to make! ;-)

Alissa Cohen & Grezzo Restaurant Classes!

This Friday morning I’m heading to Kittery, Maine to take classes with Alissa at her B&B! The first three days are in Kittery and called: The Living on Live Food Teacher Certification. On Monday we will all drive down to Boston for a 12 hour chef training class at Grezzo Restaurant! I cannot wait for Monday’s class as I’m most interested in learning how Grezzo creates it’s gorgeous 5 star raw vegan cuisine. I’ll be curious to see how they make their fermented nut cheeses! 

This is Fergus, our big Maine Coon Cat who naps while I blog. Life is good! :-)

So please check back in a couple weeks for a full update! I’ll have photos of the classes and amazing gourmet raw vegan food from Grezzo Restaurant!!  Enjoy the end of August and do come back again! 

 

White Chocolate Blueberry Cheesecake, Vegetable Fu Young, & Hot Summer Days!

White Chocolate Blueberry Cheesecake with a Rich Chocolate Sauce! Blueberries are in season here in Vermont! What better time to make a blueberry style raw vegan cheesecake and celebrate the abundance of these delicious berries!

I morphed and tweaked a couple recipes together to come up with this cake. The crust is a variation of one of Heathy Pace’s crusts. The filling is a variation of the White Chocolate Raspberry Cheesecake in Sweet Gratitude. However, next time I might do things a bit differently. I wasn’t sure about posting the ingredients I used since it’s not yet perfect, but I’ll list them anyways since this is a very good tasting dessert. When I someday have a masterpiece, I’ll post a new recipe. For now this cake is still a Work-In Progress.

I used an 8 inch springform pan

Crust

• 1 1/2 cups of macadamia nuts
• 1/2 cup of cashew pieces
• 1/4 cup of dried shredded coconut
• 2 tablespoons plus 1 teaspoon of agave syrup
• 1 teaspoon of coconut oil
• pinch of sea salt
• handful of blueberries, enough to layer on top of the crust

I used some leftover wild Maine blueberries I found at the co-op earlier in the week. They are nice and small and worked well with the cake.

Filling

• 1 1/2 cup of soaked cashews pieces (approx 1 1/4 cup of dried pieces)
• 1 cup of sweetened almond milk (with agave and vanilla extract)
• 1/3 cup plus 1-2 tablespoons of agave syrup
• 2 tablespoons of lemon juice (one for each color)
• 1/8 cup of vanilla extract
• 1/8 teaspoon of sea salt
• 1 1/2 tablespoons of soy lecithin
• 1/3 cup of cacao butter, melted
• 3 to 3.5 ounces of fresh blueberries

Joyce’s notes: This cake is indeed very good. I’m a white chocolate lover so I am really enjoying this sweet, rich cake. Scott likes it too. The cake does hold up OK in the fridge without melting. However, we are having a bit of a heat wave, so the cake gets rather soft when out of the fridge. We had temps in the high 80s F today on our mountain. That’s pretty warm for us Northerners! (I think some areas out of the mountains reached 92F today in Vermont!). 

While I do really like the taste of the cake, the white chocolate does overpower the berries a bit. Only 3 ounces or so of blueberries were used which is not a lot. Next time I might make more of the blueberry filling and less of the white chocolate filling. And I would add more blueberries in the blueberry filling.

 

The crust was good but not quite perfect. Although I do feel it’s better than a lot of raw crusts out there. It was a bit thick so next time I’d cut back on the recipe as we prefer thinner crusts.

The filling would have been a good quantity for a 7 inch springform pan. If I were to make this again using an 8 inch springform pan, I’d do the recipe one and a half times as I like a taller cheesecake. I might even add a small bit of coconut oil or coconut butter (the Artisana brand with whole coconut meat) in addition to the cacao butter to get it even firmer.

The rich chocolate sauce was a super success! We both loved this with the blueberry cheesecake. I had a young Thai coconut that needed to be used so I whipped this up in my sauce recipe. I love it when I just throw things together and they turn out well! This is a good recipe for using a squirt bottle and making pretty designs on your plates :-)

Rich Chocolate Sauce

• 1/2 to 2/3 cup of young Thai coconut meat from a small/medium coconut
• 1/4 cup plus 3 tablespoons of agave syrup
• 1/4 cup of sweetened almond milk
• 2 teaspoons of coconut oil
• 1/4 cup of shredded/chopped cacao butter, not melted

Blend all ingredients in the Vitamix until smooth.

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Saturday we went blueberry picking at Owl’s Head Blueberry Farm in Richmond, Vermont which is about 15 minutes from our house. It was a hot day but we still had fun! It’s a beautiful farm that’s having a great season! If you live nearby, definitely stop by and pick some berries. They have live local music on Tuesday and Thursday nights! We keep meaning to do that after work one evening since it’s been a while. The last time we went it was so lovely! People brought picnics, enjoyed the music and of course picked blueberries!

Vegetable Fu Young with Sweet Curried Bell Pepper Sauce. Recipe is by Chad Sarno and found in his book, Vital Creations.

Joyce’s Notes: Wow, this is another new favorite of ours! I just sent an email to Chad Sarno asking permission to post this amazing recipe set! If I am able to post it, I’ll certainly do so as a revision to this post! This is such a beautiful recipe that it should be shared with everyone embarking on a raw food journey. Recipes like this one that make me wonder why I would ever need to eat traditional cooked food!

I am not sure if I’ve ever had authentic Chinese Fu Young but the recipe ingredients looked so good. Simple and classy! The veggie patties consisted of pine nuts, soaked almonds, garlic, ginger, sea salt, lemon juice, olive oil, shredded carrot, bell peppers, zucchini, parsley, green onion (I used scallions), and Asian bean sprouts (I used mung bean sprouts). The nuts and ingredients up to the olive oil were blended in the food processor. Alone this would have made a very tasty pate or nut cheese! Then it was mixed with all the other ingredients. I made patties of 2 sizes since the directions didn’t specify. Both sizes were fine. Here’s a photo before going into the dehydrator for 8 hours.

One quick note: for those that don’t have a dehydrator, this would probably make an excellent pâté or filling in nori rolls! 

The Sweet Curried Bell Pepper Sauce was absolutely the best raw vegan curry sauce I’ve made so far!!! I was scraping the Vitamix clean and eating every last drop before washing the Vitamix. Yes, it was really that good! It consists of a red bell pepper (a small or most of a large one), olive oil, lemon juice, curry powder, garlic, lemon grass, sea salt, and black pepper. This is so simple and easy to make, and incredibly tasty! I get organic lemon grass at City Market Co-op in Burlington, VT.

For the lovely salad you see on the plate, I made a simple Miso Herb Dressing from Chad Sarno’s Vital Creations. This was also delicious and I would make this again and again! It consists of freshly squeezed orange juice, olive oil and white miso. I didn’t have quite enough orange juice. I squeezed out almost 1/2 cup and then topped off the 1/2 cup with lemon juice to reach the full quantity. I also added a squirt of the dark raw agave syrup to the Vitamix. This worked quite well and made a pretty yellow colored dressing (not shown in the photos). I found that adding drops of the curry sauce with the salad and Miso Herb Dressing was also very tasty! (Chad gives you options of using different herbs and spices for several variations)

 

This is a not-so-good photo of Chad Sarno’s must-have recipe book! Again, you can purchase it on his website by CLICKING HERE.  I was lucky enough to pick it up at a talk by Matt Monarch and Angela Stokes, this past Tuesday in Montpelier, Vermont (details below). This is a 70 page book that’s bound by spiral rings. It doesn’t have photos and may not look impressive. HOWERVER, the recipes are lovely, simple, elegant, classy and very creative. They also focus on many different ethnic dishes which I love. Chad has a great chart that shows which spices compliment different ethnic foods such as Thai, Mexican, Japanese, Indian etc, etc… I can’t wait to try more of his recipes. I have my eye on quite a few things that look delicious!

 

I thought I’d also share with everyone a recent book we’ve read and found to be excellent and very informative: The Thrive Diet by Brendan Brazier. Brendan is a raw vegan professional Ironman triathlete which is very exciting for us! I copied this review from Brendan’s website:

“Brendan’s knowledge is second to none. I read Thrive and was enthralled that after reading so many books and meeting with so many experts, Brendan was able to explain his thoughts on nutrition in such a clear and insightful way. My Thrive copy rests alone in the kitchen, tattered pages stained with beet juice and hemp oil. I only hope my competition doesn’t read this book until after I’m done competing.”

— SIMON WHITFIELD, Olympic gold medalist (triathlon, Sydney 2000)

Running in the Raw! This past Sunday, Scott and I did another long run: 11 miles for me and 10 miles for Scott. This is my longest run yet and my “new raw vegan knees” are doing so well!! This is so exciting!!

We decided to make Brendan Brazier’s Energy Pudding on page 125 which was a great pre-exercise food before our run. It ended up working out very well as we both had a great run, even in the hot and humid temperatures! I was almost shocked at how I was enjoying myself on this long run in the hot mid-morning sun. This pudding consists of bananas, dates, ground flaxseed, raw carob powder, coconut oil, lemon juice and sea salt. This all gets blended in the food processor. It even tasted good! Here’s a photo. It’s nothing fancy or pretty, but it sure gets the job done!

After our run we went home and made a Recovery Pudding also by Brendan Brazier on page 126. Since this pudding wasn’t much prettier, I decided to leave out the photos. However, it tasted good and had all the right ingredients for a speedy recovery! It consists of bananas, blueberries, soaked almonds, ground flaxseed, hemp protein, raw carob powder, ground up rooibos tea, lemon juice & sea salt.

We love running on Duxbury Road which goes along the Winooski River. It’s located at the bottom of our mountain so it’s been great for longer runs. It’s relatively flat with a few rollers and very scenic! We love this road! (We start in Jonesville) Here are a few photos we took on Sunday after our run which was along Duxbury Road:

We were tempted to jump right in after our run! But it’s best to have a recovery snack no more than 45 minutes after your long run. Next time we should pack a recovery drink/snack in the car and then take a dip!

As I mentioned above Matt Monarch and Angela Stokes came to Montpelier last Tuesday and gave talks about their raw journeys. Since my post is already long I’m going to send you to Linda Wooliever’s blog where she gives a lovely account of this super evening! CLICK HERE! for all the details and awesome photos!! I’ll just say that both Scott and I had a great time and really enjoyed hearing both of them speak. They are a super inspiring couple and have so much to share. Do go see them if you can! I highly recommend it!!

Well that’s all for now!

Stay cool and thanks for visiting my blog

Live Mexican Food, Raspberry Lemon Pie & Meeting Natasha Kyssa

Chile Rellenos, monta-raw jack “cheese”, cacao mole and red pepper sauce. Recipe is by Matthew Kenney and found in this beautiful new book, Entertaining in the Raw, page 188.

Scott and I were craving Mexican food this past week and this recipe looked absolutely divine! We lived in Encinitas, California from 1998 to 2000 which is in San Diego’s coastal North County. We always loved the authentic Mexican food that was so plentiful. Sometimes we still miss it! So this is the perfect answer for folks eating a raw vegan diet or just looking for healthy and delicious alternatives.

Joyce’s Notes: OH MY GOSH!!! THIS IS AMAZING!! Scott and I could not believe how good this was all together with both sauces! This is one of the best raw vegan entrees I’ve made in a long time. Even Scott was saying the meal was wonderful. Yes, he really did say that. The chile rellenos alone was so good with the cheese and filling but the sauces brought everything to a new level. It was an amazing combination of flavors. Matthew and his team should get an award for this brilliant dish as it truly raises the bar once again for gourmet raw vegan food.

This recipe has four parts: The filling, “cheese”, mole sauce and the red pepper sauce. It’s not a complicated recipe at all, but there are a lot of ingredients to buy and prep. I spent about $67 between City Market and Natural Provisions which seems like a lot. But we still have leftovers (recipe makes 3 meals for 2 people plus enough for salads). I am including a photo of the chile rellenos before we stuck them in the dehydrator for 3 hours. The recipe calls for a sheet pan and covering everything with plastic. We had these tin pans which worked well.

The rellenos filling was mostly chopped up fresh produce which was nice. It consisted of corn, zucchini, red bell pepper, tomato, red onion, jalapeno, fresh cilantro, lime juice, cumin, cayenne, chili powder and black pepper. This all was very good by itself!

The monta-raw jack cheese was so delicious! I loved this! It consisted of macadamia nuts, olive oil, shallot, garlic, lemon juice, sea salt, nutritional yeast, chili powder and cayenne. I cut back on the salt. The recipe calls for 1 tablespoon which seems like a lot. I used 2 teaspoons which was just fine. I kept eating it right out of the food processor! I love raw nut cheese with shallots!

The cacao mole sauce was the bomb! Oh my goodness this is sooooo incredible. It’s a nice thick rich chocolate sauce with a very spicy kick. The dried chipotle chilies give it that hot flavor! Scott and myself weren’t sure how this would taste with everything and even considered not making it. I’m so glad we did make this! There are a lot of ingredients but most of the stuff I already had on hand. The mole consists of 2 dried chipotles, red onion, garlic, sunflower seeds, almond butter, raisons, olive oil, water, agave syrup, cacao powder, cumin, coriander, sea salt, cayenne & black pepper. This sounds like a crazy mix of ingredients! Yet everything works out so well after the magic Vitamix does it’s job of blending everything up into a smooth creamy mole! I was eating this stuff straight with a spoon! Chocolate lovers will be in heaven with this cacao mole!

And the red pepper sauce is excellent too! It’s a rather sweet sauce which compliments everything so well. We loved drizzling it all over the chile rellenos and then adding the mole on top. The pepper sauce consists of red bell peppers, a red chile pepper (I used half of this long red hot pepper), cashews, water, lime juice, agave syrup and sea salt. Don’t skip this as it’s so delicious with everything!

I used 6 poblano peppers for this. They are not very hot and are a good size for stuffing. The only thing that I would do differently is dehydrate them a bit with olive oil first to get them to soften. I didn’t mind the crisp peppers for the summer but in winter I’d prefer them softer. Scott noted this too about the crisp peppers. However, he still loved this wonderful dinner!

Overall I highly recommend making this raw vegan Mexican style dish for a special occasion, a celebration, or just an intimate dinner for two. It’s a definite winner! Thank you Matthew and your talented chefs. I also want to add that Matthew has a note saying that this dish would be his favorite to enjoy with a glass of good wine, hence the lovely Spanish wine we tried that night!

At this stage in my raw journey, I really love being able to make delicious gourmet raw foods on the weekends. (I have only been on a high raw diet for about 2 years now.) It’s something I look forward to all during the workweek as I find it so much fun and enjoyable. By making gourmet raw and living foods most weekends, I’ve been able to stay high raw and maintain great health and pain-free knees for running longer distances and all my other outdoor adventures!

Here’s what we brought to Sunday’s Raw Vegan Potluck:

Raspberry Lemon Pie! Recipe is by Heathy Pace and is found in her E-book, Just Desserts.

This was the first time I tried this brilliant summer recipe. I had my eye on this for a while as I love raspberry and lemon flavors. With raspberry season finally here in Vermont I had to make this! I picked up some beautiful fresh organic raspberries from our local Farmers Market in Richmond on Friday, so this dessert was extra special!

Joyce’s Notes: Wow, this is a fantastic recipe! Everyone at the potluck loved this and asked about the ingredients. One person jokingly said that he was wondering if it was really raw! I split a slice with Scott at the potluck and was so pleased with how good it came out. Raspberries and lemon go so well together!

I did the recipe one and a half times so we could have a small 4 inch mini pie for ourselves. This worked fine. Here’s my mini below:

The crust was really good and was actually the closest thing I’ve made to tasting like real pie dough. It consists of macadamia nuts, shredded coconut, agave syrup, and lemon zest (I forgot the pinch of sea salt but it was still great). This gets combined in the food processor until nice and moist. It’s a brilliant crust recipe!

The filling was just divine! It consists of cashews, agave syrup, fresh lemon juice, fresh raspberries, lemon zest, coconut oil and lecithin. Heathy doesn’t usually soak her cashews so I ground them up in the food processor first which is easier when blending everything together in the Vitamix. I normally buy cashew pieces as they are less expensive. But I discovered that Natural Provisions in Williston, VT has whole organic raw cashews at a decent price (around $8/pound).

Saving the Best for Last: Meeting Natasha Kyssa this weekend at a book signing and raw food potluck!

Natasha Kyssa is the Author of The SimplyRaw Living Foods Detox Manual and the founder of SimlyRaw in Ottawa. Natasha has been living a raw vegan lifestyle for almost 20 years and has helped people all over the world with natural cleansing programs. www.Simplyraw.ca

Scott and I met Natasha for the first time at her book signing on Saturday at Healthy Living Natural Food Store here in Vermont. I have to say that Natasha is one of the most healthy and beautiful women I have ever seen! She radiates with perfect health and her skin just glows. And she’s super nice too! We also had the pleasure of hanging out with Natasha and her lovely husband Mark at the potluck on Sunday. They both love the outdoors and do all kinds of cool sports. Perhaps we might have the pleasure of skiing with them this winter! :-)

 

The above is Natasha’s new book! I am reading it now and loving it! I am finding it very user friendly with a wealth of information and knowledge. In November I am thinking of doing her 28 day detox program as it seems very gentle, feasible and very realistic for myself as well as most people. Even though I eat a high raw diet, I know that there are areas for improvement. Doing a program like Natasha’s will bring me to a new level of health and well being. I highly recommend this book for everyone who is interested in their own health and well being. I think this book would make excellent Christmas presents for a few of our family members! ;-)

Here’s a photo from last night’s potluck of myself, Natasha, and Linda of Vermont Fiddle Heads :

Lastly, I want to thank Geniel Fife, Joshua Pfeil, and everyone for hosting the awesome potluck last night. There were great people as well as amazingly delicious raw vegan food! So many great dishes and lovely desserts. I still need to get that recipe for the sage croquettes! And thanks to Fern for that delicious pesto recipe made with fennel tops from her garden. Scott and I are going to try harder and get to more of these potlucks at Geniel’s lovely home in South Burlington, VT. So nice to make new friends with common values and to try new wonderful living foods.

Have a wonderful week and enjoy the warm summer weather!

Home Sweet Home with Brownies, Chinese Food, Gelato & Raspberry Granola

Hemp Brownies! Recipe by Aimee (known as Bitt on goneraw.com). You can find original recipe on goneraw.com. Just CLICK HERE. Aimee has a cool blog called A Bitt of Raw that I enjoy following.

Aimee gave me permission to post the recipe. Since these brownies got such rave reviews on goneraw.com, I decided to double the recipe. Here’s the recipe which is doubled and has my very slight variations:

• 2/3 cup of Hemp seeds (same as hemp nuts)
• 19 small to medium fresh dates (I had mostly small ones)
• 2/3 cup of walnuts (plus a few more)
• slightly less than 1/2 cup of pumpkin seeds
• 2 teaspoons of vanilla extract
• 2/3 cup of cacao powder
• 2 small pinches of sea salt

Preparation:

1. Pit dates
2. Process dates in food processor to a paste
3. Add walnuts, hemp seeds, and pumpkin seeds. Puree until well processed.
4. Add cacao powder, salt. Process until well-mixed.
5. Add vanilla and blend a bit more. Taste to add more of anything!
6. Mold into small balls or little truffle-type things. Press goji berries or coconut shreds on top if desired. OR more hemp seeds if you want them to look like the store-bought ones.
7. EAT!

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Joyce’s Notes: This is a fantastic tasting raw vegan brownie!! Even Scott loved these and he can be picky with raw brownies and truffles! I made the brownies earlier in the work week and Scott took some to his office everyday. He said he liked them better than the raw chocolate truffles we brought home from Montreal. He liked the smooth chocolate texture. I also found these to be a very rich chocolate treat as well. I took a couple to work and found that I had a blast of energy afterwards without crashing like I would with typical American junk food. This recipe looks rather healthy but it tastes so naughty and sinful! That’s what I love about this lifestyle!!

Hemp seeds are actually one of the most complete sources of protein and luckily they taste good! They are also packed with a balanced ratio of Omega 3 and Omega 6! And of course they have 0.00% THC levels…hehe ;-) I buy mine at Natural Provisions Health Food Store in Williston, VT.

For the photos, I rolled the brownie balls in lucuma powder, mesquite powder and maca powder. I topped 2 of the brownies with hemp seeds and berries. The other ones I topped with shredded coconut and dried banana chips. For a quick and easy chocolate dessert, give this one a try!

Chinese Broccoli in Hoisini Sauce with Parsnip “Rice”. This is another successful recipe created by Russell James. This recipe was published in Russell’s “News from the Kitchen eZine, Issue #21”. It was actually emailed to me since I singed up for his newsletters. To obtain this recipe and future recipes, go to his website: www.therawchef.com . OR you can simply find it HERE on the Raw Freedom Community website. Thanks to Carmella for posting it :-)

Joyce’s Notes: I’m not a huge fan of typical Chinese fast-food found here in the States. But Scott and I both found this to be a delicious and tasty recipe. We totally enjoyed this one on Saturday evening after a nice hike. Thanks to Angela’s post and glowing review from the Happy Raw Kitchen blog, I decided this would be another good one to try. In fact I doubled the recipe so we could have leftovers on Sunday! And I wanted to use my new Chinese plates I picked up in Montreal’s China town last weekend. So this worked out great!

The broccoli was dehydrated with olive oil, lemon juice and tamari for 4 hours. This worked well for an authentic cooked texture. Next time I might use less lemon and more olive oil. Keep the broccoli large enough as it will shrink and you don’t want it crispy.

I loved the parsnip ‘rice’!! I’ve made variations of this in the past and this was another tasty version. The parsnips are processed in the food processor with pine nuts, macadamia nuts, light/white miso, and cold-pressed sesame oil. Chopped scallions (spring onions) are mixed in at the end. You must like parsnips to enjoy this ‘rice’ as the flavorings won’t disguise the unique taste of this root vegetable. That being said, this ‘rice’ did pass the picky-husband test so I’d say give the ‘rice’ a try!

The Hoisini Sauce was indeed very good! This consisted of raw tahini, lemon juice, yacon syrup, apple cinder vinegar, tamari, garlic, fresh jalapeno, and fresh ginger. I found this sauce to be very thick so I added a bit of water which worked well. If you don’t have access to yacon syrup, agave will be just fine. I used about 3/4 of a large jalapeno.

Overall, I’d say give this one a try if you are craving a nice hearty, filling and rich tasting Chinese style dinner! Russell did well with his recipe!

More Sweets!!

Raspberry Vanilla-Almond Granola over Almond Gelato! Both recipes are by Matthew Kenney and found in his book, Everyday Raw. I highly recommend trying these together as they compliment each other perfectly with flavorings!

Joyce’s Notes: The Almond Gelato was super sweet and sinful! We both liked it a lot! And it worked well in my ice cream maker! This gelato consists of cashews, macadamia nuts, young Thai coconut meat, agave syrup, water, vanilla extract, almond extract, sea salt and coconut oil. There are no almonds in this recipe but the almond extract gives it a very sweet almond flavor which we both loved. (I use the organic Frontier brand). Next time I might use more cashews and less macadamia nuts as they are rather distinct in flavor. I’m a sweet tooth so the sweetness factor was fine for myself and Scott. I also want to say that the texture while being in the freezer was perfect. It wasn’t too hard to scoop the next day.

The Raspberry Vanilla-Almond Granola was excellent as well! Thanks to Aimee’s blog, A Bitt of Raw (mentioned above), I decided to try this granola especially since raspberries are in season now! She gave this recipe a wonderful review as well!

Scott and I both are still enjoying this granola which was my first attempt at a raw vegan version! Scott even enjoyed some this morning for breakfast with soy milk (sorry, forgot to make some raw almond mylk). It’s also great as a healthy, filling, tasty snack!

Matthew’s recipe is truly delicious. If you have the book, definitely try it! I cut the recipe in half and it still made 2 decent sized squares on 2 dehydrator screens. The recipe calls for fresh raspberries, sunflower seeds, pecans, almonds, maple syrup, dates, pears, vanilla, almond extract, sea salt, ginger juice, and lime zest. The lime zest, ginger juice and maple syrup taste brilliant together. (I found my ginger juice this past winter at either Healthy Living or City Market). One thing to note is that before it gets dehydrated the mixture will taste super sweet. But it will tone down quite a bit after being dehydrated for 24-48 hours!

Here’s a photo after being dehydrated and picked at a bunch. It’s hard to stop sneaking bits and pieces out of the dehydrator!!

Although Scott and I had a wonderful time in Montreal last weekend, it was so good to be home all weekend! I enjoyed my Saturday to leisurely make raw food and later enjoy the woods and trails near our house. On Saturday after most of my food prep was done, we did a short but beautiful hike that started almost across the street from our house. We are lucky live next to 426 acres of conservation land that belongs to the Vermont Land Trust. Some lovely hiking trails have been cut and marked including one that reaches the top of Libby’s Lookout! This is a breathtaking summit that’s so close to our house! A truly special place! Here are some photos of the trails and Libby’s Lookout:

Scott looking out at a beaver pond along the trail.

Parts of the trail are muddy with all the rain this summer!

Hazy views from Libby’s Lookout. Camel’s Hump is on the left in the distance.

Scott enjoying the summit views

Another shot from Libby’s Lookout

Our house is somewhere out there :-)

I’m always happy out in the woods!

Backside of Preston Pond which is on the trail back home. So pretty!

Almost back to our house!

Some Running Notes: Scott and I have less than 2 months until our first half marathon which happens on October 4 in Waterbury, Vermont. The Leaf Peepers Half Marathon is a big goal for myself since I’ve suffered from chronic knee problems and injuries for close to 20 years. Going raw vegan as given me the gift of ‘new’ knees within the last 9-10 months!

I’ve been slowly increasing my mileage and training for this half marathon. Although I am only loosely training, it’s still a big deal to be thinking about such a long race (13 miles). Over 10 years ago I went through 2 unsuccessful knee surgeries and gave up my passion for road bike racing. I wish I had known about the healing effects of raw and living foods back then!!!

Yesterday I did my first 10 mile run while Scott did 8. This was the longest I’ve ever been able to run. Now with my raw vegan body, I seem to be aging in reverse! It’s like I truly have a new body and new pair of knees! Stay tuned for more information on running raw and what to eat in my upcoming posts! I hope other injured athletes and all athletes can find my posts helpful.

Thanks for visiting my blog! Have a fun and healthy week!