Sundried Tomato & Almond Goodness

I'll keep it simple and sweet this time. I make Mediterranean Almond Bread on occasion and those that I share it with seem to love it as much as I do. Enjoy.

TIP: This recipe calls for Herbs De Provence. If you don't have these handy, Herbs De Provence consists of a dry blend of basil, oregano, rosemary, thyme, and lavender. Any combination of the previously mentioned herbs would be just as delicious too.

Mediterranean Almond Bread
By Russell James
Makes 18 'slices'

1/2 c olive oil
1 c sun dried tomatoes, loosely packed
3 c almond flour*
1 c flax meal
3 medium courgettes (zucchinis), peeled & roughly chopped
2 apples, cored and roughly chopped
3 T lemon juice 1 t salt 3 T Herbs De Provence or herbs of your choice (or less!)
2 T marjoram or herbs of your choice (or less!)

*You can make almond flour a number of ways. My favorite is to save the pulp from any almond milk I make and dehydrate it so I can keep it in a glass jar until needed. You could also use the almond pulp wet. Another way would be just to grind some almonds into flour in a high powered blender or coffee mill.

-Process the olive oil, sun dried toms, courgettes, apples, lemon juice, salt and dried herbs until thoroughly mixed.

-Add the almond flour and process again until a batter is formed.

-In a bowl mix the batter with the flax meal by hand. The reason you do this separately (not in the processor) is that you are likely to have too much mixture for the size if the processor at this point, and when you add the flax meal it will become quite heavy and sticky and overwork your machine. -When mixed, process the whole batter in the machine again in small batches to achieve a light fluffy texture.

-Divide the mixture in 2 and place on Paraflexx sheets, on dehydrator trays. -Use an offset spatula (aka offset palette knife or cranked palette knife) to spread the mixture evenly to all 4 sides and corners of the Paraflexx sheet. If mixture is too sticky you can wet the spatula to make things easier. With a knife score the whole thing into 9 squares.

-Dehydrate for 2 hours and then remove the Paraflexx sheets by placing another dehydrator tray and mesh on top and invert so that your original sheet of bread is upside down. That will allow you to peel the Paraflexx sheet off and continue to dehydrate the underside of the bread.

Mint Chocolate Chip Shake Remix - Café Gratitude Nostalgia

Last month, I was gifted with an experience that blew my mind in all sorts of fun and amazing ways. I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to travel to California with someone I now hold near and dear to my heart. This special someone also took me to see one of my favorite musicians, Trevor Hall <3, but before that he took me to what is now one of my favorite restaurants. We dined at a place where my taste buds and digestive system died and went to vegan heaven, Café Gratitude. It's a favorite hot spot for many vegans, with an extensive menu full of both raw and cooked nourishment.

Adam, JB, and I decided while browsing our menus that every item sounded just as equally and uniquely delicious as the last, so we ordered and proceeded to share nearly everything. I couldn't resist the abundance of chocolate on their menu and ended up ordering 2 deserts to-go.

I loved Cafè Gratitude so much that I even kept the receipt so that I could play show and tell.

A quick summary of our delicious goodness, taken from Cafè Gratitude Venice's menu:

- I AM GRACE – Coconut milk, almond butter, date and vanilla bean smoothie 16 oz.

-I AM VIVACIOUS - Live marinated kale chips with your choice of dipping sauce: Hempseed ranch, garlic-tahini, spicy nacho

-I AM COOL – Mint chocolate chip milkshake with Vitamineral green and raw cacao nibs 16 oz. 

-I AM ECSTATIC - maple-miso-glazed Brussels sprouts 
*Seriously amazing brussel sprouts... recipe found here)

- I AM CHARISMATIC - Chai Iced Tea with almond milk.

-I AM PURE - Ginger-Tahini kale salad with avocado, sea palm, nori, cucumbers, carrots, cilantro, basil and green onions topped with sunflower sprouts teriyaki almonds   (Add kim chee)

-I AM HUMBLE - Indian curried lentils over brown rice or quinoa, with sautéed seasonal vegatables, sweet potatoes and spinach, drizzled with a spicy mint chutney and sweet tamarind sauce   

-I AM FORTIFIED - Sautéed seasonal vegetables & kale, brown rice or quinoa,  topped with your  choice of sauce:  sesame-ginger, garlic-tahini, red pepper harissa  

-I AM JOY “RAWMOND JOY’ - Sweet coconut filling, almonds, & vanilla in a chocolate shell

-I AM SUPER DARK CHOCOLATE NUGGET - An intense, bittersweet nugget of ground cacao nibs, almond butter & maca, minimally sweetened with low-glycemic yacon

YUM.

The one item that really stood out to me was JB's I AM COOL mint chocolate chip milkshake. It's made with more nutrient dense ingredients than a traditional milkshake, but it tastes just as delicious. Personally, I prefer this version and have spent the past few weeks recreating this decadent "milkshake" with Adam. I believe we got pretty close :)

Vegan Mint Chocolate Chip Shake Remix
(inspired by Café Gratitude's I AM COOL smoothie)
Makes 1 enormous serving or 2-3 servings to share

-1½ cups almond/soy/coconut milk or young coconut water
- 3 to 4 pitted dates (soak in warm water for 20 minutes if very hard and dry. Feel free to add the soak water to the blender). Use other sweetener, like maple syrup or stevia, if dates are not available.
- 15 mint leaves, fresh
- 2 to 3 cups of greens (spinach, kale, swiss chard, romaine lettuce)
- 1½ TBSP cacao powder (preferably raw and/or unsweetened)
- 1 tsp pure vanilla extract or vanilla powder.
- (optional) 1 TBSP chia seeds
- (optional) 1 tsp maca root powder
- (optional) 1 tsp spirulina powder
- (optional) 2 TBSP shredded coconut (preferably dehydrated)

-3 ice cubes
-1 cup frozen banana or 2 fruit's worth
-2 TBSP raw cacao nibs (to mimic chocolate chips or use REAL dark chocolate chips mmm)

1. Blend all ingredients together well, except for ice cubes, banana, and cacao nibs/chocolate chips.
2. Add in remaining ingredients and blend until desired consistency.
3. Share or keep all to yourself and enjoy!

Shut up and connect your mind, body, and soul

I wrote this in August of this year, but never posted it. Some weird itch brought me back to it and a few things have changed since I originally wrote this post. 

OH EM GEE!

It's been almost a year since I've touched this blog. What has changed since last August? 

-I've fallen in love with yoga, and in turn more in love with myself. 

-I started a garden with my amazing boyfriend (edit: now he is an amazing friend). 
 

-I've made awesome friends and the ones that were already in my life just keep growing more beautifully than they already were. 

-I'm going  I went to Wanderlust in Whistler with my amazing friend Bea. It's going to be awesome and I can barely wait for the end of august to come!! It's an experience that has added to and broadened my perspective. All because of the people that made the experience possible. I volunteered, practiced yoga, chanted kirtan, made friends and connected with open and beautiful people who are all on slightly different paths, but all use yoga to keep them centered and have FUN with it. :)

-My vegan foodiness has rubbed off on many of the people I know. Delicious plant-based and whole foods tend to sell themselves... all anyone has to do is try and taste the goodness! Recently, I've had friends take their family and more friends to restaurants like Native Foods in the city of Chicago and Borrowed Earth Cafe in the cute downtown area of Downers Grove. 

-My skin looks better and when I get a few pimples here and there, they heal at a more rapid rate than before. Yay!

-Dairy and I have parted ways for good for the most part, with the exception of the occasional cup of Red Mango frozen yogurt and caramel... what's a soy caramel macchiato without the caramel sauce? 

-I've had ups and I've had a few downs where I let insecurities and stress get the best of me, BUT now I'm back on top. Healing and living life with intent is amazing. Woot woot.

-I finally decided on a college major. If you've known me for at least a few years, you know that I've struggled with finding what I'm passionate about and what I want to study in college. I've decided on Nutrition & Dietetics. I'm more than excited about this because my gut feeling tells me, "Yeah! This is what you love and where you are supposed to be! You know how to find balance here." So I'm learning to listen to my intuition more often because that's the guide that hasn't steered me wrong. In the past, my mind would get in the way and my inner dialogue would sound something like, "I know what I need to, but <insert a million possibilities and excuses here>." Nike advertising knows what they're talking about when they say, "JUST DO IT". 

-It finally feels really good to be me... as I am... right now. 

Jica-what? Jicama... better than french fries.

Now that I've been educating myself about raw foods and eating that way for the most part for something close to 2 months now, I find myself preferring to eat this way. I still really enjoy going out to eat cooked food, but I find myself craving the rich flavors and energizing nutrients and enzymes in raw food.


It's funny how a month ago I was saying, "I can incorporate raw foods into my diet a few times a week". Now I say the same thing about cooked food. I understand why there are so many blogs and websites already dedicated to this way of eating. Unless you try it for yourself, even if it's only for 24 hours, you don't fully comprehend why people are enthusiastic about it. You just feel better. Everything about your life is better because you are healing your body and that sense of healthiness and sanity can only extend outwards to different parts of your life.


We listen to behavioral health experts all the time, telling us to get to the root of a problem in order to fix it. The root of anything in our lives is ourselves. We have a certain amount of control over that, including what we choose to put into our mouths. There is food... and then there is better food. There is no such thing as a "bad" food in my opinion. I like to choose better foods and incorporate a run, a bike ride, or some form of exercise into my life as often as I can... you should too! Make life a little bit easier and empower yourself :) .

"Fries" with raw ketchup... my ketchup is chunky because I didn't pre-soak my raisins.
Soak yours for a smoother consistency!

Before exploring raw foods, I had never tasted jicama. It's a root vegetable that is mild in flavor and slightly sweet. I had only noticed it's existence about 3 months ago when my boyfriend pointed the tuber looking prick out to me at the store. Needless to say, those pricks make delicious, crunchy "fries". They're better for you too; one cup of jicama provides you with 6.4 grams of fiber and 40% of your daily recommended value of vitamin C. If you eat raw or avoid bread, they make a great alternative for croutons or tortilla strips if you like crunchy textures.

The easiest, fastest, & my favorite way to prepare raw jicama is by making jicama fries with raw ketchup (adapted from The Complete Book of Raw Food by Lori Baird and Julie Rodwell). Dip them in whatever sounds good to you; I once ate them with an avocado based dressing and another time with raw "tuna" pate. 


For jicama fries (for 5 people), you'll need:
- 1 lb small jicama (the bigger ones are more woody tasting), peeled and julienned
- 1 tsp or TBSP olive oil, use more or less to your liking
- 1 tsp chili powder (I like Whole Food's 365 Valle del Sol Chili powder)
- 1 tsp onion powder
- 1 tsp ground cumin
- 1 pinch sea salt (or even better, himalayan salt or celtic salt)


Toss jicama in a bowl with olive oil and salt. Plate and sprinkle with chili powder, onion powder, and ground cumin.


For raw ketchup to go with your "fries", you'll need:
- 1/2 cup sun dried tomatoes (soaked for 2+ hours), reserve soaking water
-1/4 cup apple cider vinegar
-1/4 cup raisins (soaked for 2+ hours)
-1 tsp sea salt (the recipe in The Complete Book of Raw Food calls for 1 TBSP. I found that to be way too salty)
-1/4 cup onion powder


Blend all ingredients together in food processor or magic bullet/whatever personal blender you may own until desired consistency. 


Yes it's that easy and no, you don't need a dehydrator! Share with friends or keep the crunchy goodness all to yourself.

Raw "IT AIN'T TUNA!" Pâté

When I was just a wee child in Mrs. Sommers's second grade class, the memories that flood my mind are her love of Dunkin' Donuts coffee, the color purple, and whales... which is probably why we focused so much on learning about sea life... and that just about sums up my second grade school year. I also vividly recall that the day our class got to paint a mural full of sea creatures, my mother included potato salad among my lunch box's contents. I remember the two boys Justin and Jason that I sat down to eat lunch with that day asking me (completely unable to hold back their giggles of course), "EWWWW! Is that tuna?! EW ERICA BROUGHT TUNA FISH FOR LUNCH!" and I yelled at them, "IT AIN'T TUNA!"... and more uncontrollable laughter ensued. I heard the catch phrase "It ain't tuna!" nonstop for a few months after that. English grammar wasn't my strong suit back then. Bringing something other than a lunchable or a good ol' PB&J to school was apparently.

I totally read this at least 100 times that school year. Just thought you should know about my amazing book choices, they were Oprah's Book Club worthy.

I do have to admit, I love tuna salad and occasionally get cravings for it. Luckily, my version does not contain squirmy sea critters and my father told me it's "the best thing I've prepared so far". He's pretty blunt and honest so I trust his sincerity. He also ate the rest of what I left in the fridge without telling me, tsk tsk. I can't be mad at him though; it was rather delightful if I do say so myself!

I like my "tuna" served with celery and on romaine leaves with chopped up tomatoes, cucumbers, and avocados.

Raw "It Ain't Tuna!" Pate:

2 cups raw Sunflower Seeds (soaked for 2+ hours)

2 Tbsp Dulse Seaweed Flakes (found mine @Whole Foods, soak the seaweed in a little bit of apple cider vinegar or lemon juice before throwing it into your food processor)

1 tsp Apple Cider Vinegar

2 Tbsp pickle juice

Juice of ½ lemon

½ tsp sea salt (or less if you're like me and are satisfied with less saltiness than most)

¼ tsp black pepper

-Combine all of the pate ingredients in your food processor. It does get kind of think and chunky so you might have to stop and use a spatula

-Mix the following ingredients in:

¼ cup red onion (medium diced)

1 kosher dill pickle (Brunoise cut/just chop it up into itty bitty pieces)

I have fresh chives available to me all summer long at my convenience, compliments of my backyard, so I added a small sliced up bunch of these. 

Seriously the best pickles ever. Try them once and you'll end up craving them like you're preggers, even if you lack ovaries.

Something Sweet!

Today I had the pleasure of waking up to coconut macaroons I left on my dehydrator overnight thanks to Rawmazing's Raw Macaroons Three Ways Recipe. I made the strawberry & cinnamon macadamia variety, but since I didn't have raw macadamia nuts on hand, I used raw walnuts instead. Delicious! You could probably substitute the macadamias with a variety of different nuts and they'd still taste amazing. For the 4th of July I think I'm going to make Stawberry, Vanilla, and Blueberry ones (I wonder how these will taste?).

I also made Heather from Sweetly Raw's Choccie Cupcakes, but I used this Cashew Vanilla Frosting recipe from goneraw.com and added a little beet juice to make it slightly pink. These are super rich, but super good! I can't decide if the cupcake or frosting is my favorite part.

I added chopped walnuts to my cupcake "batter" as well.

Pink frosting! My frosting came out slightly chunky since my food processor is kind of dinky. The vanilla flavor made it feel like white chocolate chips in my mouth though.

For dinner, I went through my fridge to see what I could throw together and I came up with zucchini pasta topped with baby spinach, tomatoes, a sun dried tomato sauce I made with random leftovers that tasted a lot like vodka sauce from my SAD (Standard American Diet) days, and fresh basil. I wrote down the ingredients while I was devouring my pasta because it was SO GOOD! I'll post it tomorrow... because I know I'll probably make this again for lunch or dinner.

I would have never thought preparing raw food would be this entertaining.

On a Basil & Garlic kick this week.

Yesterday was a roll out of bed and be semi-lazy about making myself anything to eat. Luckily, I like to keep some sort of breakfast bar (in a cookie shape... because I like circles better :) on hand for the sake of healthy and delicious convenience. This week's are Pumpkin-Apple-Carrot Breakfast Cookies, which I very loosely based off of Me Amoeba's raw carrot cake recipe. Made that about a week ago for dessert for my family and boyfriend. Pretty good! All of us concurred that it would be an awesome treat for breakfast since it was so filling and we could barely eat more than a bite. Mmm fiber.  

For breakfast yesterday: Pumpkin-Apple-Carrot Cookies and a Guava-Strawberry-Banana Flax Smoothie sweetened with raw honey.

I also made Rosemary Almond Crackers. I used Nouveau Raw's Recipe, but used raw wheat germ instead of oat flour since I was out. These are terrific alone or with toppings.

I also made Matt Amsden's famous onion bread, which I found on The Rawtarian's site. I topped it with fresh basil leaves from my backyard, sliced tomatoes, pea shoots I found at Trader Joe's, and my own Sundried Tomato-Spinach-Basil Cashew Cheese:

 

1 cup cashews, soaked for two hours or more
Juice of one lemon

1 Tbsp cold-pressed extra virgin olive oil
¼ tsp salt

Handful of spinach leaves (I used baby spinach)

5 sun dried tomatoes

¼ cup basil

1 sprig fresh rosemary (optional)

2 Tbsp nutritional yeast (optional)

Process the cashews in a food processor until they become pretty well ground. Add the remaining ingredients. Since my food processor is tiny and the mixture is very think, I chopped up my spinach into small pieces separately and mixed it all together in the container I stored my cashew cheese in.

I'm a tomato fiend. I also topped 2 almond crackers with "cheese", tomatoes, and basil.

I made Me Amoeba's Sprouted Lentil and Quinoa Tabbouleh as a side for dinner.

I also made myself a... taco...?... out of onion bread, sprouted garbanzo & veggie hummus, artichoke hearts, and baby spinach. Sliced tomato would have been good in here.

Veggie and Sprouted Garbanzo Hummus:

1 cup sprouted garbanzos (chickpeas)

1 cup chopped broccoli 

1 cup zucchini 

3-4 cloves garlic (more or less according to your taste)

Juice of one lemon

¼ cup extra virgin olive oil

½ cup tahini

1 tsp cumin

¼ cup fresh basil (optional... I threw this in last minute and I loved it)

Throw the garbanzos, broccoli, and zucchini in the food processer and mix until smooth. Add and process the rest of the ingredients. Enjoy with vegetable crudités (I love carrots with hummus) or whatever else you may fancy.

 I stopped by my boyfriend's house yesterday to water his lawn since he left town for work and put down grass seed right before he left. I love being outside. I act like a 5 year old and like to make rainbows with water.

I ate a good few handfuls of mulberries while I was outside watering. Mmm!

As is expected from a 5 year old, I like to play with my food too apparently. 

 Nothing wrong with that... unless you're in company that requires proper etiquette of course :)