Really Raw by Raederle

[Article] Diet & Depression

2012-01-24T09:50:00.000-08:00

Depression is not "all in your head." Depression is a body-wide debilitating condition which I've personally suffered from. From around age nine to age nineteen my life was one big ball of pain, anxiety and unhappiness.

But how much of that was circumstantial, how much of it was "in my head" and how much of it was related to my physical health?

I have a lot of personal conclusions and beliefs regarding depression, panic attacks, but before I talk about that I thought I'd give some concrete "evidence" that comes from outside myself.

The connection between diet, disease and depression (sources at the end of the entry):

Dr. Stephen Schoenthaler has published a series of studies conducted in juvenile prison systems and schools. In the prison studies, he found that improved diet plus the addition of vitamins improved behavior dramatically, reducing rule-breaking and violence 40% or more.

A study done by Michael S Donaldson in 2001 on the impact of a vegetarian mostly raw diet on people with fibromayalgia showed a decrease in general pain, and an increase in flexibility.

Zinc deficiency is known to trigger behavioral problems, including aggression (Ward 1990, 1997). Ward's research showed that children with a diagnosis of ADHD lost zinc faster than other people did when they ate foods containing food dye.

A study at Columbia University in New York in 2008 concluded that "A [1-3 week] stay at a raw vegan institute [Hippocrates Health Institute, FL] is closely associated with improved mental and emotional quality of life."

The Pfeiffer Treatment Center in Illinois has many years of successful experience helping children whose violent behavior is the result of nutritional imbalance.

In the 1970s and 80s, Barbara Reed Stitt was having remarkable success in helping parolees stay out of trouble. Most probation officers had success with only 15% of their parolees; Barbara's success rate was an unheard-of 85%. What she did: convince them to improve their diet. You can read about her work in the book Food & Behavior, a Natural Connection and in an article called "A Different Kind of School Lunch." Her work is also used in the Appleton Alternative School in Wisconsin, a school for troubled teenagers.

Schmidt (1997) compared a diet eliminating all additives as well as most allergens with Ritalin for children with conduct-disorder as well as ADHD. 44% of them responded to Ritalin, while 24% responded equally well to the Feingold-type diet. He concluded, "dietary treatment cannot be neglected as a possible access to treating hyperactive/disruptive children."

Peter (1997) surveyed 100 young criminals and found that 75% of them had food allergies, food intolerance, and nutritional problems, compared to only 18% of the young non-offender population.

"The supplements just provided the vitamins, minerals and fatty acids found in a good diet, which the inmates should get anyway. Yet the improvement was huge." - C. Bernard Gesch

In 1998, Peter successfully treated nine children with persistent anti-social disruptive and/or criminal behavior by changing their diet to avoid the identified problem foods.

Gesch (2002) showed that antisocial behavior in prisons, including violence, are dramatically reduced by ordinary supplements of vitamins, minerals, and essential fatty acids (but not by placebo).

Weimar Institute in Northern California has demonstrated that a very low-fat vegetarian diet can also reverse diabetes.

A 2010 study by Dr Felice Jacka from Victoria's Deakin University found that what we eat can have a profound effect on our mental health, reducing the risk of depression and anxiety.
Jacka interviewed more than 1000 women regarding their diet and mental-health symptoms. What made this study different was that for the first time the whole diet of the subjects was looked at, rather than just the role of specific nutrients, such as omega-3, magnesium and folate, in relation to depression and anxiety disorders.
The study found that those subjects who had diets high in processed foods and junk food were more likely to suffer anxiety and depression disorders than those who – you guessed it – had wholefood diets high in vegetables, fruit, fish and other lean protein.
Jacka also conducted a study, published in September last year, on adolescents in relation to diet and mental health. With a quarter of young Australians already experiencing mental-health issues, she found that there was a strong suggestion that it may be possible to help prevent teenage depression by getting youngsters to adopt a nutritious, high-quality diet.
What's more, changes in the quality of adolescent diets over two years were reflected in the mental health of subjects. So the kids whose diets got worse over the two years had a commensurate deterioration in their mental health, as opposed to an improvement for those kids who adopted a healthier diet.

The Institute of Internal Medicine in Italty did a study that showed a gluten-free diet significantly reduced anxiety in coeliac patients.

In 1992 a study was done in Oregon that showed that a cholesterol-lowering diet improved the emotional state of all 305 subjects. There were reductions in depression as well as aggression.

"A raw food vegan diet has been shown to reverse heart disease, cure cancer, and solve digestive problems and depression." ~ John Wiley

In a 1994 German study published by the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition: A vegetarian lifestyle of twenty years or more was associated with a decreased rate of cancer mortality, a decreased rate in instances of colon cancer, and no deaths from rectal cancer.

Dr. Dean Ornish has demonstrated that very low-fat vegetarian diets (of 10% or less calories coming from fat) can reverse heart disease.

"I’ve been vegan since being diagnosed with breast cancer in 1982. I was very happy with that diet, but in 1999 I’d heard about a diet consisting of primarily raw fruits and vegetables. I decided to give it a thirty-day trial and then decide whether to stay raw. Well, the thirty days came and went and I stayed raw. Shopping and food preparation was simplified. My electricity bill went down. Cleaning up was almost nonexistent. There was certainly no boredom because I was eating a wide variety of foods. I had lots of energy for my triathlon running, biking, and swimming, and I felt just great! I also lost some weight." by Ruth Heidrich, Ph.D.

The above is just a glimpse of the proven effects of diet on disease and depression. Besides my my own struggle with suicidal behavior and depression, I have much personal second-hand experience with the effect of a raw vegan diet in particular.

I've written about the experience I've had with encountering raw vegans at potlucks, and how their upbeat attitude was one of my first inspirations towards a raw vegan diet. I most recently mentioned it in a conversation on my facebook wall, which I have edited down to it's basic components as follows:

Me: People are getting degenerative diseases younger and younger. However, the age to which we actually survive -- on average -- is getting higher and higher. In extreme short: People are becoming less energetic, less able, less sharp-witted at younger and younger ages, but still living longer and longer through artificial means. This means that the population of people who are not able to "contribute" is growing rapidly.

Friend: That's because our society has too much compassion and empathy.

Me: Not at all. It's because we have no compassion for ourselves that we completely disrespect our own bodies and take no heed of our own emotional health. That is a generalization, but I fully believe that it is justified.

People want to do their exercise "during television commercials" and eat one cup of lettuce (10 calories) under two tablespoons of dressing (200 calories) and then they berate themselves for not being sexy, healthy and beautiful. Then they let other people abuse them emotionally and let everyone else's opinion of them pull them down.

We put our happiness into the hands of other people and hope that the outside world will make us happy, but happiness comes from a wealth of love, compassion, health and truth that is within ourselves.

What society has is fear. We're afraid that if we don't support the weak that it would make us look bad. We're afraid that if we speak out against medicaid that it would make us seem cruel. We're afraid that if we take good care ourselves and make a fortune that someone will take it away. We're afraid that we don't deserve happiness. We're afraid of change, of being taken seriously, of loving fully, of touching someone heart to heart... We're afraid that if we don't help the 'needy' that we will be needy next.

If we had really compassion we would heal inwardly and inspire others to heal as well, and then we'd all be more able, more happy and a heck of a lot more useful to the world-wide community as a whole. We'd be able to help others better if we lived through love instead of fear.

Friend: The weak willed and weak minded should be slaughtered. That's how you build a strong society. Spartan law.

But more realistically, happiness is a mindset and no matter what your achievements in life are, we all have a built-in automatic reset to neutral. Soon you get used to what ever it is you accomplished, say getting to your perfect weight and you'll be back to feeling normal. Same you, just different appearance. This is just basic psychology.

Me: It's absolutely true that we return to a baseline, but that baseline itself can be raised up so that we always return to a feeling of contentment instead of dissatisfaction.

Friend: The media tells us that fit and thin equates to happiness but there are millions of depressed thin people.

Me: Absolutely, because thin does not equal healthy. Also, physically healthy makes it MUCH easier to become mentally and emotionally healthy, but it doesn't ensure it.

Friend: As for less energy, its not a health issue, it's social evolution. Why go out and talk to people when I can avoid social stigmas and meet like minded people online."

Me: I feel much the same way about going out and meeting people. However, now that I am healthy I love sunlight and nature and I do want to get out to be with plants... not people. When I was unhealthy I hated sun, bugs and being touched by most anybody. Now I don't mind bugs, I love sun, and being intimate with others. I enjoy being close to friends: hugging, exchanging back rubs, having a nice conversation where I can make eye contact. However, I don't like just going out to be out and to meet people. It can be very exasperating.

Friend: Forget date night I gotta go get married in WoW or skyrim. No crisis there, just social evolution.

Me: Nothing wrong with that. I played a lot of WoW for a long time, and enjoyed the heck out of it. I grew up playing Civilization, Colonization, Pharoh, Age of Empires, King's Quest, Caesar, etc.

However... Since I became a raw vegan and started helping others, growing food, spending more time drawing, etc... I'm finding accomplishment and satisfaction in the 'real world' and don't feel the same way when I try to play video games.

When someone can find accomplishment in their 'real life' then video-game accomplishments are less meaningful. I'm not trying to put down WoW -- I ran a guild with over 300 members that I built up from scratch myself, and I even met the person who took over my guild in person when I was traveling through Arizona. She was a nice woman and I was glad I was able to leave my guild in good hands.

It's not that WoW has no value, or that games are "not real." The investment you put into something is exactly what you get out of it... However, when I can invest in really helping other people, really healing them, it doesn't interest me very much to help them get through a raid or dungeon.

In some ways there is an evolution. I met my husband on the internet: that is evolution. However, when people choose to hide in their room doing nothing but smoking pot and playing single-player games, and working a 9-5 job that they hate... That is not evolution at all. There are many sides to the story.

Friend: Physical health only relates to mental health if ones condition is related to their appearance. IE: Me losing weight will have zero effect on my mental issues. I'm minoring in psych ... you need to give me some APA research in order to make a claim like that. If a person loses weight and is healed of mental illness then the issue was casued because of their own personal issues with their image. Real clinical depression is not cured by weight loss.

Me: Well, not by starvation-method weight-loss, no. I changed my diet to heal my ulcers, not to lose weight. I happened to lose 30lbs without trying. I never expected the depression to melt away and never come back either.

I've been depression-free since removing the toxic nonsense from my diet, and I hear the same thing from raw vegans I meet everywhere. Healthy equals happy, and healthy usually means thin/muscular. But I've met plenty of muscular or thin people who were unhealthy and depressed.

Friend: Personal experience can not be taken as scientific fact.

Me: Acidic pH residue caused by dairy, meat, most cooked foods and poison cause negative emotions through hormones. Toxins, like acrylamide in browned foods (fried, baked, deep fried, toasted), have to be removed with the use of nutrients and fats. This removal is exhausting, leaving people feeling lethargic, which does not promote happiness.

Nutrients get put on 'toxin control' and thereby are not put to their normal use. It's well documented than lack of b-vitamins causes depression to schizophrenia.

I have schizophrenia on both sides of my family and as a child it appeared likely that I would be diagnosed with schizophrenia as well. I have many relatives who 'cured' their schizophrenia by taking b-vitamin supplements (which I don't personally advise except in extreme conditions since it's easy to get plenty of b-vitamins from fruits and vegetables since they are so very plentiful in b-vitamins).

Even the Dalai Lama says that health is an important precursor to happiness.

Between b-vitamins, pH and the common sense (stomach aches make people unhappy), there is plenty of evidence. And what's more, those are not even all the different kinds of studies that have been done on it.

I use my personal experience as my foremost examples because my life is my own personal study. Other people's studies are their studies. My accounts of my own experiences will be more accurate than my fifth-hand account of someone else's experience.

One of the very largest reasons I got into raw veganism and stuck with it was because I at every raw potluck I went to I had live inspiration. People who've been doing raw food for a year or more glow with happiness and success.

It's such a common trend to hear someone say at a raw potluck, "Before raw food my life was a mess, but now I am doing what I love at work, at home, and I never get sick anymore." Of course, everyone says it in their own way, but the sincerity in people's eyes... I've met hundreds of raw vegans now. I hardly need any further evidence.

Maura Ann Simmonds-Price: Just want to add that being on a raw food diet has helped me mentally. I am less depressed, have less panic attacks, and am less uncontrolably angry. I think being physically healthy has alot to do with mental health.

Friend: I have tried living my life in so many different ways and did the vegan thing for over six months. I'm depressed no matter what I do or how I live: in a relationship, surrounded by friends and family, money or no money, working or unemployed, I have no cure for my depression and manic states. The only thing that seems to help is marijuana. I'm not knocking your experience, but mine clashes with yours so I have to view this as a case by case situation, not as a general fact for everyone.

Maura Ann Simmonds-Price: Raw food is very different from vegan. It may really help you.

Me: I went vegan and removed gluten from my diet without my depression going away. It helped a little, but it was the raw diet that made it go away fully.

Also, that kind of imbalance is hormonal (especially since you mention that pot helps), and it can take years to fully straighten out hormones. Hormones are affected by more than just food: breathing, sunlight, sleeping patterns and air quality all dramatically affect how hormones in the body function.

If you want some help that is purely mental/intellectual, two books have resulted in great increased to my "happiness baseline": The Mastery of Love and The Art of Happiness. These two books both made a huge change in my life each on their own. They are so good I've actually gone back to read certain passages over and over. I find myself using the information I gained from these books every single day of my life -- no kidding.

In my opinion, a completely raw, organic diet with only whole foods (no sweeteners) combined with the teachings from those two books would fully cure any individual of their depression, provided they were not actually mentally retarded at birth or otherwise severely damaged. I have confidence that you are not nearly that damaged, since you are clearly very intelligent and capable of empathy and emotion. I hope you never give up and that you find a personal truth.

Other connections to unhappiness are revealed in the book The Continuum Concept, which (for me) fully explains the sense of "longing" that most of us seem to share, and how to cure that longing.

From the evidence I started out with at the beginning of this entry, I think it is clear that it doesn't take a fully raw vegan diet to see improvement. The simple removal or reduction of toxins alone is tremendous.

Toxins include: brown and white sugar, corn syrup, canola oil, mono-sodium-glutamate, food colorings, hydrogenated oils, artificial sweeteners, 'natural' sweeteners, acrylamide and aflatoxin.

The reason why going vegan can have a big impact for some people is that animals store toxins their fat, as I go into detail about in my recent entry, "Why does a raw vegan who eats junk food get sick? Explained at last!", and removing that source of toxin intake is a relief for the body.

If you are suffering from depression, there are likely many contributors, but I believe dietary changes have the most lasting impact.

Thank you for reading.

~ Raederle Phoenix

[Article Blog] Raw Vegan Versions Of Comfort Foods: Why They'll Never Stick?

2012-01-22T14:17:00.000-08:00

I just read Ela's entry Parsnip Rice BUT Why Raw Versions Will Never Catch On, which was an entry of interest to me because I've been having the very same thought.

Cooked Comfort Foods

My comfort foods used to be lima beans with butter, mashed potatoes, french fries, baked sweet potatoes with apples and sausage, peanut-butter with jelly on hot toast, buttered egg-noodles, white rice with chicken wings, sweat-and-sour chicken, salt & vinegar chips... And well, everything I ate. My entire diet was made up of "comfort foods" because I was depressed and I wasn't interested in food that wasn't soft or creamy or crunchy or salty or sweet. If it didn't meet an emotional desire than I didn't feel like eating it.

My Relationship With Food

My relationship with food is completely transformed now. With a lot of help from experienced raw vegans and lots of good books and articles, I now only eat for "emotional needs" one to five times a week, instead one to five times a day. And now my "emotional choices" are healthier than ever. I'm no longer blending up a new version of almonds-dates-oil every day. In fact, I'm no longer eating nuts or oil except at potlucks, and I'm rarely eating dates at home. This is huge for me.

Raw Comfort Foods

But how do I feel about those raw comfort foods?

I adore raw vegan pizza more than I ever liked "regular" pizza.

Also, I find that raw vegan desserts are easier to make than traditional baked desserts. And sometimes I like them better than the recipe they imitate. I never liked cooked pumpkin pie, but I love raw pumpkin pie.

I don't like traditional hummus, and I don't like raw hummus creations. I don't like most cooked soups and I don't like most raw vegan soups either.

I was never a fan of cooked brownies, but I absolutely love raw brownies.

I wasn't a big fan of chocolate bars, but I revel in my own home-made raw cacao creations. I also love raw carob even though I never liked any cooked-carob dish I ever tried in my life.

How To Name A Raw Recipe

I really dislike when people write "mylk" instead of "milk" just like I dislike "womyn" instead of "women" -- it just seems silly to me. However, if I say "Raw Vegan Cacao Milk Shake" to someone who eats a cooked omnivorous diet, they're going to scratch their head and say, "What does that mean?"

If I say, "Chocolate Milk Shake" that will give the wrong impression as well. If I say, "Cacao Shake" that may work, or they might say, "What is cacao?" The list goes on and on, but no matter how I name something it is never quite correct.

I want to "make up" a name for something... But if I make up a word, nobody will know what I'm talking about.

We call it a "raw vegan" diet because it is raw and it is vegan. Those words describe what we mean.

We call a raw vegan pizza a "Raw Vegan Pizza" because that describes the general appearance, flavor and ingredients involved... Except that everyone always asks me, "What is the crust made out of?" Which can be buckwheat, nuts, seeds, or even sprouted grains.

I find that most people are open to trying new dishes, but I have had complaints that "this shouldn't be called ______ because it isn't ________." But then, What would I call it instead?

Ela writes, "The same held when I brought a raw lasagna to a gathering one time. Everyone adored it, and everyone referred to it as a salad."

A raw vegan lasagna is a very specific type of "salad" ...and... "salad" is just too broad. I mean, you might as well call my raw vegan carrot-muffins a salad because they are made of carrots, raisins, dried apricots and seeds... Which does sound like a salad, until I put some banana-carob frosting on them!

"Cooked" folks & "Raw" folks

It will, of course, depend on the audience. Some people will adore a raw vegan version of something familiar who are "cooked" and some people who are "raw" will feel that the version is "just not the same" or "not worth it."

I think part of the wild success of kale chips is that they are their own thing -- a raw thing -- a veggi thing -- and a different thing. They aren't really a replacement for potato chips, they are something entirely different and new.

"Cooked" people love kale chips just like "raw" people do. And they can be made hundreds of different ways!

But honestly, I find kale chips to be a lot of bother. It's just easier to throw greens in my blender and drink them and get on with life.

I make 'fancy' things for fun, not for every-day consumption. And most 'raw versions' are fancy. They take lots and lots of time and effort in comparison to a simple salad, smoothie or juice. And I think that may be the real reason they won't catch on.

Fermenting nut cheese, creating a cashew cream, marinating vegetables, dehydrating mushroom slices, carefully slicing squash... All that stuff is very time consuming and completely not required for a very healthy raw diet. It's just something to do for fun.

I do make simple truffles often. However, that is because they're super easy and they impress "cooked" folks and "raw" folks alike. Especially when they are ginger-based or chocolate-based.

Final Thoughts

Raw food versions of comfort foods are great for people transitioning to the raw diet. However, only a small selection of these "raw food comfort foods" are really ideal for a wide audience of omnivores and long-term raw foodies alike.

I think that most raw vegan truffles will be loved by all, and that most raw vegan pizzas will be loved by all, but much of the stuff in between is just to allow someone to get past that tough spot in transition... And for special raw vegan occasions.

~ Raederle

Earlier today: Why Raw Vegans Get Sick From Foods They Used To Eat: The Answer At Last!

[Article] Why does a raw vegan who eats junk food get sick? Explained at last!

2012-01-22T11:39:00.000-08:00

Many people who enter a raw vegan 'lifestyle' find that they can't eat the things they used to without getting sick. For example, they may have eaten fried shrimp each Friday night with pizza and a glass of bottled fruit juice. Now they might find that eating that same meal would leave them rolling in pain and misery.

I've heard it said before, "I can eat steak and feel great, but a raw vegan can't, thereby my body is stronger."

But is this reasoning correct? And:

Why does a raw vegan feel sick from steak?

I'd like to endeavor to answer these two questions to the best of my ability.

To understand why a raw vegan feels sick from "junk food" but a "regular American" does not, we must examine detoxification and what it is.

Detoxification

In short:

Detoxing is when toxins move from the lymph fluids or organs into the bloodstream to be eliminated. This only happens when there is "room" for this to happen as well as "energy" in the body.

Why might someone lack the energy to detox?

Digestion

Most of the energy burned by typical Americans is in the process of digestion. This takes a lot of energy when you eat something like beans.

Beans can take over six hours to digest by someone who is reasonably healthy. They take even longer (up to three days!) in someone unhealthy.

The problem is that the nutrition of the beans never gets extracted in an unhealthy system. The sum of the extraction is empty calories and fat.

The body pulls the fibers apart, the broken cooked proteins apart, and all the while the beans are moving through the digestive tract. What our bodies can't use ends up being a meal for bacteria in our gut, such as candida.

I think is is why the Paleo diet does not recommend beans.

This exhausting digestive process leaves no energy for detoxification.

Meat, dairy and eggs take two to four hours in a healthy digestive system. They can also take days in an unhealthy digestive system.

Enzymes

The body requires digestive enzymes to digest food, and all enzymes are "destroyed" by cooking. These cooked foods (milk is cooked before being sold) are exhausting to digest.

A raw vegan diet is loaded with enzymes because everything is raw. The vegetables and fruits are loaded with everything needed to digest them already.

To get the details on enzymes and how they work, read this article all about the science of enzymes.

Fruits are the easiest foods to digest when they are eaten alone (but they are nightmare for your stomach when combined with dense food like beans, rice, meat, etc -- more details about food combination are on my page: "Food Pyramid").

Fruit can take as little as twenty minutes to digest in a healthy system! This leaves lots more energy for you.

Back To Detoxification

Your typical American breaths in smoke or smog or paint odor and they feel fine. They're currently working on digesting something. Most Americans are always working on digesting something. So the toxin can not be dealt with. The toxin has to be wrapped in fat by the liver and stored.

The moment you eat something cooked or fatty (meat is both cooked and fatty) you stop all detoxing because all the energy goes into digestion. Toxins take minerals and energy to eliminate. The easiest way to handle them is to store them as fat.

Raw vegans are always detoxing. They have the energy to always detox.

But there is something key to understand about detoxing:

What you feel is what is happening in your blood. If the level of glucose in your blood is low, you're tired. Likewise, if the level of toxins in your blood is high, you feel terrible.

A whiff of smoke comes into a raw vegan's body and then the toxins enter their blood so they can move through their body and be eliminated. The person then feels sick from smelling the smoke almost instantly.

If the toxin is stored as fat, you don't feel it. The smoker does not feel the toxins in the smoke. What they feel are the hormonal reactions. The toxins are wrapped in fat and sent to the organs or fat of the body.

If you eat bad food all the time you don't necessarily feel nauseated all the time. You might be consuming toxic substances like hydrogenated oils and aspartame and feeling pretty decent. This is because most of the toxins are being processed by the liver.

When the liver can't handle all the toxins anymore, then you start feeling terrible. Or, when you try to eat a low-fat high-toxin diet. Fat-free yogurt, sugar-free gum, and I-can't-believe-it's-not-butter are a huge recipe for disaster. These items are loaded with toxins with no healthy protective fat for the liver to protect you.

What's worse is that animals store toxins in their fat just like we do. When we eat that fat we eat their toxins. It isn't the fat that makes us fat. It is their toxins stored in their fat getting re-stored in our bodies as fat. The fat of an avocado, olive or seed will not make you fat, but the fat of an unhealthy toxin-laden animal will. This is the real reason why some people lose weight by going vegan -- they stop consuming the toxins stored within animals.

But as long as you are getting enough healthy fat, or at least non-toxic fat such as organic olive oil, and your liver is working: you don't feel the toxins you consume. The toxins are not in your blood and you feel fine.

However, if someone who eats a raw vegan diet who is always detoxing ate the same foods, they'd feel terrible. Their detox may be slowed dramatically by eating the unhealthy food, but at least when they begin to eat their body is in detox-mode. This may cause a stomach upset, a headache, muscle cramps, dizziness, and so on.

Eventually the bad food stops the detox entirely and they feel a little better. The next day they eat their healthy food again, like a green juice. This green juice begins the detox again and they finish detoxing from the unhealthy meal they ate last night and they feel very sick again in the process.

Bottom line: You don't feel it unless you detox it. It just keeps getting stored as fat.

This actually is what causes brain tumors. If the body runs out of places to put toxins, it'll put it in your brain.

Weight Loss

Anything toxic in your life causes weight gain, including stress. Hormones in your body trigger weight gain and weight loss.

putting on fat

Feeling fearful, angry, jealous, upset, etc, trigger fat gain.
Not sleeping enough causes hormonal imbalances that cause fat gain.
Staying up late at night and missing your "power hours" causes fat gain and "aging."
Never letting your insulin drop by always digesting food triggers fat gain.
Eating anything toxic triggers fat gain, especially aspartame, white sugar, white flour, hydrogenated oils, animal fats and corn syrup.

burning fat and building muscle

The hormones involved in feeling good trigger fat loss.
Exercising activates hormones for burning fat and building muscle even if you only exercise for a couple of minutes.
Detoxing from heavy metals and other toxins happens simultaneously with fat loss.
Sunlight exposure without burning balances hormones and promotes muscle building.
Foods rich in antioxidants such as blueberries and pomegranates assist in detoxification and thereby assist in fat burning.

Losing weight can feel terrible. As you burn fat you are also releasing toxins into the bloodstream.

That is why it can be very unhealthy to lose weight too fast. If toxins enter the blood but then they don't make it out of the body, they can get re-deposited in an organ, such as the kidneys. That can be very serious.

This is why starving yourself to lose weight is really dangerous. That is burning toxic fat without having the nutrient intake to actually get rid of the toxins.

Toxins

The liver wraps toxins in fat and stores them because it doesn't have the nutrition and vitality to send the toxins out of the body. To send the toxins out the body needs a modicum of hormonal balance, plenty of calcium, iron, magnesium, etc, it needs hydration (which comes from a balance of potassium, sodium and water), as well as enzymes and vitamins.

Not everyone who leads a toxic lifestyle is overweight. Toxins may be released by sweating, which can cause adverse skin reactions. With enough water consumption and exercise, many toxins are never really 'absorbed' by the body and pass through in excrement and sweat. A very smelly bowel movement is a sign of consumption of toxins.

You may notice that on very stressful days, or days when you breath in a lot of second-hand smoke, or on days where you pig out on a lot of sausages, you have a very unusually smelly bowel movement the next day. It is important to notice these signs in your body. Bad smells, just like pain, are warning signs flashing: something is wrong.

Conclusions

To have the healthy amount of fat for your body type and lifestyle you must not have exposure to toxins or you must detox from all toxin exposure.

A raw vegan feels sick from unhealthy junk foods because they detox immediately or very soon after instead of storing the toxins as fat.

A diet must be at least wholly raw for part of each day to detox. Being raw for breakfast and lunch would be enough to detox from breakfast (say around 7:00am) to dinner (say around 6:00pm), getting eleven hours of detoxing time each day (provided that there wasn't much fat involved. Nuts slow detox in small quantities -- like a tablespoons -- and stop detox in high volumes -- like a half measuring cup.)

Paying close attention to bodily reactions in combination with self education can bring you to a place where you can interpret your body's condition and be your own doctor. You can notice that your sweat smells terrible after eating fried soy and come to the conclusion that fried soy is toxic to your body. You can discover that you have metal poisoning by seeing if cilantro tastes like a penny to you.

Thank's for reading! I hope you feel empowered with new understanding after reading this entry.

Let your divine-self shine and honor yourself by treating your body with respect: give your body what makes it feel good, smell good and look good. When you honor yourself others will honor you!

~ Raederle PhoenixPS: Check out some of my raw vegan meals here in my facebook album called "Living Cuisine"

[Article Blog] Depression

2012-01-17T05:44:00.000-08:00

It feels like nobody understands at the time when you're going through it. And to an extent, they don't understand. Even when you've been through something – you've been through it, and now you're somewhere else.

Sure, we were all three years old, but how many of us really remember what that felt like?

It's similar with depression. Everyone has been there, but it is hard for us to open our hearts to someone going through it because we're so afraid we'll catch the sadness like a disease.

Many people believe that happiness comes from money, family, homes, possessions, friends, etc. But the problem with that is that then we believe that not having these things automatically equals sadness and suffering.

We can not have a continual contentment throughout our lives if our happiness is dependent on the actions of other people. Other people can be coaxed into doing what you like, but only because they're convinced they'd like to do what you'd like them to. But they won't always want to do what you want them to, and that's just that. We have to happy because of our own actions.

Happiness, love, healing – it is all action. It does not just passively sit in the background. Happiness comes from what you do. Love comes from what you do. Healing comes from what you do.

Perhaps you're thinking, "You don't know what it is like."

It's true that I'm no longer there – I am no longer depressed. But let me convey how seriously ill and depressed I was for many years of my life:

I was suicidal starting at the age of ten: no kidding. I was put on medications, went to see therapists, and I was considering such a 'bad influence' that I even got kicked out a school over it when I was in fifth grade.

I had a point in my life (at the age of fourteen) where I was wearing the same clothes every day, sleeping in them, not washing for weeks a time, even months sometimes, and I wouldn't brush my hair or anything. I went through times where I wouldn't eat, and times where I'd eat anything and everything and not care about flavor, texture of health at all.

I used to get so anti-social (age sixteen and under) that I would make up any excuse to avoid any occasion where I had to be around people. I skipped school, avoided church, refused to go to parties even if I was invited (which was rare), etc, etc, just because I would get so anxious and worried. And I would get so starved for attention, love and compassion that I would act out and say and do stupid things when I was around people.

I got into drugs (age fifteen) – weed, shrooms, pills, drinking – and I ate chinese food and white rice daily. I felt like crap. I became overweight. Much of my best clothing was stretched out and ruined as my thighs kept expanding. I bleached my hair and half of it fell out (age sixteen).

My happiness was completely circumstantial. If I got a good grade at school, I felt a little happiness. If I got a bad grade, my spirits plummeted, and sometimes left me depressed for days. I felt it nearly impossible to hang onto a feeling of happiness. It would come, and then as slippery as soap it would leave again.

I felt entirely out of control of my life. Nothing I did seemed to make any improvement. I cried much more than half the nights away for years out of my life. I slit my wrists several times between the ages of thirteen and sixteen.

Do I believe I was just being an "angsty teen"? Not at all. I've met adults going through the same 'phase' and I've met dozens of teens who have no such problems at all.

This depression wasn't always present with such force that I avoided everybody, cried half the day and slit my wrist at the end of the night. However, even when I wasn't currently 'depressed' I still felt a lack of enthusiasm for life. I might get excited about a project, idea or event, but then within minutes, hours or a couple days it would wear off and I'd be back to video games, TV, and stuffing my face with pasta and french fries.

As my mental problems got worse, so did my physical health. As I cared less about what I did or ate, and as I did more drugs, my body became more and more negatively impacted. As my body became more and more fat, sluggish, and painful to be inside, I became more depressed.

When it got to the point where I woke every morning with acid reflux, burped constantly all day, and hardly ever felt in my right mind for more than an hour... I had to do something. This where all the years of research began.

It started with a google search: "burping disease." That was the best way I could describe it. I spent much of my time high on pot, much of my time sleeping, much of my time crying, and much of my time watching cartoons or movies... I didn't even know what 'acid reflux' meant, and I certainly had no clue that I had developed a stomach ulcer. I had no idea that it wasn't normal or okay to take two to six asprins a day for a couple weeks at a time... I was, however, aware that taking half a bottle was a bad idea. But I had hoped that all that asprin would put me in the hospital or kill me so that I wouldn't have to deal with life anymore.

In 2005, the search results for "burping disease" were bleak. I found one entry that made me cry. A woman had written, "help! my daughter is twelve and she won't stop burping. she burps all the time with no end and she gets these terrible stomach aches. it's been going on for two years." And then I read another that said something along the lines of, "I've been burping constantly for six years now, and no doctor has yet to give me a real solution."

Of course, I went to doctors, but no good came of it. Just some pills that didn't help and some useless advice.

When happiness is so conditional, you can imagine how miserable I felt. To top it off, I was in an abusive relationship with a boy who threatened me and others, who bent my actions to his will, and who didn't even realize he was abusive. (He figured out how awful he'd been after I left him and actually seemed to turn around. He is married with a child now, and from what I can tell – which isn't much – he seems to be a good man now.)

When I went on my very first diet-altering regime, something amazing happened: I started feeling much more optimistic about life. The healthier I ate, the better my mood was, even before I started getting such incredible bodily results. (My first diet regime was similar to a paleo diet or a macrobiotics diet.)

When I switched to raw veganism my bouts of unhappiness were reduced down to a couple hours of crying/sadness per month. And crazier still, I notice that each time I feel so miserable, each time I can link it up directly with a food choice. For example, the last time I felt all teary-eyed and hopeless I had made a really bad food combination (protein + starch + sweet + fat) and I hadn't eaten much of any leafy greens for several days. (Not eating 'much of any' in my book is eating a handful of leafy greens a day or less.)

I have several raw vegan friends who had the exact same experience.

One of them said to me a few months ago – when describing their transition to raw food, "whoa! Since when did I become optimistic? How come I don't feel cynical?"

Another friend, more recently – one of the most upbeat people I know, shared this with me and a small group of raw vegans a small dinner potluck: "It was like I woke up one day and I was an entirely different person. I felt completely unlike myself, and it was the best feeling. The only explanation was the food. Nothing else had changed."

If you want to start feeling excellent about life, I fully believe that diet choices are where to start. It becomes so much easier to do everything else in life when the food is healthy and supporting.

Once you've made a commitment to healthier eating, then there are powerful mental tools we can employ to delve deeper into an abiding joy that lasts minute to minute, day to day and year to year. I have written a few times about that, because "feeling happy" is a something everyone wants, and I especially enjoy learning about the mastery of happiness and the art of love:

Entries of mine on the topic of happiness:

The Art of Happiness

Cause & Effect

...If Only...

When You Are Broken You Are Powerful

Anger Displacement

The divine master within me honors the divine master within you.

~ Raederle

[Article] 10 Ways To Get Your Vitamin C Need Met Daily With Food

2012-01-15T14:16:00.000-08:00

Ten Different Ways To Get All The Vitamin C You Need In One Day

The Myth

Ascorbic acid is the same as vitamin C, right?

Wrong.

Ascorbic acid is like the "wrapper" (similar to the cell wall) that the full live vitamin C complex comes in. Vitamin C is destroyed by heat because it contains an enzyme. Ascorbic acid has been entirely mis-named, as the word 'ascorbic' itself means anti-scurvy. However, studies have shown that ascorbic acid alone does nothing to help or prevent scurvy. Only fresh vitamin C does that.

Oranges are the best source of vitamin C, right?

Wrong again.

Per calorie, kiwi and bell peppers have way, way more vitamin C than oranges.

It's true that oranges have a lot of vitamin C in comparison to bananas and apples.

However, oranges have been made the poster-child for vitamin C by the folks selling pasteurized orange juice. Cooking destroys all viable vitamin C, so pasteurized orange juice doesn't contain vitamin C anyway.

What is the optimal way to get enough vitamin C in your diet?

Lots of fresh fruits and vegetables contain high vitamin C levels, but certainly not all. The following is a list of ten different ways to get 75 mg of vitamin C (which is said to be the minimum amount needed daily).

The percentage on the far right is the amount you're getting in relation to your daily need. The center number is the actual amount of vitamin C.

1 kiwi and ¼ cup pineapple	83.7 mg	112%
¼ of a medium red bell pepper and ¾ cup pineapple	97.1 mg	130%
½ of a medium red bell pepper	76 mg	101%
1 cup of kale	80.4 mg	107%
2 cups cabbage and 1 cup watercress	70.8 mg	106%
1½ cups parsnips, 1 cup radish slices, 1 cup basil leaves, 1 cup cilantro leaves and ½ cup chopped cauliflower	85.5 mg	114%
½ cup chopped cauliflower and 1 cup chopped broccoli	170 mg	143%
1 cup shredded bok choy, 1 cup garden cress and 1 lemon	84.6 mg	113%
½ grapefruit, 1 leaf chard and ½ cup mango	82.8 mg	110%
1 grapefruit	76.8 mg	102%

If you want to ensure you're getting enough of all of the nutrients the man is currently able to track in your diet on a raw vegan plan, then check out my nutritionally complete meal plans.

Thanks for reading! Merry eating.

~ Raederle Phoenix

[Article] The Paleo Diet

2012-01-15T06:12:00.000-08:00

Paleo Diet

Is it a good diet?
Is it a good transition diet to raw veganism?
Is it healthy for most people?
Will it heal disease?
Will it help you lose weight?

I've only recently learned about the paleo diet, and I'm actually quiet excited about it. The guidelines of a paleo diet are very much like the guidelines I started out with for myself when trying to heal my stomach ulcers and stop the constant acid reflux, painful burping and smelly gas.

Meat & Eggs

The paleo diet is not vegan or even vegetarian. It includes meat and eggs, however, it is very specific that the meat has to be of good quality. The animals have to be pasture-raised on a completely natural diet. Chickens should be out in the sun eating insects and grain. Cows should be roaming and eating grass. Fish should be wild, or at least fed the same diet as a wild fish.

Low-Fat

Some people who promote the paleo diet says that the animal-products in the paleo diet should be low fat. This makes sense, since animal fat is full of toxins. All animals, including humans, store toxins in fat cells. If you're having trouble losing weight on a diet that should promote weight loss, it is likely that you are retaining fat due to toxin exposure. (Laundry detergent, deodorant, make-up and house-hold cleaners are come sources of toxic chemicals.)

No Dairy

What is very interesting is that the paleo diet does not contain dairy. This is fabulous. It's hard to get ahold of raw milk legally, for one thing. Another problem is the production of cheese and all the mold-waste-products present in the cheese. Another issue is that diary products are high in fat and they are often consumed with sweetened products (breads, granola, grains, desserts) which cause your digestive system to come to a complete halt.

Food Combinations

Mixing a high-fat food with a high-sugar food in one meal is the worst possible food combination for health. And most everything high-fat is also high-protein. Protein, fats and sugars require completely different digestive envirnments. Your stomach can't turn clockwise and counterclockwise at the same time, and that is essentially what you are asking it to do when you eat such a complex meal. (Your stomach does not actually spin, I'm making a silly comparison. This is your que to laugh out loud and enjoy my very great sillness and light-hearted approach to this serious topic.)

I go into more detail about food combinations in my article about raw vegan protein.

Legumes

The paleo diet also includes vegetables, but no legumes – which I think is great. The reasoning is that "if you can't eat it raw, don't eat it." Even if you're going to cook it, you still should be able to eat it raw. Peanuts are a legume, and it would be great if people stopped eating peanuts for a number of reasons.

A mold, called aspergillus, is very common in peanuts. It produces a mold-waste product called aflatoxin. This toxin is similar in bodily damge to cigarette smoking. It is held by some that aflatoxin is the reason for peanut allergies.

Some paleo diets also suggest avoiding green beans and peas because they are legumes. However, green beans and peas can be eaten raw, so that doesn't follow the 'don't eat it because it can't be eaten raw' rule.

Beans are extremely hard to digest — they take about six hours in a healthy digestive system. If someone ate beans by themselves, and waited six hours before eating anything else, and also had a very healthy digestive system and lifestyle, then I highly doubt beans would hurt them at all.

However, if someone has any digestive issues, beans must be avoided entirely, so it makes sense for a diet to come along and say "hey, don't eat legumes."

I used to have stomach ulcers, candida, leaky guy syndrome, irritable bowel syndrome, and acid reflux. Just a small half cup of beans is still something that I can not eat (last time I checked – which was around September 2011, as of January 2012.)

Beans should not be eaten before bed, because digesting during sleeping hours throws of hormonal balances (which is a long discussion in its own right.)

Food timing and food combination are critical points to consider.

When people say, "oh, people are different" they do not mean genetically. For 99.99% of your genes, or more, we're exactly identical. What makes the difference is location, toxin exposure and medical history. And now, I'd like to also point out: culture. When you eat and what combinations you eat also affect your experience of the world: your experience of food.

A person who follows beans with fruit may feel very sick. The same person may feel great if they ate beans alone and waited at least four hours before eating anything else.

I have no idea if the person who came up with the paleo diet thought about all of that, but in any event, I support the idea of not eating legumes.

Nuts

Nuts and seeds on a paleo diet are generally allowed, but limited to one ounce (two tablespoons) per day. This is a very reasonable amount that I can readily agree with. I would advice making those two tablespoons a rotation between almonds, chia seeds, sesame seeds, sunflower seeds and the occasional Brazil nut.

Nuts in general can contain mold waste. For this reason, it may be best to avoid nuts unless they come directly from the shell. However, I've not seen any mention of avoiding nuts, or mentioning the danger of mold-waste on any of the articles I've read about the paleo diet. So apparently this "movement" doesn't know about that detail.

I have read however that many paleo diet gurus suggest "no cashews" for the reason that they can't be readily consumed raw.

I also applaud this part of the guidelines. Cashews must be hand-cracked with much effort to be eaten raw, and even then it can be dangerous because of toxins in the shell of the cahsew. This is why 'raw cashews' are your grocery store are not raw. They are simply not-roasted.

Roasting nuts, beans, or anything, does create acrylimide, another type of toxin. Any form of cooking that causes browning creates this toxin. So it is still better to get raw nuts than roasted nuts, even if the 'raw nut' was still boiled out of its shell. Nevertheless, I think cashews are an inferior food choice when it comes to nutrition and optimal health.

Fruits

Fruits are not limited in a paleo diet, which shows some sense. Low carb diets can really tick me off, as so many problems are caused by high-fat and high-protein diets. (Not that I'm trying to deny the need for fats and protein: it is only that it is senseless to consume them in high volumes unless you are an athlete.)

Oils

One part I do not agree with is the concept of oils being fine, with no particular regulation on the oils. I think oil is the downfall of many so-called healthy diets. As soon as you've got two tablespoons of oil slathered all over your cabbage, kale or spianch, you're getting 80% of the calories from fat.

I especially would not agree with the concept of canola oil being okay.

No Wheat

I'm very pleased to see a diet come along that says "no white sugar, no legumes and no wheat." That is ground breaking for most Americans. The way wheat is processed is inefficient. Flour is oxidized to the point of nearly all nutrient loss. White flour is refined, stripping away the protective fiber and beneficial nutrients. Then it sits about for months in plastic contains picking up xeno-estrogen and becoming rancid. And then people consume it in horrific food combinations with diary, processed sugar and dried fruits.

Paleo Diet Premise

I read through several sets of paleo diet guidelines. One of them contained absurdly terrible things like "coffee and diet soda" being okay in whatever amount you desire.

However, one very sensible site put forward the strong importance of eating only foods that are whole, and have been available to mankind for thousands of years. Diet soda is niether a whole food or a food that was made in the past. Diet soda wasn't even around in the 1800s, much less in 100 A.D.

The same principle applies to canola oil. We didn't eat in 100 A.D. and we don't need to eat it now.

Toxic "Foods"

I certainly agree that the most toxic items being consumed today are white sugar, corn syrup, white flour and conventional soy (gmo).

Standard American Diet versus Paleo Diet

Removing many common food toxins in the American diet has a tremendous result. I still vividly remember what a huge difference it made in my life just to remove high fructose corn syrup and white sugar from my diet. Anyone who still consumes these toxins will benefit highly from a paleo diet.

Someone who is already vegan can benefit from removing corn syrup, white sugar, wheat and legumes from their diet.

Ethics

I’m in disagreement with most vegans I've encountered.

I did not get into raw veganism from the “don’t murder animals or exploit living creatures” standpoint.

As far as I’m concerned, mass-harvesting vegetables can be an ethical crime, and mono-crops of corn is absolutely an ethical crime. One good book that explains why mono-crops and pesticides are so horrible is Empty Harvest by Bernard Jensen.

Many animal-free options are more detrimental to the overall eco-system of the planet than “animal exploitation.” Destroying an entire ecosystem not only tortures and poisons the animals, but also the plants, soil and air. It doesn't make any sense to shun eating meat and then drink a bottle of soda.

The ecological impact of soda is explained in this entry here.

Synthetic fabrics often create so much waste to create that they destroy acres and acres of land, whereas wool only makes sheep cold (it doesn’t destroy the entire habitat for all the plants and animals where the sheep roam).

I want the world to be healthier and cleaner for everyone. Humans and all forms of animal, as well as plants. Forests should be honored and preserved. Oceans should never be polluted. Rivers should not be waste-dumps.

It's great to become a vegetarian or a vegan, but it is hypocritical to preach about "saving the animals" while practicing dozens of other habits that pollute the world and take away the natural habitat of wild animals.

Paleo Diet versus Raw Veganism

The “need” for raw-veganism is not that the human body can not thrive with animal products or cooked foods included.

It’s obvious that the human body can thrive while including cooked foods, such as long-grain brown rice, boiled vegetables, wild-fish and grass-fed beef.

Yet, more and more people are turning to raw veganism because it makes them feel better and heals them. Why is that?

A raw vegan diet puts someone on a slow detox, even if they don’t do a lot of juicing. Almost any cooked food stops the body from removing toxins. So anybody with severe toxicity may require a raw vegan diet to fully heal.

However, for people who never had mercury poisoning, never smoked, and have not taken anti-biotics more than once, a diet including cooked foods and even quality animal products can be quite robust.

Even if I did have access to meat I considered "safe" for consumption, I still may refuse to consume it due to ecological concerns. That, however, is different from health concerns.

I want to emphasize this however: Animal fat contains stored toxins. Livers store toxins. Meat has a high-concentration of a nearly-impossible-to-utilize protein. In other words: you need a very strong digestive system and immune system to handle meat.

This is why so many people feel so much better when they go vegan. We're already under stress from pollution coming from cars, cigarettes, planes, factories, and so forth. If your diet is not fully organic then you are being exposed to chemical insecticides. If you have carpets, then you're exposed to the chemicals put into that carpet. If you wear polyester you're exposed to xeno-estrogen. If you wear conventional cotton (which I'm wearing right now, unfortunately), then you're exposed to the chemicals used on the cotton. If you wear deodorant, make-up, perfume, etc, that isn't organic... I think you may be beginning to get the idea.

Bottom line: Animal products are an additional source of toxicity that you are free to avoid. My husband said when I met him, "I'll never be one of those crazy vegans." He was thinking about it from the standpoint of; "Animals hunt animals, I'm an animal, I can kill and eat an animal too." That is a valid standpoint, except that factory farming is not fair, not ecologically reasonable, and it is not sustainable and not efficient.

My husband is now 99% vegan and he says, "I really don't miss meat. I thought I would, but I really don't. On occasion, I want some fish, but on a day to day basis, it's great being a raw vegan." (He's had fish once in the past three months, maybe four months.)

Conclusion

The paleo diet, in my estimation, is mostly sensible in its premise and guidelines. If the entire world (except for current vegetarians, vegans and raw vegans) switched to a paelo diet, it would be more sustainable and healthy than the diets that most people follow today.

And in addition, vegetarians, vegans and raw vegans could take a few concepts from the paleo diet.

Vegetarians, vegans and raw vegans could stand to learn: No syrups, no granulated sweeteners, no powder sweeteners. That includes high fructose agave syrup (which is, in some ways, worse than high fructose corn syrup). No cashews, no peanuts. Nuts and seeds in moderation, averaging one ounce a day.

Vegetarians and vegans could stand to learn: No wheat, no legumes

Vegetarians could stand to learn: No dairy

Omnivores could learn all of the above, and also: Only pasture-raised meat that has not been giving antibiotics, gmo soy or corn, and has been raised outdoors in the sunlight and raised on its natural diet.

Your Questions Answered

Is it a good diet?

If you're coming from the standard American diet (S.A.D.), then absolutely.

Is it a good transition diet to raw veganism?

Yes. If you are currently moving towards raw veganism and eat a S.A.D. then you will experience benefits from the paleo diet that will make it easier to move towards a raw vegan diet.

Is it healthy for most people?

I think I've already answered this one plenty in my conclusion.

Will it heal disease?

No. This is not a detox diet. You need raw foods to detox, and a paleo diet still suggests much cooking.

However, if you had an allergy to corn syrup, or an allergy to pollen caused by corn syrup, this may dissipate.

Many toxins in the diet (such as aspartame) directly cause allergies, diseases and metal dysfunctions. Removing those toxins is sometimes enough to relieve an issue.

However, the paleo diet will do little to actually remove toxins from your body unless you regularly go onto a raw juice feast for one or two days out of the week.

Will it help you lose weight?

Yes. If you remove dairy from a diet high in cheese, milk and yogurt, that is a big start. If you remove soda, refined sugars, mono-sodium-glutamte, grains, flour, legumes, aspartame, trans-fats, etc, from your diet, then you will lose weight.

Another step you can take that will assist weight loss, without actually going fully raw vegan is to boil and steam food. Boiling and steaming food does not create acrylimide. Only frying, baking, toasting and otherwise browning the food causes acrylimde to form. By following the rule of only boiling or steaming, you can still enjoy hot food with less bodily damage.

Thank you for reading. I hope this has been helpful!

~ Raederle Phoenix

[Article Blog] Vaccines ― Safe?

2012-01-13T05:03:00.000-08:00

“That stupid saying "What you don't know can't hurt you" is ridiculous. What you don't know can kill you. If you don't know that tractor trailer trucks hurt when hitting you, then you can play in the middle of the interstate with no fear ― but that doesn't mean you won't get killed.” ― Dave Ramsey

My usual argument against vaccines: I've already suffered from enough mercury poisoning. I'd prefer not to continue my exposure.

A friend says, "Mercury isn't a real ingredient. What is in the vaccines is thimerosal, a mercury-derived preservative. And it's not found in all vaccines. For instance, unless it's a flu shot, it's not found in the routine childhood vaccines. And since 1999, it's been being reduced and/or eliminated from even the small amount of vaccines it's in. You see, thimerosal is only used in vaccines that they produce very large doses of because it keeps bacteria out of the vaccine."

Me: "It's true, a vaccine may be harmless. The issue is that is also may not be harmless, and the person providing it can not prove to me that it is not harmless."

My friend: "Most of the time a vaccine will have Albumin (egg) or an egg protein, amino acids, ascorbic acid (vitamin c), various forms of calcium, or gelatin and glucose. None of these are harmful to the body."

Me: "Ascorbic acid is *not* vitamin C. This is something I've done a lot of reading on, and ascorbic acid is only a very small (useless) part of the vitamin C complex that has no benefit to the body at all, and in large doses can actually be quite harmful. The book 'Empty Harvest' is one that I've read that talks about that in particular detail.

"So many commonly established things like "oh, ascorbic acid is just vitamin C" are completely false (and have known to be so for decades by many researchers and scientists.)

"And egg protein? Do I want egg protein injected into my blood? I don't even want to eat it, much less have it in my blood. From my understanding (which is less than my understanding of ascorbic acid) -- foreign proteins in the blood are treated as invaders and raise a very strong immune response. This is why many people go vegan due to "allergies." (And a "strong immune response" can be very serious: consider a 105 degree fever, for example.)"

My friend: "You can find vaccines by ingredient or ingredients by vaccine. The information is a google search away, it's not like they keep it hidden. So you can ALWAYS know what you're doing, and there's not reason not to get some of them (like the basic childhood vaccines.)"

Me: I completely disagree.

They've been calling agave low glycemic for years, and it's been finally uncovered that is not low GI at all, and that it is harmful to diabetics as well as other people with sensitive organs.

They've been saying that splenda is a safe sugar alternative, and yet it puts people in hospitals.

When trans-fats came out (hydrogenated oils, like margarine), they said it was 'healthier than butter.'

How am I to believe anything they say about a vaccine?

They aren't currently required to tell if the corn in a product is GMO or not. I bet there are plenty of things they are not required to tell you about vaccines as well.

I can be sincere, and I can be sincerely wrong. But everyone should have the right to control what enters their body.

I would deem it just as unsafe to have a vaccine than I would to have sex with a complete stranger without a condom. You just can't fully know what you're doing.

The more I learn, the less I want anything that comes in a plastic container, or in a box of any sort, or that even came shipped in a truck. Unfortunately, I have to become completely self-sustainable in order to avoid things that come by truck. (This is a tad of an exaggeration for what I currently feel, except the plastic container stuff. Amazing studies about breast cancer have shown that plastic has a very, very direct effect on creating and increasing the activity of cancer cells in the breast.)

I feel like my body has been invaded and defiled by lies, lies and lies leading to the poisoning of my organs, which I'm still recovering from.

Show me a vaccine growing on a tree, and then I'll consider putting it in my body.

That's all I have to say on the topic.

~ Raederle

[Article] Oxygen

2012-01-06T09:53:00.000-08:00

It is now evident to me that I did virtually everything wrong in regards to my health as a child. Everything from sleeping inconsistently to eating loads of fresh fries to getting virtually no exercise whatsoever.

At a recent lecture I attended I learned more about the role of oxygen and the importance of getting enough oxygen. It is a fascinating topic which I will undoubtedly research further in the future.

Raederle Phoenix, November 2011
Photo taken by timer, set by Raederle
Layering of three photos done in Photoshop by Raederle

Before I get to the notes I took from the lecture, I'd like to share something else I stumbled upon today. This strongly reinforces my commitment to being my own best doctor:

According to Jesse Schwartz, PhD:

Every year, 7.5 million unnecessary medical and surgical procedures are performed.

At least 106,000 people die every year from adverse drug reactions.

A mere 6% of all adverse drug reactions are properly identified. (Meaning the number above could only be 6% of those who die from adverse drug reactions yearly.)

Most side effects are mistaken for new disease symptoms leading to further drugging and unnecessary medical procedures.

The mortality rate for people between 45 to 64 who took prescription drugs correctly, rose 90% in just five years.

Dr. Mercola tells us:

Deaths caused by conventional medicine in ten years: approximately 8,000,000. That’s more than all the casualties from all the wars America has fought in its entire history”.

[begin notes]

Oxygen

Notes from a lecture on oxygen and the importance of pure air.

We need oxygen to survive. It is a vital element.

Oxygen:

Vitalizes
Invigorates
Sooths Nerves

Oxygen deprivation is called hypoxia.

Hypoxia:

Fatigue
Lethargy
Nausea
Headaches
(extreme case) Blue lips
(extreme case) Blue fingertips

Lack of oxygen around the cells causes cells to clump together and lose oxygen carrying capacity. Cigarette smoke in particular causes this. Oxygen deprivation and dehydration play off of each other; dehydration reduces lung capacity. Oxygen deprivation lessens the ability of cells to become hydrated.

Oxygen received by the body can be increased by environment, breathing patterns and by the foods we consume.
Oxygen received by the body can be decreased by pollution, breathing habits and by poor dietary habits.

Positive Ions [More Carbon Dioxide Than Oxygen]:

are Heavy
cause Aches
are Depressing
are in the air Before a Thunderstorm

Positive Ions [More Carbon Dioxide Than Oxygen] are caused by:

Stove heat (artificial indoor heating)
Industry cars
Chimneys
Smoking cigarettes / smoking in general

Negative Ions [High Oxygen Molecule]:

are Light
are Energizing

Negative Ions [High Oxygen Molecule] are created:

during Thunderstorms
by Waves, Oceans, Waterfalls
within Forests

To Increase Oxygen:

Avoid stove heat (use a heat lamp, a rice bag, an electric blanket, hot water, etc, but not a furnace)
Oxygen carrying capacity in the bloodstream can be increased by consuming fresh raw beets or fresh raw beet juice.
Wide-leave plants take in more carbon dioxide and put out more oxygen. Spend time around these plants.
Avoid heavy metals, such as mercury (all sea food has a dangerous amount of mercury; shrimp contains a slightly less dangerous amount)
Sit up straight and increase abdominal muscular strength; a straight back promotes deep breathing
Wear loose clothing; skin needs air just like every other aspect of the body
Breath through the nose and fill up the diaphragm; "Belly breathing" promotes oxygen within the body
Exercise vigorously each day; exercise promotes deep breathing; ideally exercise should take place outdoors near wide-leaf plants

All good things in moderation. Work and play are both good, and should both come in moderation.

All poisons do not come in the "moderation" category. They come in the "never" category. We do not want nuclear radiation in moderation, or bleach added to our water in moderation.

Moderation:

Work
Play

Never:

White Sugar / Sweeteners (pancreas abuse, gum damage, serotonin response damage, hormonal imbalance, weight gain)
Caffeine (seven cups of coffee per day will cause a mental illness. coffee poured on rose bushes will wilt the roses)
Chemicals (anything artificially concentrated)
Mercury
Tobacco (causes thin arteries)
Drugs (all alien substances, including margarine)
Mono-sodium-glutamate (hidden in ingredient lists under "natural flavorings" and "flavorings")

[conclusion of notes]

The above I've done no further research to back up in particular. Those are the notes from a single lecture I attended. However, some of the content I was already aware of. For example, after reading The Sugar Blues I had no doubt that white sugar and other sweeteners have no place in any diet, whatsoever. It is well documented that sugar is toxic, addictive, and extremely negatively life-altering. When I see children with candy my heart aches. It's not doing someone a favor to give them a sweetened junk item.

I don't drink coffee anymore, but not because I ever started avoiding caffeine. I've known that it could cause migraines and shakiness, but to go so far as to say that seven cups of coffee a day would cause mental illness or to go so far as to say that coffee should never be consumed... Well, this is not a concept I'm terribly familiar with.

I eliminated coffee from my diet at the same time as white sugar. I always used to put cream and sugar heavily in each cup of coffee I drank. The idea of consuming black coffee never appealed to me at all.

I did still drink green tea on occasion. When I learned that black, green and white teas have caffeine, I was unconcerned. However, in hearing whispers in the wind about caffeine, I decided I didn't need any tea but herbal tea, and I discarded black, green and white teas from my diet. After-all, the concept of roasting something to increase caffeine content just sounds like messing with nature to me.

As a last note on tea, it is obvious to me that the most sensible tea is sun tea: tea created by putting herbs into a glass pitcher of water in the sun. Unfortunately, I currently live somewhere that lacks in sunlight. Needless to say, I'm not going to be able to live here forever, even if it is just for that reason alone.

I was not aware, previously to the lecture, that mercury was linked to oxygen deprivation. As you may know, if you've read my story, I bit a thermometer as a toddler. Biting a glass thermometer had two repercussions: glass in my teeth and mercury in my stomach. I don't remember my stomach being pumped, but I do recall the glass being picked from my teeth.

Now you know why nobody uses glass thermometers anymore.

In any event, mercury poisoning that severe can have effects for twenty years or more. I turn twenty-three this month, and that happened to me at the age of three. So thus far, my entire life has been in the show of metal poisoning.

Beyond that, my mother has amalgam fillings, which I often call "mercury fillings" since they contain mercury. Containing such fillings when pregnant exposes the fetus to mercury in levels higher than considered safe. This means I already had a mild case of mercury toxicity at birth.

If you combine this information with the fact that I outright refused to drink water as a child, it suddenly becomes crystal clear why my lungs always burned terribly if I tried to run or play with other children. It was simply a need of oxygen and water.

I thank you for reading!

If you'd like to support me, this blog, and my continued research consider buying one of my week-long meal plans.

~ Raederle

[Recipe] Green Ginger Cookies

2012-01-05T15:02:00.000-08:00

Green Ginger Cookies
These can be made the day before they are served.

2 cups spinach, kale, chard, beet leaves or some combination of these
1 cup oat groats, soaked overnight
1 tablespoon minced ginger (or more, to taste)
1 cup raisins, not soaked
2 tablespoons chia seeds
¼ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
½ teaspoon nutmeg
1 lemon, juiced
2 tablespoons coconut shreds (optional)

1. Soak oat groats overnight in drinking water. Drain them and rinse thoroughly.
2. Pat oats dry with a clean towel.
3. Put all ingredients into the food processor.
4. If a chunky texture is desired, reserve 2 tablespoons of raisins and 2 tablespoons of oats to add after the initial blend.
5. Blend until a smooth soft dough is formed.
6. If creating chunky cookies, add reserved oats and raisins and pulse 10-20 times.
7. Form cookies. These can be rolled into balls, or smashed into cookie-like shapes, or rolled and then cut into triangles or squares.
8. If using coconut shreds, coat the outside of the cookie with coconut shreds.
9. Put in the dehydrator or the fridge. Either will firm them and create a pleasant cookie.

For information about the ingredients used, and why I use them, refer to my other recently posted recipe which uses many of the same ingredients: Berry Bowl. That recipe also contains important information for maintaining healthy teeth while on a raw vegan diet or a high-fruit diet.

Also, I've got something new I've been working on the past few months. I've been studying the nutrition of different vegetables, fruits, seeds and nuts and learning bundles about hormonal balance, digestive combinations and natural treatments for many different aliments. I've been so busy learning, I have not had much time to blog. However, I have made time to create full meal plans that get your full nutritional needs met each day in the plan. Check them out and get ready to become blissfully balanced and experience elegance.

Thanks for stopping by!

~ Raederle Phoenix

[Recipe] Berry Bowl

2012-01-05T11:50:00.001-08:00

Berry Bowl

½ cup oat groats, soaked overnight
½ cup spinach, chard or kale (use spinach if you're new to raw foods)
¼ cup frozen cranberries (use less if you're sensitive to astringent/sour flavors)
¼ cup frozen blueberries
¼ cup frozen raspberries
1 tablespoon fresh ginger, minced (adjust to your taste for ginger)
½ cup dried apricots, soaked overnight
3 tablespoons chia seeds
½ teaspoon cinnamon
⅛ teaspoon nutmeg
1 apple or 1 pear
½ lemon, juiced (optional; adds freshness)

1. Put soaked oat groats into food processor with dried apricots.
2. Blend until consistent, but chunky.
3. Add Brussels sprouts and spices and blend for ten to thirty seconds.
4. Add frozen berries and pulse seven times.
5. Cut apple into pieces roughly and add.
6. Juice one lemon over the food processor.
7. Pulse six to sixteen times, aiming for pieces no larger than ½-inch on a side.

8. Garnish with a few fresh berries. Mint leaves would also be a pretty and tasty addition.

Swish water in your mouth afterward to clean your teeth.

Try not to drink a full glass of water immediately after eating, so that you do not dilute your digestive acid. Instead, drink water twenty minutes before eating, or an hour or more afterward. Just use a mouthful or two to clean your teeth.

Another way to clean your teeth is to chew celery.

Do not brush your teeth however. The acid in fruits temporarily weakens your tooth enamel. You neither want to leave that acid on your teeth, or brush your teeth. Instead, chew celery or a lettuce leaf and drink a couple gulps of water. Another way to clean your teeth is to use a probiotic beverage such as Inner Eco (coconut water kefir).

And, while we're on the subject of teeth: Tooth paste rots your teeth and your brain. I'm not kidding. I'd rather use rubbing alcohol than tooth paste, although I do not use rubbing alcohol either. I use baking soda two to four times a week, and the rest of the time I use plain water in combination with using Inner Eco, celery and drinking water to clean my teeth.

For extra cleanliness in the mouth, on occasion (roughly once a month) I use a drop of clove oil which kills off the bacteria that form cavities.

Why I choose to use these ingredients:

Oat groats have less fat than nuts and seeds, which means they don't slow down digestion as much as nuts and seeds. I use whole oat groats, and not "rolled oats" because rolled oats are heated and thereby denatured. You can't sprout rolled oats (even if they were not heated, they're still squished), but you can sprout oat groats. They're available in the bulk section of most Whole Foods. In Buffalo, NY, oat groats are available in the bulk section of the Lexington Co-Op.

I add spinach, kale or chard to this dish to give it some added nutrition. Fresh, frozen and dried fruits are healthy, but they don't contain many key things that vegetables do. Fruit fiber and vegetable fibers are different, and both fibers are important in the diet. Green leafy things contain chlorophyll, which I believe is essential to the health of the circulatory system. I could go on, but you get the idea: green leafy things are important.

I use cranberries in my berry selection because they have potent antioxidant activity, as is evident from their astringent flavor.

I use dried apricots, prunes, figs or dried peaches because they contain higher nutrition per calorie than raisins, dates or zante currants. Dried apricots in particular are low calorie per high nutrition.

I add chia seeds to my recipes for their iron and calcium content. For my taste pallet, I have a hard time getting enough calcium and iron without chia seeds. It's true, I could get enough calcium and iron from greens, but on average I don't. This isn't because I can't, but because my taste buds are not acclimated to enough greens, and also because my schedule is tight to be juicing as much green veggies as I'd like. So, to make up for the difference, I add chia seeds.

Fresh ginger is great for digestive health, but I use it because I love the flavor and spunk that it adds.

I use cinnamon and nutmeg purely for their flavor. They don't have particular nutritional benefits that I'm seeking.

I use apples or pears because they're affordable and I like the taste. Mangoes, peaches and many other fruits also work in this recipe or in a variation of this recipe. However, the firmness of apples and pears adds a certain texture that I find desirable.

If you want a whole week's worth of recipes, organized so that you get all of your nutritional needs met each and every day, check out my raw vegan 7-day and 8-day meal plans.

Thanks for reading!

Enjoy and photograph your creations!!!

~ Raederle

[Article Blog] Questions & Answers

2011-12-18T06:24:00.000-08:00

Questions & Answers
December 2011

"I always get shin splints after about a min of skipping, any ideas where I go wrong?"

That could be a need for trace minerals.

Most of us get a somewhat decent amount of iron and calcium, but then we can't utilize our nutrients due to lack of trace minerals.

Do you eat any seaweeds?
High-mineral sea salt?
Drink wheatgrass?

Each of those is high in different kinds of trace minerals.

I notice when my trace mineral content is low, my fingernails start breaking off easily within a couple weeks.

Also, Vitamin D is required to get calcium from the gut to the bloodstream. Then something I have not looked into too much yet, called "Vitamin F" is needed to get calcium from the bloodstream to the tissue. Skin, muscles and bones all need volumes of calcium.

I do not suggest calcium supplementation, but rather looking for foods high in calcium because so many vitamins are required to utilize the minerals we take in.

"My stomach has been hurting after everything I eat. I'm at a place where everything feels potentially harmful. What should I do?"

My condolences. I've been there, and it's rough. On the positive side, that was what motivated me to get where I am today.

Digestion Tips:

Remember that cooking destroys 100% of enzymes (which are vital to digestion) and 100% of oxygen (required for every cell in the body), and 80% of vitamins and minerals (including 100% of the vitamin C content). So raw vegetables and fruits are a 1000% more beneficial than cooked ones.

Also, cooking without water (toasting, baking, frying) create acrylamide: a very dangerous toxin. Anything that is "browned" such as bread, fried chicken, french fries or toast, has a very high level of acrylamide. Often people are addicted to this toxin because it slows the body down and represses emotions and thoughts because it is so taxing to deal with. (The book Raw Emotions by Angela Stokes goes into this in detail.)

Remember that animals are given antibiotics, which kill off all the good flora and allow bad bacteria (like ecoli) to proliferate. Bacteria, even when cooked, is still very harmful, because 'bad bacteria' gives off 'waste'. Essentially, bacteria "poo" which is very toxic for us. Dairy, meat, eggs and peanuts all have very high levels of bacteria waste.

High-water content foods are more hydrating that water alone. The more juicy and watery a food is, by nature, the more oxygen it provides, the more hydration your cells receive, and the more easily-assimilated the minerals within the food. High water content foods are: melons, berries, celery, leafy greens, apples, mangoes, papaya, tomatoes, bell peppers and cucumber.

Stomach and intestines should be empty as much as possible between meals. In order to do this, digestion times must be considered:

(These times are accurate for the item eaten alone. Combining foods makes the time increase dramatically. Also, the less healthy the digestive system, the slower it is. These are times for a healthy digestive system.)

Raw melon: 20 minutes
Raw high-water fruits: 30 minutes
Dense fruits (bananas): 40 minutes
Leafy high-water greens: 1 hour
Dense greens (carrots, beets): 1.5 hours
Cooked greens and starchy vegetables (cooked yams, cooked carrots): 2 hours
Cooked grains (pasta, bread, wheat crackers): 3-4 hours
Fatty raw foods (raw seeds, raw nuts, avocado): 3-5 hours
Medium-protein high-fat cooked foods (dairy, meat, eggs): 4-5 hours
High-protein cooked foods (beans, lentils, buckwheat): 6 hours

So, using the above list, you want to emphasize meals from the beginning of the list. So melon for breakfast is excellent. Then, if you eat one hour after the melon, you're giving (in theory) forty minutes of stomach-clean time before eating again. Then for brunch, you could eat berries and an apple. If you eat again two hours later you get an-hour-and-a-half of stomach-clean time. If for lunch you eat a salad and some cooked starchy greens (like boiled yams and carrots), it'd take around two hours to digest, so you'd want to wait four hours before eating again.

Another very important tip: Try to finish digesting before you go to sleep. So, if you're going to bed at 10:00pm, and the last meal you eat is going to be a cooked grain, such as quinoa or amaranth, which will take three to four hours to digest, you'd want to eat that at 5:30pm, and then not eat anything else for the rest of the evening. If the last thing you eat that day is a big raw salad (no cooked sweetened processed salad dressing -- using lemon juice, fresh herbs, and spices for flavor) without any seeds or avocado, then you could eat it at 8:30pm and have an empty stomach by bed time.

I don't recommend eating fruits in the evening because they give you a burst of energy, and thereby a burst of insulin, which can cause mood instability, hormonal imbalance, and difficulty sleeping. Of course, I never recommend any refined sugars, and you probably know that by now. Fruit in the late evening is a very small small annoyance the body in comparison to the toxic crisis that white sugar is to the body.

In terms of cooked foods: aim for boiled foods. Avoid frying, baking, deep-frying, toasting, etc. Also, avoid wheat and barley.

Rice noodles, millet, brown rice, quinoa, amaranth, etc, can easily take the place of wheat products.

If you can follow the tips I've outlined in this message for two weeks, I promise huge improvements. I know you can't follow all of this at once right away. It's a lot to take on. Rather, I suggest using this as a guideline and moving 'in that direction' as you can. So, for starters, just start taking note of the digestion time of a meal, and avoid combining fruits with other foods. Eating steak and potatoes at 12:00pm and then fruit at 1:00pm still counts as food-combining with fruit because the steak and potatoes will still be in the digestive system.

You'll know you're doing well when you start having a bowel movement at least once a day, or even twice a day, and when it starts becoming very very easy it get a very large turd out. Yes, kinda gross, but much better out of your body than sticking in it, right?

"My bones are bothering me constantly. They pop without even trying."

There are a few possible causes for this: refined sugars, excess of animal protein especially from dairy, excess of toxins/proteins/sugars in general.

Sugar causes calcium to be stripped from the bones. Whenever the body gets too much sugar at once (I.E. when someone eats refined sugar), some of the sugar (most of the sugar) must be eliminated. Excess sugar in the blood is dangerous and sharp, damaging to capillaries. In order to expel the sugar as safely as possible the body uses calcium to bind to the sugar. If there isn't lots of calcium excess hanging around, then it will come right from the bones.

Anyone who eats refined sugar regularly develops bone problems. Sugared drinks, soda, candy, etc, are the very worst things you can do for your bones, even worse than milk.

For more information about refined sugars, check out the book Sugar Blues.

Milk is also high hazardous to bones. While consuming excessive amounts of calcium from dairy and supplements does result in short-term bone mineral density, the long-term effect is the opposite.

In Greece the average milk consumption doubled from 1961 to 1977 (and was even higher in 1985), and during the period 1977 - 1985 the age adjusted osteoporosis incidence almost doubled too.

In Hong Kong in 1989 twice as much dairy products were consumed as in 1966) and osteoporosis incidence tripled in the same period. Now their milk consumption level is almost “European”, and so is osteoporosis incidence.

Those are just a couple of examples, but if you look it up, this is the case all around the world. More dairy means more osteoporosis.

Fluoridated water and chlorinated water also play a huge role in overall health, and through their body-wide adverse results, the bones are also done harm. This is explained in detail in the book Empty Harvest.

To reduce risks from fluoride and chlorine:

Consume iodine (a halogen like fluoride and chlorine essential for thyroid health)
Use fluoride-free tooth paste (baking soda, good gums, tooth soap, etc)
Consume distilled water or reverse osmosis water (filters generally don't remove fluoride)

And to provide the body with the minerals and vitamins required to build strong bones:

Raw dark greens: Kale, chard, broccoli, collards
Mineral-dense raw seeds: Chia seeds, pumpkin seeds
Raw anti-oxidants: berries, especially currants and cranberries
Trace minerals: raw seaweeds, fresh wheatgrass juice, sea salt

[Blog] Radiant & Raw

2011-11-22T18:39:00.000-08:00

Radiant & Raw

Blueberries, Strawberries, Cherries

So full of antioxidants

You think that was an accident?

Nature doesn't make mistakes

Change now, that's all it takes

Wake up and raise the stakes.

Celery, Kale and Sesame seeds;

Natural sources of sodium,

Providing balance in your cranium,

As long as you get your potassium,

And don't forget the water,

Hydration makes you hotter,

Sexy, sophisticated, strong and sleek;

Raise your body to it's peak.

Don't settle for minimum,

Raise up to the maximum.

Jojoba jumping jubilance;

Exulting exotic exuberance.

Enter abundance,

Forget reminisce.

Fill your life with anticipation,

Elite standards of elation,

Moving motions of motivation,

Goals, gifts and gratification.

Papaya, Pineapple and Mangoes;

Putting the punch in your tango.

Broccoli, Brussels and Bok Choy;

Bring on beautiful joy.

Chilies, Cayenne, and Garlic,

Giving your body some fight,

Burn out the parasites,

Reverse your smite to delight.

Raw and radiant is right.

~ Raederle Phoenix, 2011

Short announcement: Almost a year ago I thought to myself, "This would be so much easier with a detailed meal-by-meal plan... An example to go from." And as I learned how to sustain myself through trial and error on a 100% raw and vegan diet, I discovered a lot of tricks. For months I've been telling myself, "It's time to put all this together and make that meal plan!" And finally, I'm almost finished making my first 7-day full meal-by-meal plan.

[Article] Hydration

2011-11-13T18:20:00.000-08:00

Raederle Phoenix, summer 2011, taken in my garden

I was absent-mindedly touching my elbows just now and noticed the strangest thing... My elbows are not dry. They are quite smooth and soft.

My elbows were never, ever, smooth and soft growing up. Always dry. My lips always chapped. My knees often scaly. Now, come to think of it, all of those troubled areas are as soft and supple as any other area on my body.

What's changed?

I believe firmly that the difference is hydration.

I never knew what hydration meant growing up – most people don't. It requires much more than drinking water.

Hydration requires a balance of potassium and sodium, which few people get. Most Americans consume sodium in a huge disproportion to potassium.

Sodium, however, is required for hydration. Without salt, one would perish quite rapidly, as cells could not function without it.

If you're considering switching to a fully raw vegan diet, make sure to include sea salt in your diet regularly or to double check online the amount of sodium you're getting from food. The raw diet doesn't use canned foods or salted processed foods, so some may find they end up without enough sodium.

Good sources of natural food-structured sodium include:

Celery
Sea Vegetables: Nori, Wakame, Dulse, Kelp
Beet Greens & Beets
Spinach
Chard

Good food sources of potassium include:

Coconut water (from young coconuts)
Bananas
Apricots
Avocados
Tomatoes
Kiwi
Cantaloupe
Raisins

Hydration is also hampered by eating dried foods. Dried fruits, vegetables and nuts are the healthiest of dried foods, but even these items must be accompanied by water. Dried fruits may be soaked in drinking water overnight to increase their digestibility.

Figs soaked overnight in water are delicious in smoothies. Water from soaked fruits may be used in smoothies, but water used to soak nuts should be disposed of. Soaked nuts and seeds should be rinsed before use.

Other items, such as powdered potatoes, protein powders, and other dry packaged goods are very harmful to moisture levels in the body, not just because they are dry, but also because they often contain additional toxins that hamper hydration.

Moisture is required to be rid of toxins. If there isn't enough water to pass with the toxins safely, the body will instead wrap toxins in fat, causing weight gain.

A toxin is anything that is harmful to the body and thereby must be eliminated or wrapped in fat and stored to protect the body from harm. Things that fall under the category of 'toxin' include:

Refined sugars such as white sugar, brown sugar, sucralose and high fructose corn syrup
Hydrogenated fats such as margarine. (Most commercial nut-butters contain these dangerous fats, also known as 'trans fats.')
Excess protein (cooked protein sources are often unusable, and have to be eliminated)
Excess of certain nutrients (although few need to worry about this unless they are taking a lot of cheap vitamin supplements)
Excess of dairy, meat or eggs (due to excess animal fat that stores toxins, excess protein, and excess hormones present within the animals)
Excess exposure to mold (this is especially harmful for people who have taken antibiotics)
Household cleaners
'Sanitary' napkins
Laundry detergent
Disinfecting soap

Because most people are not hydrated and lacking in ample minerals to deal with toxins, sugars are converted to fats to wrap around toxins.

Fats are always needed by the liver when dealing with toxins, but these do not become stored fats when the body has enough minerals and water to dispose of the toxin.

The amount of fat needed is not much however. Six macadamia nuts could easily be all the fat you eat in a day. Or a bowl of quinoa, or two tablespoons of sunflower seeds, or two tablespoons of almond butter, or an avocado.

It is even possible to get enough fats from the seeds present within foods, such as juicing a watermelon with its seeds, or eating cucumbers and raspberries (which contain seeds). Bananas also have a trace amount of fat, which makes them creamy and wonderful in smoothies and when making raw vegan home-made ice cream.

The fats I've just mentioned are the fat sources I recommend: whole food fats from raw seeds, raw nuts, raw fruits and raw vegetables. While cold-pressed flax oil and olive oil are healthy in small amounts, they are toxin in large volumes. For daily fat consumption, I prefer to stick to whole food sources.

Another cause of dehydration is empty water. Water without minerals tends to pass through the body without being absorbed. Water from pristine natural sources will have traces of calcium, potassium, sodium, silica and hundreds of other minerals which make it an actual source of nutrition that is absorbed, while the water itself is also absorbed.

For this reason, a water fast was much more practical in past times. Water was structured with minerals when drank directly from a clean source, and also, toxins were rarely present, thereby allowing the body no need to stress over toxin-disposal.

Hydration is aided by exercise. We absorb more of the water we drink if we exercise before and after drinking water.

A response to the above from Connier Nordan: "Good info Raederle... I agree, sodium should come from natural sources. Water filled foods, living foods, and pure water combat toxins and free-radicals. We don't need household cleaners. Tea Tree oil, vinegar, H2O2, baking soda, etc, clean while reducing toxins. I like your statement about dehydration and lack of minerals not dealing with toxins therefore sugars converting more to fat."

My response to Connier:

Thanks, and you're welcome. I do notice that high-water content foods, such as kiwi, watermelon, celery, lettuce, etc, make me feel more hydrated and uplifted than water alone could ever.

I've noticed that if you eat dehydrated foods and drink water with them, it's not as good as water-rich foods. I've tried this a number of times: getting my vegetables in dehydrated form (lots of kale chips is lovely), and then just drinking lots of water to "make up" for it.

But it seems to me that there is no replacing water-rich foods. They are intrinsic to health.

Dehydrated kiwi + a glass of water = feeling average. Kiwi = feeling excellent. That's what I've noticed.

I wish all my readers a wonderful (healthy) Thanksgiving.

~ Raederle

PS: Check out the Raw Vegan Thanksgiving Feast that I enjoyed last year. Includes ten recipes!

[Blog] 42-Day Balancing Regime Complete

2011-10-23T14:40:00.000-07:00

I made it through 42 days. True, I didn't do 100% perfectly what I set out to do, but I didn't give up. I'm quite proud of myself.

The diet's purpose and aims were outlined in my first entry about the 42-day fast from sweet fruits.

My origional aims were modified somewhat; I went beyond abstaining from sweet fruits, and for a time abstained from fat, and emphasized vegetable juice, as is explained in my first entry written during the regime.

At the half-way point I wrote an update on my progress, which clarified some concenrns I mentioned in the previous two entries to that.

This is probably my last entry about it. I completed the process about a week ago now, and I've been terribly busy and been positively delighted to return to making smoothies several times a day. It's faster than making juice, and more delightful usually.

What I gained from the 42-day experience:

I most certainly have much healthier intestinal flora, as indicated by some of the following

My gums seem to be consistently not bleeding when I brush

The breakouts I've been experiencing since the move (April 2011) are significantly decreased

My energy level is excellent

My lung capacity is improved; I can run for longer than ever without my lungs burning at all

I've discovered at least five completely new ways to make savory meals (without any sweet)

I now like the taste of many more new vegetables, such as celery, carrots, and pickles

I feel more control over my cravings and food desires

I feel more in control of my life

I've learned how to make vegetable juices I enjoy

I've detoxed from metal poisoning; cilantro no longer tastes like pennies

I love lettuce more than ever

A full log of what I ate for these forty-two days is posted here.

I'm also glad it's over. I'll do more regimes in the future, but hopefully I will not have to abstain from bananas for so long ever again. My husband I delightedly bought a 40 pound crate of bananas two days go.

If you have not noticed, there is a new tab at the top called "Food Pyramid" which contains my newly updated food pyramid, with a detailed description of the pyramid, and a sample day's menu. I'd love to hear your feedback on it.

To share your thoughts on the pyramid with a wider audiance, and to get faster feedback, comment on the pyramid's facebook location.

Thanks for stopping by!

~ Raederle

About Me & My Blog

2011-10-23T10:45:00.000-07:00

Photo of myself at a raw food potluck holding a platter with two delicious green smoothies. The potluck took place early in December of 2010. The photo is taken by my husband.

Contrary to popular belief, raw foodism is not about eating tons and tons of salads. In fact, that isn't even the basis of it. Raw foodism does not involve limiting yourself or denying yourself. And it definitely does not include boredom. Embarking on raw food is something to take one recipe at a time, one potluck at a time, one article at a time. Let it wash over you and change your life, like it changed mine.

"You know what is fluffing amazing?!  Carrots are sweet!  Who knew?  Because I no longer eat any refined sugar crap (no high fructose corn syrup poison, no aspartame poison, no white sugar poison, no brown sugar poison, no agave poison, no  sucralose poison, no maltitol poison, etc), my taste buds have changed, and changed and changed, and I'm amazed at how much flavor there is in so many things I used to find bitter or bland.

 Lettuce, tomatoes and carrots are sweet.  And blackberries are not in the least bit bitter!  It's exciting!  It's like all of nature's foods are new again, and I am a baby just trying everything for the first time."

- Raederle Phoenix

...The Raw Food Lifestyle

Being a raw foodist really is a lifestyle. It's not something you can easily switch to overnight, but it is something you can aim for and see one positive change after another along the way.

I recommend reading the following pages first, in this order:

What is a Raw Food Diet?
The Raw Food Concept

How can I apply what I've learned without going crazy?
Applying The Raw Concept

Does going raw work?
Testimonials

How will I get protein without meat and eggs?
Protein Source On Raw

Do I still need to count calories?
Weight watching methods compared & exposed

I'm Raederle Phoenix Jacot. I'm a raw foodist, and have been researching nutrition since I was thirteen. I've struggled and gone through a lot of pain because of one difficult issue after another, to read about that, read my story. I'm a freelance artist, and available for hire for creating custom graphics and artwork of any sort. (Tattoo designs, web graphics, flier creation, logo design, board game illustration: you name it.)
I am an editor, and my editing rates are posted here.

...The Title Of This Blog

The title of this blog is somewhat self explanatory.

"Really Raw Raederle"

My first name is Raederle, given to me by my mother. My middle name is Phoenix, given to me by my father. My last name is Jacot, given to me by my husband.

"Raw" refers to eating raw food; that is; non-cooked food. If you're wondering what a raw food diet is, I have written a simple introduction to it here on this site.

"Really" seems like a silly addition to the title, does it not? It comes from my initial deduction about processed foods, especially sugar: "This isn't food! This is really poison!" That deduction led to my first health site called; Real Poison.

After being a non-poisonist for a couple of years, I began to realize that poison was in everything. Peanut-butter had plastic in it, so I had to switch to organic nut butters. Croutons without sugar added were so expensive I learned to make my own croutons from whole-grain bread. Turned out the bread was still bad for me because of the flour. I learned to do without bread entirely. I learned to make my own home-made granola because even the store-bought organic granola always contained cane sugar (or tasted like sand). Then I decided that even cooked oats were a bad idea. I began to run out of options, and began asking; what should I be eating? Hence came the counterpart to my first site; Real Food.

But neither of these sites contained the answer. I was still missing something. While I had lost weight and made a lot of progress, I still wasn't finding a sustainable way to gain health for life. That's when I discovered raw food potlucks. It changed my view on food entirely. So I followed suit on my past two health sites and included the word 'Real' in my title.

...About This Site

This blog is designed to help you learn how to heal yourself. Every post of this blog is an effort to give you tools to heal. If you think you're in tip-top condition; you aren't. None of us are. Even the most avid health gurus still have some tweaking to do. And the overwhelming majority of us are far from being health gurus.

My writing also aims to show how important having your health is. I wouldn't start drinking and partying tomorrow if I learned I was going to die in a year. Rather, I'd be even more intent on maintaining the best health possible. Having health is not about the quantity of days you live, but the quality of each day you live. Quality comes from clarity of thought, motivation and ambition, and energy of the mind, body and soul. You can't have clarity or energy if you're chugging cement down your gullet (as most people are.)

...About The Template

The template of this blog is created by me, the background image and header are my own works and feature my logo.

[Blog] The Half Way Mark

2011-09-26T12:42:00.000-07:00

Today is Day 22 of 42 days. I'm now over the half-way mark. I feel like I've been refraining from sweet fruits for the past eternity. I'd so happily eat an apple followed by a bowl of blackberries, then some mango, strawberries, pineapples, blueberries, kiwi, banana, and a fig!

My husband has just now arrived upstairs to rescue me... He has brought...

Celery-lettuce-lemon juice!

I never thought I'd see the day when something like that would bring me so much enjoyment. My smile is positively gleeful right now.

As is explained in my first entry about this 42 day diet, I'm on a diet to balance my intestinal flora. It's been brought to my attention my flora must be out of whack due to the circumstances of my upbringing, and so forth, as is all explained in the entry.

As is explain in my second, and most recent entry about my current regime, never before now have I previously stuck to anything resembling a fast.

Yesterday was a momentous day. While I was outside in the garden I ate some plain parsley... And it didn't taste like metal for the very first time in my life. It just tasted green to me. Not like pennies. I've really detoxed heavy metals out of me! I feel so good about that.

Also, I finally did some research on breast lumps yesterday, and I discovered it is unlikely that the lumps are cancer. They are round for the most part, and easy to move around. I think it's very likely that they are related to killing off so much biotic life in my body so fast.

Since blogger likes to strip all my codes away lately, I've posted my full dietary log for this fast, to date, here on my typepad. If you have any suggestions, or comments on exactly what I'm eating, I do recommend you find out what I'm eating first! This log is an open book to exactly what I'm consuming and feeling, so you can find specific questions answered in the log, including portion sizes.

So this blog is just a quick celebration of passing the half way point, and to post the log for anyone who is curious as to my progress.

Much love, hugs, and thanks.

~ Raederle Phoenix

[Blog] Phase 2: Killing Bacteria

2011-09-20T11:16:00.000-07:00

As I wrote about on September 4th in a blog entry called The Diet for Intestinal Flora Health, I am on a special revision of my diet targeted at balancing my intestinal flora.

For anyone whose been following my blog for a long time, they may be aware of my past failures to complete my initial goals. For example, when I first became a raw vegan in September of 2010 (just over a year ago), I attempted to do a water fast. On day 1 my plan to do a water fast was going well. But by day three it devolved into simply becoming 100% raw vegan.

I was extremely good about being 100% raw vegan, only ever slipping down to 98% raw vegan (by having a cook serving of food during the week), until the move in April 2011. As I talked about in the entry "Staying Raw While Moving" -- I didn't manage it. I didn't go completely nuts and backtrack, but I was having cooked food upward of three times a week. The month of April was a mess for me. I was stressed out, not eating well, and not feeling good.

In June I was getting serious about recovery and tried a Juice Feast for the first time. As I explained in this entry, which ought to be titled "Juice Feast Failure, I discovered that I am very addicted to solid foods.

This time, however, I am happy to announce that I am on day 16, and I'm not only sticking with my initial intentions. I've gone beyond them!

As I mentioned in the entry I wrote 16 days ago, I've been breaking out since the move. Finally, at long last, my forehead is no longer covered in tiny pimples. However, this didn't happen just from my original plan of abstaining from fruit.

I decided I needed to take it a step further on day 12, and these past few days I've been also abstaining from all fat. No more nuts!

I was eating a cup of nuts a day trying to fill that void that the fruit left behind.

And not only am I abstaining from fruit and fat, I'm emphasizing juice especially. This morning I drank a giant jar of vegetable juice for breakfast consisting of lettuce, cucumber, lemon and carrot. If I used measuring cups to fill that jar, I'd estimate... 6 cups for the full jar, I probably drank 5 cups.

This is huge for me. Before this "fast from fruit" I never had drank more than a cup or two of vegetable juice at one time. Before this I hated plain celery sticks, which I'm munching on as I type this.

I'm now in Phase 2 of this plan: bacteria killing. Lots of garlic and supplements which move bacteria out of the body.

Am I eating entirely 100% raw? Well, no. I am eating quinoa in controlled portions, and also drinking herbal tea. I've been keeping a detailed log of everything since the first day. So here is the log:

Sunday, September 4th, 2011

Day 1

Ate: A tiny apple for breakfast.

Several nori wraps. Spiced seeds and nuts.

Kelp noodles with chard, nuts, vinegar, coconut aminos and spices.

Nori wraps with avocado, tomato, spinach, etc.

Day log: No discomfort.

Monday, September 5th, 2011

Day 2

Ate: Plain Amande yogurt with maca, vitamin powder and around nine whole cocoa beans.

Several dried 'superfruit' berries (completely wrong for the diet).

Some of Jay's green juice that contained tomato. Store-bought kale chips.

Kelp noodles with cabbage, nuts and hot sauce.

Day log: Extreme exhaustion. Could hardly stand without being dizzy.

Jay experienced the same: fatigue and dizziness.

Mild fever, feeling cold and then really hot. Random sweating out of the blue during the day.

Powerful cravings for watermelon in particular.

Tuesday, September 6th, 2011

Day 3

Ate: Half a grapefruit for breakfast.

Plain Amande yogurt with maca, vitamin powder and around seven whole cocoa beans.

Green juice that contained carrot, lemon and wild yard plants. Home-made kale chips.

Kelp noodles with kale, nuts, and garlic.

One nori wrap made from onion, nori, spinach, kale, salt, olive oil and spices.

Popcorn before bed with salt.

Day log: Grapefruit tasted somewhat sweeter than usual, but perhaps it was just a good grapefruit.

Mild cravings that lessened throughout the day. Woke up with several "loaded" pimples. Woke up with much more energy than Monday morning, but feeling emotionally dependent.

Fell asleep fairly easily and slept well.

Wednesday, September 7th, 2011

Day 4

Ate: Half a grapefruit for breakfast.

Plain Amande yogurt with maca, cinnamon, nutmeg, vitamin powder and four whole cocoa beans.

Drank a glass of carrot-lemon-cabbage juice.

Several handfuls of home-made kale chips.

A nori wrap with some kale on it and a little olive oil. A few spiced nuts.

One celery rib with almond butter, one celery rib eaten with alternating bites of spicy pistachios.

A few gulps of plain kombucha.

A glass of carrot-celery-kale juice. A bowl of quinoa.

Day log: Woke up with good amount of energy at 11:30am. I woke up before Jay.

Grapefruit tasted incredibly sweet, like a date had been added to the juice. My taste must be changing.

Started feeling really tired and blah around 6:30pm.

Feeling fairly alert and awake, but having lots of muscle pains at 8:30pm.

Thursday, September 8th, 2011

Day 5

Ate: Carrot-cucumber juice for breakfast.

Followed shortly by home-made kale chips. A few spiced nuts.

Two nori wraps with avocado, mixed greens, onion, a little kale and spices.

A few macadamia nuts. A bowl of quinoa.

Fennel-carrot-celery-wheatgrass juice for dinner with home-made kale chips. Spiced nuts.

Day log: Woke up feeling a bit lethargic at 11:30pm.

Coughed a bit in the bathroom, and sneezed a bit in the kitchen. I feel strange.

Been feeling fatigued most of the day, especially during and after the walk.

We ate the nori wraps with avocado right before the walk, which may be part of why I was so tired.

I perked up a bit after the quinoa.

Friday, September 9th, 2011

Day 6

Ate: A bite of fresh broccoli from the yard. A few tart dried berries (goldenberries?) for breakfast. A few blackberries from outside. Spiced nuts. Lettuce-carrot-celery-wheatgrass juice. A few macadamia nuts. Lettuce-carrot-celery juice. Kelp noodles. A bowl of quinoa. Kale chips, home-made.

Day log: Woke up feeling pretty good at 10:30am.

Felt distinctly like I had slept a bit longer than needed, but okay.

Had a good day overall.

Saturday, September 10th, 2011

Day 7

Ate: Half a grapefruit for breakfast.

Kelp noodles, a half-nori wrap, a little piece of celery with almond-macadamia butter, a tiny piece of tomato and some slices of bell pepper for brunch.

Lettuce-carrot-cucumber-celery juice for lunch, which was very hydrating and pleasant.

Home-made kale chips and lettuce chips. A few spiced nuts.

A simple nori wrap (onion, cucumber, lettuce, olive oil, spices).

Kelp noodles with one lemon, brazil nuts, macadamia nuts, almonds and a little walnut, and the tiniest amount of vinegar and coconut aminos.

Day Log: Got up to the alarm at 7:45am.

Did an enema first thing this morning and was amazed by how energized it made me feel. I did it with the motivation of getting rid of the gassy-ness I've been experiencing the past few days. Feeling energized was an unexpected bonus.

Catered the meeting I attended today, bringing what I described as my brunch. I also brought a sweet-ice-cream-pudding which I didn't eat any of. (I didn't even lick my fingers when coming into contact with it!)

Sunday, September 11th, 2011

Day 8

Ate: Half a grapefruit for breakfast.

Half a tiny home-grown seeded watermelon. (My half was about the size of a fist.)

Juice made up of the rind of the tiny watermelon, cucumber, lettuce and a little bit of wheatgrass.

A couple nibbles on herbs in the yard.

A mono-meal of macadamia nuts (about half a cup.)

A nori wrap with tomatillos, leafy stuff, onion, cucumber, and cold-pressed olive oil.

Kelp noodles with macadamia-almond-brazil-butter, lemon juice, tomatillos and salt.

Cucumber-lettuce-lemon juice. A bowl of quinoa.

Day log: Got up at 10:00am, went to church. Came home and transplanted strawberries. I was surprised at how little energy I had to dig the strawberry plants. I went into it feeling energized, but within then minutes I was sweating heavily and feeling fatigued. This is unusual for me since I became a raw foodist and began walking more often. Despite the fatigue I got the job done, and then I helped Jay with some shelf assembly and shelf carrying.

Not gassy today. I suspect it was due either to the kale chips or the spiced pistachios I was eating.

Monday, September 12th, 2011

Day 9

Ate: Half a grapefruit for breakfast. Spinach-cucumber juice for brunch.

Kelp noodles with macadamia-brazil-nut-butter, maca, vitamin powder, salt, lemon, and one cup of spinach blended into the nut butter.

Wheatgrass-lemon-spinach-carrot juice. A bowl of quinoa. [Dance classes.]

Celery with home-made nut butter made up of half macadamia nuts and half almonds, vitamin powder, spinach and a little maca. A bowl of quinoa.

Pills taken: 2 detox pills, 1 vitamin B, a spoonful of vitamin powder, a spoonful of maca.

Day log: Got up at 10:40am. Had pleasant detailed dreams.

I think I should start logging the vitamins and other tablets I'm taking on this log. I've been taking Markus Rothkranz's anti-parasite pills, which I generally call "detox pills" fairly inaccurately, but it's a shorter name than calling them anti-parasite tablets. I've been taking some vitamins here and there, none of them very consistently. I took the last few tablets of enzymes towards the beginning. Note that I generally only take a B-vitamin supplement, in particular for the purpose of getting B12.

As I was drinking the wheatgrass blend I kept telling myself that I liked the juice, and for a brief moment the flavor in my mouth was entirely different. The wheatgrass tasted like the first time I had Marty's freshly made wheatgrass juice. The flavor was back to it's true flavor, and not how my body interprets the flavor based on silly detox reactions. And then the moment past and it was back to tasting nauseating. I've never had this happen before, so it was really fascinating and awesome.

Took two dance classes back to back from 6:30pm to 8:30pm. Felt excellent during and after class.

Tuesday, September 13th, 2011

Day 10

Ate: Half a grapefruit for breakfast. Lettuce-wheatgrass-carrot-greenbean-tomatillo juice for brunch. Some millet with salt.

Avocado by itself. [1 detox pill] Handful of macadamia nuts.

Kelp noodles with sauce made up of: juice of lime, 2/3rds cup macadamia nuts, 1/3rd cup almonds, handful of spinach, maca, vitamin powder, and a couple drops of coconut aminos and a couple drops of vinegar, a few pinches of salt

Several slices of red pepper (around a third of a bell pepper) eaten at the Writer's Meeting.

A bowl of quinoa.

Pills taken: 3 detox pills, half a spoonful of vitamin powder, most of a spoonful of maca

Day log: Got up at 9:05am, feeling good.

Been feeling good pretty much all day. Started getting pretty sore (from the dance classes last night) around 2pm, and started to get progressively more and more sore. My entire back, sides and thighs complain a bit when I move around now at 9:22pm. My mood is still pretty good though.

Wednesday, September 14th, 2011

Day 11

Ate: Whole grapefruit for breakfast. Macadamia nuts.

A nori wrap. Some of Jay's cooked soup made up of carrot, cabbage, celery, onion, garlic and brown rice.

At the Gathering Wellness Forum I ate four or five slices of "onion bread" which is made up of flax, onion and some other seeds.

I ate several servings of the kelp-noodle dish which didn't appear to have any nuts added to it like the dishes I make with them. It include sesame seeds. The dish I brought and ate quite a bit of was shredded carrot, cabbage, pablano pepper, onion, lime juice and salt.

Pills taken: 1 detox pill

Day log: Had a great meeting at Gathering Wellness Forum, felt like sitting around the table with family. Spent most of the day prior to that working on a fantasy novel.

Thursday, September 15th, 2011

Day 12

Ate: Half a grapefruit for breakfast. Handful of macadamia nuts.

Almond-walnut-butter on a stick of celery.

Kelp noodles with sauce made up of: juice of lime, macadamia nuts, almonds, walnuts, Brazil nuts, maca, vitamin powder, and a couple drops of coconut aminos, a few drops of cold pressed olive oil, a couple drops of vinegar, and a few pinches of salt.

Six or so macadamia nuts.

Kombucha on the way home from the grocery store.

Carrot-cabbage-kale-wheatgrass juice.

A bowl of quinoa.

Pills taken: half a spoonful of vitamin powder, a spoonful of maca

Day log: Got up around 10:40am. Had a good day for the most part. Been working on the fantasy novel most of today as well. Enjoyed a walk to the store with my husband, although it was much colder than expected.

Friday, September 16th, 2011

Day 12

Ate: Glass of water. [Detox pill.] Bowl of raspberries breakfast. Kombucha. A few goldenberries.

[Bromelain] Glass of water.

Large amount of carrot-cabbage-lettuce-garlic-sorrel-lemon-basil-wheatgrass juice.

Glass of water. [Enzyme] Several goldenberries.

Glass of water. [Enzyme] Cooked onion and garlic soup mixed with raw chopped up tomato and carrot-cabbage-lettuce-garlic-sorrel-lemon-basil juice.

Pills taken: 1 detox pill, 1 bromelain, 2 enzyme tablets

Water intake: 4 glasses of water

Day log: Got up around 11:20am.

I've developed a number of breast lumps. I've had a single lump in the same place varying slightly in size for eight years. Only in the past few months have other lumps began to develop. It's likely the change started when we moved back.

I've heard that Buffalo, NY is a high spot for breast cancer, so there is pollution here that could be contributing. It could be cancer.

Another explanation is that as I've been moving toxins and bacteria out of my intestine, I may not have been providing my body with enough water and vegetables to fully flush things out, causing my body to dump toxins and dead cell waste into my breasts in lumps.

By avoiding fruit, as this log illustrates, I've been consuming an insane amount of nuts, more than I've ever consumed in my life, including when I first became a raw vegan. It's possible that the nuts contain a toxin that has caused the lumps, or contain a bacteria, or both. It's also possible that their high fat content is a large contributor to the lumps.

Whatever the case may be, today marks a change in the trend.

Went for a walk/run and did a little martial arts in the park.

Saturday, September 17th, 2011

Day 13

Ate: Two glasses of water. Kombucha.

Large amount of carrot-lemon-lettuce-cinnamon-nutmeg juice.

Two glasses of water. Large amount of carrot-lettuce-cabbage-celery-wheatgrass-maca juice.

Two nori wraps without any oil. Nori wraps contained lettuce, onion, tomatillos, and lemon juice.

Two glasses of water. One spoonful of spices nuts.

[Bromelain, Enzyme] Three nori wraps without any oil. Nori wraps contained lettuce, onion, cabbage, tomatillos, spices, and lemon juice.

Pills taken: a spoonful of maca, 1 bromelain, 1 enzyme tablet

Water intake: 6 glasses of water

Day log: Got up around 11:30am.

Went for a walk/run. Been a cold day.

Sunday, September 18th, 2011

Day 14

Ate: One glass of water. Half a grapefruit for breakfast.

Large amount of carrot-lemon-lettuce-cinnamon-nutmeg juice.

Two nori wraps with lettuce, lemon juice, onion and tomatillo. One or two celery ribs.

Half a grapefruit. A couple gulps of kombucha.

Small amount of carrot-lettuce-cabbage-celery-wheatgrass-maca-vitamin-ginger juice.

Two glasses of water. Two celery ribs.

Two large bowls of quinoa.

[Bromelain] A cup of tea.

Pills taken: a pinch of maca, pinch of vitamin powder, 1 bromelain

Water intake: 4 glasses of water

Day log: Got up at 8:45am.

Played Carcassonne with Roy (brother) and Mom. Played Innovation with Asa (friend), Mom and Jay (husband).

Was somewhat tired and strung-out most of the day, but clear-headed. Mild burps, and the very tiniest tiniest amount of gas. Hiccups were common throughout the day.

Monday, September 19th, 2011

Day 15

Ate: One glass of water.

Vegetable juice.

Three celery ribs.

Carrot-lettuce-cucumber-cabbage-celery-wheatgrass-ginger juice.

Half a grapefruit. A few gulps of kombucha. Several bites of carrot.

The other half of the grapefruit. A cup of herbal tea.

Pills taken: 5 detox pills, 2 enzymes, 2 bromelain

Water intake: 4 glasses of water

Day log: Got a lot of work done. Had very few cravings at all today. It's been a day of progress. I've never previously enjoyed plain celery sticks and plain carrots.

And today so far:

Tuesday, September 20th, 2011

Day 16

Ate: One glass of water.

A tremendously gigantic jar of lettuce-cucumber-carrot juice.

Three celery ribs.

Added after this entry was originally posted:

Garden Juice (explained in log).

One third of a red bell pepper.

A gulp of kombucha. A bite of celery.

Two medium bowels of quinoa. A gulp of kombucha. A few bites of brown rice.

Pills taken: 4 detox pills, 2 enzymes, 1 bromelain

Water intake: 4 glasses of water

Day log: Got up around 10:45am.

I'm feeling excellent at the moment. I spent a half hour in the garden looking after my plants and harvesting and I made this super strong juice from what I picked. Here's what went into it from the garden: 4 fairly small burdock roots, 5 sorrel plants (including roots), 1 stalk of broccoli including small 'flower-tops', 1 long leek leaf, 5 small strings of thyme, 5 small strands of garlic-chives, 2 dandelion leaves, 8 springs of parsley, 1 long thin stalk of fennel with flowers, and 5 small lettuce leafs. And additionally from the kitchen: 2 lemons, half a really hot 'banana' pepper, 2 cloves of garlic, and a very small pinch of wheatgrass blades.

Although, as I write this the nausea is starting to come on. I ate some red bell pepper as chaser. This stuff was super spicy hot. I diluted it in water and despite that it still burned.

PS: A lot of my formatting is going awry. I blame blogger. It seems to be stripping much html codes and doing weird things to them.

As the log shows, I haven't been perfect, but I've stuck to the core principles of what I'm trying to accomplish. (The goal of this diet and how abstaining from sweet fruit accomplishes it is explained in the entry I wrote the first day embarking on this.)

I'm quite pleased with myself, and my progress. My cravings are dramatically reduced, and many things body-wide are beginning to clear up. What I'm doing is the stuff of curing cancer, and it feels great to be doing it.

Thanks for reading!!!

~ Raederle

If you haven't seen it yet, check out this photo time-line that shows my progression from 2004 to 2011 in a stream of photos.

[Article] Pineapple

2011-09-20T10:12:00.000-07:00

Pineapple is often shunned for its level of sweetness, but it actually has many powerful health benefits. Surpriseingly, when classifying fruits between Sweet, Acid, Melon, Fatty and Sub-Acid, pineapple is actually an acid fruit. This is because the classification is based on the level of acidity, not based on the level of fructose and glucose.

It is important to note that despite pineapple being a acid fruit, it is still alkalizing within the body. Not to get into the science of it; just take note that just because a food is acid does not always mean that it is acid-forming within the body.

Sinusitis

Pineapples have been known to assist with sinusitis, even curing it in many cases.

Sinusitis is the inflammation of the para-nasal sinuses due to infections of bacteria, fungi or virus.

There are several self-care treatments available to reduce the symptoms of sinusitis – from inhaling steam, to the application of a warm washcloth, to drinking generous amounts of fluids to thin the mucus.

Doctors prescribe decongestants, oral or nasal, to ease the clogged nose. I was once prescribed with a nasal spray to relieve sinus pressure at the age of ten. I actually adored the stuff at the time. This, however, did nothing for the source of the problem of course.

Pineapple is a natural anti-inflammatory agent that can reduce the inflammation process that causes sinusitis. Many raw fruits and vegetables are anti-inflammatory, but pineapple has something going for it that is uncommon.

Bromelain

Pineapple contains bromelain, an extract that is found in high amounts at the stems and the core of the pineapple fruit. Bromelain, according to a double blind study made in 1967, resulted to complete resolution of sinusitis and other related upper respiratory tract infection in 85 percent of the patients receiving this substance.

In Germany, bromelain treatment for sinusitis has been approved.

Enjoying Pineapple

What can do you with a pineapple aside from just enjoy it plain? Here is a recipe from the Renegade Health Show:

Spicy Coconut-Pineapple Salad

Cardiovascular Health

Pineapple also assists with some cardiovascular diseases. Bromelain seems to have the ability to destroy the plaques of cholesterol found in the arteries. Also, bromelain has been shown to have some fibrinolytic activity that allows the thinning of the blood.

In a 1978 research, patients who were suffering from symptoms of angina pectoris (chest pain) reported a reduction of the symptoms within 4 to 90 days after a bromelain therapy. Those who discontinued the therapy have reported return of symptoms, especially after stress episodes.

Of course, almost any raw vegetable is very helpful towards cleaning arteries, but it's good to know that pineapple is not just a sweet treat; it's a health food.

Image from Rawmazing

Spicy Pineapple

Here is another way to enjoy pineapple. This recipe is really easy:

Pineapple Salsa

Arthritis

Arthritis centers around the inflammation process: pain, swelling and redness.

An important study showed that patients suffering from mid knee pain who were dosed with bromelain had a reduction of symptoms.

Another study illustrated that bromelain can help subside the swelling of the soft tissues of the joints.

I'd recommend blending pineapple into a green smoothie for the most effective arthritis treatment.

Green Pineapple Smoothie

Pineapple-Chard Green Smoothie

Nutritional Data

Following are the nutritional values of pineapple present in 100 grams:

Dietary fiber – 1.4 g
Sugar – 9.5 g
Vitamin E – 0.62 mg
Vitamin B6 – 0.111 mg
Vitamin B5 – 0.205 mg
Vitamin B3 – 0.495 mg
Vitamin B2 – 0.031 mg
Vitamin B1 – 0.079 mg
Vitamin C – 37.2 mg
Fat – 0.12 g
Protein – 0.54 g
Carbohydrates – 13.2 g
Zinc – 0.11 mg
Phosphorus – 10 mg
Iron – 0.29 mg
Potassium – 110 mg
Calcium – 13 mg
Calories – 50

Indigestion

Heartburn is the indigestion of acid that causes the burning sensation in the chest, which results when the gastric acid regurgitates.

Bromelain has a component called cysteine proteinases, a protein-digesting enzyme – an enzyme that is capable of digesting protein components of the food. It helps in the digestion process by assisting trypsin and pepsin, two protein-digesting enzymes. The better your digestive system functions the less likely you are to get heartburn, bloating, gas, constipation, etc.

For a great digestive boost, combine leafy greens and pineapple to make a delicious juice in a masticating juicer.

Pineapple Pulp

Here is a clever idea for what to do with your pulp:

Pineapple Bars from Pineapple Pulp
Dehydrate at 105 degrees to preserve the enzymes! Don't ruin that bromelain with high heat!

Blood Clots

Thrombosis is a condition where the blood clots inside the blood vessels which results in obstructing blood flow.

Bromelain is shown to have fibrinolytic and anti-thrombotic effects on the body. Fibrinolysis is when the body prevents the growth of blood clots in the body. Anti-thrombotic, on the other hand, is the reduction of size of thrombus – a blood clot that is already formed in the blood vessel.

Local

You might be thinking, "Yes, this is wonderful, but pineapples aren't local, and I want to work more on being a localvore." This is a valid concern.

Buying produce that isn't local is a strain on the entire planet's economy and resources. However, consider this: No packaged good is local. Every packaged good gets many ingredients from far-flung places, and often things are shipped one direction just to be shipped back after being mixed, labeled, pasteurized, packaged, or whatever. Just by consuming things primarily from produce you're cutting back on food miles.

Also, consider this: You can't do anything for the planet if you're ill. Your health has to come first. Organic and local is ideal, but with some fruits you may choose organic over local, and sometimes local over organic. It's hard to measure the full impact of our purchases, as I outlined in my article: "The Impact of $1.00".

Pineapple-Celery Yum

Blueberry-Celery-Pineapple Smoothie

Bronchitis

Bronchitis happens when there is inflammation of the air passages in the lungs, the bronchus. Symptoms include difficulty of breathing, cough with yellow-green mucus, fever, wheezing and chest discomfort.

This condition is caused usually by viral or bacterial respiratory infection. The anti-inflammatory effect of bromelain can reduce the symptoms; such as pain and swelling of the mucous membrane of the airway.

Immune System

Pineapple is rich in vitamins C and B1, and it is a source of antioxidants that fuel the the immune system. Your full day supple of manganese can be found in one cup of pineapple.

History of Pineapples

European discovery of pineapple is thought to have happened in the year 1493 in Guadalupe, a Caribbean island. Because the fruit can only grow in tropical climate, the pineapples were introduced and grown for commercial purposes in Asia, South America and Africa by the explorers from Spain and Portugal.

Pineapple in Europe, particularly the fresh pineapple, became a symbol of social class and prestige. As you've just learned, it's not just a great display, but a wonderful food to enjoy.

Thanks for reading!

Come check out the awesome benefits of kale, and some great recipes for enjoying kale!

~ Raederle Phoenix

Sources
Boulder Natural Labs
Natural News
Elements 4 Health
WHFoods
Natural Health On The Web
Dr Granny
Rense

[Blog] The Diet For Intestinal Flora Health

2011-09-04T13:28:00.000-07:00

I have come to the conclusion that my health problems developed before my birth. Not because of my mother's amalgam fillings, which may have given me a dose of mercury while developing, but because my mother has been repeatedly on antibiotics for much of her lifetime. In fact, she was on antibiotics for ten years straight during her early years. This was what doctors used to do if you got scarlet fever, to make sure you never got it again.

What does it mean for the baby if the mother has taken antibiotics a lot in her lifetime?

It means that my mother has imbalanced intestinal flora, and that I was born with the flora she had at the time of my birth. To boot I took antibiotics as a newborn due to illness... Illness I might have caught in the first place due to a weak immune system which could tie right back into the lack of flora. Vicious cycle.

In any event, I was sick a lot as a kid, and that's what got me on the path to discovering nutrition in the first place. When dietary changes made an impact at age 17, and I discovered what it felt like to have energy for the first time in my life, I became fascinated with nutrition.

I've been learning more about how intestinal flora works. What flora is bad, what flora is good, what flora we should have, and what can disrupt the balance.

From what I've learned, there is little chance that I have good balanced flora. I've taken antibiotics over and over in my life time, somewhere between six and fourteen times (it's hard to say since I didn't go to the doctor every time I was sick, I didn't always finish my course of antibiotics, and much of my childhood is shrouded in vague hard-to-decipher memories). I've asked my mom how many times I've taken them, and she doesn't recall clearly either, go figure.

In any event, more than three times in a lifetime can be enough to require drastic measures to remedy.

How do you know if your digestive tract has imbalanced flora? Well, consider your antibiotic intake in your lifetime and cross-reference that with these symptoms (and do some research):

Frequent stomach pains and digestion problems
Skin problems (skin infections, eczema, psoriasis, acne)
Foggy brain / Trouble concentrating
Constant tiredness and exhaustion
Anxiety
Mood swings
Obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD)
Anger outbursts
Irritability
Headaches
Intense cravings for sugars, sweets, and breads
Itchy skin

I used to have all of these very badly before I became a raw vegan.

What bugs me is that I still get some of these symptoms mildly on occasion. This is not something I find many other raw foodists going through after the first three to six months. (I've been raw vegan for a year now.)

There are other possible causes for the symptoms I do still have, but considering that the raw diet only starves bad bacteria and doesn't provide enough good bacteria, I think it's safe to say I could use some re-balancing in the digestive tract.

Here are the symptoms I still experience:

Around twice a week I get a strong craving for something starchy/bready or sweet, or fatty.
About twice a month I get "in a mood" where I'm near apathetic for a couple hours.
Stomach pains around three times a month, generally following a huge meal full of bad food combinations (fats and fruits generally)
Mild skin breakouts (description follows)

I've been experiencing mild breakouts since April, which I had not experienced at all in the previous six months being a raw vegan. It's true that in April I broke my raw diet a lot and ate much cooked food as I was stressed out and emotionally a mess from all the trials of moving across the country (California to Buffalo, New York in a budget-truck).

However, since April I've eaten much better than I actually did during April, and my stress has been reduced significantly, and yet the mild breakouts still continue. I'm not getting large painful pimples as I used to get frequently when my health was at its very worst. Rather, I'm getting small patches of tiny little pimples that are hardly visible unless very close to the mirror. I find this bizarre, and have often wondered if they are a detox symptom since I've been drinking fresh home-juiced wheatgrass shots for a couple months now.

So why doesn't a raw vegan diet provide good bacteria?

Humans no longer eat the dirt on the vegetables, and raw sauerkraut is no longer a staple of the diet. There just isn't much of a food source of healthy flora. Even if I drank a bottle of kombucha a week, and ate two servings of sauerkraut a week, ate fermented nut cheese twice a week, and made coconut kefir twice a month, I would never overcome an unbalanced intestinal tract.

What if I take probiotics? Well, in theory, I could just take ten a day and eventually it'd balance out. Problem is that it might not, and it'd be expensive in the process.

So what is the solution?

A combination plan where I hit the bad bacteria with all the ammo I've got, and then flood my body with healthy bacteria with tremendous force.

The diet I'm about to describe is an off-shoot of the raw vegan diet specifically for people fighting a disease or bodily imbalance. This diet "off-shoot" is used in curing cancer, remedying Candidiasis, curing diabetes rapidly, etc.

This diet has three phases: Starve, Kill, Replenish

As you can imagine, the starve and kill phases are talking about starving and killing bad bacteria, and the replenish phase is for filling the body with good bacteria. No point in throwing your money away at probiotics if you have so much bad bacteria in your gut that it can't survive more than an hour or so. That's why we're starving and killing that bad bacteria first.

Now, a raw vegan diet already does a good job of starving and killing enough bad bacteria to relieve most problems. The big issues come from pasta, flour, bread, white sugar, brown sugar, molasses, corn syrup, trans fats, aspartame, canola oil, msg, artificial colors, artificial flavors, and hydrogenated oils. None of those are included in the raw diet.

Minor issues can be caused from too much cooked white potato, especially if you're eating it with butter or sour cream, and also especially if you're baking or frying the potato. A large consumption of conventional meats, dairy and eggs can be a serious problem as well, although few people do this without also consuming too much of the above mentioned toxins.

Raw vegetables offer nothing for bad bacteria, and the vast amount of fiber helps clear them out.

Raw fruits offer little for bad bacteria. The natural sugars in raw fruits provides enough for an imbalance to remain, but not enough to cause a tremendous sporing of bad bacteria.

People who include agave in their raw diet may still experience severe imbalance if they consume it often enough. Remember that agave is High Fructose Agave Syrup. It is not the nectar of some super food plant, at all. That is mis-marketing. Also, agave is not low-glycemic. That advertising is also false.

The cure-all and balance-flora diet takes sweet fruits out of the equation. The only fruits still on the table are thus: tomatoes, avocados, cucumbers and bell peppers. (And other non-sweet fruits, if you can come up others.) Fruits such as bananas, pineapples, and apples are strictly off-limits to make sure those bad bacteria are really starving.

The starve phase as described above continues for the full time period of the diet, which is six weeks, two weeks for each phase.

After two weeks of starving the bad bacteria, we move on to killing off any bad bacteria that is left. Garlic, onion and hot peppers are food sources that drive away bacteria. I will also be employing some supplements to assist. Various potent herbs and supplements help, such as grapefruit seed extract.

After four weeks of starving the bacteria and two weeks of killing the bacteria, we move on to phase three. The last phase is an extreme flood of good healthy flora: Probiotics many times a day in supplement form in addition to fermented foods will be employed.

During this six week time period, I'll be eating nori wraps, salsa, guacamole, fresh home-made vegetable juices, salad, home-grown produce and herbs, celery with nut-butter, kale/chard chips, dehydrated vegetable crackers with home-made nut-butter spreads and kelp noodles.

During the last two weeks I'll add a lot of Kombucha, sauerkraut, vegan kefir, and nut/seed cheese.

Today is day one. I ate my last tiny apple from the farmer's market early this morning, and that was the last sweet fruit I'm going to see for quite some time. I'm anxious about whether or not I can make it six weeks... I'm used to eating three to six bananas a day, often with berries, plums, apples, etc.

After the six weeks I should be able to go back to a regular raw vegan diet and maintain healthy flora for the rest of my life (so long as I never take antibiotics again). My husband is embarking on this six week journey with me.

Speaking of the "six weeks" part of this diet plan. I am considering making each phase 10 days instead of fourteen, to cut it down from 42 days to 30, making it actually four weeks and some change. Because I'm already starting from a raw vegan diet, and because I'm going to be employing a lot of powerful supplements, it may very well be possible to do this just as effectively in 10 day phases instead of 14 day phases.

By the end of a month, I may be content to go longer without sweet fruit anyway... This is the game plan for the time being, in any event. Encouragement, comments and love is much appreciated.

Thanks for reading. ~ Raederle

[Article] If You Go Raw, How Will You Get Protein?

2011-09-01T08:06:00.000-07:00

If you adopt a raw vegan diet, where will you get your protein? A vegan diet does not contain meat, dairy or eggs. A raw vegan diet does not include beans, unless they are sprouted and not cooked. And consuming a healthy low-fat raw vegan diet means no more than a handful of unpasteurized (un-cooked) nuts and/or seeds in one day.

Michelle Battermann, raw vegan champion
Where does the protein come from?

The raw vegan diet provides protein predominantly in its basic form; amino acids. And it provides plenty of it. [1]

Fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds and sprouts do not require cooking to increase their flavor or digestibility. In fact, cooking food reduces color, flavor and digestibility all at once, while using electricity, gas or wood to boot.

When proteins are subjected to high heat during cooking, enzyme resistant linkages are formed between the amino acid chains. The body cannot separate these amino acids. What the body cannot use, it must eliminate. [2]

Anything that can not be used by the body is a toxin that the body must find a way to get rid of. When we consume refined sugar, our body can not digest the sugar, and thereby must pass it. In order to pass sugar, it must be carried in the bloodstream. In order to carry it in the blood stream the body must bind the sugar to a mineral, generally it uses calcium. This calcium is often taken directly from our bones. [3]

Like refined sugars (cane sugar, corn syrup, molasses, syrup, etc), cooked proteins are a source of toxicity: dead organic waste material acted upon and elaborated by bacterial flora.

This dead organic waste is what makes you smell when you use the bathroom. Eating raw and effectively detoxing will actually cause that toxic smell to go away with time. [4]

When you cook something, you kill its enzymes. Enzymes are long chains of amino acids. And what is protein made up of? Amino acids.

What happens if you burn your finger? The skin tissue dies.

What happens when you cook your food? The food dies.

Before whole foods are cooked, they may still grow if planted. Their seeds will still sprout.

Try this at home: Take a leek from the grocery store and chop off the top of it, leaving only two or three inches at the bottom. Place this bottom in a glass with a little water. Change the water every day or two, and watch it grow. You can plant in the ground if you like. This also works with celery. [5]

I've done both successfully on several occasions. I put my celery in vases when I buy it, filling the water up to a half inch at the bottom of the vase. It keeps the celery growing right up until the moment I consume it.

Fresh food prior to wilting or rotting sustains life. Freshly picked plants are bursting with nutrition that is highly bio-available to humans.

Everything we do to food reduces its wealth of nutrition:

Storing food reduces nutrition. The more time passes from the time a food is picked, the more the enzymes do their job and become unavailable for doing their job inside our stomach. Enzymes rot, wilt and ripen foods, but if consumed immediately after harvesting, these enzymes play a vital role in digestion.

Modern farming and the food industry uses food waxes, and preservatives, and tricks like freezing the food to preserve the corpse of the food to make it look as though it's still rich in those vital enzymes. In order to get the most out your food, try to buy things grown locally, and shop at farmer's market.

Chopping food reduces nutrition. Oxidation begins to occur, reducing the existence of available vitamin C in the food. Oxidation causes foods to brown. If you see foods losing color in your blender, that is because the food is oxidizing. This is why I don't recommend the Vitamix. My very non-exciting inexpensive blender makes smoothies without a problem.

The above is also why you should buy a masticating juicer. A masticating juicer does not contain blades. It essentially mashes your food until the juice comes out, without ever cutting the food. This preserves the fresh flavor and nutrition. [6]

Mixing food types reduces digestive absorption. Certain foods require alkaline digestive enzymes while others require acidic digestive enzymes. If both are released at once, they are both neutralized and rendered useless. Neither food digests. When food is not digested, it passes into the intestines where bacteria feast. [7]

Depending on how healthy your intestines are, this could be a serious problem, or just a minor issue of not absorbing nutrition from a given meal. If your intestinal flora is out of balance (due to Candida, parasites, or antibiotics), then feeding the bad flora in your gut can cause very uncomfortable symptoms (gas pains, bloating, smelly burps and gas, painful bowel movements, etc), and if this pattern is sustained, life-altering symptoms (inability to remember efficiently, foggy mind, itchy scalp, flaky skin, acne, etc).

Simplified food combination rules:

Fruits are best consumed alone at least thirty minutes before eating other foods, and at least two hours after eating other foods. Plain fruit is an excellent breakfast. Ideally melon should only be eaten with other melon (cantaloupe and honeydew), and sweet fruits only with other sweet fruits (banana with mango), and acid fruits only with acid fruits (lemon with pineapple).

Leafy greens may be combined with everything in moderation.

Fats should be limited, as they slow all digestion down. Fats should be held off until after lunch so as not to drag you down throughout the day. Fats should only be mixed with non-starchy vegetables.

Cooking food destroys the bio-availability of enzymes.

Dehydrating food makes them hard for the body to assimilate. [8] Dehydrated food has little to no water content. The body is made up of 80% water or so. Ideally, our food is 80% or more water.

The above are just a few common examples of what we do to food that is harmful to our bodies over time. However, I want to make one thing clear. Do not go 100% raw vegan if you're unclear about anything, or feel stressed or nervous about doing so. Being assisted by someone who is 90% or more raw vegan and has been for at least six months will help a lot. Start with 60% raw food: raw food for breakfast and lunch, and something you're used to for a snack and for dinner.

If you're anxious to get started, read this important article about the most common mistakes beginning raw foodists make.

While economy, ecology and ethics are very important, you can't do anything for anybody without your health. I recommend making your health your number one priority. Everything else tumbles if you don't have your health.

If you're having problems with your primarily raw diet, I've discovered an interesting troubling-shooting on the raw diet page. You can also write me at raederle at gmx dot com for help.

But I also want to make this clear: You will not become deficient in protein on a raw vegan diet. All you need to do is eat enough calories and you will get plenty of protein. How could this be? Watch this video:

The Protein Myth

Bottom line: The more fresh things you eat, the more amino acids are in your body. The more amino acids, the more effective you can build muscle. You don't need protein.

Explained in even more detail, in this video:

This is not something most doctors know. My doctor cautioned me away from a vegan diet because she believed I would neglect protein. She even said, "You can't get enough protein from nuts."

And yet, I have not lost muscle since I became a raw vegan. In fact, I have more muscle mass now than ever before in my life. I can lift more weight than ever before, run longer than ever before, walk longer, and climb more steps without becoming winded.

Before I became a raw vegan in the summer of 2010, I couldn't even walk one mile without experiencing pain. I can now walk all day long without side stitches, gas pains, feet pains or becoming winded. I could not climb more than three flights of steps in 2009 without needing a several minute break. Now I can climb more than six flights of steps without any rest, running up several of the flights. And as far as raw diets go, mine doesn't even focus on getting maximum amino acids.

If you want to focus on getting maximum amino acids, focus on eating sprouts and young green plants. These young green plants contains multitudes of bio-available amino acids because they have a tremendous stockpile unfolding to create an entire plant. One tiny sprout contains the "life force" to create an entire head of broccoli, or an entire cabbage, or entire sunflower stalk. Imagine what a cup full of sprouts has to offer.

Some people struggle with maintaining a weight that they feel is healthy on a raw vegan diet. These people may have one the following problems:

Poor digestion (not absorbing the needed components from food)

Confused body image (believes they are too small because they are surrounded by fat people)

Lack of sprouts (not enough amino acids for their level of activity)

Lack of calories (not eating enough calories despite eating lots of volume)

Lack of exercise (a completely sedentary lifestyle means little muscle mass)

Here are some tips if you think one of the above applies to you:

Poor Digestion

If your digestion is poor, avoid fats. One nut a day is enough fat, or just a bite of avocado (in nature enough fat is often found just by eating the seeds of the vegetables or fruits you are eating). Doing a juice feast can help digestion. A juice feast means lots of fresh fruit and fresh vegetables juiced with a masticating juicer. I have a friend who personally found that juice helped her reach a weight she desired on the raw vegan diet.

Confused Body Image

If you feel you need more fat on your body to look and feel healthy, surround yourself with live people, media and images of muscular people. Join a running club and notice the shape and form of athletic people who seem healthy to you. Attend yoga classes and notice the form of people who are highly capable and have stamina all through class.

I developed my ideals for the shape I want during yoga class. I find that the women in yoga look like I want to look. Not overly muscular, like a bodybuilder, and not really thin like some women in magazines. Capable, strong women who do a lot of yoga tend to have heavily muscled thighs, buttocks and shoulders, while having thin waists, toned abdomens, toned slender calves, and defined medium-sized arms. I personally find this form the most attractive and natural on a woman, and I desire this form for myself. I notice this form is not small, nor bulky, nor does it contain fat.

Cultivating a sense of what healthy people look like will help you straighten out your idea for what you want yourself to look like.

Lack of sprouts, fuel, calories or amino acids

Try tracking your calories using some internet service. Google "calorie counter" and many options will come up. Track how many calories you eat per day for a week. If you're getting more than 2000 a day, then you're probably fine on that note. If you're getting less than 1200, this can be a serious problem. Eat more raw mono-meals of fruit if you're lacking calories.

If you're simply lacking muscle fuel, try drinking blended green leafy vegetables and sprouts, freshly juiced vegetables and spouts, and eating salads with lots of sprouts. If you don't like sprouts, mix them into guacamole, spicy salsa, or disguise them in small amounts in sweet smoothies (using bananas, peaches, mangoes, etc) and juices (using oranges, lemons, grapefruits, etc).

Lack of exercise

Try new activities to get exercise if you're not currently getting enough. Chances are that you're bored with the methods you currently are using. Try long walks with friend or a partner. Try a jogging club. Try biking. Try yoga, and if you can't afford the usual class cost then use meetup.com to seek out local donation-based community classes. Try getting a rebounder (small trampoline), a jump-rope, a hula-hoop, or an exercise ball. Try getting a set of tiny three pound weights to use while dancing or doing pilates. Try going ice-skating or roller-blading. If you can afford it, go skiing or snowboarding. Go swimming. Take up martial arts, tai chi, or dance classes. Take up a sport. As a last resort, try going to the gym.

At least one of the things I just mentioned you will enjoy, and the chances are that you will enjoy one in three. So try them all! If you're short on time, schedule time on your calendar to try each of these that appeals to you on various dates. Make sure you also schedule time to figure out where and how you will do these several days beforehand.

In any case, if you have trouble gaining muscle, it's not a lack of protein. If you feel somehow sick or unwell without eating beans, meat or dairy, it's not a lack of protein. While some people do feel unwell at first, it's usually detoxification systems. Detoxing too fast is one of the most common mistakes, as I detail in the article: The Four Biggest Mistakes Made While Transitioning On To A Raw Vegan Diet.

More relevant videos I'd like to encourage you to watch and consider:

I would be delighted for you to check out all of these sources. Of course much of what I write is from memory (and often I discover the same information in many forms from many sources), but here are some sources I have read in the past or recently:

[1] Amounts of protein (amino acids) present in plant foods

[2] Arthur M. Baker, MA, MHE

[3] Sugar Blues by William Dufty

[4] Markus Rothkranz

[5] How To Re-Grow Store-Bought Celery

[6] Masticating Juicers

[7] Food Combination Rules

[8] Are Enzymes For Real?

PS: I must note, it is possible to not be assimilating all the amino acids you're eating into protein. This is not a lack of eating protein, this would be a bodily dysfunction, most likely due to lifestyle. The only way to know if this is the case is to get your blood tested. If that is the case, I would personally recommend a green juice feast for a week as a big step to remedying the issue. I do no recommend blindly taking any pills, powders or entering any regimes without assistance.

[Recipe] Nori Wrap

2011-08-26T18:21:00.000-07:00

Most "nori wrap" recipes strive to mimic the appearance of sushi wrapped in nori. Many of these are delicious, fun, decorative and nutritious, but generally they are complex and easy to mess up. This following recipe and variations do not attempt to taste or appear like sushi wrapped in nori. In fact, the emphasis is on simplicity, ease, flavor, and preparation speed.

The basic recipe with none of the optional additions should only take you a couple minutes to make, and less than a minute to clean up. This is something I eat almost every single day. It's about time I posted this delicious, simple, affordable, awesome recipe!

This is the nori I buy. I get it online in packets of 50 sheets.

The black cylinder down the center is a nori wrap. This plate is from the screening of "Food Inc." that I attended on August 1st 2001.

"Basic" Ingredients:

1 nori sheet

2 handfuls of spinach or four to five romaine lettuce leafs

1 to 5 spoonfuls of chopped onion (use more or less to taste: remember red onions are stronger in flavor than yellow/white onions, so use less with red onions)

A sprinkle of your favorite seasonings (I use an organic blend that includes black pepper, garlic, basil, parsley, etc.)

Pinch of sea salt (or to taste)

Optional Ingredients:

I recommend choosing one or two of the following to add. Trying to add all of these at once will overload the wrap unless you use much less than the recommended amounts.

1 finely diced tomato (be careful not to put too much 'wet' fruit on the nori wrap, as this will cause it to split)

1 to 3 diced tomatillos

1 small spoonful of cold-pressed olive oil or flax oil

Quarter of an avocado in small chunks

1 spoonful of freshly squeezed lemon juice

3 spoonfuls of finely minced celery

1 leaf of kale finely minced

5 spoonfuls of finely minced cucumber

1 clove of finely minced garlic

1 small spoonful of finely minced fresh hot pepper

4 fork-fulls of sauerkraut

3 spoonfuls of finely minced yellow, red or orange bell pepper

This is one example of what your nori wrap could look like before you 'wrap it up.'

Directions:

Put one sheet of nori on each plate that you're going to make a nori wrap on. Add chopped onion, and other minced toppings. Add lettuce or spinach. Add seasonings, lemon juice and/or oil. In place of lemon juice or oil, other fluids that could be used are coconut aminos and tahini. Remember not to get the filling too wet however, as this will cause the nori wrap to fall apart.

Put the filling somewhat towards one side of the sheet. Pull up the shorter side and hold it down against the food and carefully pick up the other end and pull it over the top. You may simply hold it closed to eat it (as I generally do), or if you like, you can go to the fuss of getting the edge wet and 'sealing' the wrap. The 'sealing' works well with some filling combinations, but leafy fillings tend to want to spring free.

I once used a piece of pineapple to rub down the nori-wrap edges and to seal the wrap. That worked quite well.

Eat and enjoy the benefits of seaweed, greens, and raw food!

This nori wrap is one I made for my husband. He liked it with mushrooms inside, but it's not a filling I'd typically recommend. The flavors, in my opinion, don't mesh particularly well.

Here are some more "fancy" looking nori wraps I made in the past. This takes a lot more effort, and I think the basic leafy wrap is more appropriate for day-to-day eating.

The best part about making nori wraps like this is the lack of clean up. If you pre-chop your onion and keep chopped onion in your fridge on-hand, there is the potential for not cleaning anything but your plate. At most, you only need to clean your knife, cutting board and plate.

And since this is such a healthy addition to your diet, if you want a second wrap, go ahead and get one! I've been known to eat two to four when I'm traveling or out of the home a lot. I can just bring the "guts" of the nori wrap with me in a glass-lock container and the nori sheets in their usual packet they come in and wrap 'em up anywhere. If I'm unsure if I'll have access to a plate, I bring a plate along.

Happy eating, loving & sharing!

~ Raederle

[Discussion] Disease & Malnutrition

2011-08-24T11:12:00.000-07:00

Before reading the discussion, consider the following quote and come up with some of your own thoughts on the quote.

“There is only one major disease and that is malnutrition. All ailments and afflictions to which we may fall heir are directly traceable to this major disease.” ~ D.W. Cavanaugh, M.D., Cornell University

Do you agree or disagree with the quote?

See if any of my cohorts or associates feel as you do.

If not, comment with your own opinion!

Gallow: That's an interesting quote, but the only references I can find to D.W. Cavanaugh are from organic food webisites. Cornell University has no record of that man existing. They do have record of a G.W Cavenough, but I can't find him having ever said such a thing. Do you know where that quote is from?

Raederle: I got it from the book "Empty Harvest" which is an interesting read. It has some solid information even if I happen to know some of the information within are untrue. Of course, even if this guy doesn't exist for some reason, the quote is still mostly true.

Gallow: The fact that someone either has to invent sources, or is so careless as to not check the validity of their sources, doesn't raise a red flag as to the validity of the content they are trying to convey?

Rig: Somehow I don't think Huntington's disease is traceable to malnutrition, nor is Tay-Sachs. I also don't think getting the flu or a cold or any kind of viral or bacterial infection can be prevented by diet, although certainly someone with a healthy diet is better equipped to deal with infections than others.

Regardless, I would definitely not say that the quote is true. Its just my opinion, but someone who believes they have found the end-all source of "all ailments and afflictions" (without that source being tautologically true), is either naive or arrogant; most likely, if they are educated, they are trying to get grant money, in which case saying things like that are meant to convince the naive and arrogant government and administrators that they deserve funding.

Sorry, but I think its stupid to believe in a panacea, and intelligent to eat healthy.

Raederle: We get viruses all the time, it's a matter of the power of our immune system to fight it off. It's the difference between one person getting a minor sniffle while another person becomes sick for three weeks.

Iron: While at the moment I agree malnutrition contributes and creates many diseases, there are other causes for some as well. No matter how good our diet, if exposed especially over time to high amounts of cigarette smoke, radiation, various poisonous chemicals and other stressors that body may still develop chronic diseases. But gorging on fast food, poisoned foods and the like certainly would be better changed into eating healthy, organic fruits, vegetable and such.

Raederle: Excellent point. Food is not the only factor, by any means. Blanket statements are never quite correct, even if close, huh?

Ling: Flus and colds can be prevented by dietary choices. Because once infected a virus is always in the blood, viral infections in particular can be prevented and lessened in severity by food choices. This is not info from a book, its a record of my own life experience, so it may not be true for all but I have proven it to myself.

If you eat nutrient dense foods your body will reward you with long lasting good health. I would say that malnutrition, particularly of certain minerals, very likely plays a role in all ailments and afflictions.

Raederle: I've had the same personal experience and encountered dozens of others with that same experience. The common flu and cold is easily prevented through food choices.

Russ: Wild animals get diseases too, and it's not from eating food grown in depleted soil. Diet and lifestyle may prevent certain "lifestyle diseases", and there are certain diseases that are directly attributed to nutrient deficiency, but adequate nutrition doesn't make you disease proof.

Raederle: That is a fair point. Although, animals in the wild certainly don't suffer as humans do from disease, but that is a different point altogether.

Snow: Saying something is true does not magically make it so... I keep saying 99% of the world needs die in a great big zombiepocyclips orgy of dead stupid people... And it still hasn't taken place...

Gallow: Interesting, the authors of that book have no idea where penguins actually live (p.12, p.14, p.131). Combined with the imaginary citation from Savanaugh, I get the feeling "Empty Harvest" has a lot of empty information. There's a reason why modern schools don't use textbooks from the early 1900s. I know your lifestyle is all about healthy eating, Raederle, but you may want to take that book with a grain of salt...

Raederle: I am taking Empty Harvest with a grain of salt, Gallow. As I said in my first comment, I know not everything in it is true. For example, it certainly does not take two acres of land to feed one person. It takes an incredibly tiny piece of land, especially with today's technological conveniences. I have a blog entry which goes into detail about how much space it actually takes to feed a person or a family. Two football fields for one person? -(Which is what the book implies.)- Absurd.

It does contain other interesting information about top soil and nutrients and how they interplay in the body. I don't think I've ever read a single book that I couldn't spot a bit of mis-information, and for every piece I can spot, there are probably ten other things I accept as true when they are only partly true, or not really true at all. This is the nature of all information.

There are levels within levels. While the quote isn't 100% true, I think offers the concept that malnutrition costs the vast majority of disease.

As Iron pointed out, there are other factors. As Russ mentioned, animals can still get disease in the wild, although that doesn't disprove anything since they could be suffering from malnutrition even in a "natural" setting. As Gallow suggested, everything with a grain of salt.

And perhaps most importantly, as Ling mentioned, common diseases are easily combated with diet. I went from having strep throat one to four times a year to not having it at all after I first made dietary changes at the age of 17. It wasn't a coincidence.

Russ: Animals in the wild generally suffer from acute infections due to overcrowding, spoiled food supply, parasites and they do get naturally occurring viruses and bacterial infections (ie: avian flu). Wild animals get things like arthritis too. Ever here of SIV, the primate version of HIV?

Wild animals do not live as long as domesticated humans do, so any sort of "lifestyle disease" brought on by genetics, poor food, etc... would not show up in populations due to predation and inability to survive with handicaps in the wild. Wild animals also have much more resilient genetics than modern (domesticated) humans because wild animals are still at the mercy of natural selection, where humans have stepped outside of natural selection through technology.

It's too simplistic to blame disease exclusively on diet and lifestyle. Faulty genetics that remain in the human gene pool due to advances in medical care, a safer lifestyle and a lack of survival necessity to be fit and healthy are a significant factor for many of the lifestyle diseases we see today. Sure, a healthy diet and lifestyle may help somebody's chances at living longer and healthier despite genetic shortcomings, but it's not a cure-all.

Tina: You know, when I first read the quote, I thought it could be about malnutrition of the spirit/soul...

I agree with Raederle about taking the quote with a grain of salt. She just put up a quote with good intentions; she didn't say everyone has to live by it.

Raederle: I like that thought, although I know some of the people who commented on this thread may have issues with accepting that put in the terms of "spiritual malnutrition." However, I think anyone can accept that it is possible to have emotional malnutrition. I wonder how much an animal that is not a human can suffer from emotional malnutrition? Or is that mainly/entirely a human thing?

Tina: Good point, emotional malnutrition is a better way to say it, and I definitely have experienced it! I think animals could have it too... That's just really hard to prove I guess.

Raederle: That is the issue with many things; we can experience something over and over, and we can learn about others' experience with the same thing (second hand), and how they've heard about others' who've experienced it (third hand), but despite sharing an experience with hundreds, or even thousands of people... It can be damn near impossible to prove. Mostly because none of us have millions of dollars laying around to throw at research projects.

Russ: I think it's important to make a distinction between acute and chronic diseases. Since embracing a mostly raw vegan lifestyle, I too no longer get sick. I don't get colds anymore, I don't get the flu, I don't get strep throat. My immune system is functioning on all cylinders.

A bit of anecdotal evidence: My wife, my sister and I ate some undercooked fiddlehead ferns this spring. Little did we know, undercooked fiddleheads contain bacteria that can make people sick and cause food poisoning. Tracy had absolutely no ill effects. I only had very mild intestinal trouble. My sister was up all night sick as can be.

Was it the difference in diet and lifestyle between Tracy and I and my sister? Or was it something else? I think there is something to be said for a healthy diet and lifestyle and it's impact on helping people resist acute illness. It's also pretty established that the chances of getting chronic diseases like diabetes, heart disease and certain cancers are dramatically increased when poor diet and lifestyle choices are present.

However, I'm a little skeptical that Americans are as severely undernourished as some raw gurus and vitamin/mineral/superfood pushers would have you believe. I think it's more about the type of food people are eating -- mainly food that we have not evolved or adapted to eat in conjunction with genetic variances, modern lifestyle and to some extent, nutritional imbalance.

Raederle: I certainly don't prescribe to the idea that we need superfoods to live, Davy. However, some superfoods do taste nice. I've grown fond of maca in particular.

I also agree that our technology and society have taken much of natural selection out of the picture, especially since people have this notion that is "superficial" to base someone's worth on their handicaps, lack of health, or poor appearance. I don't think it is superficial so much as it is instinctual rather than cerebral to judge people based on those things.

Personally I would not want have to children with someone I thought had less-than-great genetics, ethics and upbringing. I am fortunate to have found someone I consider strong on all of aforementioned points.

The point that "empty harvest" was trying to make by including that quote was that we're in big trouble if our plants stop giving us the nutrients we think they are giving us.

[Article] Slimcado Avocado

2011-08-07T19:37:00.001-07:00

We all love Haas avocados (except my brother, who is totally missing out).

Guacamole is incredibly awesome, awesome, awesome. So awesome that someone created a twitter account just raving about guacamole, and trend called holyguacamole.

So when I saw Slimcados at Wegmans my first reaction was "Oh! A different sort of avocado! Let's get two."

The sticker explains that Slimcados have less fat than your regular California avocado. I don't really care about that, since after all, raw foods are not fattening, even when they contain healthy fats.

The concept a "new kind of avocado" reminded me of "sweet avocados" which I only ever had while in California. They had a smooth skin like these over-sized Slimcados, but the sweet ones were regular sized. The sweet avocados tasted different, but I prefer traditional Haas avocados to the sweet ones.

How do Slimcados match up?

I wanted to make sure I got a good one, so I picked two that appeared very different in appearance:

xxx1

The dark green one was by far the darkest Slimcado in the entire display. I'm guessing that it may have actually been picked riper, which would imply a better flavor. Since there was also a chance that the dark green one would simply be spoiled, I chose the other one for being fairly light colored in comparison with the others.

I wasn't sure how to tell when a Slimcado was ripe, so I did a quick google search after I got back home to determine when I should eat them.

The internet wasn't very helpful. I found this blog entry where the person obviously opened theirs too soon. I found another blog entry which described the Slimcados as simply "gross." The author writes in conclusion, "The slimcado does not taste good, plain and simple."

After reading those two bad reviews I had to ask myself, "Was it wise to buy two of this unknown low-fat fatty fruit?"

I did some more online digging, trying to find an answer to the question, "Are my Slimcados ripe, or not?" and found some other non-useful pages such as this one, which tells me essentially that most people have not tried them, a rare person on occasion loves them, but most people who try them find them bland.

I crossed my fingers and hoped I would be one of the people who loved them, especially because they're around twice the size of a Haas avocado for the same price.

I finally found a useful review of the Slimcado here: "I won't say watery like some did, it's not, but it's a much thinner consistency. The guac tasted good, but I give more credit to DH's guac skills than it's constituent avocado. I would recommend avoiding the slimcado if you find yourself at the grocery store. The Haas avocado is full of good fats and omega 3 fatty acids and tastes a hell of a lot...more."

But no concrete ripe-ness information seems to be available, so I just played like a regular avocado, waiting for them to be soft, but not so soft that they were squishy.

It turns out that in terms of the way they feel when you squeeze them, you do want them to be just the same as you'd like your commonplace Haas avocado.

Here's what my first one looked like when I opened it:

The skin is much thinner than a Haas, similar to the skin on a sweet avocado. I suspect this large breed of avocado (the "Slimcado") is really a sweet avocado with some water weight.

I'm very suspicious when it comes to trying new things, so I cut off each and every tiny little imperfection, resulting in the bowl full of Slimcado pieces pictured above.

I tasted it plain. Sure enough, watery. It's as though a Haas avocado was blended with water and then reformed. In fact, that's almost exactly what it's like since a Slimcado has about the same calories as a Haas avocado, just simply less calories per volume since the Slimcado is so much larger. Go figure.

But... It isn't just watery. It's also a shade sweeter. It does have a somewhat different flavor that would not be present if you blended a Haas with water. Does that slightly sweeter flavor imply it would be better for certain recipes? The creative raw vegan chef inside me was alive and well.

But being typical me... Guacamole! I mean, seriously, I have all these tomatoes ripe on the vine growing in my yard, how could I do anything else?

And besides that I had made some carrot-patties from the carrot pulp leftover from making carrot juice early that morning. Warm in the dehydrator, thick, soft, mushy on the inside... Waiting to be topped with deliciousness and spinach.

So, I picked some lettuce, tomatoes, chives and other fresh herbs from the yard, pulled out the carrot patties and....

Ta da!

This dish turned out to be surprisingly hearty. My husband and I became stuffed before we could finish it.

(If anyone is wondering about my shirt, it was a gift from a friend of mine whom I play board games with. It says "Alien Robotic Factory" which only makes sense if you've played the board game "Race for the Galaxy." It's one of my favorite board games.)

So I made up a bowl containing what was left to bring to my father:

Now be warned: The Slimcado is bland on its own. It's got a great texture for making a smooth creamy dressing or guacamole, but without heavy seasoning, your dish will be pretty flat. In the guacamole I put home grown tomatoes, chives, red onion, tomatillo, basil and possibly some other things, and I ate this with very flavorful crackers that contained two whole fresh cayenne peppers and the carrot pulp from a bunch of carrots that were juiced.

That said, the overall effect was still delicious. It certainly wasn't a waste.

The second Slimcado actually began to change color today. I didn't photograph it before I cut it open, but to describe it: The spots that before had been spots began to consume the entire color of the fruit. It had a few bad spots on the inside, but was mostly good.

On a side note, I decided to make raw vegan corn chips, and was delighted with my success. I used raw corn on the cob, ground flax and chia seeds and dehydrated for around 24 hours at 110 degrees. This is what the "batter" looked like:

Today, when I saw all the delicious ripe tomatoes on the vine outdoors, and crossed that in my mind with the darkening Slimcado and the fact that I had some cucumber, green pepper, fresh cayenne pepper, and basil all ready-to-go in the kitchen... Well, this happened:

Needless to say: Yum!

Giant Raw Corn Chips + Slimcado + Fresh Home-Grown Tomatoes + Fresh Herbs = Happy Delighted Smiling Raederle

Overall, I say the Slimcado is basically an inflated slightly-sweeter avocado. It's probably best used in dips and dressings. Although it may be good in desserts as well. I don't recommend eating it plain, as it'll likely bore you to snoring.

Thanks for reading.

~ Raederle

[Article] Equipment

2011-08-05T16:54:00.000-07:00

If you have no kitchen equipment at all: no blender, no food processor, no dehydrator, etc, where to start?

Hardly any of us can run out and buy all of those items at once. We sure didn't. It's a matter of buying one and saving up for weeks or months before getting another, assuming the car doesn't break down in the mean time.

So where to start?

This short article is about the order in which to buy these, in my humble opinion.

Ideally, eventually, you'll want to have

all of these:

Food processor
Juicer
Dehydrator
Blender

Are each of these really required to be healthy?

Of these, I say the dehydrator is the least required, but I find it the most fun and enjoyable tool. I enjoy eating warm food that is raw, and I enjoy eating crunchy food that is raw. Dehydrated foods are a high priority for anyone who wants to eat a 90% to 100% raw food diet and also enjoy "comfort food."

Raw comfort foods are essentially all dehydrated. Salads, juices, wraps, puddings, slaws, sauerkraut, smoothies, and even raw vegan pies are not the sort of "comfort foods" we're used to. We're used to crunchy foods to fight stress (and celery isn't what we usually have in mind).

And we're used to mushy warm foods to make us feel comforted (and pudding left in the sun just isn't the best option).

What should you buy first?

Definitely a blender.

That is, assuming you have a hand-juicer for lemons. That will run you about $8 and make it really easy to juice lemons over your salad. I use my lemon hand-juicer almost every single day. It's very easy, effortless to clean, and makes using lemons a cinch.

Blenders are required for the easiest thing you can make: smoothies. The clean up is fast, the preparation is minimal, the consumption is quick. All around, smoothies are fast, easy, enjoyable and healthy.

Some very simple smoothies I make regularly (portions designed for two people):

3 bananas, 2 spoonfuls of raw cocoa (optionally add fresh mint leaves)

3 bananas, 1 fresh local in-season fruit (like a peach, plum or cup of berries)

2 bananas, 1 mango

3 bananas, 2 spoonfuls of maca, 1 sprinkle of vanilla, a handful of berries

2 bananas, 2 peaches

3 bananas, 1 rib of celery (chopped up finely), 1 spoonful of raw almond butter

All of the above require about 1 cup of drinking water. If you've just made fresh nut-milk or seed-milk, that will work as well. Just remember that mixing fats and fruits slows down the digestion of your food dramatically. An all-fruit smoothie will digest in 20 minutes to an hour. A smoothie with fruit and fats (seeds, nuts, avocados, olives, durians), will take 2 to 6 hours to digest (depending on how healthy your digestive system is). More digestion time means less energy for you, unless you're an athlete and burn calories like crazy.

To make any of the above healthier, just take one leaf (like kale leaf, chard leaf, etc), remove the stem (juice the stem later or put in compost), and slice up the leaf a bit before adding to the blender.

Does it need to be a Vitamix?

No. And I don't even recommend one. My blender is pictured to the right.

I hardly ever use my Vitamix. It over-oxidizes everything. That means that it causes the cells to break open and get too much oxyogen content, which reduces the vitality (the nutrient content) of the food.

I use my juicer's "blank" attachment to mash things, to make puddings, icecreams, nut butters, pie fillings, etc.

I use my regular inexpensive Breville blender for smoothies.

I use my food processor for salsas and soups.

Vitamix isn't required if you have other equipment, and it's really not the most healthy tool since it beats the life of your food.

Sure, Vitamix soup is still healthier than a cooked soup, but not optimal. I'd go with an mid-range regular blender, perhaps a glass one like I have, and just wait on getting other equipment to make certain dishes.

Your blender should cost between $30 and $50, not $2oo, which is absurd for a blender. Mine was $40 for a glass blender, and it makes smoothies without any issue.

After the Blender, then what?

Food processor.

While using the juicer to make nut butter, puddings, etc, is ideal, you can still do this in your food processor.

A food processor can be used to make:

Salsa, guacamole, soup, nut butter, truffles, pie crusts, pudding, ice cream, dips, dressings, and more.

When entering a raw food diet, or even when simply trying to make your diet healthier, a food processor is incredibly helpful. A powerful 14-cup or 16-cup food processor makes a world of difference.

My food processor is pictured above.

Your food processor should run you $50 to $125. Mine was around $90 if I recall correctly, and it's a real champ. I can throw in dates, nuts, oats, frozen berries and bananas and then roll up the end result in balls and have raw truffles in a matter of minutes.

Third?

Dehydrator or Juicer?

This is a hard choice for many people. I say dehydrator first, even though the juicer is much more essential to your health.

My dehydrator photographed above.

I bought a dehydrator before my juicer because I knew I'd want to use a lot of my juice pulp for cracker-making. I was right about that decision.

It's easier to trick yourself into healthier choices with a dehydrator because it allows you to make health food seem like junk food. It's a mental trick that worked wonders for me.

Dehydrators are nothing to skimp on. Excalibur, I believe, is the only brand that makes a dehydrator that will stay consistently at the correct temperature so you don't accidentally cook your crackers.

However, if you do not eat dried fruits, crackers, patties, and desserts regularly, it may not be a worthwhile investment.

It uses a lot of electricity to run it and you want to make sure you run it full when you use it, to make best use of the electrical power.

Maybe one shelf full of bananas drying, another shelf with slices of apples with cinnamon on them, kale chips on another two shelves, marinated tomato slices and mushroom slices on another shelf, and perhaps bananas mashed with chocolate on another shelf.

Then after you get a juicer you can fill up entire shelves after making juice with carrot pulp blended with ground flax or chia seed and spices or dried fruit to make sweet or savory crackers.

I believe our dehydrator was $250. We had help from family sending us checks for our recent marriage. That made it affordable for us in October 2010.

If you don't eat crackers or chips, dried fruit or many desserts, and you just want to make the healthier choice, go for the juicer third.

Juicers

Choosing a juicer is hard. The most important thing is that you get a masticating juicer. Masticating juicers grind up the food and mash it. This is very different than blades which cut your food. More nutrition is retained with a masticating juicer.

My juicer to the right.

Also, masticating juicers rule for making nut butters and ice creams. Today I used mine to turn frozen bananas, frozen pluots, and some fresh banana into this thick delicious pudding-ice-cream and I stirred in maca and fresh peach slices... It was marvelous.

There are many juicers out there to choose from. We went with a masticating Omega juicer, and we're very happy with ours. We've had it several months now, and it's handled every challenge we put it to. It does carrots, it does wheat-grass, it does nut butter and ice cream.

Delicious juice result photographed below:

The only thing it doesn't do so well is that it doesn't make apple juice. It turns the apples into a kind of slush and doesn't extract juice from them very well. Fortunately, my husband and I have little interest in making apple juice.

Research

I highly recommend spending one to two hours reading reviews on products before making any decisions. Often we're right about to buy something and read some reviews informing us that many people have had the product break within the first month.

This is so vital when it comes to equipment that is going to run you more than $50. You want it to last, and you want it to do the job you're purchasing it for!

[Article] Insulin Multi-Tasks

2011-07-29T11:51:00.000-07:00

I've just learned something that is mind-blowingly helpful and informative about insulin.

Before I tell you what it is however, I want to give you a few small tidbits of background about myself.

In a nut-shell:

Diabetes runs in my family. One of my two brothers has it. My mother did have it, and reversed it through limiting refined sugars and highly sweet fruits. I have aunts and uncles who have it.

Diabetes can be triggered on and off in the genes. If you have the gene for diabetes, then you will get it if your body becomes unhealthy in particular ways. If you do not have the gene, but your body undergoes the same unhealthy habits that would cause diabetes, then you'll simply develop other issues instead.

From wikipedia: Diabetes mellitus, often simply referred to as diabetes, is a group of metabolic diseases in which a person has high blood sugar, either because the body does not produce enough insulin, or because cells do not respond to the insulin that is produced. This high blood sugar produces the classical symptoms of polyuria (frequent urination), polydipsia (increased thirst) and polyphagia (increased hunger).

Wikipedia also says "All forms of diabetes have been treatable since insulin became available in 1921, and type 2 diabetes may be controlled with medications. Both type 1 and 2 are chronic conditions that usually cannot be cured" which is a load of crap. It usually can be cured, as shown by a number of documentaries including "Simply Raw: Reversing Diabetes in 30 Days" and "Dying to have Known" and the book "Sugar Blues" and so on.

In any case, I undoubtedly have the diabetes gene. So, if I were to "trigger" that gene, as Dr. Mark Hyman would say, then I would become a diabetic.

I react harshly to all refined sugars. White sugar, brown sugar, molasses, crystallized white stevia, maple syrup, yaccon syrup, xylitol, agave nectar, coconut sugar, etc. I have written about it in detail in many places, including my FAQ if you want the details on my reactions to sugar.

This would suggest a couple things to me: Refined sugars are bad, but also that my body has more difficulty coping with this particular toxin than most people. A harsh reaction like this is something that isn't usually developed until past middle age. Why do I have it now?

My array of sugar reactions point to thyroid, pancreas and insulin dysfunctions. Undoubtedly caused by damage from a completely cooked mal-nourished diet from birth to age seventeen, and from being repeatedly sick and put on antibiotics, combined with staying in an unclean somewhat toxic home and never getting outdoors (because I hated having to deal with heat, cold, bugs, dirt, inclines, etc)... If you want the sappy details of my incredibly unhealthy childhood I have it written out in detail along with a time-line of photos.

Now, lets explore something I've believed was unrelated.

Many people, especially me, have issues with eating high-protein foods. I talked to a woman who had gone vegan and was afraid of not getting enough protein and was eating beans twice a day in addition to nuts and she was incredibly ill. I told her to cut back to having beans once or twice a week, no more than one slice of bread a day, and no more than a few nuts a day. And her health problems vanished.

In the raw vegan community, it's known more commonly than anywhere else that the hyped up need for protein is just that, it's hype. Especially cooked proteins which are virtually impossible to utilize within the human digestive system. Notice that no other animal on the planet cooked their food, much less eats huge platters of cooked beans to get their protein. Herbivore animals have no problem building muscle with raw wild vegetation.

But why do some people, like myself, have particular issues with eating anything with high protein?

You see, if I ate a half cup of cooked beans right now, I'd wake up with a cramping, aching, lurching stomach the next morning, indicating that it would still be undigested.

To a lesser degree I react similarly to nuts. Large portions of nuts cause severe reactions from me that doesn't happen with eating similar amounts of fat from other sources. Macadamia nuts which have the least protein and the most fat never seem to give me any trouble at all.

Bread also gives me a lot of trouble in particular. White bread is around 11% protein, whole wheat/whole grain bread is around 22% protein. And we're not talking raw amino acids here, we're talking long chains of amino acids that form proteins. This is an important differentiation, because when someone says that spinach has "available protein" what they mean is that spinach has amino acids that your body may use to build protein.

Flax seeds are around 12% protein, and while I've never noticed an issue with seeds, I suspect this is only because I never eat seeds in large quantity.

Now, how is this related to what I started this entry talking about?

I've just learned that insulin does more than just regular blood sugar levels.

"Not only does insulin regulate blood-sugar levels within an extremely narrow range; it is also responsible for getting fat stored in our fat cells (adipose tissue), getting sugar stored in our liver and muscle cells (as glycogen), and getting amino acids directed toward protein synthesis (muscle building). Due to these varied actions, insulin is sometimes thought of as a “storage” hormone because it helps the body put all these great sources of energy away in their respective places for use later." From The Cortisol Connection by Shawn Talbott, PhD

This indicates that both my problem with refined sugar and my problem with protein, are really the same problem. Either I'm not producing enough insulin, or for some reason my insulin isn't being utilized very well.

I found this very fascinating, and so I've shared it with you, my wonderful reader.

Namaste

~ Raederle

[Article Blog] How To Get Energized: When It's HOT

2011-07-13T10:41:00.000-07:00

I've been hearing people say, "I'm just too tired to do anything in this heat," a lot lately.

I'm also seeing facebook statuses like "I have no energy to work out lately."

I can relate. Growing up, I hated summer. I dreaded it like most kids dread school. Bugs, which bite. Sunshine, which burns the eyes and skin. Growing things, which make me itch. Heat, which drains the energy. Sweat, which is sticky and gross.

Right up until a year ago I hated sunshine. I not only sun-burned easily, but just the feel on the sun on my skin literally hurt. Within seconds of contact my skin felt like it was already burning. Literally burning. I wouldn't have dreamed of going outdoors in the sun without long pants, a sunhat, sunscreen, sunglasses, and often a long-sleeved billowing shirt. I'd carefully craft my path to get as much shade as possible.

I've always believed this was the sane, correct thing to do. Obviously we should protect ourself from the aging effects of the sun!

And then I saw Markus Rothkranz, John Kohler, Mimi Kirk and others who are deeply tanned, well over fifty and not wrinkled. Complete exceptions to the rule. What do these three have in common? Raw vegans.

It turned out that the same is true for me. I used to burn in the sun within ten minutes, twenty minutes at the longest. Now, I tan easily without burning... And I don't burn. I've been outside every day this summer with no sunscreen, with shorts and sleeveless shirts and no burn. In fact, sunlight feels amazing and I craft my paths to avoid the shade!

I have to do more research on the cause of this, but here is what I've heard and read so far on this topic (but I am uncertain as to how true each of these is, they are just what I've read that explain why 100% raw vegans don't burn, tan easily, and don't experience aging sun effects):

The best sun protection is within our skin cells themselves. This protection comes from antioxidants in food.
The biggest cause of sun burning and sun damage is toxins in the sweat and in the skin.
Natural oil soap which leaves our own natural skin oils on our skin help protect from sun damage.

My other complaints have virtually vanished as well. Bugs are no longer half as interested in me now that my sweat isn't rich in junk. Eating foods with high amounts of refined sugars will draw bugs to you like a magnent. I used to be the one person who got all the bites when in a group of people. Now, I'm never that person. Also, the bites itch a lot less when I do get them.

My eyes still are not as strong as they could be. I used to get splitting headaches from going into the sun with sunglasses. I now rarely wear sunglasses, but I still sometimes need to squint in bright light. I notice this is better after I drink carrot juice two or three times in the span of five to seven days.

I no longer get rashes, swollen hands or a runny nose from gardening, at all. And I now do way more gardening than I did before. I used to love gardening, but I had to go in because my hands would swell from touching the wild plants. Now I eat many of those wild plants. Dandilions, burdoc, mint, plantain and clover all grow in my yard and around Buffalo everywhere. They're very good for you.

My heat tolerance used to be 78 degrees. By the time it got up to 80 degrees I could be found indoors, in front of a fan, my hair dripping cold water, reading a book or napping. I was rendered completely inert and helpless. I would take cold showers repeatedly trying to cool down and remove the sticky smelly sweat. I felt disgusting and loaded on deodorant/antiperspirant every morning and afternoon.

Sound familiar?

When I moved to California to live with my husband (whom I met online through OKCupid), I was very leery of the coming summer. More accurately, I was terrified.

When I complained to my husband of my sticky disgusting sweat, he advised me to drink more water. Back then, I hated water and the idea of drinking it was appalling. He persuaded me to drink it by adding lemon juice to it. Unsweetened lemonade, essentially. It was a huge start. When I got up to drinking three tall glasses a day, there was a noticeable difference in the smell and feel of my sweat. It was much closer to being bearable.

When I became a rawvegan in September of 2010 (and proceeded to be 100% raw vegan with no exceptions whatsoever for three solid months, and only very small occasional exceptions after that)... My sweat stopped smelling and sticking. Today, as I sit in a hot poorly-insulated attic to write this, in a room approaching 90 degrees (it was 91 up here yesterday), I'm quite comfortable. I'm sweating a little, but I don't even notice it anymore. It's not until my clothes are quite wet with sweat that it begins to bother me, and that's fine. Getting all covered in sweat once a day and then showering in a mildly warm shower is very good for the skin.

I am doing some things differently however to add to my ability to cope with the heat.

I'm very carefully avoiding foods that take more than two hours to digest. For a raw vegan, those are nuts, seeds, oils and avocados. Essentially anything with fully-formed proteins or fats. For people who eat anything/everything, that includes grains, meats, dairy, eggs and starches.

Digesting these dense foods causes your entire system work harder than it needs to, making you overheat more rapidly.

I'm eating almost entirely fruit this past week to keep from getting tired. Banana-mango smoothies, banana-kiwi-lemon home-made ice "cream" sherbet, simple spinach and lettuce salads with salt and a fresh-squeezed lemon juice, raspberry-banana pudding, grapefruits, apples, home-juiced lemon-orange juice, fresh pea pods out of the yard, and cooling salsas made up of cucumbers, celery, tomatoes, bell peppers and parsley.

All of the above will digest in an hour and a half or less, meaning more energy now and less energy wasted digesting food.

Let's return to why I used to hate summer for the first 21 years of my life: "I dreaded it like most kids dread school. Bugs, which bite. Sunshine, which burns the eyes and skin. Growing things, which make me itch. Heat, which drains the energy. Sweat, which is sticky and gross."

Bugs rarely bite me because I don't eat refined sugars or flour. Bites no longer itch as much or for as long.

Sunshine no longer burns my skin, and now feels pleasant.

Sunshine hurts my eyes less, especially when I drink carrot juice. I no longer require sunglasses.

Plants no longer cause my hands to swell or itch at all.

Heat no longer drains my energy or makes me feel tired.

My sweat is no longer sticky or smelly. I don't wear deodorant or antiperspirant anymore.

And now I love summer! So many beautiful flowers, so much fresh produce, and everything is so very gorgeous in the sunshine! It bathes the world is gold.

If you want to start enjoying your summer, try this:

Be a fat-free raw vegan until 4:00pm each day. Eat whatever you like after 4:00pm, but for breakfast, brunch and lunch, eat nothing but fresh fruits and vegetables. Also, drink plenty of water. If you dislike water, add a little fresh-squeezed lemon juice &/or orange juice. The glass of water I'm drinking now has several slices of orange in the glass.

Important note: Never remove salt entirely from your diet. Natural sources of salt include celery and seaweed. I also add additional salt to my salads. This is very important. You do require salt to survive, and without it you will not be able to hydrate. You also need potassium to be able to hydrate. A combination of a salted salad, plenty of water, some celery and a few bananas in one day is a great combination for getting fully hydrated.

In the middle of this heat, I'm finally getting back to working out regularly. Now that I've settled a bit since the move. One trick I use to get myself to work out is to be aware of my energy level at all times, and when I realize that my energy level is higher than usual I tell myself, "I've got the energy, there is no excuse not to do just one minute of working out."

Once I've done one minute, sometimes I'm game to do five minutes or ten. Often I just do one minute, but one minute is better than none! Besides, this usually happens three to seven times a day. If I do squats and lift weights for one minute at a time seven times in a day, that's still seven minutes worth of squats and curls.

[Blog] Veghealth Awards 2011

2011-07-10T10:38:00.000-07:00

My blog is a contender for best raw vegan healthy recipe blog in the Veghealth Awards 2011!

The Veghealth Awards is put on by The Vegetarian Health Institute. Their focus is to help people defeat deficiencies on a vegetarian, vegan or raw diet: to ensure that your food choices, regardless of their reason, are healthy choices. Hardly every vegan is a healthy human, so their work in educating the public about how to be healthy as a vegetarian, vegan or raw foodist, is important work.

The Vegetarian Health Institute has a twitter that may be followed to keep up with the progress of the Veghealth Awards. I'm following.

Voting in the Veghealth Awards gives you access to a free 10-day course on veg health secrets. Also, as an added bonus, you're entered for a chance to win $247 worth of online education from The Vegetarian Health Institute. There will be five winners of this prize!

On October 1, 2011 at World Veg Weekend in San Francisco, the winners will be announced.

Also, as an aside to this awesome event, The Vegetarian Health Institute is giving away two free ebooks. I've read them both, and I believe the information is very valuable and helpful, whether you're a vegan, a raw foodist, a vegetarian, or not.

The ebooks:

“How Vegans Get Calcium, Iron, Protein, A, B12 & D”

“14 Ways To Supercharge Your Health With Whole Foods”

For anyone who is reading this post and saying, "hey, I want to know what's new with Raederle!" a quick update:

I'm now pretty well adjusted after the move back home to Buffalo, NY from Walnut Creek, CA. My husband has adjusted well also. We're very thrilled to have such a vibrant growing garden full of edibles. Peas are in season right now and we're enjoying eating them off the vine. Photos of the garden to come. (Before and after photos!)

We're considering various composter designs since we need to build a large one. The one that was already here when we arrived only took us a couple months to fill entirely. We need one that we can fill throughout the entire winter.

I've been enjoying many different smoothies as of late. I can't get enough of them during these hot beautiful days. When the weather is this nice I don't want to be stuck in the kitchen preparing food. I want something fast and delicious and energizing, and smoothies are perfect. I've been especially fond of using raspberries and "nog" seasonings.

But of course, I still continue to make lots of other creative things on occasion, because I really just can't help myself. I've recently posted a simple blueberry banana cream pie recipe.

I have some recent photos on facebook of myself with various nifty creations, including me with raw vegan pizza!

In the near future I'm looking forward to going fruit picking. It's good for saving money and getting more enzymes and flavor all at the same time.

Anyway, click here to vote for my blog and officially make my day.

Thanks for reading.

~ Raederle

[Recipe] Blueberry Banana Pie

2011-07-05T09:37:00.000-07:00

This recipe will require soaking time ahead of time. Also, this is ideally made with a juicer that has the "mash" ability, using the "blank" attachment. If you don't have that, that's fine, you can still make this in the food processor.

Blueberry Banana Pie

Crust:

1 cup soaked raw almonds
6 dates or 1/2 cup dried currant berries or raisins
Sprinkle of nutmeg
Sprinkle of cinnamon
Pinch of salt

Filling:

1 cup soaked raw macadamia nuts
2 bananas
Sprinkle of vanilla powder
Pinch of salt (optional)

Topping:

Fresh organic washed blueberries

Directions:

First, put macadamia nuts and almond nuts in separate containers and cover them each with drinking water. Allow to soak for twelve hours, overnight, or for a minimum of four hours. After soaking, rinse thoroughly with drinking water. May allow to dry or use them wet.

If you have a juicer with the mash ability:

Put dates (or other dried fruit) through the juicer with the soaked almonds two or three times, stirring the mixture periodically during the process.

Add spices and salt and stir in with a spoon.

The reason to optimally use the mash setting on a juicer instead of a food processor is two fold. Firstly, there is the nutritional benefit of mashing instead of cutting. It preserves more enzyme content and nutrients. Second, there is a texture benefit to mashing instead of cutting. The mashing releases more oils from nuts, creating a creamier texture.

If you do not have a juicer with the mash ability:

Put dried fruit, almonds, spices and salt to your food processor and blend until consistent.

Next:

Spread the crust out on a plate and use your fingers to shape the edges upwards.

Optionally this can be placed in the dehydrator at 105 or 110 degrees to firm a little as the filling is made.

Again, if you have a juicer with the mash ability, put the macadamia nuts and bananas together through that first, then stir in spices and salt. If not, put all ingredients together in the food processor and blend until consistent.

Then put the filling into your crust.

Top with blueberries, or the berry of the season.

Thanks for reading.

Check out my other recipes here.

~ Raederle Phoenix

PS: Don't forget to photograph your lovely creation!

[Recipe] Raw Nog

2011-06-27T19:25:00.000-07:00

The key to nog is the spices, not the actual contents of the nog. How much of each spice you use will depend partly on your personal preference. My husband prefers a lot of nutmeg, whereas I prefer a lot of cinnamon.

The essential elements of nog aside from the spices are the texture, amount of sweetness and amount of fattiness. I'm going to give many possible variations, because I've discovered many different ways to make drinks very similar in flavor to eggnog in a variety of ways. I adore nog spices!

The classic raw vegan nog:

4 very ripe bananas
2 cups of fresh home-made almond milk (made from soaked raw almonds)
2 dates
1 spoonful of cinnamon
2 sprinkles of nutmeg
1 sprinkle of ginger
Pinch of vanilla

How to make almond milk:

Soak almonds for four to twelve hours. (Overnight works well.) Soak in drinking water and rinse thoroughly with drinking water. This is to germinate the almonds. It makes them just begin the chemical changes of growing. This change is very vital for your digestion. It increases enzyme activity, which means more digestibility. For technical details about enzymes, read this page.

Blend 1 cup of soaked almonds with four cups of water. Blend for about a minute. (Does not require a vitamix or special blender.)

Pour mixture into a nut-milk bag or into several layers of cheese cloth. Squeeze until the pulp in the bag is essentially dry and crumbly.

Alternative to nut-milk (requires juicer):

If you have a juicer with a "blank" setting, then you can make your own nut-butter by running almonds through several times. Running them through multiple times releases more and more oils, making it more and more "buttery" which is a tasty thing. With a little water, nut butter can be used in place of nut milk.

To Make Classic Nog:

Blend all ingredients together in the blender until smooth. Share with friends and enjoy.

Extra Rich Nog:

4 very ripe bananas
2 cups of macadamia nuts
2 dates or 2 dried bananas
1 spoonful of cinnamon
2 sprinkles of nutmeg
1 sprinkle of ginger
Pinch of vanilla

Soak macadamia nuts for four to twelve hours.

Either make macadamia nut milk (same directions as almond milk above) or mash in juicer. An alternative to both is to simply blend them in the blender with water and use them that way, but the texture isn't as nice.

If you're using a juicer to mash, you may run dried bananas and/or dates through with the nuts to ensure you don't end up with chunks in your blender.

Blend everything together in your blender and enjoy with a lover.

Raspberry Nog:

Use "extra rich nog" or "classic nog"
Add 1 cup of fresh raspberries

Light Nog:

4 very ripe bananas
1/2 cup of macadamia or almond nuts
1 date or 1 dried banana
1 spoonful of cinnamon
2 sprinkles of nutmeg
1 sprinkle of ginger
Pinch of vanilla

Spice Variations:

Add a couple sprinkles of cardamom.

Use half a spoonful of cinnamon, or up to three spoonfuls.

Up to five sprinkles of nutmeg.

Up to four sprinkles of ginger.

Up to a spoonful of vanilla.

Try a sprinkle of cayenne.

Try a pinch of raw chocolate or carob.

Dessert Principle:

Fat + Sugar = Dessert

Examples:
Almonds + Banana = Nog
Almonds + Date = Pie Crust
Avocado + Banana = Pudding
Cashews + Frozen Mango = Icecream
Walnut Topping + Apple-Date Filling = Apple Pie

It's the spices that really make one dessert different from one another. The difference between a luxurious creamy coconut pie and a delectably naughty chocolate pie is vanilla vs. chocolate. (Also, use of coconut oil in coconut cream pie is much more essential than in a chocolate pie.)

Got another idea for raw nog? Comment and tell me about it! I adore nog!!!

~ Raederle

[Blog] Raw Corn

2011-06-23T15:38:00.000-07:00

I would have never guessed, but raw corn on the cob is really good! I used to love it cooked and slathered in butter and salt as a child, but now, I'm enjoying it raw on the cob with nothing on it at all. I'm amazed by how much flavor it has all on its own.

I'm quite certain my tastes are drastically changed from how they were up until I was eighteen. All kinds of things I used to find tasteless, bitter, boring or nauseating now taste sweet, good, rich and enlivening.

Sprouts: I used to get sick to my stomach just from the smell. Now I feel neutral about the smell, and their taste can be easily disguised in a raw salsa, guacamole, salad, stuffed mushroom, etc.

Blackberries: I used to find them bitter, now I find them sweet.

Corn: I used to find it inedible raw, unsalted, or un-buttered. Now I love it without anything added, completely raw on the cob.

Spinach: I used to find it unbearably bitter and disgusting. Now I like it enough to eat it fresh and plain out of my garden. I feel undernourished now if I don't eat spinach every day or at least some other leafy green in quantity.

Wheatgrass Juice: I used to find it bitter and unbearable. Now I find it mildly sweet.

Kale: I used to find it too tough to it, and juice made from it too bitter to drink. I now find it acceptable prepared in a variety of ways, including in juice. I especially like kale/orange juice, and I also especially like "smooshed kale salad." I have an entry that details how to make a smooshed kale salad here.

Bananas: I used to never desire a plain banana. It used to have to always be in a smoothie, or mashed into a pudding or something. Now, I will often eat a plain banana on its own.

Cucumbers: I used to hate them and always pulled them off of burgers or salads growing up. Now, I add them to my own dishes frequently. I also enjoy their juice.

Carrots: I used to only ever eat them cooked in broth &/or with potatoes, but now I enjoy raw fresh carrot juice (which I especially like blended with bananas), and grated carrot in many of entree dishes.

Mushrooms: I used to find them intolerable, but now I enjoy making raw vegan fillings for them several times a month. I especially like to blend avocado, macadamia nuts, garlic, dates, and coconut aminos to make a savory sweet filling.

I'm sure there are other instances where my taste has changed, but these are what come to mind off the top of my head.

I'm interested in exploring new foods and recipes. Whenever I do have some spare time, one of the first activities that comes to mind is "making up a new recipe." Now that I have a juicer, dehydrator, blender, food processor and warm-plate all available at my disposal, I really want to get to making some new and different things.

One of my recent obsessions is to run macadamia nuts and partially-thawed frozen berries through the juicer together with the "mash" attachment. With the "mash" attachment, the food is mashed and all comes out as "pulp" and no juice comes out separately. This attachment essentially is just solid plastic where the usual attachment has a screen to let the juice out.

The result of running berries and nuts through the juicer using the "mash" attachment is to end up with a berry-filled-nut-butter. Very delicious and rich. Not so nice on the digestive system however to eat this too often.

Something of interest of the moment is that the lovely Raw On $10 a Day or less blog is having a giveaway for a book by Mimi called "Live Raw." To read about that (and other awesome things), visit this page.

I will be returning with lots of new recipes... Eventually. I'm not quite ready to put the time into it because I'm so incredibly busy between renovations, gardening, potlucks, other events, family gatherings, cleaning, and usual chores/errands, not to mention my actual work. For anyone who doesn't know, I'm a freelance artist and editor. You can visit my art blog here.

I also have several ideas for new books, including one all about potlucks. I've even written a draft for it on what I want it to be about, and what it will include. I want to provide recipes for people who can't afford to bring something fancy to a potluck, recipes for people who want to impress others at a potluck, recipes for people who are nervous and new and want something simple and easy, etc. The rawvegan potluck scene is so happening, fun, creative and welcoming: I want to open it up for more people.

I want a lot of things. Sometimes I wonder if I want too much, but time will tell if I can manage to accomplish everything I want or not. And hey, just because I don't get everything I want doesn't necessarily mean I wanted too much in the first place, does it?

Thanks for reading.

~ Raederle

[Blog] Potlucks, Potlucks, Potlucks!

2011-06-06T17:41:00.000-07:00

Potlucks

I adore rawvegan potlucks. It's what got me into rawvegan food. I wasn't even a vegan the first time I attended a potluck. I was just curious and interested in improving my health.

Potlucks have changed my life dramatically. They've helped me heal, grow, make friends, explore talents, ideas, inspirations and allowed me to help heal others. It's a magical experience, and I never get tired of them.

A friend asked me what potlucks were upcoming, and what potlucks am I usually attending. I replied:

There is a weekly potluck thing that's just vegans, not raw vegans (although some raw vegans usually attend) on Sundays in North Buffalo.

I do picnics on many Saturdays (such as this Saturday), at 1:00pm at Bidwell and Delevan on the grass. This one should have a pretty high attendance, which I'm excited about.

The third Saturday of each month is a rawvegan potluck at an awesome dude's house on Livingston on the upper west side (not very far from Bidwell and Delevan honestly.) That one starts at 5:00pm and is run by Aaron Fried. Aaron tries to create a good party setting and invites people to come early, prepare their food in his kitchen (which has a juicer, etc), and invites people to stay late jamming on instruments and stuff. I really like his place and style.

Every other Wednesday is the Gathering Wellness Forum which is a general study of wellness group for gathering information to share with each other and the world, and that is also sort of a rawvegan potluck. That is at an elderly couple's house (they are both thin, fit, active and healthy with grey hair!) not far from me on 16th street. That's not far from Richmond. That starts at 7:00pm and the couple's names are Toni (the woman) and Paul. I adore them both.

When the weather changes and I can't do the picnics anymore, assuming the renovations are done on the kitchen, those potlucks will transfer to our house which is in the middle of the west side, kind of between upper and lower west side.

There is also a monthly raw vegan potluck at the Holistic Center on main street the last Sunday of each month at 4:00pm.

All of this information is here on the Buffalo Live-Food Meetup group.

I'm an organizer for the group. It happened pretty fast since I'm as active as the actual group owner in the community.

Everyone is really friendly, even to non-vegans.

My nephew was afraid of not feeling comfortable, but he really likes the potlucks I keep taking him to, and my mom too. Both my nephew and mom eat fairly typical diets, but they are both experiencing benefits from small changes I'm assisting them with.

My nephew has serious migraines, which is an issue Toni used to have but rid herself of through the rawvegan diet and a few additional restrictions because of her extreme sensitivity to glutamate -- even from entirely natural sources.

It's been such a positive influence in my life that I could write a book about it. Why it's so great, what to bring, how to impress people, how to bring something simple and affordable, how to turn it into a learning experience, and how to discern the "health gossip" from the valuable information, how to discern which dishes people brought are truly in the nature of healing and which are not-so-wholesome.

In fact, in time, I believe I will write a book about it. I would also include recipes of course.

Perhaps recipes in each of the following categories:

Inexpensive
Easy to prepare / Beginners
Knock-their-socks-off
Extra wholesome & healthful

I think those are all valuable categories to know a handful of recipes in, especially for someone who wants to make rawvegan potlucks a major aspect of their life, as I have.

Wheatgrass

On an unrelated note, I'm doing wheat-grass juice for the first time and I'm loving it. I'm experiencing serious detoxification symptoms after I drink the juice, but once those symtoms pass I feel really good. The symptoms consist of nausea, dizziness and fatigue, and last between twenty minutes and an hour. After they're gone, I feel amazingly clear headed. I've found that drinking plenty of water in the two to four hours after the wheat-grass is very vital.

Chemical Garbage

A recent facebook status of mine said:

"I was so shocked to find that "mono sodium glutamate" is listed in plain English as one of the first three ingredients on many of my mother's "spices." Things labelled "Chicken Seasoning" or "Beef Marinade" or even "Italian Seasoning" contained a shocking amount of pure chemical garbage."

A friend replied:

"Mono" meaning one, "Sodium" meaning salt. It is actually a sodium salt of gludamic acid. Which means it is a naturally occuring, non-essential proteinogenic amino acid. Those are amino acids that can be found in proteins and require cellular machinery coded for in the genetic code. So our bodied are already hardwired to process this. There are 22 amino acids. Of those 22, 20 are directly encoded by the universal genetic code. Of these 20, humans can naturally synthesis 11 of them from each other or from other molecules of intermediary metabolism. The 9 that we can't are called essential amino acids and must be consumed in diet. These 9 are: histidine, isoleucine, leucine, lysine, methionine, phenylalanine, threonine, tryptophan, and valine. The other two, selenocysteine and pyrrolysine, are incorporated into proteins by unique synthetic mechanisms.

The word "proteinogenic" means protein building. It's not "pure chemical garbage." It's what our bodies are made to process naturally and all it is, is basic chemistry. It's what goes on in our bodies all the time. In fact, so much of what we need in our bodies, when spoken in it's chemical terms, sounds processed when it's not. How many of you actually know what ascorbic acid is?

There are some good points there, but I believe my friend missed my real point. So I replied:

When we refer to "chemicals" we mean something refined. Something that is concentrated and refined in such a way that you'd never find it like that in nature. Huge vats of msg don't occur in nature, nor does high fructose corn syrup. They come from natural sources, but they are not natural to consume. We can get plenty of natural glutamate from seaweed, tomatoes, etc. We don't need to add it to food. We can get plenty of salt from celery. We can get plenty of sugar from fruits, carrots, etc. We can get plenty, plenty, plenty of everything we need from soil, fruits, vegetables, seeds, nuts and sprouts. There is no need to refine things to an obscene degree. It's just corporate manipulative bull designed to make them money at the expense of our wallet and our bodies.

PS: I acknowledge that your reply was educated and reasonably backed up. Most people are not as reasonable or educated when they try to talk about nutrition. I appreciate it. My response is purely explaining why your response isn't quite relevant to the core point I was trying to put across.

Moved to Buffalo in April 2011

Overall, recovery from the move is coming along well. I grew up here, so this is my home, but in many ways it is new to me again after living in California with my husband for a year. It's good to be back. I'm glad my husband likes it here, because it's entirely new for him.

I'm very grateful. I'm blessed to have found my husband (whom I found on OKCupid.com). I am blessed to have discovered a healthy way of living and eating. I'm am blessed to have parents who love me and support my decisions. I'm blessed to have in-laws who range from awesome, to dull, to okay -- none of them being particularly difficult.

I'm blessed to have this blog and my readers. I'm blessed that you're reading this, and you are blessed to. Be thankful for your eyes that can read this, and this moment of your existence.

~ Raederle