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Not Cauliflower Cheese

Not Cauliflower Cheese

My wife made cauliflower cheese for the family dinner and it smelled delicious! Not wanting to feel deprived I quickly set to making my own raw equivalent concoction.

I’m still experimenting with coconut, and wherever fat (or fat foods) are used in traditional cooked recipes, it seems that fat needs to be used to create a substitute raw alternative. Healthy coconut is one of my favourite foods at the moment as it can be used to make some very appetising raw recipes. I took a couple of glasses of another coconut recipe, the “Ultimate Green Smoothie”, to my neighbours today and they absolutely loved it! Make sure you try it out. Read earlier in my blog for the details.

… getting back to the cauliflower cheese… or not, because I’d rather not eat cooked things or cheese.

I decided to put raw cauliflower on my plate. Then I just blended 2 bananas and 1/3 of the meat from a coconut. Nothing else was added. My trusty blender did a stirling job of making a lovely creamy thick sauce out of it. I think that you can forget having a creamy sauce unless you have a high powered blender. I guess you could put the coconut through a juicer to crush it first, that is if the juicer is man enough, please don’t blame me if you brake it though!

The only problem with the recipe is that it lacks a little colour. However shut your eyes and take a taste of the cauliflower covered in the sauce and you will be in heaven! WOW WOW WOW!!!

In case you need the full ingrediants list, here it is!:
* 1/2 a cauliflower
* 2 bananas
* 1/3 of meat from a mature coconut.

Just in case you were wondering, the other things on the plate are
… well I think you can work that one out!

YUMMY FACTOR 10/10

Ultimate Green Smoothie

I’ve been doing more experimenting with coconuts. This time I made the ultimate green smoothie! Use a high powered blender to blend thoroughly the following:

* 1/2 the meat from a mature coconut
* 1/2 lb of spinach
* 4 ripe bananas
* 4 dates
* 1 glass of water (or ice)

Ultimate Green Smoothie

The above makes 4 large glasses of the most incredible yummy green smoothie ever! It was so nice that I made the whole lot twice and I had 8 glasses of the stuff. That’s me stuffed for the day!!!

In deciding a name for it, the most apt name that keeps coming to mind is, “The Ultimate Green smoothie”!!! Let me know what you think if you decide to make one!

How does the low fat raw diet effect your skin?

When in my teens, through my twenties, thirties and right up to my 40’s I had very problematic skin. I’m giving away my age now… If you are interested, I was born in 1965 and I’ve stopped counting!

I occasionally had psoriasis and often had dandruff on my head. I had painful thick cracking skin on one of my toes. I used to get incredible itchiness from clothes and from just taking a shower. I had fungal skin infections. By far the worst for me though was severe acne, I still have bad scaring on my back.

Due to acne, in my late teens I would often have to wear two shirts so that blood wouldn’t show through. One of the most painful gestures someone could do to me was give me a pat on the back. Acne has blighted my life and massively knocked my confidence as I was growing up and in my early adult life.

Doctors used to say to me that diet has nothing to do with acne, THEY ARE WRONG. Diet has a massive effect on the health of your skin.

When on holiday earlier this year I had a few ‘cheat days’ when I just ate regular food. My skin felt clogged and my acne came back, I felt fatigued and depressed. That was a bit of a wakeup call. From then on I decided to take things more seriously and try to stick with my raw diet without cheating. Within a few days the acne on the back of my neck started to reduce, and within 3 weeks my skin was looking and feeling really good again. My skin seems to get better and better for every week that goes by when I don’t cheat with my diet.

In case you are wondering, low fat raw food has helped my skin in the following ways:

* Psoriasis on my scalp is totally gone.
* Dandruff is under control – if it ever shows signs of coming back then I rub coconut oil into my hair and into my scalp in the evening and wash it out the next morning using just water. The times I need to do this are becoming less and less. I don’t use shampoo.
* Thick cracking painful skin on one of my toes has totally gone.
… Oh I forgot to mention… I used to occasionally get athletes foot, this has gone totally as well.
* I don’t get itchy in the shower or from clothes now. I don’t use soap and I really limit use of laundry washing power.
* ACNE HAS GONE!!!!!! Scaring remains, which is still quite severe on my back but it is less pronounced since being on low fat raw food and seems to be improving as the months go by.
* I used to get loads of blackheads on my back, neck, face and chest. I rarely get them now.
* My skin is soft, supple and feels moisturised yet not greasy or clogged.

I moved towards this diet and lifestyle to help with chronic fatigue issues, however I have been helped in numerous other ways too. Getting healthy skin is just another amazing added bonus!

Orange and Coconut Surprise!

EatMoreRaw - Orange and Coconut Surprise!

I was wondering what to do with a coconut that had been sitting around for a couple of weeks, then I had a flash of inspiration. ‘Why not blend it with dates?’ I thought. It took a while to get into the thing. My latest technique is to use a corksrew to pierce the hole, then drain it off or use a straw to drink the juice (yummy!). Then I just start hitting it very hard with a heavy old rolling pin and eventually the coconut separates into two. I prize out the mature coconut meat with a large strong spoon.

That’s the hard bit out of the way, now onto something more scrumptious!

Coconut Surprise

Ideally use a high powered blender and add the following into your blender jug. Add in the order shown, otherwise the blender might jam on start up:

* 6 ice cubes.
* Half the meat from a mature coconut
* De-stone and add 6 to 8 Medjoul dates
* Add enough filtered/distilled water to cover the ingredients
* Blend until smooth

I loved it! Others in my family thought it was tasty too. Then I thought, my not add a bit more flavour to it – that’s where the oranges come in. Thankfully I still had half a coconut and plenty of dates.

Orange and Coconut Surprise! – serves 4

Use a high powered blender and add ingredients in the order shown:

* 4 oranges peeled and chopped
* 8 Medjoul dates de-stoned
* Half the meat from a mature coconut
* Enough ice to allow above to blend thoroughly (typically 10 ice cubes)

Wow, this is a big hit, even with my non raw family! I’ll definitely make this one again. It’s like an orange creamy mousse. It’s totally deliciousness and is made from 100% raw goodness.

Stuart

Do we need to eat any fat foods at all?

I’ve been quite strict recently and had only tiny amounts of fat foods. ie just occasional seeds, in very small quantities. I’ve only had one avocado in 3 months.

It’s interesting to experience that my cravings for fat foods and heavy carb’s have gone.

Also, strangely I’ve actually put on a little fat! That could be due to the fact that I’m not exercising as much at the moment. I have done a couple of runs, and considering I’m out of practice due to a forced break, I managed to keep going and do a reasonable time and not conk out on hills. I still run quite slowly though, I have a long way to go before I catch up with Tim VanOrden!

Even more strangely, my skin has actually been feeling slightly oily yet very fresh and clean, a bit like it has a natural moisturiser. So I guess I must be getting more than enough fat from just fruit and greens with the tiniest amount of seeds. The near to ‘zero fat’ experiment seems to be working. It’s not zero fat by the way, as fruit and greens typically contain between 3% and 9% of calories as fat. That is all the fat we need.

Eat Your greens Update

I have found the heavier greens just that – a bit heavy! I felt fantastic initially but I think my digestion was struggling to keep up. I’m currently still eating lots of greens but these are more of the salad type of greens, with the occasional cabbage or broccoli thrown in.

I feel I’m missing something if I don’t eat the equivalent of 3 heads of lettuce a day. That’s to give you an idea of the quantity. Perhaps 1/3 of this is in the form of green smoothies. Often I have no smoothies and occasionally I’ll just have the greens in smoothies, I just do whatever I fancy at the time – no hard and fast rules. However I do try to ensure that I have the greens in one form or another. If you want lots of heavier greens, then I’d suggest having them in smoothies. Kale and oranges make a fantastic green smoothie.

For greens, I don’t just eat lettuce by the way! My favourites are; spinach, romaine lettuce, celery, pak choy, rocket and a few others. I also like, kale, cabbage (the less strong varieties), red cabbage, beetroot tops, spring onions (some would argue that they are not really leafy greens though), plus a few other salad greens that I often come across. I also sometimes eat weeds, but I often haven’t a clue what they are! I sometimes taste them and I’m pleasantly surprised, so I just eat them while weeding! It’s funny how appetite, desires and taste buds change when you go raw and eat plenty of greens.

I find I’m at my best when I eat more of the easy to digest foods. For example at one stage I had huge amounts of runner beans, which I love. However if I eat a lot of them in one go, then in 12 to 24 hours it knocks the edge of me. Large portions of broccoli or strong cabbage has the same effect on me. My understanding is that the heavier stuff hangs around a bit longer in your digestive system and causes a bit of a backup that results in fermenting or putrefying of food. This gives the resulting toxic hangover. In general, the easier your food is to digest then the more energy you will experience.

Kind regards, Stuart