Category: Recipe

Raw Energy

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Over 30 years ago Leslie and her daughter Susannah were telling us that frying oil turns it toxic, that vitamins and enzymes are destroyed in the cooking process, about sprouting and juicing to protect against cancer and how raw foods balance blood sugar and hormones. These were crank concepts to most people, now they are widely accepted. 

They promised that changing to a mainly raw plant-based diet would lead to a new level of health and vitality, that you would stay young longer and lose weight. It would also help prevent degenerative diseases and allergies as well as helping alleviate chronic illnesses.

And you know what? They were right!

I asked for a food processor for my birthday – it is still in service over 30 years later – I ate raw and was the healthiest I had ever been. I had a chronic condition and was in a lot of pain, but eating mostly raw and no junk made me feel more alive, have more energy and lose weight. My pain was reduced and my mobility increased. A new friend, coincidentally, had also discovered the Kentons and we had fun trying out the recipes together, our families being a bit sceptical to put it mildly!

I love their raw treats, in fact those pages are so well used they are covered in food stains and annotations as I have added to and adapted the recipes. A few years ago I lent the recipe book to someone who didn’t return it, I can’t even remember who it was. I have been missing it but I recently found a secondhand copy on Amazon and am so pleased to have it again.

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Carob Fudge, one of my favourites

Eating raw doesn’t mean you never have anything cooked or warm – I couldn’t make it through a winter without soup or casserole – rather, you aim for about 75-80% raw food diet.

And raw doesn’t always literally mean raw: officially, raw means any food that hasn’t been heated above 48C. But even just eating raw some of the time, adding more fruits, vegetables, legumes, nuts and seeds to your diet, whole or in the form of juices and snoothies, will make a huge difference to how you feel.

I have been sprouting beans and seeds ever since, in fact I just sprouted some mung beans and alfalfa. They are so easy to do and so packed with nutrients.

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Homegrown alfalfa sprouts

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Homegrown mung bean sprouts

I also like to grow lentil, chickpea and broccoli sprouts.

I hope this snapshot of raw eating inspires you to make some changes so you can benefit from more energy, feel more alert and perhaps even alleviate those niggling aches and pains. It works for me!

Leslie Kenton’s website is a mine of information on all things to do with health, beauty and spirituality.

http://www.lesliekenton.com

*LESLIE KENTON’S BIOGRAPHY (found on Google)

A former consultant to European Parliament for the Green Party and course developer for Britain’s Open University, Leslie is trained in Chinese Medicine, nutrition, homeopathy and bioenergetics. She was the first Chairperson of the Natural Medicine Society in the UK. Her contribution to natural health was honored by her having been called on to deliver the McCarrison Lecture at the Royal Society of Medicine in London. She also conceived and created the worldwide Origins range for cosmetic giant Estée Lauder.

LESLIE KENTON’S TELEVISION PROGRAMS
Her network television programs include Raw Energy, a cookery series, and Ageless Aging, both of which she conceived, wrote and presented herself. She has made several short films on health and spiritual topics for the BBC. Her TV documentary To Age or Not To Age, screened in the Southern Hemisphere, made television history when, in only 5 weeks, the diet and exercise protocol she designed reversed parameters of aging in people between 30 and 60, in medically measurable ways.

Copyright: Chris McGowan

Horchata (aka Tiger Nut Milk)

Pardon? Horchata! It sounds like something you would say when someone sneezes, but Horchata is actually Tiger Nut Milk! I was recently reminded of eating tigernuts as a child when I came across the lovely Ani from the Tiger Nut Company on Twitter (@theTigerNutCo).I haven’t had them since I was very young and it brought back all sorts of sensory memories. I decided to order some raw, organic tiger nuts and we have been making Horchata or Tiger Nut Milk with them.

So what are tiger nuts? Well, for a start they aren’t nuts! They are tiny super tubers packed with nutrients: protein, fibre, fatty acids, calcium, magnesium, Vitamin E and potassium. They are sweet and when soaked and blended with water, they make a lovely sweet, creamy milk.

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There is no waste, as you can dry the pulp in a low oven and use it in making burgers, energy balls, sprinkle it on your breakfast or add to smoothies. (See also my recipes for Lemony Tiger Nut Truffles here and Raw Orange, Cacao and Walnut Cookies here). This recipe makes about a litre, the glass jug in the photo was almost full.

There is a recipe for Horchata on the company website http://www.thetigernutcompany.co.uk but here is my version:

Horchata

1 Cup Raw, Organic Tigernuts soaked overnight in filtered water

3-4 Cups Filtered Water, depending how creamy you like it

1 Pitted Medjool Date (optional)

1/4 Tsp Vanilla Extract

Pinch of Himalayan Pink Salt

Drain soaked Tigernuts and add to high speed blender* with filtered water, date, vanilla and salt.

Blend on fast until smooth, about a minute.

Strain into a large jug or bowl through a nut milk bag or piece of muslin

Pour into an airtight bottle and keep in the fridge.

Keeps for about 4 days in my Grip & Go leakproof glass bottle.

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It is also nice slightly warmed with a sprinkling of cinnamon and served in a pretty pink cup!

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*See here for blender reviews

Copyright: Chris McGowan

My Road to Raw – Going Veggie

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So what set me on the Road to Raw? It didn’t happen all at once. In fact, it very nearly didn’t happen at all. It was a long process. First I had to embrace vegetarianism.

Our best friends were vegetarian and we respected their choice, happily eating vegetarian meals whenever we got together. But we just felt we were fitting in. It didn’t really cause us to think about the issues. We never discussed it with them. Then our son was born, we moved away, led separate lives and I thought no more about it.

Until my son was two and a half.

By now I had developed a love for cooking, my son did too, and as the fad for adding bran to all things edible took hold, we graduated to baking wholemeal bread and scones, pizza bases and cakes. We substituted Flora for butter as we were urged to replace saturated animal fat with polyunsaturated margarine ‘for a healthy heart’. I became more interested in food and health.

We often went to the local library, he chose Richard Scarry and I optimistically chose sewing – I never did make that quilt – and books on conscious eating. One of these I recognised. My vegetarian friend had mentioned it when we had talked about my newfound interest in food and health.

Frances Moore Lappé’s * Diet for a Small Planet is about eating to protect the planet’s resources: she maintained that adopting a meatless diet was the only way forward because a meat-based diet was not sustainable. Lappé also posited the theory of protein complementarity (bear with me, here comes the science bit!). She advocated combining certain protein-based plant foods at the same meal to ensure you had a complete protein to replace the meat protein. So, for instance, brown rice, lentils and nuts on the same plate.* (see below).

Later, I discovered its sister book written by her friend, Ellen Buchman Ewald: Recipes for a Small Planet. Ewald developed high protein recipes to simplify this process of complementarity for would-be vegetarians. This became my bible for quite some time – as you can tell by the photo! (the cat liked it too – see nibbled corner). She does use soya quite a bit but she also introduced me to carob, which I love! Her high protein Gorp cookies were a family favourite.

The other catalyst was coming across Australian philosopher, Peter Singer’s book Animal Liberation: A New Ethics for Our Treatment of Animals, which popularised the term speciesism and was not so much advocating equal animal rights, but rather their right to consideration and equal treatment as sentient beings who experience pain.

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Together with the government campaign to cut down on animal fat, these books propelled me down the road to vegetarianism.

It was far from easy. My husband and son were not at all impressed that mince and bacon were no longer on the menu and we all reneged at using TVP (textured vegetable protein), which admittedly tasted like cardboard! And this was at a time when you were lucky to get a wilted salad if you ate out or visited friends – we ate a lot of omelettes! – and you were never invited to dinner parties.

By the time our daughter came along, we were fully-fledged veggies. I had a vegetarian pregnancy and was so much healthier than the first time, when I seemed to live off cheap meat and orange ice-lollies! She became a strong, healthy, vegetarian baby determined to run before she could walk.

We now shopped at Beano, then a small local co-operative selling legumes, oats, wholemeal flour and so on out of barrels. As I learned, so did my son, mixing up lurid concoctions of herbs and spices that he now uses on an everyday basis. He was particularly proud of the turmeric, curry powder and chilli combo, which turned out to be portentous as now every meal he makes or eats has to come with chilli on the side!

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Vegetarian sushi made by my daughter.

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 Which would you rather have: a plate of vibrant, tasty sushi with tamari or chilli sauce, or a beige meal of processed white bread, margarine, deep-fried chips and fried egg?

Next time, I’ll write about how I found my raw energy!

*http://smallplanet.org

*This is because most plant proteins don’t have a full complement of the amino acids essential for the human body to develop, repair and renew. More recently, this theory has been amended in that it is now believed complementary proteins only need to be consumed within the same day, not necessarily the same meal.

Copyright: Chris McGowan

Health Revolution – Review & Recipe

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Recommended Read (and tasty recipe at the end of the post!)

If you are reading this blog because you are wanting to make some changes to your lifestyle and improve your health but you’re not sure where to begin, then this book is for you! 

Based on his own experiences, Dale Preece-Kelly describes how he once had everything and nearly lost it all – including his life – through bad luck, poor choices and an unhealthy lifestyle. In a style that is neither hectoring nor prescriptive, he takes you by the hand and gently guides you along the path that led him to living a happier and healthier lifestyle.

Dale is passionate about helping others and in writing this book he passes on what he has learned along the way, from being an overweight smoker and drinker on a slippery slope to a permanent hospital bed to becoming a man of many talents: actor, lifestyle coach, nutritionist, pet therapist and educator, and now writer, to name a few! (http://www.organicguineapig.com & http://www.critterishallsorts.co.uk)

Dale has an easy, accessible style that is chatty and amusing and very down-to-earth. His book is so easy to read and covers nutrition, juicing, addictions, exercise, household products and provides quick, tasty and healthy recipes to set you on the road to a better you. There’s even a recipe for toothpaste!

I have a couple of copies of the paperback version which I pass around to those who express an interest in leading a healthier lifestyle but can’t quite motivate themselves or who can’t see the forest for the trees.

It would make an excellent gift for those who regularly make Spring their season for personal improvement, but who get bogged down in Life or don’t have the support to make it sustainable.

Available on Kindle and Paperback from http://www.amazon.com

Organic Guinea Pig’s Signature Chocolate Orange Brownies

Vegan & Gluten-Free.

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Prep. Time: 15-20 mins Cooking time: 25 mins. Preheat oven to 180C

Line oven dish with baking parchment

Ingredients:

2 Medium Sweet Potatoes

1/4 Cup Raw Organic Cacao Powder (We used The Raw Chocolate Company* version)

1 1/4 Cups Ground Almonds

1/4 Cup Honey (or Maple Syrup)

1/2 Cup Pitted Dates

Zest & Juice of 1 Orange

Pinch of Himalayan Pink Salt

 Method:

Peel, chop and boil sweet potatoes for 5 minutes, or until cooked. Blend till smooth

(I recommend leaving the skin on if they’re organic, and steaming for more flavour)

Add all other ingredients and blend

Bake for 25 mins in a parchment-lined tray or until knife comes clean

Sprinkle chopped nuts over brownies before cutting into squares

Allow to cool before demolishing!

(Reproduced by kind permission)..

They are moist and tasty and keep well in a tight container in the fridge. We froze some of ours and they kept for ages, only because I wanted to save some for a family visit!

*The Raw Chocolate Company

Copyright: Chris McGowan

Pears But No More Parsnips: In Which I Confront My Parsnip Phobia!

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 Parsnip-Free Zone!

In our family, everyone is allowed one vegetable they dislike and can choose to avoid: my daughter’s is Brussels sprouts – though perversely she chooses to eat them at Christmas! – my son doesn’t like cooked carrots (I used to grate them into stews and casseroles to hide them), and my husband picks out all the mushrooms. For me, as regular followers on Twitter will know, it’s parsnips. I hate parsnips. No, that’s not quite true: I have a real phobia about parsnips. Just writing the word makes me wince and feel queasy. I shudder at the mere thought.

I have no idea how this began. I don’t recall any parsnip trauma growing up. I don’t ever remember them being served up, though my mum eats them when offered. She even brought a can of Parsnip Soup with her recently – vegetarian or otherwise, I was nearly sick! imagePerhaps my dad didn’t like them. My own family is split firmly down the middle when it comes to this vegetable: my husband and daughter love them while my son and I recoil in horror whenever they appear. In our house, they are bought, prepared, cooked and served by my husband once a year at Christmas, when he makes roast parsnip chips. He loves them.

It’s not just the taste that is off-putting to me, there are other root vegetables that I’m not keen on, like swede and turnip, but I still have them in soups and stews.

Nope, it’s the smell! I can’t be anywhere near the kitchen when parsnips are being peeled. I have tried, really tried to get over this. I haven’t felt this strongly about a vegetable since my first pregnancy when I couldn’t be around potatoes in any way, shape or form.

When I first began juicing (see My First Juice Plan: Advice for Beginners or Do As I Say Not As I Did!), I followed Jason Vale’s 5lbs in 5 Days juicing plan. I was so excited at this new challenge, looking forward to not just losing some of the weight that had crept up during the previous year, but having more energy, feeling more alert and generally a lot healthier.

I did so well. The plan delivered in every respect: as promised, by Day 4 I was on a ‘juicy high’.

But, dear reader, imagine my dismay, my sheer horror when Day 5 came around and there, right front and centre was not one but two (!) juices called Pear ‘n’ Parsnip! Jason promised I would be surprised and have ‘a newfound respect’ for the humble parsnip.

I summoned up the strength and determination of hundreds of doughty ancestors, intent on not falling at the final hurdle. I even attempted to peel the parsnips myself, with a scarf over my face! I will admit, it wasn’t as I expected and I did drink them both down, but I can’t say it was a pleasant experience – because I could still smell them!

Not to be discouraged by my first attempt, I tried again a few months later. I am nothing if not stubborn and determined, I don’t like something to get the better of me.

But, Jason, I’m sorry, you did your best, I know you did, but I can’t, I just can’t…

Except that I did! In December, I began following Natural Juice Junkie‘s Winter Cleanse 2015. Loved the Winter Slammer (see Juicy Winter Warmers), The Beet Goes On, the raw Pea and Mint Soup and Pearfection.

But what’s this on Day 2? Hang on, not just Day 2 but Day 4 – twice: ‘Back to my Roots’, which means *4* parsnips in total!

Well, nothing ventured nothing gained, I am no wimp. Down the hatch they went. Still didn’t like them. But I did it. Very proud of myself. That’s it then.

But no, there was more!!

On Day 5, I discover the final meal of the plan is – drum roll – Parsnip and Ginger Soup which also has not 1, not 2, but *4* parsnips in the ingredients list!

Neil, you’ve broken me. I can’t go on. I have to draw the line. From now on I shall be replacing parsnips with squash. Or sweet potato. Total immersion therapy has not worked for me!

NO MORE PARSNIPS!

Here is my take on Jason’s Pear ‘n’ Parsnip Juice, replacing the parsnip with sweet potato.
Sweet potatoes are full of antioxidants, B vitamins, Vitamin D, magnesium, iron and potassium.
Use organic if possible, scrub well and leave the skin on for extra nutrients and flavour. You won’t be disappointed!
(Unless you have a sweet potato phobia!)

image    Ingredients

1 Apple, 2 Pears,
1 large sweet potato
Half a lime, peeled but with the pith still on
Few sprigs of mint

Juice all the ingredients and pour over ice. So refreshing. Cheers!

Update: My daughter-in-law, who loves parsnips, recently posted a video for my benefit of my 3 year old grand-daughter chomping on a raw ‘yellow carrot!’ <sigh> My daughter-in-law loathes celery and so my son delighted in posting this rejoinder: ‘don’t worry, I fed them both celery afterwards!’

Disclaimer: Please remember, these are my personal experiences. If you think you may wish to embark on a juice plan, be sure to consult your doctor first.

Jason Vale/Juicemaster

Natural Juice Junkie Home

Copyright: Chris McGowan