Domestic Dharma

big fat sand =)

2011-11-30T09:58:00.000-05:00

My favorite sandwich lately here has been generous amounts of homemade hummus (Creamy Hummus from Vive le Vegan!), cucumber, avocado, spinach, and Dijon. So good, filling, and quick to prepare, after you've made the hummus. This week was the first time I used dried beans to make hummus (so much cheaper, no cans, etc. We have been using Eden beans for years (no BPA in the can lining), but this is better financially and it's fun. It does however take a bit of planning ahead of time, I ended up having to wake up in the night to put the cooled beans in the fridge ;) they had just gotten done cooking at bedtime. I used the instructions from an Eden foods catalog: rinse beans 3 times with cold water, soak beans covered in cold water by 3-4 inches (the beans will get bigger) for 7-8 hours, drain and cover again with cold water by 4 inches or so in a pan, add a piece of kombu, bring to boil and simmer for about 1 1/2 hours until beans are tender (you may need to add more water), ours were perfect at an hour and a half, remove kombu, and let cool and refrigerate.

Thanks to Angela at Oh She Glows I made one of our new favorite dinners. Check out this recipe for butternut squash mac n cheeze! I have it bookmarked on the computer and have made it a few times since, so good! When I found the recipe I had some leftover cooked (cubed on the stove in water) kabocha squash from the night before and used that. I've also used pumpkin, but the kabocha was my fav. I stirred in some frozen peas at the end of course ;)

stirring the squash into the cheeze sauce

delectable dinner =)

Lots of protein smoothies here lately too:

water/unsweetened almond milk
2 bananas
fruit (berries, oranges, or mango, etc.)
greens
spirulina
avocado (want a creamy shake? put in an avocado, mmm!)
dates

And some food photos from the summer...

fresh organic asparagus! some raw in salads, some steamed for dinner

with nut butter carrot and parsnip fries

collards and rice seasoned with these two.

I love trying new hummus recipes...what is your favorite recipe?

Good Frosty Morning =)

2011-11-18T08:04:00.001-05:00

Good Morning from a frosty Michigan! We're starting to get some colder weather and had a beautiful burst of blowing snow yesterday for our second snow fall of the year, no accumulation yet, which is just fine, we have some long cold winters here!

This week I went to visit my Momma for the day and night for a girls sleepover and packed some sustinance for my trip. First I totally enjoyed this green juice sitting in the sun.

Organic juice of:
romaine
cucumber
spinach
ginger
apple
orange

I made the Broccoli Salad from The Cancer Survivor's Guide to Foods That Help you Fight Back. (I am not ill, but I think this book is wise). It's really simple to make, I did leave out the sugar the recipe calls for because I don't think it needs it.

Mom and I pretty much devoured this for lunch and dinner!

This was my dinner plate: broccoli salad, boiled organic beets (yum!), raw cauliflower with raw curry pate dip, brown rice and quinoa mix from Seeds of Change (we did not heat in the bag). It was delicious, awesome foods =)

In the morning I started off with an organic green protein smoothie that I had packed:

2 fresh bananas
unsweetened almond milk
frozen peaches
fresh spinach
1 tsp spirulina
2 pitted dates
splash of almond extract
2 scoops of Raw protein powder

for my back log of photos I found these from Hubby and I's dinner for my birthday in May this summer. We went to Jazzy Veggie downtown Ann Arbor for a vegan dinner that is always so tasty.

Hubby had the potstickers

and the sausage n peppers hoagie

we shared their delicious baked sweet pot fries

I had what I pretty much always choose, the sweet potato quinoa burger.

Here I am turning 33.

We walked around town after and stopped into Schakolad for a piece of chocolate. They have a nice few options of vegan chocolate. I believe these were coconut, MI cherry, and PB. The guy working keep giving me free pieces once he found out it was my BD ;)

and this was the sky on our drive home, gorgeous. I'm a lucky girl.

raw tortilla chips!

2011-11-03T12:20:00.001-04:00

I was so excited to finally make these raw corn tortilla chips from Everyday Raw. I won this book last year and have yet to make any of the recipes in it, but I knew when I first looked through it that the tortillas were what I wanted to try first. So finally it was time...after I was fearful hubby was going to turn into a corn chip from eating so many (we usually have the Kirkland organic ones, which are yummy and fried), but I wanted him to snack freely on something he loves so much, he eats them plain, blech!, maybe I could make it a ~~bit~~ quite a bit healthier for him, and being reinspired after lunching with a girlfriend at Red Pepper Deli where we had their raw chips with avocado and pico.

frozen, thawed organic corn, onion, spices, water

stirring it all together with the flax meal

2 or 3 days later ;) I am still becoming proficient with spreading chips really thin on the dehydrator sheets so I let them dry extra until they were nice and crispy. I dried 30 mins. then scored into chips, then dried maybe 24 hours, moved to mesh trays to finish to our crunchy desires. We both really like them (and these I can eat plain!) lots of flavor and good crunch. Have you all made raw corn chips?

A couple nights ago I made (along with our staple big salads) these quinoa and bean sloppy joes that a friend posted the recipe link for on Facebook. I really like making these, they are a good protein meal, easy and quick, and sometimes it's fun to eat a sandwich, something we don't make much of here. Here's the recipe link. They make great leftovers too inside romaine leaves for lunches. We sadly didn't have any ripe red peppers this time so I used extra toms, and made tom sauce out of opened paste and water, and used our favorite bean the aduki/adzuki bean instead of pinto. We like to top them with relish and yelllow mustard on a Rudi's wheat bun. So good and comforting, especially when it gets chilly here!

Now that I have gRawnola made my mornings have consisted of this at some point. Cultured almond milk and granola. yum, yum, yum!

I am pretty excited to try the new Greek style coconut milk yogurts when I find them!

We have a new coffee mug that we are digging by Klean Kanteen. We got the insulated 16 oz mug and the cafe top. The cafe top comes apart for thorough cleaning, is BPA free, however it is not leakproof. We've only had it a few days, so I have yet to use it myself, but hubby loves it, washing it is a breeze, and now I have two to rotate sending to work with him since two of our other SS insulted mugs have been left other places :/

We ordered from REI since our local stores don't seem to stock them and I had a gift certificate as part of a massage tip=) Did you know they'll ship to your local store for free? cool deal right? one of the many things we love about REI. Also, while I was there picking up our mug I saw that they had Pure bars. I picked up my favorite blueberry and the cranberry orange to try. Trader Joe's here always has just the same two flavors that happen to not be my favs.

and for the photos from days past...

we have delicious wheatgrass with half a haircut

and Maggie protecting hers ;)

Hope the sun is shining where you are today, thanks for reading!

Happy Halloween/Samhain!

2011-11-01T08:40:00.000-04:00

Happy Halloween, well the day after. Hope everyone had a fun time and not too many sugar hangover headaches this morning! Fruit leathers are what we handed out this year to our trick or treaters. We found them in boxes of 48 at Costco. We had just under100, a bit less than usual, and I think the most common costume here was the green lantern ;)

I have been searching for this nog, had a major craving for it! We found it this weekend at Plum Market, thought I was going to sing in the store. The mint chocolate is yummy, but the nog is SO yummy. I don't know if I've ever had traditional eggnog, but as a kid I loved this mix that my grandparent's had that you could stir granules into a glass of milk for instant eggnog anytime of the year. Hubby made a big mug of warmed nog, almond milk, and a few chocolate chips last night as it was a little chilly greeting the kiddos.

We've been enjoying big salads made with organic local spinach varieties, red peppers and tomatoes from our garden, pumpkin seeds, and walnuts.

We had our first hard frost this past week, a couple days before it happened I felt it coming and gathered up our green toms and peppers that are now ripening up nicely in the window =)

I've made a couple of recipes from Vive le Vegan recently. One of them is the Creamy Poppyseed Dressing that is awesome! It calls for soft tofu, but I subbed the same amount of raw cashews instead to keep it raw and it worked perfect, just adding a bit of water for blending.

poppyseeds are so pretty.

We have a couple of these bamboo ladles from pampered chef that work so well for dressing salads.

The other recipe is for her Homestyle Chocolate Chip Cookies, which are always delish. This was our sweet treat for the holiday since we don't buy candy.

Has anyone tried the new organic olive oils that Whole Foods has now? We have tried this one and I have to say it is really flavorful and nice. One thing you miss when you've been to Italy is the flavorful olive oil.

Our backlog photos of the day are of our quick pickles we made this summer.

We used this recipe for Icebox Pickles from Earthmother. They were soooo good, very apple cider vinegary, which we love. Hope our cucumbers are more productive next year for making more pickles! Hubby and I love our pickles.

Strawberry Chia Milk!

2011-10-27T09:35:00.000-04:00

I remember seeing a post with a recipe on The Raw Food World's Facebook page and thought it sounded so good for strawberry chia milk. Growing up 'pink milk' was one of my favorite treats, I loved to dunk my pb&js in it, seriously was there anything better? My strawberry milk then was made by stirring pink Quik into a glass of milk and I'm sure that I used extra ;) This is a decidely healthier real strawberry milk without any of the little blue specks. Anyone else remember those? I always wondered why there was blue in it and what it was, now I know;) So, anyway here is the link to the recipe. I made some changes so I'll give you the recipe I came up with.

2 cups unsweetened almond milk (not raw)
2 T organic chia seeds
3 T raisin soak water (I had been soaking raisins for pudding)
2 medjool dates, pitted
scant 2 cups of frozen organic strawberries (what we had left)
splash of organic fairtrade vanilla extract

blending away, isn't it pretty?

2 servings, one went with me on a bank errand and the other is for a treat today =)

This milk is really delicious, very creamy and sweet. If you want it a little less sweet, leave out the dates and see how you like it.

Thank you Raw Food World for sharing your recipe, their site is a great place to order your chias from, it's where we first got ours when I was chia curious ;)

Onto dinner last night, this rice bowl sounded perfect (and we had all the ingredients on hand) that I found on Happy Foody while starting to catch up on blog reading yesterday.

changes I made:
used collards as the green (are garden is abundant yet =)
I skipped Nori (ours is expired, not sure if that's ok or not...) and used dulse flakes instead
added chopped red pepper, we had a little late crop in the garden =)
used raw agave as the sweetener
used ACV as well

using our little frozen chunks of aging ginger (it's so much easier to grate this way too) to make the delicious dressing.

microplanes rock

dressing ready

juilenned collards fresh from the garden

stir them into your brown rice when it is ready

top with all your goodies and dress, the cucumber really added a nice fresh crunch to this bowl, Adding beans would also be great.

For a treat last night I had made these Winter Squash Muffins with leftover bnut squash from dinner this week. I used 2 mashed bananas as my eggs and they turned out great, very moist and a nice treat with chocolate chips ;) I actually ended up eating my dessert before dinner while I was getting dinner prepared, sometimes that happens here.

While I was in the garden getting greens I picked what will be the last of our tomatoes this year. These will ripen up nicely in the kitchen window.

A new favorite Theo bar is this salted almond! Our WF rarely carries different flavors, I was very excited to find this on sale.

and for back log photos of the day: Mom had made a surprise visit to see me on my birthday back in the end of May...it was nice and sunny and I was out on a day off soaking up the sun and drinking some lemonade, not quite like today, haha.

super easy lemonade recipe: water, dates, and fresh lemons. You'll want to remember this one for the summer, you can adjust your sweetness to your liking, we use less dates and more lemon for great tartness =)

The sun may not make it through the clouds today, so I have a day of organizing in order here.
Take good care, xo

Happy Fall!

2011-10-26T10:49:00.000-04:00

Happy Fall to you and a big thank you to anyone who may be out there checking into my blog yet! I have been sorely missing the blogging world as I haven't written a post since May, nor have kept up on your lovely blogs that I so enjoy reading!! Many things have happened in the meantime keeping us super busy, I'll catch you up on them eventually...the first for today was that summer was crunch time for school ending with graduation in September, yay =) I unfortunately had to push the blog to the back burner while I was finishing massage therapy school (which consisted of lots of studying, class, weekend workshops, anxiety inducing practicals, and finishing my hours working in the student clinic) and also working part time for a great physical therapist as a clinic assistant. I am proud to say that I am certified in Myofascial and Neuromuscular Therapy from the Ann Arbor Institute of Massage Therapy =) Here's a pic from one of our Maniken classes of me with mine (this feels like forever ago already!)

of course I had to give mine a heart, anatomically correct for sure ;)

and a couple of quick pics from graduation. Me and Hubby

and Dad, me, Mom, and Hubby. Man it felt good to be done. I also recieved an award for highest GPA at graduation along with a classmate, pretty exciting!

so fast forward now to fall from my last post in the middle of May it has become cool and festive here in Michigan and full of mother nature's spectacular colors. Fall in MI is indescribable, I so love it. Helping with the festiveness here were gifts brought by awesome friends that came to visit: my favorite, lilies and cinnamon pine cones, mmm.

and antique apple season is here and wrapping up. You know we've been eating more than our share of apples around here! A couple new favorites this year have been jonathons and wine saps. Trying to talk the Hubby into a wine sap tree for the spring...here's a bag of bounty from our local organic farmers one day.

and apples on our counter today (red delicious, wine sap, cortland, and jonathons). We've been eating them all fresh and in our juices, so flippin delicious.

if you get the chance to eat antique apples our favorites are:
grimes golden
red delicious (as I've said before NOT a thing like the RD in the store don't worry)
pippen
wine sap
jonathons

a couple of apples this morning were used in this awesome raw vegan pudding from Baby Greens, the Waldorf Pudding.

The FP doing all my hard work =)

and topped with soaked raisins, chopped apple, and raw soaked and dehydrated walnuts

yummola.

a great snack around here has been date, raw almond butter, and raw &dehyd. pecan bites.

I have really been making an effort to tighten the belt on our spending here and one thing that I was searching for a cheaper option for was my face moisturizer. As you know I am a big Evan Healy fan and have loved her day moisture for a couple of years now, but I was on a mission for a less expensive option that I loved just as much. I found it in the wonderful Aubrey line, I actually may like it even a little better as my face has a bit less oil wearing it and it smells awesome and herbally.

What is your favorite face moisture to use?

So I have this big back log of photos that haven't been blogged that I'll be adding to new posts here and there, I'd like to start with these. Over the summer I won Pure bars from Color Wheel Meals! We love these bars, they are much like Larabars only better since first off they are organic and they also have added protein which is awesome to have on hand in your bag when you're away from home all day for a powerpacked snack (and also created by a Michigan momma). Thank you Color Wheel Meals for your generousity, we loved them! Check out Samantha's awesome blog here. The Wild Blueberry is my favorite. Have you tried Pure Bars?

Wishing you a super day, hugs!

Cat beds

2011-05-18T16:27:00.001-04:00

Maggie and Marley have cat beds after 10 and 11 years! On my wish list last year I had asked for a soft non-toxic, eco-friendly bed for my old man Marley to lay his bones on. His loving and generous Grandma and pa ordered him this amazing little bed from West Paw Design. The bed was in the house for four months and not once walked on let alone layed in, so I called and asked if it were possible to try a different shape of bed. Their customer service is fabulous and it was no problem to try a different bed. I chose two flat mats for them and they are already kitty approved.

West Paw Design makes wonderful pet products in Montana. They ship responsibly with no extra packaging and stuff the beds into small boxes.

These are the two I chose. They are machine washable too, very important ;)

Mom and Dad had also gotten another bed from Costco so Maggie had one too. She still spends most of her snoozing time in a reed basket and on our bed...but Marley LOVES the bed from Costco. It is so funny, it looks like a little cat couch. I'll share a pic when I have it all cleaned up...it gets hairy! (<-that's an understatement ;)

I was lucky this week to recieve these gorgeous jars that were my Grandmother's! I love them so much.

They will get so much use here. I would be ~~kind of~~ a lot lost without canning jars in my house.

Last night after we got home from work and school we put together this delicious salad for dinner. Thanks to the current sale at Whole Foods, Sunshine burgers have returned to our house =D

We had julienned kale, sliced fennel, zucchini, raw olives, topped with a BBQ Sunshine burger and pepperjack Daiya. We dressed the salads with olive oil, coconut vinegar, S&P, and curry powder (thanks Ginger Is The New Pink!) it's so delicious, I swear we have the same tastebuds ;)

In between appts today I enjoyed this awesome salad:
chopped bok choy, fennel, zucchini, roasted red pepper, green beans, and cauliflower. I dressed it with dulse flakes and the same dressing as above, man was it so good!

I think I average about 5 meals a day. They're not (usually) super huge, but very nutrient dense. This works for me because I love good food and it keeps my belly happy too as I am a former IBSer. So a bit after the salad I ate this bowl of Go Raw Live Chocolate Granola with almond milk, almond butter, and an insanely delicious peach.

Ok, house cleaning is next on the self made honey-do list... I'm sharing the quote of the day from Gaiam's FB:
“Some of us think holding on makes us strong; but sometimes it is letting go.” ~ Herman Hesse

and an awesome article on Detroit as Growtown!!! here

baby apple trees!

2011-05-15T17:56:00.000-04:00

Well, our apple trees live! We planted them maybe a month ago now, they are so cute and starting to bud and leaf out, yea! They arrived while it was pretty cold here yet from California in a neat little box. We opened them and let them hang out in the garage until the ground was ready to be dug. They came bare root, so pretty much just a tall twig with some roots on the end ;) They're so cute, I know they're going to grow the best little apples, I'm in love. Our trees came from Trees of Antiquity.

Wee little trees

future branches =)

leaves!

Hope they like their new home. We moved a blue spruce to make room for them, and put the spruce back by the composters. It was crazy windy the next day after we planted and it blew right over, hubby was awesome and staked her back up, isn't she a pretty tree? We added a composter this year now that the first one is full we can let it complete the composting process this summer while we add to the new one. We're hoping for some excellent black gold since we put a lot of really great scraps in there!

In garden news there is not much happening yet, as I've been, as my husband says 'busier than a cat covered in shit' really? I don't know where he comes up with these sayings ;) I have been too busy to make time for our garden yet....I will get it rolling soon-here's hoping for a really long summer. I usually just let the garden time happen organically when it feels right, sometimes it gets in late, but seems to work out alright. I haven't even been to the farmer's market yet this spring, boo. So far there are weeds coming up with one chive clump.

and our garlic is growing well

When we juice we pretty much always include celery, but the stores have been out of organic celery for a bit here...then I found this gem at the co-op

just what I was looking for, yum

Our favorite dessert as of late has been raw cacao pudding with berries.

Just process an avocado and a mango together. Add in a couple of soaked dates, your sweetener of choice (we've been using maple syrup- not raw), and cacao powder. Holy yumminess. The leftovers even hold up well for a few days in the fridge.

For Mother's Day I made my Mom some raw fudgy balls. I used the ingredients from my raw girlfriend, added oats and rolled in coconut. I didn't measure as I was in a hurry. So just use your judgement, they are delicious! We also ordered her a salt lamp (thanks for the store link Bitt of Raw!). which is beautiful.

Krista's Fudgy Balls ingredients
raw almond butter
thick rolled oats
coconut butter (warmed in the dehydrator)
soaked raisins and /or dates ( I used both)
cacao powder
sweetener of choice (I used a little raw agave)
sea salt to taste

process all to combine, roll into balls, and roll in unsweetened coconut shreds. Store in freezer and eat as you please =)

Hockeytown

2011-05-14T00:06:00.000-04:00

This week we were fortunate to be given tickets to game 6 of the Redwings and Sharks. We had amazing seats, 6th row off the glass. The only other time I'd been to a Wings game was in Middle School when my Dad took me, my brother, and a friend where we sat up in the top of the upper bowl, little bit different perspective! The atmosphere was so fun, we really had a blast cheering on the Wings. It was hubby's first time to the Joe so I had to take his pic ;)

Enjoying a beautiful evening walking the Detroit Riverwalk to the arena.

The view from our seats.

Us having fun on a Tuesday night =)

While watching the game I was not inspired to drink beer and eat pizza, I was however very inspired to get back to exercising! I find it pretty ironic that we will often cheer for athletes in top physical shape while gathering together and doing decidedly unhealthy things. I'm not against having fun, don't get me wrong, but when I watch people at the top of their game I find it motiving...so I took my five fingers out for their first run. I actually intended on going for a walk to enjoy the sun and fresh air as a break from studying, but my feet felt like running. So that's what we did and I was amazed at how much I wanted to run (I am not much of a runner let me tell you). I did an hour of run/walk intervals and felt pretty amazing. It may have been a combination of the sunshine here (finally!) and all the chia seeds that I eat, or how the first run is always the easiest, but I do know that my body loved running in my new shoes!

I was a good girl and did my stretching afterwards in the yard. Where I decided then to lay down and read while the cats explored a bit and enjoyed the sun themselves. Breaking free from winter!

I'm reading Something Blue. Last weekend I had a great meet up after school with a couple of girlies to see Something Borrowed! I love girl movie dates =) The movie was cute and got me in the mood to watch love stories, I have promptly watched The Notebook since, swoon! If you are a Ryan Gosling fan, just wait until you see one of the previews during Something Blue!

Other inspiring sightings: I saw these cute window signs in Petoskey at Yoga Roots.

"Yoga has been known to cause health and happiness"

"Trying to find the answers from outside yourself is nonsense. You need to look inward." ~HH the Dalai Lama

What inspires you?

Do you embrace your dandelions???

Raspberry dressing

2011-05-04T17:28:00.000-04:00

I finished my homework and cleaning the floors on my day off today! Yea for being productive, now I can take some time to blog =) Hope this finds you all well and enjoying some sunshine.

I ordered a couple of books that I've been wanting. One of the them is The Cancer Survivor's Guide to Foods That Help You Fight Back. I think the idea of this book is so great and I wanted to check it out. We have unfortunately had a few family members and loved ones diagnosed recently. I haven't gotten too far into it yet, but we have enjoyed a fab dressing recipe so far.

The Raspberry Salad Dressing on spinach, avocado, and yellow squash.

I've been eating our raw granola with these little cultured almond milks by amande. It's sweetened with fruit not sugar, although I could use it a little less sweet. I've tried all the flavors that our stores carry and love them all, peach and blueberry are my favorite if I had to pick. You know me, I do also wish it was organic, maybe they'll do that in the future...

and eating more grawnola with fresh almond milk and banana

We finished our stash of dates from the Date People and got a new order in from the co-op. I think of medjools as the cadillacs of dates and they are very delicious, but man I have a thing for the barhi date! I'll have to be patient and wait until next season again and just daydream about them in the meantime ;)

apparently the box is usually purchased for store use ;) They would greatly underestimate my date consumtion, haha.

I was up in East Lansing last week to see a cool osteopathic manipulative doc at MSU (I'm in TMJ/D treatment to hopefully get rid of my tinnitus and then get my bite fixed...if you were curious) I knew there was a co-op in town so I thought it would be the perfect place for lunch. They don't have prepared foods like ours does though so I ate my banana and headed out. They have this sweet wooden sign in the front window that I snagged a photo of.

I'll call on my inner Kris Carr and wish you all a juicy day! hugs xxxx

(cucumber, granny smiths, celery, wheatgrass, and lemon) our favorite! with dinner of GF blueberry pancakes last night.

I'm Still Here =)

2011-04-23T23:23:00.002-04:00

I'm still here! ...and not in the way that Joaquin Phoenix is still here..man I really hope he's doing alright. I do love him, that was rough to watch. What I mean is I'm still here blogging. So, when I started this blog I was not working outside of the home and was much better at posting regularly. I mean Earth Day went by and I didn't even post! This last year I've added school and work to my life (I am still getting readjusted to the time management thing ;) I love it and am having fun, but sometimes unfortunately that means putting off posting :/ It takes me a bit to get a post ready and my thoughts together, however I've been taking pics all along and am constantly composing posts in my head. So I have a big backlog of pics on the computer that will hopefully make it out onto the blog! Often times it's a choice between staying up or sleeping (this girl 99% of the time chooses sleep, she likes it).
Things I've been up to:
*breaking in my five fingers

I am loving them! I have been mistaken for a Na'vi a couple times, which is ~~cool~~ awesome ;)

*making our first batch of raw granola

raw, sprouted, organic, and gluten free deliciousness! I used the Crunchy Buckwheat Granola recipe from Raw Food Revolution Diet
buckwheat and seeds were soaked

and sprouted

and dehydrated

and enjoyed for breakfast this morning with homemade almond milk, homemade almond butter, and strawberries

*making fresh batches of 'raw' almond butter makes me so happy. This stuff seriously changed my life, it's that good

*celebrated my Daddio's BD (at Rochester Mills Brewing Company) I didn't take pics of my dinner, but they have a delicious salad and hummus plate that are vegan, among other vegan menu items.

(hubby, me, my Dad + Mom) This was my second drink it what seems like ages. Seems lately it just doesn't sound good to me.

*made Dad his favorite cookies raw, Oatmeal Raisin

from Ani's Raw Food Desserts

*these have made quick treats with our super crunchy soaked and dried almonds

*and this organic sandwich has been eaten a few times from Zerbo's (ezekiel bread, sweet cashew cheese, cucumbers, sprouts, leaf lettuce, tomato, and avocado.

*dinner tonight was brown rice finished with Garlic Red Pepper miso (oh my, best miso to date!), raw collards, Eden tomatoes and cannellini beans with broccoli and peas, and asparagus. Dinner was delicious and the asparagus was fabulous! We don't eat asparagus but maybe a couple times a year. Organic asparagus isn't is a lot of $, however I've gotten it on sale twice this spring and it is SO good. We also like it sliced into rounds raw in our salads, fresh and crunchy.

Questions for the day for fun...

*Have you watched I'm still here/are you a Joaquin Phoenix fan?
I have with my jaw on the floor...I am, I love him. He was actually at the time I began my vegan journey one of my main inspirations. I kind of find his family fascinating.

*does asparagus make your pee smell crazy?
haha, yes, sometimes ;)

*do you love Shel Silverstein?
We do, so much. The Giving Tree was/is one of my favorite childhood books, makes me cry each time.

This poem has been on my mind lately and I'd like to share it with you from Where the Sidewalk Ends.

Point of View

Thanksgiving dinner's sad and thankless
Christmas dinner's dark and blue
When you stop and try to see it
From the turkey's point of view.

Sunday dinner isn't sunny
Easter feasts are just bad luck
When you see it from the viewpoint
Of a chicken or a duck.

Oh how I once loved tuna salad
Pork and lobsters, lamb chops too
Till I stopped and looked at dinner
From the dinner's point of view.
-Shel Silverstein, Where the Sidewalk Ends

-on a side note, if there are an unusual amount of typos tonight, I am not wearing my glasses and for fear of disturbing a couple of comfortable cats I didn't get up to get them ;)

Have a wonderful weekend whatever you do! xxxx

Red Pepper Deli

2011-03-30T18:15:00.000-04:00

so about those cookies....
I have been in the mood lately for cookies and looking through our cookbooks I found this gem of a recipe in The Everyday Vegan for 'Bill-Friendly' Cookies. Dreena created this recipe for a friend who avoids sugars in his diet. They are sweetened with orange juice and raisins and are totally unique and yummy.

The Everyday Vegan

'Bill-Friendly' cookies

I love this recipe, so easy and clean. I subbed walnuts for pecans as I don't think I've ever bought pecans...thinking I should try them! You won't believe this , but up until about 5 years ago I did not eat nuts, I was that picky little kid who didn't eat the bread because there were walnuts in it ;) I'm making up for it now with my love for them for sure.

Last week after work we went out for a fabulous dinner at Red Pepper Deli, a sort of local (30 minutes away) raw organic restaurant. I had actually bought a Groupon, like I could pass that up, hee hee. I love to go there, Groupon or not!

His and Hers raw organic dinner...mmm nourishing!

Dave ordered the raw pad Thai (we both loved this, it is phenomenal)
It is zucchini pasta, mushrooms, red pepper, bean sprouts, snow peas in a slightly spicy almond butter sauce. I am pretty certain that being in public was the only thing holding Dave back from licking the plate clean, this happens at home (sorry honey;) !

I had the Balsamic Mushroom Pasta which was delish as well. The marinated mushrooms were the most flavorful part, I would've eaten a whole plate of them! Love the fresh shoots on top too.
cashew ricotta, zucchini pasta, tomato, spinach topped with balsamic mushrooms

The deli is fresh and colorful ( oh how I wished we lived a tad closer...see the Help Wanted sign??)

and smells like freshly juiced wheatgrass, yummola (organic Ann Arbor grown wheatgrass!)

You know I couldn't pass up raw dessert. We I decided on the coconut oreo pie, it was perfect.

check out the fun floor too (and my Earth Mary Janes ;))

When we left there were flurries coming down, but we were happy and nourished with dessert in hand. Raw food makes you feel so good.

pie enjoyed later at home with strawberries

so about my love for nuts here's an ode to almond butter photo

oh how I love thee.

local tofu

2011-03-30T10:02:00.000-04:00

So every so often I get a craving for tofu, like an actual craving. I stopped into WF to pick up a carton, but they were all out of their brand in firm...I picked up this one from Rosewood. Reading the package I see that it's handmade here in Ann Arbor, geez this is what I should be buying all the time. Not just because it's local, but turns out the texture and flavor (yes I enjoy the flavor of poached tofu) are amazing.

When I get this craving I will most always make an easy stir-fry of sorts. I don't really know how to stir-fry, but this is what I do.

cook quinoa in low sodium veggie stock while you're preparing the veggies and tofu.

saute/sweat garlic until fragrant then add chopped/sliced veggies that you have to use. Here I used red bell pepper and broccoli, let this cook for a minute or so. If you have fresh ginger I like to grate that in as well, adding water if needed. Stir in 1/2-1 tsp sea salt, pepper, and any dried herbs you want, be generous. Here I used the giant bottle of organic Italian seasoning from Costco. After a couple minutes stir in some crushed tomatoes (or tomato sauce or paste+water) and cubed tofu. Place the lid on and let poach for a bit adding water if you need. I usually will turn it down to low and get a few things done around the house, so about 15-25 minutes, then you can stir in some frozen peas, sliced zucchini, a generous squirt of yellow mustard, and some nutritional yeast, heat through. Then plate over your qunioa and enjoy. This is an easy and economical meal and one of those that helps you use up extra vegetables. We like it anyway.

I have told you how we love Theo chocolate right? The bars were on sale at WF so we thought it would be a good time to buy a case (12) and get the 10% too...behold our chocolate stash =D

Now the goal is to not eat them too quickly...we'll see how that goes or if we just eat more chocolate ;) !

recent school lunch pic:

organic carrots, red pepper, and broccoli with raw sunflower ranch dip. (I've been making it without the garlic and onion lately and I don't miss them at all, I should note that I LOVE dill so I really jive with this dip)

there's also a couple of cookies in there that I will post about soon.

recent furry ones pics:

Marley hopes you all get to soak in the sun's warmth too.

more awards and loves

2011-03-23T10:10:00.000-04:00

I've been very honored to receive two more blog awards! Thank you Antony in London =D

and Thank you RawkinMom!

Per the rules I should list 7 potentially interesting but definitely random facts about me: So here it goes.

1. I take my basal body temperature each morning, well this got personal quick. Yes, for obvious reasons, we're going on 4 1/2 years trying now, but who's counting ? ;)

2. I know what it smells like inside the Sistine Chapel.

3. Marley cat and I take a 2 1/2 hour ride to see his holisitc vet, it's a nice ride together. He assures me he enjoys my singing.

4. I know that you can meet good people in bars. I married a guy I met in a bar.
5. To me sleep is a good solution to many things. 'Take a nap, you'll feel better when you get up ;) " It works for me. Obviously do not take this as medical advice.

6. I almost died when I was 19. An emergency surgeon saved me three days after my appendix ruptured, I have a sweet scar to remember by. Btw I'm grateful everyday and actually had a serendipitous experience running into my surgeon this week and being able to thank him again in person.

7. If I have free time my favorite thing to do is to be still and quiet and read. This doesn't happen much lately, but that's ok, I'll just keep adding to my list to read at the library ;)

The bloggers I would love to pass these awards on to: Please take your pick of either or both, you all rock, thank you for writing and sharing!

Rules to claim and share these awards: ( I say feel free to amend them as you please as I didn't nominate 15 bloggers)

Thank and link the blogger who has given you the award.

Copy and paste the Logo in your blog.

Share 7 things about yourself.

Nominate 15 other Great Bloggers

Comment and let them know of the award

ok, back to regularly scheduled programming. I wanted to share a couple of new things that I've been love love loving lately. First is Kevita coconut kefir drink that is oh so yummy. I was a little apprehensive to try it as I don't love the flavor of stevia, but the two flavors that I've had are just great and I can't discern the stevia!

Strawberry Acai

and the Coconut Mango

What a great way to get organic, raw, vegan probiotics and it tastes amazing to boot.

The other is my new Maruca bag which I think is gorgeous and functional, loving it!

This is my second Maruca bag, I love the quality craftsmanship, materials (no leather), and they are handmade in the US. Boulder, Colorado to be exact. A friend of mine who travels the world turned me on to these bags and I purchased my first one before our trip to Europe, it was so perfect for travel essentials. That bag was used non-stop for 3 years going to lots of shows, festivals, and with me everyday before the strap came apart (at a Franti show, there was lots of dancing happening =) I still need to get her back in working order...I contacted Maruca and they don't do any restrapping or repairs unfortunately. That bag is a darker color, so I think this new one is perfect for spring and summer! This one I bought locally at Heavenly Metal in Ann Arbor. Other local boutiques that I know carry them are Trend 440 in Monroe and Cobblestone Rose in Saline. At Cobblestone Rose you can also check out the gorgeous photography decor that my world travelling friend creates.

easy pocket for cell phone, lip balm, etc.

and enough room inside for the essentials: wallet, hand lotion, house keys, tea, etc. I tend to travel pretty light as far as my purse goes, and this is perfect for me.

What are you all loving lately?

Crazy Sexy Diet recipes

2011-03-16T10:11:00.000-04:00

I've recently made two delicious recipes from Crazy Sexy Diet, well one inspired by using ingredients that we have around the joint.

First up is the Vanilla Chai Tapioca Pudding that is oh so yummy and very reminiscent of the rice pudding that my Great Grandma used to make. I love chia puddings, they are so easy to prepare, are chock full of nutrition, and really easy to travel with. You can switch up your toppings depending on what you feel like (or eat it plain), this day was blueberries, strawberries, and a little nut butter, looks like peanut butter ;) There was a little run of the most delicious organic blueberries and strawberries in the stores here so we were happy to get our fill =)

The other recipe is inspired by the Buddha Bowl and also by the bowls at Ginger Is The New Pink. In CSD Buddha Bowls are described as fast food for the conscious eater. I like that they are also packed with nutrition, economical, and part raw. Also the only dishes to wash will most likely be a pot, knife, and cutting board, easy. This is how I made ours:

Simple DD Buddha Bowl

1 1/2 cups brown rice
3 1/4 cups vegetable stock, low sodium
1 carrot, grated
handful or so fresh cilantro, chopped
4-5 large leaves collard greens, stems removed and chopped
1 can black beans, rinsed and drained
1/2 bag frozen peas
1/4 bag frozen corn
olive oil
coconut aminos
raw olives, chopped (we only had 1 left, so we shared it ;)

Cook rice in the stock until done, about 35 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in the beans, peas, corn, and collards. Top the bowls with cilantro, carrot, and olives. Drizzle on olive oil and coconut aminos to your liking. Easy, yes? The leftovers are wonderful too. There was no real theme to this combination, it was made with ingredients that we had. The possibilites are endless, so feel free to get creative or keep it simple like this one. You basically just want a gluten free grain, topped with raw and/or steamed vegetables and add a couple flavors and textures to the top like olives, avocado, bell pepper, carrot, etc.

Since these beautiful berries have been in the market lately Mom got a Raw Strawberry Cheesecake.

I like that the strawberry recipe makes more than will fit in the cake pan...I get a mini one too then ;) Dad noticed that the cake was creamier than before, I figure it must have been the homemade raw almond milk! It really is creamy and rich. The recipe is of course from Sweet Gratitude.

Have you all checked out Crazy Sexy Diet? What are your favorite recipes/tidbits from the book?
My favorite is that it finally got me off my butt to start juicing! There's so much I haven't read yet too...

The dressing I can't stop making!

2011-03-10T08:58:00.000-05:00

That says it all, I haven't gotten tired of this dressing and it's a cinch to stir together.
Ingredients:

olive oil
coconut vinegar
raw tahini
brown mustard
dried ginger
sea salt and pepper

I don't measure, just add the amounts that you like to your bowl

and stir it together

and add your salad.

I was excited to put our nut milk bag to work making silky smooth almond milk!

I used the instructions in Sweet Gratitude for making nut milks. I first soaked our almonds for 24 hours, drained and rinsed them. In the Vita-Mix I used 1 cup of the almonds and 3 cups of RO water and blended for about 2 minutes. I then let the nuts and water steep for 20 minutes like they suggest in SG and gave it a quick spin again.

The next part coming up is where I remembered not to cry over spilled milk...

I poured the milk into my jar lined with our nut milk bag,

and quickly realized it was going to be a little hard to squeeze the milk without making a mess...

I transferred to a bowl to finish

and made the most creamy almond milk, love.

labeled my jar with a sharpie, which I read at Kristen's Raw would wash right off, and she's right, works awesome.

I can give up my invention now of plant based labels that degrade in the dishwasher ;) seriously, I was trying to figure a non messy, non wasteful, non toxic solution, because I'm a date labeler!

I dried the pulp in the dehydrator on 105 degrees, I don't remember how long( helpful right?), just kept checking it to see when it was dry.

and of course while I was soaking almonds we had to do some for snacking too!

Once the pulp was dry I blended it in the Vita-Mix to break it down into nice flour, labeled ( I'm starting to think the title of this post should be I keep a sharpie in my kitchen ;) and packed in freezer to use later in cookies maybe.

Our almond milk was used in smoothies and a raw cheesecake which it made them both extra creamy and rich, yum! During my next almond milk adventure I found a better procedure: after blending I poured the milk into a glass water/juice carafe so I could then line the Vita-Mix with the bag and pour and strain back into there where there is plenty of room for squeezing. If at first you don't succeed try try again =)

Recent snack lovin- homemade kombucha, chocolate, raisins, and the aforementioned almonds.

Recent packed lunch lovin- romaine, red pepper, Bubbies, and dulse salad, avocado, mango + blueberries

I'll leave you today with the reminder in the front of Sweet Gratitude

You Are Loved

Homebrew success

2011-03-09T21:33:00.001-05:00

We have officially had success with our first brew of Kombucha =)

To begin, check out what a school friend hooked me up with...

my very own scoby, and a big fat healthy one at that! So I had to get up the courage to give it a try ;)

isn't she pretty? like science experiment pretty ;)

After picking up some sugar and a big jar we were ready to roll.

Supplies:

organic black tea
organic fairtrade sugar
glass bowl
glass jar
scoby

I did a little quick research online and learned that raw sugar isn't the best to use (hence the trip to the store), real tea should be used (not herbal), metal damages kombucha, and that I didn't have a good cover for the jar...

so first I brewed the tea for 15 minutes, 5 bags. I used 2 quarts of water.

stirred in sugar ( I think I used about 1 cup, which may be more than necessary), and let cool to about room temperature, then transferred to the jar and placed the scoby inside, (Scoby is an acronym for Symbiotic Culture/Colony/Collection Of Bacteria and Yeast) and added half of the kombucha that came with the scoby.

What I ended up using to cover with was gauze, which we have a bunch left from hubby burning his hand a few years ago, so I thought I'd try it and a rubberband. I don't know if this is ideal, but we didn't have any fruitfly problems which is what I've been reading about.

and placed her in the corner (out of direct sunlight) and patiently waited...

for 14 days until I got the feeling it was time. So I peeked in to discover that a little baby scoby had indeed grown!

again I don't know if this arrangement is ideal...

I tasted it and was surprised at how yummy it turned out plain. I poured into two jars and filled an old Bubbies jar with brew and the mother and baby. Our baby isn't a solid scoby as it grew around the mother sticking up since our jar was smaller than where she had grown in, but it separated well.

labeled and packed back in the fridge

we did get some fizzyness (which dissapated as the jars I stored in are not air tight)

and to one jar I added fresh sliced ginger

which was good, but not overly flavorful. I'm wondering if I have to let it like 2nd ferment at room temp to take on the flavor more? anyway, I chalk this up to a success =) We'll find out if it was beginner's luck as there is another batch brewing now!

Things that I learned the first go round:
I probably need glass with a bigger circumference for more air exchange and so the scoby can stretch her legs out (check)
I should research more about reuseable material for the top
I need a funnel (check)
EZ cap bottles may help keep the fizziness (check)
While it's fermenting you can smell it, I love it, I may start talking to it soon...

Here's hoping we have success for round two!
I welcome any suggestions/tips from you seasoned brewers.

I've been enjoying this combo a ton for snacking:

organic, 'raw', soaked and dehydrated almonds

and Theo chocolate, mmm. It's good with Kombucha too!

Sweet stuff =)

2011-02-23T09:53:00.001-05:00

Another knock out cheesecake from Sweet Gratitude is the Chocolate-Orange Cheesecake!

The recipe calls for cacao butter, but we didn't have any (it's pretty pricey) so we subbed more coconut oil/butter combo, and it worked great.

I garnished the cake with extra orange zest and cacao nibs

Mom and Dad shared this one with us too and it is my favorite one! The orange and raw cacao combo is SO delicious. Here Dad is prepping the cake for the freezer so it's easy to pull out one serving at a time.

Here's also a couple of photos of the how the lemon wild blueberry cheescake turned out

Dad rocks with the photos huh?

On Mom and I's Mother's Day trip last year to Petoskey we bought a super duper delicious beet hummus from The Grain Train to share in our hotel room. I haven't forgotten about it since and we had a lone beet hanging around so this was bound to happen...

First I quartered the raw beet and processed it until broken down pretty well. Then I added all the ingredients to make Dreena Burton's Peanut Sesame Hummus, using two can of Eden garbanzos. (I know I've said this before, but if you love hummus this cookbook is worth getting just for the hummus section alone, there are 8 recipes! the rest of the book rocks too.) I was thinking that the combo of beet, toasted sesame oil, and tahini sounded great. I forgot I wanted to use tahini instead of peanut butter...so I added more tahini to the batch. It was good, but then it got all nice and married overnight in the fridge and it was really, really good! Not to mention it was an absolutely beaultiful color. This hummus was enjoyed with lots of veggies including this find...

in February...in Michigan. Thank you kind folks who are busy growning organic food in a greenhouse (I'm assuming) in the MI winter! We bought these from Zerbo's and notice they're 50% off so they were like a dollar something for fresh organic local peas =)

One last item for today is that I have been grateful to receive two blog awards! The first one is from Nikki at Live.Love.Yoga Blog. Thank you SO much Nikki, I'm honored. If you don't read Nikki's blog I highly encourage you to stop over. She is a Certified Baptiste Power Vinyasa Yoga Teacher who writes expertly on living life and doing yoga. This is a blog that I love to read for its thought provoking topics that so often bring self awareness and laughter =) I do believe she is a modern day sage. I met Nikki when I took her yoga classes while living in Las Vegas and about four years later her classes I still miss. She really will take you to your edge and you will finish class feeling strong, centered, empowered, and smiling! Lucky for us who are not local to her practice now, Nikki walks the walk with her service to the world and is offering podcasts of her classes on itunes or directly on her site here.

so Thank You Nikki for my first blog award! - Here is my cute award =)

With play come rules, and the rules are;

1. Thank the person that gave it to you

2. Copy the award to your blog

3. Pass the award forward to five other people of your choice

4. Share three things you like

I'd love to pass this award on to:

*Cora at Reflection: Mind, Body, and Soul who is thoughtfully beginning her blogging and sweet yoga adventure.

*Averie at Love Veggies and Yoga Averie's blog was the first food blog I started reading. Many of her recipes are used/adapted here as staples in our kitchen

*Antony at Antony in London a fellow lover of raw foods and kitty cats where I love to read about inspiring raw recipes, art, and literature

*Be Verdant my favorite holisitic health practitioner who keeps us up to date on big food, holistic health, and the beauty in the world

*Walk Slowly Live Wildly where I always find beautiful inspiration of creativity, life learning, and hooping!

3 things that I like are avocados, sunshine, and kitty purrs

hubby's lunch

2011-02-16T12:38:00.001-05:00

I thought it would be fun to talk about what the hubby's lunch often looks like. Monday -Friday we pack a lunch for him to eat at work. This enables us to save money and more importantly eat healthy and how we choose to.

In the morning we heat water for the Chemex and make a SS travel mug of organic, fair trade, shade grown coffee. I will then use some of this heated water as it cools in my neti pot. We also make a green protein smoothie which he drinks on the way into work.

Good Morning Hubby Green Protein Shake (all organic)

10-15 ounces either filtered water or unsweetened almond milk
1 scoop of Raw Protein
1 tsp of spirulina
two handfuls of greens
1 banana
1 peeled orange
2 fresh pitted dates

blend all ingredients until smooth, we top ours with local bee pollen. If I don't use any frozen berries in the shake I will add a couple of ice cubes to keep it cold.

Green Protein Shake travels in a BPA free cup. We have two cups so while one is in use the other can be washed and drying. We originally used mason/ball jars, but hubby has broken one in the car (and yes it was full ;/) this is more convenient for him and it fits in the cupholder of the vehicle he drives too.

Lunch consisted of an organic romaine salad with sliced organic fennel, piece of hormone free cheese (hubby is an omni outside of the house and eats plant based with ocassional cheese at home), and raw organic pumpkin seeds.

I add the dressing on the bottom so it doesn't wilt the greens by lunch time. This was Averie's Tahini Vegan Ceasar. When I make this dressing I use less agave and add lots of powdered ginger that Averie suggests. It's so good!

raw organic carrots and a sliced Bubbie's pickle

raw organic walnuts and organic fair trade chocolate

and an organic orange

We use glass containers, SS coffee mug, and a Klean Kanteen for water, a refreezeable ice pack, linen napkin and real flatware for packing lunches. Basically just like eating at home only it all has to fit in the lunchbag ;)

Other common items for hubby's lunch are:

organic nut/seed butter and jam on Ezekiel bread sandwich
veggie sandwich with cheese on Ezekiel bread
leftovers from dinner
celery sticks with or without nut/seed butter
other fresh fruits
chips with salsa and avocado/guac

Somedays I feel I am at a loss for new lunch ideas, I would love to hear any suggestions that you have please! Do you pack a lunch for yourself or a loved one?

(please pardon the dingy looking pics, the sun is still snoozing when we get up ;)

Happy Valentine's Day to everyone!

2011-02-14T00:28:00.001-05:00

Love to all of us, everyone.

In the spirit of Valentine's Day we had a little bit of cacao and red strawberries in our breakfast today on the eve of Valentine's. We don't really celebrate it any differently here than all the other days, but it's fun to have a bit of a theme!

Inspired by a post from Girl on Raw I made this breakfast #2

Valentine's Breakfast for Loving with a Healthy Happy Heart
(serves 2 hungry lovers plus a little leftover for tomorrow's bfast, yippee!)

In a bowl combine:

1 cup oats

3 T chia seed
and set aside
Blend the following ingredients until smooth, pour over your oats and chia and stir well.
2 fresh bananas
4 fresh dates
20 oz unsweetened plain almond milk
bit of vanilla
1 tsp cacao (could definitely use more if you wanted)

Set this aside (stirring occasionally) while you prepare your green juice which is breakfast #1

romaine, cucumber, celery, apple, lemon, ginger

When you're ready for bfast #2 (we usually wait about a 1/2 hour after drinking our juice, plus I have to clean up the juicer and stuff ;)

portion the oat mixture into bowls and top with sliced strawberries, a few straggler blueberries, and crushed raw walnuts

This was seriously a cinch to make and was so delicious. I wouldn't kid you! I think something about it tasted like marshmallow to which Dave replied 'When is the last time you have had a marshmallow?' so I take it he didn't think it did, and my answer was a long time, years, I don't even remember, they're so gross....anyway I do think it did remind me of marshmallow, the herb/flower/root. Have you smelled it? heavenly.

So good, I think you should try this =D

While I was up preparing breakfast these two babies who've had my heart for going on 12 years were enjoying a morning still in bed with the sun shining in (yes, it's amazing we've had two consecutive days of sun here in the winter!) on them.

As for Maggie's headshot she apparently struck her best vampire pose...

and with her fangs in.

and my Marley cat, who I may or may not have been wearing in a blanket sling. ;)

please don't judge ;) he likes it!

I've been super excited that Maggie has been enjoying their wheatgrass

crunch, crunch, crunch. mmmm, chlorophyll

Wishing you all a fabulous day and extending my love to you, hugs!

Make Juice, Not War

2011-02-09T14:04:00.000-05:00

We found our quick staple juice that we groove on here to be Kris Carr's Make Juice, Not War Green Juice, with a little bit of adaptation. The juice we've been making consists of:

(all organic of course)
cucumbers
head of Romaine (hearts)
big stalks of celery
lemon
bosc pears
big knob of ginger, we like it spicy here!
(if we have kale stems hanging out we put them in too)

In Crazy Sexy Diet Kris explains what produce to begin with on your juicing journey to get your digestive system used to it, she's right, it rocks and we love it!

ready to juice

juicing

the glorious green goodness. I am extra excited to wake up for this in the morning!

just plain pretty, yes?

have you all been loving the delish bell peppers and blueberries in the stores lately? This has been a common snack for me on the go to school and work. Organic red, yellow, or orange peppers, blueberries, raw soaked and dehydrated almonds, organic and fair trade dark chocolate, and organic raisins. Good fuel!

Last night I went to a screening of Forks Over Knives with two good girlfriends/wellness warriors. We had a great time and I loved the show. I am excited to take the hubby and my parents when it opens in May this year. It will be running in a few of the big theatres across the country, that is so very exciting.

Rip Esselstyn, Kerry Saunders, and two Michigan firefighters that have taken the Engine 2 Challenge hosted a panel discussion after the screening. I recognized Kerry Saunder's name when they announced it, but didn't know why, until they said she writes a column for VegNews ;) I didn't know that she's a Michigander though. Rip Esselstyn is the author of The Engine 2 Diet and the son of Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn who is in much of the movie. Rip is vibrant and strong. We loved the KALE shirt he was rockin!

(sorry for the not so great pics, one of these days I'll start taking more than my PNS around again)

Whole Foods is a sponsor of the screenings. They provided refreshments before the show. Raw veggie trays, kale butter, hummus, bread, and drinks.

The kale butter was yummy, think we'll have to play with making that at home. I've been having a sort of craving for hummus lately so I happily ate that up too ;)

Whole Foods had swag bags on the theatre seats, awesome! We received a reuseble little bag, a Larabar, can of Eden beans, coupon for a free bunch of organic greens, and the Whole Deal flyer. These will enable us to complete a 'beans and greens for bones' meal. That was Dr. Saunder's and Rip's answer for an audience question about getting calcium on a vegan diet.

Highlights of the night for me were:

* the show was sold out so that meant we were surrounded with like minded folks, or at least curious ones.
*eating refreshments where I didn't have to read ingredients (...even though I did )
*seeing two strong vibrant doctors in their 70s actively living life on a plant strong diet (along with a cast of others)
*Gene Baur was in the movie for a minute =)
* learning that there is a husband and wife MD team that treats their patients primarily with a whole foods plant based diet. Hippocrates would be proud. (they're in LA)
*hearing so much dialogue first hand about plant based diets in Michigan
*seeing and listening to strong proud vegan men
* and of course hanging out with two fab girls!

I made a big batch of organic raw tahini for dressings and to maybe satisfy this hummus craving I have ;)

A question for you juicers- Do you peel your lemons or no?

Unity.

2011-02-07T13:30:00.001-05:00

What's been going on????
I've unfortunately pushed the blog to the back burner again when life gets super busy. Today I have a glorious day off so here I am doing one of my favorite things, blogging, and trying to catch up reading blogs in my Google reader!
Around here I've been busy with work and school, we've had a couple few winter storms, which were beautiful! Today's agenda involves making phone calls, paying bills, crocheting, blogging, dehydrating, maybe cozying up with the cats to watch Julie & Julia again =), ironing, all the stuff that I love to do oh and study for a test ;) like I said it's a glorious day!...oh and maybe I'll dust... I'll tell you what's been going on in my head with a foot + of snow outside is planning our gardens, haha!

previous to today I patiently waited for the time to buy Crazy Sexy Diet (to help it count for the bestseller list) and went and picked Mom and I each up a copy. Haven't read it all yet, but loving on chapters here and there. Kris Carr is amazing. period.

Some avocado lovin...

are they just not so beautiful

I make some pretty delicious guacamole, but my favorite way of late to eat them is just with a bit of celtic sea salt and maybe a squeeze of lemon or like this.

Somehow Bubbies find their way into everything around here ;)

We all may have different ways of opening and destoning these fruit, but I thought I'd show you how I do it. I should give a shout out to Martha Stewart as I learned it from watching MS Everyday Living in college, so I'll set the scene....about 10-12 years ago I was studying biology at a university, MS was on at 10am I believe, many days I found myself cutting class and walking home to tune in to watch. I was glued to the tv, wanting to learn everything Martha knew about keeping house and cooking, etc. I would scribble down recipe ingredients during the show hoping to replicate them, man I was in love! My love affair with food, and keeping has evolved some, but it still makes me all warm and fuzzy inside to do these things. So I'll show you how Martha taught me to destone an avocado.

Obviously you want to handle your knife carefully. With your halved avocado gently, but with intent use your chef's knife to score/strike the stone.

With the knife in the stone twist the knife while holding your avocado still and it will pop right out. Then carefully push it off your knife into the compost (or save it for storing with any leftover avocado...what's that? haha)

Have you all heard that Eden will be selling their tomato products in amber glass jars soon? yea Eden! This may be the last can of toms we'll buy then.

A quick dinner after school and work one night were bowls of brown rice pasta with toms and fresh homegrown basil.

A fun dinner lately was a recipe from the current Whole Deal flyer, the recipe is on page 8, Romantic Rice Bowl. I obviously did not use animal stock or flesh, subbed low sodium veggie stock and used what I had as far as veggies went. It was pretty flippin good, the sauce of fresh oj and miso was so good. Here's our nori, which I've been meaning to make rolls with and haven't yet, gave us a nice nutrition boost.

and the cute bowls.

Guess what I finally ordered? A nut milk bag! It was just not happening to find in local and my sewing machine has not made it out of the closet in a couple of years now I'm sad to say...although I am wanting to make a window dressing for our kitchen...so maybe soon. I ordered our bag from Vermont Fiddleheads.

and have some almonds soaked, rinsed, and now dehydrating for ~~homemade milk~~ snacking, yum!

Hope you're staying warm where you are!

I've been jamming to this song non stop lately.

holy moly me oh my, juicin's the apple of my eye!

2011-01-24T08:44:00.001-05:00

For our inaugural run with the new juicer we packed it up and headed to Mom and Dad's house to share in the fun. My Dad had found a juicing recipe in Bon Appetit magazine that he had saved for us. We gathered the ingredients and were ready to roll...

We love our juicer so much.

fruit and veggies

in action

super colorful pulp

and glorious juice! so pretty.

Cheers to good health! Our consensus was that it smelled delicious, like the garden on a summer day and it tasted unbelieveably great. So much better than I had even imagined.

The recipe we used was called Veggie Detox by Marc Grossman, you can find the recipe here. It consisted of Bosc pear, ginger, carrots, celery, beet, parsley, lemon. I used lots of parsley and a whole small lemon and it was great. We shared this four ways, it was probably a great amount to get started on juicing.

I am in love with the clean refreshing energy that fruit and vegatable juices create. Do you juice? What's your favorite combo?

In reference to my title of the post, Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros, Home!

Wishing you love and happiness today.xoxoDD

blackberry pancakes

2011-01-17T12:05:00.001-05:00

Last week was fun filled and you know when I get home late and we need quick nourishing eats I will often make green smoothies and pancakes ;) ( I may blame a little of this on the ihop commercials from tv) I had picked up some frozen organic blackberries at WF so we had cinnamon blackberry pancakes and boy were they good!!! We've been using this mix from Arrowhead Mills. I am really thankful for this, seems many GF items include egg whites etc. and so often they forget to make it organic. So anyway we dig this mix for our occassional pancake fix. I actually was running out so I subbed in some spelt flour, yes I know this has gluten, I try to be gluten light if you will. Spelt doesn't give me a stuffy nose the way wheat wheat does. I will have a post in the near future on my adventures without gluten. A sneakpeak is that I feel great without it. So back to the flippin pancakes...while hubby was flippin the pancakes the Vitamix and I got to work on the green part of dinner. I don't remember what was involved specifically, I mentioned I was hungry right?, but no doubt there were some greens, fruit, and spirulina dancing around in that blender.

blackberry, cinnamon, banana, walnut pancakes>? yea buddy!

So my Momma had surgery this week and I happily volunteered to be along for the adventure and the nursing afterwards. A few days before I made a pot of split pea soup from The Yoga Cookbook and delivered to have easy meals ready. I really heart this cookbook. For anyone who isn't a fan of garlic and onions this book is really light on both if there are even any recipes with them at all. Each recipe I've made has great flavor and seems gentle on digestion. (the cookbook is vegetarian not vegan, but easy subs are made to exclude the dairy, etc., you all are pros at that anyhow!) I have no soup photos, but a picture of my treasured blue Ball jar with the peas, it's prettier anyways.

and it's glass lid. Yea, I was a little happy when I found this in the antique shop!, just a little.

The morning of surgery I made one of my favs, the Quick Noodles with Miso Lemon Tahini sauce to take along for the day with brown rice pasta and peas.

The rest of what I packed for the day included a green protein smoothie (which I drank on the drive, successfully not spilling in our new car, phew!), broccoli with ACV and olive oil, celery, Bubbies pickle, almonds, raisins, walnuts, and chocolate.

I stashed these in my bag for a recovery treat for Mom. Bitt recently got to tour the Theo factory in Seattle, you can see pics and read about it here. I can just imagine the smells in there =) I wonder if I hope hard enough that fig, fennel, and almond bar will show up in a local store?

I may have helped her eat that Theo bar ;)

I returned home to find this on our doorstep! After watching lots of youtube videos and researching we ordered an Omega VERT 330 juicer.

Don't you just love finding packages? Thank you Mr. and Mrs. Claus!

peace? peace. peace!

2011-01-14T23:36:00.000-05:00

I've been thinking a lot lately about how the prospect of peace seems to be everywhere. I see peace signs, people giving the peace sign, the word written out in home decor seemingly everywhere you look. Yet I also witness lots of evidence of judgement, anger, hate, and lack of true compassion which is to the contrary. In my daily life I make it a practice to be mindful of my thoughts, actions, and feelings. ( I am not perfect, notice I said practice) I ask myself am I really seeking and promoting peace? Taking a quick look around the house...

I strive to walk the walk not just talk the talk.

Like so many things I believe that peace begins at home, and before it fills our homes, it is found in our hearts. I also believe another part of this is to be self love, are we truly loving of ourselves? Do we have peace with ourselves? Can you really love another if you don't love yourself? good questions! I do feel it nourishes our mind and spirit to be truly happy and loving of others. How often are we quick to find jealousy, resentment, anger, defense? I encourage you when you do find that to acknowledge it and let it go, seek to turn it around into true happiness and compassion for both others and yourself. Happiness afterall can be a choice, you can choose it. So from feeling love and peace in our hearts we can truly spread it to others in our daily lifes, and it can spread out further to more and more beings. If we all really want world peace I think we can begin by loving eachother, supporting eachother, surrounding ourselves with positive people and giving love to the less positive, embrace eachother, be kind to strangers and loved ones alike and animals, practice compassion in all ways that you can, sincerely wish well for others.

I would like to share a few quotes that I find very inspiring:

'Peace comes from within, do not seek it without.' ~Buddha

'A candle looses nothing by lighting another candle.' ~James Keller

'You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.' ~Buddha

'If you wish to experience peace, provide peace for another.' ~the 14th Dalai Lama

'Thousands of candles can be lit from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared.' ~Buddha

'It matters not who you love, where you love, why you love, when you love, or how you love, It matters only
that You love.' ~ John Lennon

'When the power of love overcomes the love of power, the world will know peace.' ~Jimi Hendrix

Thank you for letting me share what's been on my mind here =)

I've spent much of the past few days with my Momma and Daddio and now I'm home tonight missing them a bit =) I'm so grateful for my parents, my cup runneth over. This past fall Mom and I attended a screening of FoodMatters together, here we are early for the event enjoying our green smoothies.

Love you Momma, you better be resting ;) xoxo

Thank you for reading!

Practice kindness, be well xoxo

cookies and Angelica Cornbread

2011-01-09T23:11:00.000-05:00

While searching for gluten free bread recipes recently I somehow found my way to this youtube video. I started watching her make her favorite bread from The Angelica Home Kitchen , a cookbook that I have!

On our next trip to the co-op we picked up some organic MI grown and milled cornmeal and I got started. There are just a few ingredients to this recipe, it's super simple to make. Cooked brown rice is an ingredient, so you will need to save time for that.

Here's the blurb on angelica cornbread in the book:

'This is another of Angelica's signature dishes. One of the restaurant's great traditions, it's been on the menu since Day One. Despite the name, it is not what most people expect when they order bread. It's a lumpy, moist, chewy, fiber-filled whole-grain loaf that featured cornmeal, brown rice, and rolled oats. If you want energy to burn, have it for breakfast. We get letters from all over the world asking for the recipe. Some people consider it more of a curiousity than anything else. We strongly suggest you try it yourself and find out where you stand.' ~The Angelica Home Kitchen

I wanted to find out where we stand...

ingredients

mixing

prepping bread pan

a very full loaf pan with a little overspill on the way in the oven ;)

baked

I would suggest waiting for it to cool for a while before getting cutting and removing pieces.

the first slice came out like this

tastes the same though ;) Once it had cooled I cut the remaining loaf and they came out perfectly. Where I stand on this bread is that it's kind of peculiar and yummy. To me it's like a cross of rice pudding, french toast, and a corn casserole. I really enjoyed it again today with a leftover piece out of the fridge cold today after work, it's dense and will fill you up on these cold winter days. The only changes I made was using olive oil instead of corn and long grain rice instead of short.

Here's The Angelica Home Kitchen

Over holiday break I was digging around for a new cookie recipe to make which I had the ingredients for and found the almond anise cookies from Angelica as well. Oh my were these cookies good, we came to the conclusion that they taste a lot like biscotti. I also got to use our new cooling rack.

Now on to a raw cookie that is stashed in our freezer, these rock of course as I knew they would from Ani Phyo. They're the Trail Mix Cookies from Ani's Raw Food Desserts. You know I had to go ahead and gojis! My supply is dwindling, I think a run to Zerbo's will be warranted here soon, as I'm running out of other raw supplies. They are pretty much like a trail mix larabar that I keep in the freezer ;) So good and cheaper (and less package waste) to make myself. I can also make them organic which Larabars unfortunately are not.

lots of goodness in these.

they also travel well for a power packed snack on the go

Speaking of power filled things, I needed a power nap last week and look who was curled up next to me, the Macaroni =) I took a couple of cute pics before I nodded off...

haha big yawn, she was tired too

a calico kitty paw, love.

Have you all seen this video? It is especially sweet.

They were also on NPR's All Songs Considered today.
A commenter on NPR left a link to this article. What an inspiring story, it will make you smile.

yogurt trial #2

2011-01-04T17:49:00.001-05:00

Over the holiday break I tried out our yogurt maker for the first time and by trial #2 I think I made some very liquidy yogurt ;) So trial #1 resulted in what was probably yogurt as well, I think my choice of using sunflower seeds was a bit different than I was expecting. My body didn't really want to eat it past tasting it. So I wasted some seeds...trial #2 I (which is not raw) used a can of full fat coconut milk and stirred in two PB8 capsules that I opened. I believe it was in the yogurt maker for about 10-12 hours. Anyway, I am not a yogurt expert, and I'm not sure if it's good practice to open any ol' probiotic capsules to use, so do your research first. My goal is to make a raw seed or nut based vegan yogurt. This did however smell nice and tangy like yogurt and tasted really great.

it was thin, kind of like the consistency of kefir

I ate it with chia, leftover canned pineapple, and thawed strawberries. It was actually really delicious.

Moving on to something that was a bit more of a success...kale chips and cheesy ones, oh baby! I've made these in the oven before, but this was our first time dehydrating them. I use Averie's Kale Chips recipe and LOVE it. This time however I did not have a red pepper around so I subbed one large carrot and I don't add any sweetener in the optional part. I think this batter could be spread on about twice as much kale, but I really didn't mind the extra noochyness =D I never do!

Stored away so I didn't just eat them all at once AND I even saved some ( it was hard) for my Momma to try because I know she loves them too.

yummola

My other bunch of kale went into an experimental kale chip which as I was afraid, didn't turn out awesome. I wanted to try some with ACV even knowing that it softens the kale, now I know for sure. They got wilty before they dried and I used too much oil...no pictures.

Something that has been turning out pretty well is our homemade bread. DDH's wheat bread turns out awesome. I however like to make it wheat free, so this loaf was spelt flour, brown rice flour, and buckwheat flour. We just do a basic vegan yeasted bread recipe and use the dehydrator to proof/rise it. You know what smells great when it's baking??? yeast bread does, good grief. You have to watch because if you're hungry you may just eat it all warm right out of the oven.

A toasty snack with apple butter and our friend's raw local honey.

One of the chores we accomplished over break was to dust/clean the tops of our kitchen cabinets and walls. Exciting, right. Chores go so much quicker when we do them together! It's so nice to have them dust free and until I find a good place for our smoothie glasses they'll be there too ;)

In honor of Nelson Mandela today (just because) I'd like to share some of his words that I love.

'Let there be work, bread, water and salt for all. '

'We must use time wisely and forever realize that the time is always ripe to do right.'

'For to be free is not merely to cast off one's chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others.'
~Nelson Mandela

getting to know our dehydrator

2011-01-03T14:09:00.000-05:00

So way back around thanksgiving when we opened our dehydrator these were a couple of the first treats that we made.
We both love sweet potato chips ( I actually fell in love with sweet pot fries working at a local bar and grill so the evolution began...fries at work...baked sweet wedges at home...now raw sweet potato chips in the dehydrator =) We used Bitt's recipe for Curry Sweet Potato Chips. They turned out delicious! We have decided we will practice patience and let them dehydrate longer next time, ours were still a tiny bit chewy ;) I think I'm figuring out that it would be really hard to over-dehydrate something.

Here they are going in. DDH (my hubby) sliced these nice and thin on our mandoline. Our mandoline is one of his favorite kitchen tools. He added exactly 3 items to our wedding registry: 1) a crock pot 2) this mandoline 3) a deep fryer, oh brother (don't tell him we could probably make sweet potato fries at home) Item #3 I tried selling at our garage sale (we've used it one time). DDH : " you can sell it if you get $75 for it" I tried...only had one interested lady and she said " he can keep it" $75 was too much for her to spend on heart disease, good call lady.

and magically chips are created!

They were yummy and sweet with curry! Thanks Bitt for sharing your recipe.

Next up were the Pure 2 Raw Twins Holiday Macaroons. How ingenious to use gojis as the peppermint candy red, love it!

adding the 'candy'

It looks like it, but it's not black pepper ;) I used raw wild-crafted vanilla which is a ground powder for the vanilla flavor. I also used less agave, somewhere between 1/4 and 1/2 cup, I guess that would be about a 1/3 cup ;0 haha.

We did dehydrate them for about four hours, I love macaroons and part of that is the little bit crunchy outer shell which dehydrating created on these raw vegan ones =D Yummy! We took these to share to one of our Thanksgiving gatherings.

So remember when I was loving how pretty the neti pots at the co-op were? Well, not too long after that I dropped a Kanteen out of the cupboard and it landed on my neti pot and broke it...my mind went right to Aunt Jett or Aunt Frances in Practical Magic saying 'be careful what you wish for'. I didn't really want to buy a new one, but I guess that's what I get. Anyway, I picked out this pretty one.

These from Baraka are handcrafted in the US and are lead free and dishwasher safe. I really love it for how cute it is, but I also like that it has a larger capacity and the neck is easier to hold on to during use while pouring.

This is a once a day habit I'm glad that I have ;)

While all our ourside snow here is gone from our rain storms and 50 degree temps last week (what?) there is still a glass snowman on our kitchen sill. Isn't he groovy? He's one of my favorite holiday decorations.

Hope the sun is shining where you are too. xoxo

birthday and NY cheesecakes

2011-01-02T19:17:00.000-05:00

So we've been branching out from our standard raw strawberry cheesecake to a couple of new recipe flavors. All the recipes have come from our Sweet Gratitude recipe book.

My Momma's birthday was a few weeks ago and we made her a Mint-Chip Cheesecake. The crust was made with almonds, raw cacao, and coconut, yummy!

I couldn't find fresh organic mint that I wanted to buy (ok I did find an organic plant at WF, but it was a 'mint julip' type, I really wanted something more like spearmint) so to make the green color we used one scant teaspoon of spirulina and to make the mint flavoring we used 1 Tablespoon of organic mint flavor.

I think we did pretty well with our swirls. I'm looking forward to swirling some more, it was fun.

We were lucky enough to get to share some with Mom and Dad on Christmas Eve, here's my piece. It was delicious.

This morning we filled our first order with a lemon and wild blueberry cheesecake. We only taste tested the batter, but kind of think this is our new favorite! This crust is mostly almonds, some walnuts, and a little coconut (I liked the addition of coconut to the mint cacao crust).

We layered lemon batter (I used about 1/4 cup less almond milk in case the frozen blueberries brought much extra water with them) with organic wild blueberries.

and finished the top with more blueberries and shredded unsweetened coconut

Hoping this turned out great for our first customer! (my Momma ;)

So you don't think that we're living off cheesecake alone, this was my lunch today:
Romaine, broccoli, Bubbie's pickles, avocado, and dulse salad with dressing of ACV, olive oil, cumin, mustard powder, and S+P.

and this morning we started off with green smoothies:

green curly kale, spirulina, blueberries, banana, dates, pineapple juice, and a red navel orange

blended in the unwashed (from the cheesecake) Vitamix, yum. A great way to start the day =)

Hoping your days are starting well in 2011!
We are again watching some football and waiting for the cats to try out their new beds...so far they still like to hang out with us on the couch and our bed...

Happy New Year! xoxo

2011-01-01T21:34:00.002-05:00

Well, I'm back from my unplanned blogging absence, whew! I hope that all of you lovely readers have had a wonderful beginning to winter, holidays, and a happy New Year. Things have gotten so busy here starting around Thanksgiving and I'm guilty of not making time to blog =( Totally not complaining, it's all been great stuff...I've started working part time out of the house for the first time in about 4 years, that alone has been an adjustment for me ;) It was crunch time for a deadline with school that kept my schedule really full (thank goodness for my planner so I can remember everything;) Yes, if you're wondering I'm an old-fashioned paper planner girl, I don't have a smart phone;) and yes I carry a full sized calendar around with me, I like the visual layout of seeing it all at once;) ps if you haven't figured this out by now, I am probably not the coolest person you know. We had a warm and yummy holiday that has been even greater that we've both had time off of school and work together, it doesn't get much better than this! (could I have done without a bout of the stomach flu?, oh sure, but I did survive. Our little family is currently all cuddled on the couch, fireplace on, hubby watching the Rose Bowl =D love it.

A couple of days before Christmas we made the big decision to get a new car. We are now the proud drivers of a new Subaru and I'm butt crazy in love with it! We've been driving two ten year old cars, so this is pretty freaking exciting, still getting used to it honestly. What's even better is that Subaru is donating $250 for us to the ASPCA for their Share the Love event. I believe we've all seen the commercial with Sarah McLachlan and I'm fairly certain cried along with it.
I was reading Peas and Thank You this week and loved her writing on the occurance of her daughter being upset after seeing the same commercial. She explained to her that there are things they do on a daily basis with animals and others in mind, share their lives with a lovely Pea Kitty, but most importantly they don't eat them. I'm so happy to be a fellow plant-based dieter, and I really love reading that blog.

Since Thanksgiving we have been eating lots of yummy food, getting to know our dehydrator, and taking pictures of it all. This post will be a bit of an anniversary for me, in ten days it will mark the 1 year anniversary of Domestic Dharma =) Over this past year I have learned SO much, benefited from many recipes and ideas in the food blog world, developed online blogger friendships, and enjoyed sharing the things that I love with you beautiful readers, so THANK YOU all =)

My very first post was about our date order last January so I guess it's a bit fitting to share with you our delivery this month of wickedly delicious barhis.

My excitement started when I saw this at the front door...

fresh from California

We order from The Date People.

They grow many varieties

and grow sustainably

Opening the box I found this

and these, ahhhhh =D Maggie's excited too, love that face!

I immediately popped a couple and made a delicious treat with cucumbers, yum.

Another organic snack mix I've been enjoying are raw almonds, choc chips, raisins, raw pumpkins seeds, and dried mango.

There was a sweet baby born recently that I made this blanket for. I loved how it turned out and also that I finished it in time ;)

I'm off to spend some time with this new book

Thanks for the recommendation Be Verdant!xoxo

Wishing you all JOY in this new year and always.

Thanks for hanging around through the dry spell!

Happy Holiday!

2010-11-25T13:10:00.000-05:00

Hope everyone is having a great Thursday so far! I got up and first thing this morning I took our sweet potato chips out of the dehydrator. I'm sure this will wear off, but I have dreams about the dehydrator, what to make next, etc. ;) I washed off the screens and mixed up a batch of minty macaroons. Having something minty in the dehydrator sure makes the kichen smell yummy!
We have a few family gatherings over the long weekend that we're looking forward to, it's so nice to catch up with everyone. Today we're making raw squash salad and I made thumbprint cookies this morning. I'm planning to write a little later about the recipes we used, I just wanted to post and wish everyone a happy holiday =)

A couple of items that have been on my mind recently, one of them is this video from Farm Sanctuary.

and the other is by Kris Carr from the Crazy Sexy Life newsletter:

..."We hope you have a magical ThanksLiving inside and out. Remember, just because everyone else gets glutonous on "T" day doesn't mean you need to join in the anarchy. Load your plate with veggies. Jam on peace and respect your buddhaful belly. " I Love that! Have a buddhaful day =D

test post

2010-11-22T16:10:00.001-05:00

I've installed a new commenting system, however I don't think it shows up until you click on the links to this post below each post.
I'm just making this test to see if I've fixed it or not...

remember your roots, enjoy the view!

2010-11-22T15:04:00.000-05:00

oh boy, this is exciting! Check out what was delivered this weekend...

We have a dehydrator that found a home with us =D Thank you Mom and Dad! What actually happened is my very kind and generous Momma picked out some cute clothes for me to use for school and work when I finish. She had been shopping at Anthropologie, you all know it's not cheap....anyway I was thinking of how the cost of the clothes could buy a dehydrator. I don't like to look a gift horse in the mouth, but trying to be frugal in tough times I politely asked if I could maybe return them and get a dehydrator instead ( I may have promised the likes of macaroons from the dehydrator;)? She said of course just wanted me to get something that I wanted, so we took a drive up to town about an hour from us to do the returns, (I did keep a cute tank). While in town we noticed an athletic clothing store with yoga inspired clothes, Lucy. I found these sweet skirted pants inside which I will use for work, and they're organic too. We had a really great day together that ended with dinner at Cacao Tree Cafe and dessert in the truck at home! I have a post coming up from our eats at CTC.

Doesn't she fit well here in the kitchen?

love this too

I had measured this spot a while ago when I started dreaming of getting a dehydrator and figured out that it would fit really nice.

So then it was on to deciding what I wanted to make first! Ever since I had watched this episode of the Renegade Health Show I've had the BBQ chips in my mind...that's what I chose. Follow the link for the demonstration video and Abeba's recipe. Abeba Wright is the self described Krazy Kracker lady , she has a few ebooks on the site with her chip and cracker recipes, I kinda want to make them all!

So first we needed some beautiful organic flax seeds

soaked overnight

and our vita-mix to blend up all the ingredients

this was my batter before adding the flax

and after

I hope I got the right consistency...they're drying away in the Excalibur as I type this (and they smell pretty good!)

We will find out...tomorrow ;)

When it gets chilly out I find myself really wanting to work on my crochet projects. It works out well since we have dear friends that will be welcoming a new babe in a couple of months that I'm making a blanket for. Baby blankets are really my favorite things to work up. I gathered supplies and am about half way through. As you can see Maggie is always my sidekick when I crochet! Can you spy a kitty belly and little foot??

I've used this yarn for a few kid's projects before and really like it, it's Lion Brand Nature's Choice Organic Cotton.

This has been a warm drink of choice lately, steeping these two teas together, yum. I fell in love with peppermint tea while healing from IBS, I find it really soothing.

We've also been enjoying lots of brothy veggie soups too this fall. This one was garlic, onion, celery, mushroom, sweet potato, low sodium veg stock, herbs, Celtic sea salt, and zucchini.

This is how I will often finish my soups. I use the juice of a lemon and South River Miso. WHen I take the soup off the heat, I'll add the juice of the lemon (strained) and pull out a bit of stock to mix the miso in with (I let it cool a bit so I don't damage the living miso) stir it well until the miso dissolves, and return it to the pot.

I love the flavor they make!

I have some muscles to learn for a quiz tomorrow =D I colored this weekend ;) In and out of the lines.

I want to leave you with a nice writing for the day from Ilan Shamir.

Advice from a Tree

By Ilan Shamir

Dear Friend,

Stand Tall and Proud

Sink your roots deeply into the Earth

Reflect the light of a greater source

Think long term

Go out on a limb

Remember your place among all living beings

Embrace with joy the changing seasons

For each yields its own abundance

The Energy and Birth of Spring

The Growth and Contentment of Summer

The Wisdom to let go of leaves in the Fall

The Rest and Quiet Renewal of Winter

Feel the wind and the sun

And delight in their presence

Look up at the moon that shines down upon you

And the mystery of the stars at night.

Seek nourishment from the good things in life

Simple pleasures

Earth, fresh air, light

Be content with your natural beauty

Drink plenty of water

Let your limbs sway and dance in the breezes

Be flexible

Remember your roots

Enjoy the view!

I found this at the store in Muir Woods when we visited there a few years ago. I love it so much, it hangs on our fridge.

it's pomegranate season

2010-11-17T20:15:00.000-05:00

I saw a gentleman open a pomegranate in the field on the Food Channel recently and I thought it was a bit better technique that I had been using. His way doesn't cut through as many arils as mine did by just cutting it in half. I thought I'd share what I learned with you in case it will help you too.

I don't see them organic very often, but when I do I pick up a couple, and they're US grown =)

This method will open pomegranates of conventional practice too in case you were wondering ;)

Here's how I did it, cut off a little top

Now you can see the cute divisions inside. I believe there's usually four, but there can be more.

I opened the fruit along the membrane segments as best as I could, this part here is where I saved some arils from being cut.

I just pop the tasty lil guys out into a container. I think many people use the bowl of water method since the arils will sink and the white membrane pieces will float. I do it this way, it may be a little slower, but I've never been accused of doing things quickly. I don't even run fast.

There you have it. We love the arils on salads, eaten alone, and of course I bet you can't guess this: blended into green smoothies! Aside from being really yummy and fun to pop in your mouth, they are a nice source of vitamin C, fiber, and antioxidants. Drink up =)

I had a big desire for pancakes recently. I haven't eaten much of any gluten for about five months so I was hoping to make them gluten free, but I also wanted them to be like the nice thick diner ones. I had this mix from Bob's Red Mill in the pantry. (I'm not excited that it's not organic, but I had picked it up in a pinch from Kroger as they are just down the street. I have this thing where if I bought it, I will really try to not waste it, so this is where I started)

I chose a recipe from Vegan with a Vengeance called Pancakes. Isa even says in the description 'straight up pancakes, just like at the diner at 2am'. Perfect. The GF mix says you can sub 1:1. However doing that I thought the batter was way thin, so I added quite a bit more mix until it got to the consistency I thought would be good and went with that. Lo and behold they were perfect, just what I was hoping for. I added the optional cinnamon and blueberries of course ;)

We loved them up with fresh raspberries and maple syrup, the real deal.

Raspberries were also seen this afternoon on my bowl of raw buckwheat granola with cacao nibs, banana, and sunflower seed butter. yummy.

Did anyone else eat this as a kid:
a bowl of sliced bananas, milk, and sugar? I did. I think today's version is a little bit healthier.

I'm bringing you a couple of my money saving tips today:

1. shop your local food co-op. They have the best sales. This is a big 8oz bottle of organic fair trade vanilla extract for, well you can see the price.

2. refill your ~~addition to everything~~ cinnamon with the bulk spice that you bought. Buying herbs and spices in the bulk aisle is way cheaper to begin with (and less waste since you're reusing the same bottle over and over) and if you buy the whole foil one pound bag you get an extra 10% off (at Whole Foods anyway). Ask your local store, it's common to get case discounts.

That's all for now. I'm going to ~~watch a movie I picked up at the library , crochet,~~ study.
Have a fabulous night!

massage the kale

2010-11-08T04:47:00.000-05:00

Kale salads are a staple in our diet around here, I know I show photos of them a lot, so I thought it'd be fun to show you how I make them. I don't know how others make them, but this is just what I do. You can also just eat a kale salad unmassaged, they were actually my favorite meal at Go Raw Cafe in Vegas.

I start with washed and destemmed curly kale that I julienne. In the bowl I take very clean hands and massage it kind of like it were bread dough, grab and squeeze, etc. It's a nice little hand workout! The kale will begin to breakdown some and start to look and smell like it has been cooked a bit. You'll also notice the volume seems to decrease a bit, so fill your bowl up before you begin.

julienned kale on left and massaged kale on right

I then like to add lemon juice, oil, and sea salt. I'll give it another quick massage to distribute the dressing.

additions for these salads were: raw pumpkin seeds, red pepper, red onion, toms, green beans, peas, and a strangely shaped cucumber ;)

and raw olives!

and the finished bowls, his and hers massaged salads

I realized I hadn't blogged about my last apple purchase. Our antique apple growers are done at the market now, so our stash will be it until next year. Here they are from L to R: winesap, red delicious, grime's golden, and a solo jonathon she gave me to try.

I think this Jonathon is still in the drawer...

and the winesaps are definitely yummy

but the Grime's Golden are unreal. They are unlike any apple I've had. They're a little sweet, but have their own flavor, juicy with a great texture. If you were to judge them by touch you'd think they were mealy inside, they're not at all. The growers (Salem Orchard and Vineyard) said GG is the predecessor to the modern golden delicious and that when they have them at the market they sell out first thing in the morning. I'm so happy that we love them since it's one of the trees that we ordered for the start of our 'orchard', taste untasted ;) I just had a feeling about it.

So this should be my last ode to antique apples post for the year =)

nature's candy, trick or treat

2010-11-06T23:55:00.001-04:00

Frist of all today, let me give a shout out to the humble medjool date and raw walnut. These two joined forces and let me sail right through Halloween without even being tempted by any candy. trick or treat nature's candy! If you have a large frest date, pull it in half and take the pit out. I like to fit 2-3 walnut halves inside. There you go!

I still have Get Naked Fast from the library and have tried a couple other recipes. One is the zucchini hummus and it was really delicious. I haven't really made a raw hummus that I've liked too well before, I ate the whole batch so I think it's safe to say that I liked it;) It was fresh and lemony and went really well with raw broccoli.

Our basil plants are doing great transferred in the house from the garden still so I was able to make the pesto recipe as well. Fresh basil in the fall without spending $15 on organic basil = awesome.

we had leftover cooked brown rice pasta to use one night this week so I tossed together some lightly steamed broccoli, chopped tomatoes, daiya mozzarella style, and stirred some miso in with the pesto.

and stirred that all together and ~~devoured~~ enjoyed thoroughly!

Something we've been eating a whole lot of since squash has hit the FM is the Creamy Kabocha Soup from the Kind Diet. It's unbelieveably simple and genius, there is really no need to add anything to the flavor of the kabocha.

diced squash and water

squashed (haha!) up into a soup

so satisfying. This squash has such a unique savory with a little sweet flavor and the texture rocks. I love it so much that we have 5 of them sitting on the bar now and I'll probably continue to buy them each week this month! ;)

Speaking of fall, some nights what I want is a big warm bowl of oats (recipe also from the Kind Diet), my hubby, and a blanket cuddled up on the couch =) So here we are.

I've admitted that I think this is a bad habit we have of eating while watching tv. Since then I've been thinking about that and have come to the decision that it's probably healthier to just own it, afterall it's what we choose to do. It's actually a nice time when Dave gets to unwind from his work day, we can chat about how our days were, and maybe most importantly compete with eachother watching Jeopardy. Hopefully someday we'll enjoy dinner around the table with our family, but now we enjoy this as well.

I didn't want to miss an opportunity to get our greens in though so we had these beautiful green smoothies before our oats.

Maggie was caught one day living it up on the table, what a rule breaker!, on fresh laundry no less ;)

and Marley was caught just looking cute. Oh man I love this face!

haha, and caught mid-yawn. ROAR.

Marley says don't forget to set your clocks back if you're in an area that does, he loves to get an extra hour of sleep.

new commenting system...

2010-11-05T21:46:00.002-04:00

Just a test post to see how the Intense Debate commenting system is working, or should I say if I installed it correctly ;)

happy in small ways

2010-11-05T11:42:00.000-04:00

Good Morning all! It's starting to feel a bit like winter here. We've been having nice sunshiney days, but our leaves are pretty much all fallen since it's been so windy. Hope everyone has had a great recovery week from the Halloween festivities =) I've been reading updates on Facebook about things folks are grateful for in November. Something that I'm definitely grateful for are the wonderful farmers and vendors braving the cold at the FM yet and their lovely goods. Here's our week's loot of greens getting washed up:

lots of curly kale, red romaine, and butter lettuces

I didn't take any pics this week, but we got some delicious and beautiful purple broccoli, Russian kale(one of my favorites), curly kale, bibb lettuce, garlic, kabocha squash, red peppers, and this raw bread that I'm in love with.

It's made my the monks of the Detroit Zen Center, it's SO good and has lots of onion and olive flavor!

I'm hoping to order our dehydrator later today! Very exciting, we'll see if I can make raw bread that I like this much =) I think I've decided on the Excalibur with the silicone sheets. I've been having such a hard time deciding on the plastic (more affordable) vs. stainless steel. I try to not have plastic around when I have the option not to, it has taken me a long long time, and honestly I'm still a bit undecided...I've emailed Excalibur again today to hopefully learn more about the plastics used. Does anyone have thoughts on this (I know I've asked before, but I'm still having questions) and know if the low temps affect the plastic? I do like that Excalibur has silicone sheets now. What trays do you all use? I'm kind of unsure of what I'd need.

We've also been enjoying this kimchi from the Brinery, a local fermenter. He makes a vegan kimchi (sans fish sauce) that I picked out among many other options like sauerkraut, pickled carrots, and beets. I bet the beets are fabulous, may have to try them next ;)

it's really tasty added on a salad with a good amount of spice. He uses local organic vegetables too.

As I was reading HEAB I was intrigued by a recipe for a grain free pumpkin spice bead from a Spoonful of Sugar. I wanted to try it, so I subbed two medium sized bananas for the eggs. (I don't usually buy non organic AB, but I had picked this up while travelling. It's pretty much gone now. We go through nut butters fairly quickly ;)

all mixed up, no grain flour, no sugar, no gluten, and vegan =)

and after baking

mine really didn't drop much at all! It was nice and dense and yummy.

I've been on such a nutB&J craving that I smeared some on top of this bread, sunflower seed butter and strawberry jelly

and I've been enjoying this interesting snack too: brown rice wrap, banana, raw almond butter, and jelly
(in Massachusetts, Trader Joe's had their own brown rice wraps too, does your TJ have them?)

in other decidedly more healthy food ;) a wonderful lunch of guac, raw cheddar cheese dip, tomatoes and carrots from the garden, celery, local red pepper, and the monk's raw bread.

Have a fabulous day! Mom and I are heading to Anthropologie for some returns that will allow me to get a dehydrator =) yea!

I've been thinking about this quote the last couple of days:

'In spite of illness, in spite even of the archenemy sorrow, one can remain alive long past the usual date of disintegration if one is unafraid of change, insatiable in intellectual curiosity, interested in big things, and happy in small ways.' ~Edith Wharton

Salem, Mass!

2010-11-01T11:08:00.000-04:00

I took a trip with a great girlfriend to Salem a couple of weeks ago. We really had a desire to be in Salem in October, the festiveness of town did not disappoint. I have lots of pictures to share, hope that's alright!
This girl is a super cool living statue, she made this sound at the tourists that was unreal, although we tried to replicate it we just couldn't quite get it ;) Her site is here, what an interesting lifestyle! Having lived in Vegas and been to a few cities in Europe I have seen a few of these statues, her 10 foot tall witch has been my favorite, she's a great artist, the costume alone was amazing.

So here we are, the Salem seeking travelers, in her harbor, enjoying the ocean. Man do I love the Atlantic.

The Friendship replica in Salem harbor.

The Joseph Story house, which has been LEED renovated!

other fun pictures from around town:

witch crossing =)

love this!

one of my favorite authors is a Salem native, it was so fun to see her books around town everywhere. We were visiting a week early to attend a reading and book signing. Maybe we'll catch up with her someday...

We visited The House of the Seven Gables where I picked up the book as my souvenir.

Nathaniel Hawthorne's birth house is now on the same property and we were able to tour that as well, isn't it beautiful?

I enjoyed this snack while we waited for the tour to start sitting on the lawn of the House of the 7 Gables looking out into the harbor. I packed our local antique apples and nut butter packs that I picked up from Kroger quickly before we left town. I was so busy leading up to the trip that I didn't have time to prepare food, so apples, bananas, Odwalla and Go Raw bars, kombucha, Justin nut butters, and water it was!

This along with a banana is what I ate for a meal while waiting in line at the Salem Witch Museum. This is my favorite road snack lately, so good!

We also visited the Witch House where one of the trial judges lived.

The beautiful front door

I found the New England Soup Factory of Salem on HappyCow. They had great veg items, I was craving greens of course and ordered the garden salad with balsamic vin. What a great salad, sometimes it is honestly really hard to find a great fresh green salad, this was not the case in Salem at all, I loved it!

This super delicious salad was dinner one night from Cafe Kushco. I would go back here in a heartbeat, the food was fresh, the staff was genuinely nice and helpful. Check out my salad, I ordered the spinach salad sans cheese and capers (I'm not always a fan) and added avocado. I know many of you will relate to when you add avocado and are disappointed by the two or three little cubes you get, if they only knew I'd really like to eat an entire fruit ;) haha! There was no reason to be disappointed here! (my orange calcite is in the top left corner =)

Our other meal was from Coven, yes we checked it out due to the name =) Here's the inside, it was cute with ~~lots~~ tons of items to look at on the walls. We had no choice but to reminisce about childhood memories, I mean there was a popple on the bookshelf! I had to play with it =)

I found another green salad that was perfect for lunch with a delicious vegan balsamic dressing.

Our last night in town we were in need of food for the 13+ hour car ride home so we headed to Trader Joe's in a neighboring town since the local health food store was closed on Sundays. I bought bananas, fruit leather, and Larabars for the ride. For my dinner I picked up brown rice wraps, spinach, and guacamole (this has to be the same guac that Costco sells, anyone else notice this??). They ended up being a delicious dinner, I ate three ;)

Other awesome sightings around town involved a solar powered trash compactor for landfill waste (they also have plenty of street recycling).

lots of shops with occult, wiccan, pagan supplies, and readings

The other part of my souvenir was healing crystals/stones from Pyramid Books. I chose orange calcite, blue calcite, and a rose quartz. I love them! I didn't take a photo...

I've been fortunate to have travelled to New England quite a few times before, the beauty of the homes and quaintness of the towns still amazes me.

We walked down Chestnut Street and admired the sweet homes where we even happened onto a personal tour of one being renovated where I fell in love with the kitchen. It had a fireplace, a wall of built-ins, an island and a big window for growing herbs, swoon.

Another highlight for me was visiting the Old Burying Point. I like to visit places that have a deep connection with the past. I make sure not to walk on any graves. It was surprising that the public is able to walk thru this graveyard.

Being the Brunonia Barry fans we are and well fans of water in general we visited Salem Willows. The beach was covered in pretty blue shells.

and this will be the last in my photo story, this ocean feels like home to me.

Hope you enjoyed my little trip to Salem, have you been?
My friend wrote of the trip here as well and more importantly touched on the topic of the witch trials and their showing of intolerance and fear associated with ignorance. Reminds me of a Brett Dennen lyric 'Darling do not fear what you don't really know'.

Hope you all had a wonderful Halloween eve! There was a sheriff here handing out the treats to lots of adorable trick or treators =)

Happy Halloween/Samhain!

2010-10-31T15:58:00.000-04:00

Happy Halloween everyone! We're enjoying a nice Sunday here after hitting 3 parties already this weekend, it was nice to sleep in a bit today and have nothing on the agenda aside from greeting Trick or Treaters later =) We're handing out the same treats this year.

Annie's snack bags, we buy them in a big box from Costco

and Organic suckers

We've been so busy lately, I'm beginning to wonder if this time of year is the new summer or what??? One of the tasks that's been on my to do list was to find a non-toxic lawn service(TruGreen has been canvasing the neighborhood and pestering me, so thanks for the kick in the butt ;). Today being Halloween marks our fourth year as homeowners! In those four years we have not treated our lawn obviously. We've been handpulling weeds, keeping the grass mowed long, and timing our mowing with the rain. It's been working well, but living in a sub-division is a whole new ball game for us with manicured lawns. We didn't want to let the weeds spread too much to where we'd need to treat them with something awful. I contacted eco-logic lawn and landscape. They were super helpful, knowledgeable, and willing to take the time to answer all of my questions. Our fall treatment consisted of aeration, a corn gluten pre-emergent application, and an animal/byproduct free non-toxic organic fertilizer. They left this cute little sign so our neighbors would know that nothing toxic was used. I don't know about you but when the neighbors' lawns are treated the smell is awful and I hate walking through it on the sidewalks and tracking it back to our home, in all honesty I close all the windows when the trucks come into the neighborhood! My Mom recently said that she loves that she can walk barefoot in your lawn and not worry about anything! Me too, I don't really see the point of having a lawn that you don't feel safe to lay down on, walk barefoot in (I'm barefoot anytime it's warm enough), and let kids and animals play on.

pretty green grass with fall leaves =)

As I understand the corn gluten works by drying out any seeds making it's shell crack and prohibiting germination. These methods will not work as fast nor probably quite as effectively, but it's safe and eco-friendly and that makes us happy. And really isn't this true about weeds: "A weed is a plant whose virtues have not yet been discovered." ~Ralph Waldo Emerson. We still see dandelions as weeds in the lawn when they are actually really health promoting food, and free no less! I should be harvesting our dandelions, maybe a few more years since I'm unsure of how the lawn was treated by our previous homeowner. We enjoy their greens in smoothies and salads through the summer. Ok, enough about the lawn ;) ...

Our library was kind enough to order this book in from my suggestion! It's Get Naked Fast by Diana Stobo. It's a nice sized book, not overwhelming with lots of good information. The first recipe I made was the Banana Buckwheat Pancakes.

I had some trouble getting them to flip well (this is probably user error, I have this problem a lot ;) but found that the longer I let them cook the easier it was. Anyway they were really delicious with some extra protein from the quinoa. I did add 1 tsp of cinnamon to the batter, I can't seem to get enough of that spice!

We had breakfast for dinner or 'blinner' for any fellow Scrubs fans ;) Here we are actually watching Scrubs while eating (yes I know this is a bad habit) blinner. We had green smoothies and pancakes. I dusted off our big bordeaux glasses so we could drink them all fancy like ;)

Our blinner green smoothie recipe:
(serves 2)

20 oz water
3 big handfuls of curly kale
4 T hemp seeds
2 t spirulina
splash of almond extract
cinnamon
raw vanilla powder
2 frozen bananas
large peeled orange
fresh raspberries

I topped our smoothies with local organic bee pollen and fresh organic raspberries, these smoothies are seriously delicious!

The previous night we had also eaten breakfast for dinner. We had some purple potatoes from the FM left so I sliced them with, purple onion, red peppers from our garden, and lots of local garlic. I sauted this mix in virgin coconut oil with some dried oregano, sliced mushrooms, and a splash of veg stock until the potatoes were softened enough.

I finished it by stirring in the mozzarella style daiya, sea salt, and pepper.

quick and easy dinner that pleases the hubby (ie. potatoes ;) and is nutritious.

Hope you all have a fabulous Halloween! Thanks for reading =)

Spirulina Frozen Fruit Cream

2010-10-08T22:54:00.000-04:00

Last night we had the most delicious, energizing, feel good dessert. I have a raw foodie friend in school (how exciting!) and she let me borrow her Raw Energy. Last night the Strawberry-Citrus Frozen Fruit Cream sounded great and it was! I added some spirulina and subbed sunflower seed butter for raw almond butter (I have none ready...need to make a batch), and instead of citrus juice I just used a whole peeled large orange. We both loved it.

I had some leftover crust from making a raw cheesecake so we sprinkled that and some bee pollen on top.

leftover crust of almonds, dates, vanilla, and salt

yummy yummy sunflower seed butter. Does that raccoon crack you up or what? I think if he were spreading seed butter on his bread he'd probably just use his hands.

We had a family wedding this weekend where we got to stay overnight in a hotel, I love that =) king size bed and everything! Here's us hanging out between the wedding and reception, we were at a bar where I enjoyed lemon water and big cucumber slices, I'm a party animal, haha!

I did not go hungry though, I finally made Averie's Spicy Doritos Cheesy Dip. It was the perfect dip to take along, I loved it and so did my parents. I did swap the amounts of hemp and sunflower seeds around and added some extra water. I just love raw dips!

Here's most of my snacks that I took along, raw veggies, flax crackers, dip, and a mashed avocado with celtic sea salt. I also made a sweet green date shake in case I had a sweet craving after seeing all the wedding cake. I got through cake time no problem though and enjoyed the shake on the ride home the next day. The bride and groom were also kind enough to have a veg meal for me, it was really nice of them! At the wedding I ate lots of raw veggie appetizers, salad, and some nice pasta with spicy marinara sauce.

It's so nice for travelling with your own food when you have a refrigerator in the room!

Marley is telling me it's time for his 'vitamin' and I have some studying to do for our workshop this weekend, wishing you all a wonderful night, hugs.

I'll sign off with this Mary Oliver poem I read on Yoga Addicted.

Wild Geese

by Mary Oliver

You do not have to be good.

You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.

Meanwhile the world goes on.

Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting —
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

Groovy Spirulina Smoothie

2010-10-08T08:26:00.000-04:00

The smoothie I've been groovin on lately has involved this lovely green powder.

Spirulina! Spirulina is a wonderful plant food, it's a single celled blue-green algae that grows in fresh water. This algae has been eaten by ancient humans and is full of chlorophyll, a complete protein, and a source of GLA, an essential fatty acid, among many other health nurishing properties. You can read more about it here. I find the end very interesting how it is considered one of the first plants (a nuclear plant) and did not develop the fiberous cell walls commonly found in the plant kingdom.

other ingredients:

Groovy Spirulina Smoothie

10 oz filtered water (we use a Kinetico RO system)
handful or two of greens (we been using Russian kale, green curly kale, or spinach)
fresh banana (if I have one, otherwise go without, still tastes groovy ;)
small palmful of goji berries
2 T hempseeds
1 T essential EFA oil (it's flax and borage)
2 handfuls of frozen blueberries
1 t spirulina
cinnamon

In the above photo I've blended the water and the greens already, add everything else and blend until smooth. It's so delicious!

This one went with me on my errand day in my little cooler bag along with an antique apple. I stopped into REI to look around at their sale...which doesn't start until Friday...so I bought Carrot Cake and Cashew Cookie Larabars. Each month REI has different bar flavors on sale, they are the two flavors for Oct. so they're 99 cents. I also picked up Yoga Journal which was $1 off, such a bargain shopper, haha!

Then it was next door to pick up items at Whole Foods that I can't get from the FM. I saw this recipe in the store for overnight oats! I know many of us bloggers love our overnight oats and have many of our own recipes, and thought this was way cool to see in the store!

In the car I also enjoyed an Almond Butter Ball that was leftover from our travels this past weekend for a wedding, it's great finding a treat like this in the car =) I bought these at the HFS in Ohio around the corner form the wedding, they are SO yummy! I love the textures and the almondy flavor.

the inside shot ;)

At WF I also picked up Purely Delicious a raw food mag, yea =) I'm still reading it, but an except from the Jason Mraz article that I really enjoyed:
'I'm always trying to promote personal canteens. If it's important for us to carry our freaking cell phones everywhere we go, so, too, can we carry a water bottle.' Jason Mraz in Summer 2010 Purely Delicious

Hope you all have a groovy morning, I'm off to yoga =D xoxo

*my pics are getting cut off on the right, I will check into that after yoga...

living food =D

2010-09-29T21:23:00.000-04:00

On Raw Food Rehab I watched this cute video of Rawdawg Rory making his Sunflower Ranch dressing and knew I wanted to give it a try. I was not a big fan of ranch in my 'previous eating life', but I know that my husband enjoys foods that remind him of times before his wife took over the kitchen ;) so I made raw ranch for him.

I've enjoyed dipping fresh green beans and red peppers in it. It traveled well to my weekend workshop at school.

We've also had salads with these beautiful greens from the farmer's market. It's baby kale and purple mustard greens. I am searching my brain for the name of the farm...geez....

I asked hubby if he liked the ranch and he says not sure I can taste much over these bitter greens ;) and we laughed! They were bitter, but so good, both our salads bowls were emptied =)

This weekend we had family over to celebrate a birthday, I made a raw cobbler from Sweet Gratitude's Fruit Cobbler recipe.

mixing up the walnut date crust

I used a combination of local snow and red delicious antique apples, blueberries that I picked, and organic raspberries.

with the topping crumble on

all done and ready to eat. It was delish and nourishing, live desserts really are the best!

I made a cute design on the top ;)

I recently saw a different salt for my neti pot at the co-op and LOVE love love it. It seems so gentle and soothing compared to the previous one I had. This one is from Baraka. They also make beautiful pots, kind of wish I would have seen these before I bought mine...may have to upgrade sometime. (who wants a used neti pot? ;) Hey, why not they can be sanitized in the dishwasher! Baraka's pots are made in the US too.

the benefits of using the natural sea salt

I have been loving the neti since the day I tried it, I think it works wonders and has become a staple part of my morning routine. If you're just starting out it gets to be second nature how to tip, pour, etc. in no time. Do you all neti? What's your favorite pot and salt? Have you ever used any of the infused sea salts?

thought of the day:

“Teach this triple truth to all: A generous heart, kind speech, and a life of service and compassion are the things which renew humanity.” ~Buddha

One Day and my first hoop!

2010-09-27T09:40:00.000-04:00

The current issue of MaryJane's Farm came with an article on growing garlic. This topic was on my mental list of things to research. I had thought it was getting about time to put it in before the winter, but didn't know for sure. She says that she starts hers in the beginning of September/early fall. That's about the time the mag arrived, so we broke up some Tantre Farm garlic and planted them in the garden. We're looking forward to homegrown garlic and scapes if all goes well ;)

This next topic is not necessarily going to fall under a green umbrella, aside from the fact that we were using found material in our shed (that was there when we purchased the house). It will fall under the enjoying life part though! I've been wanting to get into hooping/hoop dance for a while. I've been inspired by The Happy Hoop to start and to make my own hoop. Dave was game and made me two actually with the hosing and connectors that we had. This is the link we used to know what to do.

measuring

We found colored gaffers tape at Dick Blick's and a roll of yellow electrical tape at Home Depot. I've only taped one so far and need to start practicing!

my first hoop ;)

I've still been getting lots of tomatoes from the garden and have been enjoying fresh pico, yum!

with Ani Phyo's Cashew Sour Kream and Chives. I've been using our frozen chives from this spring, turns out freezing chives like that works great!

That pretty leaf in the background is some Petrified Nature made by my talented cousin from a rhubarb leaf! We were given it as an anniversary gift and love it, it goes really well in our home. Right now it's holding some beautiful winter squash.

Watch these awesome girls rock the hoop in this video! You can read the blogpost it came from here.

Sara's Hooping Lesson from Sara Janssen on Vimeo.

I really dig the song!

the journey within

2010-09-22T09:06:00.000-04:00

Our Walk For Farm Animals was a couple of weekends ago now, Ann Arbor was the first city so you may still check out walks in your area. I did a bad job of taking any photos, but had a nice time and a lovely walk with new friends. Our lovely leader is heading to Farm Sanctuary this weekend with our money raised. A sincere thank you to my sponsors on behalf of the animals. We're planning to make next year the biggest and best yet from Ann Arbor! Michigan is the state to have been holding the walks the longest! Don't quote me, but I believe this next year will be celebrating 25 years of walking. Anyway just a couple of quick photos:

It was a beautiful day

On the same note, our library ordered this book that I had suggested. Did you know you can suggest material for your library? I have not gotten into it yet since my school reading has come first lately. There really are so many books....

On the menu today we have his and hers salads. We've been loving massaged kale around here! I made these with julienned FM kale massaged with flax oil, ume plum vinegar, and celtic sea salt. Added FM purple onion, our green beans, and raw pumpkin seeds.

His with raisins

Hers with our toms and avocado

It's a great time at the FM now with winter squash and apples ripe! We've been buying lots of onion, garlic, squash, greens, and apples.

This last week in apples were Red Delicious. I stopped by my favorite antiques apple growers to see what treats they had. Red Delicious was one of them. I politely said I don't really enjoy RD which she replied oh I enjoy them even less! (we're both talking the supermarket ones with the crazy thick skin and big crowns) I'm not sure what the modern day RD were bred for, in my humble opinion it isn't for the taste. She had brought a few apples for sampling that birds had already sampled themselves ;) I tasted an uneaten side and it was not at all like the RD in the store, very good actually! They came home with me and here's what they look like, not much resemblence to their modern day relatives.

It's such an amazing thing to purchase your food hours after it's been harvested.

I picked up raw granola that I've been wanting to for a while this week too at the FM. You can read about the Detroit Zen Center, students and monks at the center run Living Zen Organics with some fabulous foods and a cafe in Hamtramck. This granola is delish, I really enjoy the cashews in it, and their kale salad is so so good!

A poetry snack for the day =)

'Have patience with everything that remains unsolved in your heart. Try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books written in a foreign language. Do not now look for the answers. They cannot now be given to you because you could not live them. It is a question of experiencing everything. At present you need to live the question. Perhaps you will gradually, without even noticing it, find yourself experiencing the answer, some distant day.' ~Rainer Maria Rilke

'The only journey is the one within.' ~Rainer Maria Rilke

Veggie Miso Soup

2010-09-20T10:05:00.000-04:00

So I have a lot of items to blog about that have been going on. I had the opportunity to see FoodMatters, attended the MI Raw Eco Fest, walked in the Walk for Farm Animals, and of course doing lots of fun things around the homestead ;) I seem to be more productive with smaller posts so I'll break then up. I've also been getting into the swing of school and studying again. I'm enjoying it so far and it's great to meet lots of nice new people.

We stopped into Whole Foods last night looking for a bag of potting soil. I lost Dave in the store and that usually means he's gone to get a piece of pizza or cup of coffee, so when I finally found him he did indeed have a cup o joe, a bag (that wasn't ours) full of stuff and grin on his face. He was given this bag of goodies at the coffee counter! WF is celebrating their 30th birthday this month. A fun fact from their website 'Whole Foods Market opens with 19 employees, some of whom are still team members as of 2010.' That's pretty cool. So Happy Birthday Whole Foods and thanks for the goodies!

We hardly ever use paper towels (like this roll can last us over a year at least). Everything will be put to good use for sure.

So for lunch yesterday I put together a soup. I've been wanting to harvest some of our leeks in the garden so out I went. There were lots of green beans, toms, and red peppers waiting. I brought in our first leeks (yes they are small ;) and a few carrots too.

(sorry for the unsharp photo)

I'd love a long mild fall to continue to eat out of the garden. I will usually make a pot of soup at some point during the weekend, this is what yesterday's looked like, and boy was it good =)

Recipe:
ingredients from the garden- 3 carrots (chopped), handful of small leeks (trimmed and sliced), green beans (snapped), one split tomato (chopped)

ingredients from the FM- purple onion (a few slices), 3 large garlic cloves (diced), lots of bok choi (white parts chopped, greens cut into ribbons), 3 small purple potatoes (cubed), large handful curly parsley (minced)

ingredients from the pantry/refrigerator- 1 T lemon juice, 1 T South River Azuki Bean miso, 1 tsp celtic sea salt, veggie broth ( I used what we had left about 2 cups), couple stalks of celery with it's greens chopped, black pepper
2-3 cups filtered water

*Lightly saute your carrots, onion, garlic, leeks, and celery in olive oil
*Add the broth, water, potatoes, beans, tomato and bring to a simmer until potatoes are cooked how you like them. Part way through potatoes cooking add your bok choi.
*Turn the heat off and let cool a minute or two, then scoop out about a 1/2 cup of broth, to the broth stir in your miso until incorporated. You can then add this back to the soup (always be careful not to boil miso). Add the lemon juice, salt, and pepper. Stir to combine everything, stir in your parsley before serving. Enjoy!

Last night we finally ordered our apple trees for the spring! We decided on Cox's Orange Pippin (btw sorry for the misspelling of Pippin in the last post!) and Grime's Golden, both are organic. I'm so excited =D

What's everyone's favorite apple variety? Have you been able to enjoy an antique apple before?

On another note we saw The Town on Friday and I loved it. It's funny how I really can enjoy a movie about things that I would not condone in reality. Do you think that's a bad thing? It's kind of how I feel about boxing movies, I love to watch them, but I don't like to see people have their brains and nervous systems take that abuse in reality. On the other hand inbetween studying this weekend I watched The Wedding Date and a cheesy Lifetime movie of which I'd seen them both before! In a romantic movie mood much? ;) ? I guess I'm pretty much up for most movies ;)

antique apples

2010-09-10T09:05:00.000-04:00

I'm having this wonderful infatuation with antique apples. How can you not, look at this lovely!

This is a pippen grown non-cert organically in our county. If you shop the A2 FM look for Salem Orchard and Vineyard. They also have delicious concord grapes, yes they have seeds ;)

I've been working on this visualization of our apple orchard =) We will have baked, gluten free donuts and also raw dehydrated ones and pumpkins and squash and greens and goats (for living) oh my!

I really think apples are so amazing. Did you know that if you plant the seeds that are inside one apple you will get all different trees from the parent apple? A really interesting documentary by Michael Pollan based on his book The Botany of Desire is so thought provoking, and a great lesson on apple history too. It plays on PBS so you can check their schedule. I fell asleep for the marijuana part, go figure ;) so I'm wanting to watch again too.

back to more apple lovin pictures! On the left are snow apples and the right are the pippens. I love the pippens, the snow apples are delicious too, a little more tart. Both types are firm and juicy. Is it not so cool that these apples are from trees that were planted in the 1930s? My gratitude to that Johnny Appleseed.

my loot

getting organized for storing

We're ordering two antique trees for the spring (now's the time to order them, I was too late last year) for our yard. I've gotten one tree decided on and still working on the other variety. It will be a few years before they bear fruit, it will be so worth waiting for! They'll be coming from Trees of Antiquity. Can you tell I'm excited!?! =)

Something that has been bearing fruit in the garden is our heirloom tomato plants. I haven't decided if these are Black Krim or Cherokee Purples. I had planted both seeds and then moved the seedlings around. Anyone able to tell for me? I'm leaning toward Black Krim, they are SO delicious and beautiful.

here's his bottom

we've also been eating our garden carrots =) Plants are just so amazing, it's really so fun to plant teeny tiny seeds and then see how they grow into amazing greens, veggies, and fruits.

Last night I stayed up and finished watching Crazy Sexy Cancer (sorry if anyone is waiting for it, it's going back to the library today!)

This link is for the trailor on her you tube channel, I couldn't seem to embed it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umnbB9QKr2Y

Kris Carr is just amazing, that's not even the word for her, she's more than that, she's the rockstar healing junkie! I was lucky to meet her and hear her talk last month. She's a radiant, smart, kind, and loving wellness warrior. She signed my Grandma's crazy sexy cancer tips book and we took a photo with her which ended up being a goof and was a video, ha. It's on my Mom's camera, I'll see if I can get it to work anyway ;) If you get a chance to see her, do it. You can also check out her sweet holistic social network Crazy Sexy Life.

If you watch Kris' latest vlog about decluttering this is on the same note. We've painted the walls, doors, trim, taken out carpet, layed a cork floor, hung repurposed curtains, installed a ceiling fan in our cute little office. It looks beautiful and is a nice calm room, but then came time to decide what to bring back in...here's the decluttering issue...all that's made it so far is our desk with laptop, small wicker drawer unit and my salt candle. I've tucked our scanner and printer on a rolling end table in the closet and out of sight, but that's where I've stopped and been stuck. I don't want much in the room, but I want it to be functional with just what we need. We don't have much 'clutter' at all, but figuring our what to do with our CD collection, etc. is what's hanging me up. In the meantime I'm enjoying the space in the glow of my salt lamp.

"Those who cherish a beautiful vision, a lofty ideal in their hearts, will one day realize it. "

~ James Allen

Walk for Farm Animals this weekend!

2010-09-09T15:07:00.000-04:00

Hey all, hope you're staying warm and cuddly somewhere. I've been chilly today since being at school, I am not used to being in air conditioning like that, brrr, it's making me want to curl up and finish my latest read The Girl with Glass Feet =) Anyway the weather has been gorgeous, so much breezy fresh air and lots of pretty clouds. It was very windy this weekend, I had pulled three of our basil plants, which are still rocking along great, out of the garden and potted them to bring inside for the winter. I'm hoping for fresh homegrown basil all year! I'll have to find them their favorite spot in the house. After I had potted them I left them set in the back yard for a day or so and they got a little beat up from the 60 mph wind whipping around the house woops. I picked them up and said some nice things to them...here's hoping they recover. So maybe you want to bring in some herbs for the winter too if you live where you get a winter. I'm no expert, but now seems like a good time.

This weekend I'm walking in Farm Sanctuary's Walk for Farm Animals. This will be my first year and the 21st for the Ann Arbor walk! This year's spokesperson is Bob Harper who those of us who watch the Biggest Loser know as one of the trainers, I was pretty excited to hear that he eats a plant based diet and also that he was going to lend his celebrity to the cause.

I have a fundraising page if you're inclined to donate to the cause, email me (my email is in the top right) and I can send you the link. THANKS to those of you who have already sponsored. I am excited to be helping an organization that does such wonderful work that I'm passionate about. This year for my birthday I asked for a donation to Farm Sanctuary instead of a gift. Honestly the few things that I'd like are really wants and not needs, so I think this is a better use of money. My parents made a very kind donation for my birthday. I plan to visit the sanctuary and it's lovely animals someday.

If you're interested in walking you can look here for the list of walks by state.

Today I have a friendly reminder to oil your wooden cutting boards. I unfortunately let mine get really dry sometimes, so I thought I'd give you a reminder in case you do the same ;) It sort of reminds me of the front of Martha Stewart Living where she has a whole calendar with suggestions of tasks to complete that time of year. It's been a long time since I've read her magazine or watched her show, but she was such an inspiration for me to begin cooking from scratch and getting back to the basics with household things and do it yourself projects, I was so infatuated with her! Back in my younger college days I used to actually skip class and walk home when there was something on her show that I didn't want to miss!

Here are our boards rehydrating

What's everyone reading? Any good book recommendations?

Don't forget to smile today as much as you can =D Smile at the computer, laugh, it feels good right?

“Because of your smile, you make life more beautiful.”

~Thich Nhat Hanh

as always my gratitude for reading.

Curried Rice Soup

2010-09-08T00:00:00.000-04:00

It's beginning to look a lot like fall around here, there I said it! I'm not wishing away summer by any means, however we are fast approaching my favorite season here in Michigan =) With that said it was pretty hot by the afternoon here today. What's got me in the fall mood? Well to start with the appearance of these lovelies at the farmer's market.

Squash, and my favorite kinds: kabocha and butternut! yum. We discovered kabocha last year at the FM, if you have not had it, do yourself a solid and try one, you can thank me later ;) Kabocha squash go by many names Japanese pumpkin being one of the other most common. I've seen these two varieties: the orange and green and also a pretty greyish one.

Our favorite way to enjoy them is roasted in halves (insides down) in the oven until tender. I like mine with flax oil drizzled on and I eat the skins (aside from the really bumpy parts that look like warts).

For the better part of two weeks recently I was without a car. On one of these days I decided to make a soup with what we had in the house and it turned out delicious if I do say so myself ;) To the best of my memory this is it:

Curried Rice Soup

minced/chopped garlic (we use a lot, about 2-3 giant cloves)
chopped onion, I had a half so that's what I used
couple stalks of celery sliced
one carrot diced

(let these saute a bit in some olive oil until fragrant)

add in:
a cubed sweet potato
sliced fresh crimini mushrooms ( I used about 4 oz, but use double if you have them)
about 1 1/2 T curry powder
about 2 T dried thyme ( I like to break this up in the mortar and pestle before I add it in)
1 cup uncooked brown rice
(stir until the spices are mixed through)

add in:
(this is where I can't really remember the liquid measure, so use your judgement as always)
2-4 cups of low sodium vegetable broth/stock
2 cups of filtered water
1-2 bay leaves (ours were small so I used two)

(bring to a boil, cover and simmer until your rice is done about 30 minutes or so. When the rice and potatoes are done to your liking, pull your bay, stir in 1/4 cup of nutritional yeast, mix through and serve)

you should also taste test for salt + pepper, you may need it depending on the sodium content of your stock and your palette/diet

I hope you enjoy it like we did!

It was a soup and salad night. Salads were kale massaged with lemon juice, flax oil, and sea salt topped with leftover aduki beans, avocado, cucumber, walnuts, and tomato.

I always welcome soup leftover lunches =)

I was lucky to win a giveaway of Ultima Replenisher from Yoga Addicted (thank you Lauren and Mandy!). I entered the giveaway with my husband in mind. We don't buy drinks like Gatorade due to the artificialness of them and he loves to make homemade tart lemonade. These replenishers are a lower sugar (sweetened with stevia) option than the lemonade without any added garbage! So the verdict is that he gives them two thumbs up and likes the grape and wild raspberry flavors the best. I really don't drink much of anything aside from smoothies and water and when it's cold, hot tea so I've yet to have one...I will be looking to buy more of these in our local store though for David once our box is gone.

Check out Nikki's post for a good recipe idea using Ultima Replenisher.

Speaking of yoga, I'm in withdrawl. My session at the rec center ended and is on break and my school classes are the same time as my favorite Vinyasa classes I haven't attended a class in a week and now I'm full blown jonesing. Tomorrow I will find a class somewhere...yes I can do a solo practice at home, but I LOVE class! How about you guys, do you practice?

Sweet dreams, teeth brushing and then bed ;)

Peachy Green Smoothie

2010-09-07T07:24:00.000-04:00

I hope everyone had an enjoyable long weekend and Labor Day. I know I enjoyed having my husband home an extra day! While I shopped the farmer's market on Saturday Dave picked up a load of compost for us to top dress our trees with, we got that done yesterday as well as filled a bed for our cucumbers, beans, and squash for next year, and cleaned the shed out. We also had fun at a family BD party, enjoyed walks around our neighborhood, took a nice bike ride to the apple orchard. They were not open yet, just as well, I didn't really need a donut anyway;) Those cider mill donuts are one of my weaknesses.

I thought I'd share with you the green smoothie I've been loving lately.

Peachy Green Smoothie

10 oz. filtered water
1 banana (frozen or fresh)
1 peach, pitted
2 T hemp seeds
two big handfuls of greens (I've been rotating spinach and curly kale)
a small splash of almond extract
generous dashes of cinnamon to your taste

blend away! I have been blending my greens with water first, then adding the rest to finish blending, makes it nice and smooth. This makes enough for a big jar for me, not sure the ounces.

last week I was craving one of my favorite recipes from The Yoga Cookbook. The Tofu, Pasta, and Olives from the protein prana section. Driving in the car on the way home I was trying to think of something quick and filling, swung into the store to grab a couple of items, but I didn't remember the olive part ;) It is still delicious! It's one of those recipes that are just way more delicious than the sum of it's parts somehow. Here's the cookbook, it was a gift from my 30th BD =) thanks Mom and Dad.

I used Tinkyada's organic brown rice noodles. I toppped mine with diced toms from the garden and Parma!, and topped Dave's with Parma! and minced fresh red onion. So good!

I'm off to get ready for my second day of school, I'll leave you with these pics of cutie pie Maggs. Can you see her?

There she is, napping on the entire scratch pad, loves her catnip ;)

Have a great day, thanks for stopping by =)

I heart green smoothies

2010-08-27T09:23:00.000-04:00

Last week I got the chance to see Victoria Boutenko. She was giving her Green for Life talk and I didn't want to pass up the opportunity to see her. I purchased Green for Life last year at VegFest and it sealed the deal on our Vita-Mix purchase =) I also have her 12 Steps to Raw Foods book, I've really enjoyed reading it and the thinking it provokes. It was fun to listen to her talk about the plant kingdom and some history of modern foods. I enjoy her quest for health answers and how when she sees a health problem she gets to the basics and thinks there might be a simple solution for this, many times there is. It was fun of course to meet her and to meet other like minded kind people and to hear about how she came up with the first green smoothie. Another treat is that we all got a green smoothie made by her!

pear, spinach, and mint

She is a very sweet person and is on the same thought as me with seeded watermelons! (That's what I had to snack on in my purse during the talk, it was such a steamer of a day I was a big sweaty when I got there and watermelon always does the trick to cool me down) She said that we have the best watermelons here in Michigan =) I haven't traveled to nearly as many places as she has but I would have to agree ;) I'm really missing it right now not being able to have made it to the farmer's market this week yet without a car...

I took my books, she was kind enough to sign and answer questions that I had.

and bought a sticker with the change in the bottom of my wallet.

These smoothies aren't in true Raw Family fashion, but here's what my smoothies have been looking like lately here.

water, banana, fruit on hand: peaches, strawberries, etc., hemp seeds, raw protein, greens: parsley, kale, spinach, etc., spoon of raw almond butter

I've been using some of this protein lately for a change. It is the one that I seem to digest best.

I don't use supplemental protein very often, but sometimes it just sounds kind of good and a fun change of pace. I personally don't ever feel like I'm lacking in protein and actually when I have a supplement I'm full for the time of like two meals! So if I did this all the time, it'd be all I was eating pretty much or I'd have to step up my exercise and burn more fuel ;)

couple more green smoothies =)

one on the go

I was on the go to the grand opening of the Lululemon showroom in A2.
So cool that there's one in town now, I met the manager and she's super nice, they'll also be hosting lots of free yoga and other fitnesses classes in the shop, I love that! I tried on some clothes and fell in love with the wunderunders, but will have to wait, with paying tuition for school yoga clothes are not in the budget ;) I know the clothes are on the pricey side. In Vegas I bought a pair of groove pants and a bra, they've had tons of use and are in like new shape, the clothes really are good quality. We have been playing the lottery so who knows maybe I'll be able to go shopping before I know it ;)

Reading LoveVeggiesandYoga Averie's Banana Nut Muffins looked so good and it would be an excuse to use my antique store find glass batter bowl =)

these are my kind of treat on these cooler days now (it was in the 40s here last night! perfect sleeping weather) gooey and dense, yum!

I changed the recipe a little bit:

*used two bananas
*did about 1/6 cup almonds 1/6 cup oats instead of the 1/3 cup almond meal
*decreased the brown sugar to a scant 2 T
*after the batter was mixed in the Vita-Mix I stirred in some oats and frozen blueberries, again I wanted to use my batter bowl =D The MI blueberries were super duper delicious.
I baked for 20 minutes, and like Averie said they're that underdoneness that I love.

other fare around here has been lots of salads with artichokes hearts this week and garden toms

and these little gems I like to call PB&J dates! This will satisfy your sweet tooth, sometimes I really get a craving for a PB&J sandwich (it might be a comfort food thing) but am not really hungry so I started making these. I've been using the Naturally Nutty vanilla peanut butter, good grief is this good.

Thanks for reading, hugs!

Also at the Green for Life talk I chatted with the manager of Inn Season Cafe and there will be a raw food and juice cafe opening up in September a few doors down on 4th street in Royal Oak!

lentil joes

2010-08-25T13:32:00.000-04:00

I had a desire to make sloppy joes from reading ChoosingRaw ( I can't find the exact post now... ) So out came Veganomicon from the bookshelf. A cool tidbit here, if you have this cookbook, somewhere on the ppk site they have a list of the corrections for it, I went through it one day and marked them down in the book, good thing to know) Anyway we enjoyed a warm meal of Snobby Joes for dinner. They're easy to make with ingredients that you most likely already have in your kitchen.
Changes that I made:
*used red bell instead of green (read yesterday's post)
*decreased the chile powder from 3 T to 1.5-2 T, three seemed like a lot to me, but use your judgement only you know how much chile heat you like.

onion, pepper, and garlic (Tantre Farms onion and garlic, they grow the best giant garlic and our garden peppers) I'm actually missing the FM today =( our car has been at the doctor since Saturday. It's pretty amazing how much cleaning and catching up gets accomplished when you're without your car!

If anyone is curious how dinners roll around here in a house with a omnivore boy and a plant-based girl, sometimes we eat the same dinner and sometimes it's a little different like this. We had leftover buns from entertaining so Dave had a lentil joe on a bun with organic cheese, raw pickles and mustard.

my dinner looked like this, romaine leafs with lentil joes, Daiya shreds, tomato, raw pickles. The buns weren't nonvegan, but I really find that I LOVE as many raw veggies and greens in my diet as I can work in, and greens are something that I regularly crave. They are the one item that I am sure to have stocked in the house.

I don't remember if we had salad as well that night. I am a big believer that greens are our such an essential food so I get Dave to eat as many greens as I can, it's not hard he does enjoy them. I'd like to spread these slogans instead of the 'go meat!' one that's been on tv. Eat More Kale! Strong Men eat Greens!!! So that's how it rolls here, we eat vegetarian/vegan meals at home (with dairy cheese being the last hold out that I shop for David), if we get carry out there will most likely be meat ordered in his meal, and then when we eat out he obviously chooses his own meal. I am so grateful that I have a husband that understands and respects my lifestyle, it works smoothly here for us. He is happy to share with others the difference the evolution of our eating has made on his cholesterol, that makes me pretty proud =) We are happy and healthy together even if we do have some differences in our lifestyles. I think patience and mutual respect with one another are key. I wasn't vegan when we met and along the way he has projected no opposing opinions on me (does he harrass me? of course, but that's about everything else and hardly about food ;) and did I continue to cook meat for him after I was no longer eating it, yes. Did it gross me out/have reservations about it? big time...am I SO glad that he doesn't care that we don't have meat in the house anymore, YES. Thank you Dave. I know there must be other households like us and many that are not. What's your story? I do love comments and getting to know any readers better =) hint hint...

Also leftover from enteraining was some guacamole we picked up at Costco, which turned out to be really yummy. I usually make our guacamole, but when you're short on time and ripe avocados...you do what you can.

guac spread on romaine leafs, mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm!

a frugal dinner of quinoa cooked in vegetable broth (This is my broth of choice lately) with lightly sauted veggies in coconut oil from the garden and FM. I added lots of dried herbs, a sprinkle of nutritional yeast, and pepper, it was really tasty.

ok so you know how much I love canning jars right, then you can imagine how excited I am about this. My friend has an Etsy shop where they sell handcrafted light fixtures. We're having one made for over the kitchen sink, yea! I fell in love with it from this photo.

(image from thebluecabinet on Etsy)

I'm so geeked, I know I'm going to love it. Here are the jars for our fixture.

I have a big thing for antique glassware. I want to buy all the old Fire King measuring cups I see and any unique glass jars with lids, ooh boy I'm like a kid in a ~~candy store~~ antique shop ;)

Check out the Etsy shop, I have new favorites Rain and Marshmallow!

Maggie wanted to say hello again and show how much she loves her new nap spot. This was not the reason I got the basket down, but I just can't take it away now ;)

We are having the most beautiful weather here, this is what I'd order if it were an ordering kind of thing ;)
I see a bike ride and/or walk in my near future, but first I have a pile of ironing to tend to...
Enjoy your day xoxo!

treats

2010-08-24T22:35:00.000-04:00

We drove up North a few weeks ago and stopped into a Whole Foods that is not one of our usuals for a couple of provisions for me for the ride/weekend. I did have some things packed like chia yogurt, peaches, a green smoothie, and Odwalla bars. I was excited to find this WF selection of raw foods bigger than ours and tried these kale chips (that were on sale =) a raweo, and some bananas. Bananas always seem to make my road trip food even though I hardly ever just eat one plain at home. I think it's the peel and eat convenience. So the kale chips were tasty, I do like homemade ones better, but they were very good. I used the crumbles from the broken ones later that weekend on top of some GF pasta (oh, I also threw a bag of this in the car too and it came in handy).

I was SO excited for this raweo...

and it was maybe the most bitter unpleasant taste that I remember in a long time, boo =( I don't know if we got a funky one or if that's how chai spice is supposed to taste and I've always had a 'western' version or something...has anyone had these cookies? (Dave tasted it too and gave me a look like you better get me some water quick, I don't know what you just fed me ;) haha, he was driving. Anyway, they were worth a try.

I did make some raw treats that were not a disappiontment. Here's the recipe, they couldn't be much easier! Lemon Treats

I'm really proud of the produce we've gotten from our little garden this year.

romaine, basil, kale

green beans, cuke, zucchini

our red zebras are so so pretty with their yellow and red striping

red peppers!!! I'm convinced that growing your own organic red peppers will alone pay for any money you spend to put in your garden. I'm really proud of these =)

A word on green peppers...from what I understand (aside from an actual heirloom variety that is green when ripe) the green peppers that we commonly see are unripe red, yellow, orange, purple, etc. peppers. It is best to eat them ripe as there are toxins in unripe veggies, but you can read more about that in a google search. So if you're growing green peppers let them stay on the plant and ripen, unless of course you're growing the actual heirloom green bells.

more goodies. We have been saving some serious dough by shopping in the garden this summer!

\

I now realized why there are so many recipes that involve zucchini ;) Here's a recent attempt to keep up with the garden. Gluten Free Vegan Chocolate Zucchini Bread

'Dare to set goals for your life that are bigger than the ones you've had until now in your relationships, career & your life in general. Have the confidence to step boldly from your comfort zone & make the changes & take the chances that will fulfill the potential within you. And don't let fear and/or negative comments... by others keep you from going after that which inspires you most! Think Big, Dream Big!' ~Earth Cafe Living Foods on Facebook today

I really loved reading this status update today. I'm going back to school next week and found comfort and strength from these words.

the photos are back.

2010-08-15T07:55:00.000-04:00

My apolozies to any readers who have visited in the last 24 hours or so. I have exceeded my bandwidth limit on the site that hosts my photo uploads for the blog. I just upgraded so now it'll be unlimited and the photos are back, at least for the next year. The reason I process the images this way is so we can see them in a bigger size on the blog. Do you like them big like they are, does it matter to you?
I have much gratitude for you taking the time to visit and read my blog! Thank you.

raw vegan cheesecake 1.0

2010-08-12T20:59:00.000-04:00

This week I attempted my first raw vegan cheesecake. I used the Strawberry Cheesecake recipe from Sweet Gratitude and it is sooooooooooooooo delicious. Anybody who has had a raw cheesecake knows how devine they are! =) I will quote Vegan Cookbook Critic here: "the most effective vegan outreach tool ever invented. I have yet to meet someone who doesn't swoon at the first bite of a raw vegan cheesecake". Check out her post with some glorious looking desserts!

Here's a photo montage of my cheesecake ;)

soaking cashews

The almond date crust

filling ingredients (this alone would be enough of a reason to buy a Vita-mix!)

you know it's summer when your coconut oil looks like this...

lecithin was the only ingredient I had to specially buy. I did make sure it's from non-GMO soybeans, when I bought this I was unaware of the sunflower lecithin...next time.

the Vita-mix can work some magic!

poured into my springform pan. I bought this pan from a Pampered Chef party especially for making these cheesecakes. Are you seeing how much I love them??? ;) My love affair started when we lived in Nevada and our local Wild Oats sold Earth Cafe cheesecakes by the slice (they're like $6 or $7 I can't remember) and it was love at first bite. I would totally ration them and have just a couple bites a day, what will power man. Now I can have a whole slice at a time =D yea! We desperately tried to justify the shipping to order whole cakes here, but it just didn't make sense since they have to ship frozen/cooled.

yea, it worked! (this one was not difficult to make at all, it was just exciting)

Next time I think I'll cut it when it's a little more frozen, this got a wee bit mushy, but still held together fine.

pretty

I picked up an extra set of these at Costco for storing slices in the freezer. They're all now packed away frozen, well except for the two slices thawing on the counter for our nighttime treat ;)

Something else I've been goo goo over lately too is this Go Raw granola.

I have a little bit with some almond milk and it is crazy good. I'm still researching our dehydrator purchase...can't wait to start making more raw goodies in our our home! I know that this fall and winter crackers and breads are going to be perfect, oh and granola too!

I'm off to enjoy that slice and to try and finish Eat, Pray, Love tonight!

Another great thought from Lululemon's Manifesto:

•Drink FRESH water and as much water as you can. Water flushes unwanted toxins from your body and keeps your brain sharp

I heart yogurt.

2010-08-10T13:24:00.000-04:00

Lately my breakfasts have been lovely thanks to the glorious peaches that are now in season, holy momma are they good! I'll eat at least one big one sliced up in a bowl while my chias are gelling in some yogurt.

Our windowsill all summer =)

two bowls of goodness!

I've been rotating non-dairy yogurts until I found this one that has no sugar added.

I do stir in some vanilla powder and a dab of agave and about 1-1.5 T chia seeds and let it hang out for about 20 minutes while the seeds gel. It is tart and yummy, boy do I love chias in my diet. This is what my husband says when somebody wants a taste of my yogurt...'it's not the yogurt you're thinking of..." haha.

When Mom and I were in Petoskey shopping in a kitchen store I was so grateful to find the yogurt maker that I'd been thinking about ordering online. It's the Yolife by Tribest. I wanted this one because it comes with small glass jars and the extra tall lid so I can also use my canning jars to make bigger batches. I have yet to use it since I now need to order a vegan culture/starter. I'm really looking forward to experimenting with seed based yogurts.

Here she is and she now has her own space in the cabinet =)

Does anyone have experience or recommendations for making vegan yogurts or the culture/starter that you like best?

Soup in the summer???

2010-08-10T12:51:00.000-04:00

I could make this short and sweet by saying this is all we've been eating lately, because it just about is all I've been wanting! I am butt crazy for watermelon and so much of it is being enjoyed here, I've found my favorite and it's from Shetler's stall at the A2 Farmer's Market. We've had the big daddy watermelon and lots of the smaller sized ones. I have seeds drying from both on the counter for our garden next year. We're going to need to put in a couple of additional beds next spring if we want to plant zucchini again ;) and also have room for melons and other sqaush!

Here's our organic loot from a trip that's now a couple of weeks ago...all the goodies have since been eaten and the ends, husks, scraps are doing their thing in the composter. Yikes, I'm really getting back logged here with recipes, photos, and posts...I need to set better intention.

This was the last tomato purchase as ours are now in, yeah! green onion, and what else but a few watermelons

collards, beets, and sweet corn

The beets were spiralized for this salad of spinach, Mushroom Quinoa Pilaf, and house dressing ( both from Get It Ripe)

keeping the spiralizer busy I made zucchini pasta with an impromptu sauce using ingredients we had on hand: sundried tomatoes, olive oil, nooch, basil, parsley, garlic, salt and water.

Dave's dinner one night looked like this: butternut squash ravioli , peas, our green beans, with a sauce made of raw tahini, lemon juice, daiya cheese, miso, brown mustard, garlic, and olive oil. The sauce was great! It's a whole different world now with daiya =) On South river miso's site it's says they'll have dandelion leek miso ready in the fall, that sounds AMAZING.

We have two types of beans in the garden this year and have had success with both, but this Contender bush bean is my favorite. They're really delicate and delicious. These are the seeds we used.

Somehow soup sounded good even though it's the middle of the summer here. I had yellow split peas in the pantry so I subbed them for the green in this recipe, I also didn't have any potatoes on hand so they got left out. This is one delicious and simple soup to make, it also got two thumbs up from the two omnis that I made it for =) Take away lesson here is; soup is good food (even in the heat), it's easy to make, you can put lots of garden veggies to good use, and it's an economical meal (especially good when you have guests), and it makes for great leftovers.

Another recipe from the blogosphere that sounded too good not to try are the grilled salt and vinegar potatoes (ok, obviously these meals are out of order since I did have FM potatoes to use here;) Dave loves potatoes, but I will go looooong periods of time with never thinking about making any. I think he's been happy about their appearance at the FM! I read about the recipe here on Oh She Glows, and followed the link to use this actual one. We had purple new potatoes not waxy ones as the recipe calls for and they worked fine, I also used apple cider vinegar as it's what we had. (we've used our supply of white vinegar in a solution on the weeds that grow in the seams of our driveway, which works pretty well) Here they are grilling inside on the cast iron grill pan.

I tasted a couple and found them yummy, Dave loved them and ate the rest =)

Also from Oh She Glows I found myself drooling over her healthy blueberry chocolate glaze cake...it was bound to become dessert here too. I wanted to make it gluten/wheat free and subbed brown rice and coconut flours for the spelt and followed a couple of Angela's recommendations.
Changes I made:

added two mashed bananas to the wet mixture
used 3/4 cup of water (instead of the 2/3 c)
used 1 cup of brown rice flour and 1/4 cup of coconut flour (instead of the spelt flour)

It turned out really well, I know it can be risky subbing non gluten flours, but I was in the groove and knew it was going to work. I think my favorite part was the glaze, yum yum yum! Make this cake =)

Back in garden news we've been harvesting lots of these lovely cucumbers. This was my first year growing cukes and it's been very successful even with Japanes beetles chowing on some leaves ;) These are the seeds we planted.

in an effort to not waste any (I have given some away too) we've been continuing to refill our Bubbie's pickles jars and they are oh so good.

Has anyone had this flavor of Tempt??? It's good...you may even finish the container in lieu of dinner...it was one of those days! Girls you know what I mean?

I've hunted around in town some at the asian grocery for kelp noodles to no avail. I was passing thru Livonia recently and decided to stop in to Zerbo's and pick some up. I also bought little powerhouse hemp seeds, if anyone is wondering they are now sold out of GT's too. Last I was in they had a bunch of grape and a couple other juice ones and this was a bit after the distribution stopped.

I drank one of my last two kombuchas...I'm curious to see what will end up happening with the whole ordeal.

I finally finished an order for colorgrown organic cotton farmer's market bags that have longer handles. Hopefully soon they'll be toting around produce in Pennsylvania!

Traverse City

2010-08-04T15:25:00.000-04:00

ok, so moving on to the rest of our little trip, we stopped in Elk Rapids to walk around an antique store, watched lots of bikers finishing a ride around Torch Lake (I saw a triple bike, crazy cool), and stopped at some road side stands that sold homemade fruit pies that Mom bought for her parents, and finally in Traverse City on the way home. My memory of Traverse City is completely inaccurate or it has changed a lot, could be both ;) Anyway, I found Oryana on HappyCow and after reading the reviews knew we had to stop in! I ended up finding the preferred cat food in our house with a great price, shelves of Naturally Nutty, and some local laundry soap, don't you love co-ops?!

I've seen this around our area, but had yet to try it. I got the lavender and loved it, going to try and make our own soon, I already have the giant bag of baking soda (from no-pooing; update on that in the near future too) and a box of Borax, with a little inspiration from Heather, I'm all set!

This was the stock of Naturally Nutty in TC (where it's made), awesome!

and here's the shelf from the co-op in Petoskey!

I picked out two. A new one and one that I love and adore.

Am I nutty for nut butter??? All signs point to yes.

While at Oryana's Lake Street Cafe I noticed they had these fancy dual flushers in the pottys ;) Just like our new toilet, sorry but you knew I had to take a picture, I get excited about these things.

ok, back out of the bathroom... for lunch I enjoyed a wrap with hummus, lots of veggies and sprouts and a soy yogurt.

I had forgotten a couple of eats from Petoskey. We stopped into Roast & Toast for bfast where they had a yummy oatmeal bar with soy milk available, pecans and lots of dried fruit (we were in NW Michigan after all!).

and this Donald Fagen vegan bar from Grain Train. I brought the label with ingredients home so I can try to make a raw one like it. This was so so yummy! It looks weird but it was oats, coconut, PB, choc chips, maple syrup, wheat germ, walnuts, and some other things...

Before leaving town we stocked up on food for the drive. I got a cup of veggie chili (is it me or do co-ops make the best soups?), a SWP decaf almond latte ( I think I just wanted to order a latte with almond milk ;), some peanut rice noodles, and refilled my kanteen.

on the way out we finally found Higher Grounds, they're local roasters of organic fair trade coffees, and were not open, but I got to admire the cafe thru the door...cool things that the sign read was homemade organic almond flavoring and you can have your coffee made in a chemex! Just like we do here. I still really enjoy checking out coffee shops even though I don't do caffeine anymore.

awesome bike delivery service

That wraps up our trip this year, we have our sights set on a yoga retreat for next year's Mother's Day celebration! =)

I heart Petoskey

2010-07-31T00:11:00.000-04:00

Mom and I went on a little road trip to Petoskey recently as our belated Mother's Day celebration. I picked the town using these requirements: be able to attend at least one yoga class, natural foods store, veg friendly restaurant, and be by the water. Petoskey was the destination =) I was hoping to make some zucchini chips for snacking on the drive and to use some of the extra zucchini we have in the garden...turns out I think it would work better if we actually had a dehydrator ;) They ended up being really tasty but just very slowly roasted.

We've been harvesting lots of these babies as I'm sure everyone is right now, zucchini is one prolific grower!

I covered them with some olive oil, lemon juice, nutritional yeast, salt, and Italian blend spice.

a long time later after being in the oven on it's lowest setting, they looked like this.

We enjoyed them with brown rice pasta and sauce instead of crunching on them in the car ;)

The leftovers were yummy cold too.

Oh well, I'm continuing to shop for our dehydrator, anyone have experience with TSM (if you can get past the name!)? I really like that it's SS so I'm leaning that way over the Excalibur, I'd love any tips, likes, dislikes. This week I watched a video of Abeba Wright making BBQ chips on the Renegade Health Show and really really really want to make them, they look so great don't they?

Ok, back to the trip. We left at 4am =) in order to make our yoga class. We traded turns driving and got out to stretch a few times to stay alert, but it was SO worth it as the class got us all sweaty and was such an amazing flow. We went to Tiffany's vinyasa class at YogaRoots, she's a really wonderful instructor with a beautiful cozy studio, it ranks as one of my favorite classes! Here's me outside the studio.

She was kind enough to direct us to a couple of veggie friendly places in town. We walked around Art in the Park for a while and then headed to Julienne Tomatoes for lunch. JT is a really cool quaint place, it's very apparent they are popular in the community, make good fresh food with tons of local ingredients. I had my favorite Gazpacho ever! Man was it good. (I love good gazpacho so much, I made a huge batch that we ate at my bridal shower but this was better (Mom doesn't agree, although I think she may be a little partial since her daughter made it ;)

and the It's All Greek to Me wrap sans feta, which was super delish as well. Here's a couple photos I thought were cute inside.

Mom and I visiting Lake Michigan

and playing on the rocks =)

We stopped at Torch Lake on the way home. It was a stormy chilly afternoon otherwise we would've gone for a swim, the water is gorgeous!

Can you believe how clear it is? Amazing.

Mom and I, Torch Lake, really belated Mother's Day ;) From here we headed to Traverse City and a super cool co-op, that wrap up in another post...

•Breathe deeply and appreciate the moment. Living in the moment could be the meaning of life.
~ Lululemon's Manifesto

summer food goodness!

2010-07-25T09:26:00.000-04:00

The summer produce is SO great with lots of veggies coming into season, this is our loot from the FM this week.

We've still been harvesting lots of zucchini, lacinto kale, basil, and green beans from our garden, but this week was the first for one of our tomatoes =) Yea!!! tomatoes are one of my most favorite foods, have been since I was a kid when my Grandpa and I would sit and literally eat a full sized dinner plate overflowing with sliced summer tomatoes (this is the time to enjoy them, not during the winter months, totally not the same thing, and WAY more food miles) I've been known to take them as snacks on the go and eat them like an apple, mmm I love em! This one is the early producer that we planted at 60 days, it's an heirloom Moskvich. If you haven't had heirloom tomatoes, be sure to try them soon. There are lots of different types with their own distinct flavors.

This one was added to what is now our pretty weekly batch of raw marinara.

We all know how zucchini produces so it's been a staple lately in our meals. The easiest way I've found is to just spiralize them into noodles to eat with sauce or any kind of toppings you have that you can throw together. You do not need a spiralizer to enjoy them this way, you can make them into more fettuccini type noodles with a veggie peeler running down the side. This was my lunch one day, topped with a fresh tomato, onion, pesto sauce that I had made earlier, Bubbie's pickles, etc. One more zucchini down ;)

Another way to use up some zucchini is in many of the dressing recipes from The Raw Food Revolution Diet. You can include your garden herbs by making the Green Goddess variation of the Liquid Gold Dressing. We had a bunch of curly parsley handy and the dressing turned out super yummy. Another zucchini and some herbs utilized, check!

I've been buying delicious green kale from Beautiful Earth Family Farm. This week I bought 3 bunches of kale and knew that some of it was bound to become massaged salads.

It's so easy, all I do is sort of julienne the kale (after you've removed the large stems) place it in a bowl and literally massage it with my hands (clean of course ;) until it starts to break down some and the smell is so green and yummy, then I just add whatever sounds good that we have available. This one included red onion, red pepper, walnuts, zucchini (more zucchini, check!) raisins, and pumpkin seeds dressed with the Green Goddess from above. Get your jaws warmed up kale salads require lots of chewing!

There was organic watermelon and corn at the market for the 1st time this week, we enjoyed lightly cooked non GMO corn on the cob and the watermelon was eaten in no time, yum, oh and yes it had seeds, we choose seeds here ;) I don't know why I only bought two ears, I could eat like 4 myself!...I could also eat about 4 of those watermelons too, hee hee.

a word on local organic garlic, it is the stuff man! Check out the size of this head, all for $1.

I soaked a jar of sunflower seeds in prep for a Raw Vegan Tuna Salad of Gena's. Recipe here. I added extra pickle juice of course ;) I've been loving this wrapped in the cute cabbage leaves from the FM with yet another pickle tucked inside.

ok, in my opinion this will not fool any tuna lovers, but I am not looking to do that anyway, it's just a yummy salad full of good nutrition.

other things full of good nutrients are green smoothies =)

blueberries and black kale in this pretty purple one!

I've still been loving these Daiya rice tortilla quesadillas big time. When you don't have salsa or raw marinara to top a little Green Goddess will work just fine =)

Hope you're all enjoying the season's bounty! If you have any creative ways to use the zucchini harvest please send them my way =) Until next time, enjoy your days.

Renewable energy in the flesh.

2010-07-21T10:05:00.000-04:00

Over the 4th of July we joined my parents for a couple days and a night at their campsite in MI's thumb. We packed the Jeep with our cooler (of water, fruit, some raw goodies, pumpkin muffins, and a quinoa and kale salad), our bikes, and our tent. We repaired one of our tent poles, blew up our Thermarests and set up our camp for the night. I love sleeping in our tent, even when you need to use an arm for a pillow =)

Enjoying the great weather outside and a beautiful Sleeper State Park

My favorite tree on the campsite, see him? it's a wee little pine.

My Dad had spotted some wind turbines in the distance so we went to investigate and it turns out that this wind farm is where some of our GreenCurrents power comes from to our home! How exciting to stumble upon this.

The fields all around were full of beets, I really wanted to eat some greens, but no doubt they were probably sprayed with something toxic and GMO :/ Also I would not steal from a farmer's field. I think these fields are sugar beets (that's how we make white sugar here in MI ) It was gorgeous anyway to see huge fields of greens.

Here's a short video I took, you can hear how windy it is too. The turbines are really kind of meditative to watch. There are 30 at this farm.

Driving around we found this too. A solar project at the school.

Here is the turbine at the school, this one was more noisy than the big ones and made of different materials.

and here is the little turbine and solar array powering the superintendent's house, pretty cool.

on to some food shall we?

We've been loving salads from our garden. This is our romaine cos, beans, and basil, and FM onion, Bubbie's pickles, and raw olives. The dressing ( I don't think is on in the pic) is Cumin-Cinnamon Vinaigrette from ED&BV.

Reading HeatherEatsAlmondButter I wanted to try the pesto sauce she was raving about too. The recipe is here on MakingFoodandOtherStuff. I didn't have parsley, but I did have some frozen chive discs and subbed one of those in along with our garden basil. I also added nooch and no jalapeno (I did have one, just forgot ;) and no garlic. I wasn't feelin the garlic and our potatoes that we were having too had a lot of garlic in them. The sauce was super yummy and creamy from the soaked pine nuts, we loved it! We used our last bag of kelp noodles (must remember to nose around some new to me groceries soon), a cucumber from the garden that I sliced super thin on the mandoline, and fresh beans snapped from the garden too, oh and a cute little pimento pepper from the FM as our noodles for the sauce.

I'll leave you with this funny quote from a dairy bottle (it was being used as a flower vase) I saw at Oryana this past weekend.