Stuff Raw Foodists Like #6: Brainstorming Outlets for Your Newfound Energy

I started going to the gym a few months ago, did my first 3k since college, and I am back to playing badminton! I have also gone on whole day training seminars and still feel I can go on even when my companions feel like going home.

I love the feeling of boundless energy, even when the day is about to end!

And since I don't have household help, I love that I still have energy to do all my chores when I get back home.

I get super motivated at the gym now because of the comments of the gym instructors - that I can push myself harder, "malakas ka kasi eh.", "after the first rep go heavier, then after that rep go heavier." Sometimes I look at the weight I'm being asked to lift, and in my head I'm going, "I can't lift this much!" but I do it anyway and surprise myself. Of course if you are just starting with weights, don't copy me. Please know that I started weights since I discovered I had scoliosis, which was in my preteens. Thing is, I have plateaued in college and never lifted anything heavier than what I was doing back then until now. Eating raw, living food is making such a huge difference in my energy levels.

How has it worked in yours?

Stuff Raw Foodists Like #6: Brainstorming Outlets for Your Newfound Energy

Stuff Raw Foodists Like #5: Bye-bye dry, bloodshot eyes!

Three years ago, I was living in the States, studying and working at the same time. I lived on convenience vegetarian food (lots of soy and microwaving involved) and white bread. Once in a while I'd cook, but on lazy days, I would just opt for vegan bacon, vegan hotdogs, vegan ice cream, vegan burritos - everything junk vegan you could think of!

I thought I was healthy. I was a regular exerciser, I took vitamins. I belonged to a badminton club, and I wanted to be active in the outdoorsy community in Seattle.

One thing I did notice was that I would usually come home from work/school with bloodshot eyes. Even though I used artificial tears (P300 for a bottle that lasts a month) to keep my eyes lubricated (I was told that my eyes were going to be perenially dry after LASIK), it wasn't enough to keep the blood vessels in my eyes from reddening by four pm. I even got an anonymous text from someone who accused me of taking drugs!  

When I came back to the Philippines, I started preparing home-cooked vegetarian food more and more. I stopped taking "fake" food, and the redness stopped. My eyes were still dry though.

This all changed when I started eating fresh, raw, organic fruits and vegetables. Aside from the dryness in my eyes disappearing, I was considerably less thirsty. Best of all, my insomnia** disappeared. Amazing!

I still have a teeny bottle of artificial tears in my kikay kit just in case, but so far, I haven't had any reason to use it except for the two months it took to get used to the smog in Manila. Those days, I used the artificial tears thrice a day! 

What is in raw, organic fruits and vegetables that helped? The lutein and zeaxanthin that are found in a variety of vegetables!

Lutein is a naturally occuring substance in the retina of your eyes. Prolonged intake of preserved foods such as the convenience vegan foods I "enjoyed" abroad, and not eating enough fresh vegetables, prevented me from replenishing the lutein my eyes badly needed. The salt from chips, french fries, and the typical Filipino diet exacerbated my dry eyes. 

Zeaxanthin is also found in our retinas, but they are found in a variety of vegetables and fruit as well. 

Thanks to naturally-produced lutein and zeaxanthin in raw fruits and veggies, and lessened artificial salt intake, I am nearing my first anniversary without dry eyes! All these without supplements too!

*I am not a doctor. I am not a food nutritionist. I don't claim to have all the answers to everyone's ailments. I simply have found raw foods to be helpful to me in improving my health and well-being. If you do try raw foods, consult a doctor and/or nutritionist. 

**Some raw foodists find that they have so much energy after adopting a raw food lifestyle, they don't need much sleep anymore. I believe that this is different from insomnia. Insomnia sufferers want to sleep, but can't, even if they want to. As a result, they are irritable the following morning, and tend to overeat, since their bodies tell them they need to compensate for the lack of rest. Raw foodists who have an abundance of energy are able to survive on less hours of sleep and still perform well, and are less prone to overeat. Not all raw foodists have completely defeated insomnia though! Not everything raw is healthy, just like not everything vegan/vegetarian is healthy. But that is a different post altogether :D

Stuff Raw Foodists Like #5: Bye-bye dry, bloodshot eyes!

Aloe Vera!

Aloe vera is a wonderful ingredient added to organic shampoos! Some non-organic shampoos claim they have it in their ingredients too.

I had a classmate from Tacoma who kept a pot of aloe vera in her house to apply to insect bites and cuts and swore by it!

And guess, what? You know what's coming, right?

You got it!

Some raw foodists love to eat aloe vera too! (As you can see by the cuts we've made!)

I got my pot a while back. Wish I took a picture then, because you'd see how emaciated it looked. And compare it with how it looks now-so much healthier! I fed it some coffee grinds from the nearest hip coffee house*... and a few weeks later, voila! The leaves turned all succulent!

These are perfect for putting in smoothies!

I use a sharp knife to separate the green outer covering from its slimy insides and then scrape the insides off into a bowl or my blender and blend it with some leafy greens and fruit. (Although it's better to use the bowl first to make sure no green prickly parts get included in the smoothie mix!)


*Sosyal ng aloe vera ko, di ba? Even I don't drink signature coffee or any kind of coffee for that matter, but my plants and the worms in my garden do. By the way, I'm not judging you for drinking overpriced coffee. I don't even judge you for drinking coffee, period. I drank it all the time in college. I also lived in Seattle, where people really loved coffee for the coffee, and not so much for the coffee house experience. So my first two years there, I drank it. But I don't drink it anymore because it's bad for my throat. Your throat is probably much healthier than mine. And I'm pretty sure you find my other purchases outrageous too. So stop getting all defensive! :P



When you visit a coffee house, just ask for the grinds - these are just discards the coffee house will gladly give away for free. I guess if you're not a coffee drinker like me you can always buy coffee or cookies for others so that they don't brand you as that crazy lady who eats only raw organic veggies and comes to our coffee house to mooch our coffee grinds!

Aloe Vera!

Stuff Raw Foodists Like #4: Raw Food Books on Sale!

Can you believe this? Living Cuisine for only P200?!!! Thanks so much to Jen the Nursing Mom for the tip! I got this at SM MOA Booksale. Yay yay yay!

Jen actually has her own copy of Living Cuisine and lent it to me last year. I was but a teeny tot in my raw food journey (I don't wanna say babe kasi baka may umangal! Haha!) and this book, along with Victoria Boutenko's 12 Steps to Raw Foods , was very helpful. While 12 Steps helps one overcome an addiction to cooked foods  and provides tips in sticking to the raw food frame of mind with lots of the author's own research in the chemistry of foods, cooked and non-cooked, Living Cuisine details the nutrition info of many common raw foods. Anyone wanting to know where raw foodists get their protein will get more of their question answered here. The book also suggests which items are essentials for the raw food kitchen. I planned my kitchen equipment acquisition program (naks) around her suggestions, as well as the suggestions from Ani's Raw Food Kitchen.  I haven't gotten everything I want yet, but I have what I need. I use my Vita-Mix to get most food processing done, but maybe one of these days, I'll get a food processor. And a ceramic knife. We'll see. Wink.

There are many recipes in Living Cuisine, although I haven't tried most of them yet. I did try a dehydrated cracker recipe and it was very easy to make. It used soaked sesame seeds and garlic. It can be very dry, so you might want to add oils and/or water. The original recipe called for lots of spices, which I don't like, so I did the recipe without, and it turned out fine.



Using a rubber spatula to spread the batter evenly...

...like so.

Here is my asymmetric cracker batter on the non-stick Paraflex sheet.

Okie dokie! See you in a little bit! (Or shall I say, 12-20 hours?)

Here is the semi-dry cracker, peeled off the non-stick sheet, turned over, and dehydrated on a naked tray for a few more hours.

Ta-dah!

Yummy crackers to share to my raw and non-raw foodist friends! These were very good on their own. Some might want to make garlic aoili nut cheese dip or salsa, or just plain olive oil.

I made two trays: One tray with thin crackers, and one tray with thicker crackers. The thicker crackers can pass for bread! No lie!

Stuff Raw Foodists Like #4: Raw Food Books on Sale!

Stuff Raw Foodists Like #3: Sprouted Quinoa

Where do you get your protein?

Protein is everywhere!

The raw foodist's advantage is that raw fruits, vegetables and nuts come packed with their own proteins in the form of enzymes. Enzymes are a protein that aid the digestion of the food it is part of.

That said, there are some raw foods that are more abundant in protein than others. One of them is quinoa. (KEEN-wa). According to Ian Merber and Vicki Edgson, authors of The Food Doctor, quinoa is the perfect vegetable protein. It also contains calcium, iron, magnesium, phosphorus, potassium and vitamin B3. It is easy to digest, is gluten-free, contains more calcium than milk, stimulates milk flow in breastfeeding, and its lysine content is a potent antiviral agent.  

I first tried quinoa in the form of quinoa pasta when I discovered that I had an intolerance to gluten. I got my quinoa pasta from the health food store. The taste was excellent! Way better than rice pasta, in my humble opinion.

Now that I have gone high raw, I buy quinoa in its raw, unprocessed form. These are grains you can find in the grain section of your health food store.

To prepare them, you need to wash them well, then soak them in pure water (in my case, I just use mineral water) overnight in a covered container. The following day, I throw out the rinse water, then I check for tails. If I see those, I rinse them again and they are ready to eat! It is one of the easiest raw foods to sprout!

Look for the tails! Can you see them?

Sprouted quinoa (KEEN-wa) is a really yummy way to enjoy proteins! Some sprouts can be really stinky, but  sprouted quinoa has a mild, sweet smell. It can be mixed with almost veggie.

Here's Aileen de Guzman who taught me how to use the sprouted quinoa in a lovely salad.

What are your favorite quinoa recipes?

Stuff Raw Foodists Like #3: Sprouted Quinoa

Stuff Raw Foodies Like #2: Raw Chocolate

For the longest time, I couldn't eat regular chocolate because I would get laryngitis in winter (almost always February-ask my former coworkers in the Pacific Northwest!) or in August when it rains in Manila. Thank you to Dr. Emmanual Ibay of Makati Med for helping me figure that out that I had to change my lifestyle, including cutting out chocolate  (as well as a host of other harmful food) out of my diet. Half a decade laryngitis-free! Yay!

Since starting raw, I've been reintroducing small doses of raw cacao and toasted carob (tastes a little bit like chocolate) into my rotation (very difficult to find raw carob in the Philippines! Kontactr me if you know someone who supplies this locally!). So far so good! I listen to my body though. It knows when too much is too much.

It is interesting to note that there is a group of raw foodists that claim it is a super food, while some other raw foodists say they can do without it, or take only a little.

Here it is as a sauce with nuts and goji berries*.

What are your favorite raw chocolate desserts?

*Have you tried goji berries? These taste fine in a trail mix, but alone? Eeek. They need some getting used to.

They are considered a super food and the Chinese in Manila use it a lot in traditional Chinese medicine. I am glad my dessert is my medicine.How many fad diets can say that about their dessert?

Stuff Raw Foodies Like #2: Raw Chocolate

A Young Vermicomposter's Photo Album

I love composting! I used to save my biodegrable garbage in containers (but now I just use the garbage can - I don't need to segregate garbage in my kitchen anymore because practically all of my kitchen refuse is biodegradable). My preferred method of composting is direct soil incorporation, but now, instead of digging each time, I throw everything in a compost pit that is all soil. (There is a side story about that too, but I don't want to stray too far from this topic which is...)

Now that school's out, your kids age 9 and up might want to consider it as a summer activity! Who knows? It might grow into a lifelong passon :D Hehe! Wouldn't that be something?

With her family's permission, I am sharing the photos and captions (provided by her dad-with minimal editing!) of this young vermicomposter's project last year.  For the family's privacy,  she will be referred to as MYC - Ms. Young Composter.

Enjoy reading!

First you get TWO bins.
The more opaque the bins the better it is for the in-the-bin community.
(We got lesser opaque bins to see the side and witness how trash is 'transformed' to soil.)

Anyways, to rectify this,
we will wrap manila paper around the bins so they will have their privacy.

Using a drill, put holes around the bin (of the one bin only).

Drill holes on the side-top portion (6 per length, 4 per width)
Drill holes on the cover (14 holes)
Drill holes on the bottom (5 holes).

Holes are for air circulation as well as water to seep through.

Others usually do not do this anymore.
But we covered the holes with mosquito net & sealed it with tape.
Note that this is an indoor bin.
Mahirap ng may makalusot.
hehehe :-)

On the second bin,
put support before putting the other bin on top.
We do this to create space for air circulation.

Now to put the housing bin on top. :-)

 Voila!

  

Then the household trash.
First, create the bedding -- ideal bedding are cut up paper, carton, etc.
Spread it evenly.

Then moisten the paper based bedding.

Then add the kitchen, garden trash.

Mental note.
For next cycle, get gloves for Miss Young Composter
So that it is easier for her to handle trash!!

Plastic gloves!! Hahaha! MYC na MYC!

Spread the garden and kitchen trash evenly.

"Now that is 1 layer of paper trash + kitchen/garden trash.
Now, do the same procedure 3 times."

Add paper trash again, moisten the paper, then add the layer of kitchen/garden trash...
and so on.

Let it SIT for 1 to 2 weeks
before adding 1 kilo worm. :-)

Why sit for 1 or 2 weeks?
To let the decomposition happen.

Hmm.
But after 1 week, I think it is OK already to add the new house mates. :-)

Welcome home, ANCs! :-)

(ANCs stand for African Night Crawlers) 

After 1 Week,
looks like the new house is ready. :-)

Game?!

Now to create space on the side.

Then to start transferring the ANC to their new 'house'

it's MYC's  turn ...

... to carefully transfer them ANCs

Sige...

... ilipat mo na lahat.

Meet your new pets.
You want to name them?

Hmmm.
Parang mahirap ata pangalanan lahat.
I will call you, NightCrawler One!

Nakakapawis pero tapos na rin! 

Bye guys!

Kids ages 9-99! Want to make this your summer project?

A Young Vermicomposter's Photo Album