{"id":131,"date":"2009-07-17T14:19:15","date_gmt":"2009-07-17T14:19:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/yourcharmedlife\/2009\/07\/feeling-fab-on-raw-food.html"},"modified":"2009-07-17T14:19:15","modified_gmt":"2009-07-17T14:19:15","slug":"feeling-fab-on-raw-food","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/yourcharmedlife\/2009\/07\/feeling-fab-on-raw-food.html","title":{"rendered":"Feeling Fab on Raw Food"},"content":{"rendered":"

The way the charmed nature of my life is showing itself most today is in how amazing I feel. I tweeted yesterday (www.twitter.com\/charmedlifelady) that I was feeling so good and found myself adding: “Being raw is better than being twenty.” It’s true: I’m not sure I ever felt as energized, steady, and at peace as I do right now. In addition to a major leap in physical vitality, it’s as if my default setting has been altered and happy is the new neutral. The only thing I’m doing differently from a few months ago is my spring\/summer re-commitment to a high-raw diet.\u00a0<\/p>\n


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Here’s what I’m doing, in case you’d like to know, and I’ll also give you some books and websites as resources if you’d like to feel better than twenty, too.<\/div>\n

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For starters, I’m eating about 95% raw. I pull that percentage out of a hat. I know that in the past six weeks I’ve had two cooked meals (at Chinese restaurants where I went with people who really wanted to go to Chinese restaurants), and some steamed veggies along with a raw meal three or four times, and at Vegetarian Summerfest last week I had a gluten-free muffin one morning when fruit was just wasn’t filling me up, and a piece of wedding cake because, gosh, friends were getting married. Otherwise, I’ve been all raw. I don’t know “how raw” a person has to be to feel this renewed and rejuvenated; my hunch is: any raw is good, and the more the better.<\/div>\n

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So, what do I eat? Most mornings I start with Natalia Rose’s green lemonade (the recipe is in the archives of this blog: 3\/16\/09) and after the gym I have breakfast — either fruit alone (maybe a mango and a banana), or fruit (sliced peaches or nectarines usually) with almond or Brazil nut milk, or a “cream” I make by blending the nut milk with a ripe bananas. I’ve been known to have a raw walnut brownie for breakfast, too.\u00a0<\/div>\n

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Midday, if I’m by myself, I usually make a huge salad. HUGE. (That’s for emphasis.) I use arugula or romaine or mesclun greens, tomato, maybe some raw sauerkraut or kim-chee, a sprinkle of Parma! (a commercial raw parmesan substitute made from ground walnuts and nutritional yeast), and a nut-based ranch dressing. (I only use extracted oils if I’m having salad at a restaurant or if a tablespoon or two of olive oil is called for in a recipe.)<\/div>\n

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If Monica, my assistant, is working, I make lunch for the two of us in the blender, either a raw soup (greens-based or tomato-based, either light and fat-free, or creamy with the addition of an avocado) and some raw flax crackers (you can make them with a dehydrator or buy them at a natural food store); or a green smoothie — bananas, frozen berries, Raw Power supplement powder, and whatever mild greens are on hand — romaine, kale, spinach — and a little agave nectar if it needs to be sweeter.<\/div>\n

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When I eat cooked food, I’m pretty tied to three meals a day, but with raw I eat when I’m hungry and usually have something in the afternoon — a piece or fruit, a bottle of Kombucha (a fermented green tea beverage, good for digestion), a raw candy bar, another glass of vegetable juice, whatever feels right and is available.<\/div>\n

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Dinner is either simple, simple, simple, i.e., another big salad with maybe some hemp seeds (42% protein) and flax crackers, or something more creative. Last night I made William and myself raw fettucine (you make the “noodles” from zucchini with a vegetable peeler) with a tasty, homemade, uncooked marinara sauce, salad, and steamed asparagus (there’s some of the 5%). After dinner we went out for a walk and when we came back, I had raw ice cream (Organic Nectars is the brand name) and it was delish.<\/div>\n

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Going out is easy: I order salad. I keep raw crackers and maybe a raw candy bar in my bag. And for a real treat, we go to Caravan of Dreams or Pure Food and Wine or some other raw or high-raw vegan restaurant where there’s a whole menu to choose from.<\/div>\n

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Do I take supplements? Only a couple: B-12 (which I’d take anyway as a vegan; B-12 isn’t found reliably in plant foods), and vitamin D (which I’d take no matter what I ate, since I live in the North and use sunblock; there’s no way I can make enough vitamin D the natural way, from sun exposure on my skin). I sometimes also take a vegan EFA\/DHA capsule, but I’m not as religious about that as the B-12 and D.<\/div>\n

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Here are some resources if you’d like them:<\/div>\n

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COOK(LESS) BOOKS:<\/div>\n

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Raw Food Made Easy for 1 or 2 People, <\/span>by Jennifer Cornbleet. (I use this book every day. It’s the source of the walnut brownies, the marinara sauce, the ranch dressing…)<\/div>\n

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The Raw Food Detox Diet<\/span>, by Natalia Rose. (A great starter: she’s not vegetarian and I think she’s overly enthusiastic about colonics, but she gave me Green Lemonade and introduced me to Lara bars, so I’ve got to love the woman.)<\/div>\n

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The Raw Revolution Diet<\/span>, by Cherie Soria, Brenda Davis, MS, RD, and Vesanto Mellina, RD. (Gourmet recipes from the co-founder of the Living Light Culinary Institute, with solid nutritional info from top-notch dieticians.)\u00a0<\/div>\n

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There is a wealth on info on the web as well:<\/div>\n

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www.lovingraw.com (Phil McCluskey lost 200 pounds on raw — you may have seen him on The Doctors<\/span>; if not, the clip is on his site)<\/span><\/div>\n

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www.giveittomeraw.com (social networking for raw enthusiasts)<\/div>\n

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www.rawspirit.com (60s-love-in-style raw celebrations around the country — I’ll be speaking at the one in the DC area August 29)<\/div>\n

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www.rawfoodchef.com\/events\/rawFoodsExpo.html (the Expo at Living Light, coming in August in Fort Bragg, CA — I’ll be there)<\/div>\n

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www.rawfoodinfo.com (raw food chef and educator Rhio tells all)<\/div>\n

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www.rawfamily.com (Victoria Boutenko, who practically ‘invented’ raw smoothies tells her family’s healing story)<\/div>\n

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Now, what do I expect you to do with all this? Whatever you like, even if that’s nothing. Although I would certainly love it if the whole world turned vegan since that would alleviate so much suffering of animals, I have no axe to grind about anybody becoming raw. I can’t even promise that I’ll do this forever. I just know that today I don’t want to do anything else, and if you felt how I felt, I’ll bet you’d want it too.<\/div>\n

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Apologies once again for my inability to post pictures or provide links. Evidently when they “fixed” my computer, they installed outdated browsers. I have an appointment at the Apple store for Sunday — the Apple store on Staten Island because nobody else has a slot available. I love you guys a lot to go all the way to Staten Island. — Victoria<\/span><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The way the charmed nature of my life is showing itself most today is in how amazing I feel. 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