Eternal Cheesecake

Have you ever thought, “Global warming? What can I do? Pfft. Nothing.” (mind gives up & moves on)

Yeah, me too. At least until what I discovered from my own research these past 2.5 years…

…that many of my meals were “dirty”, energy production-wise. They required literally thousands of gallons of water, created pollutants, and reinforced a system that was ego created. I was eating unconscious food, unconsciously, selfishly decimating the earth with my knife & fork because I had all these nutritional ideas that I wouldn’t challenge.

When I began to look at the details, I was momentarily scared because I didn’t know what to eat in place of this broken thing. Yet I found alternatives that were:

1. tastier
2. gave me more energy
3. cheaper(!)
4. more nutrient dense
5. and slashed my carbon foot print

It was a win-win-win-win situation. It even helped my meditations! As this new food palette was lighter on my body, it healed, and my head became sharper and more naturally alert.

Thus my passion and why I’m sharing this with you. Living lighter on the planet is easy, once you know how.

There’s an organization that was founded by the son of the Baskin-Robbins ice cream empire called EarthSave. The Vancouver EarthSave was responsible for gently helping me to discover this whole new spectrum of food choices, and a big part of my “awakening to food”. There’s many EarthSave chapters all over the place. I suggest that you call them up and tap their minds–they’ll make it easy and the rewards are returned at every meal with increasing joy.

In Vancouver, there’s this neat event coming up called the Taste of Health which has a lot to see, sample, and play with in a light, positive way, focusing more on what is good, rather than what isn’t. Check it out. I’ll see you there this year, although I won’t be volunteering as before. Invite your friends, too.

Coo-coo for Coconuts!

What would be your reaction if you were challenged to come up with a coconut-themed recipe and you couldn’t crib someone else? Now self-constrain it further by desiring to keep it raw and it begins to get interesting.

You may be thinking, that’s… unusual. Well, it would be if it wasn’t part of a contest sponsored by one of my new favorite produce shops called The Coconut Hut Grocery.

For years, I’ve been looking for organic young Thai coconuts and The Coconut Hut has them! I was thrilled when I discovered that they were as passionate as I was! To help understand this obsession, the young Thai coconuts that you can buy in the store (even if you shop at smaller markets), the ones that look like a cylinder shaped into a cone, are supposedly dipped in a sulphate along with a fungicide. The sulphate is used to prevent them from browning and the fungicide is a known probable carcinogen. No thanks, do not want. I’d like to enjoy the sweet coconut water knowing that it hasn’t been poisoned.

On the other hand, the Young Thai coconuts from the Coconut Hut Grocery have the outer cone already stripped away and just the inner pod exposed. It looks like a softball. But the best part is that they’re tangibly fresh! I was driving home the other week after buying a stash and my car actually filled up with the sweet smell of live coconuts! That’s never happened with the other conventional ones. And drinking them? So tasty!

As for the coconut recipe contest that the Coconut Hut Grocery was putting on, I thought that it could work, or it may not, but with raw food, things tend to err on the “work” side of the equation, a huge bonus for a raw newbie like me.

So here’s my first-ever public recipe for one of my food creations. I’ve been craving a banana cream pie, and so I thought, why not coconut-ize it? In this concoction, the fat of the coconut meat gives the cream and the filling some body, and the fibrousness of shredded coconut gives the crust a density. I added some coconut oil to give the filling a bit more of a roundness. All in all, this is quite the treat.

Ingredients

The Coco-Bana Creme Pie has three, count ‘em, three layers: the whipped cream topping, the creamy banana filling, and the “crust.” That’s in quotes because it’s not really crusty, but rather crust-like. We’d have to work in an extra dehydration step to give the crust a crunchy, crispy bite. Maybe that will be in the 2.0 version of this recipe….

This will create one personal-sized 5″ pie, which is enough for two people, assuming you want to share it. For a 9″ pie, this recipe will need to be tripled.

Whipped Cream

½ of one medium young Thai coconut’s “meat”
½ small, ripe banana
2 tblsp maple syrup, raw agave nectar, or powdered sugar (powdered sugar will make it thicker and hold its shape better)
¼ tsp vanilla
flax gel: ½ tblsp ground flax seeds soaked in 1 ½ tblsp water for 4 hours

Filling

½ of one medium young Thai coconut’s “meat”
1 tblsp coconut oil
3 ½ small, ripe bananas
5 soaked Medjool dates

Crust

1/8 cup shredded coconut
1/8 cup almonds, soaked for 8-12 hours
1/8 cup cashews
5 soaked Medjool dates
flax gel: 1 tblsp ground flax seeds soaked in 3 tblsp water for 4 hours

Instructions

This is so easy to put together. You’re basically blending each part separately and then bringing it all together in the end.

Whipped Cream

Puncture your Young Thai coconut, drain the coconut water and have a refreshing drink. (No, the water’s not needed but don’t throw it away!) Scrape out the coconut flesh, the “meat”, and put half in a bowl with the small, ripe banana; the remaining half will be used with the filling. Add your sweetner of choice, vanilla, flax gel, and then blend, blend, blend until it becomes light and fluffy. My hand blender makes this quick, but you can use a food processor. Chill in the fridge.

Filling

Blend all the ingredients, the remaining half of the coconut meat, coconut oil, the bananas, and dates, with a hand blender or food processor until it’s creamy. If you’re not licking the bowl, then adjust the sweetness with more dates, but it should be fine. Chill in the fridge.

Crust

Again, blend all the ingredients, the shredded coconut, almonds, cashews, dates, and flax gel with a hand blender until it’s sticky. The cashews will give it a creamy richness, the shredded coconut will help give it form, and the flax gel will bind it together. Press into a small 5″ pie tin. Chill in the fridge.

1 + 1 + 1 = π

When the crust is firm, add the filling and top with the whipped cream. Viola! Pie!

More photos coming….

When was the last time you felt like a whole new world was opening up in front of you? Hmm?

The last time was six years ago when I gulped and went to Mexico to be with my Mexican girlfriend for a year not knowing what I was getting myself into. Before that was learning to meditate 13 years ago. Right around then, I also was introduced to salsa dancing, which excited me because of my comparatively passionless family. And then before that was when I learned the precise mathematical formula to make a 3-D cube appear on my computer screen. That one little formula was the seed for my next business, a computer animation programed called Animasia 3-D.

I remember when I was a monk in training and there was this handsome guy from Switzerland who always raved about how good his homeland’s food was and how much he missed it and how he’d be sneaking bites of Lindt chocolate every day and I how much of an addict I thought he was. I never understood that. But now I do. I’m realizing that I’m having another one of these openings where possibilities seem limitless and I get a prickly excitement on my skin when my mind edges toward… food!

Raw food in particular, which I’m finding I can make some intensely tasty foods in ways that I never thought about before. I get so excited planning my next meal. This is significant. Why? Because growing up on TV Dinners created a condition in my mind where I wished there was an equivalent to rabbit pellets (“Human Pellet Food”) that you could just pop into your mouth to get the ordeal over with. Food was a chore, not a delight.

My new favorite kitchen gadget is my $10 dehydrator that I bought off Craigslist. I never realized that 85% of fruits and vegetables are water and if you dehydrate them, their true taste comes out in bold letters upon your tongue. Even better is that the nutrients aren’t destroyed when the heat is kept below 118°F. The food is still alive even though it’s taste and texture have been transformed into something new.

Experiment #1: blueberry bliss

My first recipe out of my dehydrator came from a YouTube video of this strange girl demonstrating how to make raw blueberry pancakes in her dehydrator. When I tried it, I couldn’t believe how every bite was exquisite–the flavors were so intense, and as a bonus, I got energy from it, unlike the up/down energy spike from a traditional pancake.

From an engineering perspective, what was more thrilling to me was that the ingredients and the process were simple to understand. It all just made sense. Nothing about the food’s nutritional profile was being destroyed, only preserved. The geek in me loved that.

Apple pie eureka!

Lately, I’ve been having some smashing successes in the kitchen. The first was figuring out on my own how to make raw apple pie. The trick was to dehydrate two sliced apples, sprinkled generously with cinnamon, allspice and nutmeg. This reduces the apples, giving them a nice solid bite, and also brings out their natural sweetness too. Then blending them up slightly with a banana to create the filling and adding that to a crust of mashed dates with shredded coconut was all that was left. To firm it up, I chilled it to make it stand at attention, and man oh man, was it bright and tasty. I thought of photographing it, but… uh… it didn’t last that long. (I didn’t mind that it didn’t have a flaky crust. That wasn’t my goal. I could always bake one with vegan butter some other time.)

Edible air

The next hit was kale chips. These were simplicity itself to make and yet the payoff was big fun. I just tossed in some ripped-up bits of kale into my $10 dehydrator, sprinkled in some salt, pepper, and garlic powder. Several hours later, I had a killer treat. Imagine that you are eating air that had magically become crispy, and at the same time taste like the thinnest, lightest potato chips you’ve ever had, except for being exceptionally nutrient dense. Incredible. And to think I’d have to pay a premium for something so trivial to make.

Best transformation of a watermelon, ever

The last creation I have to mention is not raw, but it is unique. Google could only find a few mentions of it, which says something. Awhile back, I read that eating nothing but watermelon for one day is an excellent natural cleanser for the kidneys. So I tried it. But after trying to chow through just a quarter of a watermelon, I thought I would never finish my formidable green and pink opponent before me in one day. So I juiced ‘er, and thought to save the pulp. Yet for the next few months, every time I’d open the freezer door, I’d see that pulp and think, “what the bleep am I gonna do with watermelon pulp?” And then I’d close the door and forget about it.

But now with berry season upon us, and me needing more freezer space, I pulled it out and plopped the pink ice cube into a nearby pot and slowly started to simmer it. Many hours later, I had this bright red, thick, sweet-but-not-cloyingly decadent goo. This time I took a photo (yay, me!), but gobbled it up while trying to think of where it fit on the sweet/sticky spectrum and what kinds of neat things I could do with it. Maybe use it as a unique vegan cupcake frosting? I knew I’d have to try this watermelon reduction (or watermelon molasses) again, as it was simple and yet so rewarding.

What’s next?

As you can tell, I’m super fired up about experimenting with food, especially raw, finding how tasty it is, and how much energy it gives me. There’s more discoveries I could share, but when was the last time you felt like a whole new world was opening up for you?

This food researcher is funny! I loved his first story on how to magnetize a baby. And I learned oodles, like why I’ve felt chemical cravings for certain foods, like chocolate and cheese on my vegan diet.

This is a must see! The time just flies by with this guy. Watch it now with a loved one. Go on! … How do his conclusions contradict or flow with your thinking?

My favorite grocery store, Capers in Kitsilano, recently did something that made me take notice: they posted big signs that listed the nutrient density of various foods. So for example, you could see what foods would give you the most powerhouse bang for the buck. The amazing thing is that those foods don’t have the highest profit margins. How odd.

Turns out they took the list from one of my more respected health people, Dr. Fuhrman. You can find that list on this page.

A few things are interesting to me about what’s on it. First is that kale is at the absolute top in terms of nutrients. It ranks at 1,000 out of 1,000 points. This doesn’t surprise me as I’ve intuitively felt to include kale in my daily diet as the main greens in my salads; I just feel good eating them.

The other thing is that the list doesn’t care about arbitrary distinctions like veganism or not–just the nutrient scores. So I can know that eggs are at 27 on a scale of 1,000 points. I was surprised that nuts and beans scored relatively low, like walnuts at 34 out of 1,000. But that’s still double than Swiss Cheese at 15.

The only thing that I’m curious about is what score hemp hearts are because they’re so packed with proteins, essential fatty acids, carbs and fiber.

Well, check out Dr. Fuhrman’s nutrient score list; it’s fascinating!

I’m a bit stunned. I’m just finishing the parasite cleanse part of my Blessed Herbs cleanse and I’m taken aback at just how many parasites were formerly taking up residence inside Chez Moi. Once out, these looked like little grains of rice, but the best part is how much more alive I feel.

I feel gooooood. No… I feel excellent.

Unleash Your Inner Ferrari

Before it was like my body was an okay Datsun, just making it down the road. Now it feels like I have an exotic sports car that is firing on all its cylinders, king of the road.

The interesting thing is that I gradually forgot this feeling from my last cleanse and now it’s back again. It’s like I’m remembering what it felt like to be a kid when I had so much energy. Food doesn’t make me tired; instead it gives me a thrilling boost of energy that radiates from my abdomen.

I’m still not finished with the cleanse, as it has several more organs to clean out, and I can’t wait until I get to the lymph because that’s last. The rest of the body will have been scrubbed, and when the lymph is flowing, my God, it feels good to be alive. Like when someone asks, “How are you?”, my response is invariably, “Fantastic!”

You’re a Bit Strange To Do This

If anyone is thinking, “You’ve done a lot of cleanses. Just how many of these cleanses do you have to do?” Once all of the noticeable physical deposits are gone, then it will be a different story. But for now I have come to see this as an absolute necessity.

The first week of my Blessed Herbs cleanse was to pull out the rubbery plaque lining the insides of the intestines. That it pulled out about 3 feet of the stuff tells me that I’m still not done there. (I kept saying “Oh my God! Oh my God!” as it came out–the instant release of this highly toxic mass from my body was cathartic though painless.) My previous liver flush pushed out about 200-300 pea-sized “stones” that were formerly blocking my liver ducts, blocking them from doing their job. That tells me I’m not done there either.

Well, Why Not?

I want everyone to have this clean, physical high of an experience, though few sincerely desire it, and only when their body is in dire straights.

I get that. I didn’t want to take responsibility for my internal hygiene until I was on my death bed. But, damn… I know that once anyone experiences how the body is supposed to feel, then there will be no doubt that this needs to be done.

Maybe if I say:

• “You will have clear skin” or…
• “You won’t need coffee to pick you up” or…
• “You belly will disappear when the pounds of mucoid plaque leave” or…
• “People will compliment you on how well you look” or…
• “You will feel lighter in your body” or…
• “Your cognitive abilities will be faster, clearer” or…
• “Your brain chemistry will improve and your mood will be brighter”

…would you be interested in cleansing the machinery of your body then???

What simple, everyday foods will actually clear your head? And why?

Well, two that I’ve noticed are garlic and popcorn. Yeah, really. I know, I know! It doesn’t make sense, but bear with me!

With garlic, it has the effect of mopping up the gut, re-balancing the good intestinal bacteria, and making digestion quick, snappy, and happy. I am literally jumping out of bed in the morning because my gut and head feel so good.

With popcorn, the roughage acts like a broom moving out the gut crud. That’s a scientific term, by the way. Any mental fatigue just… goes away and I’m naturally alert and quick.

So what does this have to do with cognition? It turns out that there is a direct relationship between the brain’s ability to function clearly and the functioning of the gut. Slow gut, slow mind. Don’t believe me? Try it out for yourself. However, I’ll let you in on some tips that I’ve learned that will make the difference more pronounced. If you try it half-assed, then you’ll be more likely to go, “pfft!”, and write me off as a flake.

With garlic, you need to eat it as a raw clove two hours after the last meal. Yes, it tastes something fierce, and it burns, but it is a natural antibiotic, and gets into all the crevices that harbor parasites, fungus, and yeast. It helps to rebalance the good bacteria in the gut. Do this once a night for two weeks and notice how dramatically better you feel every morning. (I am basing this off of Mikhail Tombak’s powerful cleansing work in “Can We Live 150 Years?“)

With popcorn, have it 2 – 3 hours after eating so as to give your digestive system some room. I keep my popcorn simple and light and yet super tasty with just melted coconut oil, nutritional yeast (so tasty!), and some Himalayan salt.

Ever get blindsided by a friend or person, blink a couple times, and think, “what the bleep just happened here?!?” after they’re gone?

A once revered friend came over to drop something off, but it turned quickly into Cult Recruitment 101 for an upscale “health drink” multi-level marketing scheme. She wanted me to join, and out came the bully tactics of insults, comparisons, and speculative judgment. It was a rapid one-two-three punch.

Oof!

Wasn’t expecting that from someone I trusted. But since I’ve done a similar type of recruitment when I was in my spiritual cult, I could see the identification with the group, the lack of listening without an agenda, the threat that questioning creates. In my instance, it was an escapism-based agenda. In her instance it’s a greed-based agenda. Doesn’t matter the root cause. Same dirty playbook.

There’s nothing that can be said to someone who’s in a cult. Nothing. Don’t even bother. Why? Because they get too much out of it. They think you’re the loser for not being in it, and the longer they’re in their cult, the the more they absorb clever positions to counter anything that questions The Way Things Are.

Now my job is to not get sucked into the abusive verbal recruitment drive should I meet this friend again and just love her where she’s at. I now admire the few remaining friends who did that for me when I was in my cult and waited me out. It’s a little sticky as she’s a sometimes client of mine, but we’ll see. Wish me luck.

I get requests for this recipe all the time, and with good reason: it’s so creamy, so chocolatety, so comforting, so easy to make, and from plants to boot!

People have come to associate this recipe with me, as if I invented it… no… I’m just the messenger. It’s from the book, “Health By Chocolate“.

Even though after yesterday’s discovery about chocolate not being the “super food” as it was touted to be by marketers, I still have a soft spot for it. I’m even thinking of making a surprise batch for a friend’s birthday present.

What is it? It’s called “Quick Creamy Chocolate Avocado Custard”, or as I’ve been referring to it as my “Chocolate Avocado Mousse”. (Click for the full size view)

My heart sunk…

I started to read that chocolate isn’t a superfood as was claimed to be, by marketers, of course. That it wasn’t healthy. That it is actually a toxin for the liver, a stimulant for the heart.

Bleah.

But I read it all, and took it in, starting with Paul Nison’s post, “Raw Chocolate–Harmful for Your Health“, that goes into details.

Bleah.

Well, I have been going at the chocolate powder added to my daily plant-protein puddings pretty hard lately. Like 3 Tbsp a day. Plus some unsweetened callebaut chocolate that I like to transmute into my own nightly treats, as I’ve blogged previously.

It’s said that chocolate makes it harder for the body to detox, and so what I’m going to do is kick the chocolate, substituting carob instead, and see how I feel, and if my head gets sharper in the meantime.

I also discovered that agave nectar, one of my favorite sweeteners, isn’t what I had thought it to be due to its high fructose content. So I’m going to drop that too. See if I can find some good stevia, not the white stuff which I had been taking before, and also some honey, and play with sweet fruits more.

Maybe this will help me to get “The Thrilling” feeling back…. but damn… chocolate… wonder if I’m addicted to it…