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.

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.

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…

I love sweet!

But after a short conversation with some friends at a vegan dine-out, it became apparent that my palate has been desensitized.

We were eating a yummy bean pudding desert when I happily remarked that it wasn’t so sweet. They laughed as they had just said to each other that it was too sweet, though I didn’t hear them in the moment. They have been vegan for many years, and Sean began to speak about how much pleasure he’d get from the natural sweetness of eating an apple. I don’t think I’m there yet, but it gave me pause.

In any case, sweeteners fascinate me. I used to only know about white sugar, brown sugar and honey. Now, my world has exploded. Madhava agave nectar is a favorite. Dates are divine. Carob molasses was a treasure to find.

I just ran across this article called “Essential Sugars” which lucidly educated me on the chemical nature of sugars, what they do to the body, and how some are actually essential and highly beneficial.

Have you ever thought to make your own chocolate? A friend, Kelly, recently posted something about her appreciation for chocolate, and that lead to me to say:

Chocolate definitely deserves more general praise! I just learned how to make my own variety from the basic ingredients and am delighted

She wanted to know if it was difficult. I said:

Well, I don’t start with the cacao nibs, but I do start with a big block of callebaut unsweetened dark chocolate, which is inedible, then I scrape off what I want, add some honey and cinnamon, and voila!, semi-home-made chocolate to my tastes

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