This is one of those recipes where you just raid your fridge and make something. And, in this case, it turned out pretty well. Now, if you don’t have papaya, you can sub mango, but keep in mind that it’ll completely change the character of the sauce, both in texture and flavor.

Serves one

3-4 ears of corn, kernels separated

A handful of broccoli florets

1/2 of a cucumber, diced 

A couple mushrooms, diced (optional)

4-5 medium tomatoes

1/2 of a papaya

Arugula to taste

Combine the first four ingredients in a bowl. Blend the tomatoes and papaya, adding in the arugula slowly. Check every so often to see if it’s too arugula-y for you. When it’s perfect, put that into the bowl and mix well.

Pretty simple, no?

Black sapotes are a close relative of the persimmon. They’re picked hard and are ripe and ready, like persimmons, when they’re very soft. Only use them when they’re super soft! They grow where persimmons do, so you can probably find them fresh in Florida or California, or you can buy them online here when they’re in season.

I would have let you guys see it, except it was gone about two minutes after I pulled it out of the freezer. It. Was. So. Freaking. Good. And the only fat was a little bit of coconut in the crust! So it’s a guilt-free dessert that definitely doesn’t taste guilt-free. What are you waiting for?!

Serves…well, one person, but in reality, however many people you end up sharing with

2 black (chocolate) sapotes

1.5-1.75 pounds of bananas

Young coconut water, as needed

The equivalent of about 1/2 a vanilla bean

.5-.75 pounds of dates

1/2 of a hard coconut (or about 3/4 cup of shredded coconut)

(Note: Find the dish you want to use. Plan all your amounts accordingly.)

Blend the dates and coconut on a low speed until a doughy consistency. Press into a dish and put in the freezer.

Scoop the black sapotes into the blender first, and start to blend on a low-medium setting. Add in the bananas as you blend, making sure not to change the color. Add in coconut water if needed to blend, but you want the mixture to be pretty thick. When you’ve got the right amount and texture, add in the vanilla and blend thoroughly.

When the crust is frozen, pour in the filling and put back in the freezer. It took overnight to completely freeze ours.

Serve frozen and eat quickly! (It melts into goop if you let it sit too long, but that’s alright too - all tastes the same!)

Yes.

Did I have rambutans for breakfast? Yes.

Is a vanilla-chocolate pie in my future? Yes.

Is it my “sweet sixteen”? Yes.

Did I have a small, amateur chorus of middle-aged men sing happy birthday to me this morning? Yep.

Am I getting my license? Nope.

Is anything special happening? Does the zoo count?

Am I spending a part of my birthday on the computer, typing this up? Sadly, yes.

So I should probably get off the ‘puter for once and go enjoy this sunny, warm, gorgeous Hawaii day? I think so.

Have a great day, everyone!

veganinsuburbia:

Seriously, if you haven’t tried doing this before - do it. I get more excited about eating this than I have done any other dessert. Well, other than apple crumble :D

You can mix in berries or mango, or make a date sauce, or put it in a pie…the possibilities are endless!

It’s been said that, on a raw food diet, your emotions are more overwhelming, more present, than on any other kind of diet. I can tell you from experience that this is completely, totally, and entirely true.

It’s a combination of factors. If you’re hungry and/or stressed, and somebody flips you off on the highway, or you come home to a mountain of dirty dishes, you just might end up like this:

But then, some days, you might feel like dancing down the street, singing your felicity to the masses, and grinning like a maniac:

Why? Well, I don’t know if there’s a scientific reason, but my theory is that you aren’t numbing yourself. When all you’re eating are fruits and greens, you have no comfort foods. You’re more in tune with your body and its needs, and so the emotions are closer. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing. If you look at it like that, wouldn’t you want to be thinking and feeling clearly?

They aren’t something to be shoved away; they’re something to be embraced.

This calls for surinam cherries and mulberries, which we have on the property, but I realize that not everyone has access to them. So, although the surinam cherries really make the dish, you can substitute any blend of berries or acidic fruits. Be creative! Let me know how your different concoctions turn out!

Serves about three saucy people

Coconut Crepe:

3-4 coconuts’ worth of young meat

Coconut water, as desired

Berry Sauce:

1 mango

A cup or so of your favorite berries

Blend the coconut meat, slowly adding in the water until you get a nice consistency (not too watery, but thick enough that you get a nice, thickish layer when spreading). Pour the mixture onto dehydrator sheets, making sure to not spread it too thin. Keep in mind that it is going to dehydrate; we want these to be paper-thin when they’re done. Dehydrate at 110 degrees (or thereabouts; you can adjust the time if you’d like to keep it at a lower temperature) until dry, probably about six or seven hours.

Blend the sauce ingredients, but save a small portion of the mango and a few berries to mix into the sauce.

If your crepe turned out right, you should be able to scrape it off the sheet in one piece. Mine didn’t do that, so I decided to fold it on the bottom, like a cake layer. But if you did it right, you should be able to assemble it like a crepe or a samosa-type fold. Use any remaining sauce to drizzle prettily over the top. Garnish with mangoes and berries, if you’re like me, or mint if you’re a better dehydrator-er.

I hate almond butter. I don’t like nuts in general, as they tend to close my throat up and feel too heavy to me. That being said, this is fricking delicious. It’s sweet, yet savory. Exotic. And so good I literally licked the plate when I was done.

Serves two - three

3/4 cup of almond butter

1/2 cup of coconut water

1/2 lemon, juiced

1t-1T ginger

1 clove of garlic OR 5-6 garlic chives

Your favorite kind of raw noodles

Some chopped veggies (green beans, tomatoes, peppers, peas, etc.)

Blend everything together and pour over noodles and chopped veggies. Pretty easy. I used carrot and yellow squash noodles, since we didn’t have any zucchini or cucumbers left, and it turned out fantastic. Kelp noodles would also be good, as they’d soak up the flavor of the sauce.

I mentioned some seaweed soak water that works in this - add two or three tablespoons - in place of nama shoyu (what most raw Pad Thai recipes call for) but it’s not necessary.

You can adjust the coconut water based on how thick you want it to be. As it is, it worked well to coat everything, but was a bit thin. That’s fine by me, since it’s so fatty, but others might prefer it thicker.

So, I’m back in Hawaii. There’s not a lot in season at the moment, but we have craploads of lemongrass, so this awesome soup came into being. It tastes so complex and…well, not raw. And it has no fat. Bring it on, I say!

Serves two as a starter

4 cups of coconut water

1-2T lemongrass shoots

1/4 cup of your favorite seaweed

4-5 Keffir lime leaves (or a bit of lime juice)

1t-1T ginger (optional)

1/2 lemon, juiced

2T cilantro

Two or three cups of your favorite chopped veggies

Put the seaweed in half a cup of water and soak for about fifteen to twenty minutes. Then, blend a cup of coconut water with the lemongrass, lime leaves, ginger, and lemon juice. Strain that mixture and blend with the remaining coconut water and cilantro. Mix in the veggies, and you’re done!

For the veggies, I used shredded carrot, Chinese cabbage, diced zucchini, Bell pepper, and some mushrooms, but you can use whatever turns you on. The broth is the important part.

This recipe was borne out of part of an apple pie recipe I made recently. It is so good and so like conventional applesauce it’s crazy. And it’s just two (or three) ingredients!

Makes a sizable portion for one

4 apples, chopped into large-ish pieces

10-15 dates

Cinnamon to taste (optional)

Blend until applesauce-y consistency. Seriously, it’s that easy.

For those of you who are unaware, tahini is a sesame seed paste most commonly used in its roasted form to make hummus. In its raw form, it’s milder, and is used for everything from salad dressings to raw mayonnaise and back. It’s generally praised for its high nutritional content and, well, deliciousness. But what’s really going on here?

First, the good stuff. Tahini has high amounts of multiple B vitamins (1, 2, 3, 5, and 15). These are important because they promote healthy cells, speed metabolism, help out your immune system, and generally do a lot of good things (including preventing pancreatic cancer, according to a scientific study). It also has 35% of your RDA for calcium. I don’t need to tell you why calcium is important - especially for us girls. It also makes an addictive salad dressing.

Which brings me to the however part. It has a similar macronutrient profile to an almond (17-12-71, carb-protein-fat), and contains 7.2 grams of fat to every tablespoon. Now, there’s nothing inherently wrong with this, but consider this: avocado has 2.3. Looking a bit high now, isn’t it? So it needs to be eaten in moderation on a low-fat diet. But that’s not the worst part: it swells in your body. I have experience with this. In three months, doing nothing differently diet-wise but adding about two tablespoons of tahini to my salad every day, I gained seven pounds. Keeping in mind that I hadn’t gained a single pound since I began eating raw foods last January - and had lost over twenty pounds - it’s a real bummer to have gained nearly half of that back. And over such a simple thing. Now, granted, I’d stopped running regularly, but for a three-month stretch, my exercising was sporadic at best, and my weight didn’t fluctuate in any way.

Not looking so innocent now, are you?

I’ve been off tahini for about two weeks now. We’ll see how it goes. But let this be a warning to you all: moderation, moderation, moderation. If you’re going to eat tahini, let it be sparingly and in small amounts. The LFRV diet calls for you to eat fruit - do so, and you’ll be much happier.

I made this soup last night. It was pretty delicious! I added in a couple sun-dried tomatoes and didn’t use as much OJ, but it was still something worth making again. I highly recommend checking out her Youtube channel; she has a lot of good LFRV meal ideas. (I really want to try the first savory summer recipe, but I’ve recently gone off tahini. :( )

The recipe:

Makes enough for two semi-hungry people

2 1/2 cups of tomato

1 1/2 cups of thawed (or fresh) berries

1 cup of orange juice

squeeze of lemon juice

two leaves of basil

two leaves of sage

For us low-fat raw vegans, bananas are a staple food, much like pasta or bread in a standard diet. I personally eat, on average, two 7-8 cup smoothies a day when I’m in Pittsburgh, or three-four hands when I’m in Hawaii. One of my cats is named Musa. So what’s the dealio? Why is a tropical fruit the most popular food in America?

What’s so special about you?

Well, to get a fuller story, I highly recommend you read this book. But I’ll let you in on a few facts about the banana:

• Not that you’d know it by looking at it, but the banana is actually a berry. Yes, it’s grouped with other oddities like avocados and watermelons in addition to cranberries and grapes. The botanical definition of a berry is “a simple fruit having seeds and pulp produced from a single ovary”. This being the case, pumpkins are considered berries while strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, and the like are not. Weird?
• The banana plant is a type of grass, not a tree. It shoots off offspring via its roots. In fact, the fruit is entirely unnecessary for reproduction.
• Some people say that it was a banana that Adam and Eve supposedly consumed in Eden, not an apple. The banana’s leaves make much better clothes, if you think about it.
• For a while there was a rumor that bananas had a lot of fat. This is utterly ridiculous. Four percent of a banana’s calories come from fat. Compared to, say, an egg (64%) or “extra lean” beef (60%) it doesn’t seem so bad, does it?
• Most likely the banana you’re familiar with is the Cavendish. Let me tell you now: you’re getting the short end of the stick. I haven’t had the opportunity to try many varieties (if you’re up to it, there’s a seemingly infinite amount) but I have had apple bananas, ice cream bananas, quad bananas, ladyfingers, and Williams, just to name a few. Apple bananas are my favorite, and if you’re ever in Hawaii, I highly recommend you get some.
• In parts of Africa, people rely on bananas to stay alive the way people in China used to rely on rice, or Europeans relied on wheat.
• When monkeys eat too many unripe bananas, their eyes and tongue turn green. Eat ripe food!
• Mosquitoes are more apt to bite you if you’ve recently eaten bananas. Maybe this explains my legs the first time I went to Hawaii. (It’s since cleared up a lot, but that’s not to say they don’t still love me.)

Nom nom nom.

So, what about you? Are you bananas for bananas?

Thanksgiving and Christmas feasts are not typically what you would call raw-friendly. Or even healthy. So you have to find your own way to do things.

This was my Thanksgiving turkey. His name was Steve. He was made out of a honeydew, bosc pear, two raisins, a triangle of orange pepper, a waddle-shaped piece of red pepper, grapes, clementines, and bamboo skewers. He was delicious.

This was my edible Christmas tree. Yes, I realize it looks like: a) a sea monster, b) a round hairbrush, or c) a car wash. I imagined it being more…regal. But it just turned out kookily. Those are green beans, cranberries, and a cucumber.

Edible sculptures are a very easy way to have a holiday meal. They’re fun, decorative, and usually a big hit.

Or you can go with something a little fancier. I don’t have pictures, but I made a super-delicious lasagna with thick zucchini noodles, a cashew ricotta, and a tomato-sun dried tomato-mango-date sauce. It was literally my favorite thing I ever made. If (when) I make it again, I’ll make sure to post a recipe. I made it on Christmas Eve and let it sit in the fridge overnight. I had leftover cheese and sauce after making it, so for Christmas Eve dinner I made bite-sized raviolis with circular zucchini slices (I just cut the end off and used a potato peeler). Those were a huge hit; very gourmet-looking, yet so simple to make!

Though I am a low-fat raw vegan, I’ll occasionally make something with cashews or almonds. Though it’s delicious, I don’t recommend doing it very often. At least when I eat nuts, they aren’t filling and I always end up eating too many of them. But hey, if you aren’t going to indulge a little bit during the holidays, when can you?

What did you guys have for Christmas/Thanksgiving dinner?

Makes a light lunch for one

2 small-medium tomatoes

1/2 mango

small handful of raisins (optional)

1 zucchini

Blend the first three ingredients. Make the zucchini into noodles, using a spiralizer or potato peeler. A peeler will make fettuccine-like noodles, whereas a spiralizer will make spaghetti.

The raisins are optional. They make the sauce thicker and sweeter, which may or may not be a good thing, depending on what you’re going for. It’s good either way.

Seriously. This is delicious. Just make sure you get good tomatoes and fresh corn; that’ll make it or break it.

Serves 1 - makes about four tacos

1 small avocado

1 medium tomato

chunk of bell pepper (maybe about 3” by 4”)

2 green onions

1 ear’s worth of corn kernels

half of a lime, juiced

1.5t cumin (optional)

dash of black pepper (optional)

Mash the avocado. Mix in the cumin, black pepper, and lime juice. Chop the tomato, pepper, and onion. Add those and the corn to the avocado. Mix well.

You can use it in lettuce leaves, for tacos:

Or just eat it plain:

Either way, it’s really freaking good.