I have been wanting to try kale chips for ages, it seems. For whatever reason, I only got around to trying them for the first time about a week ago. While visiting one of my favorite natural food stores, there showcased in with the other raw foods was a product that I was determined to finally sample.
These kale chips were love at first bite! I new instantly that I had to try out my own recipe of kale chips, especially because it was so hard not to eat the whole bag in one sitting. That very weekend I tried out my first recipe.
1 bunch of kale, roughly torn
1 cup soaked nuts (I use a combo of brazil and cashew)
1/3 cup nutritional yeast
1 small habanero pepper, deseeded and deveined
1 small garlic clove
2 figs
1 tsp nama shoyu or tamari
2 tbsp olive oil
2-4 tbsp lemon juice
salt and pepper to taste
water
Tear the kale into thick pieces and set aside in a large bowl. In a food processor, combine all other ingredients, adding just enough water to make a smooth consistency. If you like your chips a little sweeter, add a few more figs. If you like them cheesier, add more nutritional yeast. Spoon a generous amount of sauce onto kale and toss until well coated. Pour onto dehydrator sheets and dry 6 hours or until crispy.
I love kale chips for so many reasons. One of the top being the high nutrition: kale is abundant in essential minerals like maganese and antioxidant-rich vitamins A, C, and K. The nutritional yeast also provides an excellent source of protein and B vitamins, and then there’s all those wonderful vitamins and minerals that the nuts bring to the mix!
Kale chips are easy and fast. When it comes to dehydrated foods, 6 hours (or less) is not a long time to dry at all. Many recipes for food I have used called for a lot longer drying time. This is the kind of thing you can throw together in the morning and have waiting for you when you get home from work!
Snack food heaven, is the kind of category I would put these chips into. Crispy, crunchy, cheesy, slightly salty, sweet and spicy, how could you not want to snack on them? A guilt free chip and an excellent way to eat greens, what more could you want? Well, for me, I knew I had to try out all the different kale varieties at my local market. This included lacatino, dinosaur, and red kale.
I think they all turned out great. My favorite would still probably be dinosaur, however. It had the lightest crunch and held the most flavor, probably because it has so much curl to it. Yum. Today, I’m taking a combo bag over to my dad for Father’s Day! :) I hope you all enjoy the recipe! Have a great weekend!
Hello blog world. Long time no see/chat/write. Needless to say, blogging has taken a place in the back seat of my life. I’ve been keeping very busy with my new job, modeling, band, and my various dance classes. I still try to find the time to write when inspiration strikes. And today is one of those days.
Yesterday, I decided to take on a raw challenge, till at least the end of the week. Baby steps, are good when you are off the wagon. ;) So I came up with this delicious green smoothie recipe! Here it is:
1 banana
1 apple sliced
1 handful green leaf lettuce
1 large collard green
1 cup red grapes
1 tbsp chia seeds
10 oz frozen mixed berries
water
First, soak the chia seeds in about 1/2 cup of water. Blend everything together except the chia seeds, I usually start with bananas and greens. Add water as needed to help the blender do its job. At the end, I add the chia seeds and the frozen berries. So delicious!!! Green smoothies are great meals on the go. I drink a glass right when I make it, then pour the rest into a Nalgene to sip throughout the day.
I hope you all enjoy this recipe! It’s packed full of nutrients and energy to help you kick butt at life. :) Oh, and happy spring or summer, or whatever it is in Utah these days. We didn’t have much of a spring (so cold), and I’m starting to feel like summer is the new spring. Haha! I took some pics around the yard of Lucy and flowers and such. Have a great day and enjoy the scenery!
Lucy is starting to not look like a puppy.
She loves her new pheasant toy.
I think sticks will always be her favorite.
I like the plants in our yard.
Pretty wildflowers.
Rose bud.
Giant comfrey!
Likin’ the lichen.
Roof dog!
Well that’s all for now! Enjoy the scenery and have a great day!
Every so often I have days where I just want to cleanse and start over. It’s usually after periods of not eating so well, and neglecting what my body needs. I came up with this recipe with the longing of health and vitality in quick way, and it also features some of my favorite ingredients! Here is the recipe.
1 young coconut
1 banana
1 orange
2 kale leaves
1 handful of cilantro
1 handful of mint
5-6 PITTED prunes
1 cup ice
Open up the coconut, if you need directions on that, check here. Drain the liquid into a blender carafe, then scoop out the flesh and add that as well. Peel the orange and banana and add to the carafe. Blend until well incorporated. Add remaining ingredients except for ice, adding water if consistency is too thick. Finally, add the ice and blend until smooth.
Yum, yum, yum! This smoothie is so delicious, and so incredibly good for the body, inside and out. Young coconut is great for cleansing the blood, and kale is wonderful for the skin. A word of caution, though. Please make sure to buy pitted prunes, or take out the pits before you add them to the blender. I didn’t realize my prunes had pits in them, and it left me with a gritty smoothie even after straining. In other news, I recently met up with Carmella from the Sunny Raw Kitchen!
What a wonderful treat it was to hear she was in town! Carmella was one of my contributors for my ebook, One Week Raw. We had dinner with her friends at Omar’s Living Cuisine Restaurant. The food was amazing, as always. I had a Lebanese wrap, and mango smoothie. SO GOOD!!!!
Here are some recent pics of Lucy. She is about 3 1/2 months old and growing like a weed, and she’s getting really heavy too!
Lucy is a good sitter!
She thinks Shardul is her chew toy.
But he’s not really into that.
So this is how they spend a good portion of the day.
And every once in a while you can catch them being nice to each other.
Oh, and here’s what I had for dinner last week. I took my basic cauliflower tabouli recipe, and added parsnips to the mix. It was a bit sweeter and more crunchy! Really good!! I think I need to pulse the parsnips a little more next time, though.
And then over the weekend, we had Mexican food. I made Joe enchiladas,
….and made ensalada for myself. :) Super yummy!
Well, that’s all for now! I’ll update again very soon!
You: The Blogging World. Yes, I have been neglecting my poor little blog, but only because so much has been going on. I don’t even know where to start! In October, we moved from downtown SLC to a small, old house in Holladay. The yard is like a forest and the house is adorable! Here is a view from the back:
And here is a view of the yard:
Also in October was our 3rd year wedding anniversary! Joe and I did a special photo shoot to commemorate the occasion.
Hehe, kind of fun, eh? I’ve done many other photo shoots as well, but I’ll save those for a different post. In November, we got a puppy! Her name is Lucy and we’re very much in love with her.
Isn’t she a beauty? She’s grown a lot since this picture was taken a month or so ago. I’ll have to take some more pics and update soon! Shardul is ok with Lucy, although she is a bit rough with him.
She is a lot bigger than him now, so hopefully she will learn soon that Shar is not her chew toy. During the summer, I joined a band and we had our first gig last month. Here is a few clips of the evening.
And on the note of videos, here is how we spent our New Year’s Eve!
Well, that’s all for now. I’ll try and keep this blog current, and soon I’ll have some yummy raw foods to talk about!
My lovely mother came to have lunch with me today! She’s very interested in eating more raw food, so I made her my delicious cauliflower tabouli. I decided to try a different take on the salad and make it even more Mediterranean in flavor. To the onion mix, I added 1 stalk of celery, 1 tbsp of tahini, 1/4 cup raw cashews, 1 small Anaheim pepper and 1 tsp of cumin. It was amazing!
The tabouli was served on a bed of lettuce, with vine ripened tomato and lemon cucumber on the side. I also added a few olives and some olive oil and balsamic to the lettuce and veggies on the side.
Mom loved it, and she told me that it was very satisfying as well! Good news for someone who is looking to start a raw food delivery business! My mom will probably be my first customer! Now if I can just grow all my own food, I’ll be set. Speaking of which, here is my latest (small) haul.
I’ve gotten a few Mortgage Lifters, several Green Grapes, a couple of Lemon Pears, and some Violet Jaspers. There is also the last of my purple beans shown, and the Anaheim that was added to the recipe above. I’ve also picked a few zucchinis which were promptly eaten afterward in recipes like my Rawsta Primavera. There are a lot of green tomatoes, and I can’t wait till they ripen up! I hope all of you gardeners are getting lots of yummies.
YUM! I created this recently, and it is now a favorite. Best with fresh veggies from the garden. One of the things I like about it, is its versatility. This dish is known for its fresh veggies, so if you have them, throw it in! Mushrooms, pine nuts, and bell pepper come to mind.
Combine all ingredients in a bowl and let marinate for a few minutes. Prepare the rawsta roodles while marinating.
Rawsta Noodles
1 zucchini
1 tbsp olive oil
1/2 lemon, juiced
salt and pepper to taste
Chop the zucchini into three even pieces. In a spiral slicer, slice each piece to make noodles. My slicer has both linguine and angel hair pasta option. I like the linguine optinon the best. Another way to make noodles is to use a vegetable peeler. Toss the noodles in the olive oil and lemon juice and season with salt and pepper. Top with primavera sauce, and enjoy!
So my last garden update, was about a month ago! Things have certainly grown much bigger during this time. Let’s do some before and after shots, shall we?
Here is the garden before, when all the plants have gone in. Tomatoes are just babies, as are the peppers, and you can’t even see much of anything else.
Here is my garden how its looks right now.
Quite an improvement, isn’t it? The tomatoes are even bigger than this picture, as its a week or so old. Check out my babies!
All of my tomatoes are heirloom varieties, this is a Violet Jasper plant. I’m very happy to say that all five of my plants have fruit on them now! I’ll take some more pictures of all my new babies to share. Here’s a before shot of my squash and beans:
And after:
This zucchini has taken over this whole area. The lettuce is long gone from the heat, and I harvested what little chard I had left. Next time, I’ll be sure to plant this monster squash far from other plants so it has plenty of room! Both the squash and beans are heirloom, too! The zucchini is a tri colored variety, and the beans are lovely, tasty purple ones!
I ate the last of my beans last night, I’m not sure if more will grow this year or not. Speaking of monster squash, our mystery compost squash is taking the prize. Here is what it looked like earlier in the season:
Just a few leaves here and there. Now look at it!
Heh, it doesn’t even fit in the frame. I’m think its probably butternut, but only time will tell for sure! Joe’s butternut is doing quite well, too. We moved the barrel back closer to the house because it gets more shade there.
Here it is before:
And after:
As you can tell from a lot of these pictures, one thing that hasn’t changed much, is that our cat Shardul LOVES to hang out in the garden with us!
He’s a pretty good helper. His specialty is sniffing all the plants and looking pretty for the camera. Here he is early in the season:
And here he is now!
My what a difference! Well, that’s all for now! Good luck with all your gardens, everyone! I hope you are enjoying your’s as much as I’m enjoying mine!
Yes, its been a while since my last post, but I have a good excuse. I have just recently returned from Ashland, Oregon where we’ve been living for the past two weeks! Joe was taking a bike mechanics course, and I spent a lot of time enjoying the city. I did, however get tired of living out of a tent.
I’ll post more about Ashland later. Today, I really want to talk about tabouli! On the last day of our trip, we traveled up to Portland to meet some friends for dinner at a Lebanese restaurant. The food was amazing, and I was very impressed with their tabouli recipe. They used bulgar wheat for a base, and the flavors were simple and delicious. I immediately thought that I wanted to create a raw version of the dish, even though I think their version was high raw. There wasn’t much bulgar in the dish.
I decided to use cauliflower for a base, as it makes a good substitute for cooked grains. A whole cauliflower is needed for this recipe, because I wanted the “grain” role in this dish to play a bigger part, than the version I had in the restaurant. Here is the recipe:
1 head of cauliflower
Juice of 2 lemons
1/2 onion
2 cloves garlic
1/4 cup olive oil
small handful of mint
large handful of parsley
Cut the cauliflower away from the stem then cut into smaller segments. In a food processor, chop up the cauliflower until it is the consistency of a cooked grain, such as rice or bulgar wheat. Usually several pulses with do the trick, sometimes it is necessary to remove the processed cauliflower so that the larger pieces can be processed. Transfer to a large mixing bowl and set aside.
Pulse the remaining ingredients in the food processor until the onion and herbs are finely chopped and everything is incorporated. Fold the lemon/onion mixture into the cauliflower, and then season with salt and pepper to taste.
This is so delicious, so light and so satisfying. It’s hard to not eat the whole salad in one sitting! This is a dish packed full of vitamin C, both cauliflower and parsley are wonderful sources. Not a bad way to boost your immunity and bring in some vital antioxidants into your diet. It’s also a perfect dish for all of you out there who are looking to reduce your nut intake. However, chopped, raw nuts can be added to the recipe to make it more hearty as well. Pine nuts, cashews, macadamia or even sunflower seeds would be excellent options. I’m thinking a diced heirloom tomato would be wonderful as well.
Play around and have fun with the recipe, that’s all part of the adventure! Have a great weekend and stay tuned for a post about my trip to Ashland!
My mom will probably be my first customer! Now if I can just grow all my own food, I’ll be set. Speaking of which, here is my latest (small) haul.
