October 18, 2009

water to blend

Just a note about blenders … It’s really not necessary to have a $500 blender to make smoothies, although I agree that good equipment can make anything easier. This is what I use …

It’s a regular blender base that I’ve had for at least 6 years, and lately I’ve been using a canning jar as a carafe. I’ve broken and replaced the carafe several times and find the 24 oz size of a quart jar is the perfect size for making one or two servings of just about anything. And, knock wood, it’s stood up to some pretty heavy demands. Go easy on your blender by pulsing when the going gets tough.

nutritional information:
calories: 222
fat: 0 gr
carbs: 53 gr
protein: 7 gr

Snack
Fruit and Nut Bowl
makes one serving ~ $1.16 per serving
ingredients
1 banana ($.10)
2 oz strawberries ($.27)
2 oz blueberries ($.27)
1/2 oz walnuts, chopped ($.32)
1/2 cup almond milk ($.20)

Slice bananas into bowl, add whole strawberries and blueberries, top with the chopped walnuts and pour the almond milk over. It’s like an incredibly fresh, living bowl of “cereal.”

nutritional information:
calories: 299
fat: 14 gr
carbs: 38 gr
protein: 4 gr

Mix agave, mustard, salt and pepper and set aside. Chop cucumber into sticks, shave carrot curls with a vegetable peeler, slice avocado into strips. Divide all equally between the romaine leaves, drizzle with the sweet mustard sauce and wrap up. These are juicy and messy, but oh so delish.

Sprouting is an easy and inexpensive way to get really fresh goodies to add to raw dishes. Here is a good site with basic “sprouting 101” info … http://www.efn.org/~sundance/Sprouting.html I’ve found that I can’t slack off at all on the rinsing or they’ll start to get a little fermented smelling (especially wheat berries). Sprouts should always smell pristinely fresh and never “off” in any way … discard any that do.

nutritional information:
calories: 578
fat: 29 gr
carbs: 77 gr
protein: 1 gr

Dinner
Zugrati
makes one serving ~ $1.79 per serving

Part of the fun of raw foods is making new things and then thinking up a “raw” name for them. This is a fairly hearty dinner meal I’ve enjoyed often from the beginning (I discovered the idea of raw foods on Storm and Jingee’s Garden Diet website). I can’t remember what cooked dish I was trying to recreate or exactly how I arrived at the name, but it had something to do with grating the zucchini

nutritional information:
calories: 211
fat: 14 gr
carbs: 21 gr
protein: 5 gr

Dessert
Soft Serve Chocolate Ice Cream
makes one large serving ~ $.95 per serving
ingredients
2 bananas, frozen ($.20)
1 cup nut milk ($.40)
2 tbsp powdered rawcocao (or cocoa powder) ($.20)
1/2 tsp vanilla ($.15)
1/2 tsp salt

Break frozen bananas into pieces. Puree until smooth in blender with the nut milk, cocao powder, vanilla and salt. This will have the consistency of a very thick chocolate shake or pretty loose soft serve ice cream. Pop into the freezer for an hour or so to firm up, if desired.

nutritional information:
calories: 320
fat: 10 gr
carbs: 54 gr
protein: 4 gr

total carb: 243 gr
total protein: 30 gr