Pancakes

Hello everyone,

Last night I decided to make Maraw's (Anna's) pancakes to have for breakfast this morning. Well let me tell you I was pretty excited as everything I have made of hers has been amazing. When I tasted the "batter" I couldn't believe how good it was and how much it actually tasted like pancakes. So I was pretty excited to try them this morning. Here they are. They were incredibly yummy! Maraw, if you see this, thank you so much! You are amazing!

A Rawsome Salad

Oh yummy! I had the best salad the other day so I made it again last night this time adding tomatoes and it was even better! So so good! Here it is:

I sliced up some mushrooms and marinated them for 2 hours, then dehydrated them for about 2 hours. My salad was spinach, romaine, an avocado, 1/2 chopped tomato, and the mushrooms with a simple dressing of apple cider vinegar, agave, olive oil, and nama shoyu. It was unbelievable! This actually reminded me of a salad I used to enjoy before I went raw. It was served at Denny's years ago and I don't know why this salad reminded me of it but it did. It was their fried chicken salad and I would eat it slathered in ranch. Anyways this salad was yummy and delicious and I will definately make it again. If you try it please let me know if you enjoy it too!

One month raw progress pictures

Ok so here I am at my one month progress update. I weighed myself this morning and I lost 14 pounds. I am down from 205 to 191. I know I should be very happy, and I am. I just don't really see a lot of imporvement in my pictures. Maybe next month there will be more of a difference. Anyways the jumper I am wearing in the second photo I could not fit into last month. It is too tight right now but I wanted to wear it so that hopefully next month we can see how much better it is fitting. At least I can zip it up now, which is an improvement over last month, so even though I can't see a lot of changes I know something is going on. My husband says that he can tell I have lost weight so that is a good thing.






So there you have it. It is embarring posting these pictures. But I really want to see my progress on this raw journey and hopefully, next month, the pictures will look a lot better.

Thanksgiving

I made it through my first ever raw Thanksgiving. There's something to be thankful for! Here is my Thanksgiving menu:

For breakfast I had pineapple/orange juice and two persimmons.

Mid-morning snack was frozen cranberry salad. This came out really good and tasted a lot like the traditional SAD version I was trying to imitate.

Also for a snack was marinated stuffed mushrooms. These were so, so, so good. I had a few left over so I can pop them back in the dehydrator for supper tonight. These were stuffed with Maraw's corn nut dressing which is excellent!

Ok, main meal was steak mushrooms, corn nut dressing, and spinach salad with cranberry dressing. This was very good and very satisfying.

I am quite pleased that I was able to go through this major holiday and stay raw. I even resisted my homemade crescent rolls which are my favorites. A huge benefit to eating raw was I did not need to lay down and relax to give my body a break so I could digest all the food I had consumed. I felt great. Everything was very tasty. I am very happy to have done this!

Dessert was the pumpkin pie and date sqaures. The pumpkin pie was so delicious. I made the crust using pecans and a little bit of vanilla and it just complimented the pie so nicely. Even my husband said that it tasted good, which is huge! I just have to say that everything that I have ever made of Maraw's has been delicious! The date squares were very sweet and satisfying. This was a perfect ending to a woderful raw day!

I also made a sweet potato soup that ended up going down the sink. I soaked the potatoes all night like I had read but they were still starchy and the soup did not taste good. I am glad that I had not depended on that as a main part of my meal!

All in all it was a great day. We played games and did crafts with the children, watched the parade and a little football, read through our Thankful jar and just had a wonderful time enjoying our family, which is really what Thanksgiving is all about.

Pumpkin Pie

Here is my first ever attempt at a raw pumpkin pie. I think it came out very good!

I used Anna's (Maraw's) recipe from her wonderful magazine Purely Delicious.
I had some filling leftover so I will probably eat that later on.

So now I have made both of my desserts for tomorrow. I am going to start my stuffing in a little bit. I will try to post pictures of all the food as soon as it is made and ready to go. Or when I get a chance. Which will probably be after I eat it!

Have a great Thanksgiving!

Date Squares

Every year in the past I have made the traditional SAD date square. This year since I am doing a raw Thanksgiving I decided to try making a raw version. So here it is. It came out quite yummy. Next time I am going to use brazil nuts for the crust instead of macs because I think brazil nuts have a buttery flavor.

I never measure anything when I create things but I'll try to post the basic concept later today. Sorry the picture is so blurry.

potlucks

We had a church potluck today and it was a doozy. It was all lasagne, pasta and spaghetti with lots of yummy looking desserts and breads. A raw foodists nightmare! I had wilty salad.
I have been doing good lately. I finally made a raw cheesecake and I am so glad I did. It was really good. I made a blueberry sauce to go over it and it come out very yummy. Thats what I need to take to these potlucks. Then I won't feel so deprived.
I made some carrot juice yesterday and put it into canning jars so it would be easy for me to drink some before church this morning but it had this white stuff in it and I don't know what it was so I had to dump it all out. I was so dissapointed. What a waste.

Stinky Raw

Last night my husband told me that I smelled like I was detoxing. He is not a raw food eater so it was an interesting comment. I have noticed the last couple days a metal taste in my mouth. Maybe that is what caused it. This is a down fall of raw for me. Because my husband is not raw we sometimes have smell issues. Usually it is me smelling what he ate, so the tables have been turned.
Tomorrow we are heading down to the in-laws for supper. That should be interesting. They are making lasagne so I will bring a salad, some grapes and apples and some kind of raw dessert for me to eat. Our almost 3 year old does not eat meat so I will bring a salad big enough for her, or something else for her to eat.
Guess that's all for tonight.

Today's the day

So this is the first day of my blog. I am hoping that by writing in here I can document my journey and be more accountable in my choices.
I first went raw back in '05 and lost a lot of weight. I have never looked or felt better. It wasn't just that I was thinner. My skin glowed. I felt radiant. I have the pictures to prove it too. We went through a very tough year involving moving, loss of job and income, fixing up a home, personal losses, ect. and through all of that mess I stopped eating raw and gave in to stress eating and gained back all the weight I had lost. So this is a new beginning for me. I have been raw for two weeks now.

I will be posting my monthly success in the form of pictures. This is something I didn't do last time I lost the weight that I wish I had done. My before picture is so awful that I don't even want to post it. I will wait until I have a one month update and post them side by side. Maybe that is a cop out, but it is what I feel comfortable with.

I titled this today's the day because so many times we put off what needs to be done until another day. Today is the day to take back your health and start a new lease on life by eating raw and living foods. I have never felt better in my life than when I was 100% raw. What a wonderful gift to give yourself.