Dancing through life...

I think everyone gets it. I'm just LOVIN' the raw food. But that really is just part of the picture (of healing, fitness, life, health) and whilst it's great to feed your body (some would argue essential) the good stuff nutritionally, if that's all you're doing then it's still not really good enough.

We have been given these amazing bodies which have phenomenal healing ability and I believe it's our job to move them, enjoy them and be fully present in them.

My training has started - and the realisation I've got just 6 weeks left to train for my first triathlon has spurred me on a little.  I was inspired this week by a video my fab friend Debbie [from the always inspiring Makin' Tracks (have a peek at the link - I think I took the photo of the two of them on their home page... such beautiful people inside and out)] posted on facebook.

Have a peek here:

And then the dance walk guru was found - watch this for more:

Obviously I'm loving too the fact that Joe's in Vibram Five Fingers but aside from that what a fabulously happy way to move your body.  I love to skip down the street, I love to dance hula in my front garden under the stars and so jogging this Saturday at dawn I popped on the hula tracks on my iPod and jog-danced as the sky became lighter.  I ran twice as far as I thought I was going to, felt fabulous, creative, inspired, happy, light and so grateful to be able to move my body. 

Have a very very happy week and let's dance our way through the days.

With love,

Em x

PS If anyone fancies a dance jog in Embsay at dawn on a Saturday morning just give me a shout :)

Vegan meal a week challenge: 'Cheesy' Broccoli Baked Potatoes

Back again! It's been a little crazy lately (one diploma down - I've just this afternoon found out I've got a grade A in my nutrition diploma - hooray!) working away at my kinesiology homework and my homeopathy postgrad course... The end is getting clearer into sight now.... and I've discovered two more areas I really want to look at which I feel will enhance my life and my practice. It seems my studying journey is not about to end for a while yet!

My raw food journey continues along it's own route. I'm loving it and see no end in sight there either. Not saying never to cooked foods but the energy increase, vitality raise and all round feelings of wellness are amazing.  My gorgeous new blender has made smoothies, salad dressings and so on an absolute joy. Looking for excuses to use it really! So here's a recipe that I'd need it for...

From the fabulous Forks over Knives - The Cookbook:

'Cheesy' Broccoli Baked Potatoes

Serves 4 although adapt as need to suit

4 large russet potatoes, scrubbed
1 batch no cheese sauce (see below)
2 cups broccoli florets

Preheat oven to 180C
Pierce the potatoes with a fork a few times
Place potato on a baking sheet and bake between an hour and an hour 15mins/until tender
Combine No cheese sauce and broccoli in a saucepan and cook over medium heat, or until broccoli is tender
Slice the potato with a cross shape on top and spoon the warm broccoli cheese into the potato.

'No cheese sauce'

Makes about 2 1/2 cups

1 large yellow onion, peeled and coarsely chopped
1 large red bell pepper, seeded and coarsely chopped
3 tablespoons cashews, toasted (optional)
1 tablespoon tahini (optional)
1 cup nutritional yeast
Salt to taste

Combine all ingredients in a blender in the order given and puree until smooth and creamy, adding up to 1/2 cup of water if neccessary to achieve a smooth consistency.

Enjoy!

Raw food a go-go!

Well I never thought I'd be here! Raw food was for, well, other people. Having said that I've always enjoyed enormous bowls of salad, fruit and love the fresh produce of the supermarket bit the most (get quite excitable am sad to say) so I suppose in a lot of ways it's not such an enormous surprise.

I'm still putting it down to our Tri club chairman recommending Chrissie Wellington's autobiography back in July which started me on my journey closer to this.  It's been amazing and from my decision to go totally veggie in September it's been incredibly quick to get here. Vegan (badly) was my November challenge and now, the 3rd of February I've just completed my day 2 of 100% raw.  Having spent 2 weeks preparing myself for this (one week of green smoothies for breakfast and continue as normal for the rest and one week with the smoothies plus one raw meal) I feel totally ready and excited. 

So far I've been lucky enough to follow Tracey Russell's Incredible Smoothies 21 day transition plan which I've found really helpful (shopping lists and meal plans laid out).  I like a bit of organising if someone's prepared to do that!  It's been easy, delicious (not found anything I've turned my nose up at yet - apart from the time I didn't blend the kale in my smoothie long enough... still it's a learning curve).  I've also had a raw coaching call with Rebecca Kane which I found really helpful and am looking forward to working with Maria Ingham from Food4Fuel (website coming very soon).  There's masses of YouTube videos which I've taken to listening to as I play in the kitchen, lots of facebook groups (our local Raw Next Door people Bonnie and Jamie are very supportive) and loads to learn which I love. 

However my biggest learning has been in how I feel. It's been very much about that for me.  This year I'm planning lots of personal development stuff especially around mindfulness and I'm finding the raw food has really tapped into a groove that makes so much sense.  My energy has shifted up a gear with increased clarity and focus.  I've been feeling pretty good on my mostly vegan/plant based diet but this is something else.  The sugary cake of 2012 has gone.  For good. I'm loving how good this feels and can't wait to discover more as I continue...

And in other Alt Tri news (aware as I am that my blog has become ALL about the food!) the barefoot running is going well, swimming about a mile a couple of times a week and the cycling... well the cycling. Let's hope tomorrow's a nice day as I'll get a quick spin on the bike then for the second time this year...

Bienvenidos. Welcome to my new raw food challenge.

My little heart is singing.... Launching my 'One Vegan Dish A Week' challenge...

It seems that my excitement about food is not just affecting me - recently I've had a couple of requests for recipes... and the latest one - to send a friend one vegan recipe a week to try. 

I'm so aware I'm merely at the very beginning of my journey into vegan eating so I could be barking up entirely the wrong tree. However, it makes my heart sing and so far all my best decisions in life have made me bubble with joy and excitement (including some of the harder, less popular ones).  I know the feeling by now (and I love it!).  I've lots to learn and am looking forward to learning it.

Since I've had a few requests I'll aim to pop a vegan recipe on here each week - feel free to leave feedback and thoughts... and happy, cruelty free, life enhancing cooking!

Looking forward to a brilliant future of tasty treats (I've just discovered raw kale chips. Oh my word. I intended taking them to a party last night and they didn't make it out of the door!), feeling great and knowing that no animals have been harmed in the making of my every meal.

Going nuts for milk

I'm so very pleased with myself for managing to make milk. Well I did a great job years ago but turns out I still have a brilliant ability. Slightly different process - OK no comparison - radically different process but milk nontheless. 

It was really on the back of a not so successful (aren't all the best discoveries?) attempt - this time at a vegan like nutella.  Turns out I wasn't so good at almond nutella although it did grow on me a bit.  Now almond milk? A different story. I am GOOD!

The recipe was from How it all Vegan, a vegan cookbook and is as follows:

60g almonds
475ml water
2 pitted (I used Medjool) dates

Blend the raw almonds until they become a coarse powder - add water and dates and blend again. Strain any lumps and chill.

They recommend for cereal and porridge.  I used on my homemade granola and really enjoyed - little miss not so much her porridge with it although yours truly tasted it and found it delicious.

Coconut milk still to be trialled but again from the same book:

250ml boiling water
40g desiccated coconut.

In a blender or processor puree the water and coconut until well incorporated.  Strain out coconut bits and chill.

With big thanks to everyone who kept telling me almond milk was tasty - so glad I checked it out for myself. Easy to make and without all the additives from the supermarket versions.

Continuing on plant based journies...

Intruiged by Scott Jurek (ultra marathon runner) and his adventure into a vegan, plant based diet; inspired by Brendon Brazier (multiple Ironman Triathlete) and generally curious, I've been continuing my tentative steps into the world of vegan foods and plant based diets.

If you're anything like me then the negatives of why not to eat meat might not interest you. They didn't me. At all. I could still rationalise that I'd evolved to eat meat, it was OK if it was well kept/had a happy life/organic/free range and whilst I knew things weren't all that great it was sort of easy to switch off to the images and points of view.

What I found more difficult, even impossible it would seem, to ignore were the health benefits.  Scott (Jurek as mentioned above) talks in his great book 'Eat and Run' about how he recovers better, trains better and feels more well than he ever has before.  Brendon Brazier. Ironman. Not sure what else is needed to say there! The phenomenal distances involved and amazing feats in completing just one of the three parts of the Ironman Triathlon (2.4 mile swim, 112 mile bike ride and 26.2 mile run) are inspiring in themselves. And then to discover he feels fantastic, and discovered eating a plant based diet whilst working out what suited him best for training.  And still follows it.  Good enough for great athletes, surely it makes sense for the everyday person such as myself?

It's been much easier than I thought although am still making the transition and do have some products I'm using up such as pesto that are not entirely plant based (or go out for dinner and don't stick with it yet or sneak a bit of baking for school that I've been using butter in) but generally would have to say that I'm largely following my heart, moving closer towards 100% plant based eating.  I am feeling good, looking OK (although my daughter tells me I look like a circus performer with my braided hair) and have lots of energy to be a mum, study, work and play at training for my first triathlon. Happy days!

Homemade Energy Bars

Loving cashew nuts at the moment so I thought I'd create something yummy instead of simply devouring them (in their equally yummy state) straight from the bag...

Here's what I made...

100g cashews
25g almonds
25g pecan nuts
25g pumpkin seeds
25g sesame seeds
100g medjool dates
50g cranberries
50g apricots

Add all the ingredients to a food processor and whizz.  The longer it's blending the smoother the mix will be and if you leave it long enough it should (mine did anyway) come together in a big blob of loveliness.  Scrape out of the food processor and press firmly into a lined tray (approx 20cmX15cm or so).  Mark out the squares with a knife and put into the fridge to set.

When wanted wrap or put into snack box if taking out for a ride/run or simply enjoy on return.

'The Best Nutritionalist in the World is You!'

I'm just coming to the end of a week of juicing with salads or soups for dinner. My diet will have been approximately 80% raw, largely vegan and definitely plant based. And, most importantly I'm feeling great!  I've had plenty of energy to go out for runs, swimming training, work and run around after my 5 year old full of life daughter.  Feeling good and loving life. There's been times my food intake hasn't been so positive - and I've known it - physically less energy, less motivated and less enthused about life. We really are what we eat. I watched a film last night where it was stated that 'the best nutritionalist in the world is you'. Strong statement perhaps but we are, we know if we listen to our bodies, what's good and what's not so good. More about that in a moment.

This week, along with other reading, incidents and events, has inspired me to get out there and study nutrition and also add to my kinesiology training as I think it's vital that we look at nutrition in terms of all round health.  If we put poor quality oil into a car can we be surprised if it splutters and chugs along. Likewise if we start each day with a coffee, some white bread and sugary jam, follow on with a chocolate bar or crisps, a sandwich/carb filled lunch then is there any wonder that mid afternoon comes and we're flagging?

I've become fascinated by the topic (maybe a bit too much occasionally - advance warning!) and also by what I've not questioned in the past. Milk - good for you. Really? (1) Meat - we've evolved to eat it, we NEED it. Again - really? 5 a day is enough. Says who? The Japanese recommend 13 vegetables and 4 servings of fruit a day (3) which is actually not all that hard to do. I've done it plenty of times.

Cooking had become a chore and now has transformed into a joy - I'm loving experimenting with new foods, trying new dishes and it's opened up a whole new world of vegan/veggie cookbooks... About that new bookcase...

Oh - lastly - the documentary last night around food, health and disease - have a watch here:

http://foodmatters.tv/screening-event-cinema

Here's to 'an epidemic of heatlh' and getting towards a culture of 'education not medication'.

1 http://www.wellandgoodnyc.com/2011/09/23/china-study-cheat-sheet-10-things-you-need-to-know/
2 http://www.vrg.org/nutrition/protein.htm
3 http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2006/may/25/healthandwellbeing.health