Category Archives: Health

Friday Feature: Staples in my ‘Raw Food Kitchen’

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Eating healthy can be a hassle if you don’t know where to shop, what to buy or what to make with what you buy. Beginning today and in the coming weeks I will share some of my raw food staples, meal plans and recipes that you might want to incorporate into you food plan. Today I simply share with you what you are likely to always find in my kitchen. If I have these, I can make a variety of meals for about two weeks. What’s also good about most of these foods is that my entire family eats them.

Fruits and Vegetables

1. Apples—For juices, smoothies, desserts and to be eaten alone
2. Oranges—For juices, smoothies and to be eaten alone
3. Bananas—For smoothies, desserts and to be eaten alone
4. Strawberries—For juices, smoothies, desserts and to be eaten alone
5. Lemon—For juices and ingredients in dressings and main dishes
6. Celery—For juices, smoothies and ingredient in main dishes
7. Kale—For juices, smoothies and ingredient in main dishes
8. Cucumbers—For juices, smoothies, toppings and ingredients in main dishes
9. Tomatoes—For juices, toppings and ingredients in main meals
10. Lettuce (usually Romaine)—For juices, smoothies, salads, wraps and ingredient in other main dishes
11. Carrots—For juices, smoothies and ingredients in main dishes
12. Red bell peppers—For ingredients in main dishes
13. Green bell peppers—For juices, smoothies and ingredients in main dishes
14. Onions—For toppings and ingredients in main dishes

Nuts, Seeds and Such

1. Dates—To sweeten protein drinks and desserts and for toppings
2. Brazil Nuts—For milk, protein drinks, dressings and toppings
3. Almonds—For milk, protein drinks and to be eaten alone
4. Cashews—For cheeses, main dishes and to be eaten alone
5. Hemp Seeds—For toppings and to be used in main dishes (I have yet to try in protein drinks, which I hear people do)
6. Sunflower Seeds—For toppings, main dishes and to be eaten alone
7. Garbanzo Beans (Chick Peas)—For toppings and to be used in main dishes
8. Olives—For toppings and to be eaten alone

Condiments and Seasonings

1. Honey—To sweeten drinks and desserts
2. Nutritional Yeast—To add to vegetables, salads and drinks
3. Sea Salt—An ingredient in main dishes
4. Pepper—An ingredient in main dishes
5. Oregano—An ingredient in main dishes
6. Paprika—An ingredient in main dishes
7. Cumin—An ingredient in main dishes
8. Coriander—An ingredient in main dishes
9. Garlic Powder— An ingredient in main dishes
10. Onion Powder— An ingredient in main dishes
11. Olive Oil— An ingredient in drinks, dressings and main dishes
12. Apple Cider Vinegar—An ingredient in drinks, dressings and main dishes
13. Tahini—An ingredient in dressings and main dishes

What are some healthy foods you would like to know more about? What are some healthy foods that you cannot do without?

Friday Feature: The Wonders of Celery

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My Grandma Thomas could make the best baked chicken with just salt and pepper, but her secret was adding the right amount of vegetable oil, onions and celery. When I first tried to duplicate her taste, I didn’t have celery. The chicken was good but wasn’t Grandma Thomas great. Next time I made sure to have celery. It gave the chicken that flavor boost it needed where I can now say my chicken tastes like my grandma’s. Even though celery gives my baked chicken that extra flavor I wouldn’t use celery for anything else. It would rot in my refrigerator, not knowing what else to do with it besides cutting the stalks into sticks to eat with blue cheese dressing. And that’s what you do at dinner parties or anywhere else where they serve a vegetable tray; I had no interest in buying molded cheese just to make my celery palatable so I could consume it before it went bad. But since being on a mostly raw plant-based food plan, celery has become a staple in my fridge.

Celery goes in all my green juices and smoothies (one of which I try to consume daily) and my raw burgers. In my opinion, celery tastes awful by itself but teamed with other foods, celery is a great enhancer. Who knows, but maybe because celery is so greatly enhanced with vital nutrient that it can greatly enhance other foods? Celery

Is high in:
Potassium
Magnesium
Manganese
Sodium (natural sodium that’s essential for our bodies)
Phosphorus
Iron
Calcium
Vitamins A, B-complex and C
Amino acids

Is a:
Diuretic
Laxative
Natural diet aid (curbs appetite)

Reduces:
Blood pressure

Helps:
Restore normal blood sugar levels
Prevent stomach and colon cancers
Treat respiratory issues, like asthma and bronchitis
Ease the pain from gout, rheumatoid arthritis and rheumatism
Stimulates sexual drive
Calm the nervous system

I hope you will try celery beyond the tiny pieces you put in soups and other food mixtures. Let it not only enhance the taste of your food but the level of your health and, thus, the level of your life.

Friday Feature: Cleansers and Builders

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For nearly 20 years I have been on a quest for good health and have amassed great knowledge on what works for my body. But as God would have it, much of what I have found doesn’t just work for me but for others so I am always delighted to share with you what I know in hopes that it will help you. One theory I learned recently when on my raw food program—The Garden Diet*—was that fruits are cleansers and vegetables are builders. Storm Talifero, the creator of the Garden Diet, doesn’t even like to mix fruits and vegetables in his drinks, not even an apple to vegetables, which many juicing nutritionists believe is the only fruit that can safely be mixed with vegetables (drinking a combination of fruits and vegetables can disturb the body’s chemical balance and cause the mixture to rot in your gut). Talifero believes the mixture of fruits and vegetables gets the body confused about whether it should be trying to rid the body of toxins or to build itself up. I don’t know if I subscribe to the categorization of cleansers and builders because I haven’t searched the science behind this theory, but I did follow Talifero’s separation ideal and from a recent three-day fast I got amazing physical results that I wasn’t even looking for.

Throughout the day beginning in the morning I would drink either a fruit only juice or smoothie and in the evening I would drink a vegetable only juice or smoothie. I also attempted to drink more than half my body weight in ounces of water. As I expected, I had great mental, emotional and spiritual clarity, but what I didn’t anticipate was a whopping four pound drop in weight. I know this was water loss, as typically the first six pounds of weight loss is water. However, whenever I have fasted any other way I have never lost that much weight in that short period of time. Will I keep it off? I think so as I continue to eat mostly raw foods and begin an exercise program (Remember, since January 23, I have lost 17 pounds, which is now 21 pounds with the recent drop of four pounds). My goal for this year was 30 pounds. I praise God that I am more than half way there and that’s motivation enough to work to keep those recent four pounds off and reach my goal.

*The Garden Diet is not a Christian-focused health program. In some of the literature Talifero’s wife, Jinjee, who runs the program, mentions God and her thoughts on spirituality, which are not an orthodox Christian view. However, I believe the program is great for its health benefits and recommend it on that basis.

Friday Feature: Roundup Fourteen

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Here are a couple of links from the blog Food Renegade that my BFF Nichole hipped me to; they support what I wrote this month about knowing what’s in the food you eat (see my posts on trans fats in Lawry’s Seasoned Salt and soy):

Decoding Labels: McCormick’s Pure Vanilla Extract

Dangers of Soy

Friday Feature: Still Finding Soy

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Soy is promoted as the most versatile food around. There is soy milk, soy meat, tofu and other variations of it for meat substitutes. But while the soy industry is promoting the bean, even speaking of the supposed health benefits of it, we hear little of how this food negatively affects the human body’s endocrine system. I wrote about the dangers of soy last year, at which time I had to eliminate a number of soy-laden foods from my cabinets and grocery list. I thought I had purged them all but my vigilant son has taken to reading labels and found eight items in our home that we had missed. I share them with you today to give you a primer list to help you in your ingredient reading quest:

  • Canola oil cooking spray
  • Hash browns (frozen)
  • Waffles (frozen)
  • Pancake mix
  • Chicken nuggets (frozen)
  • Whole grain bread
  • Salad dressing
  • Children’s vitamin supplements

Like last week, this post is to encourage you to take charge of your health by reading ingredient labels so you know what you are eating. If you don’t understand what you are reading, take the time to look up the ingredient, call the company and search websites like mine to see if someone has already done the research you need. Whatever way you are able, take charge of your health so that you will be as fit as possible to do all the work that is possible to build the Kingdom of God.