TheBanyanTree: day two point five...

[Julie Anna Teague]

...of the anti-cancer, all-organic, raw foods diet, and of no caffeine or
diet cokes for me. Oy.  So far I am not having bad headaches, but am
drinking decaf green tea which gets me over the rough spots.  One of the
hardest things for me, I realize, is that I've had a pretty bad sweet
tooth in recent years.  Last night I wanted something sweet so I ate some
raisins and that seemed to do the trick for me.  After grocery shopping
last night, the kitchen counter looked like we were opening a vegetarian
restaurant.  I've been vegetarian for years now, but that does not mean
I've been eating this many vegetables and fruits by any stretch.  It's
pretty amazing the amount of produce you go through when eating only raw
foods. 

So what does a "raw food" day look like?  For breakfast yesterday we had
berry-banana smoothies.  For lunch I had raw almonds and a bottle of
"Green Machine" juice.  It's a heavy duty, fresh fruit juices with
spiralina and wheat grass.  Very yummy, if you've never tried one.  They
sell them in the health food section of the grocery. For dinner I fixed a
recipe I found on the web called "raw spagetti and sauce".  The "pasta" 
is raw zuccini, cut into very, very thin strips.  The sauce is made from
sundried tomatoes and fresh tomatoes and garlic and basil and some other
veggies, all chopped together in the food processor.  It was actually very
good and satisfying, and even though my son was eating regular pasta right
in front of me, one of my favorite things in the whole world, I was not
feeling deprived.  Last night I soaked shelled buckwheat and dates, and
this morning, following another web recipe, I put the buckwheat, dates, an
apple, cinnamon, and nutmeg into the food processor.  It makes a sweet,
cold cereal that, quite honestly, was just delicious. Tonights dinner is
going to be Tabuleh with soaked grains and a raw asparagus soup with
tahini.  We have avocados ripening and grains soaking and life feels
abundant and good. 

I think we can do this.  I am gathering recipes, and of course you can
always just eat raw fruits and veggies and nuts (but that gets old).  I'm
finding that I really have to plan ahead with soaking grains and nuts for
some of the recipes.  For instance, we are going to have these raw
"milkshakes" that are supposed to be quite delicious, but requires almonds
to be soaked for 24 hours.  We also really need a food dehydrator for some
of the recipes.  I have a good juicer and a halfway decent food processor,
which are also required. 

We are both really excited about starting this, not just for the cancer,
but for our overall health.  It gives us something to be excited about, a
new goal to share, new food options to explore.  I think those things in
themselves are something very positive in our lives. Lee says it is
somewhat symbolic that we started what he calls our "rebirth" on Easter. 
It is definitely a rebirth of a lot of ideals about health and conscious
eating that both of us have believed in and lived at various times in our
lives, but had fallen away from in the rush of life. 

Julie