Winners of Leah Salmon Giveaway!

The winner of Leah's Raw Food Feast is.....................

Dark Moon!

The winner of The Ultimate You is...............

Betty J!

Thanks everyone for entering. More cool giveaways are coming soon.

Love,

Althea

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Winners of Leah Salmon Giveaway!

CTL + ALT + DLT (aka Starting Over with Raw Food)

Yes, I cleaned OUT my fridge!

I'll start this post the same way I'll end it:

"Eat and live in the way that is best for YOU!"

I have decided to make a commitment to myself. In Leah's Raw Food Fest, she writes, "If you fail to plan, plan to fail." I've been on and off the raw path for 6 years now.

I've given it tons of thought.

I've read millions of books.

I've made some pretty darn good food, with plenty of clunkers thrown in.

I've fasted, once successfully. Other times, not so successful.

I subscribe to others' raw food blogs.

I've joined communities.

I've written The Raw Food Hero's Journey.

I've introduced my husband to raw food.

My oldest son will try anything once, so I've got at least one child open to raw food.

I've taught classes.

But still, this Candida is kicking my ASS. I am not living the entire point of my blog which is my transition from a starch-loving vegetarian to raw vegan who enjoys spectacular health.

(If you don't know what Candida is, here's an explanation from The National Candida Center: Candida Albicans is a yeast microorganism that commonly lives in the intestinal tract of every human being. It shares space in your bowel with a variety of other microorganisms, mostly helpful bacteria, call probiotics. The bacteria to yeast ration in a healthy person is about 10:1, so in a normal bowel everything lives in a nice ecological balance. The problem comes when your “inner ecology” gets off balance through a variety of causes. The bowel becomes vulnerable to other opportunistic’ microorganisms seeking a new home. With no healthy probiotics to keep it under control, the growth of yeast takes off, multiplies and causes Candida Overgrowth yeast infection resulting in a multitude of symptoms.)

I've enjoyed perfect health once in my life: when I participated in the Yabba Pot's 21-day Raw Food Challenge in December 2006.  The first four days I felt like crap. The last 17 days were the clearest, cleanest, most-energetic I've have ever been. It helped a mom like me that all my meals were prepared for me; I can't ignore that part of it contributed to my success.

But it was the high-fiber, nutrient dense food that made me feel so good. I was eating mostly veggies and hardly any fruit, if any. Processed sugars and even Nature's sugar, found in fruit, are what Candida feed on.

There's constantly lots of noise and static on raw food social networks about the "best" raw food diet. That &%$! gets on my nerves. The best way to eat is what is best for YOU. I encourage people to keep a food diary and write down how you feel twenty minutes to an hour after you eat. Your body and internal organs do communicate with you. LISTEN, and you'll discover what foods do and don't work for you.

For me, a mostly raw food diet of vegetables, seaweeds, smoothies and juices work best. Because I do enjoy the pleasure of food, I decided not to restrict tasting cooked food. The caveat is I stay away from processed food and sugars. I'll still make raw desserts for my family (got some cookies in the dehydrator now), but for me, not so much. 

I've decided to "Eat for Beauty." When your internal organs function at their optimum level (yes, you can have a beautiful, clean colon!), your internal beauty reflects as outer beauty. My next two posts will elaborate on this further. 

I am drafting a contract to myself. I will sign and date. My commitment includes 95% raw food, yoga, herbs, affirmations, exercise, and plenty of positivity. This is a year-long commitment between July 15, 2010 and July 15, 2011.

Ready to come along?

Love,

Althea

(comments ALWAYS welcomed!)

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CTL + ALT + DLT (aka Starting Over with Raw Food)

Don't Forget to Enter Giveaway

Time is almost running out to enter to win one of Leah Salmon's ebooks "Leah's Raw Food Feast" or "The Ultimate You!"

Enter here:

http://therawmochaangel.blogspot.com/2010/07/interview-with-leah-salmon-giveaway.html

Simply answer the question, "What is the best raw food or drink your've ever had?" Deadline is Thursday, July 15 at 11:59 EST.

Leah's website is: http://www.davidel.com/

Love,

Althea

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Don't Forget to Enter Giveaway

Strawberry Crepes

Strawberry Crepes

I've been fortunate to have made crepes similar to these before. If you missed my rave about Alissa Cohen's Strawberry Crepes, it's here: http://therawmochaangel.blogspot.com/2009/02/when-raw-food-goes-bad-good-and.html

Those easily make my top three best raw food I've ever had. (#1 being Kephra Anu's Kale and Egg Salad; #2 being Matt Amsden's Tostadas from his book RAWvolution.)

So when I saw Red, White, and Blue Crepes at Gena's blog Choosing Raw, I thought, "I can make that today!...Minus the blueberries because I don't have any." Away we go!

The crepe is simply bananas. I don't put anything else in it. Blend five ripe bananas in a food processor with "S" blade. Don't add anything. No water, no nothing. The bananas will turn into a cream. Put them in a dehydrator at 105 degrees, in 6" circles, on the Teflex sheet. I don't have Teflex sheets, so I used parchment paper. Do not use wax paper, plastic wrap nor aluminum foil. I dehydrated them for 12 hours. Check them at 10 hours. I didn't have to turn them over.

I peeled them off the parchment paper with ease. They are like fruit leathers. You want them to be pliable. See how I'm able to fold them in half?

Next are the strawberries. I cut up a cup of strawberries, but you can use as many as you like. I put them in the dehydrator on the mesh screens for 12 hours as well (along with the bananas). Gena shared this technique from Raw Food Real World.

Take them out of the dehydrator and put them in the food processor. You don't need to add water. But I did notice the more berries I added, the easier it was to blend. I did add a little bit of water to get the berries moving. But a "little bit" (start with a tablespoon) is all you need because you want a strawberry jam, not strawberry sauce!

For the "whipped cream" I used my "go-to" sauce that I always use, my infamous Sweet Cashew Cream. This is the same cream I used in my Oprah audition. I'm telling ya'll, if you can eat nuts, please put this on your Raw Food Staples list.

4 cups of cashews

2 teaspoon vanilla extract

4 tablespoons agave nectar

Water JUST TO THE TOP of the cashews.

Blend until smooth. You want it creamy and THICK.

Put the strawberry jam on first, then the cashew cream. Fold over. Eat!

 A good way to soften the crepes is to put the jam on top too. Just to share, if you really love strawberries, a sauce can be made like this:

Strawberry Sauce

1 1/2 cup strawberries

1-2 tablespoons honey

The combination is HEAVENLY. It's sweet and creamy. My oldest son went nuts for this. Again, you have a kid-friendly and adult-friendly breakfast!

Love,

Althea

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Strawberry Crepes

Vanilla Milkshake

We've had triple-digit degree weather here on the Eastern Seaboard. It finally rained last night and this afternoon, breaking the unbearable heat. Summer is not nearly over, so I thought I'd share a vanilla milkshake recipe with ya'll so the next time it's blazing hot, you'll have a "go-to" drink!

This recipe is adapted from Raw Food Real World by Sarma Melngailis and Matthew Kenney

2 frozen bananas

2 cups non-dairy vanilla milk (I use almond milk)

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

2 packets stevia (you can use raw honey or agave too, to taste)

pinch of sea salt

opt: 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract if you make your own milk or use a plain milk

Blend!

Always keep ripe bananas your freezer.

I run them under hot water until the peel comes off easily.

If you need more milk, just add it as the milkshake is blending.

This is a creamy, refreshing drink that you'll be drinking all summer long! Your children will beg you for it. Thank me later :-).

love,

Althea

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Vanilla Milkshake

Three Inspiring People

Lately I've read about people who have completely transformed their lives, or are doing some out-of-box things to change themselves.

Still from May I Be Frank?

http://mayibefrankmovie.wordpress.com/index/

http://www.youtube.com/user/MayIBeFrankMovie

My mother sent me a link to a documentary called "May I Be Frank." Even though I've only watched the trailers, I was so moved, I shared it on my Facebook page. Now I am sharing with you all. If you are moved, please pass around to your friends, and see if you can get the movie screened in your city.

 

Movie Synopsis from the May I Be Frank website:

May I Be Frank chronicles the transformation of Frank Ferrante’s life. Frank is 54 years old, obese, depressed, and addicted. He stumbles into a local raw, organic and vegan restaurant in San Francisco, Café Gratitude. When Ryland, a server at Café Gratitude asks Frank “What is one thing you want to do before you die?” Frank replies, “I want to fall in love one more time, but no one will love me looking the way I do."

Ryland, his brother Cary, and Conor, his best friend, are inspired by the possibility of helping Frank. For the next 42 days, Frank will eat only raw food, practice gratitude, visit local holistic practitioners, and get a weekly colonic. Ryland, Conor, and Cary get to support Frank’s miraculous transformation. Frank gets a new body, a clearer mind, and most importantly, a soaring spirit. May I Be Frank documents the essence of the human condition and what it truly means to fall in love again.

Amanda, Rory, and Isabel

Live My Life NOW Trek

I learned about Amanda's Live My Life NOW Trek through her husband Raw Dawg Rory's website. Amanda is walking across the United States. Why? Here's what she had to say:

I’m waiting. The wait is getting longer and longer. I entertain myself with human interest stories, “what not to wear” celebrities and watching everyone else move on. My moment never happens and I realize it’s because I am waiting, waiting for something that could never happen as my life passes me by.

This is what I was thinking at 3 a.m. as I stared at my sleeping husband and felt badly for myself. Then I got a little tinge of excitement, my new Wii workout game was coming in the mail soon! I couldn’t wait to play it. Until I realized that I’ve done this before, I’ve been excited over a workout, game, or something else that will change my life, but I will never stick with it.

I eat healthy, I exercise, and I barely see any changes in my body, so I give up, lie around pitying myself, and go on dreaming that someday I will lose weight and reach my goal.

But my goal was never just to lose weight. I have a reason to lose weight. I’ve always imagined myself as a runner, getting up at 5 a.m., heading out to the park, and running a few miles before I have to be in at work. I would feel good for the rest of the day, awake and excited, and I would be healthy and active.

But what I realized that night was that I really don’t understand why I have to lose the weight before I can live my life. What’s so wrong with being fat? I eat healthy, I exercise (I could do more) and I have no other health concerns. Why should I have to watch each year of my life fly by while I sit around wishing for “someday”?

This was when I made the decision. I was going to do what I have always wanted to do. I’m not going to give up; I’m not going to give in. This is my one last chance and I am not going to let it pass me by. I am going to Trek Across America.

Amanda and her family changed their route and are taking a more southern route across the country. They need donations and sponsors. If interested, please visit her website at: http://www.livemylifenowtrek.com/index.html

Shelley

Shelley Abegg is a ten-year cancer survivor and creator of Raw Food Art. Although Shelley has made it clear that raw food healed her breast cancer, she's never discussed the journey. Yesterday, she began blogging about it. She will turn the blog into a book. But for now you can sign up and read her journey for free.

http://rawfoodart.blogspot.com/2010/07/testimony-to-shelley-abeggs-creation.html

Love,

Althea

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Three Inspiring People

Interview with Leah Salmon + Giveaway!

Leah Salmon CMTA BSY. Nutri. Founder of Davidel.com has been working in the world of

complementary health and nutrition for over 9 years. She has taught seminars, run children’s workshops on simple healthy food preparation and smoothie making, been interviewed on local and national radio stations and written articles for several national magazines and newspapers on many aspects of health, nutrition and diet.

Leah’s professional achievements to date include becoming a Certified Metabolic Typing Advisor, holding diplomas in Nutrition, Herbalism, Holistic Diagnostic Techniques and Iridology from The British School of Yoga and she’s a Level Two Reiju and Sekhem Healer through Sharma Pillay of Divinity Healing.

In recent years, she has become more involve in raw food, attending trainings, workshops and retreats, as well as implementing more raw and live foods into her own family’s life. Client testimonials and feedback from her seminars and workshops show that Leah’s friendly, direct and informative approach allow her clients and audience, to not only understand how their body reacts to food, but also how they can make achievable steps to long lasting health.

1. Your first book, "The Ultimate You" opens with a quote "If the doctors of today don't become nutritionists, the doctors of tomorrow will be nutritionists." Can you tell us how that quote motivated you to become a healer?

Firstly, I’m not sure I would call myself a healer, as much as a coach who helps people to use their foods, nature and learning to listen to their own bodies to heal themselves, but back to the question! It motivated me to do the work I do, because as a teenager, I was faced with a health problem that I didn’t want to get treated by a doctor, because from my previous experiences with them, I knew they couldn’t help me. In the quest to try and cure myself, I started studying herbal medicine, iridology, massage, aromatherapy and finally settled in natural nutrition, which is where I found this quote. It confirmed to me that if I REALLY wanted to be able to help people to heal themselves, as I had done from myself, I had to be able to help them get right the one thing they did every day, 3, 4, 5 times a day, which was eating.

It all starts from there, and when I discovered that the very people whose hands we put our health, spent a few weeks learning about diet, I also knew that they were the last people I would ever go to for my health maintenance. But how could I discourage people from going to them to maintain their health, without giving people an alternative that works, so I became the alternative, always discovering new natural ways to help people help themselves to better health.

2. How did "The Ultimate You" come to life? I love that it's a holistic healing book that allows readers to re-align every area of their lives.

 

Thanks for the feedback, it’s great to hear. Whilst I was learning about health, it became a little overwhelming. There seemed to be hundreds of huge changes that I need to make to my life before I could start to feel a difference, But the reality was that making and committing to small regular changes was what lead to the success I experienced in my health. A big part of being holistic is creating a balance in your life, so only concentrating on one area and paying no attention to the others won’t get you very far in the long run, but improving all areas of your life, in small manageable steps can give you great results.

3. The book is a 39-week plan to change people's lives. Have you had people offer testimonies of their finishing the entire 39 weeks, and how had their lives changed?

I’ve had some lovely feedback from people reading the whole book in a night and implementing the steps right away. Maybe I underestimated some people’s ability for change! The book was meant to give people small steps they could implement on a weekly basis, but many people have found the steps so easy to implement, that they try 3 or 4 of them at a time and feel totally different in just a few short weeks. Whilst others have let me know that working though the steps has taken them longer than a week, but they are enjoying the gradual feeling of improvement with minimal effort.

4. Leah's Raw Food Feast is your newest book. Can you tell my readers about it?

Yes, I’d love to! When I first got into raw foods, the gold standard seemed to be going 100% raw full time overnight and for me this didn’t happen at all, As most of us, I had stacks of books and recipes, but putting it all together was a little challenging, even for the Naturally You Coach!!! But I still really enjoyed the benefits of raw live foods and wanted to find a way to incorporate it into my life in a more manageable way. So I decided to try and go 100% raw for 9 days a month and see if I could handle that (along with including 50% more raw to my diet in between). This worked a treat for me, and what helped even more was when I found someone’s meal plan for a day that I could adapt to my tastes. So I decided to help anyone else out there who wanted to experience being 100% raw for a shorter period of time, with a variety of plans they could choose to follow, PLUS the recipes for all the foods on the plans. It’s a fail-safe book for getting it right first time with raw foods, that you can easily extended depending on how you go.

5. You write about Metabolic Typing in Leah's Raw Food Feast. Can you explain it, and how a person's type affects what type of raw food diet she should eat?

 

In the same way we all have different fingerprints, we all also, on a biochemical level (i.e. right down to our cells) have different requirements for nutrients and a different balance of macronutrients (carbohydrates, proteins and fats). There is no ‘One-Size-Fits-All’ diet that everyone can follow and be healthy, otherwise everyone that tried the Atkins diet would have been successful on it, everyone that tried the zone diet would be in the zone and loving it and everyone who tried the South beach diet would have a South Beach body. But what actually happens is, some people will have great success with these diets, others will feel no different and others will actually feel worse.

 

There are universal guidelines that apply to us all (drink plenty of water, avoid poisons like msg, aspartame, trans fans etc) but apart from that, we are unique and the world is a better place for it.

 

In short there are roughly 3 different types you can be ( you use a detailed but simple questionnaire to determine your type), a protein type who does better on high levels of proteins and fats, a carbohydrate type that thrives on higher levels of carbs in their diet and a mixed or balanced type who needs a good balance of proteins, carbs and fats to feel great. So if you’re a protein type and try to eat a raw vegan diet mainly comprised of fruits, salad vegetables, grains and greens, you may struggle. Similarly, if you are a carbohydrate type (as I am) and you try to eat a raw vegan diet mainly made up of nut milks, seaweeds, oils, avocado and higher protein veg like mushrooms, sweet corn and olives (as I did) you will struggle. This is why in my book I give special meal plans dedicated to proteins lovers and carbohydrate lovers, so once you discover your type you can thrive on raw foods using a plan for you.

 

6. How does you husband, children, and family feel about your raw lifestyle? Hubby’s a grown man, so he makes his own decision as to what he want s to eat on any given day, but as time goes by, he seems to be getting more and more into eating higher levels of raw foods. I aim to give my children 3 raw meals a day most days and wholesome snacks which works well for them. I have noticed their health improve the more raw foods they eat, they are much more conscious of what foods are wholesome and which ones aren’t and they really enjoy helping me make the desserts and choosing fruits and veg at the supermarket. They have their favourite cooked and raw foods, the like being able to request their favourite snacks and actually get them!!!. I won’t enforce any lifestyle on them they don’t want, so if they ask for more cooked food when they are older (they are all under 6 now) then that’s fine. But the variety, vibrancy and life in the foods they eat now makes meals times interesting.

7. Where do you see your business in 5 years?

By then, I aim to have at least 5 products to help more people get healthy naturally, I’d also like to more actively help younger children and adults learn more about incorporating natural living into their lives and the importance of it. Many live a life they think they have to (they can’t afford to eat healthy, they don’t know what to do with whole foods etc) so I want to show them how easy it can be to live like our ancestors, not relying on fake processed foods and practices and building good health at the same time. I’d love to have a Naturally You Education Centre where people can come to learn and experience naturally healthy living, on a charitable basis.

8. Where do you see yourself in 5 years?

In Africa, living on a wide expansive plot of land, that bears rich organic fruits and vegetables, not far from a small lake in case we feel like fresh fish once in a while. Enjoying my family, the sun, nature and all the wondrous gifts the ancestors bestow on us.

9. Do you have parting words for The Raw Mocha Angel readers?

Be You and Know You. You are unique and beautiful, don’t try to be a like anyone else, or expect your body to function like anyone else’s. Get in tune with yourself so you can understand and respond to the signals your body give you, so you can become in control of yourself and your health.

GIVEAWAY!!!!!!!!

Two lucky people will win! One (1) person wins a copy of the ebook Leah's Raw Food Feast. Another lucky person (1) wins a copy of the ebook The Ultimate You!

- Leave a comment at the end of this post. Answer the questions, "What's the best raw food or drink you have ever had? (Share the recipe if you know it.) And tell me which book you would like to win!"

- Post your comment by 11:59pm EST, Thursday, July 15, 2010.

-All comments are moderated because I get a lot of comments in Chinese. If you have an email account you can comment. If you have trouble, send an email to me at mochaangels@aol.com.

- I will pick the winner at random. The winners will receive an email from me on Friday, July 16, 2010. I will announce the two winners on The Raw Mocha Angel blog on that same day.

- Good luck!

Love,

Althea

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Interview with Leah Salmon + Giveaway!

Leah's Raw Food Feast

I connected with the wonderful Leah Salmon, The Naturally You Coach, on Facebook a few months ago. After reading about her, I knew I had to interview her for my blog. I read her books first and tried out the recipes.

They were a hit.

My oldest son loves juices and smoothies (he likes almost everything!) He is pictured before drinking Leah's Apple, Carrot, and Broccoli Juice, and a Carrot Juice.

This is a Mushroom and Walnut Burger from Leah's Raw Food Feast. This book teaches you how to be raw for nine days. Complete with recipes and a planning menu, depending on your Metabolic Type (explanation in my next post), this book is for the beginner. It guides you every step of the way with Leah's gentle guidance. This burger was easy to make and very, very good.

And you all know how I love a Kale Salad, of any kind. Again, it was easy. There are lots of complaints about raw food being complicated and expensive. It can be. But it doesn't have to be that way. Leah's book was full of easy recipes, with ingredients that can be found at your local grocer or farmer's market.

So guess what's next?

And interview with Leah Salmon and a giveway of her wonderful books!

Love,

Althea

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Leah's Raw Food Feast

1st Annual DC Raw Food Festival

Yes, the First Annual DC Raw Food Fest organized by Wanakhavi Wakhisi and SaMaa Claiborne was on June 6...and I'm just now blogging about it :-). It was SO much fun. Wanakhavi said about one hundred fifty people showed up. It would have been more but DC was hit with a massive thunderstorm that afternoon. The lights even when out for a moment. Outside of the rain, the event was a hit. It was nothing but love.

My husband Rom and our boys were there. The children ran around playing with each other enjoying themselves. The adults went around to each table sampling food. There were eleven vendors. My time was tight. I barely left my table, but when I did I sampled kale chips, banana ice cream, "cheese" crackers, and and "egg" salad and kale.

Khepra Anu of Mojo Juice Club prepared the egg salad and kale. It was the single best plate of raw food I have EVER eaten. Period. I've had a lot of tasty raw food. I became a Khepra fan in an instant. If you are in the DC area and can take one of his classes, do so. If not, get his DVDs. I wrote him and told him that his food was "perfection on a plate." I believe the egg salad was made from coconut meat. Think of the best egg salad, or even deviled eggs you've ever had, then imagine it silky. The kale salad was perfectly seasoned. I couldn't get over it. I wanted more, but Jona had to go to the bathroom. When I got back, Khepra was packing up. (Ugh!)

And in all my pictures, I have the same look on my face because I took off my glasses before the shot was taken. I can't see a thing without my glasses or contacts. I'm just trying not to squint!

This is me and Dana Smith-Rogers, founder of Spiritual Essence Yoga. She also auditioned for her own show on Oprah Winfrey Network. Her audition is here:

http://myown.oprah.com/audition/index.html?request=video_details&response_id=3649&promo_id=1

Everyone wanted the recipe to the Apple Crisp I served. Here it is!

Raw Apple Crisp Redux 2

8 apples cubed & peeled

½ cup agave nectar

1 teaspoon cinnamon

Pinch to ¼ teaspoon cardamom

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Mix the spices together and pour over the apples. Let marinate for 2 hours to overnight.

Icing

4 cups of cashews

2 teaspoon vanilla extract

4 tablespoons agave nectar

Water JUST TO THE TOP of the cashews.

Blend until smooth. You want it creamy and THICK.

Top the apples with your favorite raw granola. Put the icing on top of that and you've got one heck of a dessert.

This is me with Marcy, one our Raw Mocha Angel readers. She is pictured with her husband Greg, and their children Hannah, Alston (14), John (12), Caleb (9). I was so happy to meet her in person. Thank you for the love Marcy and Greg!

Wanakhavi, the organizer. He is on a quest to be a raw vegan for one year. He began his journey on January 1st. He says he's lost 25 pounds and feels amazing.

Me and Ms. Kiona Cloud. Love her energy.

Me, Jessica, Monica, and their sons.

Me, Raymond, and D'ana. She is the one who told me about the event and got me in touch with Wanakhavi. Thank you! I can't wait until next years event!

Love,

Althea

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1st Annual DC Raw Food Festival