Kelp Noodles

We looovvvvvveeeee kelp noodles.  These are purely raw kelp noodles made from nothing but-------kelp!  This day we had them in a cabbage slaw made from cabbage from our garden and shredded carrots.  Laura made a sauce that's similar to the sauce at P.F. Chang's and tossed it through with the kelp noodles.  The noodles have a crunch to them when eaten raw, but will soften a bit if warmed.  They are so versatile and a great way to get extra iodine and nutrients.  Yummy!

The site for the kelp noodles (very inexpensive I will add):

www.kelpnoodles.com

Local Meal of a Different Kind

No pictures this evening!  We're still trying to reorganize things on our new hard drive, and we have a bit more tweaking to do before we load more pictures.

Actually, the meal this evening didn't even include pictures.  The photographer was too busy in the kitchen.  It was a local meal of a different kind.  Here's the story.....

My husband and our two daughters - 14 and 17 - coordinated an evening for the lady of the household.  

Dear husband asked me out on a date night this evening and wouldn't tell me where we were going - just that reservations were for 6:30.  So I showered and got all purtied up for my date and we left the house.  My date then proceeded to drive me around the neighborhood and ended our trip by pulling into our very own driveway.  He opened my car door and escorted me to our front door where there was a sign reading "Welcome to Ninetta's".  (From a song my classically trained opera singing youngest daughter used to sing)  We rang the doorbell and was greeted by a fair haired angel wearing an apron.  She ushered us to a dimly lit formal dining room lit with only hand dipped beeswax candles.  Romantic Italian opera was softly playing in the background while my husband proceeded to pour me a glass of wine.

The waitress then entered once more with our menus - 

Freshly made sourdough bread (made with my daughters own starter) with a local olive oil and balsamic dip.

Salad with greens fresh from the garden, tomatoes from a local farmer, croutons made from freshly made sourdough bread and homemade salad dressing with the feature ingredient being some hickory mustard we picked up at the Santa Fe farmers market.

Whole wheat angel hair pasta with meat sauce made from Edelen Farms grass fed beef (which I just purchased at the farmers market this morning).  An alternative of fresh zucchini pasta with tomato sauce was offered to the "lady of the house".

Dessert was sauteed peaches over local vanilla ice cream for the gentleman, and local pumpkin and almond torte freshly made by the eldest daughter.

WOW!  Unbelievable!  Sooo....... romantic, precious, delicious, and mostly local to boot!  As my husband said, "we will definitely be coming back to this restaurant"!

Again, no pictures, but it was a date night you know.  The servants left us to ourselves most of the time.  (I do have to say, though, that it was the only time I ever had a waitress give me a hug and kisses.)

This Week's Local Meal

My youngest daughter was so excited when we received our Greenling's local farms delivery, that she asked if she could make our local meal this week from start to finish. The following was what she prepared:

We first started with a salad made with beautiful green leaf lettuce. She topped it with sunflower sprouts and a dressing of valencia orange juice and olive oil.

Next were the cabbage cups. I thought this was a great idea, and they were so delicious. She simply took leaves from cabbage from our garden and filled them with roasted beets. She then drizzled meyer lemon juice on top and added a sprinkle of celtic sea salt.

The final course was sweet potato souffle with sauteed beet greens. She lightly cooked the sweet potatoes and added just a touch of butter made with raw milk by local Amish, and then topped it with local pecans and some apple sweetened cranberries (the only item in the entire meal not local). The beet greens were sauteed and topped with a squeeze of meyer lemon juice and dollops of local goat cheese.

Her creative dinner was pretty to the eye and scrumptious to the mouth.

Local Meals - Raw and Cooked

We were thrilled with our Greenling's box this week--great goodies including all sorts of root vegetables, greens and wonderful citrus! We made two meals for our local meals this week, one cooked and the other raw (for me).

First we roasted some veggies - turnips and cabbage from our garden, and carrots and beets that came in our local box. While they were roasting, we cooked the local potatoes and then mashed them with Texas Olive Oil and some of our home grown hatch chilis that Laura roasted and put up in the freezer. Then we assembled our roasted root veggies in the bottom of a deep dish pie plate and loaded the taters on top. Then the pie was baked for a bit so the flavors could marry.

Next came the sauteed greens. We used a combination of our garden turnip greens and local beet greens. These were topped with sauteed local yellow onions. My daughters absolutely loved these dishes.

My raw meal was sooo...... good! Collard wraps.

I started with two collard greens from my garden. (So much better and softer than what you get in the grocery store) I made some guacamole from avocados, lime juice and minced onion--all local, of course. I spread that on top of the collards and topped it with shredded local beets and turnips from my garden. I then topped it all off with pieces of baby lettuce and chives from our garden. Wow!

Here are the names of some of the local farmers that contributed to our local box from Greenling's:

Avocado, lime, meyer lemons, grapefruit and oranges - G & S Groves
Beets and potatoes - Naegelin Family Farm
Baby carrots - Animal Farm (We're saving the carrot tops for soup this weekend)

Local Salad

Many of our meals consist only of a large salad. This was a truly local salad. Every ingredient came either from local farmers in our Greenling's local box, or our garden.

The base of the salad was three different types of greens. We mixed in a large amount of sunflower sprouts and several herbs such as dill, chives, cilantro and tarragon. Next to be added was grated zucchini, sliced avocado (yes, local) and sliced radishes. We then made a dressing from the juice of a meyer lemon and Texas olive oil. The absolutely only ingredient that wasn't local was the celtic sea salt we sprinkled on at the end.

We actually had several other salad items we could have added, such as cabbage, broccoli and dark greens from our garden. But we wanted this salad to have a light texture with the baby lettuces and herbs. It had such a light delicate taste.

Raw Food Class - Part 2

Our menu for the class was:

Eggless Nog
Christmas Kale Salad
Walnut/Almond "Stuffing"
Sweet Potato Casserole with Honeyed Pecans
Cranberry Sauce
Apple Pie
Pecan Pie
Chocolate Torte

Everyone seemed to enjoy the dishes and the colors were just beautiful - great for the seasons!

We didn't quite get pictures of all the dishes alone, but I'll share some of them in the making.

Eat Local Challenge

We joined a challenge sponsored by Urban Hennery this week called the Dark Days Eat Local Challenge It runs from Nov 15 - Mar 15. The object is to eat a meal that's derived from completely local ingredients each week during the "dark days" of winter. Well, here in Texas, our winter days aren't so dark, and our garden produces year round. But we thought it would be fun to join in and see what others are doing. In fact our family is coming close to trying this challenge for an entire year - and every meal not just one a week. It's still in the planning stages, but our discussions have been really exciting so far. So.... here's our local dinner for the week of Nov 15.

It was almost too easy for us, as we chose to make this local meal the evening our local box from Greenling.com was delivered to our door. Between the box and our garden, it was pretty much a no brainer, but really fun. Again, not much raw as we decided this last minute. I'll work on making each meal more raw in the future.

We started with a salad of baby greens and dill from Greenlings and added chives from our garden. The dressing was made from a meyer lemon from our local box and Texas olive oil that we also bought from Greenlings.

We harvested chard from our garden, lightly sauteed it and topped it with little dollops of chevre from Pure Luck Dairy in Dripping Springs.

The red potatoes also came in our local box. I thinly sliced them and layered them in a dish, alternating potatoes with a drizzle of the Texas Olive Ranch olive oil and a dusting of local raw milk parmesan I ordered from Greenlings. So light and so good. (I don't normally eat cheese, but again, is was in the spirit of the evening)

The eggplant was also from our local box and was roasted in the oven with the Texas olive oil. The absolutely only non-local ingredients used were our celtic sea salt and freshly ground pepper from Frontier. Can't do without that!

What a local meal! It was great!

Casa de Luz Lunch

We drove to Dripping Springs recently to pick up some goat cheese from Pure Luck Dairy and decided to continue to Austin for lunch at a place I had been wanting to try. We weren't disappointed. It's called Casa de Luz - a restaurant that specializes in macrobiotics. While I'm not big on macrobiotics because of the emphasis on grains, this was a great meal. 98% of their ingredients are organic and they try to get as many items locally as possible.

The menu is set daily, and you can either partake in the whole meal or break it down to something like grain and bean, or soup and salad. We chose the entire meal. Each day is the same framework -- all you can drink tea, and all you can eat salad and soup. Then a plate with that day's bean, grain, veggie, greens with topping and "pickle" is brought to you. And you may ask for seconds on that plate also.

Our meal that day was wonderful. The soup was creamy cauliflower and corn. (Everything served is vegan) The salad was delicious and included sprouts and a platter loaded with raw veggies including beets, carrots, etc. The grain of the day was a mixture of millet and butternut squash and was topped with an onion gravy. We also enjoyed pinto beans and a veggie mixture of turnip, carrot and snap peas. The fermented "pickle" item was purple sauerkraut. Each one of us really enjoyed this meal. So much so that my daughters decided to make a "Casa de Luz" meal each week.

These are pictures of last week's spread. We started with a salad topped with sunflower sprouts and apples. Elizabeth made our soup which was basically a carrot broth with fresh parsley from our garden. Our grain of the day was quinoa, and we topped it with the same onion gravy (we purchased their cookbook). Laura made our veggies with butternut squash and zucchini from our Greenling's box and carrots. Our green was chard from our garden, coupled with pintos with cilantro. We sort of cheated on our fermented item and just dished out a spoonful of Bubbies pickle relish. No this meal wasn't wholly raw, but the girls worked hard and it was really delicious!

Locavore Dinner

Last night, Laura asked if we could eat the butternut squash that came in our Greenling's local box last week. Because we had been gone for the retreat this weekend, we still had quite a bit left that hadn't been eaten. So we brought out the recipe books to find a dish that would be worthy enough of our locally grown squash. Well, the first book we looked at had a pretty good looking recipe that Elizabeth could eat (because of her many food allergies). As we read the list of ingredients, we noticed that the majority of these ingredients were actually items that came in the local box we got from Greenling's.

This one recipe snowballed into an entire dinner made with mostly everything coming from either local farmers' produce from Greenling's, our local farmers market, or our own garden.

Laura made the squash dish which included butternut, yellow and zucchini squashes, onion, red pepper, and eggplant--all from the Greenling's box. We added fresh parsley and thyme from our own garden. The only ingredients not local was the lemon juice, garlic and olive oil dressing and a can of organic chick peas.

The side dishes were a salad of mixed lettuces and also a side of slightly sauteed collards all from our garden.

We couldn't leave my husband out, so I just made up a dish which he named Poblano Beef Bake. I just sauteed the red potatoes from the Greenling box and added them to some browned ground sirloin that I get for my husband at our farmers market. (I've been buying this gentleman's grass fed beef, free range chicken and eggs for years. Much healthier and tastier for David.) To that mixture I added roasted hatch chilis from our garden and a touch of onion, garlic, cumin, and chili powders. Then I stuffed this concoction into freshly picked poblanos from our garden and baked in the oven for a bit. He absolutely loved this dish and wants the leftovers for dinner tonight.

For dessert, Laura made David an apple dessert made with apples from, where else, but from our Greenling's local box. She served it with David's favorite ice cream - Blue Bell. Not organic, but sort of local. He was one happy camper.

Elizabeth set the table with ideas she learned from the retreat last weekend, and she asked David to bring home some flowers for the table. We had such a wonderful meal. The windows were open letting in the fresh cool air from outside (it was a little too chilly to actually eat outside), and we enjoyed an almost all local dinner.

Through our discussion at mealtime, we realized how economical, healthy and fresh this dinner was (although my future local dishes will be raw--I wanted to join my daughters on their veggie delights). We're now excited and feel challenged to try to eat as "locally" as possible. It sure beats the taste of veggies and fruits that have traveled such long distances and have sat for so long.

Can't wait to see what Greenling's brings this week! And we also can't wait til our cabbage and broccoli is ready in the garden. For now, our garden will just continue bringing in the greens.

With our current economic times being a little on edge, we are trying to find creative ways to be better stewards of what we have been given. I think these locavore meals are a keeper.

God is so good and faithful!

Love that (not) Tuna

Alissa Cohen's not tuna tastes the closest to tuna that we've tried. I'm thinking it's the bit of almond butter that helps. I also add extra kelp and some dulse to further the "sea" taste. This day I wasn't prepared with some of the sprouts, so I just used extra clover and broccoli sprouts. I also add chopped Bubbies pickles, and some more on the side. I was trying to use up some tomatoes, so I just served the "tuna" on tomato slices. Perfect, light, and filling.

A Lovely Catered Al Fresco Dinner

We catered a dinner two Fridays ago at the home of one of our students. It was so much fun! My youngest was still getting over the chicken pox, so Laura and I handled this by ourselves.
We kept it a simple meal so that guests would think (hmm... maybe I could make this myself!)

The setting was on the deck in the backyard with tons of beautiful flowers and landscaping. You know how we love gardens! So relaxing and just plain pretty.

We first served coconut water for the before dinner drink and set out appetizers. Laura made some wonderful spicy avocado fries. She came up with the recipe from scratch (you'll find the recipe in our "soon to be" recipe book) and they were scrumptious. The other appetizer was guacamole stuffed creminis, a take off Alissa Cohen's portabello entree.




The guests then sat down at beautifully decorated tables with cloth linens with candlelight and tree lights from above. The pineapple cucumber gazpacho was waiting for them. (from Raw Food/Real World)

For the entree, we stuffed huge dark green romaine leaves with a seed cheeze and Rawvolution's mango salsa and topped it with clover sprouts. The side salad was made from mache, herb salad mix, and baby romaine topped with pomegranate seeds, walnuts and honey crisp apple slices. The dressing was a simple blend of fresh squeezed orange juice, olive oil and celtic salt. This was a really colorful plate.




And because everyone seems to ask for Laura's chocolate pudding, we served it up with raspberries for dessert.

The weather was also perfect for a lovely al fresco dinner. And did the guests enjoy a raw meal? Hardly a plate came back with even a crumb. Everyone seemed to enjoy it so much that we had questions galore. We think there will be a few more people looking into the joy of raw food!

Raw Food -- Take Me Away!

Well, for the last few days, we've been nursing my youngest with the Chicken Pox. Just around the time that she probably would have contracted them as a little girl, the vaccine came on the market and it became impossible to find anyone with them for her to be exposed. Soo.....she's now almost 14 and has finally experienced this uncomfortable nuisance due to the chicken pox coming back in fashion. I guess all those who took the vaccine are finding that it doesn't work as well as they had been told.

This has been a bittersweet event. You never want to see a loved one in such agony, but on the reverse side, we're glad that they finally found her so that she won't have to go through this as an adult.

So after some looonnng days and a few sleepless nights, we were looking for something quick but fun and very refreshing. We decided on this dish that was served as an appetizer in a local restaurant. Look through some of my back posts for the actual picture of the yummy concoction that was made for us tableside.




We sliced very red tomatoes for the base and topped with a mix of diced zucchini, cucumber, and green and black olives. We sprinkled on some rosemary olive oil we get shipped from Napa Valley and ended with some fresh cracked black pepper. The combination of the veggies was such that not one veggie in particular stood out--just a very clean and fresh taste--just what the Dr. didn't order.

We love these flavored olive oils. Their store in St. Helena is so much fun. They have tables and tables of different olive oils, vinegars, and lavender products that are just loaded with goodies. Just dip a little spoon in the samples and taste the olive oil straight. Our favorites are rosemary, garlic, and jalapeno. These flavored oils are not labeled organic, but after discussing it with one of their helpful associates, found that they are grown organically without pesticides, etc.-- just haven't paid for the certification. Are they raw? Don't know, but just a touch here and there on some fresh fruits and veggies are delish--no different than occassionally using maple syrup, agave, etc.

Great Veggies in Midland

What a great sign! When traveling, it's always wise to scout ahead of the trip and find what veggie friendly restaurants are available. This was a great find in Midland, Texas -- Strawberry Fields. Perfect for our family of mixed diets. Plenty of organic vegetarian items with a few free range chicken dishes thrown in for my husband. Great juices and smoothies as well as a salad bar. It's name came from the owner's love of the oldies. There were album covers all over the walls. My husband was in absolute heaven.

Raw Comfort Foods Class

I'll be following up with a picture or two of our latest class.  Actually there are probably only a couple because we were so busy with 19 of y'all attending.  This was probably one of our favorite classes because we were fixing some of our favorite foods. 

For those not able to join us, here's the menu:

Best Ever Nut Mylk

Mango-Cherry Mylk Shake

Strawberry Mylk Shake

Nacho Cheeze Dip

Serene's Energy Flat Bread

Garden Burger with Ketchup and Mustard

Mango Salsa and Tomato Salsa

Laura's Hot and Spicy Chili Fries

Seed Cheeze

Spicy Beenies

Two flavors of Elizabeth's Yogert with Berries

Laura's Famous Chocolate Pudding

We started with the shakes and then made several of the staple items.  Since some of the attendees were on an anti-fungal diet, we had a couple of choices for some of the items that followed the anti-fungal principles (including no vinegars, mushrooms, nutritional yeast, sweet fruits, etc.).  The girls really had fun altering some of our regular recipes to accommodate these needs.

We put all of the savories out on the kitchen island and showed how to make burgers, pizzas or tacos using the bread and flax crackers as a base.  Then everyone got in line and made their own fun creations based on their tastes.

Some took time to go out and look at our fall garden.  Can't wait for all the babies to be ready for harvest.  

It was a great day and we really enjoyed the fellowship with everyone!

Ladies Lunch

The girls and I had quite a lunch today. We started making smoothies and just kept going through entrees and dessert!

Laura started out making almond milk. Just 4 cups water and 1 cup almonds with a bit of coconut oil, agave nectar and vanilla blended in the vitamix. This has been a staple for Elizabeth who uses this not only for the nourishment but also calories. We make this milk with all sorts of nuts--hemp which provides the omega 3s and 6s and brazil nuts rich in selenium are our favorites.

This smoothie today was made with mango and cherries added to the milk. Tastes just like a milk shake (only better)!









Next came the entree for Laura and I. (Elizabeth is allergic to a couple of the ingredients so her entree is below.) We called it Mexican Pizza for lack of a better term. It wasn't from any one recipe but a concoction of several and even altered at that. To duplicate this yummy lunch, just use your favorite recipes for pizza bread, seed cheeze and refried beenies. Top with baby spinach, soaked sun dried tomatoes, diced red pepper, and raw olives. We served it with a side of sliced avocado and a squeeze of lemon juice. I can't even describe how luscious this was--and very filling.



Here's Elizabeth's entree--I Can't Believe It's Not Egg Salad

Because of her allergies, she had to tweak the recipe in Rawvolution--no yellow turmeric here. She also added Bubbies dill pickles to the mixture of macadamia nuts, lemon juice, garlic, red peppers, and celery. Always the artist, she decorated her plate with baby spinach sprinkled with macadamia nuts.



And the best part? Laura surprised us with a raw apple pie. She uses the recipe in Jennifer Cornbleet's Raw for 1 or 2 People as her base and changes it to suit our tastes. Just unbelievable! It was even fragrant with the cinnamon and nutmeg - didn't miss the smells from the oven.

Of course, this wasn't very good food combining. But sometimes you just have to have fun in the kitchen!

Memories of Raw Food Classes

I'ts been awhile since I've posted. My, how life happens.

Here's some of the dishes we taught raw food students to make at some of our classes. We have another beginning class next week and an advanced class in August. We really enjoy the time we spend with the attendees and we even learn quite a bit from them.

Not Charlie the Tuna Salad

I Can't Believe It's Not Egg Salad

Zucchini Fettucini with Donna's Summer Marinara

Kale Salad

Pineapple Gazpacho from Raw Food Real World

Spring Garden

It's been awhile since I've posted. We had a mishap (parents left daughters camera at a restaurant in California). Sooo...... we bought her a new one, and now she's back being our resident photographer.

I'll be sharing some pictures of the spring garden in the next few posts. The veggies and flowers in spring are just the most beautiful of the year. (The summer garden gets to looking like an overgrown jungle.)



This little friend just appeared. We haven't had to bring any in yet (that will be later in the hotter weather)



The color of the eggplant flowers are gorgeous!


Some red basil mixed in with the tomatoes.

We love the chard in green drinks, green smoothies and salads. They also make great wraps.

Haricot verts -- not as many came up as we had hoped, but they're my husband's favorite.