Multi-taskers

I love making foods that can be more than one meal. I don't mean like leftovers. I mean foods that actually do more than one thing. There's a guy on TV who refuses to have any tools or appliances in his kitchen that only have one purpose, and I feel that way about food. Example number one, pineapple. We love it cut up in chunks, especially in a fruit salad. It's a great snack dried also when we have more than we can use fresh. We also use two of them when we make Hawaiian granola, so it definately qualifies as a multi-tasker.

The picture at the top of the article demonstrates another one: no-net tuna. We've seen this on every menu at every raw vegan restaurant we've been to, but I don't see people trying to do a lot of other things with this sunflower seed pate. Because it makes a large quantity, and we get tired of eating it every day, we were anxious to use it in some other ways besides just on top of a salad (though it is good that way!).

One of our favorite variations is the sushi roll. Yesterday Alicia lined a nori sheet with a leaf of lettuce and spread some no-net tuna on it. Then she added a couple of slices of pickle from some leftover cucumber salad and some cabbage from leftover ensalada. We shredded up some carrots and slivered up some red pepper to make a perfect little sushi roll. Easy peasy lunch, wouldn't you say?

We also like to sandwich a layer of no-net between 2 nori sheets to make a tasty little snack. These can be eaten fresh, but we like to dehydrate them a little while to make a little sandwich cracker. We get a lot of mileage out of our no-net!

The other day my meat and potatoes son was visiting while we were making some. He wouldn't even try it (he's been burned before, he says!), but his friend who came with him did. She said, "That doesn't taste like tuna salad. Why do you call it that?" I guess it sounds better to say it is no-net tuna (since it does look like it) than to ask the kids if they want sunflower seed pate on their salad tonight. There are so many variations of sunflower seed pate that each would have to have their own name anyway. Can you think of something better to call it? It does have kelp in it (to make it from the sea) and all the other stuff that goes into tuna salad, so that seems as good a name as any.

Besides, when you haven't had any "real" tuna in a couple year, who can remember what it's supposed to taste like. All we know is that we like it, and our 12 year old grandson could eat it everyday if we weren't trying to find so many other things to do with it.

Another great multi-tasker is the honey almond butter. We love to eat it as a dip for apple slices and/or celery sticks, but it is also good as a base for a peanut sauce we make to go over shredded zucchini (pasta). We mix a cup of it with some water to thin it down, grate some ginger in there and grind up a couple of cloves of garlic as well. We also add some raw soy sauce, Nama Shoyu, and some lime or lemon juice. It really is tasty over the vegetable noodles.

We like to make "peanut butter and jelly" with the honey almond butter spread on some apple slices. Then we stick a little sliver of a date on top and sprinkle with a tiny bit of salt. It is a really tasty snack or meal. We also make banana mambo by slicing up 3 bananas. We top this with some honey almond butter and add raisins and some sunnies. Very filling and delicious! Now that I think of it, the sunnies are pretty versatile as well. We love them as a snack or on top of salads. They can even be ground up to make some mock taco meat. They can also be ground up with some almond flour and walnuts and veggies to make a veggie burger.

Do you have any good multi-taskers in your kitchen? How about sharing them? I think we use almost everything in at least 2 ways, but I don't want to beat this to death if no one is interested in it.

On the menu this week:

Elotes con crema (of course). This one actually doesn't multi-task too much, but we do eat it in several different ways. Love it on a bed of lettuce or ensalada. These are just corn mixed with a picante mayonnaise (cashew cheese, lime juice, agave nectar, salt, and chili powder) topped with some of our crema (raw vegan sour cream made from cashew cheese, lime juice, hemp seed, salt, and olive oil).

Unfried no-bean (to be used in some lettuce burritos with tomato salsa and guacamole. Ingredients: sprouted sunflower seeds, sun-dried tomatoes, cumin, chili powder, coriander, lemon juice, olive oil, agave nectar, sea salt, jalopeno peppers, sweet onion, and some cilantro. This is great with some Mexican rice as a side dish: cabbage, fresh and dehydrated tomatoes, onion, olive oil, salt, chili powder, cumin, onion powder, garlic, and green peas.

We're loving our berries this time of year for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, especially as a parfait with vanilla yogurt sylk. (Who says you can't eat dessert for dinner?) ingredients: cashew cheese, lemon juice, honey, Irish moss, vanilla bean.

Olive Cheese Spread stuffed in celery (cashew cheese, olives, fresh and dry red peppers, jalopeno peppers, lime juice). This spread is also good spread on everyday bread or with corny chips.

Surf n Turf salad topping: arame seaweed, shredded carrot, sweet onion, sweet pepper, mixed with a nice ginger dressing: nama shoyu, olive oil, sesame oil, sesame seeds, apple cider vinegar, ginger, miso, and some salt.

Lots of snacking type meals this week with yet another spread: Olive tapenade. This is made with 2 different kinds of olives, capers, olive oil, lemon juice, basil, garlic, and some black pepper. Yummy...

We're also going to make some marinara (oooh, another great multi-tasker), cucumber salad, and kale salad. Desserts include pumpkin pies, chocolate mousse cake, skinny mints, crunch meister, candied pecans, soul dates, and chocolate macaroons. Please check the catalog or give me a call if you need ingredients for any of these as I'm out of time...have a great week and know we love you and can't wait to see you again!

What's Swallowing You?

Well, I was thinking I would have a little more time this week, but I think with graduation coming up soon, I'm not going to have much free time until that is done. That is true every year, but it still kicks me in the butt every year.

At the market last week, one of our friends that we haven't seen for a while came by our booth. When I asked her how she was doing, she admitted that her health challenges were getting the best of her. When I asked her how her diet was doing, she said it was not going well, and she was sure that if she could eat better, her health problems would improve. As we talked about why she doesn't eat better, she recognized that addiction to the SAD (standard American diet) was seriously holding her back.

I am constantly amazed at how great a part addiction plays in holding us back from fulfilling our potential here on earth. We see in every area of life. There is more to this than we like to admit.

I had been thinking a lot about addiction as I wrote last week, and Sunday at Church, one of the speakers was talking about people in the Bible who had trials they successfully got through including Abraham with Isaac, Moses in leading the children of Israel out of Egypt, etc. Then he mentioned Jonah, and he asked, "How many of us have whales in our life that are holding onto us until we are ready to fulfill our life's mission?" I had thought about Jonah before and how many corollaries there were to my own life, but that question had me thinking about it again. I cut and pasted the chapters out of the Old Testament, and then I made a chart showing the comparisons. I couldn't believe how much these chapters related to addiction.

I assume everyone has access to an Old Testament, so I won't reprint those scriptures here, but I'll be glad to send them to anyone who does need them if you e-mail me and ask for them. It would definately help you to have them close at hand as you think of these comparisons so that you know where I came up with this.

Here are the points I extracted from Jonah:

1. Jonah was asked to serve a mission.
2. He ignores the request (tries to hide).
3. The Lord allows the tempest to upset his journey.
4. Others suffer also when Jonah is being chastened.
5. The Lord lets others know the source of their problems was Jonah.
6. Jonah offers to be the martyr; it is easier to be a martyr than to do what he’s supposed to do.
7. Jonah helped others turn to the Lord as they recognize the Lord's power through the seriousness of Jonah’s consequence.
8. The Lord prepared a fish to hold Jonah until he repented. Note that time was a factor; if Jonah waited too long, would the fish's digestive juices kick in?
9. He recognizes that he would not be in this situation if he had listened and obeyed in the first place; recognizes that his relationship with the Lord is threatened.
10. He remembered covenants he has made.
11. “They that observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy.”
12. He recognized that he had forfeited a portion that he would never get back, but he was willing to turn to God to get what he could.
13. Commits to turn to God no matter how painful the envisioned consequences are.
14. The Lord delivers Jonah from the belly of the fish.
15. The Lord repeats His request to have Jonah serve his mission.
16. His journey to Ninevah was not an easy one even though he was doing what he was supposed to do.
17. Jonah gives the Lord’s message; people listen and are preserved.
18. Jonah is angry because the people received this blessing.
19. The Lord shows Jonah that the people of Ninevah were at least as deserving as the gourd plant.

I know that we each have a great work to do on this earth. There are many others depending on us as well. We can allow our addictions to keep us from being productive, or we can overcome them. I believe that the Lord is an important part in overcoming addiction as He would never leave us without the tools we need to do the things He wants us to do.

One of the reasons the 12 step program (A.A. for example) is successful is because it teaches the addict that he must recognize there is a power greater than himself who will help him if he will be humble enough to ask. Our pride is what keeps us from asking for that help.

I'm praying for that help on my journey, and I pray that we as a human race can recognize these addictions for what they are. Our lives are too short to waste them in this way.

A couple of weeks ago, there was someone on a talk show who said scientists have learned that high fat, high sugar foods are addictive because they elicit a positive emotional response (due to release of dopamine).

Here's the definition according to wikipedia.com: "An addiction is a persistent behavioral pattern marked by physical and/or psychological dependency that causes significant disruption and negatively impacts the quality of life of an organism."

Do foods in the SAD diet fit that criteria? In my opinion, absolutely, at least in my life they have. Unfortunately, just knowing this is not going to change anything. We will take the knowledge unused to our grave if we do not make the changes that must be made. We must have the courage as Jonah did to make the break, and do what we perceive to be incredibly difficult. It may even seem impossible, but of course, intellectually we know it is not.

This week we're excited to have so many wonderful organic fresh fruits and vegetables to eat each day. Spring is such a wonderful time of year!

Breakfast: cucumber juice, green drink (cucumber, celery, apple, lemon, greens), still some grapefruit/orange juice, green smoothies (rejuvelac, frozen bananas, greens).


2nd breakfast: fruit

We try to eat fruit each day until we feel the need for something more substantial. Sometimes we have a whole day of just eating fruit. Other days (and Hippocrates Health Institute recommends this be a once a week habit) we only drink juices and coconut water for the whole day. (Here's a fun thought: for the juice day, they recommend one also abstains from talking. It is amazing how that changes the dynamic in your day.)

Our main meal of the day is around 2:00. This is usually a large salad or some other vegetable based main dish. Here's what I'm thinking for this week:

Chili con crema (We mix marinara with some mushrooms, corn, chopped tomatoes, and sweet pepper along with organic chili powder. Then we top it with cashew cheese sour cream (We call it crema.))

Hopefully there will be some leftovers as we love it tossed with some shredded zucchini for another meal. We call it chili mac.

Save some of the marinara as a base for some Leaning Towers. We put a little marinara on the plate. We have some nice spinach or basil leaves as the base. Then we thinly slice some rounds of zucchini. Put a dab of nut-based cheese on top of the zucchini slices (queso verde, crema, etc.). Then put some nice slices of tomato on top of that. Olives are a nice addition, and then a little more marinara. It is really simple meal, but very satisfying. If you've got some dehydrated alfredo around, it makes a nice parmesan if you'd like to sprinkle that on top. yum yum

While broccoli is still in season, we're going to have a little broccoli cheese soup. We either use marinated broccoli or regular broccoli (depending on how spicy you like it) mixed with cashew cheese cheddar. Nice with some Alicia crackers.


Collard wraps are great as we still have a ton of collards. They are still tender and delicious and easy to roll into wraps or burritos. This week, I think we'll spread some queso dulce on them (this is a cashew cream cheese mixed with raisins). Then we'll top it with shredded carrot. Roll. Couldn't be easier. Some of us like to dip this in mock peanut sauce (honey almond butter diluted with water, mixed with some lemon juice, ginger, nama shoyu, and a dash of cayenne or jalopeno pepper), but some of us like them without any dipping sauce.

With all those collards, maybe some burritos would be nice too. We'll just spread some unfried no beans on the collard leaf and roll it with some avocado, chopped tomato, and some of those wonderful hotshotz sweet onions shreds. We'll probably have some tomato salsa for those who want to dip them in something.

Well, that's 6 meals, and I'm sure we'll want to have a huge i Viva La Verde salad ! at least once this week (greens, shredded carrot, minced celery, cilantro, sunnies, dulse, raisins; ranch dressing).


Desserts this week (all plant based, no dairy or animal protein): rawky road, key lime pies, chocolate macaroons, apple crisp.

Our night meal if we have one is usually something light: apple slices and/or celery sticks with honey almond butter; carrot sticks and/or celery sticks and/or cucumber spears with ranch dressing or hummus; cucumbers with olive tapenade or sprouted garbanzo bean hummus; bowl of Hawaiian granola with almond mylk, a nice mylk shake (non-dairy of course!), or just some nice fruit eaten out of hand.

We had a delicious strawberry mylk shake with the last of the organic Florida strawberries last week: almond mylk and coconut ice cream blended with strawberries and a little rejuvelac to get it moving along with a quart of frozen bananas. Life if good!