Let them eat kale!

There's been a lot of talk around these parts about the raw food diet, the whys, the whynots, the logic behind championing a diet that extols the virtues of unprocessed, unadulterated, living food eaten the way our ancestors did while necessitating an electrodomestic army of juicers, blenders, food processors and food dehydrators to make anything palatable and nutritious enough to survive on. And then there's the fire question. But, anyway, I'll save the rants for ed002d, who today marks two weeks raw; two weeks until cheese makes its triumphant return.

As an observer of the diet and occasional participant, I've mostly been pleased with the various raw concoctions to emerge from my kitchen that in some cases would be worthy of eating even when back on the hard stuff. Last night's salad, for instance, with mixed spring greens, strawberries, pecans, cilantro, sunflower seeds, red pepper, carrots, grape tomatoes, dried figs and dressed with a green onion/garlic/honey/olive oil/balsamic vinagrette was a winner. So was this raw marinara sauce over zucchini "pasta." A raw pesto (basically regular basil pesto, hold the parmesan cheese) over shredded jicama and carrots also stood up to its cooked brethren. Avocados with salt and pepper, and maybe a little lemon juice, are always tasty. Smoothies for breakfast are easy and delicious, and you can sneak in spinach, kale and hemp seeds amid the bananas, strawberries, blueberries, pineapple, pear, or whatever else you throw in without really noticing anything but the change in color (and the green stuff stuck between your teeth). Oats soaked in lukewarm water (which is OK by raw standards) are pretty much the same as your standard cooked oatmeal, 'cept they're cold, which is unfortunate, but with enough fruit and maple syrup (grade B is apparently preferred by the raw foodists), you forget about the temperature.

But the real fun has been in my on-going cookie and truffle experiments. So far, I've made three prototypes with my handy mini-food processor, all of which have earned passing marks, though hopefully through more experimentation (coupled with augmenting weeks-long desperation for variety), I should be able to bring their grades up. My first attempt was these almond, coconut, raisin, honey, vanilla extract and cardamom "cookies." They were pretty good.
My second and third attempts have been chocolate truffles, the first batch made with raw cacao, honey, almonds and agave syrup; the second batch without the honey but also with coconut milk. Dusted with more coconut or cacao powder, they look pretty, but they have not attained the sweetness I was hoping for. Clearly, further experimentation is needed. The SJB raw test kitchen will continue apace as long as raw food is called for, or until the end of April, whichever comes first.