A new routine that's working

Tomorrow makes 8 weeks raw, about 90-100% overall. Have been at 100% lately.

When I first started this, I thought I'd be making a lot more complicated recipes involved nuts and sprouted seeds, but I'm finding that simple works best for me most of the time. I bought a 9-sheet Excalibur dehydrator, and made a few good things with it, but haven't used it for a couple weeks.

Have found a general routine of starting out the day with a blended papaya/berry smoothie. Raspberries are my first choice, because they have such a great ZING that offsets the papaya-ness, and they turn the smoothie a deep FUSCHIA! And I love my fuschia food! But blueberries, strawberries, mixed berries... or peaches & bananas... they also work nicely as backups, or for variety! I'll prepare a blender full and pour it all out into a couple bottles to take to work, adding some ice cubes to keep it cool.

I found some nifty ice trays at Bed, Bath, & Beyond -- they are in the shape of sticks, so they can be added easily to water bottles on-the-go! I have only two -- I plan on getting more because they are incredibly handy, and they get used up very quickly.

Before I leave for work, I also make some kind of green smoothie, and I do the same thing, putting them in bottles with ice. At work, when I've finished the fruit, I switch to the greens. If I haven't finished them by lunch, I'll sip some with my meal.

I tend to go in phases with the green smoothies -- it all depends on what I'm stocked with. I might do a salad/soup theme one week, with lots of spinach, broccoli, radish, & red pepper, maybe spice it up with jalapeno or ginger. I add hemp seeds or pine nuts, and some hemp oil or olive oil, and always a good dose of Himalayan salt & raw apple cider vinegar. Lately -- having gotten a large jar of NFL's amazing virgin coconut oil -- I'm putting a good dose of that. These kinds of smoothies are like drinking creamy veggie soups! It always amazes me how beautiful they, an almost luminous neon spring-green!

But then I'll go on a jag where I'm doing the chocomacaverde thing... and what-ho! I'll have to put a recipe up for that. Spinach or simple baby romaine (much darker than the mature stuff!), with ground raw cacao, ground raw carob, some maca powder, coconut oil, Himalayan salt, and either a banana or two or a dash of agave syrup. Plus some hemp seeds or pine nuts for body and all their nutritional goodness. AWEsome!

In the afternoon, I'll have some fruit (I usually keep 2-4 oranges or bananas in my bag when I'm not at home). Or, if I need something more substantial, I'll have some nuts, chopped up and mixed with some agave or honey and a bit of almond butter. Don't need a lot of this at once... just a bit. It's delicious & filling!

For supper, I've been doing a parsley/coconut soup over fresh fruit. So filling, and my body just seems to sing for the rest of the day!

I had stopped eating raw oatmeal for weeks, but am going to bring it back in. I absolutely love it but, also, its high silicon content is great for healthy hair, bones, and skin, and for collagen repair & development! Here's a good link on silicon:

http://www.pdrhealth.com/drug_info/nmdrugprofiles/nutsupdrugs/sil_0235.shtml

This week, I'll start either taking the oatmeal with me to work for lunch, or I'll have it in the evening for supper. I find a nice big bowl of soaked steel-cut oats, covered in creamy fresh-made nut milk, and topped with various fresh & dried fruits and nuts, is very grounding. After that, I don't need to think about food for awhile. And that's a good thing.

Gotta luv it.

(check out the recipe section for everything listed above)