Thursday, December 20, 2012

ICE CREAM!! Vegan Kale & Banana Ice Cream! Loved by Toddlers

I don't really do recipes. I just shove random things in the Vitamix. The Vitamix is a MUST if you want to make it creamy enough to pass as ice cream. Other blenders won't crush the ice. The Blendtec is not ideal since it takes 4x longer since it has no stamper, this melts the ice cream. 
Basic recipe:
- Bunch of Kale. Frozen is better. (fresh, but recently frozen is best)
- 1/2 Banana. Frozen is better. (this fruit specifically counteracts the Kale taste)
- Ice
- Liquid as needed. (cold water, coconut milk, or almond milk).

Beginner recipe:
- Double the Banana and add some blueberries. The more sugar the tastier, but not as healthy, but best to get the toddler hooked on the concept with more fruit at first (no adding straight sugar).

Optional other recipe stuff:
- Dash of Stevia (an all natural, real plant sweetener)
- Cinnamon
- Wyman's wild blueberries (not too many,t hey are very flavorful)
- Capful of Apple Cider Vinegar (only if from Braggs)

Frank

Wednesday, December 19, 2012

Coconut Oil Chocolate Stevia Cookies. For Toddlers.

    Recipe:
  • Coconut Oil, slightly melted
  • Cacao powder (raw, no sugar)
  • Stevia
  • Low sugar granola
Mix it up, put it in the fridge too "cook" it. Yep, it hardens in cold temperatures. Then good to eat. Sometimes tends to be heavy on the oil taste (to keep it together), but raw coconut oil is still good for you straight up. Frank

Steel Cut Oatmeal. Low sugar, Toddler friendly

Not an official recipe, just threw this together and the Toddler loved it. Super low in sugar yet tasty and really healthy.

- Steel cut Oatmeal cooked for 13 min or so. - Pear slices (I cooked the pear in the water, not sure if this is necessary)
- A few blueberries (I like the small wild and flavorful variety from Waymens)
- A few banana slices
- Coconut shavings
- Cinnamon
- Some vanilla
- Dash of Stevia
- Optional: Some "So Delicious" Keflir-type plain drinkable yogurt. (only 3g sugar in it)
- Optional: Some currants. They are 1/4th the size of raisins. 

All Vegan of course.

I made enough to store some in the freezer and some in the fridge for tomorrow.

Frank

Raw Vegan Kale Chip Recipe! For Toddlers


Kale Chips are addictive and great and healthy. Make sure to add a sauce. If you want to keep it simple just use a sauce of 50% cashew, 50% red pepper . More complex recipe is below.

They can be cooked at low temperatures in an oven, or best in a dehydrator overnight at 115 degrees, just below the temperature that many nutrients are lost. The food is still considered "RAW" at 115. But expect a good 10-14 hours, so don't wait for it. Also eat it within a couple hours of finishing. If you "cook" it for 14 hours and let it sit for 4 hours until you get home, it will pick up moisture in the room and lose the crisp.

Put it in a plastic bag, try and remove the air, sometimes I put rice in it, not sure if that does much to absorb moisture, or those "do not eat, silica" packets also should help absorb moisture.

This is my favorite Kale Chip Recipe (inspired by this Kale Chip recipe)

Video:

  • 1 bunch kale, rinsed with large pieces since they shrink (maybe 5 pieces per leaf)
Put this in the blender (Vitamix preferred)
  • 2 cups raw cashews (buy pieces, they are cheaper) (soak for 4 hours is better, but not required)
  • 1 large red pepper
  • 1 clove garlic!
  • 2-3 tablespoons nutritional yeast flakes ( I use KAL Nutritional Yeast Flakes) optional
  • Juice of one lemon
  • Pinch of sea salt
Some people add some olive oil.

Get your hands messy and lather it up.

When you make the above recipe, the more liquidy you make it, the less stay on the chips. But if it is too clumpy and thick, it won't spread well. So play with it. Also think of it as 75% will go away, so don't think you are putting too much on.

Frank

p.s. We own the Excalibur Food Dehydrator 3526T, 5 tray , which has a timer on it. Most of their models do NOT have a timer unless you buy it from them on ebay or directly. Resellers get the non timer model, which is a pain. You could buy a $15 timer at Home Depot I guess.

Mushroom Chips from a Dehydrator. Loved by Toddler

One of Dr. Fuhrman's top 5 food to eat are mushrooms. There are some that my toddler has been able to eat directly. Some from the farmers market. But the best way I found to get them in him is making Portobello Mushroom Chips! In our dehydrator. Set at 115 degrees, so it is still considered RAW.

Sometimes we will put a small dab of "So Good Miso Mayo" or Vegenaise (both Vegan).

Here is a video of our toddler loving them.


Note that they only last 1 day out. You need to keep them dry to keep them crispy. I put them in a bag or canister with rice at the bottom (or those "do not eat" silica packets that absorb moisture).

Also sometimes I mix the mushrooms in the leftover sauce from the Kale Chips (cashews, red pepper, garlic homemade sauce)

Frank

p.s. We own the Excalibur Food Dehydrator 3526T, 5 tray , which has a timer on it. Most of their models don't unless you buy it from them on ebay or directly. Resellers get the non timer model, which is a pain. You could buy a $15 timer at Home Depot I guess.


Drink 1 Liter of Water within 10 minutes of waking up.


Recently I have been drinking 8 oz of water immediately upon waking up. I really like it because it tends to wake me up. Like coffee, but healthy.


Today watching FoodMatters, they said to try a full liter of water, within 10 minutes of getting up. Before even eating anything. I plan to try it for a week. Supposed to help cleanse the body and get all the bad stuff out. Even helped one guy lose 14 pounds in one day (went to the bathroom 14 times).

Monday, October 29, 2012

Homemade Wannabe Nuttso Multinut butter

Have you ever tried Nuttso? Man oh man is it awesome. But it is crazy expensive.

Nuttso is a raw multi nut peanut, with no peanuts, butter. But it runs like $20 a container. So we decided to try and make our own. But before you do this, you should buy the real thing to see what your end game goal is.

Here is what I did:
Melt some coconut oil. (not required, but without it, it seemed too dry).
Then take  Raw almond, cashew, brazil nuts, pistachio and put it in a vitamix. Use the stamper to shove stuff down. Fill it up half way or it won't work. If you let it run too long it will get too hot and technically no longer be "raw".
Then add a bunch of chia seeds and sesame seeds. You don't want to blend these since they make the perfect popping light crunch. You can also use whole flaxseed, don't chop it up since it goes rancid if cut open.

Optional: raw cocoa powder (no sugar). I haven't tried this yet.

Let me know how it goes!

Frank

Thursday, September 27, 2012

Answering the "But, what do you eat?" question.

The #1 question I get when people hear about us being Vegan is "But what do you eat?". So I wanted to go over our staples.
Just like meat eaters might have a staple like "Chicken" that they eat once or twice a day, our staple 2 things are:
1) RED Quinoa
Without going too much into detail, meat has the advantage of being a "whole protein" whereas most plants are incomplete and must be added with other plants to get all the nutrients you want. However, Quinoa is the lucky few that is a "whole" protein. We make it for the week (in our pressure cooker). We prefer the larger RED color and taste. We put it in the fridge and eat it with our cereal (see Cereal post) or heated up with Coconut oil, or Coconut butter, Turmeric, Garlic, and a touch of salt (or get fancy and add chopped onions or a bunch of other options).

2) Avocado/ Guac
One person told me that Avocado is the world's only complete food. Enough, fat, protein etc and if you could only eat one thing ever in your life, you would get furthest with Avocado. This is our Chicken. Whether it is slices to go along with the breakfast, with Hemp oil or Flax oil drizzled over it with Garlic, or a full blown open face sandwich with a huge mound of homemade guac on it (add a tad of Curry for a perfect match!). We might eat this even 2x a day depending on what we have around.

3) Vitamix stuff. (get the lowest model for $320) 1-3 times a day. (including preworkout)
Not a meal replacement, but a full on meal. I sometimes don't use recipes. I just shove a bunch of stuff in and take it on the run. The key is not to put TOO much fruit. If you do, all you are doing is getting too much sugar and going backwards. You might start off with more, but then start cutting it back as your taste buds adjust. Try a tad of Stevia too to help increase the Green veggie balance.

Our two staple bases are: 
i) Spinach (a ton!) and watermelon. Our boy calls it "Superman Hugo" (Juice in Spanish).
ii ) Kale and Banana. This fruit cuts the Kale bite. Other optional things added include flax seed oil, ground flax seeds, Hemp seeds, raw nuts, ginger, turmeric, Maca, Spirulina, carrots, and anything you might see in a typical salad. Ony use apples if you plan on drinking it within 30 minutes.

Other not so obvious stuff:

4) Raw Stevia! 
(Not Stevia in the Raw, which is counter-intuitive and full of fake fillers)

No, not yet another fat sweetener that causes lab rat disformaties (is that a word, spell check says no). This is a REAL plant (but then people start saying Mushrooms, the drug, are plants, come on). The powder is 300x more powerful than sugar so 95% of the Stevia out there has fillers in it. So avoid those and buy the most expensive bottle and that likely will be small and 100% Stevia. Just put SMALL amounts.

5) Steamed Red Lentil from Trader Joes. Love this stuff. Lightly steamed and premade. Eat it straight from the package. Or heat it up and add stuff like we do to the Red Quinoa.

6) The baby loves seaweed! Dulse is what it is called. Not the small flakes, but actual leaves.

Things we avoid:
- Soy and Tofu. Sure we get some, but it is not a staple. Too over processed and tons of negative stuff around it. Tempah is much preferred (a type of soy but fermented and much better).
- Wheat. We aren't 100% gluten free, but when given the option, we try and avoid it.
- Sugar. We look at boxes for the sugar content. 100% ignoring the fat on the label.
Bottom line is you should eat 100% until you are full. No skimping, no starvation. Just eat right and you can do it endlessly. (for more see Dr. Fuhrman's books or videos online)
Hope that helps

Frank & Carrie

p.s. Please show me that somebody is reading this by at least leaving an anonymous comment.

Friday, August 24, 2012

Scam alert drtimtao@yahoo.com Dr. Tim Tao from World Best

SCAMMER WARNING
This guy is a scientist but he is a fraud. He gets leads from Lookchem and works it for years until you need a chemical that only he can make. He requires bitcoin payment. He is a scam. Nothing was ever delivered. He will never do a video Skype or give a phone number. Only his Yahoo email. 

Scammer = drtimtao@yahoo.com
Tim Tao, Ph.D.
Technical Dept Manager 
Shanghai WorldBest Corp Group Co., LTD.
SWBC Group (A Public Company)
No.1956 ZhongShan Road
Shanghai 200063
China
Visit us at CPhI China 2016 Shanghai (BOOTH E1C23)

He also mentions these fake websites

14GMhZq6UtaSqfTuo1BCGWffQcaBgB3gsT 
Bitcoin address above. 

I even found the cphi booth info for 2016 and his company doesn't exist. He picked this company name because it is very hard to Google. 




 
I was trying to be Sweet Potato chips in our dehydrator, but the first few batches weren't great. Not crunch enough. Did I use too much oil maybe?

Not, they just weren't thin enough.

First I bought the $20

(BAD) Progressive International HGT-11 Folding Mandoline Slicer but even the "Super Thin" was not thin enough.


So then I tried the 

(GREAT) Kyocera CSN-202-RD Adjustable Mandoline Slicer, Red and it was a night and day difference.


Notice the two slices on the left are MUCH thinner than the two on the right. About half as thick.

So just mix a tiny amount of olive oil throughout a bowl of thin sliced and put in the dehydrator for 24 hours (yep, takes a long time, so make a lot, and it is ok if they overlap a little since they will shrink) at 120 degrees or so. 

If you want, you can also try chopping up some red onions and vegan sour cream if you want to be adventurous and make Vegan Sour Cream and Onion chips.

Friday, July 20, 2012

Rethinking Breakfast. Quinoa, Nuts, Granola in seconds

Inspired by Rich Roll's comment on rethinking breakfast. I have moved my breakfast away from processed foods (not completely).

Summary of my morning cereal:
1 Part Granola
1 Part Red Quinoa
1 Part Mixed nuts
Some Nut Milk Unsweetened.

Granola:
I haven't fully mastered

Short Videos to Watch. Pre-Post Workout Drinks & Brendan Brazier on Vegan Pro-Athletic Eating

One draw back of eating vegan is you have to eat ALOT. Massive amounts of veggies. If you ate them just via spinach salads, you would be the last one to finishing eat.

One buddy of mine tried going vegan for a week. I asked how it was going. He said "Hungry." People are used to eating a certain size bowl. I then showed him Rich Roll, from Finding Ultra and a video of him eating. I said "do you think he is hungry." MASSIVE amounts of Kale, Spinach, celery... sometimes shoved into a blender for easy eating. Does it taste like a snickers or chicken wings, no. Usually the response is "hum, not bad" (as in "not good," but at least not bad).

Here is a Post Workout Vegan recovery drink:


And a Pre-Workout Drink also from Rich Roll.

Friday, June 29, 2012

Comparing Breville 750 Watt Compact Juicer to the Breville 900 Watt Ikon Juicer

Watch the video to see the difference

Must See Healthy Inspiring Movies. Pro-vegan of course.

1) FatSickAndNearlyDead.com (not to be confused with Fat Sick and Almost Dead, which goes to a domain squater and reseller of products). You can watch the movie free on their site (upper right corner) or watch it below.  Here is the Low Res for watching it on your Phone.
Or watch it in High Res for

Thursday, June 28, 2012

Intro to my Vegan Kitchen, The Tools!!

Above is a video where I show the products that we own. Some are overkill, some are underkill.

VitaMix 5200 for
blending. Paid like $400 or $450. As powerful as a lawnmower. I think our model is overkill, so don't get anything higher up. Most of them over $400 have the same engine, but they find ways to charge up to $600 for worthless features and more dials. I wish I had one with fewer dials. I did spend $50 more for stainless steal. I bought it at Whole foods when they were having a "show" and got a $50 discount. Also people

Wednesday, June 6, 2012

Deep Sleep Nirvana, A Reachable Goal?

8 Months ago I randomly had the most amazing sleep ever. I just woke up and felt like a spring chicken all morning and throughout the day. Since then I have tried to achieve this every night. After turning vegan I am getting closer and closer. I also did a ton of research and found different advice from each place, so I thought  I would put it here.

1) Don't watch TV or read an ipad, iphone