From Russia with Love

I always get behind on the weekends because of the work that goes into the market. I guess there's really nothing new and different because we are making the stuff that people ask us to make for them. So not missing much by not recording that on here. On Monday I start getting a little creative again.

We had a sea veggie salad for lunch; I think I'll call it Surf and Turf. It has some wonderful land veggies in it that go along with the arame (sea vegetable). I made it for the first time last Sunday, but I decided when I made it today that I would put more land vegetables in it, and I liked it a lot better. It was delicious.


We got some beets from our Gainesville farmer friend, Jeff, on Saturday. That is the first time we've gotten them. We ended up with 3/4 of a case which is about 18 lbs., so I'm hoping we can hold them for a while. I have to figure out how to pickle them or something. I used to make pickled beets all the time in my previous life (BR - before Raw), but I have to figure out how to do them in a more enzyme productive manner. Anyway, I made borscht today from a recipe Tatayana gave me. She is from Russia, and has eaten it all her life. Since she has started eating raw, she had to come up with a raw version, and that is what she passed along to me. Here is the version she gave me:

2 cups water
3 med. beets
1 small root of ginger
4 garlic cloves
7 bay leaves
3 sticks of celery
1 bunch of parsley
1/2 cup pecans
some sea salt


In a bowl, put some sauerkraut and minced parsley, and pour the above blended mixture over it. She adds defrosted lima beans which tastes like cooked potatoes in this dish. I didn't have any bay leaves or limas, and I forgot the sauerkraut part, so we just ate the broth, and it was very good. I'll be experimenting with that. I don't know if that is a good food for the market or not. Not too many people eat borscht, but I'll bet it is really good for you.

I also spiralized some beets to mix with an alfredo sauce tomorrow. I think the pink color will be really pretty.

For dinner we had spinach messaged and added to our cheddar cheeze soup base. It was really good. I diced up some tomatoes to have in it also. Very delicious.

Elizabeth has been asking me about foods for the 4th of July. Light and summery... that is what everyone loves in all this heat. I bought a case of corn, and we're going to have a marinated corn for our "heavy" part of the meal. I'll also have cucumber salad, and some kind of tomato dish, maybe a gazpacho since that is usually served chilled. For dessert I'm planning red, white, and blue parfaits. The blueberries, strawberries, and raspberries are amazing, and we'll top them off with some vanilla yogurt silk.

Of course, watermelon will be the star of the day if I can find some good ones. I think all the rain has watered down their flavor a little, but I'll keep hunting.

I was trying to decide if I wanted some "burgers", but they are way too heavy for this time of year. I just like lighter things to eat in the summer. The denser foods are nice in the winter when it is colder.

I'm sure a lot of people will want to add some hot dogs or grilled chicken to that menu, but I'm more than content with it just as it is. One of the things I like about eating like this is how I feel AFTER a meal. For many years I was sick almost every night from acid-reflux. It is such a relief to have NONE of those symptoms. I do not take it for granted. I am very grateful to not have to do that anymore. No food is worth having to feel like that every night of my life.

I also love the light feeling I have. It is hard to explain to anyone who has never experienced it. It is kind of the opposite of how one feels after a Thanksgiving dinner. It is so not like that. All cooked foods drop like a pit into my stomach. Raw fruits and vegetables don't make me feel like that.


We were talking tonight about how grains when they are sprouted are not the chemical composition of a grain but are a vegetable. I wonder if there's been anything written on that. It seems to me I have read that somewhere, but I can't recall where. I was thinking about it because today Angelina said she thought celery was a fruit since she knew people ate celery seed sometimes, so we went over the botanical definition of fruit. Everything else (in the plant kingdom) is a vegetable. I guess it is hard to keep it straight for a 7 year old. Anyway, that got me thinking about how a wheat seed is no longer eaten as a seed when it is sprouted and eaten: it becomes a vegetable. I suppose a lot of the nutrients in the seed are used up by the developing plant which then takes on the characteristics of a plant instead of a seed. Photosynthesis begins and the chemical composition would be entirely different. See what happens when I don't have enough things to keep my mind active?

Seasonal Fruits are the BEST!

Started off the day with some grapefruit juice cocktail. That stuff is amazing. I love grapefruit anyway, but it is a real treat when done in this way. Try it!

For lunch, Alicia made a fruit salad we dressed with the vanilla yogurt silk. Then we had a green salad with ranch that was delicious. We had some crackers with the olive spread and sliced tomatoes and followed up with the butterscotch pudding. (We still have more work to do on that one. It tasted fine, but I would like to work on the texture. The olive spread on the other hand....that's another story! I could it eat it all day and all night and still want some. Better watch out for that stuff.)

Could you tell I had worked out right before lunch? I was starving. It sounds like more food than I usually eat for a meal. What's up with that?

Then for dinner we had some cucumber salad, alfredo, and a lovely kale salad. We were out of avocados, but I did have a half jar of guacamole, so I mixed that in. I also put in a couple of tablespoons of agave. I was thinking about a kale salad I had in a restaurant that put candied pecans on it. I really liked the sweet flavor it gave to the bites that had pecans, so I was thinking maybe it was the sweet flavor I was liking. It worked; I did like it a little better. That's saying something as it is already a really good salad. A couple of tablespoons for that large a serving is not enough sweetness to make you feel like you're having a dessert. It just changes the flavor a little. Try it and see what you think...

There are no ataulfo mangos this week, and I'm very sad to see their season coming to an end. Good thing cherries from Washington are in this week to help comfort me. Wyatt asked me what my favorite fruit was today. I told him it was whatever was in season...

Some New Stuff

All of the food we fixed on Friday for this week was sold, so I had to start over today. I had plenty of cashew cheeze to work with, so we had a lot of fun. First I had to make some things for customers who wanted items delivered today, but that was done by 8 a.m. Then I made more cheddar cheeze, vanilla yogurt silk, Queso Dulce, and cucumber salad. I decided to experiment with some cashew cheeze alfreda, but we haven't eaten it yet, so I'll have to report on that when we eat it.

Here's the recipe for the "pasta":

1 whole zucchini shredded
1 red pepper, julienned
1/4 lb carrot, shredded
a touch of basil
some parsley
enough alfreda to sauce the dish

I plan on sprinkling some pine nut parmesan on it when it is served.

The alfredo is cashew cheeze (2 c) mixed with 1 T lemon juice, 1 T Nama Shoyu, 2 garlic cloves, 1 t apple cider vinegar, an jalopeno, some salt and pepper.

One other cashew cheeze experiment was an olive sandwich spread to which some red pepper, an jalopeno, and some green olives were added. I don't know if green olives are raw or not, but I love them anyway, and they made this spread taste really good. I pulled some alicheezits from the dehydrator to spread it on. Wow! It was really good. I think it would be really good with sliced tomatoes on it as well when we use it for a meal.

My last experiment was for a grapefruit cocktail made with some delicious grapefruits we got for the market this weekend. I just mixed grapefruit juice with agave nectar and water. It was a delicious soft drink. 5 cups juice, 2 1/2 cups agave. Fill up the gallon container with water. Serve over ice.

I also put some Irish moss on to soak and made it into gel tonight. I filled up 4 pint jars with a 1/2 lb. of moss and had 3/4 cup left over. I couldn't resist trying a recipe for butterscotch pudding I have been dying to try, so I was glad that I had the almonds soaking that were needed for the almond mylk that is the basis. The recipe calls for "thick" almond mylk, so I interpreted that as 4 cups of water to 2 cups almonds, soaked, instead of the usual 8 cups of water. This made 4 1/2 cups of almond creme, of which 2 1/2 cups were used for the pudding with the 3/4 cup of Irish moss. Then I added 1/2 cup agave nectar, 1 teaspoon butterscotch extract (from Frontier - organic, no alcohol), and 1/2 a vanilla bean. It tasted great, but we have to wait for it to set-up to see how the texture works.

All the soaked almonds had had their 48 hours dehydrating time, so they came out tonight. We need to get more alicheezits going, but that will have to wait until tomorrow as I'm tuckered out, and Roger's tired of washing dishes (4 loads today!). I'm lucky to have him to help. He's a great sous chef.

Also enjoying the wonderful stone fruits that are in season: peaches, pluots, cherries, plums... does food get any better than this?

Cucumber Salad by the Ton

Sorry I haven’t kept up; this has been a crazy week. Thursday I needed to drive to Alachua to pick up kale and cucumbers for our weekly orders of kale salad and cucumber salad. I decided to call Geri who is visiting from Utah to see if she wanted to ride with me. She agreed and probably got more than she bargained for. I don’t think she’s ever seen that much “country”. We finally found a park on our way home where we could stop for lunch, and we had a great romaine salad with no net tuna, cucumber salad, and ranch dressing. At least I thought it was great. She ate it all, so I’m thinking she must have liked it as well. It is hard for people to believe it has no meat products or dairy. They don’t expect it to taste good. As an aside, our branch president told Roger he had felt sorry for him having to eat this way until he saw how we ate the other night at the branch party. We really aren’t deprived at all.

I was thinking about that yesterday when I was asking how the cheddar cheeze went over at the market yesterday. (I was unable to go as I had a church assignment in Orlando.) I was wondering if I would eat it if I was still eating “real” cheese. I think our palettes have to adjust to eating differently, but it is not offensive in any way. We eat what we are used to eating. Things we are not used to seem strange to us. I guess the main difference is that once we get educated as the harmful effects of something, say coffee for example, we make an effort to find substitutes that are both palatable and not destructive. Once we realized that meat and dairy products were unsuitable for us, we were determined to find substitutes that we enjoyed as much or more that were plant-based. (Please read the China Study if you haven’t done so already. It really is one of the best scientific explanations for why we must change our way of eating culturally.)

Well, anyway, enough of the philosophical stuff. On to the goods! Friday we had some delicious Mac n Cheeze made with wonderful spiralized zucchini, cheddar cheeze sauce, and marinated mushrooms. Of course we had a delicious salad to go with it. We experimented with mixing our ranch dressing and avo mayo for a fantastic avocado ranch dressing.

Saturday was leftover no net tuna for Wyatt and Roger. Angelina and I just had regular salads with veggies. We had some nice cherries and grapes as well. Roger had his cucumber salad of course. He eats it every day if we have it. We had Queso Dulce for dinner with celery sticks. Darius and Alicia like to dip strawberries in their QD. Today I sent shredded zucchini and cheeze sauce for the after-conference lunch. They have the missionaries with them as well as Alicia’s mom. I made a couple of quarts of cucumber ranch dressing to go with all the carrot sticks we have. The cucumbers add a nice touch to it.

I am making a bunch more cucumber salad as Roger eats it by the pound. Since the name didn't come up with I put it in the labels, I guess I haven't posted how this is made. It is very simple. I don't measure any of the ingredients, so I can only tell you what goes into it: cucumber, onion, apple cider vinegar, raw agave nectar, and a pinch of salt. I also marinated some broccoli (Nama Shoyu, maple syrup, onion powder, jalopeno pepper, sesame oil) so that we could have broccoli soup (marinated broccoli and cheddar cheeze) for dinner. I guess I’d better get more cheeze started, but I can’t make the alicheezits from the rejuvelac that's ready as the dehydrators are both going full blast with soaked and sprouted almonds.

There were a lot of people asking for prepared foods at the market yesterday, but it is too hard for us to keep everything at the right temperature. We are asking everyone to let us know what they would like us to bring to them there as we can keep small quantities cold. New people came though who had heard about our stuff and were hoping to buy it. I’m sorry they were disappointed; we’re not sure how to get people what they want. We’ll keep working on it. ¡Viva La Verde! is definitely a work in progress.

Try It, You'll Like It!

We had an unusual experience this week. There was a missionary preparation party we held for a young man going on a mission soon, and Alicia and I decided we would go ahead and prepare our raw vegan food for them. I was really worried that people might not like it, even though one of my favorite phrases is, "What's not to like?" Here's what we made for them:

Unfried no-beans served on a bed of lettuce
Ensalada
Guacamole
Salsa
Cashew Hemp sour creme
Corn chips

The avocados and cilantro were so amazing this week that we have been eating it all week long. We can't get enough of either.

The people attending all seemed to like the food very much including the Spanish people which was surprising. I guess you never know.

Leftovers are the Best

For lunch today we had some beautiful strawberries left over from the market. I decided to make Wyatt's favorite: strawberry soup. This is just strawberries, a few raspberries to highten the flavor of the strawberries, some lemon juice, and agave to sweeten. I swirled a teaspoon of the vanilla yogurt silk on top. More delicious than you can imagine. We had waldorf salad left from the market, so that's what we had for our lunch. It was also very good. I love the avocado mayonnaise in there. Have I published the waldorf salad recipe? There's a tag for it, so I must have. The avocado mayo makes it better than the nut based one in my opinion.


Darius made some jalopeno poppers for dinner. These are just jalopenos split and cleaned of their membranes and seeds (for us wimps). Then we fill it with that good guacamole we made. I'll have mine on lettuce leaves, thank you. I do love the peppers, their flavor, but the heat is too much for me to eat more than one. Wyatt had the peppers stuffed with no net tuna and really liked it.

We finished off the night with some popsicles for FHE treat made from left over raspberry smoothies last week. I just wanted a juvie lemon shake. It hit the spot.

Pineapple Salsa

We met a few people at the market today, but the highlight was seeing all of our "regulars" when they came to pick up their pre-orders. One of our new friends was talking about how frustrated she was that her son is eating so much bread when he has wheat allergies. He is only 6 and will not stop "sneaking" it when they go to church or other areas where it is being served. I told her what I had learned about grains and how they have opiates that cause people to be addicted to them when consumed in large amounts. She had not heard this before, but it was very helpful to me in learning to control my eating to understand the addictive nature of foods that I was craving. Once I could see them for what they were, foods designed to control me, I was able to overcome the urge to eat them. This does not mean that I do not still crave them occasionally (rarely, fortunately), but I know why that craving exists, and it has nothing to do with nourishment.

We talked about the emotional needs that create a dependence on any drug or substance and how even young children have that need. It is kind of scary to think about it.

Everyone liked the pineapple salsa (I think). Here's the recipe I used yesterday to make it:

Pineapple Salsa

1 pineapple cored and peeled and chopped
3 avocados, peeled and chopped
3 jalopeno peppers, seeded, and chopped finely
1/2 carton of sweet mini peppers (about 1 large regular sweet pepper)
1/2 large onion, minced
1 head cilantro, chopped fine
3/4 pound tomatoes, chopped

Mix all together and enjoy. This makes a large recipe. You'll need it! Everyone loves this, including the children.

One of our friends introduced us to the lychee nut. I have heard of this for many years and even seen them at markets, but since I did not know how to eat them, I had never purchased any. She gave us one of hers, so I went to another vender and bought some. They are really delicious. I'll try to u-tube how to eat them, but you just peel the skin off and pop it in your mouth. There's a large seed, so don't bite down too hard. The flesh easily separates from the seed.

Long, Busy Day

We had a very long, busy day from about 7 a.m. until after midnight. You'd think we'd be able to pace ourselves through the week a little better, but maybe we will get better as we go along.

Our new recipes for the market were pineapple salsa along with guacamole and regular salsa. We also decided to do tuna. Alicia thought of a great name for it: "No Net Tuna". Isn't that clever? We made the regular kale salad, cucumber salad, raisin cheeze, ranch dressing, waldorf salad (along with little side salads), and honey almond butter. Alicia also pulled several trays of Alicheezits out of the dehydrator. We'll see how it goes tomorrow.

We sprouted some more buckwheat, made more alicheezits for the dehydrator, and Alicia got some alternate universe sunnies going as well. What's that about? Can you tell I'm a stick in the mud. I like things to stay the same...

We've been sprouting 2 cups of wheat every day to keep up with the need for juvie. I think we've caught up. When I got my grocery order today, they messed up and left off my cashews, so we're hard pressed for our cheezes until I can get another order next Friday.

Life is Good

Today was a fun culinary event for me. The other day I had an inspiration for a recipe come into my head, and today I was able to create it. I don't do that all that often. I usually re-work other recipes that I try, and I'm pretty good at that, but this one, I actually came up with in my head.

I had been having some fruit with my other yogurt on it, and it was tasty and everything, but the consistency wasn't as good as real yogurt is. So I was trying to think of how to make it better. Then I was impressed to put irish moss in it which is the substance from which the food industry extracts carageenan (commonly used in ice cream - read the label). We've used irish moss in other applications with great results, but I hadn't used any in a while. I made some irish moss paste last week - I can't remember why. Oh yeah, Alicia had put it on to soak and left it there. We had to do something with it, so I made it up into paste.

Anyway, I decided to put some in my yogurt recipe, and I also added part of a vanilla bean. It was perfect, in fact, better than perfect! I loved it. I tried it out on the family tonight, and I think everyone enjoyed it. Here's the recipe, I think:

3 cups fermented raw cashews
1 cup irish moss paste
3/4 cup fresh lemon juice
1 cup honey (or to taste)
1/2 a vanilla bean

All of this is mixed in the blender. We had some nice blueberries left from the market, and I topped them with this mixture, and then sprinkled them with buckwheaties for some crunch. It is truly too good for words. It is one of those foods it would be very easy to overeat. I had some on a really ripe banana tonight, and it was perfect because the tanginess counteracted the oversweetness of the banana. Anyway, I think we'll take it to market Saturday for one of our samples.

I didn't get breakfast this morning because I got caught up in the recipe, and the next thing I knew was I had to leave for work. I was also making some Queso Dulce (that's our new name for raisin cheese). So no breakfast today even though Roger had food in the car on the way to the school visit. I guess I didn't feel like eating. I had 3 mangos before going to bed last night, so maybe I really wasn't in need of any calories anyway. No exercise this morning either, so it worked out all right.

For lunch I had marinated veggies over zucchini noodles with an alfredo type sauce along with a salad and avo soup. Then I made another avocado soup for dinner with one avocado, 2 stalks of celery, 1 huge cucumber, and 1 whole bunch of cilantro. We put some miso in there too. It was pretty tasty and not overwhelmed by the cilantro as you might think. It felt so vivacious and alive. (I feel silly saying that food feels like that, but I don't know how else to describe it. It is really amazing.)

After Alicia and I went to the gym, I cut up 2 pineapples for all of us. They were so sweet and delicious, it felt almost decadent. I think they put yogurt on their's, but I ate mine just the way it was with a few sprinkles of blueberries. Life is good. I feel bad that it takes food to make me feel like that. Driving home from the YMCA, we saw one the prettiest sunsets I have seen in a long time. Yes, life is good for more reasons than just wonderful food...

Planning for the Market

I'm not doing too much cooking this week because I have a lot of work to do with school, but I did come up with some items that might be good for the market. We are committed to making 2 items for sampling each week, so we need to have enough product from the week before so that we have enough for sampling the next week. I made up a tentative schedule, but it will depend on what is available from the suppliers and the garden, and what is leftover. I guess we will figure it out after the market each week for the next week.

I was hoping to make a spinach alfredo, but the spinach is not in good enough shape for that to happen. We have mushrooms that would have been nice stuffed with it.

I think we will make a nice marinated broccoli to serve with shredded zucchini and marinated mushrooms with a marinara or alfredo sauce. Can't decide for sure. For the other thing, maybe we'll make some salsa to have with corn chips or something. Or maybe a lemon pie? or sunnies would be easy since it is a hard work week, and I haven't had much time to make stuff. Alicia made a whole batch of them this week, and I'm sure they're delicious. Of course, we always cut up produce for people to try as well, but we've had so many pre-orders, our table produce might be limited.

Anyway, the other thing on our agenda is the prepared foods that we prepare to have for customers. The honey almond butter went over well as did the ranch dressing. We have pre-orders for both of them as well as for the alicheezits and East Indian Sprouts. I think we'll make more kale salad even though we don't have pre-orders for it. It sold well. I was also wanting to make a pineapple salsa and some salads. I wonder if miso soup would go over well. Then we could use those gorgeous mushrooms. I want to make some guacamole as well. I ordered a whole case of avocados, and I am anxious to make lots of stuff with them.

So, even though I haven't been able to cook much this week, I've had fun thinking about what to prepare. It is kinda fun imagining what people will like, and there is a thrill to seeing them enjoy it. I've never felt like that before even though I've cooked a lot for others. They've always liked it, but I think this is more of a challenge because people assume they WON'T like it. They are surprised and delighted when they do enjoy it. I am getting a satisfaction from this that I didn't from preparing cooked foods. People expect to like that.

We were talking tonight about how we like not having to go to the grocery store anymore. We haven't been for the whole month. We just eat leftover produce! It is very cool. Our menus revolve around what is left, and we are eating like kings. (Raw vegan kings, that is. There probably haven't been a whole lot of them historically.) Fun stuff! It is a challenge to try to eat it before it spoils. We don't like to waste any of it because it is all so beautiful and delicious.

Smoothie Overload

I know this is boring during our heavy work weeks, but there is still stuff going on. We are kind of in survival mode when we have to work a lot, but that's ok, because we need to see that it works for us whether we have a lot of time to prepare and be creative, or if we need fast preparations so that we can get on with our work.

Cucumbers are coming on in the garden. That is good news. They were really high last winter, and they are still expensive. They never recovered. The more of them we can produce for ourselves, the better. I suppose that is true for any food, but some things will always be more elusive than others. For example, herbs are always high. Speaking of which, the basil is also doing great. We cut some today, and it was so fragrant, it was almost heady.

Darius made raspberry smoothies for breakfast. I know he used greens in there, but I'm not sure which one(s). They were delicious. He went a little overboard, so we made sorbet with the leftovers. The raspberries we got at the market this week were really delectable. I'm not a big fan usually, but these were truly wonderful.

For lunch Alicia made us a delicious salad with some sea vegetables, cucumbers, heirloom tomatoes, and that wonderful romaine. We also had some more yummy cucumber salad. We still had ranch dressing. UmUmUm. Thank you, mother nature. I do love salads.

We served the ice cream as our FHE treat, and the children really loved it. I'm glad we have the ice cream maker for them. I don't think it would matter that much to us, but it seems to be important to them. We had enough smoothie left over to make some popsicles, so they can enjoy them tomorrow.

Alicia got the sunnies into the dehydrator today, and we did broccoli tonight. We are not sure how it is going to come out, but we'll see.

I pulled the tomatoes that were drying. I can never resist munching on them as I pack them. The dried sweet peppers were yummy too.

We're going into double time on the juvie. I'm not sure where we'll put it all. We don't have the refrigerator space for it. I guess we'll figure that out as we go along.

Watermelon Feast Day

Today was fast and testimony day, so we did not eat until after our church meetings. We had some sugarbaby melons left from the market, so we had a wonderful watermelon feast. These were not as sweet as some I have had, but they were wonderfully hydrating after 19 hours of no fluids. They were tasty as well, just not the best I've had. Actually one of the 4 we cut open was delicious, the others were just okay.

Do we expect perfection each time we eat a fruit or vegetable? We had some cherries this weekend as well. Almost every one of them was an exquisite jewel of goodness. The few that weren't were a lesson in opposites. It helps us appreciate the good when we have something to which to compare it.

I had some of those cherries for dinner, and I will never cease to think of them in the off season. They are truly memory makers.

We also had some of Roger's salad left over from yesterday, so we had that. I think the children nibbled on fruit all day as well. It was a simple day.

Tonight I made some more rejuvelac for the week, started more wheat seeds sprouting, and used the rejuvelac that was ready for some more cashew cheese. The cashew cheese that was ready was used for some cheddar, some yogurt, and more raisin cheese. We needed to stock up! Our supply had diminished drastically! Can you tell we like this stuff?

We also packaged our finished zucchini chips and started more. Some of the heirloom tomatoes we had put in the dehydrator were ready, so we packaged them. We also cut up some peppers for the dehydrator along with a few more trays of zucchini and yellow squash. We have 2 dehydrators now going full tilt: 18 trays.

We started some marinated broccoli for some broccoli soup tomorrow. Everyone said they like the dehydrated broccoli texture better than the fresh for this application, so I guess we are going to start some broccoli drying tomorrow. Should be interesting. I got out my dehydrator book I bought when I got my dehydrator, and Alicia was able to find lots of other concoctions I had forgotten about. One is an herbal tea made from raspberry leaf. We have literally tons of that in our garden growing as a weed, so we will probably try some of that. I used the raspberry leaves in my juices last year, but I hadn't thought of them as a tea. Of course that makes sense. I think raspbery leaf is supposed to be a good blood cleanser. Sounds we have a new avenue to pursue.

Synergy in the Soil

Met some more wonderful people at the market yesterday. (I forgot to write last night.) We feel very blessed that they find their way to the market so that we can meet them. There are so many venues for organic food these days (and man, isn't that an amazing blessing), that it is a wonder we get to connect with so many people seeking those choices.

We brought some of our concoctions to the market including kale salad and ranch dressing/dip as samples. They seemed to be a big hit. We also brought cucumber salad, honey almond butter, East Indian sprouts, zucchini chips, and banana bark for sale. We are wondering how we will keep up with the demand when we get a lot of customers. I guess we will deal with that when it happens. We know this is what we are supposed to be doing at the present time, and we know it helps people to have support when they are trying to change from destructive habits, so that being the case, He will help us do it just as He always has when He directs the path in which we are to travel. He never leaves us high and dry. We just can't imagine what that path might be. We are ALWAYS amazed at it when it does become evident.

One of the greatest benefits of this has been the wonderful produce WE are blessed to eat. When we were buying it at stores hit and miss, much of it was older and not as good. We are being blessed to eat the best possible food available to us right now, and I am so grateful for that. Some of it is so incredible, and I am so thankful to the growers that produced it.

Speaking of growers, Roger added 40 tomato plants to our farm yesterday. We will soon be swimming in cherry tomatoes, and that is a wonderful thing. Last year I would pick our tomatoes, bring them into the sink, and could hardly resist eating them as quickly as I washed them. Most of them never made it to a salad, sadly for Roger. He has no idea how wonderful they were! There was a sweet tangy thing going on, definitely yen and yang. I am salivating to think of them. I can hardly wait for this year's crop. In the meantime, I will enjoy other farmer's versions.

Saying that reminds me how personal and distinct each garden's output is. I don't believe any 2 gardens or farms produce could be identical. That is all the more reason to have a greengrocer who wants delicious produce as much as you do. I was thinking that at the market yesterday. So many people turn their nose up at organic. I can't even tell you how many people walk by and say, "Oh, that's organic...", and walk by as though it is something to be avoided as much as possible. The sign we have which designates us as organic is as much a detriment as it is an attraction. That is okay. It is the great divider. We don't want to force our idealogy upon anyone. We just want to help those who have come to believe it is important.

I am becoming more and more passionate about buying only those fruits and vegetables produced by farmers who care about their soil and the organisms they encourage to live there in a symbiotic relationship. I can tell by how a fruit or vegetable tastes how much effort was put into this. I know that sounds strange to some. There are even organics for which this is true. There are non-organic (conventional) foods in which I have tasted this, but it is rare, and not worth the chance since most conventional produce is mass produced with little thought put into the life of the soil.

Some farmers accomplish this unknowingly. I think of this when I drive through Hastings and see the silage growing. Farmers grow this as a way to enrich their soil the cheapest way possible, but it is also a great way to accomplish the synergistic relationship that makes for great tasting produce.

I have been thinking of how this is true of our food preparation as well. When we combine fresh, organic, and whole fruits, vegetables, nuts, and seeds into foods, we must keep this concept going. They must compliment each other. We must keep the synergy going. That is why some combinations are so delightful and others aren't. If we begin with foods that are substandard to begin with, we have little chance of coming up with something wonderful. When we use only great products, and feel what would go well together, we can't lose. I realize too, that what is good for me, may not be good for everyone, but apparently I have a pretty generic sense of this since most people like my preparations.

So no new recipes at the market this week, just some oldies but goodies. We are already excited about what we will be making next week: spinach alfredo stuffed mushrooms, caesar salad, and waldorf salad. We had the most beautiful romaine this week I have seen in a long time, and we can wait to make these delicious salads with them. Our celery was gorgeous too. Oh how blessed we are...

Change in Repetoire

It's fun to take a lot of samples for people to try at the market, but we have decided it is a little too labor intensive for us this early in the game. We decided to bring 2 new recipes each week for people to try which highlights some sort of seasonal produce we've been able to get. Then we can have other prepared foods we've passed out samples for before if anyone wants anything. We'll see how it goes tomorrow.

This week we made some kale salad and ranch dressing, raw vegan style. Both are delicious. We have celery sticks to go with the dressing/dip. I've already posted both recipes, so nothing new there.

We had a delicious fruit salad for breakfast with some cashew yogurt. For lunch, because the children both "graduated" today, we went to Present Moment for lunch. They had a great corn chowder today for their special. Darius and Alicia liked the jalopeno poppers, but they were too hot for me. There was also a scampi zucchini pasta dish with a Caesar salad, but it was nothing too special. We did like the addition of sun-dried tomatoes to it. It was nice to see Yvette and Sandy again.

"Sufficient for Our Needs"

Today it was Alicia's turn to forget something...she forgot the agave when she made her smoothies. Like I said, it is really hard to mess these things up. Darius said they were fine. I had watermelon. It was ok, but I am really looking forward to having one of the organic ones from Lady Moon Farms we will have at the market this weekend. All of their produce is top of the line.

We picked up our cherries today. They have been so outrageously priced, we have not been able to get any before today. They are still high, but this is the price they tapped out on last year. We bought some conventional ones last year, and they just aren't that tasty, so we held off getting cherries until we could get the organic ones. They seem hard to come by in general this year though. I haven't even seen any conventional ones at the market.

I have been thinking alot about why organic fruits and veggies taste better than conventional. (There is no doubt that they do. If you don't believe it, eat only organic for a couple of weeks, and then eat a conventional apple.) I believe it has to do with the life of the soil. When the soil is being nourished, there is a magical mix there, and all of the components are able to work together to make for a very desirable fruit or vegetable. Any other theories?

For lunch we had a delicious salad with romaine and heirloom tomato, cucumber, and alfalfa sprouts with some of the fantastic ranch dressing. I also sprinkled on some blueberries and capers. Yummy.

For dessert, we sliced up celery to have with the raisin cheese. Darius convinced me to try a banana with the raisin cheese, and that was good too. Seems like it combines well with all fruit. I had it with strawberries the other day.

Put some bananas in the dehydrator today. Alicia had some slices in there when I pulled something out of there, and they were so good, it motivated me to get more bananas in there. There is just too much good stuff to eat and not enough time to eat it!

We are going to pick basil and parsley and rosemary from our "farm" to take to the market this week. The basil is going crazy! Pesto time!

Messing Up is Hard to Do

I made smoothies for breakfast, but I was in a hurry, so I forgot the juvie base. It was a very thick smoothie! It's really hard to mess this stuff up even when you're trying!

Worked many hours today, so I didn't have time for much cooking. Alicia made a salad for us for dinner to go with yellow squash noodles and cheddar cheeze sauce. The ranch dressing is so good it makes me want a salad every day.

Darius made a fruit salad for lunch with some of all our fruit we still had. It was delicious with some of our yogurt dressing.

We were making more juvie, of course, and this time I used 2 cups of wheat berries so we could make a bigger batch of Alicheezits. We decided to make our own version of the Greek seasoning. We looked on the bottle of the one we got from Penzey's and concocted our own ratio based on the listed ingredients: coarse salt, garlic, lemon, black pepper, Turkish oregano, marjoram. It smells really good dehydrating, so maybe we got it right.

Patterns

Since we started a new work month today, there is not too much time for me to prepare food, so a lot of that fell to others. Darius made a mango milk shake for breakfast. Gotta love the mangos.

I had leftover kale salad for lunch with a lemonade. Good stuff. For dinner I was wanting a salad, so I made some ranch dressing from my giant bottle of cashew cheeze. After 3 1/2 quarts, there was still some cheeze, so I made 2 quarts of yogurt. I also started another bottle.

We are kind of getting in the groove with sprouting and fermenting. When I finish one, I start another. That seems to be a good pattern. I think it is essential to get some kind of pattern if you want to keep the food in your fridge that you want to eat.

Waldorf Salad

We went to Jacksonville last night for seminary graduation and our granddaughter Brooklyn's 1 year birthday, so I was pretty beat last night when it came time to get the old quill out for record keeping. Let's see how much I can remember about yesterday...

I know we had a Waldorf Salad for lunch after church. This is one of my favorite salads, and we don't have it often. I'm not sure why. I guess we don't want to get tired of it...

I like to serve this salad over a head of lettuce.

Mix well in a mixing bowl:

1 cup of chopped apples
1 cup of chopped celery
¼ cup raisins
¼ cup walnuts (I use soaked & dehydrated walnuts)

Mix together and dress with the following mayonnaise:

Blend in a blender till creamy smooth:

1/2 cup water
4 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons raw agave or honey
2 teaspoons sea salt

For creaminess choose one and add to the blender mixture, creaming well:
1 1/2 C chopped young coconut meat
1 1/3 cup raw cashews
1 ripe hass avocado

This mayo can be used as a sandwich spread or as a delicious dressing for any kind of salad. I've made it with each of the three "creamers", and they are all good. Just go with whatever you have on hand. I'm really into the avocado one right now.

Before church everyone munched on their fruit of choice, and you already know what I chose (mangos). After we got home from Jacksonville, I had some celery and raisin cheese after I ate some of the watermelon Alicia cut up for dinner. It wasn't a truly great one, but it was adequate and hit the spot.

Today Wyatt and Angelina made a fruit salad for breakfast. I took a picture but will have to post it when I have more time. More fruit for lunch for most of us, and then for dinner we had another kale salad, cucumber salad, and an save-the-tuna salad served over romaine lettuce with a tomato/pineapple/red pepper/onion/parsley salsa. It was very good. I made the above mentioned mayonnaise instead of the one I've made with it before. I think it was good. We had a dinner guest, Stephen Miracle, one of Darius' oldest friends. I think he liked it as well.

After dinner we had some delicious strawberries, some raisin cheese, and some more celery. Strawberries really taste good with raisin cheese, a little like that dip everyone makes with marshmallows.