I’ve been neglecting the blog of late due to our travels to Oz (yep we are still here – hubs leaves to head back to work tomorrow and I have another week here), but I’ve been updating daily eats, and raw food tips on the facebook page if you’ve missed me!

One of the great things about writing a health focused blog is connecting with other great likeminded people, who share the same healthy living vision and enthusiasm to encourage others to join in.

Over the years of writing Girl on Raw, I’ve not only met some wonderful people in real person, but online too, and it’s a great little community we are building.

Today I’m going to share with you 3 people whom I’ve ‘met’ and had the pleasure of reviewing their products which I know you guys will absolutely love.

First up is aimed at the guys (and gals) who are worried about being on a raw diet and losing too much bulk/muscle. Although I aim for a high raw diet, my husband, even though he advocates it, does tend to lose a great deal of weight without supplementing with protein powders/formulas.

When the author ‘Thor’ sent me out a copy to review, it was during busy Christmas time vacation and it sat on my desk for a month or two, until it caught Pat’s eye, and he devoured it in 2 days.

He shared with me some of the book, including ‘Thor’s’ workout plan for a busy father who has little time to dedicate hour long or more workouts at the gym. He also talks plenty about the best foods/juices for pre workout and post. And how to supplement to get enough protein.

You can grab your copy from Amazon for $14.95US here

Next up is the gorgeous  and fellow Queenslander Jess Ainscough. Jess healed her cancer through a healthy diet and lifestyle change and is now known as The Wellness Warrior. Her latest ebook, Make Peace With Your Plate, has been selling like hotcakes. You don’t have to be vegan or vegetarian (although it would be nice!) to gain from reading her book, as she doesn’t discriminate.

For those of you who have unsuccessfully battled diets for years or are looking for ways to clean up your act, Jess’ concise, easy to read ebook will help you well on your way from the basics to the more complex.

You can purchase her ebook from her website here for $19.95AUS

And lastly is another cancer survivor and inspirational speaker/blogger Polly Noble who if you haven’t checked out her beautiful website yet, go over and check it out! She has generously offered 5 lucky readers a chance to win a copy of her ebook “7 Day Kickstart – a Beginners Guide to Eating More Raw” which comes complete with a raw food plan and shopping list, perfect for those newbies or those of you stuck on where to get back on track.

Ok, there’s no child labour laws here in Saudi clearly

Anyway here’s an article I’ve been wanting to share with you for some time from my friend Jenni Maddions from Coconut Magic about the truth about one of my favourite foods, coconut. If I was stuck on a tropical deserted island I would be in heaven. Really.

I hope you enjoy the guest post!

Coconut Oil, Cholesterol, and Heart Disease.

Back in the 1930’s tropical oils were being widely used around the world. People were happy and healthy using coconut oil for its many health benefits. For almost 4000 years the news about coconut oil had been all good.

Coconut oil was then one of the leading and most consumed plant based vegetable oils. The American Soy Bean Association decided to scuttle and destroy its reputation. For economic and political reasons they set out to take over the market with their own hydrogenated and heavily processed vegetable oils and margarine. Sadly, at the great expense of our health, they succeeded.

In a very clever single swoop approach that tarnished the reputation of the good oils along with the bad – all saturated fats were labeled as bad.

The tests published at this time were done using hydrogenated coconut oils. These studies have no relevance to the non-hydrogenated coconut milk or virgin coconut oil that you eat today.

It is now known that the process of hydrogenation creates trans fatty acids (TFAs). TFAs are toxic in the body and known to impede cell functionality and cause a rise in blood cholesterol. These substances are not present in organic virgin coconut oil.

This scuttle is what has created the widespread misconception that coconut oil is bad for you, raises cholesterol levels and causes heart disease. Coconut oil was clumped in the ‘saturated fat is bad’ category, along side saturated animal fats.

Saturated fats in the form of animal fat do carry foreign cholesterol that tends to ‘clump’ together in the arteries, leading to raised cholesterol levels and heart disease. Coconut oil is a plant based, medium chain saturated fat that does not carry any foreign cholesterol. In fact it is the medium chain fatty acids (MCFAs) of coconut oil that makes it so incredibly healthy.

Virgin coconut oil is now being rediscovered as the healthiest and most versatile oil on earth.

Jenni Madison

http://www.coconutmagic.com/

Happy Friday! Any exciting plans for your weekend?

We had a Harley Davidson rally here on the compound yesterday which happens every year, and it’s the closest thing we have to a festival as our friend’s band played with their heavy metal/rock band for 45 minutes at the cricket ground.

It’s pretty much a family day with food vendors, jumping castles and other entertainment, so it was lovely to get out and about.

Our friend Chris, who is a wonderful photographer, and has taken some great shots of my tasting events, happened to snap this quickie of Manus and I (without his hearing protection which we had for when the band played).

Anyway onto some great giveaway news, especially for those of you who are new to raw, or struggling with how to make raw work for you, the gorgeous and talented Tanya Alekseeva from Better Raw in London, has recently brought out this fantastic new DVD called Rawfood 101.

I was lucky enough to receive a copy last year just in time for Christmas, along with some other raw food personalities like:

Matt Monarch from The Raw Food World

My friend Amber from Almost Vegan

And Matt’s wife Angela from Raw Reform, just to name a few!

Tanya’s DVD is concise, easy to follow and full of useful tips and tricks on easy raw food dishes and techniques for the newbie to raw food.

Plus she is the picture of what raw food health can and does look like!

Yesterday for lunch I had her chia seed crackers topped with her tangy sauerkraut and had to fight Manus for the crackers – they are tasty on their own too!

Tanya and Better Raw have teamed up with Girl on Raw to offer one lucky reader their own copy of Rawfood 101 to add to their raw food collection, but if you can’t wait and need to grab your own copy NOW you can order your own here for £15.99 (approx. US $25).

To be in the running to win your very own copy of Rawfood 101 all you need to do is comment below and tell us why you want to win your very own copy of Rawfood 101.

For a bonus entry, you can go to facebook here and tag yourself in on the Better Raw Rawfood 101 photo!

Entries are open worldwide and will close at midnight GMT Sunday 5th Feb, so get your entry in now before it’s too late!

Lately, I’ve been eating a little more simply with my raw foods, because so often I feel the need to make more gourmet complex dishes for showcasing here on the blog, or I am in the theme of making more transitional foods especially when in the thick of doing my classes as what I usually teach is the impressive dishes on how to make raw food more appealing. Plus it is what I am trained in.

But as I’ve mentioned before, usually the longer you have been interested in raw foods, the more simplistic your tastes become, and spending  hours to process, dehydrate, juice etc for every.single.meal. becomes a little tiresome.

So I’m going to start focusing on more simple, quick, tasty and easy raw food meals and dishes over the coming weeks, as for the month of February I will be very busy with the delivery of my classes, and will most like want to eat as basic as possible.

Yesterday I stocked up on plenty of fresh fruit and vegetables – love that feeling of knowing I am all stocked up and can go shopping in my own pantry!

But before I put all my new produce away, I cleaned out my fridge of all the older produce and made some ‘clean out the fridge juice’

A mix of broccoli, green cabbage, carrots, celery, zucchini, apples, pineapple & lime.

Then I chopped up some vegetables for marinating. Oh so good.

Cauliflower, tomatoes, green onions, zucchini, marinated in olive oil, juice of one lemon and Himalayan/Celtic sea salt to taste. Mix it through with hands and let marinate for about an hour. Juicy and yum.

For those of you who missed it, check out my soul sista Kristen Suzanne’s  article cost cutting with a raw food diet on One Green Planet here.

Have you got any raw food simple recipes or ideas to share?

Or any ways to use up old produce?

Sorry to disappear on you like that, but between being in the kitchen plenty coming up with new recipes, testing old ones, planning my raw food launch and classes which begin next week and a slight emergency involving our little munchkin – all is well now thank goodness! I’ve just found it difficult to get on line to share my raw BLT I promised to you!

Anyway plenty of you guessed all the components, but here’s how I made my scrumptious raw BLT last week.

BLT  **RAW**

Onion Bread (otherwise known as farty bread!) – recipe here

Zuchinni & Dill Hummus 

Eggplant Bacon: Used a variation of the recipe I learnt at culinary school but you can also find a delicious version from Gena here and also another in Matthew Kenney’s Everyday Raw recipe book here

1 large eggplant (I used about 6 miniature ones from our CSA box) thinly sliced lengthways

1 T himalayan or celtic sea salt

1/2 dried chipotle chili soaked for 1 hour – keep soak water – if you don’t have chipotle chilli you could supplement with 4 drops of liquid smoke (this is what I used)

2 T maple syrup

2 T olive oil

1 T tamari

2 T apple cider vinegar

1/2 tsp paprika

1/2 tsp cumin

Place eggplant slices in a large bowl and toss in the sea salt and set aside for 2 hours.

Blend all remaining ingredients into a marinade.

After 2 hours, squeeze eggplant gently to remove as much liquid as possible and place in a fresh bowl. Cover with marinade and set aside for another hour.

Spread slices across the tefflex sheet and dehydrate for 24 hours on 115′F or until crispy like bacon.

When all components are complete then pile up your bread however you like your BLT. Here’s how I did mine

Oh yeah and don’t forget the fresh tomato and lettuce!

Hi everyone!

If you follow on facebook, you will see that last week I was so excited to receive my first organic box in our CSA (community supported agriculture) which is organic as well! And yesterday I received our second box.

I’m even more excited, because in the 4 years I have been living here, I have found it difficult to find organic produce let alone local and now we have both – at least until the growing season ends (not sure when that is). If you want to check out more about where I shop I wrote about it here and here.

Here’s what our box includes:

3 heads cauliflower
3 heads broccoli
3 heads iceberg lettuce
2 bunches spinach
1 bunch coriander
2 bunches parsley
1 bunch mint
4 ears of corn
1 bunch fresh fenugreek
2 big local lemons (lots more juice)
1 big white cabbage
3 boxes of cherry tomatoes (sweet)
1 Kilo Kousa (local zucchini)
1 Kilo Cucumber
1 Kilo Bell peppers

And what’s even better is they collect the boxes from us to take back and refill for next week, so there is zero wastage!

The above is a little too much for 2 adults and a baby for a week so I am sharing my box with another couple but for the last couple of weeks, we’ve had the whole box to ourselves as they have been out of the country.

One of the challenges I faced with so much produce for our little family was how to wash and store, especially the greens as they can tend to wilt when not stored properly.

As this produce is organic I do not do the usual baking soda baths that I do for un organic fruits and vegetables which I wrote about here.

How To | Washing Your Greens & Herbs To Keep Fresh

Equipment:

Salad spinner

Large bowl/bucket for rinsing or sink

Paper towel

Gallon size sealable sandwich bags

Multiple clean tea towels/dish cloths

Instructions

1. Fill up a large bowl or sink with fresh water (filtered if possible). Side note: our water in Saudi is desalinated salt water and we also have a sweet water tap in the sink which has been treated even futher – I use a US tap filter on the sweet water tap for washing vegetables, cooking water and also drinking water

2. Trim the unusable stems from the herbs/greens and discard (I actually keep these for juicing purposes and wash with the rest of the produce and store away until I make the juice)

3. Place the greens/herbs in the water (most likely in batches as you won’t have enough space for them all!)

4. I usually use my clean hands to ‘swish’ them around in the water to ensure all parts of the leaves are rinsed. Also important to note, especially here in Saudi where our locally grown produce is almost always saturated with sand/dust (product of living in the desert) that you may need to do this with the same leaves multiple times with the produce to ensure they are grit free. Having said that, this box of vegetables has been less sandy than I’ve experienced with supermarket purchased produce!

5. Place the leaves in your salad spinner and SPIN!

6. Place the leaves in a single layer on top of a dish cloth on the bench and gently lie a second cloth on top.

Be gentle as you don’t want to ‘bruise’ your leaves, but lightly pat the leaves through the dish cloth and leave a while to dry. Repeat with the rest of the leaves – emptying your salad spinner of water before the next round. If you are limited on kitchen space you can layer the clothes up like this.

7. I usually leave the leaves to dry from 20min to an hour then check on them. You will most likely need to dab them all again, as you want to try and ensure they are all completely dry before storage.

8. Place a piece of paper towel in a sandwich bag, then place your leaves inside, then top with another piece of paper towel.

9. Before you seal the bag, try and ensure limited air is left within the bag – this will ensure maximum freshness.

10. Enjoy your greens & herbs as you like, taking what you require from the bags, and sealing once again with limited airspace to savour them for as long as possible – my leaves are still as fresh as 1 week on!

NOTE: keep your bags and paper towel (can be dried) for the next week’s goodies.

Sorry if this seems elementary to some, but up until now, I struggled to keep my greens crisp and fresh for long periods of time. If you follow these instructions you will have spinach, dill, arugula/rocket, parsley, fresh for as long as possible.

You will need to do this multiple times if you have as much produce as we received in our box!

I’ve heard of many other techniques for keeping and storing herbs, so what do you do?

It’s been a little slow start to the year for us, we’ve just been chilling at home, planning our next holidays unpacking from our holidays, and thinking about our goals for 2012 whilst enjoying the weather as the cold snap has departed. Yes it does get cold here in Saudi

Last year, Pat and I both talked about doing our own Vision Board’s (a la The Secret) but never got around to it, but this year I am determined to get something down on some kind of board or goals list (which I usually do anyway) as I’ve got plenty to look forward to this year, some of which include:

• a special person’s first birthday
• ramping up my raw food classes both here in Saudi and possibly abroad (maybe Australia, Dubai & Bahrain) sign up here if you want to be informed of upcoming classes & workshops
• becoming a Raw Food Coach via Karen Knowler’s awesome programs
• bringing you a lot more raw food recipes via the blog which means more kitchen time for me
• a couple more ebooks in the works!
• more recipe and how to videos
• a couple of fitness related goals
• introduction of a family page on the website – for baby product related reviews & discussions plus more

Just to name a few – phew!

So whilst I slowly get my hands dirty back in the raw food kitchen here, here is a simple recipe I put together to follow our simple veggie chilli dinner I made the other night.

EASY Raw Blueberry Softserve

{Bad iPhone photo!}

Ingredients

2 frozen bananas

1 cup of frozen blueberries

optional – splash of almond milk [especially if you are not using a high powered blender like a vitamix - will help get things moving]

garnish – fresh fruit, I used pitted fresh cherries

1. Place bananas, blueberries and almond milk if using in a blender, until smooth.

2. Garnish with fresh fruit.

You can use other frozen fruit like pineapples, strawberries, mangos, kiwi fruit so have a play around.

Here’s one my mum made the other day of nectarines, kiwi fruit, passionfruit, banana, pineapple, orange, strawberry, blueberry and coconut flesh.

What are your plans goals for 2012? Do you like to think big or break them down into monthly goals?

As of yesterday, we are safely and soundly back home here in Saudi, after a wonderful end to our holiday in France when we were unexpectedly upgraded to Business Class (thank you frequent flyer miles!) which was a god send especially for Pat who had to go directly to work on arriving back into camp – a rude holiday awakening for sure!

Even though we were upgraded to the spacious flat bed seats (on Emirates for those of you who are curious), we were still tired from flying through the night, so spent the rest of yesterday trying to reset our sleep clocks and just relaxing.

Then this morning it was time for me to hit up the shops to restock the fridge.

Usually I like to hit up the supermarket on a Saturday (the beginning of our working week here) to begin the week off on the right foot, but obviously our tummies couldn’t wait til then

So here is how our fridge and bench look now

Ready for some raw (and some cooked) yummies.

Also had some unpictured frozen strawberries and mango slices ready for some smoothie incarnations. Did I tell you I’m finishing my next eBook right now? It might just be on smoothies

Being on holiday is always good, but I do love coming home too.

How about you?

When this posts, we should be in our car on our way up to the snow for the next 7 days, so I think we’ll be out of internet service til the New Year. Whatever your plans, whether it is staying at home, planning the year ahead, enjoying time with family and or friends, here’s to 2012, may the beginning be a great start for the rest of the year ahead.

Here are some snaps from our last week in Paree.

x Robyn Pat and Manus

Vin chaud (hot spicy wine) on Champs Elysee

My favourite salad from Relais Gascon, Montemarte

Vegetarian restaurant in Montemarte

Christmas markets

Christmas markets Montmarte – dried fruit

Basilique du Sacré-Cœur

Christmas markets near Eiffel Tower

Arc de triomphe

Paris metro

Outside the Louvre

Gingerbread house

Here’s a repost of a post I did earlier in the year as part of the EASY series, but it’s something I return to usually at this time of year as more social occaisions pick up and people begin to fear straying from their healthy lifestyle.

Hope you enjoy!

Socialising whilst adopting a new way of eating can be quite daunting, and previous to being high raw, I’d even opted to NOT socialise whilst bedding down a new diet fad or whilst doing a detox. I remember one time, when I was still a flight attendant,deciding to pick up more flights for a month as I was giving myself a 30 day (month) ban of anything social, just so I could focus on my eating and exercising without having to have the anxiety of peer pressure to drink or eat things I just didn’t want to.

However this was before I went raw, and possibly had an unhealthy association with diets or ‘detoxes’ that would only be for a period of time, and what I found with RAW was that it was something that was going to last me over time and become a habit, and not just last for a short timeframe.

I promise you, there are ways you can still care for your health without dropping out of the social scene.

Here are some tips I’ve employed over the years to stick on track:

• have a treat day and coincide it with your outting: the whole idea of having a treat day is to ensure you don’t have a feeling of deprivation and resent the new way of eating. Treats for me since having gone raw have changed quite significantly and even if they are still considered junk food, as long as I aim to stick to vegan foods, even if cooked, then I am not too stressed out
• load up: fill up on a green smoothie, cooked or raw soup of salad monster before heading to a party. This will curb your appetite and ensure you are able to stop at just one or two nibblies when you get to the party. Don’t arrive hungry
• pack your own smoothie! I’ve done this loads, and before you say ‘how embarrassing’ basically it’s not really a big deal at a party. Mostly everyone else is concerned with what they are drinking to worry about what you are drinking (usually why I never recommend people to announce ‘they are not drinking alcohol tonight’ as it was probably likely no one would have noticed anyway. I often take a pineapple and coconut smoothie or an equally delicious smoothie – usually my husband will choose to have some of mine rather than alcohol instead. I pack my smoothie in a cold flask so it doesn’t need to be refrigerated and at a party where it is ‘help yourself’ to drinks I just discretely pour my drink into a cup like everyone else’s. In a situation where you are at a dinner party, perhaps make enough for everyone to try. Also green smoothies are a great conversation starter!
• Dinner Time! When I am asked to a friends house for dinner, I never assume they know what kind of food I like to eat, so rather than be ‘that person’ who can’t eat this or can’t eat that, I actually make my own dinner (enough for a full meal size) plus extra for everyone else to sample. I take it along, and if I am lucky then the host has prepared something for me, and I have contributed something healthy and delicious as well. Usually I pick a show stopper – something that will really impress people so it encourages them to try it and I’ve always taken home empty dishes!
• Going out to dinner? If you know where you are going ahead of time, call up the restaurant for a copy of their menu or check them out online. Most restaurants have vegetarian dishes than can be easily modified – think salad minus the cheese, or even ask to speak to the chef and let them know your requirements to see if they can come up with something to suit you prior to arriving. I’ve been known to take a ripe avocado in my bag to bulk out my meal if the options have been poorly. If you cannot prepare ahead of time by calling ahead, or it’s a spontaneous dinner plan, think of ordering 2 or 3 appetiser size meals if there are no or minimal options in the main meal section. Don’t be afraid to speak to your server about your requirements (you can use the ‘I’m allergic to these foods…will help). I have a friend who carries a business card size card with their food requirements for the server to give to the chef, good idea!
• Relax your rules: sometimes it’s just not going to be easy to get the exact meal you require due to the fact you are in a social environment that is a little challenging. Don’t stress out, make the most of your situation, hopefully you’ll have a lara bar or some trail mix in your bag to get you by, until you can have your next meal as you want! Try and enjoy the moment for what it is, it’s about being with friends and loved ones, and if you happen to slip up, you can get right back on track when you get home!

Do you have any other suggestions?