Cucumber Summer Rolls

Raw vegan, lite refreshing summer rolls.

When we moved to California the famous Roxanne’s raw food restaurant had just closed. We heard stories of the amazing unique food served. So when I came across the book “Raw” by Charlie Trotter & Roxanne Klein, I knew I had to get it and see what the buzz was all about.

The pages of this beautiful book are filled with pictures of the mouth watering gourmet creations and freshly picked produce that make me want to be a farmer! After reading through the recipes I knew I had to make some adjustments for my family, and so here is my version. I also added another simple kids version on the bottom of this post.

Adapted from “Raw” by Charlie Trotter & Roxanne Klein.

Marinade
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar (or shoyu)
2 Tablespoons fresh lemon juice
1 teaspoon ginger, peeled and minced (or 1/2 teaspoon ginger powder)
1 teaspoon maple syrup
Black pepper to taste
2 Tablespoon dried coconut flakes, soaked in 2 Tablespoons coconut water
1/2 clove garlic, minced (or 1 teaspoon garlic powder)

Mix ingredients and set aside

Cucumber Wrappers
1 large cucumber, English preferred, peeled

Cut the cucumber in minimum 4 inch pieces, crosswise (or close to that length, depending on the size of your cucumber)
Thinly cut the cucumber long ways with a mandolin, as thin as you can get. Once you get to the seeds turn it over and cut the other side, put these slices to the side.
Julienne the part with the seeds, and add to the filling (below).

Filling
1/4 avocado, julienned
1 small carrot, shredded or julienned
1 small bell pepper, julienned
1/4 cup mung bean sprout, or thin sprout of choice
1/4 cup romaine lettuce, finely chopped
1 teaspoon ginger, peeled and julienned
Sea salt and pepper to taste

Place the filling in a bowl, pour 3/4 of the marinade over it.

Take a slice of cucumber wrapper, put some filling across the bottom of it short ways. Roll it up. Place it on a plate and drizzle a little marinade on top. Repeat until you have finished all the cucumber.

If you have any filling left over put it on a bed of lettuce and pour the remaining marinade over it to make a refreshing summer salad.

Tips:
The thinner the cucumber wrapper the easier it will stay rolled up

The original recipe has red Thai chile, cilantro and some other ingredients that I didn’t have, but would have been excellent in this recipe.

Starting with the basic cucumber wrapper you can fill it with anything.

Kids Version
My boys got so excited to try this, but they aren’t fans of ginger, so I made them a separate plate of cucumber avocado roll up sushi. Wish I would have taken a picture. I took a cucumber wrapper, placed a piece of avocado on the end, sprinkled on very thin pieces of nori and rolled them up. They ate them as fast as I could make them. Adding some carrots or pea sprouts would have been perfect, but I was all out.

Quick and Easy Sauerkraut

I went to a sauerkraut party today. The ladies and I pounded away at shredded cabbage. It was fun and I left without making my own kraut, intending to make it at home. The evening came and went and I’m left with cabbage that needs to be kraut-ed, so I opted for the quick and easy way.

1-shred a head of cabbage, a food process with a silver works fast.
2-put in a glass jar
3-add enough salt water to cover the cabbage (for one small head of cabbage about 1-2 tablespoon of salt is enough).
4-put a full piece of cabbage on the top and press down so it’s submerged in water.
5-put on lid loosely or cover with a tea towel or paper towel and secure with rubber band, so no bugs or dirt gets in. You want it to get some air. The water will rise as the salt pulls out the liquid from the cabbage.
6-put on counter for 3 days, press down the cabbage as needed 1-2 times a day, to keep submerged in water
7-transfer to fridge, it will continue to ferment
8-check in a week, usually takes 2 weeks however it can take up to a month depending on weather and how cold your fridge is.
9-eat when reaches desired taste.

This technique tends to make the sauerkraut a little more crunchy yet still ferments.

I have 2 other techniques that produce sauerkraut faster. I will share those in another post.

Happy Kraut-ing!

Some future posts to look forward to:
-Is colored natural salt healthy? What I found out about sea salt and heavy metals.
-kombucha, how to make scobys and this fizzy health drink
-bye bye PMS! Hello kombucha

Sweet Potato Carrot soup

1 leek, scallion or onion chopped
1 cups vegetable stock or water with veg bouillon – for a raw version add spices of choice (I used Italian seasoning)
1 medium sweet potato, peeled and diced
4 large carrots, peeled and sliced
2 garlic cloves
1 small peeled fresh turmeric or 1 Tbsp powder
1 inch grated fresh ginger

Raw recipe: put all ingredients in a vitamix or blendtec, or other high power blender. Blend on high (increase the speed slowly) for 4 minutes or until heavy steam comes out vented top.

Cooked recipe: Heat broth in soup pot or pressure cooker. Saute the onion and garlic until lightly brown on edges, about 3 minutes, or longer for caramelized, add more water/broth as needed to keep it wet. Add all ingredients and cook on medium heat until vegetables are soft, about 15 minutes, stir often.
Blend the ingredients on puree in a blender, or with a hand blender directly in the pot, until smooth, leaving some chunky is good too.
Salt and pepper to taste.

Notes: for a holiday spiced soup add nutmeg, clove and cinnamon when sauteing the onion.
-for a curry soup add curry spice during saute.

Pressure cooker:
Cook on high pressure for 7 minutes.

Brownie bites, Vegan Gluten-free (can be made raw)

No-bake easy to make brownie bites. Can be made raw.

-Mix equal amounts of each:
Almond butter – or peanut butter (or nut butter of choice)
Cocoa powder, my favorite is Rapunzel
Maple syrup, agave or liquid sweetener of choice
-Form into balls or any shape you like.
-Chill in fridge for at least an hour uncovered.
-Serve

Will keep for weeks in a sealed container refrigerated.

For Raw ingredients: be sure they all clearly state raw on the package.
There is some debate on agave nectar, any liquid sweetener can be used, such as pure maple syrup or if your not vegan use raw honey.

Strawberry syrup or fruit preserve

Fresh or Frozen strawberries, thawed
Maple syrup, agave or sweetener of choice, a juiced pear or apple works too

Blend n serve.

My son loves this over pancakes (reduces how much syrup he eats), or w pbnj.

You can use and type of fruit, berries or mango work best, maple syrup will preserve it longer then most sweeteners.

It’s a very runny consistency, xanthium gum, which is not “raw”, irish moss or other thickener will do the trick to make it more of a preserve or jelly.

Quinoa Cold Cereal

Cold cooked or sprouted quinoa mixed with maple syrup and a dash of sea salt. Pour almond milk over as you would cereal. Serve cold.

To me it tastes like rice crispies and won’t get soggy. Very filling breakfast.

Quinoa Farina

Farina, oh the memories, snowy NY mornings, a dash of chocolate syrup… yum!

These days I try to make everything I can vegan and gluten free, raw is a plus. A few days ago I got the idea to blend quinoa and see what happens, to my surprise it became a farina constancy and taste!

Cooked or sprouted quinoa
Almond milk (or other non-dairy milk)
Maple syrup or sweetener of choice (dates best for raw)
Sea salt

Blend all ingredients until smooth, a hand blender works best, be aware it’s very sticky.

I didn’t put measurements because it really depends on how smooth or chunky you want it. For chunky put just a small amount of almond milk, just enough to wet it. And for smooth and thin add as much almond milk as quinoa. Everything else is to taste.

And if you want a special treat, like how my mom used to make it for me, add some cocoa powder or chocolate syrup just before serving. For fun, stir into a swirl.

Enjoy!

Fun food = Health Kids

What’s the secret to a healthy happy child? The answer is not food (exactly), it’s FUN!

Happy=fun=joy

All my son wants to eat lately is spelt vegan tortilla pizzas. I’ve been feeding him superfoods every chance I get, and I know getting him back to mostly raw is best for him, and will calm down his mode swings (oh the joys of being influenced by school).

The best way to get my son interested in something is to have fun with it. This morning we had a blast making fruit shapes, ants marching and even a surprise Mickey mouse. A few cookie cutters and a bunch of laughs later he went to school excited to show his friends his “so cool” lunch. And he had a belly full of heart and star shaped watermelon.

Sometimes he needs big hugs, sometimes tickles, and sometimes creative play! Happiness is the only way to have a happy child, and a happy you!

Juicing again!

1 pear
Handful beet greens
3 carrots
2 celery stalks
1 tsp e3live (stirred into juice)
1 heaping serving of Love 🙂

Yum!
It’s been so long since I’ve juiced that there was dust on my juicer (life of a mom w a 1 month old n 4 yr old). So grateful I had the time and space to make this today.

No bake thumbprint cookies

Adapted from a Whole Foods recipe makes about 16 cookies.

2 C quick or rolled oats
3 T almond butter
2 T maple syrup
1/4 C dates, approx 3 large
1/2 C hot water
1/4 t sea salt (optional)
1/2 C fruit preserve

In a small bowl cover the dates with hot water and set aside for 10 minutes.

In a food processor, pulse oats until coarsely ground, transfer to large bowl and set aside.

Purée the dates and water in food processor until smooth. Add all remaining ingredients except fruit preserves, to oats.

Mix well to form a slightly wet dough. If too wet add more oats, if too dry add water.

Scoop approx 1T of dough into your hand and roll into balls, press down onto a parchment paper lined tray, to make a cookie shape, press the middle down and fill with fruit preserve.

Refrigerate for at least an hour, serve.

Notes: I don’t make this with salt, but that may be a little bland for some people.

While this cookie is great on its own, it’s a basic dough recipe, u can make it with most any other ingredients you would put in cookies. Just be sure to adjust the amount of water-oats as necessary.

Options:
Add spices, shredded coconut, raisins or dried fruit, fresh fruit instead of preserve (blueberries work great), juice of an orange w the zest (use less water or more oats in this case), chocolate or carob chips, any smooth nut butter will work, chopped nuts.

Raw version: use raw oats, raw almond butter, agave nectar or other raw sweetener and dates, soak the dates in warm water, use fresh fruit or dried fruit that has been softened w a little water for the filling.