Make Your Own Mini Green-za's!

NOTE: THIS RECIPE REQUIRES A DEHYDRATOR.

This is just plain old FUN! I like inspiring people to try healthier, raw options, and I know for me that was an issue of convenience for a long time. For a lot of you, an issue is that you have older kids who are not vegan/raw and convincing them to switch to a diet like this might be hard. So you might need some yummy, fun to eat finger-foods for the family. I've got one for you right here! A wonderful, truly green pizza. Now, this takes a while, so you're gonna have to put in some prep work beforehand...

Crust:
480 Ml (2 Cups) Milled Flax Seed
360 Ml (1 1/2 Cups) Ground Almonds
240 Ml +  1 Tsp Water
2 Tbsp Olive Oil
1 Tbsp Mixed Herbs (Or just equal parts Thyme and Oregano will do)
1 Tbsp Basil
1 Tbsp Nutritional Yeast
1/2 Tbsp Rosemary
1/4 Tbsp Local, Organic Honey
A Couple Pinches of Salt

Stir all ingredients in a bowl or, better yet, use your hands! Roll out into golf balls, smack in your hands to flatten to a little less than a quarter-inch thick and pop onto the dehydrator trays-dehydrate on 40 degrees C for about 7 hours. This is a lovely GF Italian herb bread and you can use it for anything, sandwiches too, whatever you like.

Green Cheeze (This is for you Ali-an easy Cheezy for my nut-allergic friend!):

240 Ml (1 Cup) Pumpkin Seeds
2 Tbsp Pine Nuts
2 Tbsp Sunflower Oil
1 Tbsp Rejuvelac (I make quinoa rejuvelac because it is gluten free)
1 Clove Garlic
1/4 to 1/2 tsp Fleur De Sel (or sea salt)
Pinch of white or black pepper
Pinch of ground mustardseed (optional)

Soak the Pumpkin Seeds for about 4 hours or so. Drain and put in a food processor or a blender (but the food processor will work much better) and mix with all the other ingredients, stopping and stirring continuously until you have it well blended.

Once your crusts and cheeze are ready, put the cheeze in a bowl and the crusts on a plate. Slice up some organic cherry tomatoes onto another plate and you're ready to serve your make-your-own mini pizzas! These are AWESOME with My Rawkin' Raw Ranch Dip. Pizza + Ranch, and it's all healthy and raw?! I must be joking, right? Nope. Give it a try for yourself. Out of this world, and tons of fun! I finished it off with some raw carob brownies, but those are for another time...

Bold n' Spicy Veggie Soup

I know. ANOTHER SOUP! Sorry. but I love them! They are low-cal, rich in flavour, cheap, easy and PACKED with veggie goodness and, SO flavourful. I'll let you in on a little secret...I...don't even like vegetables on their own! OK, I do, but not so much. It's boring. My taste buds have been ruined by the horrible standard of eating I once had. I long to be this forager who eats single ingredient meals, and just stuff my face full of naked spinach and broccoli, no dressings required day in and day out. However until that day comes, I shall blend my beautiful, precious vegetables into soups, smoothies, and so forth-and get their raw goodness in any form I can get it. I did something a little different for this soup, however, than my "routine"soup base and I am impressed with the results.

2 Large Organic Carrots (Use 2 Small to Regular Size "Normal" Carrots if Organic Absolutely Cannot Be Obtained)
1 Large Organic Parsnip (Or 1 Small to Medium Size "Normal" Parsnip)
2 Organic Celery Stalks
2 Cups Vegetable Stock (You can make your own raw stock by googling how or you can just buy some organic, yeast & gluten free in the store and mix  it with 1 1/2 cups of water like I did. Lazy, I know.)
1 Big ripe Tomato
2 Tbsp Extra Virgin Olive Oil
2 1/2 Tbsp Nutritional Yeast
3 Cloves raw garlic
1 Tsp Black Pepper
1/2 Tsp Fleur De Sel (or sea salt)
1/4 Tsp Dill
A few sprigs of fresh basil (optional)
Pinch of ground mustard seed (optional)

Toss everything in the blender and...blend. Garnish with pine nuts if you like-they are delicious and like crutons in a savoury soup. Mm, mm mmm

Rawkin' Raw Ranch Dip

JUST like the real thing! I got the inspiration for this fromThe Rawtarian's Raw Ranch Dressing Recipe, but I made it my own because I prefer my ranch a little bit thicker, peppery and less "tart"/sour (or more sweet, whatever). So here is my version, which I hope you will like:

300 ml (1 1/4 cup) Cashews
180 ml (About 3/4 Cup) Water
2 1/2-3 Tbsp Lemon Juice
40 ml (1/6 Cup) Unfiltered Apple Cider Vinegar
80 ml (1/3 Cup) EVOO
3 Tbsp Agave nectar
3 Large Cloves Garlic
3 Tsp Onion Granules
1 Tsp Dill
1 Tsp Fleur De Sel
1/2 Tsp Black Pepperhh

Throw it all in the blender & mix on high speed. Add a little more water if you want it to be more of a salad dressing and less of a dip. Keep in the fridge in old syrup containers or hummous tubs (ect)-tastes fantastic with fresh veggies...cherry tomatoes & carrots...mmmm

All-purpouse Ground "Feef"

Admission; MY guilty pleasure, the thing keeping me from going vegan for a time was ground beef. I love love love the taste. I've been missing it for a long time. So I had to recreate it. I think I've done a pretty decent job, because this really hits the spot.

Raw Feef (Fake Ground Beef):
3 Organic Carrots
480 ml/2 cups Walnut halves/chopped Walnuts
24 Sundried tomatoes
2 Tablespoons Olive Oil
2 Tbsp Sesame Seeds
3 Cloves Garlic (remove the green bits in the middle if raw garlic tends to give you indigestion)
1 tsp Ground Black Pepper
1/3 tsp Fleur De Sel
1/4 tsp Cayenne Pepper
Pinch of ground mustardseed (optional)
Pinch of basil (optional)

Pulse, stir, pulse stir ect until you have a gritty, paste-y texture. You can make meatballs(as I have done in the photo above by scooping with a tablespoon!), form burgers (which are great on a bun of greens with mustard), use as taco meat, ect. Pile on some Basic Cashew Cheeze to a meatball and this is out of this world. Yum!

Rawnnaise

Time for a sauce. A sauce which is admittedly, not my favourite. Why? Because mayonnaise DISGUSTS me and I mean REALLY, REALLY disgusts me. However, my husband LOOOOOVED the stuff. He could have eaten a mayonnaise sandwich (hmm, not unlike my brother...if only I lived close enough to convince him to try this)! So I like a lot of the "raw" versions of things, but this one tastes exactly like mayonnaise. Wow. I have offended myself. Paul, on the other hand, I have made a happy man. So if you are like Paul, and you love mayonnaise, try my recipe:

175ml (3/4 cup) Macadamia Nuts
175 ml (3/4 cup) Cashews
120 ml (1/2 cup) Water-Add a little bit more if you want this to be more of a "salad dressing" type mayo.
2-3 Tbsp Olive Oil
2 Tbsp Raw, Unfiltered Apple Cider Vinegar
1 Clove of Garlic
1/4 to 1/3 tsp Fleur De Sel
1/4 tsp ground Mustard seed/Mustard powder
Pinch of Basil
Pinch of Cayenne powder

Blend it up, and there ya go!

Mambo Italiano!

This meal is a beauty (and very heart-healthy with all the tomatoey goodness :)) it is not entirely raw, but mostly so and is jam packed with Italian inspired flavours.

For a starter, we have:

Stuffed Tomatoes with Pine Nut Pesto

2 large Aromatic Tomatoes
1 large Greens leaf (I don't know what kind of "greens" these are...at the store it just says "Cornish Greens" :/ The leaves are however HUGE, very long and dark green and they come in a big bulb somewhat like cabbage does, I hope that helps some...they are similar to spinach so spinach could easily be substituted if you cannot find something like this! )
Pine Nut Pesto, which I will detail below.

Gently cut off only the very tops of the tomatoes. Cut them in half and scoop out the innards. Chop and dice your greens and divide them into quarters. If you desire, you may gently cook the tomatoes open-face down on a skillet-but be careful not to cook them too much because A. the nutrient content will be drastically altered with cooking which is why we eat raw to begin with and B. they will fall apart when you try to "stuff" them. Now, simply stuff the greens inside and garnish with as much pine-nut pesto as you like. Serves 1-4, depending on how much you want to eat ;)

Pine Nut Pesto

3 Handfuls of Pine Nuts
2-3 tablespoons Olive Oil (I used the nice flavoured oo from the sun dried tomato jar, but EVOO will substitute fine.)
1 clove Raw Garlic
A few sprigs of fresh Basil
A few grinds of black pepper

Add all ingredients to a blender or food processor. Pulse, stir, and repeat a few times, noting that it will be chunky.

Pasta

Whole-wheat spaghetti
Sauce of your choice (I used Napolina's Tomato & Basil, I know...lazy!)
Pine Nut Pesto

Cook, top with sauce and pesto, enjoy!