Raw Food Lunch

I’ve always been interested in all kinds of food.

Lately, I’ve been intrigued with the “Raw Food” movement. That’s where you eat only foods that are raw; no animal products of any kind.

(Sushi would not really be “raw food” since it contains fish. Also the rice is cooked).

When I first heard of raw food, I envisioned some veggie salad-head type of person, nibbling on a stalk of raw broccoli – preferably with bits of dirt clinging to the root hairs.

However, once I read some of the recipes, I was pretty intrigued with the creativity involved. After trying some of them and was even more impressed.

What really persuaded me was the fact that every raw food recipe ingredient is stuff we should be eating. Think about it. Take a hamburger for example. We know so well that beef, white bread, and mayo are known to cause distress. The only things in a hamburger that we should really be eating are the lettuce, tomatoes and onions.

Whenever I made a raw food meal, any hunger was really satisfied with just a small portion of it. After all, it’s pretty packed with lots of nutrients. If you want to pig out with a heaping portion. . . . all the better.

Can you say that with any other diet?

What raw foodies like about it is that all of the natural enzymes remain and are not destroyed by cooking. That sounds nice. But in reality, I think the acid in our tummies destroys a lot of the enzymes anyway.

But still, can any other food programs actually advocate eating more food that less?

I’ve been fiddling with my own ideas and recipes. Here is my lunch that I brought to work today. (See pic below) It’s my raw food version of lasagna.

For the “noodles,” take a zucchini, a yellow squash and a carrot and shred them with a vegetable peeler. Toss with olive oil, garlic, and lemon juice to “cook” them.

For the filling, soak black eyed peas overnight in water (in the fridge). Drain the peas and puree them in a food processor with olive oil, a few golden raisins, lime juice and a little salt. (The sweetness of the raisins takes away any of the bitter “beany” flavor of raw beans).

Use flaxseed oil if you like. Use more of it if your budget allows. It will only make the filling richer and is packed-and-pure omega-3s.

For the sauce: Soak cashews in water for a couple of hours. Reserve some of the soaking liquid. Drain and puree them in a blender with some sun-dried tomatoes, olive oil, (or flaxseed oil) a few golden raisins, lemon juice, fresh basil and garlic. Add a bit of reserved liquid as needed. As it emulsifies, you really will get an incredibly rich and creamy sauce.

Assemble in layers with sauce on top.

Ta-daahhh. . .

. . . Yeah, I know.

It sort of looks like when my beagle would throw up.

But it’s really very good. And it even contains a complete protein since it has beans and nuts and is packed with omega 3s. The black-eyed pea is just about the best legume around; low in fat, packed with protein and contains more minerals than any other food source, including significant amounts of the trace element, selenium, (which we really need).

Because this recipe combines the proteins of legumes (black-eyed peas) with seeds (cashews), it results in a protein complementarity that is more complete and useable than any other animal protein. In other words, the parts are greater than the sum.

And, when you think about it, have we ever known of any primate to obtain sustenance from eating animal flesh or from sucking the milk of other species? . . .

. . . It’s Saturday.

I’ll probably have a big honkin’ Chicago style pizza delivered tonight. With anchovies.

After all, what other primates have evolved to deliver Pizzeria Uno?