Day 1 - Nathan

I'm feeling better, and just slightly "off" today. I'm eating more now, and we've discovered a couple great recipes that I'll talk about below. Here's a summary of my planned meals today:

Breakfast smoothie: Half a humongous orange, one banana and ice/water

Snacking: Two bananas and one apple dehydrated into chips

Lunch: Salsa (tomato, onion, sea salt, cilantro), guacamole (avacado, tomato, onion, sea salt) and sprouts on sprouted tortillas that we got at the store.

Dinner: Unplanned, but Kelly is deyhdrading some sort of grainy goo to make crackers by this evening, so I'll be slathering them with raw hummus.

We'll be hitting the gym after work for the first time since I've altered my diet, so I'm curious to discover whether I'll end up pinned underneath a barbell at any time, too weak to cry for help. I'll also be hunting for those elusive sprouting jars tonight.

Concerning those recipes, my big desire right now is to find that handful of "go-to" foods that I can successfully make on a regular basis. I'm talking raw food versions of peanut butter sandwiches and frozen pizza. Last night, we made kale chips and raw hummus, and I was so stunned by how well the hummus turned out, I've got to share it.

RAW HUMMUS (modified from source: allrecipes.com)

Ingredients:
2 1/2 cups garbanzo beans
3 tablespoons tahini
1 1/2 teaspoons sea salt
2 lemons, juiced
2 cloves garlic
1 cup filtered water
Some paprika
Some cumin

We modified the recipe proportions pretty significantly because we weren't happy with the consistency. We also worried that raw garlic can be oppressive, so cut back from the recommended 4 cloves. Cumin was also our addition.

Procedure:
1. Soak a bunch of garbanzo beans in water for 24 hours.
2. Drain them and let them sit for three to four days. Make sure to rinse them a couple times a day. We just kept them in a strainer above a bowl, sitting in the refrigerator. They'll start sprouting. Proceed when the sprouts are 1/2 inch long.
3. Boil a large pot of water. Remove the boiling water from heat and let it stand for a minute. Drop in the beans and let them sit in the water for a minute, then remove them, drain them and toss 2 and 1/2 cups of them into the blender.
4. Blend everything together. Using our Vita-Mix, we ran at 10 on the variable setting and used the tamper to push the ingredients down until it was smooth.
5. Top with a dash of paprika, purely to convince your subconscious that you've created something worth decorating.

KALE CHIPS

Procedure:

1. Remove the dark green kale leaves from the stems and then tear them into smaller pieces

2. Wash and spin the pieces dry

3. Lay them on a dehydrating rack. Sandwich them between two breathable dehydrating sheets.

4. Dehydrate at 115 degrees for a couple hours. Our recipe (Complete Idiot's Guide to Eating Raw) told us to wait 90 minutes, but they were still very chewy at that point. It may have mattered that our machine was also full of apples and bananas. I have no idea.

5. Season with olive oil and sea salt.

-Nathan

Equipment

Our final piece of major equipment came in the mail today, so I'll give a rundown of the things we've purchased:

1. Vita-Mix 5200 blender

This machine was our first must-have, because the idea of chunks of food floating in my smoothies makes me gag. According to the Vita-Mix website, the machine runs at 240 miles-per-hour at top speed. A co-worker asked if it will crush ice. I'm certain it will crush my soul if I look inside while it's running. The machine will turn nuts into butter and will make ice cream out of a little almond milk and a bag of frozen strawberries. We took advantage of the option to purchase a refurbished machine, which came sparkling, with a seven year warranty.

Vita-Mix website (videos, products and more)

2. Benriner Turning Slicer

Used to turn vegetables into thin strips of "pasta", I was a little disappointed at the quality of the equipment in light of its price ($70-ish). It seems to work very well, though. We've already made strips of carrots and covered them in an almond dressing that Kelly made in the blender.

3. Excalibur Food Dehydrator

As I write, I'm nodding off to the white lullaby noise of this 9-tray skyscraper of food dehumidification. After research, we learned that Excalibur is the dehydrating standard for raw foodists because it allows low-temperature settings that prevent food from cooking. Kelly's excited to make sprouted breads - a combination of blended sprouts and other ingredients - so we'll have something to work as a bread substitute.

Our kitchen:

Kelly enjoying a (disgustingly) pre-Vita-Mix smoothie:

Spikey and Emma, our moral support:

Our first batch of ice cream:

-Nathan