The Avocado Store

avocado varieties florida

I’ve received a handful of emails lately concerned with the amount of sweetness on a low fat, high fruit raw vegan diet.  As expected, several of you aren’t quite used to the sweetness of so much fruit

To solve the problem, many beginner raw foodists substitute savory greens and/or nuts, seeds and avocado for sweet fruit.

Big Mistake

There are 2 problems with this approach:

1. Greens and vegetables have few calories
2. Nuts, seeds, and avocado are high-fat foods

In terms of greens, these foods are simply too low in calories.  Even a large salad of 8 ounces of romaine, one large cucumber, a whole bell pepper, and two medium tomatoes is under 200 calories!  The only way to increase the calories in this meal would be to add in fruit or fat.

Which brings me to the second problem: fatty nuts, seeds, and avocado.  Contrary to what people (raw and cooked foodists alike) like to believe, nuts are NOT a high protein food.  Take an ounce of walnuts (14 halves), for instance.  With only 9% of calories from protein and whopping 83% from fat, it becomes clear that nuts and seeds are really a high FAT food.

Avocados are in the same boat, with 4% protein and 77% fat.

SIDE NOTE: I’m referring to the Hass avocado here.  There are avocados with lower percentages of fat, such as some Florida varieties, but these are not as readily available.

While there’s nothing inherently wrong with this fact, it becomes a problem when these foods are substituted for fruit and eaten in mass quantities.  While it is perfectibly acceptable to eat a pound (or two) of fruit in one sitting, this is a recipe for disaster in terms of fat.

Too much fat has been linked to obesity, heart disease, atherosclerosis, and even depression.

To learn more about the problems associated with eating a high fat raw food diet, check out this article.

This is why I side with the numerous doctors and health institutes - including Dr. Joel Fuhrman, Dr. Douglas Graham, Dr. Dean Ornish, and The Pritikin Longevity Center - in recommending a low fat diet for optimal health.  This works out to about 1-2 ounces of nuts or ½ - 1/3 of an avocado per day (depending upon your caloric needs).

This means that if you decide to substitute sweet fruit for fat you will need to keep the quantities low.  Say you add 1 tbsp of nuts to the salad example above.  This still only gives you about 350 calories!

And that’s assuming that you can actually consume such a mountainous salad in one sitting.  I’m pretty proud of my eating prowess when it comes to fruit.  But 8 ounces of lettuce and a slew of veggies?

No way, Jose!

With the low amount of calories in this dish, you’ll be back in the kitchen looking for more fuel (probably in the form of simple carbohydrates) within the hour.

What to Do?

The easy way out is just to eat more sweet fruit.  But you're sick of sweet!

It seems we're back at square one, right?

Not quite.

There is a tasty solution.

Go Green!

Green smoothies, that is!

A green smoothie - renowned amongst gourmet and low fat raw foodists alike - is a fruit smoothie with greens added to it.  Sure, you've probably heard of them.  But have you actually tried one?

Here’s a tasty raw recipe:

• 3 bananas
• 1 pint of strawberries
• Handful or two of romaine lettuce

Blend everything together.  Add water to achieve the texture you desire.  I like my smoothies thin so I tend to add a few cups to the mix.

Why It Works

The green smoothie concept works for (you guessed it) 2 reasons:

1. It’s still fruit-based, providing quality fuel and satiation to your body.
2. The greens help to cut the sweetness.

Even though green (and contrary to the lovely picture in this post, often times pretty gross looking), green smoothies are very much a fruity meal.

As you can see from the recipe above, the smoothie is still mostly fruit.  The green comes from only a handful or two of romaine.

It is this small amount of "green-ness" that really adds a nice crisp, clean taste to the meal.  The drink will still be sweet, but not sickly so.

And you can easily add more fruit or make more than one smoothie to meet your caloric needs.

For instance, whenever I make smoothies (green or not), I have to make two separate batches because I like them so thin.

*sigh* If only they made 64 ounce blenders...

Long-Term Sweet Sickness?

Almost every beginner raw foodist has a problem eating so much sweet fruit at first.

Even I, the Fruit Queen Goddess that I am, had some troubles.  Bananas were especially sickening to me.  They were just so thick and sweet.  Yuck!

And to think, now I eat multiple bananas EVERYDAY!

If you stick with a high fruit, low fat diet, you will not experience this aversion to sweetness forever.  And the transformation generally does not take that long.  We're talkin' just a few weeks or so, on average.

And eventually, you'll stop thinking of fruit as sweet altogether.  At some point, it just becomes delicious, mouth-watering, satiating food.

About the Author:

For more information on the best raw vegan diet, be sure to visit Fit On Raw and subscribe to Swayze’s newsletter Peachy Keen Ezine. By subscribing, you will also receive the free report The 4 Principles of a Healthy Raw Diet as well as the 5-week mini-course The Fool Proof Transition to Raw.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Go Green, The Raw Food Way!

Migraine headaches do not just drop out of the sky on some poor person. If you are suffering from migraine headaches, there are probably physical causes behind your condition, and there are steps you can take tavoid the frequent recurrence of the headaches. Some of the food that you are eating may in fact be the "trigger" that sets off your migraine attack, and it is helpful to know which common foods are known to start migraine headaches.

Before I go into a discussion about the kinds of foods that often cause migraine headaches, it is important to understand that food alone is not the only factor associated with migraine attacks. Other contributors include stress, hormones, emotional factors and even some medications. In addition, some foods that trigger migraines in one person, may not affect another person. That said let's take a look at the commonest kinds of food associated with the onset of migraine attacks.
The foods which can cause difficulty include the following:

• peanuts and peanut butter
• caffeine in all products, not just coffee
• dairy products
• yeast
• some beans (which includes peanut), as well as broad, lima , Italian, lentil, soy, peas
• avocados
• dried meats
• sauerkraut
• pickled herrings
• canned soups and packet soup mixes
• chicken livers
• ripe banana
• soy products as well as the bean itself
• sodium nitrate, which is used to preserve hot dogs, bacon and cured meats
• the preservative benzoic acid and its associated compounds
• MSG, common name for monosodium glutamate, a flavor enhancer which is now in almost universal use in almost all processed foods
• nuts
• sourdough breads
• cheeses which have been aged
• red wines, beer, champagne, vermouth
• chocolate
• anchovies

If the list above seems depressingly long, the good news is that most of the items in this list come from highly processed and manufactured food products. These foods aren't too difficult to identify, test, and eliminate from your diet. You just have to pay attention when shopping, when preparing food and when sitting down to eat your meal.

Hold the Cheese Please!

If you are a cheese lover, and you also are susceptible to migraines, then you have to pay attention to what kinds of cheese you eat. Aged cheeses are high in tyramine, a substance that forms during the breakdown of protein. The longer cheese ages, the greater the tyramine content becomes. If you sensitive to tyramine then these are the cheeses that you should avoid:

• Blue cheeses
• Brie
• Cheddar
• Stilton
• Feta
• Gorgonzola
• Mozzarella
• Muenster
• Parmesan
• Swiss
• Processed cheese

Cheese is not the only food that has high tyramine levels. Other foods high in tyramine include processed meats, pickles, onions, olives, certain types of beans, raisins, nuts, avocados, canned soups, and red wine.

Doctors concede it can be difficult to avoid all of these foods. Nestor Galvez-Jimenez, MD, a neurologist with The Cleveland Clinic in Florida, says some of his tyramine-sensitive patients find it difficult to avoid foods that are on the "stop list," especially wine. "They want to drink wine even if they know it will give them a headache. In that case, I recommend a preventive dose of medication before dinner." He adds that patients should discuss this idea with their doctors before trying it.

Avoid Additives

Whenever you buy processed foods it is important to read the labels carefully because several food additives, such as nitrites, food colorings and artificial sweeteners, are also common headache triggers. Doctors are not 100% sure why these additives can trigger migraines but suspect that they increase the flow of blood to the brain and bring about changes in blood vessels.

Unlike other migraines which are triggered by a food substance and are felt on one side of the head, headaches induced by additives or other substances are usually sensed on both sides of the head. In addition, additive-triggered migraines usually occur within a specific time after taking the additive and they disappear when the additive is eliminated or within a specific time thereafter.

Monosodium glutamate-induced headaches, sometimes known as Chinese restaurant syndrome, occur within an hour after ingestion of MSG and can cause at least two of the following symptoms:

• Pressure in the chest or face
• Burning sensation in the chest, neck, or shoulders
• Dizziness
• Abdominal discomfort

MSG is not only found in Chinese food but is used as a flavor enhancer in a wide variety of snacks and other manufactured foods, so once again it is important to read the labels carefully when shopping for your household groceries or even when grabbing a quick snack.

As I mentioned in the beginning, the ingestion of specific foods is not the only cause of migraine attacks, and the foods that trigger these attacks vary from person to person. However, if you are suffering from frequent migraine headaches then it makes sense to consult your physician and to do your best to eliminate the foods that may be contributing to your discomfort. Click on the links below for more information...

About the Author:

Ray Attebery is Managing Dir. for Daily Health Updates a video health content service, and President for The Centre for Pain Relief, New York City.

http://www.painreliefforpain.com
, The Centre for Pain Relief and also,

http://www.painreliefforpain.com/migrain_headaches.htm
, for Headache Relief

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Pain - Common Foods Can Start Migraine Attacks

green avocado recipes

Does anyone have good recipes for kabobs's dips or sauces? Plz help!?

I need a good dip recipe (not ketchup plz) for a bbq (kabobs) party. My kabobs including shrimp, red onions, avocados, green and red sweet peppers and bacons.
Thank you so much
Joanne - clumsy chef

Thai Shrimp Kabobs With Hot Ginger Sauce
MARINADE
1/2 cup canola oil or peanut oil
1/2 cup soy sauce
2 tablespoons lemon juice
2 teaspoons grated fresh ginger
4 cloves garlic, minced
HOT GINGER SAUCE
1/3 cup apricot preserves
1-4 tablespoon soy sauce (start w/ 1 and keep adding until to your taste)
1/4 cup lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon grated fresh ginger
1 teaspoon cornstarch
1 tablespoon orange juice or water
# ombine marinade ingredients (oil through garlic) in a ceramic or glass bowl.
# Stir in shrimp, cover and refrigerate between 3 hours and overnight.
# Thread shrimp on skewers and grill just until opaque (about 5 minutes).
# SAUCE:.
# In a small saucepan, combine apricot preserves, soy sauce, lemon juice and 1/2 tsp grated ginger; bring to a boil.
# Dissolve cornstarch in orange juice and add to apricot mixture.
# Stir just until sauce thickens.
# Serve hot with shrimp.

In this day and age, everybody wants to improve their looks with a thinner waist line. For that, people may need some directions for finding healthy solutions to lose weight. The best choice someone can make in order to lose weight and gain health, energy and vitality is switching to a raw food diet.

People discover each day the benefits of raw food recipes. When switching to a raw food diet you will see improvements to your daily behavior like improved sleep, some anti-aging benefits, increased vitality and health. Owing to such advantages, the popularity of raw food diets is bound to increase, because we all want to improve the way we look and the way we feel about ourselves, don’t we?

In the beginning people didn’t cook their food and they consumed it raw. Eating like this helped them keep very healthy. Our bodies are built so that we can consume raw foods. The only thing we need to do is to rediscover the way we were in the beginning and enjoy all that nature has to give us. Consuming raw foods helps our bodies because they contain enzymes that help digestion. These enzymes are destroyed if the fruits and vegetables are cooked. Our body digests the foods through its own enzymes, but the enzymes in our body also give us energy. Therefore, when we use the enzymes in our bodies for digestion and not the ones in fruits and vegetables, it means that our energy levels and vitality are decreased.

Basic guidelines for planning your healthy raw food recipes recommend that you should include in your diet mostly fruit and vegetables, which are our most biologically conducive meals. Something that can help you in planning your raw food recipes is the categories in which fruits and vegetables are divided.

Fruits can be divided in sweet fruits (tropical fruits, persimmons, sweet grapes), acid fruits (lemons, citrus), sub-acid fruits (apples, pears, tart grapes) and fatty fruits (avocadoes, durian). Melons constitute a separate category of fruits. Some of the vegetable categories are non-starchy greens (spinach, cabbage), fruit vegetables (cucumbers, tomatoes) and root vegetables (carrots, celeriac). Another category of vegetables includes lettuce and celery. The vegetables named here can be found as items on a list of raw low carbohydrate foods. All these fruits and vegetables are the common components of raw food recipes.

Now that the categories have been established, here are some rules of combining them in order for you to avoid fermentation in the intestines, indigestion, water retention and toxicity. Sweet fruits are to be eaten with other varieties of sweet fruits only or with sub-acid fruits. Don’t eat acid fruit with anything other than celery and lettuce. Avocadoes and olives should be eaten with non-starchy vegetables. Melons should be eaten alone or not eaten at all. These are combinations that you should try. But there are a few combinations that you should try to avoid like starch and acid (tomato and potato), protein and protein (avocadoes and nuts), sweets and starch (maple syrup and rice). Think about these combinations when you are developing your own raw food recipes.

Raw food diets are not all about fruits and vegetables. Organic foods can also be included in the diet. Organic cheese is very nutritious and can be included in raw food diets because it does not involve a cooking process that destroys enzymes. You should make sure that the organic cheese you buy is organic, and not a scam. The process that is followed by farmers to obtain organic cheese consists of letting nature take its natural course, from harvesting the milk from the cows and letting it coagulate with no help from additional catalytic agents. Incredible products made from raw ingredients and that may include organic cheese can be found here, on rawbakery.com.

About the Author:

The most reliable way to improve our health and vitality is by switching to raw foods. Raw food recipes can easily replace our daily food and in most of the cases they taste better than cooked foods. Organic cheese can be also included in the diet as a component that improves the nutritional value of the foods.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - The Basics for Raw Food Recipes

smoothie avocado

Have i eaten well so far today?

I am trying to lose 5-10 pounds. i am 5'9, 135 pounds 19 years old female. today i have eaten:

seems like a good diet to me... add some veggies to your dinner instead of just a slice of toast or try putting organic peanut butter on your toast this way you get protein and a good taste!!! good luck

I have to be honest.  This is one question that REALLY gets my goat.  Whenever I hear someone attacking the raw diet because it’s too “boring,” I go crazy!

Really, I hulk out!

I’ve been following a low-fat raw vegan diet for almost 2 years now.  I can honestly say, without any reservations, that there is absolutely NOTHING boring about a raw food diet!

*Deep Breath*  Okay, I’m calm now.

Let me explain why a raw food diet is totally NOT boring.

Variety

The variety of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds that exist is astounding.  You have apples, grapes, oranges, bananas, peaches, pears, cantaloupe, romaine, celery, cucumber, avocado...and I’m just alluding to what is available in your local grocery store!

In fact, I can almost guarantee you that raw foodists eat *more* variety than ANYONE on a standard American diet...or any other diet for that matter.

This is because most people tend to eat just a handful of dishes that become their staples.  And these dishes are usually very similar.

If you eat meat, your meals will generally center around a protein, with some starchy vegetable and maybe greens along side.  If you’re from the Southern States, your greens are cooked to death in butter and everything gets a nice heapin’ helping of beef gravy smothered on top.

If you are vegetarian or vegan, the focus is usually on whole grains or legumes with vegetables.  And of course, everyone has his or her favorite dessert.

But when you live on a fruit-based diet, you have to adapt what you are eating to what you can find in your area.  Just because you have a few favorite fruits does not mean that they will always be available.

I would gladly eat nothing but mangoes for the rest of my life, but I can’t because they are not always in season!

Where’s the Proof?

Still skeptical that a raw diet is really that varied?  Here’s a list of several of the different varieties of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds that I eat in a given year:

o    Apples
o    Apricots
o    Avocado
o    Bananas
o    Basil
o    Bell Pepper
o    Blackberries
o    Blueberries
o    Boston Lettuce
o    Cantaloupe
o    Celery
o    Cherries
o    Cilantro
o    Clementines
o    Cucumber
o    Currants
o    Dates
o    Dill
o    Grapefruit
o    Grapes
o    Honeydew
o    Iceberg Lettuce
o    Kiwi
o    Lemon
o    Lime
o    Mangoes
o    Mint
o    Nectarines
o    Oranges
o    Papaya
o    Peaches
o    Pears
o    Pineapple
o    Pistachios
o    Raspberries
o    Romaine Lettuce
o    Star Fruit
o    Strawberries
o    Sunflower Seeds
o    Tangerines
o    Tomatoes
o    Watermelon
o    Zucchini

AND I didn’t even include the different varieties of fruit within each species.  For instance, there are Navel and Valencia oranges, red and green grapes, the Fuji apples and the Gala apples, Red Haven and White Nectar peaches, etc.

All of this is found conventionally at my local supermarkets in Tennessee.  Of course, if you live somewhere tropical or have access to exotic markets, you have a whole different spectrum of fruits to choose from:

o    Chocolate Sapote
o    Custard Apple
o    Durian
o    Jackfruit
o    Litchi
o    Longan
o    Mamey Sapote
o    Mangosteen
o    Rambutan
o    Sapodilla
o    Soursop

There’s even a peanut butter fruit that has the taste AND texture of peanut butter!

How can a diet that’s full of so many different smells, tastes, and textures be boring?

Quite simply, it cannot.

Raw Recipes

If you *still* aren’t convinced that a raw diet isn’t boring, you probably haven’t considered all the different raw vegan recipes that you can make.

And I’m not talking about fatty dehydrated conglomerations that are made to mimic the flavor and textures of cooked dishes.  I’m referring to simple, delicious, healthy meals that contain few ingredients and take literally minutes to put together.

There are fruit smoothies, green smoothies, fruit soups, vegetable soups, fruit salads, savory salads, fruit puddings, dips, salsas, and even fruit ice creams!

You could literally take just a few different healthy raw ingredients and have a completely different dish for every meal for a whole week!

Now how in the world can a diet like *this* be boring?

Quite simply, it cannot.

Don’t Take My Word For It!

If you are still debating going raw, there is no better time than now to get out there and go for it.  See for yourself just how varied this diet can be.  Buy all the fruits you can and go crazy in the kitchen!

Just be sure to send me the recipes to all of your awesome raw creations.

About the Author:

For more information on the best raw vegan diet, be sure to visit Fit On Raw and subscribe to Swayze’s newsletter Peachy Keen Ezine. By subscribing, you will also receive the free report The 4 Principles of a Healthy Raw Diet as well as the 5-week mini-course The Fool Proof Transition to Raw.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Is a Raw Food Diet Boring?

avocado availability

I’ve received a handful of emails lately concerned with the amount of sweetness on a low fat, high fruit raw vegan diet.  As expected, several of you aren’t quite used to the sweetness of so much fruit

To solve the problem, many beginner raw foodists substitute savory greens and/or nuts, seeds and avocado for sweet fruit.

Big Mistake

There are 2 problems with this approach:

1. Greens and vegetables have few calories
2. Nuts, seeds, and avocado are high-fat foods

In terms of greens, these foods are simply too low in calories.  Even a large salad of 8 ounces of romaine, one large cucumber, a whole bell pepper, and two medium tomatoes is under 200 calories!  The only way to increase the calories in this meal would be to add in fruit or fat.

Which brings me to the second problem: fatty nuts, seeds, and avocado.  Contrary to what people (raw and cooked foodists alike) like to believe, nuts are NOT a high protein food.  Take an ounce of walnuts (14 halves), for instance.  With only 9% of calories from protein and whopping 83% from fat, it becomes clear that nuts and seeds are really a high FAT food.

Avocados are in the same boat, with 4% protein and 77% fat.

SIDE NOTE: I’m referring to the Hass avocado here.  There are avocados with lower percentages of fat, such as some Florida varieties, but these are not as readily available.

While there’s nothing inherently wrong with this fact, it becomes a problem when these foods are substituted for fruit and eaten in mass quantities.  While it is perfectibly acceptable to eat a pound (or two) of fruit in one sitting, this is a recipe for disaster in terms of fat.

Too much fat has been linked to obesity, heart disease, atherosclerosis, and even depression.

To learn more about the problems associated with eating a high fat raw food diet, check out this article.

This is why I side with the numerous doctors and health institutes - including Dr. Joel Fuhrman, Dr. Douglas Graham, Dr. Dean Ornish, and The Pritikin Longevity Center - in recommending a low fat diet for optimal health.  This works out to about 1-2 ounces of nuts or ½ - 1/3 of an avocado per day (depending upon your caloric needs).

This means that if you decide to substitute sweet fruit for fat you will need to keep the quantities low.  Say you add 1 tbsp of nuts to the salad example above.  This still only gives you about 350 calories!

And that’s assuming that you can actually consume such a mountainous salad in one sitting.  I’m pretty proud of my eating prowess when it comes to fruit.  But 8 ounces of lettuce and a slew of veggies?

No way, Jose!

With the low amount of calories in this dish, you’ll be back in the kitchen looking for more fuel (probably in the form of simple carbohydrates) within the hour.

What to Do?

The easy way out is just to eat more sweet fruit.  But you're sick of sweet!

It seems we're back at square one, right?

Not quite.

There is a tasty solution.

Go Green!

Green smoothies, that is!

A green smoothie - renowned amongst gourmet and low fat raw foodists alike - is a fruit smoothie with greens added to it.  Sure, you've probably heard of them.  But have you actually tried one?

Here’s a tasty raw recipe:

• 3 bananas
• 1 pint of strawberries
• Handful or two of romaine lettuce

Blend everything together.  Add water to achieve the texture you desire.  I like my smoothies thin so I tend to add a few cups to the mix.

Why It Works

The green smoothie concept works for (you guessed it) 2 reasons:

1. It’s still fruit-based, providing quality fuel and satiation to your body.
2. The greens help to cut the sweetness.

Even though green (and contrary to the lovely picture in this post, often times pretty gross looking), green smoothies are very much a fruity meal.

As you can see from the recipe above, the smoothie is still mostly fruit.  The green comes from only a handful or two of romaine.

It is this small amount of "green-ness" that really adds a nice crisp, clean taste to the meal.  The drink will still be sweet, but not sickly so.

And you can easily add more fruit or make more than one smoothie to meet your caloric needs.

For instance, whenever I make smoothies (green or not), I have to make two separate batches because I like them so thin.

*sigh* If only they made 64 ounce blenders...

Long-Term Sweet Sickness?

Almost every beginner raw foodist has a problem eating so much sweet fruit at first.

Even I, the Fruit Queen Goddess that I am, had some troubles.  Bananas were especially sickening to me.  They were just so thick and sweet.  Yuck!

And to think, now I eat multiple bananas EVERYDAY!

If you stick with a high fruit, low fat diet, you will not experience this aversion to sweetness forever.  And the transformation generally does not take that long.  We're talkin' just a few weeks or so, on average.

And eventually, you'll stop thinking of fruit as sweet altogether.  At some point, it just becomes delicious, mouth-watering, satiating food.

About the Author:

For more information on the best raw vegan diet, be sure to visit Fit On Raw and subscribe to Swayze’s newsletter Peachy Keen Ezine. By subscribing, you will also receive the free report The 4 Principles of a Healthy Raw Diet as well as the 5-week mini-course The Fool Proof Transition to Raw.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Go Green, The Raw Food Way!

We eat to nourish our bodies and stay healthy and strong. But which food is best? That is, if you could survive on eating only one thing for the rest of your life, what would that perfect food be?

Here are the top contenders (in no particular order):

Blueberries — packed with antioxidants and phytochemicals, they are delicious. Widely available year-round fresh or frozen, they may help protect against Alzheimer’s disease and colon cancer, plus they improve nighttime visual acuity and help fight aging by reducing wrinkles.

Avocadoes — provide more than 25 essential nutrients, including potassium, Vitamin E, B-vitamins, and folic acid. One serving (about one-fifth of a medium avocado) contains 55 calories, most of which come from monounsaturated fat, thought to help maintain heart health. They are also a great source of fiber.

Sweet potato — naturally sweet, low in calories, high in fiber, and packed with vitamins and minerals (including beta-carotene, vitamin C, manganese, copper, vitamin B6, potassium, and iron), the sweet potato is king. Note that the moist, orange-fleshed sweet potatoes are NOT to be confused with yams, which are not related to sweet potatoes, and not usually found in local grocery stores.

Yogurt — has live cultures (probiotics), calcium, and B vitamins, which work together to help mitigate lactose intolerance, allergies, colon and breast cancer, diarrhea, and urinary tract infections. In addition, the calcium in yogurt helps reduce the chance of osteoporosis and keep our teeth strong. The protein helps our muscles to get stronger.

Salmon — a good source of protein and omega-3 fatty acids (more highly concentrated in the wild kind), salmon reduces inflammation and improves cholesterol levels, thereby reducing risk of heart attack and stroke.

Eggs — high in quality protein and essential fatty acids, they offer many ingredients needed to build and maintain strong health. Eggs also provide significant amounts of several vitamins and minerals, including vitamin A, riboflavin, folic acid, vitamin B6, vitamin B12, iron, calcium, phosphorus, and potassium.

Soybeans — found in foods like soy milk, soy sauce, miso (soybean paste), tempeh (which is kind of like a soy cake), and tofu, soy products provide a good source of protein (and healthy meat alternative), as well as iron, zinc, phosphorus, magnesium, B vitamins, omega 3 fatty acids, and fiber.

Whole grains — contain valuable antioxidants not found in fruits and vegetables. They also contain B vitamins, vitamin E, magnesium, iron, and fiber. Their main benefits include heart disease and stroke risk reduction, and type 2 diabetes risk reduction.

Broccoli — packed with vitamins A and C, iron, calcium and phytonutrients, it is filling, high in fiber, and low in calories. It also contains many cancer-fighting antioxidants and can help prevent cataracts, heart disease, and arthritis.

Bananas — a sweet source of potassium (an electrolyte necessary for maintaining many functions in the body), vitamin C, and several amino acids, bananas make a wonderful addition to any meal of the day for all age groups.

Chocolate — perhaps most delicious of all, chocolate contains heart-healthy antioxidants called flavonoids, which may reduce damage to arteries by preventing the oxidation of LDL (“bad”) cholesterol. About one-third of the fat is monounsaturated, which can even slightly lower cholesterol. Additionally, it appears that cocoa (chocolate without the fat) has an aspirin-like effect, helping to prevent blood clots known to cause heart attacks. Also, new studies have shown cocoa may lower blood pressure and improve the body’s processing of sugar.

And the Winner is …

So, which food is most perfect? None of them! That’s right. Because our bodies cannot function without all essential nutrients, and no food exists that provides every single one, we could not possibly live on any one food.

Bon appetite!

- Robin Brett Wechsler

Modern Menus Staff Nutritionist
www.modernmenus.com

About the Author:

Modern Menus is a wellness company dedicated to designing nutritious meal plans for health conscious families. Modern Menus offers delicious yet easy and quick-to-prepare recipes written by our staff nutritionist, as well as a fully customizable grocery list, nutrition articles, healthful hints and advice, an “Ask the Nutritionist” column, and more.

Modern Menus also publishes a free weekly newsletter with current nutrition news, valuable tips, and dinner suggestions.

Modern Menus is independent and unbiased, and therefore is a subscription-based service. Modern Menus does not promote specific products, nor do we subject our users to unsolicited advertising.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - In Search of the Perfect Food

vegan avocado smoothie recipe

I have spent a good amount of my time on raw food forums over the past couple of years. It is a great way to learn about eating raw and to gather information from others who are thriving on the diet.

While visiting these forums, I have noticed a problem that is expressed over and over again by various members. Many people complain that they find it too difficult to stick to a raw food diet. They find themselves extremely hungry and experiencing cravings for cooked dishes on a regular basis.

And I'm not talking about brand new raw foodists. I'm talking about people who have been attempting a raw food diet for years and still can't seem to stick with it!

So what's the problem? Why is it that such a vast majority of raw foodists fail on a raw food diet?

Not enough calories, Too much fat

In general, the raw foodists I'm talking about are consuming lots of greens and vegetables, avocados, nuts, oils, dehydrated mixtures like flax seed crackers, some vinegars, and dried fruit.

Even though the raw foodists described above are eating large amounts of greens and other vegetables, these foods do not offer a substantial amount of calories.

Here's an example...

*Typical Salad without Overt Fats*

A large salad of 1 pound of romaine lettuce, 1 medium red bell pepper, and one medium cucumber is only 153 calories. All of that food has less calories than just two bananas!

This is a problem because the average person needs between 2000-2500 calories a day. To eat that much food from romaine lettuce, you would need to eat 25 pounds (about 50 heads) of lettuce per day! This is completely impractical, not to mention rather unpleasant. My jaw aches just thinking about it!

We've now established that it's nearly impossible to get enough calories from vegetables. While salads like this are high in volume, the satiation is short lived because the caloric needs are not being met.

So where do these raw foodists get their calories from?

Avocados, raw nuts and seeds, and cold-pressed olive oils. To be precise, fat. These fatty foods are used to make dehydrated dishes like "raw" crackers, breads, and "mock" pizzas. They are also eaten on their own or put atop salads.

Let's return to the salad example...

*Typical Salad with Overt Fats*

1 head of romaine, 1 medium bell pepper, and one medium cucumber is 153 calories. Now, add just one medium avocado and one tablespoon of olive oil. That takes the calories up to 561 calories!

The avocado and oil alone provide 2/3 of the total calories in this dish. Not only that, but the addition of the avocado and oil took the fat content from 10% to a staggering 61% of fat!

As you can see, it only takes a small amount of these foods (fatty fruits, nuts and seeds, and oils) to exceed your needed calories and fat content for the day.

Again, this is just one meal. Many raw foodists have two salads during their day and often times these are even more fat laden than the example I have shown above. This does not even consider the popular complex, dehydrated recipes that are mostly comprised of high-fat nuts and seeds.

With this knowledge in mind, is it surprising that the average raw foodist consumes a whopping 60% of his or her calories from fat everyday? How many times have you come across people who claim to eat several avocados a day and handfuls of nuts in just one sitting? Maybe this isn't surprising, but it's certainly unhealthy.

What's the Alternative?

While greens and vegetable fruits are very important in a healthy raw diet, they simply do not provide the necessary calories to fill you up and combat cooked cravings. However, you do not have to get your calories from low-volume fatty foods.

You are not destined for raw food failure.

There is another way...

*Sweet fruit*

By eating substantial amounts of whole, raw, simple, delicious fruits, you will feel completely satiated and will no longer suffer from cooked food cravings. You will also be getting the absolute best nutrition available and fueling your body right!

And it's so easy to get started! If you still eat a cooked diet, simply replace your breakfast with as much fruit as you can eat and move on from there. If you already eat raw, just replace the majority of the raw veggies and fats you eat with sweet fruit.

If you are having a hard time getting enough calories via whole fruit, try blending them into tasty smoothies!

So put down the avocado, pick up an apple, and start succeeding on a raw diet today!

About the Author:

For more information on the best raw vegan diet, be sure to visit Fit On Raw and subscribe to Swayze’s newsletter Peachy Keen Ezine. By subscribing, you will also receive the free report The 4 Principles of a Healthy Raw Diet as well as the 5-week mini-course The Fool Proof Transition to Raw.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Are You Destined For Raw Food Failure?

Anyone who has ever eaten a meal of raw fruit knows how intensely pleasurable this can be.  Fruit requires little to no preparation (all you need to eat a banana is opposable thumbs).  It is easy to eat and digests quickly, usually in just 30 minutes.

Best of all, fruit tastes great and completely satisfies the sweet tooth in the most healthy way possible.

Just like avocado and nuts, fruit is calorically dense.  However, fruit is also high in volume, like vegetables.  This means that a meal of fruit both provides enough calories AND enough volume to leave you completely satiated until the next meal.

Just Fruit?!?

The idea of eating only fruit for a meal is very strange to people.  Much of this confusion stems from the fact that we grow up thinking of raw fruit as a snack or part of a dessert.  The idea of eating more than a couple pieces of fruit in one sitting is completely foreign to us.

As a result, people who are new to a low fat, high fruit raw food diet often under eat on calories at first.

To make the transition easier for you, here is a simple example of a sufficient fruit meal…

*Fruit Meal*

Let’s say you need 2000 calories a day and you like to eat 3 meals a day.  If each meal is divided equally, one meal would be between 600-700 calories.

One medium banana contains about 100 calories.  In order to consume 600-700 calories in one meal from bananas alone, you would have to consume 6 to 7 bananas.

And that’s it!  It really is that simple.

Of course, if eating a meal of only one type of fruit seems much too boring to you, there are many alternatives.  You can combine your favorite fruits into a nice fruit salad.  A popular choice for beginners is to blend fruits into a smoothie.  This is an easy way to get enough calories from fruit.

Here is a delicious smoothie you can make in just a few minutes…

*Two Pears in a Peel*

• 5 bananas
• 2 pears
• 1 cup of water

Blend ingredients together and enjoy!

There are many different combinations you can make.  You can also add greens, which will add some nice variety and counterbalance some of the sweetness.

Problems with Fruit

Many raw foodists believe that fruits should be severely limited, or even eliminated, because they contain simple sugars like fructose and glucose.  These simple sugars are believed to lead to such ailments as diabetes and Candida.

First, I want to clarify that the sugar in fruit does not cause sugar metabolic disorders.  It is an excess of fat in the body that coats the insulin, blocking it from reaching the sugar molecules.  The excess sugar in the blood leads to a high blood-sugar level.

Without the excess fat, the insulin will reach the sugar molecules and transport them out of the blood and into the cells.

Second, there is a huge difference between the simple sugars found in fruit and the simple sugars found in processed foods.  These refined sugars have been removed from whole foods (i.e. fruit, sugar cane) and further processed.  They no longer contain any nutritional value whatsoever.

On the contrary, the sugars in whole fruit have not been processed and are accompanied by necessary water, fiber, Vitamin C, Vitamin A, phytonutrients, etc.

How Much Fruit?

I recommend that the majority of your calories come from fruit.  The best way to determine how much is to simply eat sweet fruit until you are full.  As a general guideline, our closest relatives the bonobos consume 95% of their calories from sweet fruit.  The other great apes consume between 70-90% of their calories from fruit.

Dr. Douglas Graham, a well-known leader in the raw food movement, recommends in The 80/10/10 Diet that 80% of our calories come from simple carbohydrates in the form of fruit.  You can check out this excellent book and the rest of Dr. Graham’s top-quality catalog at FoodnSport.

On average, I consume between 85-90% of my calories from sweet fruit.

Take Action

You can get started today by simply eating all fruit for your next meal.  Many people prefer to wait until breakfast, as it is the easiest meal to transition.

You could also begin your next meal with as much fruit as you can eat, and then finish the meal with your regular fare.  Just be sure to wait at least 30 minutes between your two meals so that your body has time to fully digest the fruit.

About the Author:

For more information on the best raw vegan diet, be sure to visit Fit On Raw and subscribe to Swayze’s newsletter Peachy Keen Ezine. By subscribing, you will also receive the free report The 4 Principles of a Healthy Raw Diet as well as the 5-week mini-course The Fool Proof Transition to Raw.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - A High Carb Diet for Raw Food Success

avocado desserts recipe

I have to be honest.  This is one question that REALLY gets my goat.  Whenever I hear someone attacking the raw diet because it’s too “boring,” I go crazy!

Really, I hulk out!

I’ve been following a low-fat raw vegan diet for almost 2 years now.  I can honestly say, without any reservations, that there is absolutely NOTHING boring about a raw food diet!

*Deep Breath*  Okay, I’m calm now.

Let me explain why a raw food diet is totally NOT boring.

Variety

The variety of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds that exist is astounding.  You have apples, grapes, oranges, bananas, peaches, pears, cantaloupe, romaine, celery, cucumber, avocado...and I’m just alluding to what is available in your local grocery store!

In fact, I can almost guarantee you that raw foodists eat *more* variety than ANYONE on a standard American diet...or any other diet for that matter.

This is because most people tend to eat just a handful of dishes that become their staples.  And these dishes are usually very similar.

If you eat meat, your meals will generally center around a protein, with some starchy vegetable and maybe greens along side.  If you’re from the Southern States, your greens are cooked to death in butter and everything gets a nice heapin’ helping of beef gravy smothered on top.

If you are vegetarian or vegan, the focus is usually on whole grains or legumes with vegetables.  And of course, everyone has his or her favorite dessert.

But when you live on a fruit-based diet, you have to adapt what you are eating to what you can find in your area.  Just because you have a few favorite fruits does not mean that they will always be available.

I would gladly eat nothing but mangoes for the rest of my life, but I can’t because they are not always in season!

Where’s the Proof?

Still skeptical that a raw diet is really that varied?  Here’s a list of several of the different varieties of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds that I eat in a given year:

o    Apples
o    Apricots
o    Avocado
o    Bananas
o    Basil
o    Bell Pepper
o    Blackberries
o    Blueberries
o    Boston Lettuce
o    Cantaloupe
o    Celery
o    Cherries
o    Cilantro
o    Clementines
o    Cucumber
o    Currants
o    Dates
o    Dill
o    Grapefruit
o    Grapes
o    Honeydew
o    Iceberg Lettuce
o    Kiwi
o    Lemon
o    Lime
o    Mangoes
o    Mint
o    Nectarines
o    Oranges
o    Papaya
o    Peaches
o    Pears
o    Pineapple
o    Pistachios
o    Raspberries
o    Romaine Lettuce
o    Star Fruit
o    Strawberries
o    Sunflower Seeds
o    Tangerines
o    Tomatoes
o    Watermelon
o    Zucchini

AND I didn’t even include the different varieties of fruit within each species.  For instance, there are Navel and Valencia oranges, red and green grapes, the Fuji apples and the Gala apples, Red Haven and White Nectar peaches, etc.

All of this is found conventionally at my local supermarkets in Tennessee.  Of course, if you live somewhere tropical or have access to exotic markets, you have a whole different spectrum of fruits to choose from:

o    Chocolate Sapote
o    Custard Apple
o    Durian
o    Jackfruit
o    Litchi
o    Longan
o    Mamey Sapote
o    Mangosteen
o    Rambutan
o    Sapodilla
o    Soursop

There’s even a peanut butter fruit that has the taste AND texture of peanut butter!

How can a diet that’s full of so many different smells, tastes, and textures be boring?

Quite simply, it cannot.

Raw Recipes

If you *still* aren’t convinced that a raw diet isn’t boring, you probably haven’t considered all the different raw vegan recipes that you can make.

And I’m not talking about fatty dehydrated conglomerations that are made to mimic the flavor and textures of cooked dishes.  I’m referring to simple, delicious, healthy meals that contain few ingredients and take literally minutes to put together.

There are fruit smoothies, green smoothies, fruit soups, vegetable soups, fruit salads, savory salads, fruit puddings, dips, salsas, and even fruit ice creams!

You could literally take just a few different healthy raw ingredients and have a completely different dish for every meal for a whole week!

Now how in the world can a diet like *this* be boring?

Quite simply, it cannot.

Don’t Take My Word For It!

If you are still debating going raw, there is no better time than now to get out there and go for it.  See for yourself just how varied this diet can be.  Buy all the fruits you can and go crazy in the kitchen!

Just be sure to send me the recipes to all of your awesome raw creations.

About the Author:

For more information on the best raw vegan diet, be sure to visit Fit On Raw and subscribe to Swayze’s newsletter Peachy Keen Ezine. By subscribing, you will also receive the free report The 4 Principles of a Healthy Raw Diet as well as the 5-week mini-course The Fool Proof Transition to Raw.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Is a Raw Food Diet Boring?

Christmas is a time when we think of family get-togethers and abundance. It is memory lane for most of us, enjoying friends, memorable times and good comfort, traditional foods. But the weeks after the holidays are usually weight gains, health problems from too many sweets and food. 

Today white sugar, white flour, dairy products, trans and saturated fats, refined cars and excess calories are on the \"no-no\" list ... and with the holiday times it feels as if the cakes, cookies and candies will become obsolete. And we begin to feel deprived and panic stricken. After all, it is a long-time tradition.

One answer is to make some raw food desserts and take them to get-togethers and family meals. Use nuts, dried fruits, and avocadoes instead of white flour and white sugar. They have a lot of flavor, looks and are good for you. Oh yes ... and they are easy to put together. Jenny Cornbleet has a book out called \"Raw Food Made Easy for 1 or 2 People\". In it there are desserts - cakes, cookies, fruit crisps, pies, tarts, puddings, mousses, shakes, and ice cream recipes all raw - for holidays and all meals. Guess what? They taste better than their sugar laden counterparts.

One recipe is for a \"Flourless Chocolate Cake with Raspberry Sauce\" which calls for 1 1/2 cups raw walnuts, dash of salt, 8 pitted medjool dates, 1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa or carob powder, 1/2 tsp vanilla extract, and 2 tsp water. For the raspberry sauce you use 1 cup fresh or frozen raspberries (thaw and drain if frozen) with 1/4 cup pitted medjooy dates, soaked for 30 minutes and drained. Place the walnuts and salt in a food processor with the S blade and process until finely ground. Add dates, cocoa powder, and vanilla ... process until mixture becomes sticky. Add water and process briefly. Transfer to a serving plate and form a 5 inch round cake. Place the raspberries and dates in a blender and mix until smooth, pouring over the cake just before serving.

You do not have to give up all your comfort foods, just find a healthier recipe for it. You will find the dessert to be much tastier. But should you choose to nibble on a few old foods, do so in moderation, do not go overboard, and remember to wait and let your stomach digest properly before the next meal.

About the Author:

To learn about growing mango and mango allergy, visit the Mango Fruit website.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Eating Right During Christmas

smoothie avocado recipe

When I first learned about the raw food diet, it took me years to figure out how to do it properly. Then it took me even more years - making mistakes and compromising my health - until I started experiencing the benefits I was looking for from the start! Let's face it, if you're going to bother changing your diet at all, there's got to be a reason for doing it. I would bet you want to improve your health and energy, right? But why take years to get those results, when you can get them in months or even weeks? Here are some of the things that I've found can help you get faster results from your raw food diet.

1. Incorporate Fitness: Until you reach the point where your body fat is at an optimal level and your fitness "above average", you probably won't get all the results you're looking for even with an ideal diet. Fit people not only digest better, the entire process of nutrition is improved with improved fitness. This means assimilation will be better, blood sugar will be more under control, and much more besides. To start improving your fitness, you have to identify your areas of weakness and work on improving these first.

2. Address Emotional Issues: Emotions are an integral part of your nutrition & health. You've probably had the experience of hearing a piece of bad news and suddenly losing your appetite. This shows that emotions are an integral part of how your body processes food. It's an essential part of your health. Often people jump into a raw-food diet, hoping that it will help them "clear emotional problems", when in fact it puts these problems right in their face and they can't deal with it!. Be aware and ready to feel and face your emotions. Equip yourself with whatever tools are necessary to get over emotional baggage - including self-improvement seminars, tapes, and group support.

3. Cleanse: One of the best ways to accelerate your health success is to go on some sort of cleanse. A cleanse should be easy to do, while giving you results in terms of increased energy, weight release (if necessary), and increased vitality and health.

   My favorite cleanses are:

• Green Cleanse: consuming only green smoothies and fruit for 5 to 10 days or longer.

• Fruit Cleanse: consuming only mono meals of fruit for 3 to 7 days or longer.

• Low Fat Cleanse: consuming only fruits and vegetables without any fat (avocados, oils, etc.) for 3 to 7 days or longer.

While it's possible to do a cleanse on your own, it's best if you have someone to coach and support you in the process.

mango avocado salsa recipe

I have to be honest.  This is one question that REALLY gets my goat.  Whenever I hear someone attacking the raw diet because it’s too “boring,” I go crazy!

Really, I hulk out!

I’ve been following a low-fat raw vegan diet for almost 2 years now.  I can honestly say, without any reservations, that there is absolutely NOTHING boring about a raw food diet!

*Deep Breath*  Okay, I’m calm now.

Let me explain why a raw food diet is totally NOT boring.

Variety

The variety of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds that exist is astounding.  You have apples, grapes, oranges, bananas, peaches, pears, cantaloupe, romaine, celery, cucumber, avocado...and I’m just alluding to what is available in your local grocery store!

In fact, I can almost guarantee you that raw foodists eat *more* variety than ANYONE on a standard American diet...or any other diet for that matter.

This is because most people tend to eat just a handful of dishes that become their staples.  And these dishes are usually very similar.

If you eat meat, your meals will generally center around a protein, with some starchy vegetable and maybe greens along side.  If you’re from the Southern States, your greens are cooked to death in butter and everything gets a nice heapin’ helping of beef gravy smothered on top.

If you are vegetarian or vegan, the focus is usually on whole grains or legumes with vegetables.  And of course, everyone has his or her favorite dessert.

But when you live on a fruit-based diet, you have to adapt what you are eating to what you can find in your area.  Just because you have a few favorite fruits does not mean that they will always be available.

I would gladly eat nothing but mangoes for the rest of my life, but I can’t because they are not always in season!

Where’s the Proof?

Still skeptical that a raw diet is really that varied?  Here’s a list of several of the different varieties of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds that I eat in a given year:

o    Apples
o    Apricots
o    Avocado
o    Bananas
o    Basil
o    Bell Pepper
o    Blackberries
o    Blueberries
o    Boston Lettuce
o    Cantaloupe
o    Celery
o    Cherries
o    Cilantro
o    Clementines
o    Cucumber
o    Currants
o    Dates
o    Dill
o    Grapefruit
o    Grapes
o    Honeydew
o    Iceberg Lettuce
o    Kiwi
o    Lemon
o    Lime
o    Mangoes
o    Mint
o    Nectarines
o    Oranges
o    Papaya
o    Peaches
o    Pears
o    Pineapple
o    Pistachios
o    Raspberries
o    Romaine Lettuce
o    Star Fruit
o    Strawberries
o    Sunflower Seeds
o    Tangerines
o    Tomatoes
o    Watermelon
o    Zucchini

AND I didn’t even include the different varieties of fruit within each species.  For instance, there are Navel and Valencia oranges, red and green grapes, the Fuji apples and the Gala apples, Red Haven and White Nectar peaches, etc.

All of this is found conventionally at my local supermarkets in Tennessee.  Of course, if you live somewhere tropical or have access to exotic markets, you have a whole different spectrum of fruits to choose from:

o    Chocolate Sapote
o    Custard Apple
o    Durian
o    Jackfruit
o    Litchi
o    Longan
o    Mamey Sapote
o    Mangosteen
o    Rambutan
o    Sapodilla
o    Soursop

There’s even a peanut butter fruit that has the taste AND texture of peanut butter!

How can a diet that’s full of so many different smells, tastes, and textures be boring?

Quite simply, it cannot.

Raw Recipes

If you *still* aren’t convinced that a raw diet isn’t boring, you probably haven’t considered all the different raw vegan recipes that you can make.

And I’m not talking about fatty dehydrated conglomerations that are made to mimic the flavor and textures of cooked dishes.  I’m referring to simple, delicious, healthy meals that contain few ingredients and take literally minutes to put together.

There are fruit smoothies, green smoothies, fruit soups, vegetable soups, fruit salads, savory salads, fruit puddings, dips, salsas, and even fruit ice creams!

You could literally take just a few different healthy raw ingredients and have a completely different dish for every meal for a whole week!

Now how in the world can a diet like *this* be boring?

Quite simply, it cannot.

Don’t Take My Word For It!

If you are still debating going raw, there is no better time than now to get out there and go for it.  See for yourself just how varied this diet can be.  Buy all the fruits you can and go crazy in the kitchen!

Just be sure to send me the recipes to all of your awesome raw creations.

About the Author:

For more information on the best raw vegan diet, be sure to visit Fit On Raw and subscribe to Swayze’s newsletter Peachy Keen Ezine. By subscribing, you will also receive the free report The 4 Principles of a Healthy Raw Diet as well as the 5-week mini-course The Fool Proof Transition to Raw.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Is a Raw Food Diet Boring?

History of Salsa

The word "salsa" is the Spanish word for sauce. The salsas that many of us think of are salsa frescas or salsa cruda, fresh sauces served as a condiment aside a Mexican meal. These uncooked sauces might be pureed until smooth, semi-chunky, or the uniformly chopped pico de gallo (my favorite).

The Chile – Tomato Combination

The making of of a sauce by combining chiles, tomatoes, spices and other ingredients like squash seeds and even beans has been documented back to the Aztec culture..

We have Spanish-born Bernadino de Sahagun to thank for the detailed culinary history of the Aztec culture. His extensive writings documented every food common to the culture. This is an excerpt from Sahagun's writings about the food vendors in the large Aztec markets:

"He sells foods, sauces, hot sauces, fried [food], olla-cooked, juices, sauces of juices, shredded [food] with chile, with squash seeds, with tomatoes, with smoke chile, with hot chile, with yellow chile, with mild red chile sauce, yellow chile sauce, sauce of smoked chile, heated sauce, he sells toasted beans, cooked beans, mushroom sauce, sauce of small squash, sauce of large tomatoes, sauce of ordinary tomatoes, sauce of various kinds of sour herbs, avocado sauce. (Sahagun, translated 1950 -1982).

Ingredients Then and Now

The paragraph above refers to many of the ingredients in our modern-day salsas.

Large tomatoes - We believe this references is to a large red tomato similar to what we eat to day.

Ordinary tomatoes - most likely this reference is to the tomatillo or tomate verde.

Smoked chiles - The chipotle or smoked jalapeno was a staple in the Aztec diet.

Avocado - cultivated by the Aztecs the avocado was an important source of fat and protein and was used in a sauce similar to what we call guacamole.

Two Delicious Salsa Recipes:

2 c fresh plum tomato, diced

1 c fresh green tomato, diced

1/2 c fresh green bell pepper, diced

1/4 c fresh purple onion, chopped.

1 tbsp jalapeno pepper, finely chopped

1 tbsp fresh cilantro, finely chopped

1 clove fresh garlic, minced

1/4 tsp salt.

1/8 tsp coarsely ground pepper.

2 tbsp fresh lime juice

1 tbsp olive oil.

Directions:

Combine all ingredients in a bowl. Stir well. Serve at room temperature or chilled. Serve with corn or flour tortilla wedges, poultry, or fish.

Yield: 3 cups (approx 6 calories per tbsp).

Mango Salsa

2 medium ripe mangoes

1 small cucumber, peeled, diced (it says seeded, but I've never bothered)

1 ripe tomato

juice of 1 lime (lemon works, too!)

pinch of salt

1/2 - 1 small fresh chile pepper, minced, or Tobasco or other hot pepper

sauce to taste (I have always used Tobasco)

1 Tablespoon chopped, fresh cilantro (It says optional, but I don't really

think so)

Peel and chop the mangoes. In a large bowl, mix together the mangoes,

cucumber, tomato, lime juice, salt, chile or tabasco, and cilantro. Let

salsa sit for 10 minutes to allow the flavors to blend before serving. Mango

salsa keeps refrigerated for 2 or 3 days.

About the Author:

Michael K. Sasaki is the founder of RecipeMatcher ( http://www.recipematcher.com ), where you can find delicious salsa recipes.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - The Real History of Salsa

avocado weight

hey how many calories is there in an avocado? And whi weighing do we weigh it with it seed?

cause i read on the internet that 145 grams of avocado is 235 cal and iweighed the avocado( with its seed) that i had and it weighed 300. So is it correct to weight it with is seed?

Weight it without the seed. Only weight what you plan on eating. Avocado is a very good source of fiber!

Are you realistic about your weight-loss goal? Remember, losing as little as 10 to 20 pounds can improve your health if you're overweight or obese. Ask your doctor how much weight you can safely lose.

Here's a guide to understanding and dealing with childhood obesity. If you're overweight or obese, you are not alone - you're among nearly 130 million other U.S. adults. Obesity is the second leading cause of preventable death and is closely linked to conditions such as heart disease, cancer, diabetes, arthritis, gout, asthma, and gum disease. WebMD has created a weight loss clinic to addresses this public health epidemic.

Vegetarian Food

Natural weight loss with a vegetarian diet or raw food diet is healthy weight loss. Natural appetite suppressants like hoodia weight loss or green tea weight loss are the best weight loss supplements. There are no weight loss vitamins, only natural appetite suppressant.

Eat Balanced Meal

To lose weight safely and effectively, a well balanced diet from the Food Guide Pyramid consuming enough high carbohydrate (low and moderate glycemic index) foods for energy and lowering fat consumption to reduce calories is recommended rather than following a very low calorie diet. It is also important not to eliminate all fat from the diet. The body needs some fats for normal operation. The best fats are monounsaturated (canola oil, olive oil, peanut oil, almonds, pecans, peanuts, walnuts, and avocados).

Diet and Exercise

Diet and exercise are vital strategies for losing and maintaining weight. A study by the National Weight Control Registry found that nearly all of 784 study participants who had lost at least 30 pounds, and had maintained that loss for one year or longer, used diet and exercise to not only lose the weight, but also to maintain the weight loss.

The Result

Once the desired weight has been reached, the gradual addition of about 200 calories of healthy, low-fat food to daily intake may be attempted for one week to see if weight loss continues. If weight loss does continue, additional calories of healthy foods may be added to the daily diet until the right balance of calories to maintain the desired weight has been determined. It may take some time and record keeping to determine how adjusting food intake and exercise levels affect weight.

About the Author:

WAN MOHD HIRWANI WAN HUSSAIN is a sucessful business consultant, and fitness advocate. He has done extensive research and testing of nutrition, diet and exercise programs. His interest was initiated by a personal health issue, and he was sucessful in losing over 50 pounds, lowering his stress and blood pressure, as well as increasing muscle mass all at age 24. This was after he failed at the so called expert programs. visit his blog for more info at {woman weight loss}

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Story About Losing Weight

vegan avocado ice cream recipe

I have to be honest.  This is one question that REALLY gets my goat.  Whenever I hear someone attacking the raw diet because it’s too “boring,” I go crazy!

Really, I hulk out!

I’ve been following a low-fat raw vegan diet for almost 2 years now.  I can honestly say, without any reservations, that there is absolutely NOTHING boring about a raw food diet!

*Deep Breath*  Okay, I’m calm now.

Let me explain why a raw food diet is totally NOT boring.

Variety

The variety of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds that exist is astounding.  You have apples, grapes, oranges, bananas, peaches, pears, cantaloupe, romaine, celery, cucumber, avocado...and I’m just alluding to what is available in your local grocery store!

In fact, I can almost guarantee you that raw foodists eat *more* variety than ANYONE on a standard American diet...or any other diet for that matter.

This is because most people tend to eat just a handful of dishes that become their staples.  And these dishes are usually very similar.

If you eat meat, your meals will generally center around a protein, with some starchy vegetable and maybe greens along side.  If you’re from the Southern States, your greens are cooked to death in butter and everything gets a nice heapin’ helping of beef gravy smothered on top.

If you are vegetarian or vegan, the focus is usually on whole grains or legumes with vegetables.  And of course, everyone has his or her favorite dessert.

But when you live on a fruit-based diet, you have to adapt what you are eating to what you can find in your area.  Just because you have a few favorite fruits does not mean that they will always be available.

I would gladly eat nothing but mangoes for the rest of my life, but I can’t because they are not always in season!

Where’s the Proof?

Still skeptical that a raw diet is really that varied?  Here’s a list of several of the different varieties of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds that I eat in a given year:

o    Apples
o    Apricots
o    Avocado
o    Bananas
o    Basil
o    Bell Pepper
o    Blackberries
o    Blueberries
o    Boston Lettuce
o    Cantaloupe
o    Celery
o    Cherries
o    Cilantro
o    Clementines
o    Cucumber
o    Currants
o    Dates
o    Dill
o    Grapefruit
o    Grapes
o    Honeydew
o    Iceberg Lettuce
o    Kiwi
o    Lemon
o    Lime
o    Mangoes
o    Mint
o    Nectarines
o    Oranges
o    Papaya
o    Peaches
o    Pears
o    Pineapple
o    Pistachios
o    Raspberries
o    Romaine Lettuce
o    Star Fruit
o    Strawberries
o    Sunflower Seeds
o    Tangerines
o    Tomatoes
o    Watermelon
o    Zucchini

AND I didn’t even include the different varieties of fruit within each species.  For instance, there are Navel and Valencia oranges, red and green grapes, the Fuji apples and the Gala apples, Red Haven and White Nectar peaches, etc.

All of this is found conventionally at my local supermarkets in Tennessee.  Of course, if you live somewhere tropical or have access to exotic markets, you have a whole different spectrum of fruits to choose from:

o    Chocolate Sapote
o    Custard Apple
o    Durian
o    Jackfruit
o    Litchi
o    Longan
o    Mamey Sapote
o    Mangosteen
o    Rambutan
o    Sapodilla
o    Soursop

There’s even a peanut butter fruit that has the taste AND texture of peanut butter!

How can a diet that’s full of so many different smells, tastes, and textures be boring?

Quite simply, it cannot.

Raw Recipes

If you *still* aren’t convinced that a raw diet isn’t boring, you probably haven’t considered all the different raw vegan recipes that you can make.

And I’m not talking about fatty dehydrated conglomerations that are made to mimic the flavor and textures of cooked dishes.  I’m referring to simple, delicious, healthy meals that contain few ingredients and take literally minutes to put together.

There are fruit smoothies, green smoothies, fruit soups, vegetable soups, fruit salads, savory salads, fruit puddings, dips, salsas, and even fruit ice creams!

You could literally take just a few different healthy raw ingredients and have a completely different dish for every meal for a whole week!

Now how in the world can a diet like *this* be boring?

Quite simply, it cannot.

Don’t Take My Word For It!

If you are still debating going raw, there is no better time than now to get out there and go for it.  See for yourself just how varied this diet can be.  Buy all the fruits you can and go crazy in the kitchen!

Just be sure to send me the recipes to all of your awesome raw creations.

About the Author:

For more information on the best raw vegan diet, be sure to visit Fit On Raw and subscribe to Swayze’s newsletter Peachy Keen Ezine. By subscribing, you will also receive the free report The 4 Principles of a Healthy Raw Diet as well as the 5-week mini-course The Fool Proof Transition to Raw.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Is a Raw Food Diet Boring?

I have to be honest.  This is one question that REALLY gets my goat.  Whenever I hear someone attacking the raw diet because it’s too “boring,” I go crazy!

Really, I hulk out!

I’ve been following a low-fat raw vegan diet for almost 2 years now.  I can honestly say, without any reservations, that there is absolutely NOTHING boring about a raw food diet!

*Deep Breath*  Okay, I’m calm now.

Let me explain why a raw food diet is totally NOT boring.

Variety

The variety of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds that exist is astounding.  You have apples, grapes, oranges, bananas, peaches, pears, cantaloupe, romaine, celery, cucumber, avocado...and I’m just alluding to what is available in your local grocery store!

In fact, I can almost guarantee you that raw foodists eat *more* variety than ANYONE on a standard American diet...or any other diet for that matter.

This is because most people tend to eat just a handful of dishes that become their staples.  And these dishes are usually very similar.

If you eat meat, your meals will generally center around a protein, with some starchy vegetable and maybe greens along side.  If you’re from the Southern States, your greens are cooked to death in butter and everything gets a nice heapin’ helping of beef gravy smothered on top.

If you are vegetarian or vegan, the focus is usually on whole grains or legumes with vegetables.  And of course, everyone has his or her favorite dessert.

But when you live on a fruit-based diet, you have to adapt what you are eating to what you can find in your area.  Just because you have a few favorite fruits does not mean that they will always be available.

I would gladly eat nothing but mangoes for the rest of my life, but I can’t because they are not always in season!

Where’s the Proof?

Still skeptical that a raw diet is really that varied?  Here’s a list of several of the different varieties of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds that I eat in a given year:

o    Apples
o    Apricots
o    Avocado
o    Bananas
o    Basil
o    Bell Pepper
o    Blackberries
o    Blueberries
o    Boston Lettuce
o    Cantaloupe
o    Celery
o    Cherries
o    Cilantro
o    Clementines
o    Cucumber
o    Currants
o    Dates
o    Dill
o    Grapefruit
o    Grapes
o    Honeydew
o    Iceberg Lettuce
o    Kiwi
o    Lemon
o    Lime
o    Mangoes
o    Mint
o    Nectarines
o    Oranges
o    Papaya
o    Peaches
o    Pears
o    Pineapple
o    Pistachios
o    Raspberries
o    Romaine Lettuce
o    Star Fruit
o    Strawberries
o    Sunflower Seeds
o    Tangerines
o    Tomatoes
o    Watermelon
o    Zucchini

AND I didn’t even include the different varieties of fruit within each species.  For instance, there are Navel and Valencia oranges, red and green grapes, the Fuji apples and the Gala apples, Red Haven and White Nectar peaches, etc.

All of this is found conventionally at my local supermarkets in Tennessee.  Of course, if you live somewhere tropical or have access to exotic markets, you have a whole different spectrum of fruits to choose from:

o    Chocolate Sapote
o    Custard Apple
o    Durian
o    Jackfruit
o    Litchi
o    Longan
o    Mamey Sapote
o    Mangosteen
o    Rambutan
o    Sapodilla
o    Soursop

There’s even a peanut butter fruit that has the taste AND texture of peanut butter!

How can a diet that’s full of so many different smells, tastes, and textures be boring?

Quite simply, it cannot.

Raw Recipes

If you *still* aren’t convinced that a raw diet isn’t boring, you probably haven’t considered all the different raw vegan recipes that you can make.

And I’m not talking about fatty dehydrated conglomerations that are made to mimic the flavor and textures of cooked dishes.  I’m referring to simple, delicious, healthy meals that contain few ingredients and take literally minutes to put together.

There are fruit smoothies, green smoothies, fruit soups, vegetable soups, fruit salads, savory salads, fruit puddings, dips, salsas, and even fruit ice creams!

You could literally take just a few different healthy raw ingredients and have a completely different dish for every meal for a whole week!

Now how in the world can a diet like *this* be boring?

Quite simply, it cannot.

Don’t Take My Word For It!

If you are still debating going raw, there is no better time than now to get out there and go for it.  See for yourself just how varied this diet can be.  Buy all the fruits you can and go crazy in the kitchen!

Just be sure to send me the recipes to all of your awesome raw creations.

About the Author:

For more information on the best raw vegan diet, be sure to visit Fit On Raw and subscribe to Swayze’s newsletter Peachy Keen Ezine. By subscribing, you will also receive the free report The 4 Principles of a Healthy Raw Diet as well as the 5-week mini-course The Fool Proof Transition to Raw.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Is a Raw Food Diet Boring?

calories in one tablespoon avocado

Will this get me a bikini body in 4 months?

I want to lose about 42 lbs (that's 3 stone to any other UK dwellers out there P) by the end of Aug/beginning of Sept :]

what is your current weight and Age... yah these people didn't take into account we don't know your current weight... its very dangerous to lose weight at certain weights... also its not weight you want to lose... perse... its BFP or body fat percentage.

looking at a scale can really mess you up... certain body types will always be large boned and somewhat heavy even with a low BFP and lean muscle.

research mesomorphs to understand.

I have spent a good amount of my time on raw food forums over the past couple of years. It is a great way to learn about eating raw and to gather information from others who are thriving on the diet.

While visiting these forums, I have noticed a problem that is expressed over and over again by various members. Many people complain that they find it too difficult to stick to a raw food diet. They find themselves extremely hungry and experiencing cravings for cooked dishes on a regular basis.

And I'm not talking about brand new raw foodists. I'm talking about people who have been attempting a raw food diet for years and still can't seem to stick with it!

So what's the problem? Why is it that such a vast majority of raw foodists fail on a raw food diet?

Not enough calories, Too much fat

In general, the raw foodists I'm talking about are consuming lots of greens and vegetables, avocados, nuts, oils, dehydrated mixtures like flax seed crackers, some vinegars, and dried fruit.

Even though the raw foodists described above are eating large amounts of greens and other vegetables, these foods do not offer a substantial amount of calories.

Here's an example...

*Typical Salad without Overt Fats*

A large salad of 1 pound of romaine lettuce, 1 medium red bell pepper, and one medium cucumber is only 153 calories. All of that food has less calories than just two bananas!

This is a problem because the average person needs between 2000-2500 calories a day. To eat that much food from romaine lettuce, you would need to eat 25 pounds (about 50 heads) of lettuce per day! This is completely impractical, not to mention rather unpleasant. My jaw aches just thinking about it!

We've now established that it's nearly impossible to get enough calories from vegetables. While salads like this are high in volume, the satiation is short lived because the caloric needs are not being met.

So where do these raw foodists get their calories from?

Avocados, raw nuts and seeds, and cold-pressed olive oils. To be precise, fat. These fatty foods are used to make dehydrated dishes like "raw" crackers, breads, and "mock" pizzas. They are also eaten on their own or put atop salads.

Let's return to the salad example...

*Typical Salad with Overt Fats*

1 head of romaine, 1 medium bell pepper, and one medium cucumber is 153 calories. Now, add just one medium avocado and one tablespoon of olive oil. That takes the calories up to 561 calories!

The avocado and oil alone provide 2/3 of the total calories in this dish. Not only that, but the addition of the avocado and oil took the fat content from 10% to a staggering 61% of fat!

As you can see, it only takes a small amount of these foods (fatty fruits, nuts and seeds, and oils) to exceed your needed calories and fat content for the day.

Again, this is just one meal. Many raw foodists have two salads during their day and often times these are even more fat laden than the example I have shown above. This does not even consider the popular complex, dehydrated recipes that are mostly comprised of high-fat nuts and seeds.

With this knowledge in mind, is it surprising that the average raw foodist consumes a whopping 60% of his or her calories from fat everyday? How many times have you come across people who claim to eat several avocados a day and handfuls of nuts in just one sitting? Maybe this isn't surprising, but it's certainly unhealthy.

What's the Alternative?

While greens and vegetable fruits are very important in a healthy raw diet, they simply do not provide the necessary calories to fill you up and combat cooked cravings. However, you do not have to get your calories from low-volume fatty foods.

You are not destined for raw food failure.

There is another way...

*Sweet fruit*

By eating substantial amounts of whole, raw, simple, delicious fruits, you will feel completely satiated and will no longer suffer from cooked food cravings. You will also be getting the absolute best nutrition available and fueling your body right!

And it's so easy to get started! If you still eat a cooked diet, simply replace your breakfast with as much fruit as you can eat and move on from there. If you already eat raw, just replace the majority of the raw veggies and fats you eat with sweet fruit.

If you are having a hard time getting enough calories via whole fruit, try blending them into tasty smoothies!

So put down the avocado, pick up an apple, and start succeeding on a raw diet today!

About the Author:

For more information on the best raw vegan diet, be sure to visit Fit On Raw and subscribe to Swayze’s newsletter Peachy Keen Ezine. By subscribing, you will also receive the free report The 4 Principles of a Healthy Raw Diet as well as the 5-week mini-course The Fool Proof Transition to Raw.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Are You Destined For Raw Food Failure?

raw food avocado recipe

I have to be honest.  This is one question that REALLY gets my goat.  Whenever I hear someone attacking the raw diet because it’s too “boring,” I go crazy!

Really, I hulk out!

I’ve been following a low-fat raw vegan diet for almost 2 years now.  I can honestly say, without any reservations, that there is absolutely NOTHING boring about a raw food diet!

*Deep Breath*  Okay, I’m calm now.

Let me explain why a raw food diet is totally NOT boring.

Variety

The variety of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds that exist is astounding.  You have apples, grapes, oranges, bananas, peaches, pears, cantaloupe, romaine, celery, cucumber, avocado...and I’m just alluding to what is available in your local grocery store!

In fact, I can almost guarantee you that raw foodists eat *more* variety than ANYONE on a standard American diet...or any other diet for that matter.

This is because most people tend to eat just a handful of dishes that become their staples.  And these dishes are usually very similar.

If you eat meat, your meals will generally center around a protein, with some starchy vegetable and maybe greens along side.  If you’re from the Southern States, your greens are cooked to death in butter and everything gets a nice heapin’ helping of beef gravy smothered on top.

If you are vegetarian or vegan, the focus is usually on whole grains or legumes with vegetables.  And of course, everyone has his or her favorite dessert.

But when you live on a fruit-based diet, you have to adapt what you are eating to what you can find in your area.  Just because you have a few favorite fruits does not mean that they will always be available.

I would gladly eat nothing but mangoes for the rest of my life, but I can’t because they are not always in season!

Where’s the Proof?

Still skeptical that a raw diet is really that varied?  Here’s a list of several of the different varieties of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds that I eat in a given year:

o    Apples
o    Apricots
o    Avocado
o    Bananas
o    Basil
o    Bell Pepper
o    Blackberries
o    Blueberries
o    Boston Lettuce
o    Cantaloupe
o    Celery
o    Cherries
o    Cilantro
o    Clementines
o    Cucumber
o    Currants
o    Dates
o    Dill
o    Grapefruit
o    Grapes
o    Honeydew
o    Iceberg Lettuce
o    Kiwi
o    Lemon
o    Lime
o    Mangoes
o    Mint
o    Nectarines
o    Oranges
o    Papaya
o    Peaches
o    Pears
o    Pineapple
o    Pistachios
o    Raspberries
o    Romaine Lettuce
o    Star Fruit
o    Strawberries
o    Sunflower Seeds
o    Tangerines
o    Tomatoes
o    Watermelon
o    Zucchini

AND I didn’t even include the different varieties of fruit within each species.  For instance, there are Navel and Valencia oranges, red and green grapes, the Fuji apples and the Gala apples, Red Haven and White Nectar peaches, etc.

All of this is found conventionally at my local supermarkets in Tennessee.  Of course, if you live somewhere tropical or have access to exotic markets, you have a whole different spectrum of fruits to choose from:

o    Chocolate Sapote
o    Custard Apple
o    Durian
o    Jackfruit
o    Litchi
o    Longan
o    Mamey Sapote
o    Mangosteen
o    Rambutan
o    Sapodilla
o    Soursop

There’s even a peanut butter fruit that has the taste AND texture of peanut butter!

How can a diet that’s full of so many different smells, tastes, and textures be boring?

Quite simply, it cannot.

Raw Recipes

If you *still* aren’t convinced that a raw diet isn’t boring, you probably haven’t considered all the different raw vegan recipes that you can make.

And I’m not talking about fatty dehydrated conglomerations that are made to mimic the flavor and textures of cooked dishes.  I’m referring to simple, delicious, healthy meals that contain few ingredients and take literally minutes to put together.

There are fruit smoothies, green smoothies, fruit soups, vegetable soups, fruit salads, savory salads, fruit puddings, dips, salsas, and even fruit ice creams!

You could literally take just a few different healthy raw ingredients and have a completely different dish for every meal for a whole week!

Now how in the world can a diet like *this* be boring?

Quite simply, it cannot.

Don’t Take My Word For It!

If you are still debating going raw, there is no better time than now to get out there and go for it.  See for yourself just how varied this diet can be.  Buy all the fruits you can and go crazy in the kitchen!

Just be sure to send me the recipes to all of your awesome raw creations.

About the Author:

For more information on the best raw vegan diet, be sure to visit Fit On Raw and subscribe to Swayze’s newsletter Peachy Keen Ezine. By subscribing, you will also receive the free report The 4 Principles of a Healthy Raw Diet as well as the 5-week mini-course The Fool Proof Transition to Raw.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Is a Raw Food Diet Boring?

In this day and age, everybody wants to improve their looks with a thinner waist line. For that, people may need some directions for finding healthy solutions to lose weight. The best choice someone can make in order to lose weight and gain health, energy and vitality is switching to a raw food diet.

People discover each day the benefits of raw food recipes. When switching to a raw food diet you will see improvements to your daily behavior like improved sleep, some anti-aging benefits, increased vitality and health. Owing to such advantages, the popularity of raw food diets is bound to increase, because we all want to improve the way we look and the way we feel about ourselves, don’t we?

In the beginning people didn’t cook their food and they consumed it raw. Eating like this helped them keep very healthy. Our bodies are built so that we can consume raw foods. The only thing we need to do is to rediscover the way we were in the beginning and enjoy all that nature has to give us. Consuming raw foods helps our bodies because they contain enzymes that help digestion. These enzymes are destroyed if the fruits and vegetables are cooked. Our body digests the foods through its own enzymes, but the enzymes in our body also give us energy. Therefore, when we use the enzymes in our bodies for digestion and not the ones in fruits and vegetables, it means that our energy levels and vitality are decreased.

Basic guidelines for planning your healthy raw food recipes recommend that you should include in your diet mostly fruit and vegetables, which are our most biologically conducive meals. Something that can help you in planning your raw food recipes is the categories in which fruits and vegetables are divided.

Fruits can be divided in sweet fruits (tropical fruits, persimmons, sweet grapes), acid fruits (lemons, citrus), sub-acid fruits (apples, pears, tart grapes) and fatty fruits (avocadoes, durian). Melons constitute a separate category of fruits. Some of the vegetable categories are non-starchy greens (spinach, cabbage), fruit vegetables (cucumbers, tomatoes) and root vegetables (carrots, celeriac). Another category of vegetables includes lettuce and celery. The vegetables named here can be found as items on a list of raw low carbohydrate foods. All these fruits and vegetables are the common components of raw food recipes.

Now that the categories have been established, here are some rules of combining them in order for you to avoid fermentation in the intestines, indigestion, water retention and toxicity. Sweet fruits are to be eaten with other varieties of sweet fruits only or with sub-acid fruits. Don’t eat acid fruit with anything other than celery and lettuce. Avocadoes and olives should be eaten with non-starchy vegetables. Melons should be eaten alone or not eaten at all. These are combinations that you should try. But there are a few combinations that you should try to avoid like starch and acid (tomato and potato), protein and protein (avocadoes and nuts), sweets and starch (maple syrup and rice). Think about these combinations when you are developing your own raw food recipes.

Raw food diets are not all about fruits and vegetables. Organic foods can also be included in the diet. Organic cheese is very nutritious and can be included in raw food diets because it does not involve a cooking process that destroys enzymes. You should make sure that the organic cheese you buy is organic, and not a scam. The process that is followed by farmers to obtain organic cheese consists of letting nature take its natural course, from harvesting the milk from the cows and letting it coagulate with no help from additional catalytic agents. Incredible products made from raw ingredients and that may include organic cheese can be found here, on rawbakery.com.

About the Author:

The most reliable way to improve our health and vitality is by switching to raw foods. Raw food recipes can easily replace our daily food and in most of the cases they taste better than cooked foods. Organic cheese can be also included in the diet as a component that improves the nutritional value of the foods.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - The Basics for Raw Food Recipes

avocado webmd

Are you realistic about your weight-loss goal? Remember, losing as little as 10 to 20 pounds can improve your health if you're overweight or obese. Ask your doctor how much weight you can safely lose.

Here's a guide to understanding and dealing with childhood obesity. If you're overweight or obese, you are not alone - you're among nearly 130 million other U.S. adults. Obesity is the second leading cause of preventable death and is closely linked to conditions such as heart disease, cancer, diabetes, arthritis, gout, asthma, and gum disease. WebMD has created a weight loss clinic to addresses this public health epidemic.

Vegetarian Food

Natural weight loss with a vegetarian diet or raw food diet is healthy weight loss. Natural appetite suppressants like hoodia weight loss or green tea weight loss are the best weight loss supplements. There are no weight loss vitamins, only natural appetite suppressant.

Eat Balanced Meal

To lose weight safely and effectively, a well balanced diet from the Food Guide Pyramid consuming enough high carbohydrate (low and moderate glycemic index) foods for energy and lowering fat consumption to reduce calories is recommended rather than following a very low calorie diet. It is also important not to eliminate all fat from the diet. The body needs some fats for normal operation. The best fats are monounsaturated (canola oil, olive oil, peanut oil, almonds, pecans, peanuts, walnuts, and avocados).

Diet and Exercise

Diet and exercise are vital strategies for losing and maintaining weight. A study by the National Weight Control Registry found that nearly all of 784 study participants who had lost at least 30 pounds, and had maintained that loss for one year or longer, used diet and exercise to not only lose the weight, but also to maintain the weight loss.

The Result

Once the desired weight has been reached, the gradual addition of about 200 calories of healthy, low-fat food to daily intake may be attempted for one week to see if weight loss continues. If weight loss does continue, additional calories of healthy foods may be added to the daily diet until the right balance of calories to maintain the desired weight has been determined. It may take some time and record keeping to determine how adjusting food intake and exercise levels affect weight.

About the Author:

WAN MOHD HIRWANI WAN HUSSAIN is a sucessful business consultant, and fitness advocate. He has done extensive research and testing of nutrition, diet and exercise programs. His interest was initiated by a personal health issue, and he was sucessful in losing over 50 pounds, lowering his stress and blood pressure, as well as increasing muscle mass all at age 24. This was after he failed at the so called expert programs. visit his blog for more info at http://weight-loss-woman.blogspot.com/

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Story About Losing Weight

Are you realistic about your weight-loss goal? Remember, losing as little as 10 to 20 pounds can improve your health if you're overweight or obese. Ask your doctor how much weight you can safely lose.

Here's a guide to understanding and dealing with childhood obesity. If you're overweight or obese, you are not alone - you're among nearly 130 million other U.S. adults. Obesity is the second leading cause of preventable death and is closely linked to conditions such as heart disease, cancer, diabetes, arthritis, gout, asthma, and gum disease. WebMD has created a weight loss clinic to addresses this public health epidemic.

Vegetarian Food

Natural weight loss with a vegetarian diet or raw food diet is healthy weight loss. Natural appetite suppressants like hoodia weight loss or green tea weight loss are the best weight loss supplements. There are no weight loss vitamins, only natural appetite suppressant.

Eat Balanced Meal

To lose weight safely and effectively, a well balanced diet from the Food Guide Pyramid consuming enough high carbohydrate (low and moderate glycemic index) foods for energy and lowering fat consumption to reduce calories is recommended rather than following a very low calorie diet. It is also important not to eliminate all fat from the diet. The body needs some fats for normal operation. The best fats are monounsaturated (canola oil, olive oil, peanut oil, almonds, pecans, peanuts, walnuts, and avocados).

Diet and Exercise

Diet and exercise are vital strategies for losing and maintaining weight. A study by the National Weight Control Registry found that nearly all of 784 study participants who had lost at least 30 pounds, and had maintained that loss for one year or longer, used diet and exercise to not only lose the weight, but also to maintain the weight loss.

The Result

Once the desired weight has been reached, the gradual addition of about 200 calories of healthy, low-fat food to daily intake may be attempted for one week to see if weight loss continues. If weight loss does continue, additional calories of healthy foods may be added to the daily diet until the right balance of calories to maintain the desired weight has been determined. It may take some time and record keeping to determine how adjusting food intake and exercise levels affect weight.

About the Author:

WAN MOHD HIRWANI WAN HUSSAIN is a sucessful business consultant, and fitness advocate. He has done extensive research and testing of nutrition, diet and exercise programs. His interest was initiated by a personal health issue, and he was sucessful in losing over 50 pounds, lowering his stress and blood pressure, as well as increasing muscle mass all at age 24. This was after he failed at the so called expert programs. visit his blog for more info at http://weight-loss-woman.blogspot.com/

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Story About Losing Weight

avocado disease florida

I’ve received a handful of emails lately concerned with the amount of sweetness on a low fat, high fruit raw vegan diet.  As expected, several of you aren’t quite used to the sweetness of so much fruit

To solve the problem, many beginner raw foodists substitute savory greens and/or nuts, seeds and avocado for sweet fruit.

Big Mistake

There are 2 problems with this approach:

1. Greens and vegetables have few calories
2. Nuts, seeds, and avocado are high-fat foods

In terms of greens, these foods are simply too low in calories.  Even a large salad of 8 ounces of romaine, one large cucumber, a whole bell pepper, and two medium tomatoes is under 200 calories!  The only way to increase the calories in this meal would be to add in fruit or fat.

Which brings me to the second problem: fatty nuts, seeds, and avocado.  Contrary to what people (raw and cooked foodists alike) like to believe, nuts are NOT a high protein food.  Take an ounce of walnuts (14 halves), for instance.  With only 9% of calories from protein and whopping 83% from fat, it becomes clear that nuts and seeds are really a high FAT food.

Avocados are in the same boat, with 4% protein and 77% fat.

SIDE NOTE: I’m referring to the Hass avocado here.  There are avocados with lower percentages of fat, such as some Florida varieties, but these are not as readily available.

While there’s nothing inherently wrong with this fact, it becomes a problem when these foods are substituted for fruit and eaten in mass quantities.  While it is perfectibly acceptable to eat a pound (or two) of fruit in one sitting, this is a recipe for disaster in terms of fat.

Too much fat has been linked to obesity, heart disease, atherosclerosis, and even depression.

To learn more about the problems associated with eating a high fat raw food diet, check out this article.

This is why I side with the numerous doctors and health institutes - including Dr. Joel Fuhrman, Dr. Douglas Graham, Dr. Dean Ornish, and The Pritikin Longevity Center - in recommending a low fat diet for optimal health.  This works out to about 1-2 ounces of nuts or ½ - 1/3 of an avocado per day (depending upon your caloric needs).

This means that if you decide to substitute sweet fruit for fat you will need to keep the quantities low.  Say you add 1 tbsp of nuts to the salad example above.  This still only gives you about 350 calories!

And that’s assuming that you can actually consume such a mountainous salad in one sitting.  I’m pretty proud of my eating prowess when it comes to fruit.  But 8 ounces of lettuce and a slew of veggies?

No way, Jose!

With the low amount of calories in this dish, you’ll be back in the kitchen looking for more fuel (probably in the form of simple carbohydrates) within the hour.

What to Do?

The easy way out is just to eat more sweet fruit.  But you're sick of sweet!

It seems we're back at square one, right?

Not quite.

There is a tasty solution.

Go Green!

Green smoothies, that is!

A green smoothie - renowned amongst gourmet and low fat raw foodists alike - is a fruit smoothie with greens added to it.  Sure, you've probably heard of them.  But have you actually tried one?

Here’s a tasty raw recipe:

• 3 bananas
• 1 pint of strawberries
• Handful or two of romaine lettuce

Blend everything together.  Add water to achieve the texture you desire.  I like my smoothies thin so I tend to add a few cups to the mix.

Why It Works

The green smoothie concept works for (you guessed it) 2 reasons:

1. It’s still fruit-based, providing quality fuel and satiation to your body.
2. The greens help to cut the sweetness.

Even though green (and contrary to the lovely picture in this post, often times pretty gross looking), green smoothies are very much a fruity meal.

As you can see from the recipe above, the smoothie is still mostly fruit.  The green comes from only a handful or two of romaine.

It is this small amount of "green-ness" that really adds a nice crisp, clean taste to the meal.  The drink will still be sweet, but not sickly so.

And you can easily add more fruit or make more than one smoothie to meet your caloric needs.

For instance, whenever I make smoothies (green or not), I have to make two separate batches because I like them so thin.

*sigh* If only they made 64 ounce blenders...

Long-Term Sweet Sickness?

Almost every beginner raw foodist has a problem eating so much sweet fruit at first.

Even I, the Fruit Queen Goddess that I am, had some troubles.  Bananas were especially sickening to me.  They were just so thick and sweet.  Yuck!

And to think, now I eat multiple bananas EVERYDAY!

If you stick with a high fruit, low fat diet, you will not experience this aversion to sweetness forever.  And the transformation generally does not take that long.  We're talkin' just a few weeks or so, on average.

And eventually, you'll stop thinking of fruit as sweet altogether.  At some point, it just becomes delicious, mouth-watering, satiating food.

About the Author:

For more information on the best raw vegan diet, be sure to visit Fit On Raw and subscribe to Swayze’s newsletter Peachy Keen Ezine. By subscribing, you will also receive the free report The 4 Principles of a Healthy Raw Diet as well as the 5-week mini-course The Fool Proof Transition to Raw.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Go Green, The Raw Food Way!

Recent studies show that there are certain foods out there which can help you achieve a flat belly. These foods are comprised of monounsaturated fatty acids, better known as the good for you fats. These good fats can help you flatten your tummy and protect you from numerous chronic diseases. So what are some of these magical foods?

The first of these foods are oils. Canola oil, flaxseed oil, olive oil, peanut oil, sunflower oil, sesame oil, soybean oil, and walnut oil are just a few of the selections. It is recommended to eat at least one tablespoon, which is one serving of this product. Another flat belly food is avocado. This particular product is available Florida grown or Hass. ¼ of a cup is the recommended daily serving. Seeds and nuts are also great when it comes down to trimming that waistline. Almonds, Brazil nuts, cashews, dry roasted peanuts, dry roasted sun flower seeds, and walnuts are just the tip of the iceberg as far as nut and seed selection is concerned. You can snack on these plain or you can add them to your cereal, salad, favorite desert or even your favorite dish. The recommended daily serving is 2 tablespoons.  Just as olive oil, black and green olives are also comprised of monounsaturated fatty acids. 10 large olives is the recommended serving of this treat.

And last but certainly not lest is chocolate. Yes, believe it or not, chocolate can help you lose belly fat. The best kind is dark or semisweet. This of course does not mean that you should overindulge in it; it means that you should have only the recommended dosage which is ¼ of a cup. When eaten in the right proportions, these five foods can help you get rid of that unwanted belly flab.

About the Author:

Lauren S. Johnson writes health articles about fitness and nutrition.
Some of her favorite passions include studying the medicinal benefits of herbal remedies for antidepressants,
diet pills, and hoodia gordonii.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Foods That Make Your Belly Flat

raw food avocado dressing

Detox, or detoxification of the body is a common practice many people use in order to rid the body of toxic substances or lose some weight quickly. There are many different ways and many different diets to detox the body. Some of these are the dieuretic diet, the fat flush diet, an all liquid diet, liver cleansing diet and the raw food diet. Certain detox diets may be better for certain people, so it is important to look at each and decide which one would fit your day to day lifestyle the best. The detox diet that I would like to talk about here is the raw food detox diet, also sometimes called foodism. This detox diet is generally made up of fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, grains, dried fruits, herbs and spices that are all eaten raw.

The first thing you will want to do is prepare for the detox. The safest way to do so is to slowly remove the foods that are not allowed during the detox from your day to day diet for a week before you start the full on detox. This means that the first day of preparation you will replace one or two things that you regularly eat during the day with something that is a fruit, vegetable or other food allowed by the detox. By the seventh day, you will have replaced pretty much everything in your regular diet with someone that is allowed in the detox diet. The other thing that you will need to do to prepare is create a menu plan for your detox diet. You will want to make your menu as appetizing as possible for yourself, but don’t expect it to be as good as friend chicken or extra cheesy lasagna. With a little creativity and searching for recipes you can however find some very tasty meals.

Once you have created your menu plan, create a grocery list and go shopping the day before you start the detox. You are now ready to begin your raw food detox diet.

Generally the first couple days of any detox are the hardest days, so it is important to keep any temptations out of sight and as out of mind as possible. It may take a lot of will power but you will find as you are on the detox for longer that it will become easier, and believe me, when you start seeing those results of how much better you feel or how much weight you have lost, you will want to keep the detox going strong.

With the raw food diet it may be a little costly to purchase all of the fruits and vegetables that you will need, but it is important not to skimp or cheat. Some great meals you can make are fresh fruit salads, mixed salads with other various vegetables such as tomatoes, onions, parsley and other dressings, raw mixed vegetable soup, avocado and even raspberry and banana sorbet. You should be able to find these special raw diet recipes as well as many others with just a little searching online. The important thing with a raw food detox diet is that you make a plan and stick with it.

About the Author:

Jon Heus is the owner of Raw Food Weight Loss Diet, which can teach you all about healthy living with raw foods. If you have ever thought about a raw food diet, visit his site.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Raw Food Detox Diet

Many people see the raw food diet as being healthier and giving them more energy, despite the lack of any long-term analyses of the successes of a raw vegan diet as compared to other types of raw food diets. To try a raw vegan diet for yourself and see what it can do for you, these are the three food groups you can partake of: high-fat plants, sweet fruit and leafy green vegetables. As to the portions of each, opinions vary. Some say as little as two percent of your daily calories should be from leafy green vegetables; others think it should be as high as around thirty. With the high-fat foods, eat things like olives, nuts, avocados, seeds and cold-pressed oils. Again, some recommend anything from a tiny amount to as high as forty per cent.

To be honest, it’s unlikely you can get as high as thirty percent of your daily calories from green vegetables. That would require eating a lot of big salads! Fortunately, such a massive intake is not necessary to derive the benefits of a raw food diet. The green leafy vegetables have plenty of calcium, protein, vitamin K and zinc. All you need to do is eat around 500 g a day to get the recommended amount. If you’re sure to get things like carrots and peas in your meals, you’ll get plenty of calcium, zinc and protein.

Now, when it comes to striking the correct proportions between sweet fruit and fatty foods, that’s where your personal tastes and health come into play. It’s common for people to have troubles with their teeth if they eat a lot of fruit, especially young children. On the other hand, if you have a high metabolic rate, you may need more high-fat foods in order to maintain your weight in the optimum range. Just one caveat: do not have more than ten percent of your diet made up of polyunsaturated fats. Instead, get monounsaturated fats in there. By eating olives, avocados, almonds, hazelnuts and macadamias you can get the fats you need. Depending on how much energy you need each day, you can make up to forty percent of your diet from these foods. Also, you need to include omega-3 fats; they’re very good for you. So, eat things like crushed flax seed. Flax seed oil is also great for salad dressings. There are soils in the world that are low on selenium, and you can’t be sure where your foods were grown. So, an easy way to get around that issue is to include even just Brazil nut a day.

In terms of what sorts of fruits to eat, you don’t have to go with ones that are unusual or exotic. The banana has energy; it’s rather low in fiber, and plenty of potassium. Oranges are great to get calcium, folate, potassium and vitamin C into your body. One of the real pluses of a raw vegan diet is that it reduces calcium loss, and thus reduces your blood pressure; it will also reduce your risk of having a stroke.

Finally, there is vitamin B12. Some health experts recommend that you don’t take vitamin B12 supplements unless symptoms of a deficiency manifest themselves. And even then, some further say you should avoid taking any pills. Instead, there are some excellent natural sources such as wild plants, nori and spirulina. Now, if those are not available, eat fermented foods or a probiotic, and just be sure to include a B12 supplement.

Follow these steps, and you can eat a healthy diet that is in keeping with the vegan dietary guidelines.

About the Author:

Writer on alternative lifestyles

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - A New way to Do the Raw Food Vegan Diet

vegan avocado smoothie

I have to be honest.  This is one question that REALLY gets my goat.  Whenever I hear someone attacking the raw diet because it’s too “boring,” I go crazy!

Really, I hulk out!

I’ve been following a low-fat raw vegan diet for almost 2 years now.  I can honestly say, without any reservations, that there is absolutely NOTHING boring about a raw food diet!

*Deep Breath*  Okay, I’m calm now.

Let me explain why a raw food diet is totally NOT boring.

Variety

The variety of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds that exist is astounding.  You have apples, grapes, oranges, bananas, peaches, pears, cantaloupe, romaine, celery, cucumber, avocado...and I’m just alluding to what is available in your local grocery store!

In fact, I can almost guarantee you that raw foodists eat *more* variety than ANYONE on a standard American diet...or any other diet for that matter.

This is because most people tend to eat just a handful of dishes that become their staples.  And these dishes are usually very similar.

If you eat meat, your meals will generally center around a protein, with some starchy vegetable and maybe greens along side.  If you’re from the Southern States, your greens are cooked to death in butter and everything gets a nice heapin’ helping of beef gravy smothered on top.

If you are vegetarian or vegan, the focus is usually on whole grains or legumes with vegetables.  And of course, everyone has his or her favorite dessert.

But when you live on a fruit-based diet, you have to adapt what you are eating to what you can find in your area.  Just because you have a few favorite fruits does not mean that they will always be available.

I would gladly eat nothing but mangoes for the rest of my life, but I can’t because they are not always in season!

Where’s the Proof?

Still skeptical that a raw diet is really that varied?  Here’s a list of several of the different varieties of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds that I eat in a given year:

o    Apples
o    Apricots
o    Avocado
o    Bananas
o    Basil
o    Bell Pepper
o    Blackberries
o    Blueberries
o    Boston Lettuce
o    Cantaloupe
o    Celery
o    Cherries
o    Cilantro
o    Clementines
o    Cucumber
o    Currants
o    Dates
o    Dill
o    Grapefruit
o    Grapes
o    Honeydew
o    Iceberg Lettuce
o    Kiwi
o    Lemon
o    Lime
o    Mangoes
o    Mint
o    Nectarines
o    Oranges
o    Papaya
o    Peaches
o    Pears
o    Pineapple
o    Pistachios
o    Raspberries
o    Romaine Lettuce
o    Star Fruit
o    Strawberries
o    Sunflower Seeds
o    Tangerines
o    Tomatoes
o    Watermelon
o    Zucchini

AND I didn’t even include the different varieties of fruit within each species.  For instance, there are Navel and Valencia oranges, red and green grapes, the Fuji apples and the Gala apples, Red Haven and White Nectar peaches, etc.

All of this is found conventionally at my local supermarkets in Tennessee.  Of course, if you live somewhere tropical or have access to exotic markets, you have a whole different spectrum of fruits to choose from:

o    Chocolate Sapote
o    Custard Apple
o    Durian
o    Jackfruit
o    Litchi
o    Longan
o    Mamey Sapote
o    Mangosteen
o    Rambutan
o    Sapodilla
o    Soursop

There’s even a peanut butter fruit that has the taste AND texture of peanut butter!

How can a diet that’s full of so many different smells, tastes, and textures be boring?

Quite simply, it cannot.

Raw Recipes

If you *still* aren’t convinced that a raw diet isn’t boring, you probably haven’t considered all the different raw vegan recipes that you can make.

And I’m not talking about fatty dehydrated conglomerations that are made to mimic the flavor and textures of cooked dishes.  I’m referring to simple, delicious, healthy meals that contain few ingredients and take literally minutes to put together.

There are fruit smoothies, green smoothies, fruit soups, vegetable soups, fruit salads, savory salads, fruit puddings, dips, salsas, and even fruit ice creams!

You could literally take just a few different healthy raw ingredients and have a completely different dish for every meal for a whole week!

Now how in the world can a diet like *this* be boring?

Quite simply, it cannot.

Don’t Take My Word For It!

If you are still debating going raw, there is no better time than now to get out there and go for it.  See for yourself just how varied this diet can be.  Buy all the fruits you can and go crazy in the kitchen!

Just be sure to send me the recipes to all of your awesome raw creations.

About the Author:

For more information on the best raw vegan diet, be sure to visit Fit On Raw and subscribe to Swayze’s newsletter Peachy Keen Ezine. By subscribing, you will also receive the free report The 4 Principles of a Healthy Raw Diet as well as the 5-week mini-course The Fool Proof Transition to Raw.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Is a Raw Food Diet Boring?

I’ve received a handful of emails lately concerned with the amount of sweetness on a low fat, high fruit raw vegan diet.  As expected, several of you aren’t quite used to the sweetness of so much fruit

To solve the problem, many beginner raw foodists substitute savory greens and/or nuts, seeds and avocado for sweet fruit.

Big Mistake

There are 2 problems with this approach:

1. Greens and vegetables have few calories
2. Nuts, seeds, and avocado are high-fat foods

In terms of greens, these foods are simply too low in calories.  Even a large salad of 8 ounces of romaine, one large cucumber, a whole bell pepper, and two medium tomatoes is under 200 calories!  The only way to increase the calories in this meal would be to add in fruit or fat.

Which brings me to the second problem: fatty nuts, seeds, and avocado.  Contrary to what people (raw and cooked foodists alike) like to believe, nuts are NOT a high protein food.  Take an ounce of walnuts (14 halves), for instance.  With only 9% of calories from protein and whopping 83% from fat, it becomes clear that nuts and seeds are really a high FAT food.

Avocados are in the same boat, with 4% protein and 77% fat.

SIDE NOTE: I’m referring to the Hass avocado here.  There are avocados with lower percentages of fat, such as some Florida varieties, but these are not as readily available.

While there’s nothing inherently wrong with this fact, it becomes a problem when these foods are substituted for fruit and eaten in mass quantities.  While it is perfectibly acceptable to eat a pound (or two) of fruit in one sitting, this is a recipe for disaster in terms of fat.

Too much fat has been linked to obesity, heart disease, atherosclerosis, and even depression.

To learn more about the problems associated with eating a high fat raw food diet, check out this article.

This is why I side with the numerous doctors and health institutes - including Dr. Joel Fuhrman, Dr. Douglas Graham, Dr. Dean Ornish, and The Pritikin Longevity Center - in recommending a low fat diet for optimal health.  This works out to about 1-2 ounces of nuts or ½ - 1/3 of an avocado per day (depending upon your caloric needs).

This means that if you decide to substitute sweet fruit for fat you will need to keep the quantities low.  Say you add 1 tbsp of nuts to the salad example above.  This still only gives you about 350 calories!

And that’s assuming that you can actually consume such a mountainous salad in one sitting.  I’m pretty proud of my eating prowess when it comes to fruit.  But 8 ounces of lettuce and a slew of veggies?

No way, Jose!

With the low amount of calories in this dish, you’ll be back in the kitchen looking for more fuel (probably in the form of simple carbohydrates) within the hour.

What to Do?

The easy way out is just to eat more sweet fruit.  But you're sick of sweet!

It seems we're back at square one, right?

Not quite.

There is a tasty solution.

Go Green!

Green smoothies, that is!

A green smoothie - renowned amongst gourmet and low fat raw foodists alike - is a fruit smoothie with greens added to it.  Sure, you've probably heard of them.  But have you actually tried one?

Here’s a tasty raw recipe:

• 3 bananas
• 1 pint of strawberries
• Handful or two of romaine lettuce

Blend everything together.  Add water to achieve the texture you desire.  I like my smoothies thin so I tend to add a few cups to the mix.

Why It Works

The green smoothie concept works for (you guessed it) 2 reasons:

1. It’s still fruit-based, providing quality fuel and satiation to your body.
2. The greens help to cut the sweetness.

Even though green (and contrary to the lovely picture in this post, often times pretty gross looking), green smoothies are very much a fruity meal.

As you can see from the recipe above, the smoothie is still mostly fruit.  The green comes from only a handful or two of romaine.

It is this small amount of "green-ness" that really adds a nice crisp, clean taste to the meal.  The drink will still be sweet, but not sickly so.

And you can easily add more fruit or make more than one smoothie to meet your caloric needs.

For instance, whenever I make smoothies (green or not), I have to make two separate batches because I like them so thin.

*sigh* If only they made 64 ounce blenders...

Long-Term Sweet Sickness?

Almost every beginner raw foodist has a problem eating so much sweet fruit at first.

Even I, the Fruit Queen Goddess that I am, had some troubles.  Bananas were especially sickening to me.  They were just so thick and sweet.  Yuck!

And to think, now I eat multiple bananas EVERYDAY!

If you stick with a high fruit, low fat diet, you will not experience this aversion to sweetness forever.  And the transformation generally does not take that long.  We're talkin' just a few weeks or so, on average.

And eventually, you'll stop thinking of fruit as sweet altogether.  At some point, it just becomes delicious, mouth-watering, satiating food.

About the Author:

For more information on the best raw vegan diet, be sure to visit Fit On Raw and subscribe to Swayze’s newsletter Peachy Keen Ezine. By subscribing, you will also receive the free report The 4 Principles of a Healthy Raw Diet as well as the 5-week mini-course The Fool Proof Transition to Raw.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Go Green, The Raw Food Way!

raw chocolate pudding avocado

I have to be honest.  This is one question that REALLY gets my goat.  Whenever I hear someone attacking the raw diet because it’s too “boring,” I go crazy!

Really, I hulk out!

I’ve been following a low-fat raw vegan diet for almost 2 years now.  I can honestly say, without any reservations, that there is absolutely NOTHING boring about a raw food diet!

*Deep Breath*  Okay, I’m calm now.

Let me explain why a raw food diet is totally NOT boring.

Variety

The variety of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds that exist is astounding.  You have apples, grapes, oranges, bananas, peaches, pears, cantaloupe, romaine, celery, cucumber, avocado...and I’m just alluding to what is available in your local grocery store!

In fact, I can almost guarantee you that raw foodists eat *more* variety than ANYONE on a standard American diet...or any other diet for that matter.

This is because most people tend to eat just a handful of dishes that become their staples.  And these dishes are usually very similar.

If you eat meat, your meals will generally center around a protein, with some starchy vegetable and maybe greens along side.  If you’re from the Southern States, your greens are cooked to death in butter and everything gets a nice heapin’ helping of beef gravy smothered on top.

If you are vegetarian or vegan, the focus is usually on whole grains or legumes with vegetables.  And of course, everyone has his or her favorite dessert.

But when you live on a fruit-based diet, you have to adapt what you are eating to what you can find in your area.  Just because you have a few favorite fruits does not mean that they will always be available.

I would gladly eat nothing but mangoes for the rest of my life, but I can’t because they are not always in season!

Where’s the Proof?

Still skeptical that a raw diet is really that varied?  Here’s a list of several of the different varieties of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds that I eat in a given year:

o    Apples
o    Apricots
o    Avocado
o    Bananas
o    Basil
o    Bell Pepper
o    Blackberries
o    Blueberries
o    Boston Lettuce
o    Cantaloupe
o    Celery
o    Cherries
o    Cilantro
o    Clementines
o    Cucumber
o    Currants
o    Dates
o    Dill
o    Grapefruit
o    Grapes
o    Honeydew
o    Iceberg Lettuce
o    Kiwi
o    Lemon
o    Lime
o    Mangoes
o    Mint
o    Nectarines
o    Oranges
o    Papaya
o    Peaches
o    Pears
o    Pineapple
o    Pistachios
o    Raspberries
o    Romaine Lettuce
o    Star Fruit
o    Strawberries
o    Sunflower Seeds
o    Tangerines
o    Tomatoes
o    Watermelon
o    Zucchini

AND I didn’t even include the different varieties of fruit within each species.  For instance, there are Navel and Valencia oranges, red and green grapes, the Fuji apples and the Gala apples, Red Haven and White Nectar peaches, etc.

All of this is found conventionally at my local supermarkets in Tennessee.  Of course, if you live somewhere tropical or have access to exotic markets, you have a whole different spectrum of fruits to choose from:

o    Chocolate Sapote
o    Custard Apple
o    Durian
o    Jackfruit
o    Litchi
o    Longan
o    Mamey Sapote
o    Mangosteen
o    Rambutan
o    Sapodilla
o    Soursop

There’s even a peanut butter fruit that has the taste AND texture of peanut butter!

How can a diet that’s full of so many different smells, tastes, and textures be boring?

Quite simply, it cannot.

Raw Recipes

If you *still* aren’t convinced that a raw diet isn’t boring, you probably haven’t considered all the different raw vegan recipes that you can make.

And I’m not talking about fatty dehydrated conglomerations that are made to mimic the flavor and textures of cooked dishes.  I’m referring to simple, delicious, healthy meals that contain few ingredients and take literally minutes to put together.

There are fruit smoothies, green smoothies, fruit soups, vegetable soups, fruit salads, savory salads, fruit puddings, dips, salsas, and even fruit ice creams!

You could literally take just a few different healthy raw ingredients and have a completely different dish for every meal for a whole week!

Now how in the world can a diet like *this* be boring?

Quite simply, it cannot.

Don’t Take My Word For It!

If you are still debating going raw, there is no better time than now to get out there and go for it.  See for yourself just how varied this diet can be.  Buy all the fruits you can and go crazy in the kitchen!

Just be sure to send me the recipes to all of your awesome raw creations.

About the Author:

For more information on the best raw vegan diet, be sure to visit Fit On Raw and subscribe to Swayze’s newsletter Peachy Keen Ezine. By subscribing, you will also receive the free report The 4 Principles of a Healthy Raw Diet as well as the 5-week mini-course The Fool Proof Transition to Raw.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Is a Raw Food Diet Boring?

Christmas is a time when we think of family get-togethers and abundance. It is memory lane for most of us, enjoying friends, memorable times and good comfort, traditional foods. But the weeks after the holidays are usually weight gains, health problems from too many sweets and food. 

Today white sugar, white flour, dairy products, trans and saturated fats, refined cars and excess calories are on the “no-no” list … and with the holiday times it feels as if the cakes, cookies and candies will become obsolete. And we begin to feel deprived and panic stricken. After all, it is a long-time tradition.

One answer is to make some raw food desserts and take them to get-togethers and family meals. Use nuts, dried fruits, and avocadoes instead of white flour and white sugar. They have a lot of flavor, looks and are good for you. Oh yes … and they are easy to put together.  Jenny Cornbleet has a book out called “Raw Food Made Easy for 1 or 2 People”. In it there are desserts – cakes, cookies, fruit crisps, pies, tarts, puddings, mousses, shakes, and ice cream recipes all raw – for holidays and all meals.  Guess what?  They taste better than their sugar laden counterparts.

One recipe is for a “Flourless Chocolate Cake with Raspberry Sauce” which calls for 1 ½ cups raw walnuts, dash of salt, 8 pitted medjool dates, ¼ cup unsweetened cocoa or carob powder, ½ tsp vanilla extract, and 2 tsp water.  For the raspberry sauce you use 1 cup fresh or frozen raspberries (thaw and drain if frozen) with ¼ cup pitted medjooy dates, soaked for 30 minutes and drained.  Place the walnuts and salt in a food processor with the S blade and process until finely ground. Add dates, cocoa powder, and vanilla … process until mixture becomes sticky. Add water and process briefly.  Transfer to a serving plate and form a 5 inch round cake. Place the raspberries and dates in a blender and mix until smooth, pouring over the cake just before serving.

You do not have to give up all your comfort foods, just find a healthier recipe for it.  You will find the dessert to be much tastier.  But should you choose to nibble on a few old foods, do so in moderation, do not go overboard, and remember to wait and let your stomach digest properly before the next meal.

About the Author:

Get all your delicious vegetarian recipes here! Here at eBooksilverfish, we provide all the Value eBooks at the best possible prices we can afford to, 24/7! In other words, you save more $$ and time, as you don't have to search elsewhere on the internet for similar eBooks! We do all the work for you!

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Raw Food: Christmas Food

avocado tomato onion salad

Detox, or detoxification of the body is a common practice many people use in order to rid the body of toxic substances or lose some weight quickly. There are many different ways and many different diets to detox the body. Some of these are the dieuretic diet, the fat flush diet, an all liquid diet, liver cleansing diet and the raw food diet. Certain detox diets may be better for certain people, so it is important to look at each and decide which one would fit your day to day lifestyle the best. The detox diet that I would like to talk about here is the raw food detox diet, also sometimes called foodism. This detox diet is generally made up of fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, grains, dried fruits, herbs and spices that are all eaten raw.

The first thing you will want to do is prepare for the detox. The safest way to do so is to slowly remove the foods that are not allowed during the detox from your day to day diet for a week before you start the full on detox. This means that the first day of preparation you will replace one or two things that you regularly eat during the day with something that is a fruit, vegetable or other food allowed by the detox. By the seventh day, you will have replaced pretty much everything in your regular diet with someone that is allowed in the detox diet. The other thing that you will need to do to prepare is create a menu plan for your detox diet. You will want to make your menu as appetizing as possible for yourself, but don’t expect it to be as good as friend chicken or extra cheesy lasagna. With a little creativity and searching for recipes you can however find some very tasty meals.

Once you have created your menu plan, create a grocery list and go shopping the day before you start the detox. You are now ready to begin your raw food detox diet.

Generally the first couple days of any detox are the hardest days, so it is important to keep any temptations out of sight and as out of mind as possible. It may take a lot of will power but you will find as you are on the detox for longer that it will become easier, and believe me, when you start seeing those results of how much better you feel or how much weight you have lost, you will want to keep the detox going strong.

With the raw food diet it may be a little costly to purchase all of the fruits and vegetables that you will need, but it is important not to skimp or cheat. Some great meals you can make are fresh fruit salads, mixed salads with other various vegetables such as tomatoes, onions, parsley and other dressings, raw mixed vegetable soup, avocado and even raspberry and banana sorbet. You should be able to find these special raw diet recipes as well as many others with just a little searching online. The important thing with a raw food detox diet is that you make a plan and stick with it.

About the Author:

Jon Heus is the owner of Raw Food Weight Loss Diet, which can teach you all about healthy living with raw foods. If you have ever thought about a raw food diet, visit his site.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Raw Food Detox Diet

Basil is the best herb for pesto, hands down. Its leaves have a warm and spicy flavor. You need to only add a small amount of this delightful herb in such dishes as soups, salads and sauces. Basil is also particular suited, by the way, to season anything dish with tomato flavoring. Don't hesitate to use basil to enhance the flavor of your meat, poultry or fish. You can even add it to your morning breakfast omelet.
You'll want to start your basil plants early in the spring, preferably in a greenhouse or a sun-drenched windowsill. Early in the summer transplant this herb to your garden. Or, if you have the courage, sow basil seeds directly into her garden early in the spring. Or you may want to try your hand at both methods, just in case those seeds don't catch.   Simple Guide to Successful Herb Gardening   2. Chives
Who doesn't love some fresh chives on a hot, newly baked potato? If you're as mad about this herb as me, then you've already noticed that chives have a mildly onion taste. This makes them an excellent addition to salads, any egg and cheese dish, cream cheese, sandwich spreads and sauces. And, oh, by the way, don't restrict chives to just the baked potato. Taste how in adds a little zing to your mashed potatoes as well.
If you plan on growing chives from starter plants, then you'll want to get these into your garden in the early spring. And you'll want to give these plants plenty of room. My recommendation is to plant them a good 9 to 12 inches from each other.
If you plan to plant the chives seeds, then plant them in the fall or the spring, digging down a good half inch and setting the seeds in rows that are spaced about 12 inches apart.
3. Coriander
Now here's a versatile herb. Its versatility is so great that different parts of this plant are known as different herbs. Grinding the dried seeds to use them in your meats, like veal, ham or pork? You're using coriander. Using the leaves to add to some Indian or Asian dishes? You're actually using cilantro.
And of course you can use the roots of coriander as well. If you can't use them right away, don't worry you can freeze these. They can be used to flavor soups. Or chop the roots and serve with avocados. You'll find this deliciously delightful!
Even a novice herbalist should have no problem growing coriander from seeds (I know I did it my first time around and there was no novice who was more naïve and at a loss than I!)
Sow these seeds in the early spring. Dig a hole about ¼ inch in depth. Plant them in rows that are just about a foot apart. Once the seedlings appear, you'll want to thin them down some, making sure they're at least 6 inches from the other.
4. Dill
Here's another herb that you can use both the seeds and the leaves. Both of these parts have a sharp, slightly bitter taste. (But then who among us doesn't know the taste of dill?)
Simple Guide to Successful Herb Gardening
Don't Be Afraid to Actually Use Your Herbs . . .
Using your herbs regularly in cooking has two distinct advantages. First, of course, it adds an added dimension to your cooking that not only will impress you, but your spouse and even your children.
But using these herbs regularly, you'll also effectively keeping your plants shaped nice and growing healthy.
 More on my book "Simple Guide to Successful Herb Gardening".

About the Author:

Julio Villanueva is a herb garden expert and an avid herb garden writer. For more great information on how to grow a successful herb garden, visit http://www.livelyherbgarens.com

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Choosing the right types of herbs for growing

avocado honeydew smoothie

I have to be honest.  This is one question that REALLY gets my goat.  Whenever I hear someone attacking the raw diet because it’s too “boring,” I go crazy!

Really, I hulk out!

I’ve been following a low-fat raw vegan diet for almost 2 years now.  I can honestly say, without any reservations, that there is absolutely NOTHING boring about a raw food diet!

*Deep Breath*  Okay, I’m calm now.

Let me explain why a raw food diet is totally NOT boring.

Variety

The variety of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds that exist is astounding.  You have apples, grapes, oranges, bananas, peaches, pears, cantaloupe, romaine, celery, cucumber, avocado...and I’m just alluding to what is available in your local grocery store!

In fact, I can almost guarantee you that raw foodists eat *more* variety than ANYONE on a standard American diet...or any other diet for that matter.

This is because most people tend to eat just a handful of dishes that become their staples.  And these dishes are usually very similar.

If you eat meat, your meals will generally center around a protein, with some starchy vegetable and maybe greens along side.  If you’re from the Southern States, your greens are cooked to death in butter and everything gets a nice heapin’ helping of beef gravy smothered on top.

If you are vegetarian or vegan, the focus is usually on whole grains or legumes with vegetables.  And of course, everyone has his or her favorite dessert.

But when you live on a fruit-based diet, you have to adapt what you are eating to what you can find in your area.  Just because you have a few favorite fruits does not mean that they will always be available.

I would gladly eat nothing but mangoes for the rest of my life, but I can’t because they are not always in season!

Where’s the Proof?

Still skeptical that a raw diet is really that varied?  Here’s a list of several of the different varieties of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds that I eat in a given year:

o    Apples
o    Apricots
o    Avocado
o    Bananas
o    Basil
o    Bell Pepper
o    Blackberries
o    Blueberries
o    Boston Lettuce
o    Cantaloupe
o    Celery
o    Cherries
o    Cilantro
o    Clementines
o    Cucumber
o    Currants
o    Dates
o    Dill
o    Grapefruit
o    Grapes
o    Honeydew
o    Iceberg Lettuce
o    Kiwi
o    Lemon
o    Lime
o    Mangoes
o    Mint
o    Nectarines
o    Oranges
o    Papaya
o    Peaches
o    Pears
o    Pineapple
o    Pistachios
o    Raspberries
o    Romaine Lettuce
o    Star Fruit
o    Strawberries
o    Sunflower Seeds
o    Tangerines
o    Tomatoes
o    Watermelon
o    Zucchini

AND I didn’t even include the different varieties of fruit within each species.  For instance, there are Navel and Valencia oranges, red and green grapes, the Fuji apples and the Gala apples, Red Haven and White Nectar peaches, etc.

All of this is found conventionally at my local supermarkets in Tennessee.  Of course, if you live somewhere tropical or have access to exotic markets, you have a whole different spectrum of fruits to choose from:

o    Chocolate Sapote
o    Custard Apple
o    Durian
o    Jackfruit
o    Litchi
o    Longan
o    Mamey Sapote
o    Mangosteen
o    Rambutan
o    Sapodilla
o    Soursop

There’s even a peanut butter fruit that has the taste AND texture of peanut butter!

How can a diet that’s full of so many different smells, tastes, and textures be boring?

Quite simply, it cannot.

Raw Recipes

If you *still* aren’t convinced that a raw diet isn’t boring, you probably haven’t considered all the different raw vegan recipes that you can make.

And I’m not talking about fatty dehydrated conglomerations that are made to mimic the flavor and textures of cooked dishes.  I’m referring to simple, delicious, healthy meals that contain few ingredients and take literally minutes to put together.

There are fruit smoothies, green smoothies, fruit soups, vegetable soups, fruit salads, savory salads, fruit puddings, dips, salsas, and even fruit ice creams!

You could literally take just a few different healthy raw ingredients and have a completely different dish for every meal for a whole week!

Now how in the world can a diet like *this* be boring?

Quite simply, it cannot.

Don’t Take My Word For It!

If you are still debating going raw, there is no better time than now to get out there and go for it.  See for yourself just how varied this diet can be.  Buy all the fruits you can and go crazy in the kitchen!

Just be sure to send me the recipes to all of your awesome raw creations.

About the Author:

For more information on the best raw vegan diet, be sure to visit Fit On Raw and subscribe to Swayze’s newsletter Peachy Keen Ezine. By subscribing, you will also receive the free report The 4 Principles of a Healthy Raw Diet as well as the 5-week mini-course The Fool Proof Transition to Raw.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Is a Raw Food Diet Boring?

I have to be honest.  This is one question that REALLY gets my goat.  Whenever I hear someone attacking the raw diet because it’s too “boring,” I go crazy!

Really, I hulk out!

I’ve been following a low-fat raw vegan diet for almost 2 years now.  I can honestly say, without any reservations, that there is absolutely NOTHING boring about a raw food diet!

*Deep Breath*  Okay, I’m calm now.

Let me explain why a raw food diet is totally NOT boring.

Variety

The variety of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds that exist is astounding.  You have apples, grapes, oranges, bananas, peaches, pears, cantaloupe, romaine, celery, cucumber, avocado...and I’m just alluding to what is available in your local grocery store!

In fact, I can almost guarantee you that raw foodists eat *more* variety than ANYONE on a standard American diet...or any other diet for that matter.

This is because most people tend to eat just a handful of dishes that become their staples.  And these dishes are usually very similar.

If you eat meat, your meals will generally center around a protein, with some starchy vegetable and maybe greens along side.  If you’re from the Southern States, your greens are cooked to death in butter and everything gets a nice heapin’ helping of beef gravy smothered on top.

If you are vegetarian or vegan, the focus is usually on whole grains or legumes with vegetables.  And of course, everyone has his or her favorite dessert.

But when you live on a fruit-based diet, you have to adapt what you are eating to what you can find in your area.  Just because you have a few favorite fruits does not mean that they will always be available.

I would gladly eat nothing but mangoes for the rest of my life, but I can’t because they are not always in season!

Where’s the Proof?

Still skeptical that a raw diet is really that varied?  Here’s a list of several of the different varieties of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds that I eat in a given year:

o    Apples
o    Apricots
o    Avocado
o    Bananas
o    Basil
o    Bell Pepper
o    Blackberries
o    Blueberries
o    Boston Lettuce
o    Cantaloupe
o    Celery
o    Cherries
o    Cilantro
o    Clementines
o    Cucumber
o    Currants
o    Dates
o    Dill
o    Grapefruit
o    Grapes
o    Honeydew
o    Iceberg Lettuce
o    Kiwi
o    Lemon
o    Lime
o    Mangoes
o    Mint
o    Nectarines
o    Oranges
o    Papaya
o    Peaches
o    Pears
o    Pineapple
o    Pistachios
o    Raspberries
o    Romaine Lettuce
o    Star Fruit
o    Strawberries
o    Sunflower Seeds
o    Tangerines
o    Tomatoes
o    Watermelon
o    Zucchini

AND I didn’t even include the different varieties of fruit within each species.  For instance, there are Navel and Valencia oranges, red and green grapes, the Fuji apples and the Gala apples, Red Haven and White Nectar peaches, etc.

All of this is found conventionally at my local supermarkets in Tennessee.  Of course, if you live somewhere tropical or have access to exotic markets, you have a whole different spectrum of fruits to choose from:

o    Chocolate Sapote
o    Custard Apple
o    Durian
o    Jackfruit
o    Litchi
o    Longan
o    Mamey Sapote
o    Mangosteen
o    Rambutan
o    Sapodilla
o    Soursop

There’s even a peanut butter fruit that has the taste AND texture of peanut butter!

How can a diet that’s full of so many different smells, tastes, and textures be boring?

Quite simply, it cannot.

Raw Recipes

If you *still* aren’t convinced that a raw diet isn’t boring, you probably haven’t considered all the different raw vegan recipes that you can make.

And I’m not talking about fatty dehydrated conglomerations that are made to mimic the flavor and textures of cooked dishes.  I’m referring to simple, delicious, healthy meals that contain few ingredients and take literally minutes to put together.

There are fruit smoothies, green smoothies, fruit soups, vegetable soups, fruit salads, savory salads, fruit puddings, dips, salsas, and even fruit ice creams!

You could literally take just a few different healthy raw ingredients and have a completely different dish for every meal for a whole week!

Now how in the world can a diet like *this* be boring?

Quite simply, it cannot.

Don’t Take My Word For It!

If you are still debating going raw, there is no better time than now to get out there and go for it.  See for yourself just how varied this diet can be.  Buy all the fruits you can and go crazy in the kitchen!

Just be sure to send me the recipes to all of your awesome raw creations.

About the Author:

For more information on the best raw vegan diet, be sure to visit Fit On Raw and subscribe to Swayze’s newsletter Peachy Keen Ezine. By subscribing, you will also receive the free report The 4 Principles of a Healthy Raw Diet as well as the 5-week mini-course The Fool Proof Transition to Raw.

Article Source: ArticlesBase.com - Is a Raw Food Diet Boring?