Raw Dinner Party

Can it be a party with just 2 people? I invited a friend over for dinner, cause I’m so excited about the giant eat-in kitchen in the apartment that I’m staying in (belonging to my amazing friend Josh who is out of town on business for a couple of weeks). I used to love love love throwing dinner parties: the candles, the wine, the company, the tasty food. It’s been a while, though, and am a little unsure about how to integrate raw foods into the mix, particularly with non-raw friends. And beyond what my guests’ usual diet is, I’m also trying to get past the fundamental / my learned oddness in inviting someone for dinner and not cooking for them. My mom’s comment on me having someone over for dinner was, “What are you going to make for him, a smoothie?”

Behold, an ideal candidate for my foray into raw entertaining: my friend Andrew. He’s not a vegan or vegetarian, but is consistently eager for new foods and taste experiences. For instance, we were once in a chain restaurant in Orlando (Applebee’s? Bennigan’s?) and he ordered a hickory smoked veggie burger with bacon and cheese. Not because he didn’t want the meat-hamburger, but because he wanted to see how a veggie burger mixed with the rest of that stuff. Beyond his eclectic palate, I knew he’d offer constructive criticism in a gentle way.

We started with kale, apple, celery juice (my current favorite). I loved it; he was a little overwhelmed by the amount of greens in it – the flavor, not the color. We then had the Creamy Carrot Ginger Soup with Lime (from the Raw Food, Real World cookbook). I had mine chilled, and his was heated up a little. His comment was that he really enjoyed how he could really taste each individual ingredient. He wished that he could taste the avocado a little bit more, though. Personally, I really like that I can barely taste the avocado, I think that it lets the other flavors shine. Then we had broiled swordfish (old habits die hard) covered with a (raw) salsa of mango, cucumber, jalapeño, lime, ginger and scallion. And an arugula and pistachio salad with Creamy Citrus Dressing (also from Raw Food, Real World cookbook). He loved the salad and fish, enough to convince me to let him take the leftovers to work the next day for lunch. For desert we had a persimmon, so ripe that the flesh was just about falling apart. The wine was Les Champs Clos Sancerre, and happy-surprisingly fit with everything really well (surprisingly because I usually choose wine by the font on the label).

Sated, we lingered over the table. I asked, “So, do you like my cooking?” And he said, “No, I love your cooking.” Three cheers for Andrew, for being open to new food, and four cheers for me for giving someone a thoroughly enjoyable introduction to raw food.

One love,
Marissa

On the go

As much as I may want to, it’s just not possible to eat at home every meal of the day. Behold, an incomplete list of the places that keep me raw throughout the day:

Healthy Nibbles Organic Lounge and Juice Bar – 305 Flatbush Ave, Brooklyn (Park Slope)
Inexpensive, charming café with amazing juices and yummy salads

Second Helpings – 9th Street between 7th and 8th Ave, Brooklyn (Park Slope)
My go-to place for delicious food and juice, not all raw but a great compromise when dining with enlightened, non-raw companions

Lodge Outpost – Havemeyer at Grand Street, Brooklyn (Williamsburg)
Next to the cozy bar/restaurant Lodge, they have raw smoothies (Freckle Juice is my favorite) and organic tea. Plus, my brother is a bartender next door.

Siggy’s – Henry Street between Orange and Pineapple, Brooklyn (Brooklyn Heights)
Organic, with lots of live food (they even note on the menu exactly what is live), and they make my favorite smoothie right now, with Goji berries, pomegranate juice, raspberries, blueberries and banana

Pure Food and Takeaway – 17th Street at Irving, Manhattan
Can’t beat them. The S&M salad is my favorite dinner these days, and their juices are uniformly amazing. On the expensive side, but perfect for a treat

Juicy Lucy’s Fresh Mixed Juice Outpost – Northeast corner of 1st Street and 1st Ave
Little kiosk that would typically sell coffee and pastries, but no! They sell fresh juice! Reasonably priced ($3.50 for 12oz), and right by the subway. There’s a proper store front at 85 Avenue A between 5th and 6th

Liquiteria – 2nd Avenue at 10th Street
I put this on because it’s so well known, and good in a pinch. But personally, I don’t love it there. I think that it’s on the gimmicky side, and that the menu isn’t inspired. An exception, though, was an apple/pineapple/mint/wheatgrass juice that I had a few weeks ago that was pretty exciting.

Bonobo’s – 18 E 23rd, between Broadway and Park
Not a lot of ambiance, but all raw food and the only place that I know of that has durian on the menu.

Integral Natural Foods – 13th Street betw Greenwich and 7th Ave
Has a juice bar, a good selection of prepared raw foods, and is next to Integral Yoga.

One love,
Marissa

Raw in New Jersey

Very exotic locale, may I say. We went to my Aunt’s house near Asbury Park for Thanksgiving, and really had such a lovely time. My family is amazing, so many generations and stories and love and comfort.

I offered to bring a salad, but that was already on the docket. And while I had a vague plan to go all out and bring raw stuffing and raw blah blah blah, I didn’t quite get around to it. Also, honestly, as a compulsive overeater, the holidays are big potential excuses for a binge, raw or not. So it’s important to me to remember that it’s just a day like any other – I love that joke, “What does a recovering compulsive eater call Thanksgiving? Thursday.”

Part of the amazingness of my family is that they are, by and large, very willing to accommodate my food lifestyle. When I was a vegetarian, vegan, and now raw, at big holiday meals my aunt would make sure that she had something that I could eat. There were plenty of cut up vegetables with (non-raw) hummus during appetizers, and aforementioned big, raw salad. I volunteered to help, and was put in charge of the salad, so I made it exactly as I wanted – different sized cuts of crunchy vegetables, a few different types of greens.

In tribute to “What We Ate Wednesdays”, I give you What I Ate Thursday, ‘cause it was just Thursday, a Thursday that I spent with family, and a Thursday that I continued to be grateful for all of the gifts in my life:

* 2 apples with cashew butter, some flax crackers
* mixed salad with greens, yellow pepper, cucumber, grated carrots, mushrooms, tomatoes / oil and vinegar
* handful of raisin and nut mix
* nori rolls with cucumber, tomato, kohlrabi, daikon
* raw blondie macaroons from Pure Food and Wine takeout

This isn’t a typical day for me, I usually have at least one green juice and green smoothie, but it got me through.

One Love,
Marissa

Raw in Brooklyn

I am so grateful to call this city my home. Beyond all the cultural goodness, it is a city that generously allows for any diet or food lifestyle, whatever your schedule. Working late? No problem, restaurants are open until midnight, and grocery stores until 10 or 11. Can’t make the farmer’s market on the weekend? Go to one (of many) on Monday. Or Tuesday. Or Wednesday. Or Thursday or Friday! Any day of the year! I do admit that this is a gigantic neon sign of epic American consumerism, and there are some fundamental problems with that. But. It happily allows for me to have a non-conventional work and life schedule, and I love that.

My mom and I had lunch yesterday at Second Helpings, the organic health-foody café in Park Slope (Brooklyn, on 9th Street at 7th Avenue). It’s not a strictly raw or vegetarian place (Mom had a chicken something sandwich that she said was delicious), but I had a gorgeous salad of greens with sprouts, tomato, cucumber, avocado and tahini dressing (note to self to ask for it without roasted red peppers next time), and a kale apple celery juice. The juice was way exciting, mostly because I’ve never been a big fan of kale, always found the flavor to be overwhelming and bitter. But it was so great in this juice, the radiant woman behind the counter put in exactly the right proportions that now I am on the quest to make my own perfect kale apple celery juice.

That quest, however, will wait a few weeks until I find my own apartment. The kitchen – or, more accurately, line of appliances in the tiny living room/dining room/bedroom – is just too small to accomodate my appliances. And I love and know my sister well enough to be aware where her boundaries are as far as filling up her limited counter space with a juicer and vitamix and dehydrater. The juicer, in particular, is a point of contention between us – when we shared an apartment, we had a giant fight one morning when I woke her up with the noise of juicing cucumbers. And all of this, and she is still so amazing to open her home to me while I look for a place of my own. So for now, it’s me, a knife and a cutting board – as well as the impossibly sexy variety of places that I can eat out in this big, bad-ass city.

Love,
Marissa

There's no place like home

Oh it is good to be home. Well, in the city that I call home because I don’t actually have a home – staying with my sister until I find a place. Looking forward (trying to be positive) to the challenges of being a good raw houseguest in a tiny Brooklyn studio apartment.

Yesterday’s looooooong travel day went well. I fasted on the first leg of the trip, from Brussels to Dublin, and then for about half of my 5 hour layover. Wandering around in the airport, I stumbled onto a fresh juice bar! They made juices (celery, carrot, beet, apple, orange) and smoothies (mostly with a dairy base). I was beside myself with excitement, to have a cucumber celery apple juice. But when I got to the front of the line, the woman at the counter told me that the juicer was broken, but I could have orange juice or a smoothie. Too bad, but I am so happy to see a (albeit nonfunctioning) juice bar in a airport to contribute to hydration in the air and good health! So instead, I had an apple and some raisin nut mix (charmingly called “student mix” in Europe).

Once settled into the flight, I was eager to see the raw vegetarian meal that I had requested for my infight meal. It came, with a big sticker on it that said my name and “RAW VEG”. However, on the plate was: hot lasagna (cheese, pasta, cooked tomato sauce), cold pasta salad, a roll, packet of margarine, packet of cookies, and an sad-looking fruit salad of honeydew, orange, and grapes. Sigh of disappointment. Looking back, it was the perfect opportunity to educate someone on the fundamentals of raw food and possibly help other raw foodists down the line, but at the time I just didn’t want to bother the harried-looking flight attendant. So, I’ll send an email to the airline. Not because I’m particularly angry/annoyed – I didn’t really have high hopes – but just to spread awareness that RAW food is vastly different than just veggie food.

I got back to the apartment on the late side, and my sis didn’t feel like going out for dinner. I was pretty hungry, though, and craving greens – not something that she regularly stocks in her fridge. But she mentioned a (new?) place nearby in Brooklyn Heights that her boyfriend had referred to as, “One of those places that has wheatgrass that your sister would like”. We found it on line, Siggy’s, on Henry between Orange and Pineapple. There are some really lovely salads on the menu, juices, and they delivered! Oh, the wanton luxury of NY living. I had a salad with greens, tomato, avocado and sunflower seeds with a vinagrette and a celery apple greens juice. So exactly what I was craving.

One love,
Marissa

New food!

These past 5 months, I’ve been enjoying fruits and vegetables here that I had never experienced before. It’s entirely probable that my eyes are open in a different way these days and all of this is easily available at the same time of year in NY, but I am just loving “discovering” these new foods of the earth:

Fennel – I know that this is readily available in NY, but maybe not so common. In Brussels (and France when I’ve been there in the past) it’s all over the place. Steamed, roasted whole, and my favorite - shredded onto salads. It’s been described as kind of licorice-y, but is also sweet and light and crispy.

Kohlrabi – Part of the cabbage family, if you haven’t seen it before. I can get it at the food coop in Park Slope at home, but never have. To me, it always looked like a hard, dirty root vegetable, and I imagined it tasting kind of dull. However, at the farmers market in the courtyard of the Theatre de la Monnaie (Place de le Monnaie, Brussels, every Wednesday morning), my French friend selected it, deeming it a “vegetable eaten my hippies around the world”. We (well, she) peeled off the tough outer skin, and shredded it onto our salad. It was nutty and hearty, the exact right counterpart to the shredded fennel. Later on, I had it sliced thin like chips with olive paste and it was exactly perfect.

English cucumbers – these are the long skinny ones, commonly individually shrink-wrapped (huh?). Not as common in the US as their thicker, shorter siblings. The skin on the English cukes is thinner, and usually eaten. Personnally, I find the skin kind of bitter, and don’t love the taste of in when I juice it. But satisfying when eaten in thick slices.

Persimmons – called “Kaki” in French. I know that these are relatively common in the US, I had just never tried one before. My oh my. How delicious. Sweet and buttery, it’s more like candy than fruit. I’ve been eating them plain, just sliced, but could see the day that I’m carrying one around and eating it like an apple.

I am beyond excited to continue my discovery of “new” fruits and vegetables when I get home.

One love,
Marissa

Travel Days / Raw in Brussels

Some of the best advice I’ve read about traveling raw is to fast on travel days. I’ve been doing that, fasting until I get to my destination and have time to settle in. It really makes me feel best. Eating on an airplane (even when I bring my own food) makes me gassy and uncomfortable – from the air pressure, the sitting in one position, etc etc. Plus, if I’m fasting, I get the added bonus of not having to search high and wide in an airport for something raw or be tempted to eat what they’re distributing on the plane.

All of my travel days recently have not been long at all, though, so maybe I’ll reconsider on my flight back to NY with the 6 hour layover in Dublin. Interestingly, though, when I booked my Aer Lingus flight online (through the suspiciously named CheapoAirlines.com) a whole menu of inflight meal options came up. There was kosher, low salt, sugar free, non dairy, hindu, vegetarian, vegan and RAW VEGAN! Not sure if this is offered by Aer Lingus or CheapoAirlines, but I’m impressed, I have to say. Of course I chose the raw vegan meal, and will report back about how that worked out.

I’ve found that it’s important to keep food with me for after the fast, once I’m comfortably in the new city. I can’t count how many times in the past I’ve had long travel days, and once I arrive in a city, famished, it takes a frustratingly long time to find something appropriate for me to eat. For all the years that I was vegetarian or vegan and touring the US, I’d arrive into a new city late at night, and the only options were Applebee’s or McDonalds. Or even more challenging, arriving into a tiny European town late at night, where either nothing is open or only the town’s single bistro that exclusively serves pork chops and boiled potatoes.

So, I’ve learned my lesson: Bring snacks. For after. Today I brought with me 4 apples, some trail mix, 2 clementines, a grapefruit and some cut and washed celery. I am sure the people at the x-ray machines thought I was a bit of a nut (or possibly were impressed and inspired) and yeah, my carry-on was heavy but it was worth it when I got into my flat here and could have a couple of apples before we went exploring the city. That way, finding food wasn’t the only thing on my mind, and I could enjoy my surroundings and the beauty of wandering unfamiliar streets.

I did, eventually go to a market to get some food for the week. It was a pretty standard supermarket (by European standards, would have been just a “market” in the US), but had a nice selection of conventional and organic produce. The weirdest thing, though, that all of the organic fruits and vegetables were wrapped in plastic! The bins overflowing with loose oranges and kiwis were conventional, but ALL of the organic stuff was packaged. So weird. For cleanliness? I have no idea. Will have to investigate.

One love,
Marissa

Raw in Vienna

At the last minute, I decided to leave my juicer in Berlin. Not quite enough room in my suitcase, and I figured that juice bars were so plentiful in Berlin, they probably would be similarly common in Vienna, right? Yeah, no such luck. I haven’t found any actual juice bars, nor many vegetarian restaurants with juicers. But I am so so glad that I brought my immersion blender, and have been making green smoothies.

One of the last days in Berlin, I came across a brown wrinkly fruit in the bio store called Maracuja. I had tasted it before in a commercially prepared mango-maracuja smoothie, but didn’t know what it was in English, and didn’t know what it looked like. I bought a few, brought them home and cut them open. They’re filled with edible seeds embedded in a delicious tart slimy goo. I bought some at the giant bio supermarket, Basic (at the Meidlinger Hauptstrasse UBahn station), and the sign there also called them Passifruchte. Aha! This is passionfruit! All these years, I had never known what they looked like. I could have looked it up before, I guess, but kind of liked the idea of some exotic euro-fruit that no one in the US knows about. I did just look it up on wikipedia, which says that there are two types of passion fruit, a smooth yellow grapefruit-looking one, and a wrinkled purple-brown one. The purple-brown one (that I’ve been buying) allegedly has traces of cyanide in it. Hmmm. Apparently it’s only in the skin (which is too tough to eat). Well, I’ve had about 6 in the last week and am just fine.

Aside from the Basic supermarket, I went to a cute vegan / veggie restaurant called BioBar von Antun, on Drahtgasse 3 (next to Judenplatz). I had a lovely greek salad, and a orange/beet/carrot juice. It was way sweet, but tasty. Also, the first time that I’ve ever liked beets in anything.

Off to ride a giant ferris wheel,

One love,
Marissa

Last day in Berlin

I have to retract my advertisement for the Arugula salad at Borschart – I must have just made up in my head that it was raw. I ordered it last night, and it has parmesan cheese on it, and a probably not raw dressing. But, I also ordered a tomato salad there, and it was fantastic. Juicy plum tomatoes, sliced and sprinkled with diced onions and garlic, with a little sprinkling of salt and pepper. Very simple and delicious.

I had a realization about bread. It has long been my favorite cooked food. Like, since I was a baby, probably. And a couple of days ago, I had eaten raw all day, and then went out for dinner. I had a nice big salad with raw dressing. Feeling great. And the bread on the table looked so fluffy and good that I had a piece. Or 2. Or 3. Or 4. So, a couple of things about this: First, it was not good. It was dry and flavorless (not saying that all bread is, but this definitely was). Second, I am compulsive with food to the effect that I can never eat just one of the food that I am addicted to. And third, I felt horrible all night afterwards, and didn’t go out with the rest of the group after dinner. Like gassy and stomach pain-y.

Somewhere in the back of my head, I had made up that bread is a less-harmful cooked food. I don’t know where I got that from, but clearly it’s not true. I was totally ill. So, that’s it for bread and me for a while.

It’s my last day in Berlin. And I had wanted to have lunch at my favorite restaurant, a Vietnamese place. I had kind of planned it for the last week, knowing full well that it wasn’t raw but what the heck. And then this morning, I woke up and just want to eat raw today. And I am so happy about that. That restaurant will be there another time. Vietnamese food will always be here. But today, instead I choose what makes me feel the best in the long term, short term, and medium term.

Love,
Marissa

Back on the train

I can’t say enough how much I love the way I feel when I eat raw food. And how much I love it even more when I eat exclusively raw food. Why, then is it so hard for me to actually do that? Since Friday night’s cookedfoodextravaganza, I’ve been having a little (or a lot) of cooked food each day. Saturday night was sushi. Yesterday was chips and pizza(!) at night. Today, pizza for breakfast(!!).

I feel tired and gross, and have 2 new pimples. Awesome.

However, I’m doing a few things to help me out:
I’ve removed all the non-raw food from the flat that I’m staying in.
I’m sitting in a cafe enjoying an organic carrot/celery/ginger juice. Usually, I don’t like ginger so much, but trying to expand my palate, and I now love it in this combination.
Heading to the organic market to load up on fruit and veggies for these last few days in Berlin.
Having a green smoothie before I go out for dinner tonight with friends.

Sad me, I passed by Grasshopper, the juice bar that I like by Hackescher Markt, and it looks like it’s closed permanently! Boo. As far as other juice places: I’m at St. Oberholtz right now, on Torstrasse at Rosenthaler Platz. It has fresh organic juices (not a huge variety, tho), some raw salads, some vegan food, free wi-fi and are playing Bob Dylan right now.

One love,
Marissa

Honesty

I ate cooked food last night. I want to pretend that I didn’t, and certainly don’t want to share on this blog about it. But the truth is that I’m only as sick as my secrets -- a recovery slogan that resonates with me a lot. And I don’t want to punish myself. Part of my path is finding a new self love. Factually, though, these are the things that happened:

I had low grade anxiety, that I didn’t even realize.
I woke up from a nap, and before I had time to think or debate about it, I ordered some room service.
I ate the sandwich and fries and didn’t feel great, but didn’t feel horrible.
Then I called room service again and ordered desert.
And ate it, and felt nauseous.
I fell back asleep, woke up a few hours later. Felt like crap.
Felt like such crap, bloated, spacey, full, totally unsexy that I blew off the party that I was going to go to – a goodbye party for all of us in Berlin for the last 5 months. So, missed the chance to enjoy a party and say goodbye to the friends I’ve made.

Ugh.

All I can do is learn from this, hopefully the lesson sticks.

I am ecstaticly happy that today is a new day (well, medium happy, looking toward ecstatic). I’m off to the farmer’s market and to London Juice Co for some breakfast.
And full of wonder about how much better I feel when I am raw.

Love,
Marissa

Oh, the vanity.

Last night, I saw a colleague who I hadn’t seen for a couple of weeks. And she said, ”Marissa, you look amazing! Have you been doing tons of yoga or something?” It made me deliriously happy, because I know that it’s this detox and my 100% raw intake. I’d heard about the amazing physical effects, and seen it happen with other people, and though I hoped that it would happen to me, I didn’t necessarily believe it. So, yay.

Also last night, I went out with some friends. To a bar. And while I don’t think that I’m addicted to alcohol, it ALWAYS triggers me to be messy with my food. I don’t know if it’s a physical trigger that makes me crave salty fatty greasy food, or if it’s just a lowering of my inhibitions that makes me eat salty fatty greasy food. Even with one drink. Either way, right now in my life, it’s trouble for me. So, what to do? I had sparkling water. It took a lot of deep breathing and praying and focusing on the amazing things about being raw before I was willing to order it. And yeah, I had to answer some questions – mostly with just, Oh, I’m detoxing. This morning when I woke up, I was proud of myself all over again, especially when I thought about how I would I have felt with a food hangover.

Aside from the emotional cravings and a few pimples, this detox has not been particularly hard. And every day that I’m 100% raw, the next day is easier. Like, this is what I do now.

Still in Berlin, and looking forward to the next 5 days of holiday. An addition to an earlier post about which restaurants I like here for their salads – Borschart. There is a really lovely, simple, huge arugula and pine nut salad with a light vinagrette. It’s the only raw vegan thing on the menu, but I’ve been there several times with cooked-food eating companions, and they love it too.

Honestly, though I’m looking forward to the free days, I do sometimes have a hard time with unstructured time. I’ve been known to lie in bed all day watching bad TV and eating crap. My plan? To make a plan. Though I love the idea of free-wheeling and taking the day as it comes, I have to take steps to protect myself from old habits. A lightly structured, social week with time to go to my favorite raw places in Berlin and hopefully find some new ones before I leave.

On this detox, I’m avoiding all overt fats like olives, avocado, nuts and seeds, and just been fruit/veggie/sprouting it. And I love it, love the way I feel, love that I can eat without overt fats for a period of time (makes 80/10/10 seem doable). When I miss savory stuff, I’ve been having sundried tomatoes. They are sooooo good, I’ve always liked them but find them slimy when they’re reconstituted in oil. Doing it myself, in water, is easy, cheap and very tasty. I bought a giant box of them at the supermarket in the Friedrichstrasse UBahn station, and have been grooving on them for days. (side note - I find it so interesting the amount of shops and stores in Berlin’s train stations. They’re like malls, it’s amazing).

Love and all,
Marissa

Organic in the ring with Conventional

In the fancy schmancy hotel that I am staying, they leave a little tray of snacks in the room each night. When I first moved in, they would leave 2 chocolate truffles (not raw), 2 jelly candies, and a piece of fruit. They were very accommodating when I asked if they would JUST leave fruit, and so now every day I get 3 fresh pieces of fruit. This is a giant help when I can’t make it to the market because I’m working crazy hours. It’s conventional fruit, though, and when I put it side by side with the organic fruit that I buy, I am impressed with the differences all over again.

For instance, the conventional fruit lasts much much longer. An apple that I bought from the bio store about a week ago is starting to get a little mushy and has some brown spots. The apple that they left in the room THREE WEEKS ago still looks exactly the same. Some people would argue that this is a great thing, longer shelf life leads to more time / energy saved for a myriad of reasons. But really, gross. I don’t want the same thing that preserves twinkies and cereal in my fruit. Plus, the whole point of fruit (all food, actually) is that it’s supposed to break down and digest. If it won’t break down naturally, imagine how much harder my digestive system is working to break it down and get the nutrients.

Also, I have long been of the belief that there is a specific amount of flavor allocated to each variety of fruit. And whether the grapefruit is the size of a tennis ball or a volley ball, it’s the same amount of flavor, just spread over a larger or smaller area. Know what I mean? That’s why smaller fruit tastes better. When I did a side by side comparison, the conventional apple dwarfed the organic apple.

Weirdest of all, the conventional fruit didn’t exactly smell like fruit. The orange, for instance, smelled like orange-scented something. Like a fake version of itself. Like orange flavored gum. Strange.

Anyhow . . . the banana-date-romaine smoothie that I made last night to drink at lunch today? Not good. Bordering on revolting. Way too sweet. I was really hungry, and could only choke down about half.

Spent a lot of today fantasizing about certain cooked food. It was very weird. I’m pretty sure that it’s part of the detox process. Interestingly, though, I took the fantasy far, like actually imagining the taste and texture of the foods. And it didn’t make me want to eat them any more, such a vivid fantasy actually satisfied some of these cravings. Makes me think about how much of what I eat I taste with my brain and not my mouth. Cool, right? By the way, I was fantasizing about raw food also, specifically the sunflower pate tacos from Pure Food and Wine. And I also realized that everything I was fantasizing about was all in New York. Seems like equal parts homesickness and food cravings, huh.

One love,
Marissa

Mmmm . . . detox

I found my way into the Raw Diva’s 7-Day Detox a couple of weeks ago. For a few (not very convincing) reasons, I didn’t start right away. But I appointed last Wednesday the day I was going to start. Wednesday was great, I water fasted and felt light and free and happy and a little hungry but powerful and clear. And Wednesday night I broke my fast with melon, as recommended. And I felt perfect! And then later that night, I ordered room service, and ate decidedly non-detox-friendly cooked food. Fine, I thought. I woke up Thursday and started again. Water fast. Yay! Break the fast with a green smoothie. Smooth sailing! Pack my lunch for the next day! Eat my delicious organic grapefruits for breakfast on Friday! I feel so great that I have to punctuate everything with exclamation points! And then. I had admitted to myself that I need to steer clear of the catering tent at lunch, but found myself having a conversation with my boss, walking over there. And all of a sudden, I’m standing in front of a buffet of yummy-smelling cooked food, and all of the raw-goodness that I’d built up over a couple of days seemingly evaporated, and I was having this out of body experience watching myself eat the pasta, not wanting to eat the pasta, but still doing it. (NB – my food / eating issues extend way beyond raw vs cooked, of this I am entirely aware. Not right for this post, but later on at some point).

After a weekend of more cooked food (if I ever doubted my addiction to them, I sure don’t now), I re-committed to the detox on Sunday night. It’s now Tuesday night, and I’m beyond grateful that I’m still working it. I’ll let you know how it goes.

As promised – my forays into green smoothies with no blender! At home, I have the all-powerful VitaMix, and I love the smoothies. They were all fruit or fruit/nut milk combinations, as the idea of adding greens into my fruit made me want to barf.

But as I’ve been reading and reading and reading some more about the goodness of green smoothies, I found some willingness to try them out. Side note – I hadn’t had NEARLY as much resistance to juicing greens, I’d been happily (if infrequently) doing that for months and months. Anyway. Everything I know about smoothies requires a blender, right? Hence, the “smooth” part of “smoothie”. I’m sure that I could have found a relatively inexpensive standard blender, but I was more concerned about the precious real estate it would take up in my luggage when I moved onto the next location.

I’m not sure where exactly I read it, but the idea of an immersion – or stick – blender came up. Now that I can easily toss into my luggage. Back I went to Galleria, and bought an inexpensive immersion blender and excellent knife. By the way, the immersion blender is exactly the same as the one I have at home except that it has a European plug at the end, not a US one. I then biked over to IKEA (much much much farther than expected), and bought some nice-sized Tupperware containers that I can blend my smoothies in. And Voila! Smoothie without the blender. Well, at least without traditional blender.

The immersion blender works fine. Not perfect, takes a bit longer and I haven’t been able to get anything totally smooth, but chunky is ok for me right now. AND, I love me some green smoothie. I’ve been making the smoothie at night, putting it in my adorable red thermos, and taking it to work the next day. Yes, I know, I’d be better off making it fresh, but for now this works for me. What I have noticed, which possibly everyone else in the raw world knows, is that letting the smoothie sit for 12 hours makes it get very VERY thick. So I’ve learned to make it quite a bit more liquidy than I might actually want at the time of preparation. Tonight’s smoothie for tomorrow is bananas, dates, romaine.

Rock on with your raw selves,
Marissa

Raw in Berlin

Raw around the world.

Well, maybe a bit of an exaggeration. Not like I’m in Sri Lanka. And not like I’m traveling around the world with the purpose of spreading the raw gospel. More like, my lifestyle and my work take me around the world (for which I am grateful) and I’m going to blog about the adventures and challenges about being raw when away from home.

So, here we are. I’ve been in Berlin since June 12, and have been about 50% raw during this time. I guess. I’ve only been keeping a consistent food journal for the last 6 weeks, and within that time, it’s 50%. Which is quite a joy for me to realize, actually. When I’m not 100% raw, I have a habit of thinking that I’m not raw enough – or at all. But 50% is quantifiable, and a starting place, At least.

I’ve been reading Raw blogs and websites a lot since I’ve been here. Angela Stokes and Philip McClusky, and We Like It Raw and Raw Divas and Pear Magazine. Just yesterday, though, I was turned onto Heidi and Justin’s Raw Food Right Now blog, and was simply inspired with their honesty and imperfection (and I mean that in a really positive, loving way). I want to be raw. I am raw. Imperfectly. And though I admire and love reading about people who are 100% raw and seemingly perfect at it, that’s not my path right now. Being able to read about people who I identify with, their struggles with cooked food and weight gain/loss, and the joys of new raw recipes and a raw life, that’s what is accessible to me. That is why I love Raw Food Right Now.

Back to Berlin. Germany? Though I’ve spent quite a bit of time here in the past, it still conjures up images of wurst and potatoes (not necessarily inaccurately). I remember being in the south about 5 years ago, a vegetarian, and explaining to a waiter in my shoddy German that I just wanted potatoes. No meat. Eventually, we understood each other, and out came a giant plate of about half of a dozen potatoes, boiled, sliced in half, and slathered in butter. I think that I was surprised, but happy enough to eat it at the time.

Berlin, though, is a very international city, with restaurants and food from all over the world. Quite a big handful of traditional vegetarian restaurants, plus zillions of Vietnamese, Chinese, Thai, Indian, Japanese, Middle Eastern places as well. But not so much raw food, actually.

What I have found here, raw-eating-out-wise: My favorite salad is at Assel (Oranienburgerstrasse 41, Mitte). Really beautiful, lush greens, crispy vibrant crunchy veggies, and depending on the season, juicy strawberries and kumquats thrown in. Nothing else raw on the menu there, but I’ve had some other delicious meals there.

I also really like a couple of the juice bars here: Grasshopper (on Oranienburgerstrasse also, close to Hackescher Markt) is beautiful and green inside, cute people behind the counter, and they make this terrific juice with dandelion greens, kiwi, grapefruit and lemon. I also like London Juice Co., in Prenzlauerberg. I had a kiwi-cucumber juice there a few weeks ago and loved the beverage, the presentation, and the Molten Brown soap and hand lotion in the bathroom.

Now, during the week, I work, and there is an excellent caterer who serves breakfast and lunch buffet. It’s almost all cooked, but it is certainly possible to eat raw. But right now, I am still very tempted by cooked food. And I can walk into the catering tent with the best intentions of heading directly to the salad bar, and making up a pretty salad of greens and cucumber and tomato with a squirt of lemon, but sometimes it’s like an invisible set of hands actually propel me to the cooked food line and I eat it. Oy.

I’ve realized that I need to take my rawness into my own hands. First, that means staying out of the catering tent. Until I’m in such an emotional/spiritual/physical place that I’m not aggressively tempted to eat cooked food in mass quantities, I’d best avoid it (particularly if it’s free – another trigger for me). So, where does that leave me?

About six weeks ago, I bought a juicer. I had been thinking about it for months, since I arrived here, but hadn’t. Didn’t want to spend the money when I had a perfectly good one waiting for me when I got back to NY. And felt like a jerk juicing in the super fancy hotel that I’ve been living in. Then I did it, and have been pretty psyched about it. I found one at Galleria at Alexanderplatz for about 35 euros. So, most days (well, at least some), I wake up 10 minutes early (well, 5, and then scramble around to get out the door) and make some juice from the bounty that I’ve bought at the farmer’s market in Hackerscher Markt or by Wortherstrasse in Prenzlauerberg, or at the bio store.

This morning, I woke up early (-ish) and made apple-celery-lettuce juice, put it in an empty glass bottle that originally had sparkling water in it, and now it waits in the mini-fridge in my trailer to be an afternoon pick-me-up. Yay on me.

Coming next time: My adventures making green smoothies with no blender!

Love,
Marissa