In Paris

We were in Paris last year and made a point of visiting as many vegan eateries as possible.
One of them was Grand Appetit a macrobiotic place.

And would you believe there were two recipe books right next to each other.
One called Green. The other called vegan.
I had to sneak a photo of them.

My other half and I have been wanting to open a pop up raw or vegan or both eatery in our house in Green Point for a few years now. What's kept us from going ahead is plain fear and lack of confidence. However we are going to have to overcome this soon as family, friends and strangers are hinting hard they feel we should just go for it.

Matthew Kenney Online - Weekend Intensives - Everyday Express

M.A.K.E. - Weekend - Everyday Express

I would love to attend the M.A.K.E. raw food school in California but I can't see it happening. Certainly not anytime soon. Not sure when I first discovered they have a distance learning school but I was keen to try it.

Almond milk

Not going to lie, I had reservations about this course. I've studied on-line before. Done a few journalism courses as well as Internet marketing and web design which tend to be more academic. Making food is definitely a practical skill. I wondered how they would get it right.

Fruit tea and Cape Goosberry smoothie

My other concern was dealing with an academy so far away in a different time zone. To make it easier I did the Weekend Intensive Everyday Raw Express course. It's a Saturday and Sunday course and costs $150.

Zucchini Tartare

I contacted Matthew Kenney's school and they came back pronto with an application form. Gave them my details, they phoned from the USA to check one or two things and just like that I was booked into the November course. Also contacted them a bit in advance as I was going to be in Europe and wanted to buy any perculiar ingredients from either Marqt in Amsterdam or the Wholefood Store in London. I've never found Irish Moss in South Africa. But apart from different names for foods i.e. cilantro for coriander and jalapeno for a large green chili there was nothing weird on the list.

Moroccan Carrot and Golden Rainsin Relish

I LOVE how we can be scattered all over the world but in one class together. The teacher was in Goa, one student was in Amsterdam and the other in the USA - good spread of continents. I would have loved to share a screenshot but the rules say no reproducing of MK material so I won't even think about it.

Chia Pudding

A week before the teacher contacts you with a list of things to buy. Then the day before you get a link to the on-line academy and a password. Once in, you are given prep work to do on the Friday. Stuff like soaking almonds and freezing bananas.

Saturday morning arrives and you find out what you are doing for that day only. Sunday's work only becomes live on Sunday. That's the only criticism I have of this course. It would have been really helpful to preview the recipes so I could adapt them to local produce. I'm not entirely new to raw food. We had to make a zucchini pasta but we only get baby marrows in SA which are too small to spiralise. I substituted with a daikon and the radish flavour of the daikon was too strong.

Apple Almond Spice Smoothie

Now on to the praise. Matthew Kenney is a Michelin Star chef and his team take the gourmet aspect of their food seriously. The recipes are well thought out and really tasty. The Everday Raw Express course does not require a dehydrator. It's entry level raw and fuss free food for every day life. I got to work with Chia and Wakame which I had been wanting to do but somehow never did. I used a herb tea in a smoothie. And frozen apples instead of bananas in a smoothie. Also good. Everything was really tasty except my radish noodles.

Seaweed Salad

I made: - Almond Milk, Hibiscus Berry Smoothie, Zucchini Tartare, Moroccan Carrot Soup with Golden Raisin Relish, Chia Pudding, Apple Almond Spice Smoothie, Seaweed Salad with Orange Tahini Dressing, Zucchini Noodles with Corn Mint Pesto and a Lemon Bavorois with Raspberry Syrup. You read the text, watch a video and then take pics as you make the food. Your teacher is available on-line if you have any questions. They grade you on your final work and your answers to some easy questions.

Daikon Noodles with Corn Mint Pesto

I had to choose between two soups, the other was Heirloom Tomato Gazpacho with Basil Sortbet. So that is a bonus recipe. I like bonuses. You get until the following Friday to complete the course should you run late. And then that's it. Time up.

Lemon Bavorois with Raspberry Syrup

Having done this course I will definitely go on to do the other Weekend Intensive courses which are Detoxing, Deserts and Superfoods. Hopefully I can do the Level 1 and Level 2 Raw Food courses. They also have courses on sports nutrition, food photography, juicing to name a few.

Why raw food?

Raw vs. processed food

This week I wanted to write a bit about why a person would consider eating raw food. My plan was to photograph a few food labels and talk about what actually goes into our so called "food" these days. Unfortunately we don't have much processed food in our house anymore. (See photos of our fridge. The only processed item is the Tofutti - soy cream cheese.) So, I've used food packaging pics from the Internet.

Contents of our fridge

All food starts out as fresh raw produce. And really that's what we should be eating. It's what our bodies recognise and know. Back in the days people ate for example fresh fruit or whole oats at breakfast time. Yes, the oats might have been cooked to make porridge. Maybe milk and honey were added, but the DNA of the oats and the milk and the honey was still in tact. Compare that to a box of cereal below and the difference is immense.

Image from source www.wellsphere.com

Food companies take perfectly good food, strip it of natural ingredients, which in turn removes other nutrients. They are likely to heat treat it and add sugar, salt, fats, colourants or flavourants. They need to add preservatives as fresh food will certainly expire. They may even add vitamins which are extracted from plants via processing. And what you end up with is dead synthetic stuff that is so far from what food should be. There is a lot of debate on whether vitamins are absorbed. The jury is out, but by making simple changes you can get your nourishment from your food - as nature intended.

M K Moroccan carrot Soup with Golden Raisin Relish

For us to make the shift I had to change my way of shopping. I stopped supporting supermarkets and now shop at the health food stores and farmers markets. Instead of boiling oats to make porridge, I soak it overnight. Or I blitz oats into a smoothie with fruit, nuts and even super foods. I can't say we don't ever eat cooked food. We still do, but we keep learning to make food without using excessive heat. I did the Matthew Kenney Online Intensives course this weekend and made a delicious Moroccan Carrot Soup.

Image from source www.imgarcade.com

You are allowed to heat raw food to a point that your body can tolerate it. However, if the temperature would burn your body, it is certainly causing harm to your food. That lovely caramelised golden colour you get on roast veggies is actually really the equivalent of 3rd degree burns on your food. If you did that to your finger, you would lose it. So why do we cook?

Home made Almond Milk

Civilisations have been using fire and heating food since time began. It must have evolved as a way to preserve food, particularly meat. But humans and domestic pets are the only species to eat cooked food. We don't ask where elephants or rhinos get their protein. There is never a need to prepare food for wild animals. By learning to make yummy foods from fresh, organic produce with minimal processing you won't ever have to read food labels or worry about taking in excessive fats, salt and sugar. You will make your 5 a day, which in turn is proven to protect you from harmful diseases.

Deliciously Raw - Feast and Taste Courses

Is raw food better?

Patrick is back at Deborah Durrant's raw food school in Gloucester right now. Find her at deliciously-raw.uk. We did the Feast course, which is entry level, together in October. Now Patrick is taking the next step and doing Taste.

Patrick's raw Asian soup

Both courses run Monday to Friday. You have to have done Feast to do Taste. On the Feast course Deborah taught us raw food basics such as raw pasta and gnocchi, sauces and custards, raw cheese and yogurt, new takes on a salad, granola, cacao truffles, breads and crackers, vegetable fermentation, nut milks, raw pizza and raw cookies.

Patrick's smoked root vegetables

I cannot say enough how valuable this course was to me. And no I am not plugging it or connected to Deborah in any way. My diet has been vegetarian since 1981. I wouldn't know how to prepare meat anymore. But the switch to vegan in 2012 has been hard.

Raw chutney, curried pickles, cold pickles and kimchi

I miss cheese. They say it gets easier and it does. I swerve past the Philadelphia cream cheese and aged Parmesans. Instead I head for the deli counter where I buy hummus and dairy free pestos. We also discovered Tofutti at our local Spar which is great vegan cream cheese alternative.

Patrick's raw beetroot toast with horseradish cream

The problem with a lot of vegan alternative foods though is they are still processed. They come with Palm oil, preservatives, flavourants and other E numbers. I don't want that stuff in our food. And that is where raw food steps up to the plate. It is minimally processed and uses only fresh natural flavours. I need to get over my desperate need to healthy everything up. A bit of natural sweetener like maple syrup, smoked Himalyan salt or a fat like coconut oil does help improve the flavour of food

Cacao panna cotta

Eating raw appears to be a whole lot of work but actually it's not. If you take a few hours to do all the prep work, you have most of your food ready for a week. Remember you don't have to wait for any of this to cook or heat it up? Once it's chopped and plated, it's ready!

Patrick's salad

But I will admit, if driving via the Golden Arches and collecting your meal in a brown bag or popping a ready-meal into the microwave  is your thing then making a salad is a bit more of a schlep.

Summer rolls

Taste is geared toward gourmet dining and they are learning techniques such as cold smoking, cold pickling, sous vide and elegant slicing. Patrick takes a zillion photos so I can see what they have been doing. I shared some of pics here and I can't wait to try some of these recipes when he gets home.

Hopefully we will be making these for other people soon.

Why Organic?

Is organic food really better?

I get quite a bit of shtick for choosing to buy organic over regular food. People are not convinced it's better. Most folk  believe organic food is way overpriced. Here's what I think.

Local organic produce

I often ask people if they would take a slice of bread, or any food item, and first spray it with a can of domestic cockroach or ant killer spray. And they are horrified. Of course not!

We all know those cans come with a warning that the substance is highly toxic. So why then are people so accepting of pesticides on their food? The same or a similar agent is applied to our food!

And it's not just pesticides. Food producers apply a good few of the following: - herbicides, insecticides, nematicides, termiticides, molluscicides, piscicides, avicides, rodenticides, predacides, bacteriacides, fungicides. That excludes various kinds of sanitisers also commonly used.

I have no way of knowing how many different biocides my food has been subject to. Or how many times it has been exposed to poison. Food producers are not required to label with this information. Which is weird as food label legislation is getting so tough on other ingredients like salt, sugar and fat.

The argument that the toxins are washed off also doesn't hold with me. Farmers need pesticides to work. Biocides are made to cling to produce through rain and irrigation. But yes they do leech into the soil killing all the organisms that would normally nourish the soil.

That means the soil has less to give the growing food. Chemical fertilisers usually have a ratio of three minerals - nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium. But we know there are a LOT more minerals required by the body than that.

The word -cide means death. Actually intended death. Think homicide, suicide or genocide. These chemicals kill of heaps of beneficial creatures too. Like bees. Without bees and pollination we would have almost no food. And we are eating this stuff on our food?

Organic doesn't have to be more expensive. Actually it can be the same or cheaper. I buy from Woolworths, Wellness Warehouse and Rodgers Fruiterers at the City Bowl Market in Hope Street.

If you can't find organic produce easily, you can either start growing your own, or buy the Clean Fifteen and avoid the Dirty Dozen.

When we get going with our restaurant, you can be sure as much of the food as possible will be organic.