As for Cinco De Mayo, I’m celebrating with home made quac & fresh salsa-whooohoo. Via Etsy’s daily email I found these hysterical Mustachio glasses from Etsy seller 502global, There perfect for any kind of fiesta & have been added to my “must own list.”

This little gem I found Via Gawker last week…It’s guaranteed to make you laugh if you’ve seen Lady Gaga’s Telephone Video, as for the funny part, watch this…. Gaga for the Guys.

Thanks to THX THX THX: for helping us appreciate the little things in life.  I <3 these sweet little post its.

Is your beard trustworthy? Via Auburn & Ivory, guaranteed to make you LOL, facial hair enthusiasts & haters will enjoy this alike.

The best chicken coops ever!! Via Making It Lovely, I would love to have chickens, mostly because I want to buy them a cute little house.

Brooklyn Botanical Garden is oh so precious right now, everything is blooming, the gardens are really impressive & this place is huge. Visiting the gardens has been on my “things to do in NYC list” for quite sometime and somebody surprised me with a trip out here—-totally worth it, great picnic spot.

My order of Surthrival Colostrum came today, yayay!! After hearing the lecture from David Vitalis and Dr. Anthony Kliensmith I was dying to try this stuff out. I think it’s best blended into a smoothie, I don’t really love the taste so much, but if it’s good for me I’ll eat almost anything. Here’s the link to the interview, please check it out, it runs a little long and can feel kind of like an infomercial at times but there’s some darn good info here.

Fun thing #2-

Groupon is a websites that emails you daily bargains for your neighborhood. Groupon came highly recommended by my dear friend Sarah.  Today’s Groupon Deal in Salt Lake is a steal on a monthly Yoga membership for 40$ to Kula Yoga.  Kula is a wonderful studio and the regular monthly membership is 120$$$.  In NYC a while back they had a deal on golf instruction at Chelsea Piers. If golf is your passion you must, must, must visit Chelsea Piers driving range, you hit golf balls on a Pier in the Hudson River, pretty awesome. I love bargains, so I love Groupon.

Fun thing #3-

My first black eye! Got it snowboarding, doing things I shouldn’t have been doing and falling. It’s mostly gone now because I was downing Arnica Montana homeopathic pellets like a junkie! For any kind of bruises, cuts scrapes etc, this homeopathic remedies is a charm at helping you heal quickly. I’ve used this many, many times and keep an extra bottle in the first aid kit.

My life has been moving in a new direction for the last 6months or so. I got laid off from my job, which was really a blessing in disguise and I’ve started back to school. I’m currently commuting between New York and Salt Lake, it’s hectic but I love it. Amongst all of these new changes I really did have the best intentions of keeping up my raw diet but for some reason I’ve been having a love affair with Taco Bell, no joke.

I’ve come to realize eating raw in NYC was much, much easier, Utah has the best raw food groups and a great raw restaurant but as a whole it’s sooo much harder to stay raw in a city where there aren’t raw options ready made and at your finger tips. In conclusion, I’ve realized my food foundation has some cracks in it and I need more recipes under my belt. I get board with green smoothies and spinach, when it’s cold out, I want warmth. So realizing my raw food plan is inherently flawed, the on again, off again saga continues. This is a good thing, a learning curve, minor set back and an opprotunity to grow into a highly educated raw food woman.

My first steps back onto the road of energy and health included a trip the produce section where I snatched up an entire fridge full of veggies. I’m starting back with what I know and adding a new and exciting raw recipe into my bag of tricks every week. I originally started Raw Food Porn to keep me motivated and share my excitement with my family. I’m going to be posting my experiments, the good, the bad and the ugly to keep me on track.  So yes, you’ll be hearing more from me soon.

P.S. It feels good to write again!!

♥ Lesley Anne ♥

• This cute monkey face was found via Crafzine. Add a little excitement to your summer picnic, this monkey man is so easy to make, if you don’t have grapes for eyes try using, almonds, raisins or blueberry’s. He’s so lovable even the pickiest eaters would find him delectable.

• Haha, vegetarian kitteh. My cat eats cashews and loves, loves mana bread.

• The NY Times posted 101 Simple Summer Salad recipes. They happen to be mostly vegan, you can get some great ideas for adding variety to your salad menu. I think the “number 9″  salad would be incredible.

• Not raw, but so freakin’ adorable. This panda bread is just too fun not to link. Another gem from Craftzine. I suppose you could make a raw almond flower freezer cookie using this same method, hmmmm. Any suggestions on how to utilize this panda in raw foods?

• I saved the best for last. I started skin brushing twice daily with Tonya Zavasta’s skin brush.  If you don’t skin brush, start right away. This simple routine has tightened my pores, improved circulation, skin texture, color and clarity. I don’t think my skin has ever been this smooth, it’s incredible. On Tonya’s website she gives detailed instructions on how to skin brush and why it works so well. I’ve also been using her skin cream and mask, there good but I love, love, love that skin brush.

♥ Lesley Anne ♥

New recipes with exotic ingredients that require a trip the “little India” area of Manhattan are my new favorite thing. Maybe I was Indian in my former life, who knows, but I love everything about their culture, the clothes, jewelry, dancing, Ayurveda, make up and yes, the food.

Martha Stewart had Suvir Saran on her show and he made a dish called cardamom roasted cauliflower.  With a few small adjustments I made an awesome raw version. I really enjoy this vegetable but usually only as a snack because it requires so much chewing. With this recipe it marinates making it softer and a great main course.

Cardamom Cauliflower

● 1 Head cauliflower

● 1 Red onion

● 1 Dried red chili pepper

● 3 Green cardamom pods

● 1 1/2 Tsp Cumin seeds

● 1 Tsp Coriander seeds

● 1 Tsp Turmeric

● 1/2 Tsp whole pepper corns

●  1/3 Cup olive oil

● Celtic sea salt

Cut your cauliflower into small bite sized pieces then place in a large mixing bowl. Dice the red onion and add it to the cauliflower. With a coffee grinder or food processor grind all your spices until fine. Pour the olive oil and spices into the mixing bowl, stir and coat all the cauliflower pieces. You can serve right away or let it sit over night in the refrigerator. The spices will intensify and they cauliflower will soften.

My version is very similar to Suvirs except for a few differences:

1. I added less chillies because as this sits in your refrigerator the chilies will intensify making this dish too spicy.

2. My version has more cumin and I added turmeric because I love those flavors together.

3. Dicing the onion and cauliflower smaller makes it easier to eat.

Enjoy!

♥ Lesley Anne ♥

• Hulu has a documentary called The Future of Food that’s a must watch. They’re also featuring Morgan Spurlock’s series 30 Days,  you probably know him from Super Size Me. There’s speculation Hulu may start charging for content, boo, so watch these gems while you can do it for free.

• Yardsnacker once again finds goodies via youtube! Take a peek at the “Eating” video, it’s particularly interesting.

• Galadarling linked to Audrey Kitching’s near death experience with Gardasil. Please be sure to read her story.

• Evelyn Feilds is responsible for making the most adorable reusable sandwhich bags on Etsy. Using organic fabrics and cute fruit appliques your bound to want them.

• What are your favorite affirmations? An inspirational thread on the Give It To Me Raw forum.

• HighonHealth is a natural skin care blog. Fran posts about alternative methods for keeping your skin clear, a favorite subject of mine. She loves the same Bee Yummy skin cream I do. Great minds think alike.

• East and West Books is hosting a raw event with Tonya Zavasta on Sunday, July 26th from 7-9pm. The class is only $20 if you register online at newlifemarket.com. I’ll be there with bells on! I love Tonya and can’t wait to meet her, yippie.

Enjoy!

♥ Lesley Anne ♥

]]> http://www.rawfoodporn.com/?feed=rss2&p=984 http://www.rawfoodporn.com/?p=922 http://www.rawfoodporn.com/?p=922#comments Fri, 01 May 2009 03:03:38 +0000 Lesley Anne http://www.rawfoodporn.com/?p=922 Macadamia nuts and a champudeck, oh this is heaven. The spiky fruit below is called a champudeck (chomp-pu-deck). Never heard of it? Me neither, I had no idea this fruit even existed. I thought it was a durian at first, but I was quickly corrected by. There both spiky right? I consulted the oracle of information (Google) about champudecks and I only found minuscule amounts of information. It may be known by another name but as far as I’m concerned  champudeck sounds pretty good to me. When I asked how to spell it someone replied, any way you want??? I love that line of thinking, I will be applying it to more things in life. So here it is, a chapmudeck in all it’s fruity, fruity glory.

Spiky and soft on the outside and very, very fragrant when ripe. I’ve never smelled such a strong fruit before. Not in a bad way, it doesn’t stink but it’s so fragrant you could smell it from ten feet away, unopened, crazy!

When fully ripe you open them by tearing the soft skin with your hands. Inside are fruit covered seed pods and sticky fibrous fruit strands that kind of melt in your mouth, yum.

This is Olucean, he’s a member of Pangaia and maintains the gardens, he’s highly knowledgeable about exotic fruit and was so nice to share this lovely chompudeck.

The shiny seeds of this exotic beauty are saved with the intent of planting new champudeck trees.

These cute little guys are macadamia nuts! I’m not used to seeing them with  the shell so I had no idea what they were until someone told me. They have two shells, on the left is the dark brown outer shell and on the right is the light brown inner shell.

Pangaia’s macadamia nut cracker makes it easy to open these babies.  I could sit in Hawaii and open macadamia nuts for hours, I love the tropics:) Fresh out out of the shell, so cute, so tasty…hooray for Hawaii!!

P.S. I’m blogging from my very own computer! My last PC was a work computer so I bought a little Macbook and I dig it. It’s my first Mac so it’s taking me a little while to figure it out but I look cool typing;)

♥ Lesley Anne ♥

Pangaia is a permaculture project on the Big Island of Hawaii, located in the great district of Puna. They’re  in an active volcano and tsunami zone. You may be familiar with Pangaia from Jenna Norwoods YouTube posts. They’re completely off the grid, water is by rain catchment and the electricity is obtained via solar panels. They’re a self sustaining community and eat what they grow. What they don’t grow they get from the Pangaia Pantree the online raw food store they own and operate.

My mom and I enjoy going on adventures together and this was our first raw food vacation. We had been wanting to visit Pangaia for quite some time. We were thrilled to see they were so flexible with accommodating visitors. You can stay at Pangaia for a nightly or monthly rate, it’s also possible to trade accommodations for services. We taught a class on the benefits of water kefir in exchange for our stay and food.

Welcome to Pangaia! I will be your tour guide for today, please keep your hands, arms and legs inside the ride at all times:D

This was the cute Bali hut we stayed in, it was screened in on all four sides and in the back there was an outdoor sink. Our hut was peaceful and quite in the day but rather noisy at night. As soon as dusk rolls in the singing frogs come out. Around 6 a.m. natures alarm clock would join in as well, I’m talking about roosters, Pangaia has several of them. It was a little shocking the first day but you get used to it.

Even when it rained all day and night this hut kept us nice and dry. It was also an insect free zone due to the gecko mating ground above the bed. Since they eat all the mosquito’s, spiders and anything else that crawls, I welcome them:)

All the cozy nooks in the top of the hut made the ideal gecko nest. There were probably 30 geckos up there, if you look close you can see some tails and feet.

Occasionally, a rogue gecko would jump down from the ceiling. This one was rescued from my moms hair, I don’t know who was more shocked!

Ahhh, the great kitchen! This mega kitchen is the hub of Pangaia. The kitchen, living and dining room are situated on a polished concrete slab. It’s protected from the elements by a massive roof made from clear corrugated fiberglass panels that let the sun in. This kitchen is well loved and is often the busiest part of Pangaia.

The kitchen is right next to the garden, a perfect location. It was awesome to pick your own fresh food every day. If you look closely you can see the papaya trees.  The garden is really quite big and my picture does not do it’s size justice.

The living and dining room is where the electricity is, everyone comes here to charge phones, cameras and plug in laptops.  At night everybody congregates here to chat and check their Give It To Me Raw profiles over tea:) We came to visit at a great time because there were two parties during our stay and they were a blast! Bongo’s and ukulele’s in full swing and of course fun people and great food.

The showers are embedded in this lava rock wall. Each little crack had something interesting to look at, a shell, a crystal, a statue or painted rocks. This wall was gorgeous. I admit to being nervous about the showers and bathroom before I came to Pangaia. They look amazing but being in the buff in front of people I don’t know didn’t thrill me. The first two days I purposely showered at the beach. I soon realized that know one else here cares if I’m in the buff so on the 3rd day I showered at night. No sweat;)

The bathroom sink was stately and adorned with shells, crystals and plants growing from coconut husks. If you look in the mirror you can see the bath tub as well.

A zen soap holder;) One of the many decorative touches on the shower wall.

Yes, this is the loo! It looks intimidating but it’s very user friendly:) In the top left corner of the photo you can see the toilet seat. You would remove the lid and place the seat over the hole. Outside the loo you are supposed to pick a few broad plant leaves and that’s your TP. We did however get the 411 on the real toilet paper stash. I have no problem with leaves but I prefer the conventional paper stuff. The ceramic bowl contains a sawdust that aids the composting process.

So that was the quick tour of Pangaia, hope you enjoyed it! Stay tuned because the next post is all about food, oh boy! I’ve got some great photos, so start drooling in anticipation.

♥ Lesley Anne ♥

On my trip back home I happened upon a gem worthy of posting. JetBlue’s new JFK terminal has a self serve salad bar! A nice one with pretty a spring mix, spinach and a hearty veggie selection for toppings. It’s priced per lb but worth the $7.99. It was so exciting to see nice salad while traveling I had to take advantage even though I had snacks. Fresh food at an airport, what a novel idea! No more roaming around terminals only to find gross washed out salads, hooray! Ahhh, if only all airlines followed JetBlue’s trend, some day…..in the not so distant future.

I still like to clean out the fridge before I leave on a trip, taking my fruits and veggies with me. This has been a great asset for keeping in the raw while on the go and you don’t waste your food. This photo was from a trip I took in the summer and those were my very own home grown tomatoes;) Cute little guys aren’t they?

I promise I won’t be such a stranger. I’ve got several fun posts up my sleeve, book reviews, recipes, beauty secrets and yes, the long awaited Pangaia pictures. Stay Tuned:)

♥ Lesley Anne ♥

P.S. You may have noticed, my blog got a mini make over, the photos are bigger and better than ever:)