Posts Tagged ‘smoothie’

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2 Yummy RAW Post-Workout Snacks

August 11th, 2011

post-workout snacksI hope you enjoyed Joy’s pre-workout smoothie that I shared with you the other day.

Today, we’re going to talk about what to eat after your workout and Joy has once again provided us with 2 delicious raw post-workout snacks.

The first one is her “Watermelon Gazpacho” (this is damn good).

Gazpachos are cool, refreshing summer soups, but this one is particularly good in that it successfully pairs the sweetness of watermelon with the coolness of cucumbers and the spice of jalapeños. If you are not big on the fire factor of jalapeños you can use green pepper instead.

Again, this doesn’t necessarily hit all the protein needs for a post-workout snack (on it’s own) but I would definitely use this to rehydrate after a sweat-inducing workout or any type of prolonged outdoor activity.

Watermelon Gazpacho

Ingredients:
2 cups of watermelon juice (if you don’t have a juicer, blend it in the Vita-Mix)
3/4 cup watermelon diced to 1/4 inch pieces, seeds removed
1 heirloom tomato, seeded and diced to 1/4 inch pieces
1/2 cup English cucumber diced to 1/4 inch pieces
the juice of one lime (reserve the zest for garnish)
1 tablespoon minced cilantro (reserve a few leaves for garnish)
1 teaspoon minced jalapeño
1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon Himalayan sea salt

Combine all ingredients in a glass bowl and stir well to combine. Serve chilled and garnished with fresh lime zest and cilantro leaves.

Alright, so you’ve got your gazpacho, which has helped rehydrate your body and replenish those vital fuel stores within your muscles.

Now, let’s top up the fuel tank with Joy’s “Ginger Lime Colada”. Again, a little different from most “nut heavy” post-workout smoothies but this is another great electrolyte and fuel replenishing raw food recipe:

As you can tell, Joy’s got some really cool raw recipes up her sleeve and she’ll be sharing more of them with us over the next little while.

Stay tuned (and stay hydrated)!

Yuri

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Posted in Raw Food Recipes

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Pre-Workout Smoothie with Joy Houston

August 9th, 2011

My good friend Joy Houston just sent over a few recipes that I think you’ll really enjoy.

And since she’s got an awesome studio in which to shoot her recipes, I asked her if she could record a few raw food recipes for you guys…

And so she did. Thanks Joy – you rock!

Anyways, the first recipe that I’ll be sharing with you today is a pre-workout smoothie (courtesy of Joy) that will rev you up for your workout.

Give it a shot and let us know what you think.

Enjoy…

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Posted in Raw Food Recipes

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Energy Diet Secrets

July 29th, 2010

So you’ve been on an energy-boosting diet as of late, and people are beginning to notice. They can see that you’re losing weight, but gaining strength and endurance. You’re no longer the mopey, quiet and tired person you were just a few scant weeks ago. Today, you’re full of pep and vigor, and of course, the people around you want to know how you did it. What is your secret?

Now, your energy diet is no big secret – it is all about selecting the right foods to give your body the energy that it needs to thrive all day long. But people aren’t going to believe you when you tell them that. Just eating the right foods? That’s boring, and anyone could do it. But you are the only one who seems to have mastered it – so clearly, you know something they don’t know. You hold the secret to eating for energy, and they want to know what it is. So, what can you tell people who want to know your energy diet secrets, but won’t be satisfied with the truth?

What you give them is the truth with a heaping helping of fancy and sexy. No lies – just overblown statements about your amazing diet plan.

For instance, telling people that you are cutting back on processed sugars is not going to wow them. Sure, we all know that those glucose/fructose enriched foods are bad for us, but people want to hear your fancy answer for what you could possibly replace the sweets with (and no, going without something sweet is simply not an option – it’s practically cheating).

What you can tell them is that the world of fruit has some amazing sweets waiting for them, but a proper energy diet won’t simply ask you to down bowl after bowl of boring mixed fruits. No, you can tell them about the exciting variety of smoothies available for people who eat for energy; you can share your recipes for all-raw, one-ingredient frozen banana ice cream; and you can wow them with information about how strawberries are calorie negative, meaning they actually use up more calories to consume, digest and pass than they provide as fuel, and how this helps your body to learn to burn it’s own fuel reserves – your fat.

Another important area for eating for energy is hydration, but no one wants to hear about how you should be drinking so many glasses of water every day. Instead, you can tell them about your super-hydrating watermelon smoothies; impress them with your abstinence from the diuretic effects of caffeine; and tell them how you can jazz up a glass of water with citrus, without adding a lot of empty calories.

And when your friends want to hear about where you’re getting all of your new, raw energy from, they don’t want to hear about how simple it is to tailor the energy diet plan to their own likes and dislikes; they want to be told that what you are doing takes effort and intellect, but with a little coaching, they too could be on the path to eating healthier, and gaining more energy.

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Posted in Food For Thought

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3 Raw Food Recipes for the Summer

May 16th, 2010

23_popsic_lgWith the return of beautiful summer weather, many of us begin to put away the last remaining items that we use regularly during the winter.

The big bulky sweaters return to the back of the closet; the winter tires come off the family car; the mittens and scarves are stored away and replaced with light hats to keep the sun off our heads. One other area of de-winterization, even for non raw food enthusiasts, tends to be in their diet.

During those cold winter months, we crave those hot foods to fill our bellies and warm our insides. Big, thick and steaming soups, hot meat pies straight from the oven, and mugs of hot chocolate are all the rage as the weather rages below freezing outside. But in the summer months, we tend to put away those hot foods in favor of cool salads, iced teas and other cold items intended to chill us out as the mercury climbs. We do this without any thought towards using more raw food recipes.

One of the most obvious summer foods is one that you can use for any number of easy raw food recipes – the watermelon. This enormous fruit may be mostly water, but the juicy flavors are synonymous with sunshine and picnics.

And while the temptation may be there to simply split the fruit open and feast on it by the slice, there is much more than can be done with watermelon in the summer. One great dish for raw food enthusiasts and those simply seeking an apres-sun dish is the delicious watermelon soup.

Served chilled, this dish is great for the evenings, just before the sun goes down. All you have to do is combine the flesh of a good sized melon in a food processor with a small amount of ginger to taste, the juice of a medium lime, and a few leaves of mint. Blend until smooth, adding cold water as needed, depending on the consistency you desire. Strain if you like, or serve as is, garnished with an extra mint leaf.

Another great summer raw treat comes from the huge selection of green smoothie recipes that can be found online. Green smoothies give you all of the energy you need, in a cool refreshing drink. For optimum results, process a handful of spinach or kale with a medium orange, a touch of lemon zest, a bit of raw honey, a glass of cold water, a half cup of ice and half of a cucumber. This delicious drink will serve you well as a breakfast, or a patio sipper on a scorching hot day.

Another summer favorite is the simple popsicle, but many of the store-bought options are loaded with processed sugars and artificial colors. For a healthier raw version, try mixing together your favorite smoothie – maybe a delicious banana-strawberry smoothie – and freezing your own treats on a stick.

This way, you will know exactly what wonderful foods you are eating, know that you are not resorting to sugars to provide flavors, and you can customize your frozen desserts and have a different flavor every single day!

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Posted in Raw Food Recipes

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Raw Diet Recipes – Great Tasting Simple Nutrition

April 3rd, 2010

If you remember a few years ago, there was a very effective advertising campaign for a beer company, debating what the key quality was that drew in their consumers. Was it the great taste, or the fact that the beer was less filling? There was no clear answer, no definitive winner.

And while you would usually be at a loss as to what a mass-produced beer and a healthy raw diet might have in common, this is one instance where a similar argument can be made for both.

With a raw diet, there are two key reasons to forgo the cooked foods, and move towards a diet rich in vitamins, nutrients and fresh foods. Raw foods taste great! No, raw foods offer better nutrition! Both are right, and both draw a different group of people to the raw food diet.

Sure, raw foods taste great. Raw food recipes use plenty of fresh, ripe produce that is full of its own flavors – so much so, that you rarely need the salts and sugars that you might otherwise add to your cooking to give an extra dimension of taste.

Take, for instance, those fresh green smoothie recipes that you have heard so much about. While the average grocery store purchased smoothie might be full of sugars, preservatives and other chemicals in order to enhance the long-dead and diluted tastes, a fresh smoothie recipe reads more like a haiku. No long list of additives and other outside influences on flavor. Instead, it’s a few simple ingredients that will taste that much better.

This is great, especially if you have children and you want to set a good example for them by eating healthy, and providing them a tasty way to follow in your footsteps. After all, if you make the healthy option a delicious one, it makes the raw food diet a lot easier to stick with.

On the other side of the coin, those easy raw food recipes are more than just crowd pleasers for taste. The vitamins and nutrients that you find in the average raw food diet are going to be several powers higher than a similar cooked food item.

A great example of this is broccoli. Most people eat their broccoli cooked, which means boiling it in a pot of water, and then covering it with melted cheese to make it somewhat palatable. But if you skip the scalding, and eat your broccoli raw, you will find a lot more than better flavors. You will find that the vitamins A, C and K that you hear so much about will actually stay on your food, not get leached out in the cooking pot. On top of that, the natural levels of glucoraphanin in your broccoli will be closer to what the studies tell you should be there, helping to create sulforaphane in the body to help fight cancer. And don’t forget about the iron, calcium, magnesium and other minerals that will stay on your broccoli, and get into your body when you consume it raw.

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Posted in General Nutrition

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