Here it is: Putting it all together. Here you’ll see what we use for our taco shells and how we build up our taco. Quite often, we also make a raw sour creme using cashew nuts and lemon juice. But, for these tacos, it’ll just be meat, salsa, and guac. Enjoy!

Taco Assembly

Use Romaine leaves for your taco shells or, as Wendi says, do a search for making other kinds of taco shells. (A good place to search out raw recipes is the All Raw Directory.) Top with:

• Shredded lettuce
• Taco meat (see previous recipe)
• Guacamole (see previous recipe)
• Salsa (see previous recipe)
• Optional: Raw Vegan Sour Cream (search our blog or the All Raw Directory)

There you go: Celebrate TACO WEEK by making your own tacos!

(And, by the way, we’re celebrating something special today, too:  KDcat turns 15 today!!! )

Please Post on Facebook!	Please Tweet This on Twitter!
Visit:	View Comments

Here’s the next component in our raw taco recipe — the guacamole. This is Wendi’s favorite component! Enjoy!!!

Raw Guacamole Recipe

• 3 avocados
• juice of 1 lemon
• 1/2 cup lightly packed fresh cilantro
• 3/4 tsp salt
• optional: 1 med. tomato, scallion

Pulse in food processor until “meaty” consistency is obtained. Set aside in a serving bowl for the taco dinner!

Please Post on Facebook!	Please Tweet This on Twitter!
Visit:	View Comments

COntinuing with our Taco Week, here’s a quick and easy (and delicious) salsa recipe. You can really have a lot of fun with salsa, and can get highly experimental if you like. Almost anything tastes great in salsa. This one is fairly basic, so feel free to spruce it up with some of your favorite ingredients. Let us know in the comments section some of your favorite variations so you may inspire others!

Raw Salsa Recipe

• 4 med tomatoes, chopped
• 1 Tbsp. lemon juice
• 1/2 cup lightly packed fresh cilantro
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. ground coriander
• 1/2 tsp. ground cumin
• 2 scallions
• optional: fresh garlic, onion, chilis, cayenne, etc.

Pulse in food processor until “meaty” consistency is obtained. Set aside in a serving bowl for the taco dinner!

Please Post on Facebook!	Please Tweet This on Twitter!
Visit:	View Comments

EVERYONE LOVES RAW TACOS!!! So, this week, we’re going to show you FOUR “Makin’ It Monday” videos instead of just one. These were filmed in Berkeley, CA, at our dear friend Carolyn’s apartment. We hope you love these recipes. We actually eat raw tacos quite regularly — especially when tomatoes are in season.

Taco “Meat” Recipe

• 1/2 cup walnuts
• 1/4 cup Brazil nuts (or more walnuts)
• 1 tsp. ground coriander
• 1 tsp. ground cumin
• dash garlic powder
• 1 1/4 Tbsp. Tamari or Nama Shoyu

Pulse in food processor until “meaty” consistency is obtained. Set aside in a serving bowl for the taco dinner!

Please Post on Facebook!	Please Tweet This on Twitter!
Visit:	View Comments

Jim here… Wow, how awesome is it that today’s Makin’ It Monday falls just one day after Mother’s Day — and that we had  a very special guest edition ready to post featuring …  my awesome mom!???!!!  I love my mom so much … she’s the best mom ever! And you’ll love watching her demonstrate how to make 100% raw hummus. Mom might be 100% Italian, but she makes a pretty mean 100% Lebanese raw hummus, which is a pretty popular dish in my family. Here’s the vid!

For the recipe for this video, please sign up for Pure Jeevan’s FREE Raw Food Recipes eBook! You can do that by clicking HERE. (The recipe is called “Tahini Genie.”)

As always, we’d love to feature YOU on a Makin’ It Monday Guest Raw Chef Edition.For details on that, click here.

Please Post on Facebook!	Please Tweet This on Twitter!
Visit:	View Comments

You’re in for a treat with this recipe. Our Guest Raw Chef this week is Shivie Kaur, half of “The Cook and Butler” duo of TeamRaw. Wendi shot this video a few weeks back in San Francisco during Pure Jeevan’s recent cross-country tour! While there, Shivie and her partner Cemaaj created and served a delicious gourmet meal for Wendi and KDcat. The blog post from that visit was here. So, here’s Shivie sharing with you how to make an easy and delicious raw salad dressing!

Orange Asian Pear Ginger Salad Dressing

• 1/2 cup of orange juice
• flesh of 1/2 orange
• 1/4 cup raw cashews
• 1 asian pear
• 1 Tbsp. gresh ginger
• splash apple cider vinegar (optional)
• 1 Tbsp. agave nectar (or other raw sweetener)

Process in a high-speed blender until smooth and creamy.  Enjoy!

Please Post on Facebook!	Please Tweet This on Twitter!
Visit:	View Comments

Today we welcome Shea Lynn Baird from Monday Night Live. As you may recall from a few weeks ago, Wendi and KDcat visited with Shea and her husband Stephen during their 2010 Trip. While there, they all attended a raw food meetup, and Shea brought a wonderful Thai salad. She shared this delicious creation with all of you in this special guest raw chef edition of Makin’ It Monday, below:

Recipe

• 1/2 jar raw almond butter
• 2 large jalepeno peppers
• 3 large cloves of garlic
• about a 1-2″ piece of ginger
• juice of 3 large limes (or lemon)
• 1+ Tbsp. tamari
• dash of sweetener (maple syrup shown in vid)
• water as needed for consistency

Blend this dressing in a Vitamix and serve over a large salad of parsley, tomatoes, cilantro, romaine, cabbage, and avocado.

As always, we’d love to feature YOU on a Makin’ It Monday Guest Raw Chef Edition. For details on that, click here.

Please Post on Facebook!	Please Tweet This on Twitter!
Visit:	View Comments

So, did you think we’d forget about Makin’ It Monday during Wendi & KDcat’s big cross-country tour?  Absolutely not!  While in Salem, Wendi filmed Kerry Matson demonstrating one of her favorite raw recipes – heck, one of our favorites, too! I’d have to say that raw apple pie is one of the classic raw dessert recipes. Everyone interested in raw should know how to make this! (And anyone who tastes it will soon be interested in raw!)

To us, raw apple pie is not only an amazing dessert. Sometime’s it’s the main entrée! I suppose that’s just one more example of how raw folks tend to live it up just a little more.  Here’s the recipe:

Kerry’s Apple Pie

For the crust:

For the filling:

BTW, if you’d like to connect with Kerry, I know she’s a member of Raw Food Rehab, an online raw food community that can be found at http://rawfoodrehab.ning.com .

Once again, we’d love to thank our generous trip snack sponsor, Natural Zing, for helping us to make this possible on our budget!

Please Post on Facebook!	Please Tweet This on Twitter!
Visit:	View Comments

Here’s a video demonstrating a technique for making super-fast, vibrantly beautiful, tasty salads! If you frequently find yourself in a rush, but also want a healthy meal, definitely check out this mandoline technique.  (Further commentary below, after the video…)

We love our mandoline slicers. But, the inexpensive one (the hand-held one shown in the video) seems to be our favorite appliance lately. It’s so easy to create and eat a delicious salad when you have one of these handy tools. When we slice the cucumber into tiny rounds with this slicer, the flavor really permeates the dish — and is so delicious.

We looked online for a mandoline slicer similar to ours and found an even better hand-held model for a great price over at Natural Zing — http://tinyurl.com/NaturalZing.  (Search for “mandoline.”) The ceramic blade stays sharp longer than metal blades. And, the slicer Natural Zing is selling has four settings to create different thicknesses in your slices. For this recipe, we recommend the finest/thinnest slice possible.

Another great quality of these hand-held models is the clean-up. Just rinse them quickly under running water, and you’re done. Takes only a few seconds! If you have a mandoline and would like to share a video recipe with the rest of the Pure Jeevan family, just let us know! Here’s a link to guidelines for submitting a “Makin’ It Monday Guest Raw Chef” feature video here on Pure Jeevan.

Please Post on Facebook!	Please Tweet This on Twitter!
Visit:	View Comments

It’s time for another “Makin’ It Monday” installment!  This time, Pittsburgh raw foodies Joe Prostko and Tracey Anne Miller (along with videographer Heather) demonstrate their “Turbo Tornado Superfood Solution,” which has (as you’ll see) a *ton* of superfood ingredients. Take a look:

Wow, that looked awesome. Here’s the recipe, along with a few options, such as making this without honey.

Turbo Tornado Superfood Solution

• 1/2 tsp. Astragalus Root Powder
• 1 tsp. Bee Pollen (optional)
• 27 Cacao Beans (or 3 tbs. nibs)
• 1/2 tsp. Camu Camu Powder
• 1 tsp. Chlorella
• 2 tbsp. Coconut Meat
• 1 tbsp. Coconut Oil (melted)
• 1/2 cup Coconut Water or Spring Water
• 1 tsp. Cordyceps
• 2 tbsp. Goji berries
• 2 tbsp. Hemp Seeds
• 4 tsp. Raw Honey (or 1 tbsp. Agave Nectar)
• 1 tbsp. Red Maca
• 2 tbsp. Lucuma or Tocotrienols (optional)*
• 1/2 tbsp. Mucuna Pruriens (optional)
• 1 tbsp. Mesquite Pod Meal Powder
• 1 tbsp. Revitaphi
• 1 pinch Celtic Sea Salt
• 1 tsp. Spirulina
• 2 dropperfuls Sweetleaf Vanilla Creme Liquid Stevia
• 1 tsp. Vanilla Powder

* Joe notes that they forgot to add the tocotrienols that Tracey had while making the recipe. Adding that or the Lucuma gives a creamier texture and adds some sweetness.

Among the sources for some of these superfoods, both Joe and Tracey are reps with Elements for Life:

• Joe’s link:  RawLifeProducts.com
• Tracey’s link:  www.rawafrolic.com

And of course anything you need from Natural Zing can be found at http://tinyurl.com/NaturalZing. As always, we’d love to feature YOU on a Makin’ It Monday Guest Raw Chef Edition. For details on that, click here.

Please Post on Facebook!	Please Tweet This on Twitter!
Visit:	View Comments

Hi everyone. Did you miss me on Friday? Was your entire day absolutely hinging on evaluating the quality of the raw salad dressing recipe that you very rightly expected to see demonstrated right here? … and then I posted nothing at all! Well, missing one day isn’t so bad, really. I think it’s the first one I’ve missed since Wendi stepped away from the blog temporarily. Anyone want to guess what happened? … Yep, a nasty case of the flu took me down! 

O, my raw friends, I thought I was a goner Friday — thought for sure I had th’ deadly swine. But, being the resilient, nearly infallible raw foodie that I am, I totally kicked it’s porcine rear end, and am now supercharged and ready to rock and roll once again here on Pure Jeevan’s blog!

It occurs to me that I owe you another salad dressing recipe! After all, how can I claim to have featured an entire week of delicious 100% rawsome salad dressings when, in fact, I only featured four? 

Thinking ahead to a visit to family in St. Louis this coming week, I’m inspired to offer you something a little different. You see, we have an extremely tempermental member of the family who lives in St. Louis. She’s never liked me much. Quite often, in fact, our meetings turn off rather poorly, not infrequently involving actual bloodshed! (My blood, just for clarification.)

Lucy, you see, is a very troubled Siamese. Her raison d’être, if you will, seems to be “seek human flesh.” Now, my sister Jeanne will defend her cat to the bitter end — and I’ll admit that Lucy can be fun to play with if you have one of those cat-teaser toys — but man, Lucy has some real deep-seated anger issues and probably needs some kitty therapy.

But maybe not… Maybe if I came up with a recipe to pay homage to her Siamese heritage, she would change her opinion of me, and maybe not single out one of my hands to scratch or bite open! So, here’s number five in Pure Jeevan’s raw salad dressing series — and, in my opinion, the tastiest one I’ve created! Let’s hope Lucy approves!

I’m serious… That is the Best. Dressing. Ever! Give it a try and let me know how it turns out for you!! Here’s the recipe again:

Thai Coconut Curry Salad Dressing

• 1 young Thai coconut (flesh and water)
• 1/2 red sweet bell pepper
• 1/4 cup fresh basil
• 1/2 clove garlic (or more to taste)
• 1 Tbsp. lemon juice
• 1/2 tsp. curry powder
• 1 tsp. lemon grass
• cayenne pepper to taste
• salt to taste (1/2 tsp. plus)

Pulse in food processor until it’s got a salad-dressing consistency. (It’ll be rather watery because of all of the coconut water.) Pour liberally on your salad, garnishing with thin strips of sweet red pepper and chiffonaded basil. (To chiffonade, stack basil leaves, roll them tightly, and then cut across the roll to produce long thin strips of basil leaves! Of course, you could also just “chop” them. But this wouldn’t be as fun, nor would it sound half as cool, as chiffonading!)

Soooooo delicious!  I used a lot of cayenne, so our mouths were pleantly on fire afterward. I might, for this reason, also suggest that you have a small sweet dessert prepared for just after your salad.

Please Post on Facebook!	Please Tweet This on Twitter!
Visit:	View Comments