Raw Foods Books
and Equipment!

Everything you truly need to be a raw foodist can be purchased at your local grocery store or food co-op. All you really need are fresh (preferably organic) fruits, vegetables, nuts, and seeds. However, there are certain conveniences available that many raw foodists enjoy. If you're considering purchasing one of the items below, consider clicking through from this page, as we get a small (very small) commission from Amazon.com.

Equipment

For equipment, we highly  recommend buying the most well-built products on the market. Often, this means you'll pay more than what you might find elsewhere. But, usually, you get what you pay for. We've had great results with the items below; all have performed well through daily use. Let's begin with the things we use most.

Blenders:  We're sure there are many great models, but we swear by Vita Mix. We've included a few cheaper models (if you consider $350+ cheap). However, considering we use ours daily (the pro model), and have owned it for years, it's been a worthwhile investment!.

Food Processors:  Another item we use daily. Nut dips, brownies, shredding fruits, quick-slicing veggies, etc. We use the 7-cup Cuisinart, which is usually more than adequate for a family. If you're going to need to feed, say, 5 or more people on a regular basis, look into the 14-cup model. Again, Cuisinart is an expensive brand, but these things are heavy, durable machines!

Big Juicers:  There are many juicers on the market; a few of them are real powerhouses. Like the Cuisinart processors, these are heavy-duty machines. We use ours regularly for fruit juices, vegetable juices, and raw ice cream (just run through a few frozen bananas!). We use a Champion, shown four models below. Many raw foodists use a slightly more expensive juicer, the Green Star (also shown below).

Small Juicers:  For the small stuff -- e.g., squeezing lemon juice for a recipe or juicing some wheat grass, you should use something smaller than a Champion. Try these:

You should also get yourself a small citrus juicer for making quick orange juice or lemon juice. Here's a picture of one, just so you can see what they look like. We recommend looking for one of these at a local department store, as they're usually $10 or less.

Dehydrators:  As we covered in Raw Foods 101, foods are considered raw if never heated above 108-115 degrees Fahrenheit. The Excalibur dehydrator allows you to set the temperature. It's great for making raw breads, crackers, and dried fruits. On the left is a 5-tray model; on the right a 9-tray. We have the 9-tray. We don't use this every day, but are happy that we invested the extra $30 to get the larger model because, once we're in the mood to dehydrate, we figure we may as well fill the thing up.

Sprouters:  This has been more of a Summer-time thing for us, but can certainly be used year-round. Sprouts are, for lack of a better adjective, simply awesome for you -- and they taste great and grow easily.

Other Handy Accessories:  The mandoline slicer can slice veggies very thin (such as turnips for making raw ravioli), the spiral slicer is good for making raw spaghetti with zucchini, and nutmilk bags are always handy for nutmilks and sprouting.

Recommended Books

There is no shortage of books about raw foods! We do not own all of the ones listed below, but we do have a fairly extensive (and always growing) library here at Pure Jeevan. If we've left something off, please drop us a line!