The Raw Chef Blog

Global Warming.  Pollution.  Unrest In The Middle East.  Rising Fuel Prices.

There is an alternative.

Find out more here.

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Americans spend more than $3 billion yearly on nutritional supplements.

Imagine you’re standing in front of the supplement section in a shop, looking for your digestive enzymes, and you hear a lady approach an assistant and ask, "Hi, do you have anything for someone who doesn’t eat very well, eats late at night, is under stress and doesn’t take much excercise?"

What advice would you give?

I’m talking about an experience I had in Wholefoods today, which is why I’ve used the statistic about the US market, but I believe most countries will have similar figures.

This woman was demonstrating the modern way of thinking:  I know what I’m doing wrong, I know it’s not doing me any good and I know I need to do something about it.  Now just give me a pill that will fix it all so I can get on with my day!

Do you think it occured to the assistant to say, "Yes actually, you could go down to the organic produce section and spend your $15 on fruit and veg, don’t eat late at night, get a less stressful job and then go out for a walk."

No, taking a pill sounds much easier to me.

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Ok, I’ve been a bit slack on the posts recently so I’m playing catch up!  Here’s the menu & photos from the 6th October Brazillian Friday Night Dinner at The Plant.

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Hi, I’m currently in the process of updating my blog to WordPress. Please change your bookmark to www.therawchef.blogs.com to access the current site.

I will announce on that site when this one is ready.

Thanks again for visiting!

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Just a quick update on a few things going on with this blog….

Firstly, thank you to the people who emailed me to tell me that they weren’t able to leave comments on posts.  I’ve resolved this issue with the strange things that were happening with Feedblitz and you are now able to leave comments!

Secondly, if you came to this blog through therawchefblog.com you will notice that it no longer points to this blog.  The reason is that I’m doing some work on that particular URL, so for now, please change your bookmarks to therawchef.blogs.com.  All email subscriptions and feedreader signups will remain unaffected.

Thank you!

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Raw Food certainly has come a long way and no more so was that on display than last night at The Plant in Brooklyn, NY.  I was fortunate enough to be a part of the weekly themed dinners, this week inspired by the films of Stanley Kubrick.

My thanks and admiration go out to Matthew Kenney and his team, particularly his Head Chef, Kristen Rayes who created the menu and masterminded the realisation of it on the night.

Here’s a few photos of the event…

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Before I get started, I just wanted to remind you that anything that I’m up to that isn’t related to being happy, healthy or raw (the first two being a result of the latter) gets posted in my personal journal so anyone who doesn’t want to hear about every detail of my life can just get straight to the good stuff.

I’ve just been writing a personal blog post about my general maneuvers around NYC over the first week and something occurred to me that I want to share here.

I’ve just moved into a hostel and as soon as I opened the door to my private room I was disappointed.  There’s no TV, the flooring isn’t great, it’s smells a bit and the shower doesn’t look as if it would even wash the shampoo out of my hair.  I haven’t even unpacked my suitcase because I don’t want to fully acknowledge that I’m staying.

So I decided to get a train downtown where I like life a lot better than right up here at 96th Street.  I got off at Union Square and walked up to Pure Juice & Takeaway to grab some comfort food.  Despite not being particularly hungry I bought some chocolate cherry biscotti, a pinacolada (coco meat, coco water, coco oil and pineapple) and some tacos.

So then I walked up to 23rd Street and caught the train to Central park thinking that I’d get on another train to take me back to the hostel.  As I walked my eye was caught by the bright lights of Times Square and I was drawn like a moth to a lamp.  I’ve been to Times square already this week but it was during the day and I was slightly disappointed I have to say.  But at night it’s a whole different situation!  It was beautiful (in a man-made, overpowering, bright, in-yer-face type of way).
It certainly took the edge off my dissatisfaction about my new temporary accommodation.

As I walked further, I passed a homeless guy who was clearly having trouble ‘keeping things together’ and I had a moment of clarity.  I realised how much abundance I have in my life - here I am feeling bad about a room I’m not too keen on, carrying a bag full of amazing food, having the trip of a lifetime, walking through the famous Times Square and looking forward to checking my email on my laptop via wireless internet access.  The list of things I could be grateful for just goes on and on.

Sometimes it can be so easy to feel a sense of loss even though we’re surrounded by such abundance and the antidote is gratitude, being grateful of what you have whilst in search of what you want.  I’m constantly surprised at my ability to forget that.

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If you’re like me, you’ll always be on the lookout for new raw websites that are actually any good!  And by ‘any good’ I mean they have something to offer you, and the thing that I love is photos of raw foods!  That’s why you’ll be seeing more photos and recipes on my site over the coming months.  A site that I wasn’t aware of that has great photos is that of chefs Kristen and Anna - The Ladies Of The Plant In DUMBO .  By the way, DUMBO, which stands for Down Under (the) Manhattan Bridge Overpass, is an area of Brooklyn that has been mostly developed by one developer and is very up and coming.  It’s populated by some very creative people such as artists and musicians and is the perfect place for The Plant.

Anna is passionate about posting on their blog and will be photographing the events they do (there’s already been a raw wedding there), the shopping in the wonderful green market and anything else of interest, of which there is plenty in the NYC raw scene.

Just so you know, all the photos are of raw food.  I say that because when  you look at some of the creativity that is on going on there, you won’t believe it’s raw.  Enjoy and leave them a comment if you like it, because it’ll make them happy!

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