Durian? At 50° North? In WINTER???

OOOOooooooo, I LOVE a bit of it – look at this nifty new raw t-shirt – I want, I want, I want… (The t-shirt and the durian ;) They’re $18 from this site HERE and they have other cool designs too, with more on the way ;) Yummy…

On September the 21st I had:

1 litre water
1 litre green juice with carrots
2 persimmons
avo/salt with tomatoes, spinach, flax crackers, jicama slices, a handful of hemp seeds
500ml water
10 gorgeous little dark plums
a few slices of delicious dried pineapple
700ml green juice with carrots
bowl of chia seeds soaked in water, with lucuma, maca and mulberries
1 litre water

I’m happy to see that more of you are able to use the ‘comments’ function for this e-journal now – very cool ;) In fact, last week sometime, the divine ‘Sara’ left a comment here that I am yet to respond to, so…here we go…here’s what she had to say:

“I was wondering how you felt about eating only local raw foods, especially if you live in a 4 season climate with longish winters? I experimented with a lot of raw foods this summer and it has been wonderful, but this question remains in my mind about whether the raw food diet is the right diet for the planet. Providing food from your local region seems to make a lot of sense to me and feel really right and indeed, most of the food I ate this summer was purchased from local farmer's markets. I noticed a lot of raw food super foods are definitely not local. Avacados, something I enjoy a lot are not local. I have thought of sprouting sunflower and buckwheat greens during the winter, but do you have any other tips on winter fare that is raw and local? I have frozen some blueberries and peaches picked fresh this summer from nearby farms. Also, i am transitoning to all of this and while I do enjoy more simple fare, I am far from the place in which you enjoy meals (after several years raw and a long juice feast). I would really, really appreciate it if you are able to find time to respond. Thanks and Namaste, Sara”

OOooooo, yummy – see my answer below…

on September the 22nd I had:

1 litre water
300ml green smoothie with banana, grapes and spinach
1 litre green juice with carrot
capful of raw aloe juice
nori rolls with avo/corn/tomato/red pepper/cumin salsa and spinach
500ml water
handful of dried pineapple rings and a banana
700ml cucumber/celery/apple/ginger juice
bowl of sea spaghetti seaweed with hemp seed, flax oil and granulated wrack
300ml beet/apple/carrot smoothie
1 litre water

MMmmmm-Hmmmmm, I hear you, sista Sara ;) Hmmmm…the perpetual pesky issues of local vs tasty vs sustainable vs healthy vs organic vs environmentally friendly and so on…many factors to consider here ;)
Here are my thoughts…in practical terms, I LOVE the Native American wisdom that everything you ‘need’ to feed yourself and your family is within 5 miles of you (or smthg to that effect)…many people simply don’t know enough about foraging to make that a viable option for themselves however… plus, yes, cold climates, winter, snow etc hardly lend themselves to an abundant local raw lifestyle…so, I love that you’re thinking abt indoor sprouting/growing greens through winter, that you’ve been freezing stuff in preparation and so on – GREAT steps, good for you :)
In terms of the question of whether this really makes sense on a global scale for humans, my feeling is this – humans have done a pretty remarkable job of spreading ourselves out and adapting to climates ALL over this globe, from starting out down round the middle, where fresh raw produce was in abundance, straight from the Earth and it is WARM…we’ve spread ourselves out and ‘made’ it work for us to be anywhere with processed/cooked foods/imports etc…and then some of us out in those colder places start to want to eat raw vegan…which just doesn’t seem to fit that ideally in the colder months in those places if you also want to eat locally…it’s like a monkey native to Costa Rica going to live in Chicago and demanding that he gets exactly the same bananas there as he used to get in the jungle…SO…hmmmmm…what to do…??? Well, indeed, you could follow other people who have spread themselves into those colder places and eat raw meat/fish to keep yourself tanked up over winter time…OR you could say ‘dickens’ to eating local/pollution issues and live on goji berries, durian and mangosteens all winter OR you might enjoy to try out some of the following:

*Focus your attention on: sprouts, dried foods, frozen foods, foraging skills and fermented foods.

*Listen to the interview with Steve ‘Sproutman’ Meyerowitz on RawVeganRadio (who have a fantastic new-look site by the way). He talks about how by growing and using our own sprouts, it’s possible to really live anywhere raw – even in isolation on a hillside with nothing growing on the land…it’s cheap and easy…a very inspiring interview…you can also see his wonderful sprouting books HERE.

*I would also HIGHLY recommend you check out the books and work of Helen and Scott Nearing and Eliot Coleman - these people work together on INCREDIBLE farms in the States, growing and harvesting year round with systems they've developed - I'd especially encourage reading 'Four Season Harvest' and 'Winter Harvest Manual' by Eliot Coleman - you can see those books HERE.

In the end, I feel we’re all just doing our best – so, whatever that means to you in terms of eating local, I hope you ENJOY it ;)

All love,
Angela. xxx