Avocado and Strawberry “Cream Pie"

It's time for avocados and strawberries, this is a delicious dessert that I think you will be surprised on how good it taste.

Avocado and Strawberry “Cream Pie"

Serves 8-10

Crust:

• 1 1/2 cups Almonds ( presoaked,)
• 3 dates, soaked until soft

 Place all ingredients in food processor. Pulse until finely ground and well blended.  Pat into 9″ pie plate. Set aside.

Filling:

• 3 avocados
• 1 cup cashews, soaked overnight, rinsed and drained
• flesh from one thai coconut (about 1 cup)
• 1/4 cup coconut oil
• 1/2 cup agave nectar 

Place all ingredients in food processor, process until smooth. Smooth into crust. Refrigerate for at least 3 hours.

Topping:

• 1 1/2 cups cashews, soaked at least 6 hours, drained and rinsed.
• 1 cup coconut water 
• 2/3 cup coconut oil, melted
• 2 tablespoons raw agave 
• 2 cups sliced strawberries

Combine all ingredients except strawberries in high speed blender. Blend until smooth. Refrigerate until set (this can take hours). Stir in sliced strawberries. Spoon over pie. 

Glaze:

• 1/4 cup raw agave nectar
• 2 tablespoons coconut oil, melted
• 1/4 cup carob 

Whisk all ingredients together until smooth. Dip spoon in ganache and add to top of pie.

Raw Vegan Truffles Recipe

Raw Vegan Truffles Recipe

ingredients

• 1 cup almonds 
• 1 cups brazil nuts ( If you do not have almonds or brazil nuts you can substitute for any kind)
• 13 dates 
• 1 cup finely shredded coconut 
• 2 tbsp cocoa or cacao powder or carob Powder
• 1 tsp vanilla 

In a food processor with an S blade, process all ingredients, except the cocoa powder, until finely chopped and it all starts to clump together. This takes a minute or two.

Using a plastic rounded tablespoon or melon scooper, scoop out and press to make a half sphere. Use half the mixture to make regular coconut macaroons. Add the cocoa or cacao powder to the remaining mixture and process until well incorporated and then shape with the tablespoon or scooper

Cinnamon, Coconut

add to basic recipe instead of carob or cocoa

• 1 tsp Cinnamon

Strawberry

add to basic recipe instead of carob or cocoa

• 1/2 cup chopped strawberries ( I did this in the food processor)

Raw Chocolate Cheesecake

Crust 

1 cup Almond meal 

¼ cup  raw cocoa powder or  Carob

3 Tablespoons Agave syrup 

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 pinch sea salt

Filling 

2 cups raw cashews, soaked (2Hrs) and rinsed 

¼ cup hazelnut butter (peanut butter works too) 

½ cup coconut oil, melted 

½ cup Agave syrup 

½ cup cocoa powder or carob 

½ cup water 

2 teaspoons salt 

Chocolate Sauce 

⅓ cup coconut oil, melted 

1 teaspoon vanilla 

¼  cup agave syrup 

¼ cup cocoa powder or carob

1- Blend all ingredients together in a food processor until it starts to come together. Press the crust into the bottom of desired pan, about ¼ inch thick. Set aside while you making the filling. 

2 -In a food processor or mixer blend together cashews, maple syrup, water and salt. Mix until totally smooth, scraping down the sides of the processor as necessary. Add cocoa powder, hazelnut butter and coconut oil to the cashew mixture and blend them all together, scraping down again, until mixture is uniformly combined. 

3-Spoon or pipe the filling on top of the crusts. Stick the cheesecake in the freezer until solid all the way through (at least 2 hours for individual cheesecakes, 4 for a large cheesecake). 

4- Once frozen, remove the cheesecake from the pan. If using a silicone mold they will easily pop out. If you have a muffin tin, run a sharp, hot knife around the edges of each cheesecake, flip the tin upside down and give it a few good whacks against the counter. They should start to slowly side out at this point. Be patient, gravity is on your side. If a few minutes have passed and the cheesecakes are still refusing to drop, use a lighter to heat the bottom of the tin briefly; the heat will help release the cake. 

5-Place the cheesecakes in the refrigerator and make the chocolate sauce.

Raw Kale Salad

1 bunch of Kale

1 tbsp. lemon juice

2 tbsp. agave nectar

1 red bell pepper, sliced

2 tbsp. olive oil

1 tsp. salt

Wash, remove stalks and chop Kale into small pieces.

Mix in the Olive Oil, Lemon Juice, and salt. Squeeze the Kale in handfuls to brake down the leak fibers and make the kale easier to chew. Wait 30 minutes to an hour then add red bell pepper, Agave nectar.

toss together and serve

Rawvioli

Rawvioli

10 Roma tomatoes, thinly sliced

3 garlic cloves, minced

1/2 cup extra virgen cold press olive oil

1/2 tsp sea salt

Place all the ingredients into a large bowl and marinate for 15 minutes.

Nut Cheese

1 cup pine nuts

1/4 cup basil

2 cloves garlic

1/2 cup sunflower seeds

1/2 cup distilled water

1/2 tbsp sea salt or to taste

Put all ingredients into a blender and blend until smooth and creamy.

Assembly

Place a paper towel under the dehydrator screen to catch drips.

Place one tomato slice on the screen, add 1 tsp of the nut cheese and top with another tomato slice. Repeat until all the tomato slice are used. Dehydrate at 105º for eight to nine hours.

Study: Red Meat Raises Risk Of Dying, Risk Higher With Processed Meats

By CBS News

Eating a diet heavy in red meat has been tied to added risk for cancer, diabetes and heart disease. It shouldn't be surprising then that a new study found eating red meat every day appears to increase a person's chances of dying from a chronic disease by 12 percent.
For the study, published online in the March 12 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, Harvard researchers analyzed data from two dietary studies that tracked nearly 37,700 men and 83,600 women for 28 years.
The researchers found overall that there were 23,900 deaths, including 5,900 from heart disease and nearly 9,500 from cancer. When the researchers looked closely at dietary habits, red meat took the cake when it came to raising death risk.
A daily serving of processed meat increased death risk by 20 percent, the study found, while a once-per-day serving of unprocessed red meat was tied to a 13 percent increase in overall mortality risk. According to the study authors, nearly 9 percent of deaths in men and 8 percent of deaths in women from the study could have been prevented if participants ate less than half a serving of red meat per day.
"We found that a higher intake of red meat was associated with a significantly elevated risk of total, CVD and cancer mortality, and this association was observed for unprocessed and processed red meat, with a relatively greater risk for processed red meat," the authors wrote in the study.
When it comes to red meat research, the findings are not in the carnivore's favor.
Previous research by study author Dr. An Pan, a nutrition researcher at the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston, found eating red meat - particularly when its processed - raised a person's risk for type 2 diabetes by 19 percent. A January study found that for every 50 grams of processed meat a person eats per day - which can be as little as one sausage link - raised a person's risk for pancreatic cancer by 19 percent.
A 2010 study showed that people who ate the most red meat among study participants were 79 percent more likely to develop cancer of the stomach and esophagus. Another study that year found processed red meats were tied to a 30 percent increased risk for bladder cancer.
The bottom line?
"We should move to a more plant-based diet," study co-author Dr. Frank Hu, a professor of nutrition and epidemiology at the Harvard School of Public Health, told HealthDay. "This can substantially reduce the risk of chronic disease and the risk of premature death."
In fact, the study found replacing red meat with healthier alternatives reduced a person's risk of dying.
Replacing one serving of red meat with one serving of fish was tied to a 7 percent death risk reduction, with poultry the risk fell 14 percent, nuts 19 percent, legumes 10 percent, low-fat dairy products 10 percent or whole grains daily was associated with a 14 percent lower risk of dying.
Since meat is a big protein component of many Americans' diets, what can be done to reduce death risk?
In an accompanying commentary published in the same journal issue, Dr. Dean Ornish, clinical professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisico, said way for Americans to eat is with a diet that contains little or no red meat and is high in "good carbs" - which include vegetables, fruits, whole grains, and natural soy products - and low in "bad carbs" - such as simple and refined carbohydrates, sugars, white flour, and high fructose corn syrup, and high in "good fats" found in fish oil.
"We have a spectrum of choices, it's not all or nothing," Ornish wrote.
Ornish is the namesake behind the "Ornish diet," which limits fat intake to 10 percent of daily caloric intake, compared with the government's recommended 20 to 35 percent of caloric intake. It was ranked by U.S. News as the top diet for heart health, but experts said it might be somewhat difficult to follow and tough for some dieters to give up fatty animal foods.
Other experts suggest simply following the U.S. Department of Agriculture's new MyPlate nutrition icon, which offers dietary guidelines for healthy eating.
"The message is simple," Dr. Robert Graham, internist at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City, told HealthPop in an email. "In concordance with the "choose my plate campaign" eat less meat and more fruits and vegetables (half of your plate).
To track food consumption and for health tips, visit the USDA's SuperTracker.

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WKRG.com © Copyright 2012 Media General Communications Holdings, LLC. A Media General company.

Should Sugar Be Regulated like Alcohol and Tobacco?

Scientists at the University of California, San Francisco, argue that sugar is toxic and needs to be taxed and controlled. Why it's so hard to break our addiction.

By Bonnie Rochman, Time Magazine

Sugar poses enough health risks that it should be considered a controlled substance just like alcohol and tobacco, contend a team of researchers from the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF).

In an opinion piece called “The Toxic Truth About Sugar” that was published Feb. 1 in the journal Nature, Robert Lustig, Laura Schmidt and Claire Brindis argue that it’s a misnomer to consider sugar just “empty calories.” They write: “There is nothing empty about these calories. A growing body of scientific evidence is showing that fructose can trigger processes that lead to liver toxicity and a host of other chronic diseases. A little is not a problem, but a lot kills — slowly.”

Almost everyone’s heard of — or personally experienced — the proverbial sugar high, so perhaps the comparison between sugar and alcohol or tobacco shouldn’t come as a surprise. But it’s doubtful that Americans will look favorably upon regulating their favorite vice. We’re a nation that’s sweet on sugar: the average U.S. adult downs 22 teaspoons of sugar a day, according to the American Heart Association, and surveys have found that teens swallow 34 teaspoons.

To counter our consumption, the authors advocate taxing sugary foods and controlling sales to kids under 17. Already, 17% of U.S. children and teens are obese, and across the world the sugar intake has tripled in the past 50 years. The increase has helped create a global obesity pandemic that contributes to 35 million annual deaths worldwide from noninfectious diseases including diabetes, heart disease and cancer.

“There are good calories and bad calories, just as there are good fats and bad fats, good amino acids and bad amino acids, good carbohydrates and bad carbohydrates,” Lustig, a professor of pediatrics and director of the Weight Assessment for Teen and Child Health (WATCH) program at UCSF, said in a statement. “But sugar is toxic beyond its calories.”

The food industry tries to imply that “a calorie is a calorie,” says Kelly Brownell, director of the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity at Yale University. “But this and other research suggests there is something different about sugar,” says Brownell.


The UCSF report emphasizes the metabolic effects of sugar. Excess sugar can alter metabolism, raise blood pressure, skew the signaling of hormones and damage the liver — outcomes that sound suspiciously similar to what can happen after a person drinks too much alcohol. Schmidt, co-chair of UCSF’s Community Engagement and Health Policy program, noted on CNN: “When you think about it, this actually makes a lot of sense. Alcohol, after all, is simply the distillation of sugar. Where does vodka come from? Sugar.”
But there are also other areas of impact that researchers have investigated: the effect of sugar on the brain and how liquid calories are interpreted differently by the body than solids.Research has suggested that sugar activates the same reward pathways in the brain as traditional drugs of abuse like morphine or heroin. No one is claiming the effect of sugar is quite that potent, but, says Brownell, “it helps confirm what people tell you anecdotally, that they crave sugar and have withdrawal symptoms when they stop eating it.”

There’s also something particularly insidious about sugary beverages. “When calories come in liquids, the body doesn’t feel as full,” says Brownell. “People are getting more of their calories than ever before from sugared beverages.”

Other countries, including France, Greece and Denmark, levy soda taxes, and the concept is being considered in at least 20 U.S. cities and states. Last summer, Philadelphia came close to passing a 2-cents-per-ounce soda tax. The Rudd Center has been a vocal proponent of a more modest 1-cent-per-ounce tax. But at least one study, from 2010, has raised doubts that soda taxes would result in significant weight loss: apparently people who are determined to eat — and drink — unhealthily will find ways to do it.

Ultimately, regulating sugar will prove particularly tricky because it transcends health concerns; sugar, for so many people, is love. A plate of cut-up celery just doesn’t pack the same emotional punch as a tin of homemade chocolate chip cookies, which is why I took my daughter for a cake pop and not an apple as an after-school treat today. We don’t do that regularly — it’s the first time this school year, actually — and that’s what made it special. As a society, could we ever reach the point where we’d think apples — not cake on a stick — are something to get excited over? Says Brindis, one of the report’s authors and director of UCSF’s Philip R. Lee Institute for Health Policy Studies: “We recognize that there are cultural and celebratory aspects of sugar. Changing these patterns is very complicated.”

For inroads to be made, say the authors in their statement, people have to be better educated about the hazards of sugar and agree that something’s got to change: 

Many of the interventions that have reduced alcohol and tobacco consumption can be models for addressing the sugar problem, such as levying special sales taxes, controlling access, and tightening licensing requirements on vending machines and snack bars that sell high sugar products in schools and workplaces.

“We’re not talking prohibition,” Schmidt said. “We’re not advocating a major imposition of the government into people’s lives. We’re talking about gentle ways to make sugar consumption slightly less convenient, thereby moving people away from the concentrated dose. What we want is to actually increase people’s choices by making foods that aren’t loaded with sugar comparatively easier and cheaper to get.”

Source: www.healthland.time.com/2012/02/02/...