Raw Bento

Hi everyone, I’d like to say thank you to those who have said a few kind words over at my angsty update here.

I’ve got an awesome raw cereal recipe I’m just bursting to share.

I poured in some Flax 4 Life Flax Granola (Hawaiian Pineapple, Coconut & Mango flavour) into a bowl and loaded it with blueberries, frozen raspberries, banana, dried cranberries, big fat plump Yamanashi raisins and hemp seeds. I drizzled some leftover pecan and cashew milk (yup I like mixing nuts and seeds in my raw vegan milks) on top and waited for a few minutes for the raspberries to defrost.

The nut milk turned into a pretty shade of pink that lifted my slightly lazy, grey mood this rainy morning in Tokyo. I was licking the spoon dry after I shovelled the last bit into my mouth.

As I ate, I didn’t watch the news nor read any blogs, and I slipped into some thought wanderings.

Just to let you know, I’ve eased up on the personal pressure I was giving myself. A post called, The Biggest Risk of Raw Food at Philip McCluskey’s Loving Raw blog, spoke volumes to me about being too obsessive about eating raw.

I can’t say that I’m the strictest of raw foodists because I don’t eat organic and allow some non-raw items in regularly like maple syrup and cocoa powder. But I have to admit that when I read the list of foods with the most pesticides in them (also called the Dirty Dozen), I was scared and disgusted. I did away with strawberries, apples, celery, grapes, raisins, cranberries, raspberries, peaches, bell peppers and potatoes, for several months.

But, in Japan where I live, this left me with quite a small range of produce to nosh on and the boredom led me to my recent rut. I had pineapple and grapefruit a lot of the time and I got so sick of kiwis that I’ve officially banned them from my pantry for now. I still had spinach because the variety of leafy greens here are paltry. I can only find mizuna (watercress), a few types of bok choy, various lettuces, parsley, coriander, and romaine. There are no kale or collard greens here. Sometimes I do find individually packed kale leaves (yes you can buy one kale leaf in Nissin, a foreign supermarket here) that cost 250JPY (USD2.60) each and I will juice this to get the most out of it.

So, I’m back to eating whatever produce I fancy — be it a Dirty Dozen or not. I think life is too precious to spend so much time thinking about (raw) food. I actually feel better (though purists might argue the toxins are just building up slowly in my system) because I have a wider range of flavours to taste everyday.