Stacey D - My Raw Food Experiment: February 2013

Monday, February 11, 2013

Raw Brownies

I have a new favorite raw sweets recipe - raw brownies! These have a mere 3 ingredients and are so wonderfully satisfying.

Raw Brownies

1 1/2 cups fresh pitted dates
1 cup raw pecans
1/2 cup raw cacao powder

Place dates and cacao powder in a food processor and process until fully incorporated and a "dough" forms. Add pecans and process until the nuts have the desired sized chunks (the mixture will be crumbly). Press the mixture onto a 6"x9" glass pan (lightly grease the pan with oil - I used coconut) and place in freezer for about 10 minutes before cutting into squares. Store in refrigerator to keep up to 2 weeks - if they are around that long :)

Enjoy these awesome treats with your friends and family.

Why Eat Raw Foods?

I've been asked this question over and over again, and to be honest, there are so many reasons. But when I go online to try and find a more scientific explanation that I could post here I am too often met with statements such as, "cooking food changes that molecular structure rendering it toxic" which feels like a fear based statement that isn't very encouraging. I personally don't believe that cooked food is poison as many raw foodies do.

Ultimately, eating foods that are not heated above 115 degrees means that all of the enzymes in that food are intact. What does that mean to you and me? Well, just think of enzymes as the "life force" of food. Foods that have their "life force" intact are going to make you feel different when you eat them than foods that do not. It's kind of like eating energy.

So I guess I like to eat the majority of food while it still contains most of it's energy so I can get some :) Who doesn't need more energy? Not to mention that choosing to eat mostly raw foods automatically eliminates a lot of foods that were never meant to be eaten on a regular basis in the first place (chips, soda, etc.) and believe it or not, this whole lifestyle has helped reveal my emotional eating patterns and actually change them.

I just want to be healthy. Health is wealth, no?