Marie / On the Road to Raw

The Green Drink

Every morning Alisa would come into the Bed and Breakfast with a large glass containing a green drink. It looked remarkably like slime, reminding me of something from an old B science fiction movie – something that grew and devoured a town. But Alisa drank this stuff as if it was ambrosia and, despite it’s somewhat toxic appearance, when she offered me a sip one day I decided “why not” and gave it a try.

That afternoon I was driving myself into town, shopping list stuffed into my purse, to get all the ingredients I would need to make myself one of those verdant concoctions the following morning. You couldn't help but be a convert; it was really good, made of fruit and all kinds of superfoods including cacao nibs. Alisa, with her self- admitted chocolate fetish, always put in at least two tablespoons of those. They have the reputation all by themselves of being mood altering – which probably explains why Alisa was always so eminently even tempered.

I started drinking the green slime concoctions every morning when they took the place of breakfast. All of a sudden – just like that – I was starting my day out raw. I barely even had to think about it. Strangely, even though I’m always creating these elaborate breakfasts for my guests, I never eat any of them myself. Oh, sometimes I would love to! I stand around waiting for leftovers like a dog expecting scraps from the table. But most often there are no scraps to be had. I wash empty baking dishes and pie plates hungry and unfulfilled with a few hours of work still ahead of me before I can eat. I end up starving to the point of ravenous by the time I get home around 11:30 after clearing the table, washing and drying dishes and cleaning the rooms. I inhale my lunch as if I’d spent a week on hunger strike! Don’t ask me what I ate… I wouldn’t know except that it usually began with bread – the first thing I could shove into my mouth! The green drink takes me three minutes to make in the morning- most of it blending time and it satisfies and staves off hunger well into the afternoon. A revelation! When I get home henceforth, I calmly make myself an enormous salad full of everything I can find in the crisper. I add some nuts. I cut up an orange. That salad could sustain ten men. Within a week of doing this I realize that I am living my day- at least until 5 o’clock – totally and irrevocably Raw. Almost immediately I experience a shift. It’s funny but I begin to feel strangely happy. There is almost an aspect of feeling drugged. In the raw food literature, they frequently talk about how raw food is the fountain of youth, the experts regaling us with ‘proof’ that when you eat a raw diet you tend to eat less and people who eat less live longer and look better. Well, that’s all very well and good but what I feel is happy – sometimes so happy that I have to cook something or eat a doughnut just to get a feeling of relief. I’m not used to so much ecstasy. I believe that there is something narcotic about such a pure diet… all those fruits and vegetables, the blender buzzing like an orgasm. Raw food guru, David “Avocado” Wolfe tells us that introducing raw foods into our diet helps to remove the junk that has built up in our bodies and that as we move through this purification “you’ll feel a sense of intuitive powers. You may feel a sense of absolute relief… you may feel a sense of just gentle and ever increasing energy. You’ll definitely notice an enhanced change in your immunity.” Alisa says once you really go raw it opens you up to so many possibilities, not just physically but mentally. I believe it has opened me up to the possibility that I might be insane because where else could all this happiness be coming from? It’s unnatural! I look around me and see that the floor isn’t properly swept. There is a spot on the glass of the back door. I catch sight of a little tear on the corner of the bedroom rug – perhaps something the cat decided to scratch at when I wasn’t paying attention enough to pay attention. I notice that my daughter’s homework is not in a neat pile on her desk but fanned out sloppily like discarded cards. I notice that all is not perfect but in the midst of it all I smile. Boy! Do I feel good!

Marie / ON THE ROAD TO RAW

My Introduction to Raw

My true introduction to the world of raw foods came as a result of a party and a dream. From the moment we met, Alisa and I liked each other . There was no ‘becoming’ friends. We just were. But beyond that we both recognized tremendous benefits to our joining together as business partners. Oddly enough both of us had corresponding visions of creating a women’s community. Now, granted, in Alisa’s community all the women ate raw food – but basically our ideas of creating a space where women could bloom physically, spiritually and creatively were so similar that it seemed synchronistic that the universe had succyeeded in bringing us together. And the thing was, I had the perfect place to start us out. I had been operating the Crystal Mesa Farm as a Bed and Breakfast and miniature animal farm for sixteen years during which time I had fallen in love with the property much as one does with a person and never fallen out . I have often said I would sell my body before I sell my house and I stand by that to this day. It’s a beautiful place, rurally situated but within half an hour of downtown Santa Fe. Lots of land and space and a very special energy that drew guests in and kept them coming back year after year, falling in love with it all – just like I did. So many have claimed that being here is both healing and regenerative. Only perfect. Alisa and I agreed that the Crystal Mesa Farm would be a wonderful place to launch raw food workshops and retreats. I thought we could support these with additional workshops in creativity, journaling, meditation… things that would help to encourage the changes that women would experience in their journey to ‘raw’. Their journey to raw.

My own journey, I was not so sure of. I love food. I love to eat. I have been fortunate up until now (knock wood hard) to have an enviable metabolism; I shall not tell a lie… I have never been fat. When I was young my nickname was ‘Pin’ and it was only my amply endowed bosom that saved me from skinniness. Depending on how one looks at these things, my lactose intolerance has also worked to my advantage; no fatty milk products to metamorphose into extra pounds. Actually I believe that the real story there, is that I just ate way too much cheese when I was growing up in Switzerland. At one point the sixth grade class went on a week-long trip into the heart of the Swiss alps to learn about glaciers and orienteering; every single day consisted of miles of walking up some serious mountains after which we would be given a brown bag containing our lunch; half a loaf of hard French bread, a mammoth hunk of cheese, a thick chunk of chocolate and an apple. This was basically finger food, not by choice but by necessity; they gave us no knives. We just sat there on the alm chomping away at these gargantuan portions like prisoners condemned to hard labor. I never looked at cheese the same way after that trip. Chocolate kind of suffered too. As a treat they took us on a tour of the Nestle chocolate factory. I remember thinking it would be more like Willy Wonka’s but what it was bordered more on the industrial: huge metal vats full of silky dark chocolate, metal arms stirring, ingredients poured in automatically… factory workers there mostly to oversee the machines. The smell of chocolate was so strong it could make a person faint. At the end of the tour they led us into a room filled with the finished products- all the different kinds of chocolate they produced. All the kids just looked at each other. Hardly anyone ate anything. I recommend this plan of action for anyone who can’t get enough chocolate. It’s a surefire cure.

Nowadays when I have cravings, it’s usually for fruit – or pickles! But I happen to have two kids. Ronald McDonald usually does a guest spot in our lives once a week, most often on Tuesdays when afterschool activities bring our estimated time of arrival back home to 7:30PM. And even though, left to my own devices, I could probably easily be a vegetarian with only the extremely occasional craving for grilled steak , my children are most definitely carnivores. So - to save time and effort - when they ate meat, I did too.

And then, there’s this: I love to cook. It’s one of the reasons I opened a bed and breakfast. I’m one of the few women I know who cooks all the time, who consistently prepares actual meals for her family. My husband always says I’m kind of like a 50’s wife. We hardly ever go out to eat; I’m too busy cooking. And eating, of course. When you cook, you eat… they kind of go hand in hand. Me, raw? Not likely. I would feel deprived.

But then Alisa had her party. In those days I had very little to do with the raw food preparation. It was kind of alien to me. I was just supplying the venue. Oh, and the name. As un-raw as I then was , I was the one who came up with ‘RawWoman’. The party, in effect, was a means of introducing ‘RawWoman’ to the community. And part of the introduction – the largest part –was a smorgasbord of raw food. I watched Alisa and her crew preparing things. There was hummus and guacamole, fresh salsa and a spicy carrot dip that someone came up with on the spur of the moment. There were delicate nori seaweed chips and tortilla chips slightly jeweled with little touches of red pepper, all made from scratch. I myself had never made anything like a tortilla chip before. But the most interesting thing of all was the vegetable lasagna lovingly created from the freshest of ingredients. One of Alisa’s kitchen helpers was mixing something in a bowl that appeared to be crumbled sausage.

“What’s this?’, I ventrured,curiously.

“Oh, this is the meat”.

“Raw Meat?”, I asked incredulously, my stomach doing a sick flip of revulsion.

“Well,” Melani clarified, “ this is what we call ‘the meat’. It’s actually beets, dehydrated and mixed with a bunch of spices. Here: try some”. She held out a spoon.

Dubious, but not wanting to appear rude, I tried it. And it was good. Really good. Actually, it was kind of better than sausage. Not as fatty. Not as cloying. Surprised, I moved on to the next ‘station’ where Alisa was stirring something around in another bowl.

“What’s that?”, I asked. It looked like cheese.

“Cheese”, Alisa said, matter-of-factly. Then she laughed. “Not real cheese, of course. It’s a nut cheese.”

Never having known that you could make cheese from nuts, I was more than a little surprised. I have to admit… it sounded a little gross too.

When the entire lasagna was assembled with its layers of fresh tomato sauce, zuchinni noodles, spinach, beet meat and nut cheese, it was really delicious… no matter how bizarre it sounded. Everything tasted so fresh and full-flavored. And it was beautiful too, every color crisp and bright.

As the party began I plowed through the buffet like an industrial vacuum, sucking up everything in my path. I developed a special weakness for the Not Tuna Pate mounded in a nest of baby lettuce; I love tuna salad and this tasted like a very delicate one – but it was Not. Everything was – not just good – but, amazing! And then, there was the chocolate. The best chocolate I have ever tasted or smelled; rich, dark with cherries and flower petals. Raw chocolate. The silver churning vats of the Nestle factory could not compete with this wonderful concoction. If this is raw, I thought, I could do this. I looked around at all the people in my house, happily eating and remarking on how great everything tasted. No deprivation here. Alisa passed behind me, drink in hand. Leaning in she whispered, “It’s going really well, don’t you think?”

“Yes”, I said, “ It’s all wonderful”.