Tulsa Whole Foods Event

Last evening Whole Foods hosted a raw food event for Real Food Tulsa. Philip Hiserodt, the new head chef, is really enthusiastic about the growing population of raw food enthusiasts here in Tulsa. This is Philip's fifth Whole Foods assignment and I feel so fortunate to have a young, dynamic and forward thinking person in charge of the prepared foods section of the store.
We had an impressive turn out, with the final count being just at 50 people. Philip did a fantastic food prep demo of three raw food recipes and they will begin offering at least two raw food dishes in the deli each week. Tulsa, we've come along way, Baby! Also a big thank you to James Aguilar at Whole Foods for getting this ball rolling in the first place and for his commitment to building the raw food offerings within the store during the upcoming months. Let's be sure to support their efforts by our purchases!

Although last night's recipes are the property of Whole Foods and the exact measurements can't be shared, Philip agreed to let me share with you what was in each dish and you can have fun playing with them in the quantities you would enjoy!

Fresh Corn & Tomato Salad

• fresh corn, cut from the cob
• roma tomatoes, diced
• green bell peper, diced
• red onion, diced
• fresh garlic, minced
• lime juice
• lemon juice
• extra virgin olive oil
• cilantro
• sea salt & pepper to taste

Cabbage Cashew Salad

• red & green cabbage, shredded
• raw cashews
• cilantro
• yellow & red bell peppers
• lime juice
• olive oil
• sea salt & pepper, to taste

Orange Spinach Salad

• spinach
• mushrooms
• oranges
• red onion
• walnuts

Tahini Dressing

• fresh orange juice
• dates
• raw tahini
• garlic
• fresh lemon juice

I would put the dressing ingredients into a blender to emulsify.

We ran out of time last night, but this was the other recipe we had planned. Here are the ingredients and be sure to look for this in the deli counter!

Kale & Seaweed Salad

• shredded kale
• arame seaweed
• nama shoyu
• fresh ginger
• olive oil
• sesame seeds

Now, THAT'S GOOD EATS! Sorry, Alton Brown...I still love you!

Tuesday Afternoon Update: I just came from the Whole Foods' deli (4 pm) & they had 2 different raw kale salads & the cabbage cashew salad available! I am so happy!!!

Matt Monarch & Angela Stokes in Tulsa

Save the Date - Thursday, May 21st - Real Food Tulsa welcomes Matt Monarch & Angela Stokes!

Award-winning author, Angela Stokes, lost an amazing 160lbs with a raw lifestyle, reversing morbid obesity. 30-year-old Angela went raw in May 2002 and her life has since dramatically transformed. Her website shares her amazing story of recovery, along with guidance and inspiration for others. She shares videos, before/after pictures and also maintains a regularly updated blog. Angela has written books, facilitates retreats, conducts consultations and lectures to standing room only crowds internationally, teaching about her lifestyle and journey to radical health.

In February 2007, she completed a 92-Day Juice Feast and her juicing book, A Juice Feaster's Handbook, has inspired countless others, including me, onto amazing juicy journeys. Angela is a valued mentor and one of the most real and meaningful personalities in the natural health, raw food movement. Her most recent book, Raw Emotions, explores raw food transformations beyond the physical level. Angela's story was also a featured story this year on CNN, and it remains one of the website's most visited pages.

Matt Monarch was one of my first online acquaintances when I switched to a raw food diet in 2005. He has always been so supportive and helpful to me each time I needed an encouraging word. Matt has been a 100% raw vegan for 9 years. He dove head-first into this lifestyle after reading Norman Walker's classic book, Become Younger. Matt didn't go raw to relieve health issues; being raw simply made sense to him. After five years raw, Matt wrote the book, Raw Spirit, covering various physical challenges and spiritual shifts that going raw can involve. Matt considers his second book, Raw Success, like his "Bible" for being raw. He travels worldwide teaching about eating healthily and healing degenerative diseases. He runs the popular online store, The Raw Food World, of which there is a link on the left column of this page. Matt also maintains his daily blog here.


The venue for this event will be announced soon, but be sure to mark your calendars NOW for this very exciting evening. Their lecture will be held in Tulsa and will begin at 7 pm. The charge will be $20 per person and seating will be limited. Matt & Angela will also have a number of books and products available for you to browse and/or purchase while they're in town. If you live near Tulsa and are not already a member of Real Food Tulsa, please join us so you will be one of the first to have an opportunity to reserve your seat.

Raw Event of the Year

Matt Monarch & Angela Stokes are getting married on Sunday, June 21st 2009 – Summer Solstice/Father's Day – and they would love for you to join them. They have created a website with all of the exciting details here.

I think it's cool that they have also created an entire fun-filled week of events around the wedding to mark this special occasion. On Saturday June 2oth, there will be the Raw Expo/Festival. Sunday will be their very special and unique wedding celebration. And for those who are able to stay longer, they are opening up their honeymoon week with an educational retreat that is sure to be off the charts. The theme of the expo and honey moon week’s festivities will be Raw Foods, Healing, Permaculture and LOVE !!

You can attend as many of the planned activities as you wish. The actual Wedding is free for all to attend and all expo attendees are also welcomed as their guests at the Wedding Post–Celebration on June 21st.

As the Food Editor of RawFu Magazine, I'm so excited to be reviewing the raw food buffet and the Raw Wedding Cake that will be created by The Raw Family themselves… the Boutenko’s! They have an entire three-tier cake planned for this luminescent Wedding Celebration. I can’t wait until Mr. & Mrs. Monarch cut the cake!!!

On Saturday, at the Raw Expo/Festival, there are going to be many AMAZING Speakers including Angela Stokes, Matt Monarch, David Wolfe, Bunny Berry, Shazzie, the Boutenko’s, Philip McCluskey, Anthony Anderson (the Raw Model) and many more to come…

Just so you have the dates:

The Expo/Festival - Saturday June 20th and Sunday June 21st.
The Wedding and Celebrations - June 21st.
The Honeymoon Retreat - June 22nd – June 28th.

I encourage you to explore their website and discover which speakers are coming, costs, available accommodations, activities and so much more…I'd be overjoyed if you can come join me in Medford, Oregon this summer for this raw event of the year!
To order your ticket for the Raw Union please go here.

Making the Shift

Today is Day 1 of the latest RawFu Challenge. Although this video was made sometime ago, I thought hat today was a great time to finally upload it and share my thoughts with you.

If you've been successful with a raw food diet for sometime, I'd love for you to share with everyone how you've been able to make the shift that has helped you reach for your personal health and dietary goals. And if you're totally new to raw foods, I'd really enjoy hearing what your motivations are for making the shift.

Hope today has been a great day for you!

Someone You Should Know - Debbie Young

Debbie Young is most well known in the natural healing and raw food communities as Debbie Does Raw. Not only is Debbie a gorgeous, dynamic, humorous, inspirational, and captivating woman....she's also a wife, mother, step-mother, sister, daughter, cosmetologist (you know I love that!), athlete AND she is graciously and triumphantly living with and overcoming a cancer diagnosis through her healthy lifestyle and positive attitude.

I recently asked Debbie if she would make a guest blog appearance on Real Food Tulsa, and she generously delivered a post that couldn't be more timely. Be sure to visit her blog, Debbie Does Raw, and follow her on Twitter. I promise you, Debbie is absolutely someone you should know!

Let Sleeping Monkeys Lie: Why Raw Food Is Not Enough

Lots of people want to talk about what I eat. What? Well, yeah, I do call my blog Debbie Does Raw, so unless they think I am a nudist, they want to talk "tofurkey" with me. Which is great. I love my raw vegan diet, giving juicy tips on juicing, sharing luscious raw food secrets, drooling over food porn. But it’s not the whole story. Not by a long shot. Here is a direct quote from me, Debbie Does Raw, on my Crazy Sexy Life forum page: "Healing is a holistic endeavor that I approach in a multifaceted way. There is no magic bullet cure, only many many fragments that add up to vibrant health and a beautiful life here on earth." Wow, I must have been having a deep thoughts kind of day. So if food is just a facet of vibrant health what else keeps me going strong?
Relax. Yes, I said relax, and I mean it. Don’t make me come over there. One of the driving forces that sent me for a check up and led to my diagnosis of cancer was my incredible inability to relax, ever, or sleep for more than four hours straight. My mind was in constant overdrive, in fact, day and night. Some of my “best” thinking happened at 3:20 am, and it went something like this: “I’m awake now, how will I go back to sleep? I need to get up by 7 am and get Sam’s lunch made and the PTA meeting is tonight. When was the last time I got my teeth cleaned? Did I email everyone about the school garden? What will I make for dinner? Got to go to Trader Joes. Did Warner get those copies printed? I better check my bank account, I might be overdrawn again.. What time is it now?"

You get the picture.....in Buddhist terms it is called Monkey Mind, a restless never still crazy train. I think my monkey was on crack. There’s something about being told you have a chronic, fatal, untreatable (by allopathic medicine) disease that makes you change a few things, just a few dozen things.

Ok, right, Everything. Sleep became an art and science. I draped a dark sheet over the bamboo blinds so the room was pitch black, seems any light disrupts the immune function of the pineal gland. I started meditating, added yoga to the mix, and started doing Qi Gong, a form of Tai Chi known for it’s healing properties. I stopped trying to force my child to actually go to bed at a certain time with the story and all the bedtime stuff and let my husband do it. I became militant about my rest and meditation time. I was known to yell loudly “Leave Mommy alone, I am trying to MEDITATE!!!” That monkey was still hanging out in my head; he was obviously not fully rehabbed.

So how, pray tell, do you relax while Rome Burns or sometimes, your family’s vegan dinner? I have three techniques that I learned via the magic of my Ipod and the Triangle Vegetarian Society podcast. The speaker was Larry Green, a 25-year vegetarian and kinesiologist. I tried these at around 4 am the other day, well, yeah; sometimes the Monkey still wakes me up. I use this time to shove that earplug in, squint into the face of the Ipod to choose a meditation or listen to enlightening fare like the We Like it Raw podcast by Dhrumil Purohit, or seriously silly comedy. It depends on my monkey’s mood. No one wants an angry monkey, trust me. Mr. Green shared three ways to calm the monkey right down, turn him into a good boy, and keep his chatter down to a low roar.

Here they are in no particular order:
One: The Hand to Forehead Movie By placing your open palm across your forehead, you calm your mind and help your thoughts clear. Once you have your hand touching your forehead, close your eyes and play out a stressful situation, movie style. First time through, do it with exquisite detail, the replay it faster and faster, each time directing and editing it to result in the outcome you desire. I love to do this with encounters at the oncologist office, just imagining how nice it will go, how pleasant it will be and how friendly everyone will act. Works for me, the monkey falls right asleep when the movie starts.

Two: The Cook Hook Up No, it’s not a new dating site. It is a way to calm even crazy chaotic children. Teach it to your kids so their monkeys don’t wake yours up.

Cross your left ankle over your right. Now, cross your left palm over your right, interlacing the fingers with the left hand on top, or in front of the right wrist. Stretch your arms, left wrist over right up over your head. Breathe in, touching the tip of your tongue to the roof of your mouth. Breathe out and drop the tongue. Keep doing this for a few minutes. Drop your hands to your heart area and touch the fingertips together. Keep your left ankle crossed over the right for another minute of the tongue trick. Enjoy the calm, relaxed stare your body and mind will be in. Teachers can use this to help de-stress hyper kids, teach them this technique if you want to be teacher’s pet!

Three: Alternate Nostril Breathing This is a Hatha yoga technique. Lightly place your hand into a fist, then press your thumb against your right nostril and lightly place your index and middle fingers against the left nostril. Block the left nostril gently, breathing deeply in through your right side only. Breathe out, still on just the right side, then block the right side and breathe in using only your left nostril. Try for ten repetitions or however many it takes for you to feel relaxed. Raw food is not the end all and be all to a healthy life. Eating the optimum diet does no good if the vehicle you are fueling is run down and tired out. Harmony between body and mind are key facets of the healing diamond. Your monkey will thank you.

Debbie's beautiful daughter, Sam, at Golden Bridge Yoga Studio

Debbie, my monkey and I thank you for your wisdom today.....how did you know I needed that?

Ruby's Raw Brag Book

Andre's Revenge - Day 99 from Bunny Berry on Vimeo.

Every Thursday I guest vlog on RawFu. Today we're a day away from coming to the end of another 100 Day Challenge. Our next challenge will start on Monday - April 21st. I hope you'll be joining us for the fun and inspiration.

On today's video, I show off my raw food recipe and article "brag book." It's probably the most used item in my raw food kitchen. I encourage you to design a personalized raw book for yourself.

I'll be spending the holiday weekend with family at our farm in southwest Oklahoma. Perhaps I'll be able to gather some footage of the place and people for your viewing entertainment. The Shelton's always know how to put the fun back in dysfunctional! I look forward to being back with you again next week! And if you celebrate Easter.... have a blessed resurrection Sunday!

People You Should Know......

I've waited long enough to share my excitement with all of you here at Real Food Tulsa! Before I explain why I'm so ecstatic, I'd like to officially introduce you to a very dear friend of mine, Geoffrey van Glabbeek. In Tulsa, Geoffrey is known as Chef Geoff and although he is rather humble about his many accolades, I'd like to share a bit of Geoff's impressive background.

Geoff's passion for food began some years ago while he was working a summer position cooking with Chef Jacques Lisonnet at the Adams Mark Hotel in downtown Tulsa. This passion continued to be fueled by his work at both Bodean Fish Market and Biga in which he learned the importance of using the freshest ingredients. His reportoire further expanded as he learned to make breads and create seasonal menus at Utica Square's esteemed Stonehorse Café.

By this time Geoff's passion for creating amazing food was set. Geoff left Tulsa to attend the prestigious Culinary Institute of America in New York's Hyde Park, where he worked closely with the professional chef instructors in the classroom, commercial kitchen and in catering numerous and impressive events. After graduation, Geoff returned to Tulsa and immediately took the position of Pastry Chef for Montereau and then was promoted to the position of Executive Sous Chef.

Geoff later became the Chef de Cuisine at the Palace Café where he wrote seasonal menus and developed relationships with local farms and their organic growers. This is really where Geoff's love of organic, fresh, ripe and local fruits and vegetables took flight and became an essential part of his creative, delicious and beautifully presented dishes.

In 2006, Geoff became the Executive Chef and General Manager of Lava Noshery, chosen as Best New Restaurant of 2007 by the Tulsa World. This past July, Geoff was named Tulsa’s most Exuberantly Inventive Chef in Tulsa People magazine’s Food Lover’s Guide. Geoff was then offered a position as the Chef de Cuisine at Soleil in the Colcord Hotel, which moved him to the heart of downtown Oklahoma City. Although I was sad to see Geoff leave Tulsa, I recognized this move as a positive step in his already very successful career.

It was not by coincidence that Matthew Kenney happened to be staying at the Colcord Hotel several months ago. I happened to mention that one of my dear friends was the chef de cuisine in the hotel's restaurant and that's when the synchronicities began. After a series of meetings and interviews, Chef Geoff has been hired for the position of Chef de Cuisine at Oklahoma City's (perhaps the world's) most ambitious raw food project, 105degress. To learn more about this epic restaurant, culinary institute and lifestyle store, see Matthew Kenney's online magazine, Matthew Kenney Lifestyle.I couldn't be anymore delighted by the way this is all unfolding in such a magical, exciting way. 105degrees is scheduled to be open in mid September with the grand opening celebration in early October. Be sure to let me know when you plan to visit 105degrees so I can tell Chef Geoff you're coming!!

Please Pray for Trinity

Kevin & Sarah Parker's (of Going Bananas) daughter, Trinity, is in very critical condition. Sarah has been an inspiration to so many within the raw food community. Right now, Trinity is fighting for her life and Kevin has created a blog on which he is keeping their many caring friends, family and readers up to date on their precious daughter's condition. I hope you'll join me in taking a moment to stop by the Parker's blog and send your warmest wishes and prayers.....it would mean so much to them right now. Thank you!

Rocking the Fu......Again.

In today's video, I'm shamelessly doing another plug for Raw Fu Magazine. As the proud Food Editor, I honestly couldn't be any more excited about this magazine. Since I've been privy to a bit of the insider scoop, (as in, I've seen the layout), and it's gorgeous...nothing else like it in the marketplace. If you have had any exposure to Bunny Berry, you have a sense of her creative genius. I think that even if you don't give a flip about raw food, you'll love this magazine and be able to learn and grow from its thoughtful, inspirational, educational and captivating contents.

To subscribe, go here. Send an email and tell all your health conscious friends that there's a new mag in town....RawFu, Baby!! Subscribe today....all the cool kids are doing it!