Come Go FRESH with Me!

I am delighted to roll out the details of Raw Food Rehab's upcoming 11 Week Total Health & Wellness Initiative - Go FRESH. This 11 program will kick off on Friday, April 1st and end on Thursday June 16th.

To commit to joining Go FRESH, you will need to become a member of the new Vault (currently under construction), which is where members participate in the Initiatives. As always, The Vault will be a fully private room in the RFR mansion that is dedicated to a more intense focus on getting down to the business of the diet & lifestyle principles that are embraced during the 11 Week Total Health & Wellness Initiatives. The additional details are:

~ Anyone who agrees to the Rules of Vault Participation and pays the $33 sign up fee can join the Vault at anytime during the Initiative. We will welcome new members to the Vault throughout the duration of the 11 weeks.

~ Members of the Vault can expect a special video message each week, digital copies of specially prepared material for the Go FRESH Initiative, (which offer support, inspiration, recipes, beautiful color photographs, journal pages, etc.), an opportunity to win fun & exciting giveaways, and additional features throughout the Initiative.

~ Members of The Vault are no longer required to post before photos, measurements or their weight weekly during the Initiative, but they are required to abide by our House & Vault Rules of Participation to remain a member in good standing during the 11 Weeks.

~ An additional & optional aspect of joining the Initiative is to participate in The Weight Room. Those who choose to join the Weight Room are required to post a fully clothed before photo, add their beginning measurements & weight and are required to log in for a weekly weigh in for support and accountability. This particular portion of our Initiative has proven to be very powerful in supporting members who are focusing on weight loss and weight maintenance.

The number of members I can accommodate in the Weight Room is limited and no new members will be added after April 1st, so time is of the essence if you are interested in joining us.

To sign up and secure your place in Go FRESH - The Vault and/or The Weight Room- you will need to send a payment of $33 to the link below. Once I receive your payment, your place in our Initiative is totally secure. You will will receive a confirmation email from me once your payment has been made.

To join the Vault for Go FRESH, Click Here.

To join both the Vault & The Weight Room, Click Here.

If you are interested in learning about our Darlene Knight Scholarship, please click here for all the details. Scholarship requests will only be accepted for those who want to go the distance, making the full commitment to both the Vault & Weight Room. The last day to submit a request for Go FRESH is March 25th.

Foodie Friday - Easy Pesto Wraps

Earlier this week I received a special delivery from Crown Publishing: The Raw Truth - Recipes and Resources for the Living Foods Lifestyle by Jeremy A. Safron. It is a lovely book and I've added a review for you in the Raw Food Rehab Library.

Since I have been so busy with travel and writing the past couple of weeks, I have really been keeping my food preparations very simple.....well, boring actually. This book has brought some new inspirations and I was delighted to find so many easy to prepare recipes. I thought it would be good if I made one of them for you today. I hope you enjoy it!

Pesto Wraps

For the wraps:

3 large zucchini, peeled

pinch of sun-dried sea salt

juice of 1/2 lemon

2 tomatoes, sliced

chopped green and purple basil, for garnish

For the Presto Pesto:

2 cups chopped walnuts

2 cups loosely packed green & purple basil leaves

3 cloves garlic

1 heaping tablespoon red miso

Using a vegetable peeler or mandoline, cut thin wide strips lengthwise down the zucchini. Place the strips in a bowl, cover with water, add the sea salt and lemon juice, and soak for 2 hours, or until they taste clean (not starchy). Drain, rinse and drain again.(Penni Note: I just cut the zucchini and skipped everything else - they didn't taste starchy to me).

To prepare the pesto, plavce the walnuts, basil leaves and garlic in a homogenizer juicer or a food processor to create an oily paste. Transfer the paste to a bowl and stir in the miso.(Penni Note: I added some baby spinach leaves because I didn't have quite enough basil and my I added the juice of one small lemon - also my pesto did not seem oily).

To prepare each wrap, lay a zucchini strip flat on your work surface. Drop a teaspoon of pesto in the center of the zucchini strip. Press a tomato slice into the pesto. Fold or roll up the zucchini strip and secure with a toothpick. Serve the wraps on a serving plate with the chopped basil garnish.

Again, to check out Jeremy Safron's newly released book, The Raw Truth, click here.

And to check out the entire Foodie Friday Collection, click here.

Welcoming March - Just a Little Late : )

I wanted to offer an update for you as to what's been going on with me most recently. As many of you may know who are members at Raw Food Rehab, I've been traveling back and forth to Oklahoma City a couple of days a week, working on a special project. This week, I was there for the past couple of days - on Monday - working and yesterday - I was staying over to attend the lecture and dinner with Philip McCluskey at 105degrees.

Monday's work went beautifully (and yes, I promise that I'll fill you in on the details of what I've been up to very soon), but around midnight I awoke in my hotel room with the chills and began to feel extremely ill. For those of you who have ever had a nasty stomach bug, you can imagine the scene without me offering a play-by-play. So to make an ugly story short, I was unable to attend the sold-out Philip McCluskey event at 105degrees. I was beyond disappointed, as there were a good number of Real Food Tulsa readers and Raw Food Rehab members who traveled in for the lecture/dinner. I had been looking so forward to getting to meet and spend time with the crew, but alas, the unforgiving intestinal bug won.

Fortunately, I was able to drive myself home today and although still pretty weak, I can tell I'm on the mend. So even though it's March 2nd already, I'm happy to be starting a new month in which I hope to pack plenty of excitement! This Friday, after a month off, thanks to the marvelous Michelle K of it's a High Raw Life, I'll be back in the Foodie Friday kitchen making a recipe from the Resolve to Evolve March Recipe Supplement, so you will want to be sure to tune in for that.

I also want to share that we're gearing up for our next 11 Week Initiative at RFR over the next couple of weeks.

GO FRESH - 11 Weeks of Rejuvenation & Renewal with Raw Foods will begin on April 1st! I am really looking forward to sharing some exciting details with you about this Initiative very soon. Be sure to keep your eyes on the Main Forum at RFR, as this is always where I post breaking and headline news! You can read more about what the 11 Week Total Health & Wellness Initiatives are about Here and I also want to encourage you to learn about RFR's Darlene Knight Scholarship Fund.

I sincerely hope this post finds you well and that March is off to a fantastic start. I'd really love to hear from you in the comments below - tell us how things are in YOUR world!