tao organics

you may recall the company tao organics when they were working inside buddha-full making the burgers and kale chips and selling their products in karmavore as well.
recently (in the last few weeks!), they have opened their OWN cafe and it is actually quite close to buddha-full which means it is quite close to the sea bus and lonsdale quay in north van. yay!
me and emilee went on monday after work and it was glorious! i wish i had taken pictures inside the shop. it's tucked away in a courtyard and has windows on the multi-layered ceiling (think lovely natural light) when you first enter. there is bright blue seating outside as well as several tables inside beside the open kitchen and a couple coolers and shelves of take-home goodies.
me and em shared each a parvati roll (collard wrap with sweet raisin chutney - i used to buy the chutney at karmavore ^_^). super delicious! em mentioned she enjoyed the moist, vibrant flavour.
we both ordered lemon macaroons and ate them before (and after!) our meals after finding out that they didn't actually have cashews in them like the menu (that was getting redesigned as we ate!) said! we loved the big chunks of dried coconut flakes!

photo: avocadowalnutlovely on instagram

photo: avocadowalnutlovely on instagram

 emilee had the sushi for dinner and i had the gaia burger (which i had before at buddha-full. so delicious!)

it was awesome to get to eat at yet another raw, organic-friendly place in greater vancouver! YAY! and we were super impressed with the prices. my burger was $6.50 i think and i took home a big bag of kale chips for paul for the same price. our macaroons were $1 each! and i love that there are cashew-free options and agathe does not use green peppers at all (hurrah!) and i don't think she uses peanuts or gluten. i'm still hesitant about tamari and such, even when it is wheat-free... why doesn't it claim to be gluten-free? i'm still pretty new at all of this allergen stuff. it's easier to avoid things when you don't have to be militant. curious if after my next liver cleanse i will have even less allergies!

full + grate-ful (for) buddha-full...

12 hour days of work are no fun, especially when you get to the seabus to get home and have to wait half an hour until the next one.
then you rush back to your favourite place for food and they are closed!
but then one of the lovely owners is outside and invites you in...
then you have food to bring home for your favourite person and you to enjoy!
and the night is saved!

 thank you, buddha-full! always a delight!

oh and today, look what i took home from one of my 6 year old students! little rocks in the vase with these beautiful flowers from her garden! managed to not spill anything on the bus despite an hour of balancing with an over-capacity bus of canucks fans.

sadly, we did not win the stanley cup this year.

but is it bad that i don't care?

it's weird but i think i have finally figured out why i don't "get" hockey or watching sports in general. i think it's that i don't feel i get ANYTHING out of watching it. most or everything i do inspires me in some way and i feel i'm learning or want to create or do something after.... i've watched one hockey game and it didn't motivate me to do anything. 

so... no hockey for me.

but! raw food for me! on friday it looks like i'm going to lead a kindergarten class in creating a raw food dish. i'm thinking zucchini noodles with marinara sauce as i'm sure they will love the spirooli :)

photos of the process to come :)

oops, here's soup. it's been awhile.

i haven't written anything in forever. i swear i have been making lots of new things with success! hmm... well, to start is a soup today! i'm so happy it didn't taste awful! (for once)

what it is: brazil nuts, filtered water, a sliver of red onion, a couple sprigs of parsley, a stalk of celery, a carrot, a leaf of romaine and a spoon of sprouted chickpea miso. i was paranoid that i put too much onion in (i remember in attempts before that a little onion or garlic goes a long way when doing the raw soup) so i added more watery greens than i was originally thinking. i added the brazil nuts for creaminess when i worried it'd be too watery or "hot juice"-like. anyways, success! i ate it all with ease and even enjoyment. ha.
i feel like i should dump some photos on this ol' thing for an update so here goes...
last week i went for a picnic on the patch of grass in front of the storage place, across the street from organic lives. my friend had the tapas platter and i had one of my 'usuals', the tostada salad. of course, in my excitement to be eating AND eating outside, i slid the salad onto my lap first. but no matter.

so i bought tocotrienols the other day from, yep, organic lives, and i'm excited to up my vitamin e (so far, i've been using it in smoothies including a fantastic brazil nut milk, frozen pear and banana with ginger one). my skin has been freaking out lately and it's been driving me crazy!!! hoping more vitamin e is going to help... i was pretty proud of my "raw glow" as of last year. i guess detoxing can take quite awhile though. and i recognize i need to sleep more than a few hours a night. anyways... on the weekend, i managed an afternoon off to go on my friend's boat for a cruise around vancouver. it was BLISS!!! the water, the wind, the sun, the friends, the classic rock on the radio... the next day, my skin was noticeably more clear! i can't believe that one day can do that!!! so anyways, i have just a couple weeks until summer vacation and i'm going to be trying to sleep more and relax more before then but i'm hopeful that i will feel a lot healthier very soon!

okay, what else has been inspiring me lately? raw dessert! my friend alexia made this cheesecake a couple weekends ago for our friend anna's birthday:

 isn't it gorgeous? it tastes as great (or better?) than it looks!!!

i'm pretty sure it's the white chocolate-raspberry cheesecake (page 95) of sweet gratitude, the desserts book of cafe gratitude - an organic vegan place in san francisco i've somehow never been to despite visiting sf at least 3 times? anyways, alexia swears by this book and i requested it from the library right away. i now have it in my hands and am excitedly getting ready for my first attempt at something - the alexia-recommended "lemon-poppy seed cake" (page 54). i'm thinking if the sun comes out next weekend as well, it'd be super amazing to bring this out with some friends on grass somewhere or maybe if i'm especially lucky, on the water again!

hmm, so what other excitement? i've started making cracker/bread type things again! i was inspired by organic lives's sesame gaufrette but thought i'd try something to make a wrap. i blended up soaked medjools, sesame seeds and red onion, orange and a date or 2 and spread out on the teflex. ooh yes! so great! i don't have an exact recipe but each time i've done it, it's been great! though i do recommend one orange rather than 2. me and paul are imagining raw perogies in the near future! YES!!!

and what else? i finally attempted to make coconut jerky! i have been nervous about wasting my frozen organic coconut meat (not the cheapest stuff ever) on such attempts but i have since learned, you can't really screw up a good thing. coconut is just so fantastic... i guess if you have all yummy things together, you can't go wrong! regardless, i felt safer with a recipe to at least loosely follow and this is the one i found: 

Meat of 1 Young Thai Coconut - sliced in strips

Marinade:
1 T Agave
1 t Nama Shoyu
1/4 t each of Cardamom, Cumin, Cinnamon, Black Pepper and Salt

Marinate the Coconut strips in the marinade for 4 hours and then dehydrate.
I liked it best after in for 3-4 hours before I went to bed, but then I flipped and left it in until morning - and they were a bit too tough, still very delicious and great exercise for the jaws! 

ok it's funny to me now as i guess i didn't follow this all that closely but i was definitely heavily inspired. i don't use agave so i'm not sure what i used, if anything, in it's place.. i'm sure i used tamari instead of nama shoyu (not raw or soy-free but them's the breaks!) and i used the caradamon, cumin and cinnamon and some salt and maybe pepper. the texture is so awesome when you dehydrate the meat. i'm excited to experiment with this further!

hmmm... what else? well i am always super inspired and excited to eat at buddha-full in north vancouver. 

a few weeks ago, there was some sun and my friend and i ate outside. i finally tried their raw lasagna!

 super delicious, as to be expected, though i thought it was a little small for the price. but i am more than willing to pay for such things. i'd much rather have access to this kind of take-out than anything else!!!

bought a cheesecake for the bus ride home :) is it bad that i can no longer remember what kind it was?

ah, and as usual, had to get some of agathe's raw burgers for easy dinner later at home! 

here's some pics from the last time we made raw burgers at home!

it appears that agathe is no longer producing raw food items under the name "nature provides". looking at buddha-full's site, her company now appears to be called "tao organics". 

it looks like i will get to go to buddha-full on wednesday (hurrah!) so i'm excited to try one of their new menu items!

okay... 2 more updates... since i last posted, paul has been inspired to make his own raw dinner! i was so excited! it's always so much fun to eat something someone else has prepared!

i wish i could remember what he put together but i think it involved kelp and zucchini noodles, avocado, nutritional yeast (undoubtedly), tomato... and awesomeness. :) 

and last but not least, my 2nd year volunteering with growing chefs is almost done yet again. here's an inspiring photo from probably a month back already! look at this classroom garden! happy sigh!

happy growing and eating and loving!

organic connections cafe

last sunday, i was super excited and lucky to get to white rock to check out organic connections cafe.

they are a mostly raw, all vegan cafe overlooking the water and eek, it was great!

here is the menu:

i had the banana ice cream sundae first!

then all 3 of us ordered the burger! i had it with the side salad with dijon dressing (DELICIOUS) and my favourite boys had soups. 

 had to have dessert again after lunch... the blueberry cheesecake! and check out the "just eat an apple" magazines from 2002/3... wish it was still around now!

can't wait to go back! though it'd take almost 2 hours to get there on transit if i were to try! but it'd be worth it!

catching up...

i've been terrible at updating lately but of course still taking photos of foods i think are fun.
one night in the last few weeks (gah!), i made some sort of ice cream. i'm guessing it was a chocolate mint type thing. but maybe it was just mint leaves on the side of something with cacao nibs. i'm guessing frozen bananas were involved, a splash of almond milk (which i FINALLY started making my own of! hurrah for vitamix!) and who knows. was that it? was there some lucuma maybe? why is it so white? oh man, i'm thinking now that this might just be some of that coconut milk ice cream which is not raw in the least. it might be the chocolate chip mint one and i added nibs to it to make it more legit. ha. the martini glasses help too, right?

ok so ANYWAYS, feb. 13th me and paul hosted some friends for raw dinner. YAY!!! first up (after a veggie juice!) was the caeasar salad i believe i've posted before. i like to practice first so it's not so nervewracking having people over. though i love doing a recipe/idea for the first time for potlucks. maybe it's because there are other dishes/people involved so it's not all relying on me!

then... the raw lasagna! YAH! that day i was like CRAP i don't have anything white or cheese like for a ricotta type layer!!! so i went to gorilla food for some of their alfredo sauce to put as a layer along with marinated mushroom, pine nut pesto, sundried tomato sauce with slices of roma and then ani phyo's marinara sauce for top and bottom layers!

i LOVE all the layers! i felt i put a bit too much thyme (time? ha, not really) into the marinara sauce but at least it wasn't bland?

 for dessert... the brazil nut/almond 'shortbread' from organic lives. these are soooo awesome. i have been begging for them to keep this cookie going. i think hearts are TOTALLY relevant past valentines' day but i don't care the shape of them! if that's why they're done, they should just make 'em in another shape! i just want them again! they are the best! i don't know how you would pick a baked sugar cookie when you could have these!!!

 ooh and then another day recently, i finally made use of the burgers (from nature provides) i bought at karmavore. warmed em up in the dehydrator and packed some romaine leaves (the bun!) with beets and peppers and onions. hurrah! i went to buddha-full the other day and noticed their amazing kale chips are from nature provides. i didn't previously make the connection that the fabulous pizza (i had bought the crust from karmavore also) and raw burger was nature provides also! and so then i'm told that they are building a spot for nature provides in the restaurant to make everything there in house! eek! i love buddha-full. they are going to start having theme nights, i think the last friday of the months so there is a raw meal of a certain style of food like italian or what not. organic lives did an indian one in january which i sadly missed. they debuted a raw samosa which will hopefully be appearing on the menu any day now. i think they are doing a mexican night next! anyways... excited to see what will be served up in buddha-full in the coming months!

 and then there is rooted cafe in eternal abundance on the drive. i was there on friday for dinner and started with the raw chocolate heart! YES! not too sweet... just right!

 and gah, the raw kale caeasar... i could eat a million of these forever. i can't imagine getting sick of this!

 raw tomato red pepper soup with flax cracker. excellent! and inspiring me to get on trying the soups in the vitamix again...

 and well, i had to have a second dessert! after dinner! hehe. the cheesecake! YES!!!

i want to get out to the drive more often. i love what the rooted cafe is doing!!! the food and the people there are so amazing!!!