Are my family to offer me ANYTHING to eat that is not raw! I have made this quite clear to them all! Even my mam.

I have reset my count ups to start as of midnight tonight and my pics will be posted of my raw food choices, not all of them because who wants to see a repeat of a glass of smoothie every day? Not I for one!
I know I still need to post my new wooden bowl pics and I have another pic I want to share with you of a drawing I done years ago, about 25 years ago actually.

I am going to do more in my kitchen tomorrow because I still haven't pulled my washing machine out to clean underneath it yet. I need to empty the cupboard under our kitchen sink tomorrow also because our kitchen taps have become loose but it will give me a chance to clean that cupboard again. My hubby also needs to tighten our bathroom hot tap because for some reason that too has become loose.

I am going to definitely start Russell James' raw chef classes tomorrow which is the salad and dressings which includes salad toppings. I needed tamarind for some of his recipes which I managed to find in Tesco's, now, I have never tried tamarind before so I am a tad dubious about trying it but apparently it is like a sweet n sour taste and I like sweet n sour so it SHOULD be nice....more on Russell James's course and tamarind tomorrow.

Nighty night

On my kitchen. I pulled out my American fridge freezer and my shelves and cleaned under that lot, I still need to clean on top of my fridge freezer but I need the step ladders for that.
I have brought some plastic storage boxes down from upstairs and I now have them on the shelves with raw items inside; one box full of superfoods, the other with chocolate making products and the other with jars and packets. My next task is to pull the washing machine out and clean behind and under that. I am one of these people that like to know that under and behind things is clean....the places we can't see daily.
I now have the dishwasher going.
Still loads to do.

I still need to take a pic of my gorgeous wooden bowls and they were a bargain!

Breakfast: Strawberry & Banana Smoothie
Lunch:
Dinner:
Snacks: Banana

I dozed off for 3 hours today:(

Back later today!!

It has been a mixture of things lately. I have just finished taking my last antibiotic that I was prescribed last week. I had yet another lump on the back of my neck which is now a total of 4 lumps I have had in and on my body over these last few year. I have had two operations to remove lumps from inside my body; one in my neck at my collar bone and the other in my belly which fortunately were both benign and now this is the second lump which is more on my neck. These lumps have been cysts. The lump in my belly resulted in the surgeon having to remove other inside parts; a tube and ovary along with the what turned out to be a big cyst. as it happened I wasn't too bothered about having other parts removed, what was, was. I was prescribed antibiotics this time because this latest cyst on the back of my neck had become infected. These antibiotics have been making me visit the little girls room loads for a number 1 yet my belly is SOO bloated and just looks extra big.....ummm. You really wanted to know all that didn't you?! NOT! :)

Right then, onto other things. I was using my Cuisinart food processor last night; I was making sauerkraut but when I was only half way through grating carrot the thing decided to just STOP! That was it and no matter what we done and how long we left it there was no way it was going to start again so I had to finish making the sauerkraut using my Tefal machine. I am rather upset about my Cuisinart because it is just 2 year old and was rather expensive so my hubby rang Cuisinart today and they are going to replace it for a new cuisinart, of the same model of course, which just happens to be the latest FAB machine. Cuisinart do give a 20 year gaurantee which I am very pleased about!!

As I said above I have been making sauerkraut; a sundried tomato/italian style kraut and a kraut with asian pear in. I added probiotics also as suggested by Cafe Janae, she is wonderful and has lots of fab raw recipe's. I am also going to make her coconut yogurt. I have already made Russell James' coconut yogurt and that is SOO delicious! Speaking of Russell James, I bought some cheese papers which arrived this morning for when I make his cheeses. Russell wraps his in cheese paper and finds they store better and for longer in the fridge.
I have also purchased Russells Dessert course so I will be going through all of that and making his recipe's...watch this space!! I am going to start again with his courses and I am thinking of starting tomorrow with his main course - week 2 which is salads and dressings. I have already done his week 1 which was kitchen set up/equipment, knife skills, ingredients, F.A.S.S/the chefs table, recipe building, spice charts, meal/menu planning which I am still trying to master the art of menu planning, prep planning and shopping.

I bought some wooden bowls last week so I will post a pic of those but I will post it tomorrow.
I really need to get my kitchen scrubbed through and things organised better so I am thinking of making a start with that tomorrow also..going to be a busy ole day tomorrow.

That is all for now so I will be back tomorrow with pics.

Over the last few days despite taking prescribed medication I have been suffering with rather bad acid reflux.
I am back to raw as of today, supposed to be a few days ago but it didn't feel right so today is THE day. Being back on raw should help with the acid.

I popped to town this morning to buy some groceries for the family.
I have been admiring some black pants/trousers that my mam has been wearing lately and whilst in town I noticed that the shop that sells tham had my size back in stock; size 18...oh no! But true so I bought two pairs. I am pleased with them because they are smart and fit so comfortably. I am now working my way to the next size down.

I also went to Asda and bought some Organic cabbage and carrots for making sauerkraut. I also bought a white cabbage, so coleslaw is on the menu.
I wanted some organic carrot juice but the stores dont stock it...madness! So I decided to buy a couple of bags of carrots, I suppose buying the carrots is better anyway because once juiced I can use the pulp for raw crackers or raw carrot cake etc, and not forgetting that I also bought some brown coconuts which I am going to de-meat and grind the meat up for coconut milk, macaroons etc....loads of things. So, that is about it for this morning.

The sun is shinning for now which is nice.
The kale etc that I planted a few weeks ago don't seem to be growing...not happy about that! Kale is hardy which also made me think that it would be easy to grow, not for me it isn't.

I am going to have some strawberry and banana smoothie now.

Back later today!

Watch this space, I am coming back!!

Click here: COUNT-UPS to check out my new count-ups which start tonight at 12am.

Day 43

I have been pretty good except when it came to tea time, I had some chips...OOOHHH NOOO!
I spent time in the kitchen tonight and I've got Kefir flavouring now and I also made some Russell James Coconut yogurt.

My husband bought me a diddy little slow cooker the other day just for me because I am going to have small amounts of cooked grains EVERYTHING else raw though with the odd bowl of quinoa or other grain that is good along with raw foods, so I now have a tub of cooked quinoa in the fridge which I am going to have along with raw veg and a raw dressing for tea tomorrow.

I asked my other half to pop to Asda for a few things last week and one item I wanted was a bag of spinach, now, Asda always has bags of spinach and it usually is pretty good EXCEPT when I ask my hubby to pop to Asda to buy spinach because my hubby being my hubby gets help with the packing from the cashier and to my horror when I unpacked the bags I noticed that the cashier had actually put two 5kg bags of poatoes ON TOP of the bag of spinach....can you believe that???? Wouldn't you have thought that a lady cashier would have more sense than to do that?...UNBELIEVABLE!!!

 

Day 44

 

I have been quite good today but I did sneak one of my hubby's blue Riband biscuits.

I tell you what I am DEFINITELY going to do, I am going to do Russell James' weekly menu plans, to do plans and his shopping list plans of the foods that are on the menu for that week, might save an absolute fortune, could do with learning to save money and budget more now, so the sooner I learn the better and it starts NOW! And my raw menu planning starts NOW! The menu planning is in Russell James' first week or two of his main course, not the desserts course. I have printed out a lot of his planning sheets to keep me going.

I had raspberry flavoured kefir this morning...LOVE those raspberries!! Thanks to my friend who is also a raw foodie! I am going to buy a bag of the frozen strawberries from Costco the next time I am there.

My plans as well as the Russell James' menu planning etc is to consume a lot more probiotic and fermented foods because I think my digestion is shot so this will help get it back on the right track. I am also incorporating a few grains into my menu, not much though and just sometimes.

Have you ever watched Cafe Janae on You Tube? She is a raw foodie mostly but she has a few grains, well this is where I have got the idea of the grains from. Here is her link: Cafe Janae

Check out her vids and let me know what you think, she has some fabulous recipe's on there.

Oh My!!......I'm sure this is day 40

There has not been anything to report lately.
I have started getting the Raw Dessert course from The Raw Chef so I will be starting that soon. I am not sure why I haven't been blogging lately, I suppose laziness.

My mother brought a load of craft things for us to get stuck into which the boys will love! They are going to start a scrap book or I hope they will, I think they will enjoy doing that once they realise what it is all about.

I should be back later today.