Raw Treats

I still consider myself a "flexitarian", but definitely more vegetarian than a carnivore. I never have a craving/wanting for steak, but maybe twice a year I will really crave a well done, with blu cheese on top, hamburger. On my days off I continue to stir up new vegetarian recipes and I am finding more and more that I love it and how it makes me feel, physically as well as mentally. I could go this route entirely, but when I am also cooking for others, I find myself throwing in a chicken or turkey now and then, along with fresh fish when available. I grew up living and eating off a garden...my mom and dad were farmers at heart and always had a huge garden full of tomatoes, carrots, asparagus, potatoes, peppers, beans, peas, etc., and so we ate GOOD! Best food memory? My moms fresh vege soup. She would cut up all the veges and serve it up in a warm milk broth and oh yummm, I can taste it now! My mom never preached good eating of good food...it was just what she did and how we ate and (like I always warn my daughter) what you see as your growing up is what you end up doing! My dad was a big hunter and I have eaten more than my share of venison and steak (he was, after all, a butcher)....but somewhere along the line (sorry dad) I was easily able to give up those choices! Now I continue to look at different eating options, and recently I have looked over a few of the raw food blogs. I have a lot of reading to do on raw food, as I don't know even the basics of it yet. One of the blogs, the Raw Epicurean (rawepicurean.net), is a favorite and this last weekend I made her Hazelnut Truffles. They are light and slightly sweet and satisfying and they went together fast. I am usually much heavier on the sweet side of a recipe, so these took a little bit of getting used to for my sweet tooth, but I will be making these again. They are a great ending to a meal and I even have a few with me at work to bite into at snack time. Her blog has gotten me looking into other raw blogs and articles and it seems like all these raw foodies loose weight eating that way!!! That right there is enough to start me introducing raw food into my everyday meals...why not....and if I end up a combination vegetarian/raw foodie, well, I think that would be just fine.