FREE Fortnightly Recipes and Tips
Published April 21, 2012 | 
Two of the most important things in the world, food and water (and sweet fizzy wine… NO, wash your mouth out Joy, no, not with the wine!). The media is starting to rumble and warn us that food and food production is going to be the common denominator for wars in the near future. 
We need to start growing our little edible patch now and then take self defence lessons in how to protect it. My judo is a bit rusty by about 35 years but if someone threatens my food source beware the power that could be unleashed! 
In the interests of doing our bit for food, 4 of us had a lovely weekend in the Blue Mountains. I picked up Toni, a visiting raw foodie friend from Buffalo, America and we drove up to stay with Tony & Libby, another 2 passionate raw foodies. Put all that enthusiasm for food and non-cooking together and creativity flows along with non-stop conversation about, well about food of course. I hear many of you groaning. I know, but hey, you have to admit that I have found the perfect solution in raw fresh living foods.
I can eat and eat and still maintain this shapely, sexy body of a 20 year old, okay maybe 35 year old. Toni has an amazing figure too and I’ve seen her play Twister! Raw food heals the joints, your flexibility comes back.
We drove into Katoomba and visited the local co-op first to buy 8 bunches of kale, the wonder green that is becoming more popular here in Australia, then the local fruit & veggie shop to fill up the trolley with colour. At the bottle store we chose organic and preservative free wine to complement the healthy food.
The rest of the weekend was a blur of talking, laughing and food preparation. Kale chips were put into the dehydrator, more kale was massaged into a divine salad along with spiralised zucchini and 2 sauces. Breakfasts were sweet fruits blended into porridge, served with hemp and banana.
Lunch was a striking green lemony soup with enough nutrients to wake up any sleepy digestive system and served with Tony & Libby’s signature flax onion bread. Dinner loomed and we voted to have the delicious kale salad again with falafel, tabouli and cabbage salad. Just reminding you all, these are all raw versions of traditional dishes and you thought we just ate cucumber and tomato? 
There are too many pictures to share so I will load the rest up on facebook and those of you, who enjoy staring at food pictures without actually making anything, have fun! 
Buon Appetito!
Published April 13, 2012 | People have been asking, so did we succeed, do we still love each other, do we still want to travel together? At the beginning of this trip one of my goals was to see how we coped in a small space travelling along. We have a dream of retiring from work, renovating a bus and taking off into the wide blue yonder, like so many others. 
So did we succeed on our 24-day trip? Traditional meat eating, loves cooked food Aussie male with wannabe raw vegan fresh living foods South African girl. I mention the South African bit because even though I have been Australian for over 20 years, the paranoia of feeling secure, constantly locking doors and watching strangers with suspicion does not go away (and can drive those close to me nuts).
Hell yes there were moments that didn’t work and times where it did flow smoothly. If you want to test any relationship, go on a trip together! Travel brings out the best and worst in us, a different set of rules. Throw in the extreme diet differences and who knows what could happen.
Our standard phrase of ‘I keel you’ to diffuse tense situations works a treat. You try staying angry at someone when you say it. Watch some You Tubes on Jeff Dunham the ventriloquist with Achmed the dead terrorist and tell me it’s not funny! His ‘n Hers dinners, barbecued veg for him, salad with veggie sausages and lentils for her.
Most women analyse, need and want more. More of what? Well pretty much more of everything! More communication, couple time, special moments, a point to life, reasons for doing things. I asked Geoff:
J: So how do you think the trip went?
G: Good.
J: Anything we could do better, differently?
G: Not really.
J: Did my diet and food choices cause any problems
G: None at all.
J: Well I felt that we could have communicated more, especially at mealtimes when we were in café’s and restaurants, you know, make eye contact and really talk to each other. And because the evenings and nights were cold I was inside the van most of the time with the little heater going full blast. You were outside a lot of the time because you smoke and get too warm inside. 
It was hard for me to stay high raw when you were cooking crispy potatoes & veggies on the barbecue and drinking beer, because then I wanted some and also wanted to drink wine. And making up the bed in the van every night was a frikking pain in the ass although luckily your snoring didn’t keep me awake too often and we had enough blankets. So what do you think?
G: Let’s do it all over again to make sure!
In the end I was the one with issues over talking, food & alcohol temptations, cold weather, security and feeling grumpy about some things. Geoff bless him, had a lovely holiday (even though he didn’t catch a fish), gives me big cuddles and loves me no matter what. So how do you analyse that? Asked Geoff this question and he said ‘Fucked if I know!’
Published April 9, 2012 | Damn duty free shops, they shouldn’t be allowed or at least we shouldn’t be forced to walk through them to get out of the immigration area. 
Here I am home again, holidays over and getting into the daily routine of life. Routine helps us get back on track sets the boundaries and life flows smoothly onwards. Geoff and I went past the supermarket and I stocked up on my staples: tomatoes, cucumbers, red capsicum and leafy greens – cos lettuce or bok choy, English spinach.
Unless you have experienced the incredible lightness of being with a high raw diet, it’s hard to describe it to you – the flat tummy feeling, the energy levels, the juicy refreshing delicious dishes. It’s like looking at life through clean clear lenses. 
Lots to catch up throughout the day, the usual holiday return stuff, piles of mail to open, washing to do, unpacking. Buzzing around happily getting in order and feeling productive. Night time draws near, the computer calls with so many things to action for my business, the raw food groups, friends and family. I have had dinner, I am full, truly. 8pm and am leaning towards having a ‘little something’, just a snack which could be dates or nuts but wait….
Duty free. Damn duty free. I know it’s in the cupboard, behind closed doors where I put it. Why did I buy it? Well because it’s a good price, tax free and nice to have now and then. And the toblerone was buy 3 get 1 free, mini toblerone white, milk and dark choccies sitting in the cupboard right next to me. Who can I blame, there must be someone I can point a finger at after I have drunk a healthy triple tot of Southern Comfort and ingested a few mini choccies.
Scene of the crime – empty glass and chocolate papers strewn across desk.
If the government didn’t charge such hefty import taxes on some commodities then there wouldn’t be duty free shops and we wouldn’t feel almost compelled to enjoy the cheaper prices. So I am blaming the government for my night time weakness!
bok choy, cos lettuce, English spinach, flat tummy, high raw diet, Southern ComfortPublished April 1, 2012 | Ah if only I could send you all the stunning photos we took in the South Island, every possible landscape. Here are a couple more showing the diversity from beautiful to serene to stark glacier. 
I’ve been blogging the old fashioned way all my life in the form of hand written letters – my word how did I ever manage that? With the advent of electric typewriters I was able to communicate with more legible writing. Then computers came along with Word programmes, how GREAT an invention! Email came on the scene and I could share my letters with everyone at once. Then the BLOG which links to a website and has funky things so you can add photos, videos and techy stuff. Goodness knows what will be next. I never seem to quite catch up. 
These days I can write to all of you and a larger audience via the Internet, so besides having fun and sharing experiences, I am also spending time working on my raw healthy food workshop business.
In every Sales & Marketing course we have learnt that Social Media has become of utmost importance. We don’t all sit on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter just for fun; it is now an integral part of business building. Along with loving to write and play with food the idea is to send all of you a link to click on to read my blog at my webpage www.fruvenu.com.au Here you can see the photos in between the text, much nicer than having to open each attachment.
And the almighty powerful Google watches over all the millions of bloggers worldwide. The statistics say that google does not pay attention to your blog until you have made at least 25 posts (blogs). This immediately rules out the few million who enthusiastically start their own blog only to peter out after number 3, 11, 19 …. For the millions of us left who do reach 25, we hope that our content is creating some interest. Just to let you know I am up to blog number 15 with this one and I look forward to continuing and reaching my target whilst entertaining you, the readers.
My contribution to YOUR lives is good health with a bit of humour thrown in and an honest account of my daily travels and activities good and bad. I hope you enjoy and start to use some of the recipes/suggestions and get a giggle on the way.
So grab a cup of herbal tea and some raw bikkies, sit down, relax and read on!
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