About this site:

This blog serves as a repository for all my favorite raw food recipes. Up until a year ago, I in fact already had what I thought was a great site up and running with hundreds of recipes, but (and don’t ask me how this happened) I managed to erase all the data. No backup, naturallement, ludite that I am. I was so devastated at losing all my recipes that it’s taken some time to mentally prepare to start from scratch again, but I’m now motivated! Now I have a new server, a new domain name, a new title, a new look, and new and better recipes (to come)!

The recipes are not all original here – far from it: I get my raw kitchen concoctions from books, magazines, online sites, and raw vegan friends. I provide links to these resources whenever possible. On the very rare occasion I come up with something original, although simple – I won’t be shy in letting you know!

Not all raw vegan recipes are created equal. Some are harder to make than others, some require fancy equipment, and some are a more than just a little too high in fat to be considered healthy. I try to steer away from those on this site. That said, a few time-consuming recipes are worth it on special occasions,  a dehydrator can be a great piece of equipment for making food last for weeks (thereby saving preparation time) and for recreating your favorite cooked food delights, and a little high-fat sin is perfectly acceptable once in a while, no? Still, the goal here is to provide myself, and YOU, with fast, easy, tasty, and healthy raw food recipes. I don’t mind (un)cooking, but unfortunately I’d much rather spend my time eating and blogging about food than actually preparing it.

About me:

my alter ego avatar - nope, no tats in real life!

I (Cathrine-Mette (TRINE) Mork) am a Canadian expat who’s been teaching mostly EFL at universities in Japan since 1995. I turned vegetarian when I was in university myself in 1989, but had a difficult time avoiding fish when I first moved to Miyazaki in Southern Kyushu. EVERYTHING seemed to have at least fish in it! But times have changed, and I live in the Big Mikan that is Tokyo now, a city that offers a lot more food diversity. There are not only now a couple of raw food eateries, but there are vegan hangouts shooting up here and there on a regular basis now.

I have been experimenting with different degrees of the raw food lifestyle since the beginning of 2009. I wish I’d known about this way of eating earlier!  The first month experimenting with this lifestyle I was pretty much 100% raw, and like so many others who’ve done the same, I felt absolutely fantastic! I initially only wanted to try it to see if it would help me loose some weight (it did), but subsequent motivation to continue was based more on the way it made me feel, so I did, roughly for about 6 months. Then what happened? I had a sudden influx of stress and retreated into some bad eating habits, like eating processed breads on the odd evening, and then it got worse: I fell off the wagon big time. This too, apparently, happens to a lot of people in the early stages of their raw food journey, most often because they are too strict with themselves, as was I. Another lesson learned!

Now my approach is more moderate. I let myself eat out with friends at “normal” places (usually at izakayas, as they have salads en masse these days) and I am no longer 100% raw, that’s for sure. I eat things like sweet potatoes, brown rice and sometimes beans and lentils. I feel that when there is a choice between cooked foods and high-fat raw substitutes, I am better off with the former.  Also, I no longer mentally punish myself for eating the occasional faux pas, whether it be bread, or even the odd bit of fish of cheese (Go to notmilk.com to find out why you should ideally NOT do this).

I don’t personally believe that having a piece of grilled salmon once or twice a year should discredit me from self-proclamation as a vegetarian (although the heavy metals in fish these days are to be avoided, and there are more omega3s to be found in chia seeds than in salmon). Nor do I feel I deserve to be stripped of the vegan title for having a slice of  pizza with cheese (!) once in an extremely blue moon. I admit that my personal reasons for veganism are more for health and the environment than for animal rights, though I do feel that the current methods of animal “production” are unnecessarily cruel; I am against factory farming more for the negative impact it has on society, our health, and the environment.

One thing I am adamant about, however, is drinking (eating?) a massive green smoothie almost every morning. No better way to start the day, me thinks! In any case, it’s all about one’s overall, dominant philosophy, n’est ce pas? And mine is: eat predominantly  fresh, raw (unheated/ unpasteurized/ unrefined/ unprocessed) plant-based food → feel great → live long!