As you may know already, I am a big fan of eating healthy. God knows I have my bad days, when nothing can stand between me and a piece of dark, rich chocolate…but for the rest of the time, I am doing my best to be decent with myself and eat as much raw foods as possible. Nowadays, I am more often than not fighting tooth and nail just to see my son taste some fresh fruits & veggies. So far, I am failing miserably. And frankly, I feel I am running out of ideas.

To cut a long story short, I tried going all raw for a week. Out of the 7 days-target, I succeeded in eating raw vegan foods for 5 days…I’d say pretty good for a first try. I could have done the whole 7 days, had I prepared better in shopping for specific raw foods that are currently not sold in the supermarket. Things like goji berries or various raw “breads” that I couldn’t make in house, as I don’t have a dehydrator.

Conclusion after 5 days? I wouldn’t be able to be 100% raw foodist. I could easily do 1-2 raw meals a day – since I love having fruit smoothies in the morning and usually have lunch by myself. But dinner time would have to be cooked food that I could enjoy together with my partner. I have to add also that at the end of the 5 days trial, I felt good, energized, and alert.

In her book, “Evie’s Kitchen” , Shazzie encourages those who want to go raw but can’t do 100%, to try and eat at least 51% in weight of raw food at every meal. According to her “this magic number allows our bodies to recognize enough of the food to digest, rather than attack it.”

She goes on to explain that the problem with cooked food is that our bodies doesn’t recognise it, treats it as an “invader” and causes leukocytosis. Meaning, white blood cells are released into the stomach to fight it, just like they would fight a virus. “Having leukocytosis many times a day is the reason why our bodies can end up in a terrible auto-immune self-attacking state.” These being said, it is up to us to try to create a better health for our whole family.

Inspired by her book, today I prepared a very easy and tasty Green Gazpacho Soup that looks more like a yummy green cream.

So here it is….“Zee Soup”:

110g celery

150g courgettes

30g pine nuts

1 medium avocado

1/2 clove of garlic

5g parsley

5g coriander (I left this one out. I am not a big fan.)

Pinch of unrefined sea salt (I used Maldon sea salt)

Optional garnish

10g pine nuts

Pinch of parsley

10g alfaalfa sprouts

Soak the pine nuts in water for at least an hour, drain and rinse. Blend all the soup ingredients until smooth. Serve over ice and top with the garnish if required. Keeps for two days when refrigerated in a sealed container.

And voilá:

It literally took me 5 minutes to prepare and I promise you, it’s DIVINE!