This is a little number some friends and I put together about dead food. Well, I just initiated it mostly. Renee, Michael and Scott are the real talent. (Thanks, guys, for humoring me.)

Anyway, hope you enjoy it. Here’s the lyrics if you wanna follow along:

Woke up this mornin’, couldn’t get outta bed
Remembered last night, and all the bad food I had
Downed a bottle of tums, some alkaseltzer too
Oh, I don’t know what to do
I got the dead food blues

Had myself some doughnuts, but that just wouldn’t do
Topped it off with cheese fries and a chocolate shake too
Feel so bloated, sick of this fast food.
Oh, I don’t know what to do
I got the dead food blues

Got on the scales, got the bad news
Nothing but fat rolls and I can’t see my shoes
Lord have mercy, have mercy on me.
Oh please help me
I’ve got the dead food blues

Called my friend Linda
She said, girl, I’m telling you
Raw is the way to go, live food is the new groove
Get with it, sister, no more time to snooze
She said, you know what to do
To get rid of your dead food blues.

Got out my blender, to try something new
Threw in some spinach, and a banana or two
Add a few peaches, a little mint n’ apple juice
I know what to do
to get rid of my dead food blues

Oh, no more cooked food for me
No more dead food blues

 I can’t get over how much I love this thing!

I’m totally stoked about this food dehydrator I just bought because it requires absolutely no electricity…and it works! 

It hangs in a corner of my house, and somehow dries food by using the natural air flow.  I was really skeptical at first, I admit.  I couldn’t figure out how in the world it could work.  It doesn’t even need to be outside in the sun.  You can also use it indoors in the winter time!  Crazy! 

So, I cut up some eggplant to see if it really worked. 

The next morning, wallahh……

Can you see from the picture that the eggplant is dry and crisp?  The weird thing is that it didn’t take any longer to dry them in this dehydrator than it does my regular one that runs on electricity.  So, all this time, I’ve been wasting energy?  I’m so ashamed! 

It’s also a great tool for sprouting.  I’m just testing out my first batch, but so far, so good.  All you do is put the sprouts on a tray:

And then you cover that try with another one so the seeds are held in place between the two trays:

Then you can take the two black trays and run them under water to rinse the sprouts every morning and night until they grow tails.  If you’re doing something like wheat to make wheat grass, you would then take the top try off so the grass can grow upwards. The roots will start to grow down through the bottom tray, anchoring them to it.  Then, you can fill the white try underneath with enough water to nourish the roots while you cut away at the grass on top.  It’s brilliant, if you ask me!

Well, you can tell I’m really excited about this little tool.  Not only does it save energy, but it is a necessary item for a raw foodie when it comes to food storage and emergency preparation.  You can even take it camping and hang it in a tree to dry berries you collect out in nature. It has a net that completely encloses it so little bugs can’t get in.  Sweet!

The best part is, they are very reasonably priced at only $59.99.  If you order 6 at a time, you save $10 on each one, so share this with your friends and family, and let me know when you’re ready to place an order.  I love these things so much, I’ve decided to add them to my product line! 

You can email me to place an order or for more info at Info@RawRecipeBox.com

Here’s the lastest abomination from Monsanto.  Man, I wish they would just mysteriously disappear from the face the earth.  This article is from “Food Democracy Now!”  

“As if genetically engineered alfalfa, corn for ethanol, sugar beets, and most recently Kentucky bluegrass for lawns weren’t enough, the Obama USDA is now poised to approve another unnecessary GMO crop, in lieu of independent scientific data and practice of precautionary principles.

Currently, Monsanto is seeking approval from the USDA of a drought resistant corn known as MON 87460, which Monsanto claims achieves better results under low-water conditions compared to other varieties. Even the USDA’s own assessment shows that MON 87460 is no more “drought-tolerant” than current corn varieties nor does it have the true long-term potential benefits to meet drought conditions that farming with organic corn can bring to farmers.

Unfortunately, like all GMO approval processes in the U.S., the USDA has relied heavily on Monsanto’s own corporate science and failed to get adequate independent, peer reviewed data regarding the safety of this new GMO drought corn or of Monsanto’s claims.

It would appear that the “science” used to rationalize the approval for yet another GMO crop is biased to the benefit of Monsanto, ignoring the needs of farmers, the environment and the health of the population.

Learn more on the website:

http://action.fooddemocracynow.org/go/399?akid=362.290432.pxOmxz&t=9

British Scientists Find GMO Horizontal Gene Transfer
In what can only be a glaring scientific oversight, the USDA assessment readily admits that “horizontal gene transfer” of DNA is a common event in nature, but somehow diminishes the potential for the novel genetic components found in Monsanto’s GMO drought corn to be capable of such leaps. Current ag biotechnology relies on a crude insertion of GMO genes done in scattershot fashion, which are by their very creation designed to cross previously untraversable genetic barriers imposed by nature.

More alarming is the fact that scientists in England have found that “horizontal gene transfer” of one of the main GMO genetic components found in MON 87460 has already occurred. Just last year scientists at University of Bristol “identified a natural process they say that would allow synthetic genes to move across GM organisms and out into the wild.”

According to the USDA’s own assessment, Monsanto’s GMO drought corn “was developed through a plant pathogenic bacterium Agrobacterium tumefaciens mediated transformation”. It is the same Agrobacterium tumefaciens that British researchers found that “‘transforms’ plant tissue at ‘plant wound’ sites and ‘clearly demonstrates that when placed together on damaged plant tissue, Agrobacterium readily transforms associated fungi’”.

It is hard to understand how scientists at the main U.S. government oversight agency could miss these facts in their own assessment of a new GMO crop, but like previous administrations, officials in the Obama administration appear more interested in fast-tracking Monsanto’s GMO technology.

Tell the USDA that they need to reject Monsanto’s studies of their own products and demand more independent peer reviewed data before it can approve any more GMO crops.

 

Monsanto’s Missing GMO Genes: Where did they GO?
On top of this, the current USDA assessment for Monsanto’s GMO drought corn readily admits that multiple GMO genetic components “did not get incorporated into the transformed plant”. Even as Monsanto attempts to diminish this alarming finding, the USDA also admits “a 22 base pair length of genomic DNA got deleted at the insert-to-plant DNA junction in MON 87460.”

Despite these disturbing scientific anomalies, which the USDA calls “minor genetic sequence modifications” the agency concludes there is no “biologically meaningful difference between MON 87460 and conventional corn.”

Do you believe them?

Bt toxin from GMO Corn Found in Pregnant Mothers
This past spring, further punctuating the point of gene trasference from plants to humans, Canadian scientists alarmingly discovered traces of the Bt toxin from GMO corn – engineered to release an insecticide – in 93% of blood samples taken from pregnant women and 80% umbilical cords tested.

This discovery comes in spite of promises by ag biotech companies such as Monsanto that this was not possible.

For any mother or parent such findings should bring about a sobering awakening that U.S. governmental regulatory agencies are not adequately doing their jobs and that more independent peer reviewed studies must be conducted before any more GMO crops are approved by the USDA or the Obama administration.

Thanks for participating in food democracy,
Dave, Lisa and the Food Democracy Now! Team
Sources:
1. “PLANT PEST RISK ASSESSMENT FOR MON 87460 CORN” U.S. Department of Agriculture, Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service.
http://action.fooddemocracynow.org/go/403?akid=362.290432.pxOmxz&t=14
2. “Scientists Discover New Route for GM Contamination”, November 4, 2010 Farmers Guardian. http://action.fooddemocracynow.org/go/401?akid=362.290432.pxOmxz&t=16
3. “GM food toxins found in the blood of 93% of unborn babies”, May 20, 2011, UK Daily Mail.
http://action.fooddemocracynow.org/go/402?akid=362.290432.pxOmxz&t=18

You know what’s awesome?  This:

My very first gogi berry grown in my own home!  This is oddly exciting to me because I think of gogi berries as such an exotic plant.  I’m amazed that I can grow them myself.  Although, I shouldn’t be so surprised, being that they grow wild in the mountains of my Utah homeland.  For some reason, I expect them to come from someplace like the Amazon or Thailand or some place far, far away. 

Well, they ARE native to southeast Europe and Asia…but how did they get here, in Utah? Who knows, but if I can grow them, you can too.  Here’s a few little tips that I’m learning about how to keep them alive and happy.  Finding someone in your area who sells them might be the hardest part.  So far, getting them to grow isn’t so difficult. 

1.  Grow them indoors in a 5 gallon pot for the first year or so until they are very established.  I’ve known people who have put them outside too soon, and they end up dying during the winter.  It sounds strange, since they grow in the wild here, but it does seem like they do better starting indoors for a while.

2.  Only put one plant in each pot, and make it a big pot.  Once these guys take off, they spread like wild fire.  In fact, established plants grow to be about 8 feet high and 8 feet wide, so give them plenty of space to spread out.  Once they are established and you can transplant them outside, they’ll make a great border along a fence or something of that nature.

3. They do like sun, so put them near a window with plenty of light. 

4.  As with other plants, water them whenever the dirt is dry.  In the summertime, I’ve been watering mine every 2-3 days.  They seem to like that.

5.  Nourish the soil with a really good organic fertilizer every 4-6 weeks.  I’ve been using one called “Happy Frog” that’s doing an awesome job. 

6.  I was told that the plants wouldn’t produce berries until the 3rd year, so you can imagine my surprise when I started getting fruit in this first season.  Maybe I just got bad information, but they are definitely growing and I’m definitely eating them.  Fresh gogi berries are so different than the dried ones I’m used to having.  They are juicy and not too sweet, but light and refreshing.  When I start getting a whole bunch of them, I’ll experiment with some fresh gogi berry recipes.  Until then…I just get to keep watching them grow.