I am attending my first class with you this week. How long will it last and anything I should bring?
The regular class with food preparing demonstrations lasts two hours. I will make foods for us to eat and will have water and other drinks to offer also. The only thing to bring would be a pen so you could take notes. You will receive print-outs of all the recipes and could use these to write down your comments and observations. Or bring a note book if you like. Welcome, I look forward to meet you!
What equipment would you recommend to start out with? I have neither a juicer, blender, nor a food processor! I can only afford to invest in one of these to start out with. Which one would you suggest?
If you are quite new to raw foods and are just curious about what this new way of eating is, I would recommend you to start out with a blender. With such a machine you can blend smooth and creamy drinks, soups and shakes. These drinks are the easiest to incorporate into your diet and the least intimidating for your family and friends to accept and like.
I would also suggest that you go equipment hunting in your parents, grandparents or friends cupboards. (You can tell them I sent you!) You might find an old blender, not-used-for-ages (or hand mixer, juicer or food processor), which you could borrow and take home. This is a great way to start out and see what drinks (or other foods) you can create which become favorites of yours. If making healthy delicious smoothies for yourself is something you definitely want to continue doing, then you should invest in the best blender you can afford, because you will get so much more satisfaction out of all the creamier drinks, nut milks and veggie soups you can whip up in a more powerful blender.
If your health is on the line and you need to get yourself well again, the quickest way to do this is to consume freshly squeezed vegetable juices daily; the greener, the better. You can juice anything from fresh ripe fruits, to veggies, shoots, sprouts and wheat grass. Then definitely invest in a good juicer, the kind that does not heat the juice when extracting it. A single or twin gear is good for this. If you have a centrifugal juicer already, by all means start using it right away and make healthy juices every day. Once you are in the habit of making delicious nutritious juices and you know you want them in your life, you can invest in equipment that is top-of-the-line.
If you feel that you really want to get into raw foods and try to eat as much unprocessed, fresh foods in all of your meals as you possibly can; a food processor is the way to go. With such a machine you can chop, dice, and mash the ingredients and can make a very large variety of dishes. It will not take long time at all to prepare either; compared to if you had to cut everything by hand. And now you can right from the beginning have a large repertoire of dishes you can whip up in a jiffy. You will most certainly need both a variety of and heavier foods when you first start out all raw. In a food processor you can make anything from granola, mashed parsnips, pâtés to cakes, pie crusts and candy .
Once you have a good blender, juicer and food processor, I would recommend buying a dehydrator. With this equipment you dry your foods gently and you will get crispier textures and denser foods; so now you can have crackers, bread slices, cookies, fruit leathers, veggie burgers, chips, warm lasagna or pies. At once you are able to make a large array of dishes and accomplish different textures in your foods.
With these above mentioned essential food-preparing equipment you are very well outfitted and making raw foods has suddenly become both quick and fun.
And of course delicious!
