Angelina's Easy Lasagne (Raw)

This recipe makes plenty! It filled a 9 X 13. Next time, I'd halve it.

I have so many cookbooks that I hardly know what to do with them all. Some of them are quite useful, some of them not so much. But I'm still searching and finding more cookbooks that fit my diet better, recipes filled with veggies and spices to tantalize my tastebuds.

Recently I came across the book, Alive in 5 by Angela Elliott. It seemed like a good fit because I like to incorporate A LOT of raw foods into our diet for their nutritional benefits. Gone are the days of thinking that having a few carrot sticks will fulfill your raw foods quota for the day. Alive in 5 is filled with some pretty straightforward recipes with easy-to-find ingredients. I'm looking forward to trying a bunch more recipes.

Tonight I put together the lasagne. It was different but delicious. Fair warning - you must start earlier in the day to soak the sunflower seeds and marinate the artichoke hearts (or cucumber slices, in my case). Also, this makes a large quantity. For my size family, I should have made half as much, but we'll share some with relatives and eat lots of leftovers, although I don't think they'll keep very long. So here goes:

Angelina's Easy Lasagne
Serves 8

Note: Start soaking the sunflower seeds 3 hours before you prepare this dish. This is what you'll do:

Place 3 12 C raw sunflower seeds in a medium sized bowl. Cover with water and allow to soak for 3 hours. Drain.

And, 1 hour before preparing the lasagne, start marinating the artichoke hearts (or cucumber slices).

Begin thawing frozen artichoke hearts.

To make lasagne, first prepare the marinade, then Presto Pesto and then the Olive Medley
Marinated Artichokes

1/2 c. olive oil
3 -4 T. fresh lemon juice
1 t. salt
1/2 t. Italian seasoning
1/2 t. fresh ground black pepper
1/8 t. cayenne
2 packages (12 oz. each) frozen artichoke hearts, thawed

Combine all ingredients except artichokes and blend. Add artichokes, stir gently, and set aside to marinade one hour.
Presto Pesto

1 C. fresh basil leaves
1/3 C. olive oil
3 - 4 T. fresh lemon juice
1 t. Real salt
3 1/2 C. soaked raw sunflower seeds (drained)
1/8 t. fresh ground pepper
1/8 t. cayenne pepper
(I added 2 cloves minced garlic)
Place basil, olive oil, lemon juice, and salt in a food processor with the S blade. Pulse to chop. Add sunflower seeds, garlic, black pepper, and cayenne powder, and pulse again until evenly combined.
Olive Medley

1 1/2 C. pitted olives
1 red bell pepper, diced

Place the olive and bell pepper in a food processor. Pulse until evenly chopped.
Lasagne ingredients

Presto Pesto
Marinated artichokes
4 large ripe tomatoes, thinly sliced
1/2 C. minced fresh basil
Olive Medley
2 T. nutritional yeast

Line bottom of a 9 X 13 dish with the Presto Pesto. Use cucumber slices or tear apart each marinated artichoke heart to make "noodles"  and place over pesto. Layer the tomato slices over "noodles", completely covering them. Scatter the minced basil over tomatoes. Evenly distribute the Olive Medley mix over the basil. Sprinkle with the nutritional yeast powder and additional salt and pepper to taste.

Serve immediately. Enjoy!

You can sort of see the layering.

Picnic Food - Veggie Sandwiches on Raw Onion Bread & Sweet Potato Fries

Friday night. What shall we do? We're in the habit of going out, usually to a restaurant, and normally to one that's inexpensive. These days we look for places that have salads or salad bars, but we opted for a little picnic at the park instead. We hadn't planned ahead, so it was very last minute and the food had to be prepared fairly quickly. We settled on Veggie Sandwiches on Raw Onion Bread and Sweet Potato Fries.

If you're not very familiar with a raw foods diet (I distinctly remember the first time I heard the term and thought of all the food we ate and how they'd taste raw - yuck! I couldn't imagine), do a little Google research and you'll find it's pretty popular and there are tons of recipes and recipe books on the subject. At any rate, we're trying to eat a large portion of our diet raw because of the health benefits, and with the dietary restrictions that my husband has had, bread has been completely out of the picture. But he can have raw breads, and the onion variety is a good one!

There are a number of different twists on raw onion bread and I've made several. I've taken a couple of recipes and tweaked them into my own, so I guess I get to put my name on it. You'll need a dehydrator to make this work.

Cristi's Raw Onion Bread

2 1/2 lbs sweet onions, peeled
1 cup ground sunflower seeds
1 cup ground golden flax seeds
1 zucchini
1/2 avocado, well mashed
2 T. olive oil
1 1/2 t. Real Salt

Note: You may want to start with 1/2 batch if you're uncertain about liking it or not. Also, I use a coffee grinder to grind the flax seeds and sunflower seeds.

Put onions in food processor with 's' blade and process until small pieces, (but not mush). Put in mixing bowl with the other ingredients and mix thoroughly. The flax will absorb liquid. Smooth onto Teflex sheets* about 1/4" thick and place in dehydrator for 5 hours, turning over for another 3-4 hours or until dry and crispy. Either break into pieces or cut with a pizza cutter, and store in refrigerator in an airtight container.

*If you don't have an Excalibur dehydrator, any type will do - just use natural unbleached parchment paper instead of the Teflex sheets.

Of course you'd have to be thinking ahead to have this ready to make sandwiches. Once you have a batch, you'll be good to go. Here's what we do:


Veggies Sandwiches on Raw Onion Bread


Spread a little mayo on the bread. We prefer Vegenaise with a few seasonings thrown in. Chef's Shake was our favorite, but we can't seem to find it anymore. I used Herbamare but it was a little on the salty side. You're on your own for this! Experiment a little. 


Place lots of cut up raw veggies on. We've used spinach, romaine lettuce, bell peppers, onions, avocados, tomatoes, carrots (thinly sliced), you name it. Put another slice of the bread on top and you're good to go. Chances are that your veggies will start falling out. Eat quick and keep a plate and fork handy for what drops!


*For the picnic, we placed the veggies in a plastic container and assembled the sandwiches just before eating.


Now for the fries. They're a bit of an odd thing to take along for a picnic, but they sounded good and we weren't going far. We baked them, wrapped them in foil, and wrapped the whole thing in a towel. They were still good and hot when we were ready to eat.

If you're only accustomed to white potato fries, you're in for a treat. These generally aren't very crispy, but they are oh so flavorful. And they're much healthier, being lower glycemic and higher in nutrients. Yum, yum!


Indian Spiced Sweet Potato Fries


2 med. sweet potatoes
1 1/2 T olive oil
1 t curry powder
1/4 t turmeric
1/4 t cumin
1/4 t ginger powder
1/2 t Real Salt
Parchment paper

Preheat oven to 400F. Line cookie sheet with parchment paper.
Wash & scrub potatoes, leaving the skins on. Cut them into sticks and place in mixing bowl. 
Pour on olive oil and mix together until all are coated. 
Mix spices together in small bowl (I'm generous with the amounts!), then dust over sweet potatoes, mixing them around as you dust. (I mix everything together with my hands. It's messy but it gets the job done better.) 
Spread in single layer onto cookie sheet.
Bake for 30 to 40 minutes, turning them half way through the baking time.

And here's my man, enjoying our little picnic. We ate, then walked the perimeter of the park in our bare feet, a healthy thing to do called grounding.  Then we played a round of croquet. 'Twas fun and relaxing. It reminded us of our engagement days. Who cares if that was 32 years ago? We don't!!!