Part 3 (1/2)

Chapter 9.

HOW MY FAMILY EATS.

”In this plate of food, I see the entire universe supporting my existence.”

-A Zen blessing at mealtime.

Is it expensive to stay on raw food? Yes and no. Let me explain. In order to be understood correctly, I am going to pull out my receipts and share in detail exactly what I spend. For my family of four, I spend on average $45 per day. That comes to $1,350 per month; but if divided by four, it is only $338 per person. I would like to clarify that we spend this much money on food not because we are very rich, but because we do not have health insurance; and we consider our health to be the priority among all of our expenses. My intent is to not save money when it comes to nouris.h.i.+ng the body. I am aware that I need to receive adequate nourishment not only for today's performance but also to make up for thousands of days in the past when my body was malnourished. I would rather reduce spending on other things: furniture, clothing, household chemicals, fancy cars, and surely health insurance.

There were times when my family didn't have much money. Once, for two years, the four of us lived on a total budget of $900 per month. That included car insurance, gas, and the rest of our expenses. My children like to remember the Christmas of 1997 when Valya received a hair band for a present, and Sergei got a pencil. For some reason, they cherish the memory of that holiday more than any other. Even then, we managed staying on a high-quality raw-food diet. We discovered many different ways of obtaining good produce for little money or at no cost at all; we just had to spend more of our time sorting or gathering produce rather than buying it. Igor built a special attachment to our van for growing sprouts in jars, in two large coolers. We constantly had an abundance of fresh sprouts for the cost of pennies. We approached different organic farmers and offered our help in exchange for fresh fruits and vegetables. We bought marked-down organic produce from the health food stores. We learned to arrive at farmers' markets at the end of the day to get the best deals on their goods. By attending several wild walks with experts, we acquired foraging skills and started gathering wild edibles during most of the year. We went to countless U-picks and gathered anything from cuc.u.mbers to peaches. Finally, we offered help in picking fruit to owners of fruit trees who did not have time for harvesting. Many times people were curious about what we were going to do with so much fruit and were quite surprised that we considered persimmons or cherries to be an important part of our diet. We ran into families that lived in big mansions but who ate very poorly. We were poor, but we sure ate like kings and queens, or I should say, as ”educated kings and queens.”

Today all four of us work and we are happy to be able to buy all our food from health food stores and farmers. I am committed to obtaining only the best-quality, fresh organic produce, preferably seasonal and locally grown. During the warm seasons of the year, we buy most of our produce from farmers. I love talking to organic farmers. I consider them all to be heroes for their dedication to natural gardening despite tremendous challenges and hard labor involved.

I am fortunate to have a health food store two blocks from my house that I visit every other day (or three to four times a week) to buy food for my family. My husband and children like to help, but I do most of the food shopping. Typically, I bring with me several cloth bags that I fill with produce. In the wintertime, I alternate buying a case of apples or pears every week, to always have fresh organic fruit on hand at the house. Buying in bulk saves me twenty percent of the retail cost.

When I began consuming green smoothies and was looking for ways to increase the variety of greens, I went to the growers' market and spoke to at least ten farmers. I offered to pay each one of them $20 for bringing me a large box of edible weeds the following week. I believe that wild edibles are our true superfood. Two farmers became interested. Both of them have been bringing me chick-weed, stinging nettles, lambsquarters, thistle, plantain, dandelions, purslane, and many other different edible greens on a weekly basis since then. Because of this supply of the most nutritious greens, I stopped buying greens from the store almost completely from April to October. Encouraged by my support, these farmers offered edible weeds to our local co-op; and I was pleased to see these most nutritious greens there for sale.

During the rest of the year, I usually buy eight bunches (two days' worth) of different greens from the store, including but not limited to the following: dandelion, kale, chard, spinach, romaine, cilantro, parsley, scallions, collard, arugula, frisee, escarole, and endive. Once a week I purchase a bag of baby greens mix. For two days' consumption for my family, I usually buy twelve avocados, eight ripe, bright yellow lemons, and a bunch of bananas.

I consider that the fruit variety is not perfect in any of the stores because most of the fruit has been picked unripe. I also find it frustrating that I cannot enjoy seeded grapes anymore. I always buy the fruit that is the ripest of all, and sometimes I ask the produce manager if he has riper fruit in the back. Typically I buy one pound each of three to four different fruits, such as mangoes, pineapples, papayas, grapefruits, kiwis, figs, persimmons, or whatever is in season. I always buy a lot of berries, as they are less hybridized, riper than other fruit, and rich in many essential nutrients. I usually buy four to five pints of different berries. I almost never buy watermelon, except when it is in season, because I only buy the best organic seeded watermelons directly from farmers.

I usually buy a dozen ripe tomatoes, two to three firm cuc.u.mbers, and a couple of red or yellow bell peppers. I never buy green bell peppers, as they are unripe. Once or twice per month, I buy several carrots or beets to shred them in our salad. Approximately once a month, I buy a bag of dates, choosing a different brand each time.

About every other month, I place a bulk order for a five-pound bag of sunflower seeds, a five-pound bag of almonds, a two-pound bag of chia seeds, and a twenty-five-pound bag of flax seed (that might seem like a lot, but we share a large portion of our flaxseed crackers with friends).

I do not buy chocolate or raw cacao beans. I also do not buy any kind of salt but only sea vegetables: kelp, dulse, nori, arame, and others. I do not buy oil, as we stopped using oils altogether a while ago. However, I cannot guarantee that we will stay away from oils forever. In my family, we are following our intuitive guidance rather than other people's recommendations. We attempt to consume fats in a more natural form rather than using oil-for example coconuts, avocados, occasional durians, and a small amount of seeds and nuts. I especially enjoy sea buckhorn berries that I pick in August through September in a local garden. I consider sea buckhorn berries to be a wonderful source of healthy oils, folic acid, B-vitamins, and many other important nutrients.

Often people ask my family to describe what we eat in the course of a day. I will tell here what I eat.

I always have one quart of green smoothie for breakfast, around 8 a.m. If I remember, I snack on a piece of fruit around noon. In other cases, I get so busy with work, which I love, that I forget about my snack.

We have a tradition, almost a ceremony, to eat green soup with our friends and family every day at two o'clock in the afternoon. Whether at my office or at home, one of us quickly prepares green soup, which consists of just four ingredients, in a Vita-Mix blender. This soup is incredibly satisfying, and it is the most essential meal of my day.

When I come home at 7p.m., I have another smoothie accompanied by either a bowl of greens and veggies without any dressing, or a bowl of fruit. Another option for my dinner is a bowl containing a pint of berries topped with a spoonful of raw almond b.u.t.ter, which we grind ourselves. I really would like to not eat anything else, but I do eat an apple or two later in the evening.

I am providing this information only as a means of sharing and not as recommendation. Please do not try to copy me-keep in mind that it took me more than twelve years to come to this way of eating, and it is continuously changing. Follow your inner guidance and treat yourselves as if you were well-educated kings and queens.

Chapter 10.

BACTERIA-NATURE'S BRILLIANT INVENTION.

”It is about time we take a closer look at the Bacterial Kingdom, with capitals. For a Kingdom it is, biologically speaking, and the ancient lineage, diversity, and evolutionary power of its inhabitants deserve royal treatment rather than disgust.”

-Trudy Wa.s.senaar, PhD, a molecular biologist.

I want to share my amus.e.m.e.nt with and appreciation for bacteria. Maybe your respect for them will grow after reading this chapter. Bacteria are the world's greatest recyclers. By transforming all dead organic matter into soil, bacteria recycle useless garbage into the source of all elements. Bacteria are unique; they are tiny and huge at the same time. Smaller than any living cell, bacteria can instantly increase their power by multiplying into ”zillions” more. Each bacterium is capable of producing 16 million more in just 24 hours.1 Therefore, whether bacteria need to decompose ten dead elephants or one dead ant, bacteria will always have plenty in their army; and no rotting will be delayed due to the lack of little critters. Bacteria are nature's brilliant invention and gift to us all. We are constantly trying to destroy as many bacteria as possible because we don't understand their purposes on Earth. Let us imagine life without bacteria. There would be rocks but no soil in which to grow food. All dead trees, animals, birds, insects, snakes, human bodies, or other organic matter would be piled into huge mountains. What a ma.s.s of clutter that would be!

Perhaps you have noticed that in a natural setting, bacteria in the rotting cycle do not cause an offensive odor. In the forest, n.o.body rakes the leaves or buries the animals; everything is just left in the open. The droppings of animals and birds are left where they've fallen. You would expect the forest to smell bad. Yet the last time you were in the forest, did it smell bad? I bet your answer is ”no.” In fact, when we go to the forest, we breathe in and say, ”Ah, it smells so good!” If bacteria don't produce smell in the natural habitat of the forest, then why do we a.s.sociate rotting with odor?

Healthy soil contains a large percentage of ”good” bacteria. Friendly bacteria manufacture many essential nutrients for the plants that grow in this soil. Such ”good” or aerobic bacteria flourish in the presence of oxygen and require it for their continued growth and existence. ”Good” bacteria thrive in the soil with a large amount of organic matter, such as parts of plants and dead animals. When there is a lack of oxygen or organic matter in the soil, ”bad” bacteria take over and begin to multiply, causing an extremely offensive odor. These pathogenic bacteria are anaerobic and cannot tolerate gaseous oxygen. While pathogenic bacteria create offensive odors and may cause disease, they serve their own imperative purpose. That is why in nature there is a balance of ”good” and ”bad” bacteria, with a significant dominance of ”good” bacteria. ”Good” bacteria can be easily destroyed by countless factors, such as chemical fertilizers and pesticides in soil, and in the human body by antibiotics, a poor diet, overeating, stress, etc.

That is why, in the civilized world, bacteria create foul smell. Bacteria have a hard time decomposing the unnatural substances we create. To test this statement, you may conduct your own experiment. Put raw fruits and vegetable sc.r.a.ps into your compost. You will notice that they will rot and disintegrate without a bad odor. Now add to your compost some cooked food such as cooked noodles, chicken soup, or mashed potatoes. After a few days, you will notice an unpleasant odor emanating from your compost. The smell could be so bad that your neighbors might complain.

Bacteria play a major role in growing nutritious produce. The main difference between organic and conventional gardening is that ”Conventional agriculture attempts to feed the plants while the organic method nourishes the microorganisms in soil.”2 In simple words, conventional farmers ignore the microorganisms in the soil and aim their efforts at supplying pota.s.sium, nitrogen, and other chemicals for the sake of plants, while organic gardeners take care of feeding the living things in the soil, which provide harmoniously balanced nutrients to the plants. Just as humans cannot live on chemicals instead of food, microorganisms in the soil cannot survive when fed artificial fertilizers only. When all microorganisms get destroyed with chemicals, the soil turns to dust. No plants can grow in dust, no matter how rich in various chemicals this dust is.

Through the plants we eat, we receive essential nutrients that were created by microorganisms in the soil. The more organic matter or ”humus” present in the soil, the more nutritious is the food grown in this soil. We humans have inherited many feet of beautiful, fruitful topsoil all around the globe with zillions of happy microorganisms thriving in it. In their best-selling book, Secrets of the Soil, Peter Tompkins and Christopher Bird state: ”The combined weight of all the microbial cells on Earth is twenty-five times that of its animal life; every acre of well-cultivated land contains up to a half a ton of thriving microorganisms, and a ton of earthworms which can daily excrete a ton of humic castings.”3 As a result of our ”highly technological” gardening, most of the soil at agricultural farms in the USA contains less than 2% organic matter, while originally, before the era of chemistry, this figure was 60100%. According to David Blume, an ecological biologist, perma-culture teacher, and expert, ”Most Cla.s.s-1 commercial agricultural soil is lucky to hit 2% organic matter-the dividing line between a living and dead soil.”4 By applying permaculture gardening techniques to a field of extremely depleted soil, which consisted of cement-hard adobe clay, David Blume was able to bring the organic matter to the 25% level within a couple of years. From this field, he harvested the crops at a rate ”8 times what the USDA claimed is possible per square foot.”5 We cannot successfully feed soils with chemicals because ”biology does not equal chemistry.”6 In other words, chemical fertilizers are missing live enzymes, which contribute to the most productive and unique qualities of all soils.

Another interesting fact is that all living things have a strong immunity that doesn't let bacteria enter the body of plant, animal, or human until this organism dies. Bacteria can never disintegrate anything that is still alive. For example, gigantic redwood trees can exceed two thousand years of age, yet they remain free of decay. Their roots are always in the soil, yet bacteria do not touch them. However, as soon as the tree dies, the bacteria move in to return the tree to its source-the soil. Bacteria can tell what is living and what is dead, and they are only interested in dead matter.

We can find many more examples in nature of how different parasites can attack only plants or animals with a weakened immunity. For instance moss, mistletoe, and lichens don't live on strong, healthy trees. Healthy, balanced soil in organic gardens results in st.u.r.dy plants, which deter slugs and insects. Tree mushrooms grow mainly on fallen logs or dying trees in the forest. Similarly, bacteria and parasites don't live off healthy flesh. Since immunity is the only existing barrier for parasites, why not put all our efforts into strengthening our immunity, instead of trying to poison bacteria? The same applies to any parasite. If we keep our body clean, healthy, and nourished, parasites cannot live in our body ecology, and even mosquitoes won't bite us.

Maintaining personal hygiene is essential; but at the same time, we are unable to control the presence of all bacteria in every place, no matter how well we clean and how many chemicals we apply. With much effort, strict law, and financial investments, we have now gained almost complete control over spreading bacteria through public bathrooms. There are high-tech hand dryers and sophisticated toilet seat covers. One can go through the entire visit to a public restroom without touching anything. Yet there are still plenty more places where humans could encounter ”bad” bacteria that are next to impossible to control. For example: shopping cart handles, car doors, pens at the post office, store, or bank, handrails in the public transportation system, escalators, and elevators, money, serving utensils at all-you-can-eat restaurants, automated bank machines, and many more, including food containers such as cans, buckets, and boxes. In comparison to the enormous task of destroying all ”bad” bacteria in our environment, improving bodily immunity seems a lot more sensible and doable.

Ironically, all antibacterial agents that we apply to our bodies destroy not only the ”bad” bacteria but also the ”good” microorganisms, which are an important part of our natural immunity against ”bad” bacteria. I see in this action more damage than worth. To me, it is like cutting a finger off just because it has a splinter in it. Instead, let us be afraid of our cleaning supplies, most of which are poisonous chemicals. Bacteria cannot harm us if we follow the laws of nature, but chemicals eventually will kill all of us if we do not drastically reduce their utilization. Therefore, if we are afraid of infectious disease, the best thing we can do is strengthen our immune system through eating nutritious food, exercising, applying stress-reducing techniques, and using other natural ways of healing.

Chapter 11.

WHAT ABOUT.

INSECTS?.

”The pure and simple truth is rarely pure and never simple.”

-Oscar Wilde.

Presently, I am not for or against eating insects. However, I would consider myself an idealist if I didn't address this subject. Furthermore, I have been asked the question about insects at almost all of my lectures. Thus, despite being vegan for many years and feeling a personal repulsion towards the very idea of consuming bugs, I decided to share with you what I have found.

The chief fact to consider is that most, if not all, human groups or tribes throughout our history have consumed insects. Almost all ancient people, including Native Americans, considered insects a wonderful food source. To some, insect food was a matter of survival; to others, a delicacy.1 According to a Purdue University study,2 at present time, 80% of the people in the world consume insects deliberately and on a regular basis; and 100% eat them unintentionally. There are 1,462 recorded species of edible insects. Dishes that include different bugs are served in many gourmet restaurants in j.a.pan, France, Taiwan, Australia, New Zealand, Thailand, and other countries. Edible insects are and have been traditionally an important and nutritious food for people in Africa, Asia, Australia, and Latin America for centuries.3 The natives of southern Africa have used a number of insects as food, including caterpillars, locusts/gra.s.shoppers, ants, termites, and beetles.4 Many people consume crawfish, lobster, crab, and shrimp, which are part of the insects' biological phylum-arthropods.