Discovering the Beauty of Raw Foods

Yes, she's a chef!

 After the highly successful launch of The Beauty of Raw, Multi-certified raw chef and health educator Mona Lisa Neuboeck and Sugarleaf…foods that nourish continues their partnership with four more workshops that perfectly balance healthy and yummy, food and discovery in three-hour information-packed events until September 2012.

· 12 May, 230-530pm – Demystifying Superfood, The Beauty of Raw part 2

· 21 July, 230-530pm – Truly Healing Food, The Beauty of Raw part 3

· 18 August, 230-530pm – Detox with Food, The Beauty of Raw part 4

· 15 September, 230-530pm – Lose Weight The Raw Way!, The Beauty of Raw part 5

Demystifying Superfood, The Beauty of Raw Part 2 

This was an invitation I said to myself, one that shouldn't be missed.   For one, we are still on the series of discovering food choices that are healthier and has the healing touch.    Then, there's my daughter's condition, being an insulin dependent, she had  shares of  pain and angst of being deprived  with certain food.   Also, there is this fear of  giving what might be harmful rather than nourishing, to each member of the family that includes me.  So,  down I went to Sugarleaf, MEDICard Lifestyle Center last Saturday,  May  12,  with  the workshop given by Certified raw chef and health educator Mona Lisa Neuboeck.  

This three-hour class, the second of a five-part raw food preparation series from May to September, focuses on the countless benefits and preparation of recipes focusing on powerful healing properties of imported and local (!) super foods. 

Superfoods are vibrant, nutritionally dense foods that have recently become widely available and which offer tremendous dietary and healing potential. In this lively, informative class, raw-food chef and instructor Mona Lisa Raw profiles delicious and incredibly nutritious plant products such as Goji berries, hempseed, cacao beans (raw chocolate), maca, spirulina, bee pollen, and a host of local Philippine super-foods. As powerful sources of clean protein, vitamins, minerals, enzymes, antioxidants, good fats and oils, essential fatty and amino acids, and other nutrients, they represent a uniquely promising piece of the nutritional puzzle. Each superfood is described in detail, accompanied by generous servings of Mona Lisa's easy and delicious signature recipes.

This fun and educational class introduced persuasive arguments, based on sound science, for the important  role of superfoods in promoting nutritional excellence, health and well-being, beauty enhancement and the transformation of diet, lifestyle, nation and planet.

I'm sure you are dying to see how the whole afternoon were spent.   Before that let me introduce the chef.  Born in Seattle but raised in Salzburg , Austria, chef Mona came from a long line of  Innsbruck  Austrian butcher.   Ironic but somehow she chose the Raw Vegan Food path.

A passionate painter, former culinary student and theater costume designer at the Salzburg Opera House, and  an athlete and a  model, is now a certified Raw Food chef and Health Coach.

A witness to thousands of patients with incurable disease which had regained their health under alternative treatment and having a raw vegan lifestyle.

Here are some of the recipes Chef Mona showed us.

1.  GREEN SUPERFOOD LUNCH SMOOTHIE

 The concoction is high in muscle building amino acid (plant-protein), blood sugar regulating soluble and insoluble fiber, replenishing lectrolytic minerals, appetite-controlling pectin, mood stabilizing micro nutrients, nourishing Omega 3's, youthening enzymes and immune system boosting anti-oxidants.
What's In it? Spinach, Romaine lettuce, buko meat and juice, bananas, flax meal, vanilla bean, Sea salt, coco sugar, mangoes, malunggay, spirulina powder, maca powder, bee pollen, goji berries hemp pwder and raw cacao nibs.
2.   SUPER CHIA CHOCO PUDDING

 Chia seeds supply the single highest source of Omeag 3 fatty acids known to men, just as raw Cacao is the highest food source of Magnesium.
Highly recommended for breakfast or snack, replacing high-sugar cereals.
What's in it?  raw coconut milk, Virgin coconut oil, vanilla bean, Agave, raw Honey, Chia seeds,  raw cacao powder or Carob powder, sea salt and cinnamon, Bee pollen.
Sure looked like champorado and somehow has the same taste with the eeky feeling of eating seeds from a dragon fruit with chocolate drink.
3.  AMPALAYA GINGER PICKLES
I love ampalaya, though it's bitter, benefiting from it greatly  is what makes it sweet.  High in disease -preventing and health promoting chemical compounds, it inhibits the growth of pretumorous cells and lowers blood sugar levels, thus deserving appreciation as an inexpensive local Superfood.

 4.   SPIRULINA PURSLANE TEMAKI
Purslane is a weed con veggie, that would be hard to find here in Manila, but grow vagrantly in the province.  However, it is famous to be food for pigs.  Also known as Gulasiman or Alusiman in the Visayas.
More interesting was the dressing named  as Spirulina Green Cheese.
What's in it?  Raw cashews, lemon juice, spirulina powder, garlic, sea salt, spring onions.



5.   SUPER FOOD BLISS BALL
 According to Chef Mona, the all organic power ingredients of raw cacao, flax seeds, Goji berries, raw dates and activated Almond powder is an "Instant-Energy" source.  This balls will provide you those extra antioxidant's, amino-acids, magnesium, fiber amino acids and enzymes, making it a "power ball (instead of bar)."

Maca has been called Peruvian Viagara® and Peruvian ginseng because of its legendary ability to promote mental and physical vitality and increase libido in both men and women. Maca is often referred to as a natural hormone balancer, an adaptagen that can treat symptoms of menopause and sexual dysfunction in both men and women. Maca root may also help treat other conditions associated with hormone imbalance, such as depression, insomnia, fatigue, and acne.

What's in it? Raw almonds, dates, flax meal, vanilla extract, VCO, cinnamon powder, organic dried cranberries. Goji berries, Bee pollen, Cacao nibs, Maca Powder.

 6.  FAIRY FUDGE  SQUARES

"Who cut the lawn in our yard?"  Jokingly, talked with so much anticipation with my  seat-mate at the workshop, these cunning bars is super-packed with enzymes.  The high content of Chlorophyll present in Spirulina and the medium chain of triglycerides in Virgin Coconut Oil, make this truly  a wonderful dessert-addition to balanced meal.

What's in it?  Raw Honey or Agave, VCO, sea salt or Himalayan pink salt, Vanilla extract, Spirulina powder, dried coconut flakes or dessicated coconut, nuts and Bee pollen

 This is the most bizarre cooking demo I have chanced to, in fact there is no cooking involved at all.  

 Duh!! That's why it's raw!  This is Chef Mona's advocacy, to teach people that there is more to not cooking, boiling or frying our vegetables.   Nature had blessed us with an abundance of micro-nutrients, trace minerals, vitamins and enzyme that is dissolved when heat is applied as in cooking.  
 If you are curious about this they have more workshops in the future where Chef Mona will be sharing an overflow of health information and recipes to support them.   Most of the Superfoods in powder form are available at Sugarleaf.

 Venue will be at Sugarleaf at the MEDICard Lifestyle Center located at 51 Paseo de Roxas corner Sen. Gil Puyat Avenue, Urdaneta Village, Makati City.  

Email angelo@sugarleafph.com or call, SMS 0917 8039 055 for more information and reservations. 

 Be informed and not left out, with only P2,200 per person comes with an incredibly healthy and delicious helpings of all dishes prepared. 

 P200 discount for senior citizens, pairs, couples, groups and students and attendees pre-paying for the workshop through Sugarleaf’s BPI Wilson Street bank account.  See you there!