How to Improve Your Digestion by Eating Raw Whole Foods
If you’re stomach’s been grumbling, gurgling or cramping with discomfort, and you haven’t been quite able to figure out why, we hope this last month on the blog has given you some food for thought. We’ve talked about some really common digestive issues including Irritable Bowel Syndrome, constipation, gallstones and candida, and how to start clearing them up with natural, whole foods, superfoods and herbs.
We’ve also highlighted some key foods which help to get your digestive system back on track and functioning smoothly. Check out the amazing benefits of avocado, flaxseed, lemons, chia and garlic. These foods each contain unique properties which can assist with restoring the delicate balance required throughout the digestive tract.
4 Raw Food Recipes to Improve Digestion
To add some fuel to your digestive fire, these recipes are a great place to start to enjoy more of these powerful foods:
Raw Food Recipe: Chocolate Mousse
Recipe from Decadent Gourmet
Servings: 2
from Decadent Gourmet by Angela Elliott
Ripe avocados are the best base for chocolate mousse and chocolate puddings. Don’t tell your family. They would never know!
Ingredients:
- 1 1/2 avocado
- 1/4 cup date syrup
- 1/2 cup cacao powder
- 1 tablespoon vanilla flavor by Frontier
- 1/4 cup carob powder
Directions:
In food processor or blender, combine all ingredients and blend or process until smooth.
Serve chilled.
Enjoy!
Meatzaballs Mad with Golden Flax
This recipe for Meatzaballs can be served alone or with a raw spaghetti!
Ingredients:
For 2 main meal servings:
- 1/4 cup freshly ground golden flax seed, ground in a coffee grinder
- 1 1/2 cups walnuts
- 2 cups young zucchini, shredded
- 1/2 cup carrot, shredded
- 3/4 cup celery, minced
- 1 1/2 cups mushrooms, minced
- 1 clove garlic, crushed
- 2 tablespoons mellow unpasteurized miso
- 2 tablespoons nutritional yeast
- 1 tablespoon fresh sage, minced
- 3 tablespoons fresh parsley, minced
- 1 1/2 teaspoons of Spice Islands brand poultry seasoning
- 1 teaspoon Celtic sea salt
- 1/2 teaspoon white pepper
Directions:
Grind the walnuts in a food processor until finely ground, remove and place in large bowl. Pulse chop in a food processor the zucchini, carrots, mushrooms, and celery and place in a bowl. Chop the herbs and garlic by hand and add to bowl. Grind the flax seeds in a coffee grinder and add to the bowl. Add the rest of the ingredients and mix by hand.
Form mixture into little balls and place in dehydrator on a teflex sheet and dehydrate at 104 degrees for 6 hours. Remove teflex sheet, turn over and dehydrate for another 6 hours or until desired texture.
For more delicious raw recipe ideas, you can purchase The Simple Gourmet online.
Lemon Love Cookies
Taken from Angela Elliot’s Decadent Gourmet recipe eBook.
Making these luscious Lemon Love cookies is easier than traditional baking. And there’s only four ingredients! All you need is a food processor and a dehydrator.
Ingredients:
- 1 cup cashew nuts
- The juice of 1 and 1/2 lemons
- 1 cup shredded dried coconut
- 10 honey dates, soaked for an hour
Directions:
Process dates and cashew in a food processor until smooth. Transfer mixture to a bowl. Add the lemon juice gradually, stirring into the date and nut mixture. Add the dried coconut and combine well.
Place spoonful drops onto a teflex sheet and dehydrate cookies at 104 degrees for 12 hours. For other indulgent, no-bake treats check out the Decadent Gourmet recipe eBook.
Creamy Thai Mango Chia Seed Pudding with Lemongrass
By Priscilla Soligo Founder of Rawthentic Food
(All low GI sweeteners)
Serves 2
Ingredients:
- 1 Cup Almond Milk (See recipe below, or substitute with filtered water)
- 2 Small Mangoes, or 1 Large (chopped)
- ½ Cup Coconut Meat
- 1/3 Cup Chia Seeds
- 2 Tbsp Lucuma
- 1 ½ tsp Lemongrass (lower stem chopped finely)
- ½ tsp Lime Juice
- 1 Tbsp Coconut Nectar
- ½ tsp Pure Vanilla Extract (no alcohol)
- ¼ tsp Celtic, or Pink Himalayan Salt
- 1 Dash of heartfelt kindness!
Almond Milk
Ingredients:
- 1/2 Cup Almonds (soaked for 8 – 12 hours, or overnight)
- 1 ½ Cups Filtered Water
Directions:
Rinse soaked almonds several times with filtered water.In a high-speed blender blend nuts with water on high until nuts have completely broken down. In a jar, strain blended milk into a nut milk bag, squeezing as you go to get all of the liquid out. Continue with this recipe.
Tip: You can freeze your almond pulp to use for delicious cakes, biscuits and other recipes later on, so nothing goes to waste.
Method:
In a high-speed blender blend the mango, coconut meat, almond milk and lemon grass until smooth and well incorporated. Add the lucuma, coconut nectar and salt and blend until well mixed.
Add the Chia Seeds and blend on low until just incorporated. Pour into two small bowls and refrigerate for at least one hour Garnish with slices of mango, chia seeds and lemon grass.
This is so yummy and refreshing for Summer, enjoy!
Zesty Garlic Dressing
Are you a Diva who loves garlic? You can add as much as you want to this zesty, zippy salad dressing!
Ingredients:
- fresh minced garlic
- equal parts of lemon juice, orange juice, and lime juice
- fresh dill
- your favorite salad herbs
Directions:
Blend! And you can always blend in an avocado or olive oil if you want!
Want More Free Raw Food Recipes?
It contains 140 pages of easy, tasty raw food recipes you can make in minutes!
On hot summer days, cool off with Stephanie Cole’s refreshing choice of Green Lemonade. For lunch, indulge and gobble up Tera Warner’s Sunflower Soup, and, if you’re feeling *especially* celebratory, as we are around here, make your supper a dessert of Caroline Hurry’s Papaya Paradise Pudding!
Raw Chocolate Diva Alisha gave us the goods on magnesium in raw chocolate and how this important mineral works to facilitate so many critical functions in our body, including our digestion!
Kristen Suzanne filled us in on her tried and tested strategies for keeping to your raw food lifestyle when you’re away from home. Keep an eye out for Kristen’s post next month when she gives us a sneak peak into her very own kitchen set-up at home. You’ll love it!
For a herbal solution to your digestive dilemma, look no further than Matt Gaffney’s insightful expose on the properties of Slippery Elm.
