Peek Inside My Kitchen Apothecary
– by Treesa
As many of you already know I’ve been hard at work self-directing my own healing path. I stepped off the allopathic path and into my kitchen apothecary! I’ve become a food medicine maker, and since my kitchen is my office of healing it needs to be a space that inspires me to make optimal choices.
So today I thought I’d take you on a tour of my high-raw-vegan kitchen and show you how I’ve set up my kitchen apothecary in order to support my journey to optimal health!
1. Keep in Sight Foods that Inspire You to Eat Healthy
Keep ‘things’ that inspire you to eat healthy visible and accessible in your kitchen.
For me, it’s my herbs. Seeing my jars of herbs and spices inspires me and puts a big ol’ smile on my face every time I see ‘em!
On the flip side, keep ‘things’ that trigger you and or impede your success to eating well as far out of sight and reach as you can. If you can get rid of those things altogether, great.
If you are in a mixed household and cannot surround yourself with only food and or items that inspire you to make optimal choices than try, at least, to keep them as far under the radar as you can.
2. Buy in Bulk & Save
Buying in bulk will help you save in the long run.
To the extent possible, try to keep nuts, seeds, legumes, herbs, super foods, et al., stocked up so that you have what you need when you need it.
Susan, of Raw Energy Eating (and Raw Food Rehab) has a great tip worth implementing if you can. She takes her yearly tax return and invests it in buying bulk food items for the year! Now that is a wise investment!
3. Set Up a Sprouting Station in Your Kitchen
You don’t need a lot of space to grow healthy eats indoors. Sprouting requires minimal effort, is inexpensive and will provide an invaluable nutrition to your diet.
Since I like to mix my seeds into blends (such as: fenugreek, clover, alfalfa, broccoli, sesame and garlic) I label my sprouting jars so I know what blend is sprouting at any given time. I use erasable labels or you can simply use a sharpie pen (as suggested by Kristen) and write directly on your jar!
4. Create New Uses for Standard Kitchen Items.
For example, I now use my loaf pan to prop up my sprouting jars and a cake cooling rack to set my blender canister upside down on to drain and dry.
I use a batter bowl (with its convenient pouring spout) to hang my nut milk bag on so I can pour in my blended greens with ease and pour the resulting green juice into a glass without making a mess.
When my hubby empties a little jelly jar I wash it and turn it into a protein shot container.
This can even be as simple as using the flat surface of a kitchen appliance, such as your fridge or dehydrator, into a space to store jars of herbs.
Get creative…reuse, recycle!
5. Prolong the Life of Greens
You can do the following to help your greens last longer:
a) Stand your greens upright in your fridge (stem side down) so that they are not laying flat in water / moisture, this will help keep their leaves from getting slimy
b) Take off the metal and or twist ties once you get your greens home from the market, they will be so much happier and last longer.
c) If you are able to wash, dry and bag your greens before putting them into the fridge…great. For many of us, though, it is not feasible to do this. So, at the very least, try to keep one or two heads of greens washed and ready for use at any given time so healthy eats are always ready to plate.
Finally, I invite you to take a tour of my kitchen apocthecary on YouTube!
I hope you’ll find it inspiring for creating your own efficient kitchen apothecary, too.
I encourage you to create a space that inspires you and supports you on the road to your dreams!
Be well.
Treesa