November Brings Fresh Opportunities

Borrowed from Yorch's Place

Now that we have the dreaded Halloween candy nearly behind us, it's a great time to think about real ways to create joyful deliciousness to our meals and celebratory occasions over the next two months. I've always loved the holidays, my cherished family recipes and all the festivities that are involved during this time of the year. However, since becoming a raw food enthusiast several years ago, I have also had challenges during these times of the year. Each year I found myself feeling conflicted, displaced, compromised and even sad during my most favorite time of the year. Dealing with these emotions certainly wasn't doing anything to promote better overall

health, so I made a decision to start moving in a new direction this year.

Instead of allowing dread, worry or guilt to work against me this year, I'm working to create ways to embrace the season, along with it's traditions AND it's foods. Recently I've been actively involved in recreating recipes and coming up with new ways to prepare foods that will satisfy, nourish and heal, along with maintaining a serious festiveness factor. As you read in my last post, Raw Food Rehab and I have just released an eBook called Raw For The Holidays, which is chocked full of great holiday and celebratory recipes to assist you in surviving and thriving during this time of the year. I'm so proud of the book, but it doesn't stop there.

I have also rolled out a new site, Raw For The Holidays, where I will be sharing ideas, recipes and holiday survival tips to help others, along with myself, make this the best November and December EVER! So many people dread the potential weight gain of the holidays and they feel weak and dis-empowered when they arrive to work to find the office loaded down with sweet treats that are so hard to resist. There is no time like the present to start getting prepared for success. It is fully within reason to become the example of what is possible, being the influencer, NOT the one who is being influenced with less than healthy dietary options at this time of the year.

Pumpkin Dessert Shake from Raw For The Holidays

I invite you to follow my new seasonal blog, Raw For The Holidays, and consider ordering the companion eBook, to help you as you plan for your most amazing and healthy holiday season ever!

Raw For the Holidays - Available For Order

My most recent labor of love is finally available for purchase/download. Raw For The Holidays is a collection of over 80 Festive and Delicious recipes created by the Original Cast of Raw Food Rehab. It has been a pleasure to co-collaborate on producing this raw holiday survival guide and I hope you'll share the link to order this eBook with friends who you think might enjoy this unique collection of recipes.

Creating this, my first official eBook, was only possible due to the power and inspiration of community. I hope you will be as blown away as I have been by the creativity of those who have contributed recipes and photographs to this effort. Not only am I very proud of this book, but I'm also very eager to get in the kitchen and start un-cooking for the holidays!

ORDER YOUR COPY TODAY!!

The Healthiest Places For Women

Recently I was interviewed for the November issue of Self Magazine, because Tulsa made it into the Top 100 Most Healthy Cities in America....but don't get excited, we came in dead last. Go check out the November issue of Self, on your newsstand now, and see where the healthiest places to live in the US are. I am still believing that Tulsa is a great place to be, and in today's video, I'm showing you around a little bit of my world.

What's it like in your neck of the woods? I'd love to here all about it.

A Week In Review

It's been pretty busy in my neck of the woods lately! So as not to neglecting my first love, Real Food Tulsa, here are the highlights of what's been happening:

This past Friday morning I was interviewed on Tulsa's local CBS affiliate - KOTV regarding the the opening of Raw Food Rehab and asked to give a bit of details about what the 11 Week Total Health & Weight Loss Initiative is all about. Big Props to RFR Member, Jeromee Scott, producer for Six In The Morning, for making this possible!!

Then on Sunday, Kevin & Annmarie Gianni rolled through Tulsa in the famous "Kale Whale" to give a lecture for our Real Food Tulsa Meetup group. I was able to do a short interview with them for the Raw Food Rehab Unit (and you all) and I was able to capture a couple of minutes of Kevin's inspiring talk.

Even though I've known the Gianni's for a couple of years, I am always so impressed by their authenticity and passion for helping others. They are so down to earth and generous with their time and knowledge. Kevin's perspective on eating and health is completely refreshing and inspiring. Annmarie's new skin care line is truly excellent.

If you're not familiar with The Renegade Health Show, please do check it out. The Gianni's travel the country, working to bring you the most cutting edge health information possible. Kevin has interviewed the most high profile leaders in the raw and living foods community and continues to bring this information to you for no charge on his daily program.

I also recommend his recent book, High Raw. His philosophy and mine are nearly identical, as he teaches that it is about so much more than just the diet. His doable approach to eating raw will inspire and motivate you in this easy to read book. I prefer the hard copy but you can download the eBook for FREE at their website.

Fesitive Holiday Baubles from Raw for the Holidays

Then lastly, I've been devoting all my spare time to the editing of Raw For The Holiday's, an eBook that is the love child from the original cast of my Raw Food Rehab research Guinea Piglets. This book is a combined effort from many members who have submitted their best raw food friendly holiday recipes and photographs. Some of the celebrations we are including are; A Crisp Autumn Dinner, Football Watch Party, Thanksgiving, An Enchanted Winter Evening, Hannukah, Holiday Sweets, Christmas Brunch & Dinner and New Year's! Stay tuned as I'll be giving you details of how to order your copy within the week!

Ambrosia Salad

Health Renegades....It's Not Too Late!

REAL FOOD TULSA IS DELIGHTED TO ANNOUNCE:

KEVIN & ANNMARIE GIANNI

will be our guests this Sunday evening as we kick off the new and improved REAL FOOD TULSA fall/winter series. Please mark your calendars for a fabulous raw food potluck and captivating lecture from the amazing couple behind The Renegade Health

Show, Rawk-A-Thon and the Raw Summit.

Kevin is the creator and co-host of The Renegade Health Show, a fun and informative daily health show that is changing the perception of health across the world and the author of High Raw – A Simple Approach to Health, Eating, and Saving the Planet, which in 5 easy steps helps people transform their bodies and minds naturally and without confusion. Along with business partner Mike Adams, Kevin created HealthBookSummaries.com, a free service that allows you to stay well informed about health, nutrition and fitness in just a few minutes each week.

Kevin also created the widely viewed “Rawkathon” series, including in-depth interviews with leading experts in the raw foods movement.

Annmarie and her husband Kevin are the founders of RHTV, a multi-media production company that strives to educate the public about true health and wellness and to empower people to take action in improving their own lives and the communities in which they live. As mentioned, Annmarie is the co-host of The Renegade Health Show where you can regularly see her “cooking” up something in the kitchen. Annmarie continually teaches others optimal health by being her own testimonial, always learning and growing.

You'll want to RSVP for this event as soon as possible to insure your place at this exciting event!

We will start the evening with a potluck, so please bring a raw food dish to share that will feed at least 8 -10 people. Bring or email your recipe to me so I can put a recipe collection together to share with the group! Please arrive promptly at 5:30 pm, as the doors of the building are locked at 6 pm for security reasons. If you have any questions, please email me directly at realfood.tulsa@yahoo.com!

If you're in the Tulsa area, I'll be looking forward to seeing you there and please share the details of this exciting meetup with your friends and family!

Raw Food Rehab Grows Up

What is Raw Food Rehab?

Raw Food Rehab was birthed as I was working on research for my recently completed book The Raw Food Cleanse. In June of this year, 60 faithful "guinea pigs" and I worked as a team to track our progress and collect data as we consumed a diet that was rich in raw & living foods. As a group, we tried to maintain a level of at least 80% raw foods daily. Most of us also incorporated some kind of body movement and other healthy life practices into our days. Although no one person reached perfection during this 11 weeks, all had some kind of personal life transformation on some level during this time. We grew mentally, spiritually and shrunk physically. As a collective group we lost just under a thousand pounds, with our biggest piglet, Dennis Clark, from Southern Alabama, dropped a cool 60 lbs. to the curb.

Our experiment was closed to the public as it was originally to be for research purposes only. Since we began this experiment back in June, I have received hundreds of emails from people all over the world who desperately wanted to be part of what we were doing. Some of the letters were heart wrenching and I knew in my soul that after the 11 week experiment was over, there would likely be another chapter to our story.

After much prayerful consideration and encouragement from my original cast of guinea pigs, we have joyfully opened the doors of our brand new rehab facility to the world. Raw Food Rehab will be offering a second 11 Week Total Health & Weight Loss Initiative that will begin this Friday, October 16th continuing on through New Year's Eve, December 31st. If you are interested in being part of this life transforming program, we would love to have you join us in the "Unit." New members can join and benefit from the ongoing education and support on the site at anytime.

Someone You Should Know - Bill Hoppa

Friends of Real Food Tulsa may already know Bill Hoppa. In case you don't know Bill and his wife Katy, they joined my Raw Food Rehab Experiement at the prompting of their daughter, Jen Hoppa, this June. The transformations in each of their lives since that time have been profound.

This past weekend in OKC, Bill had the pleasure of meeting the lovely Karen Knowler, international raw food coach from the UK. Karen was captivated by Bill's transformation and filmed him as he shared his story and a bit about what has happened since he AND his family have made a choice to impact their health with this new and improved approach to eating. You can find this video along with many others on her YouTube channel.

Please visit my friend Karen's website or friend her up on her Facebook page.

The Hoppa's inspiring and heartwarming story, along with many others who participated in Raw Food Rehab will be featured in my upcoming book, the Raw Food Cleanse.