A Change in Dietary Habits?

I am not the best eater in the world, in fact far from it. If I had my way the only time I would eat salad would probably be in a burger. Whilst I make the kids eat fruit, sadly I do not practice what I preach. I eat vegetables, so the kids do, but give me meat, dairy and bread and I am one happy, if not overweight little duck. You get the picture.

Now that I am in my 40's heading swiftly towards 50 (sob, sob), I am noticing that parts of me are actually heading towards 60 and because I have young children I really do need to make changes towards my diet if I want to keep up with them, or perish the thought be around to see them grow up. I simply eat because I am hungry and will collapse if I don't but I must admit I don't give that much thought on what is going into my body. Food has so many medicinal qualities that it's time I looked at using them as they are supposed to be, as a healthy supplement which can benefit my body and mind rather than putting foods into it that could be causing damage.

Salads sampled at the workshop - 3 types, all delicious!

So yesterday I went off to a 3 hour Raw Energy Workshop at a company called Nature's Nutrition which included juicing, smoothies, wheatgrass, beans and sprouts and dehydrating, etc. 

This is how the workshop is described on their site:
"This is a great workshop and one that everyone should attend when thinking about making the change to include more "raw" in your diet.
Whats included

• Comprehensive pack including recipes
• juicing - what to juice, how to juice, why we juice
• Wheatgrass - taste a wheatgrass shot and learn how to grow wheatgrass
• Smoothies - the difference between smoothies and juicing, how to make a nutritious smoothie that can be a meal replacement
• Sprouting - what to sprout, how to sprout and what meals to include sprout in
• Taste fantastic raw energy salads with nutritious dressings, learn how to make your own hummus and pesto that is cost effective and preservative free
• Learn how to make nutritious juices, smoothies, delicious salads and dressings and more.
• Have you tried raw fish - you will in this workshop!
• Finally learn how to make your own tasty crackers and satisfy those sweet cravings, naturally with dehydrating "
 

Now this workshop lived up to the description perfectly! It is taken by the very lovely Debbie Buddle who is a Juice Therapist, Clinical Nutritionist and and Naturopathy Student. Debbie was very easy to understand and what I liked about her is that she does not make you feel like a dill for not knowing about this kind of stuff, despite being a vegetarian herself, she does not make you feel bad about it if you aren't and never at any stage of the workshop does she force her opinions onto you about becoming Raw, etc and I found that she was quite open-minded and not militant about it. She promotes good, healthy eating and changes and if she is anything to go by, then it must work.

First Debbie started by introducing us to Juicing. We got a run down on the equipment to choose and also the benefits of juicing and then she made a few varieties for us to taste. Seriously yum!

We had a brief introduction to growing wheatgrass and were able to sample a shot. I was amazed that despite it being green (did I mention I am not big on greens!) it was really rather nice and the benefits of the stuff blew me away!

We then moved onto smoothies. Did I mention that in the handout you receive when you arrive that the recipes for the things you try are in there for you to use later. We got to sample the smoothies ... of course.  At this stage I was wishing I hadn't had breakfast as I couldn't refuse a shot of any of these they were so yum.

We received an introduction to growing your own sprouts and the benefits of those. I am not much of a sprout eater I confess and my girls haven't taken to them to well either but Debbie managed to even make these quite tasty added to the salads (pics above) that she had prepared earlier.

A raw fish salad, humus, healthy nut bread (baked) and some pesto sauce.

She made some lovely fresh salad dressings, which didn't take long at all and would have to be so much healthier than all the ones that we have sitting around in the fridge at home full of preservatives.

Then she made some fresh preservative free humus (I am never going to buy pre-made humus ever again!!!!)  and some pesto sauce. She also served a raw fish (salmon) salad. So, so good, I am salivating just remembering how yummy they all were.

And then lastly she took out some raw food crackers from the dehydrator and some sweets made from raw foods. It's hard to believe they are simply dehydrated and not baked isn't it.

Best of all we all were handed plates and got to sample ALL of these foods!  I have got to say despite not being a lover of salad, vegetables, etc that there was not one food that I did not enjoy. It was so tasty and I could eat these foods ALL the time and not feel as though I was missing out on anything.

And do you know what, whilst I did not feel as though I had over eaten (don't get me wrong I felt quite full, just not stuffed or lethargic) I was still not hungry at dinner time! I wasn't tempted by any snacks in the afternoon and felt rather energetic all afternoon.

I would strongly recommend taking a course similar to this. Even if you change a few meals to this way of eating then it can only benefit you. I myself have laybyed (payment plan) a juicer so that my family and I can start to reap the benefits found in natural (and organic where possible) foods. Good one's are very expensive but really necessary if you want all the vitamins, etc that can be obtained from your produce.

Stay tuned and hopefully I will be able to share some recipes, etc that my family and I try as we try to improve our eating habits and introduce more smoothies, raw foods and further down the track when I get my juicer (big grin on my face right now!). By the way I have booked in for another one of Debbies classes (she offer's a 50% discount on your next workshop if you book and pay on the same day as your first one) and I just cannot wait.


(Sorry the pics don't do justice to the food served - I grabbed one of the kids camera's and the lens was greasy, which I only realised later when I downloaded all the pics and they were hazy.)