I don't have a juicer or dehydrator. Are there any raw cookbooks in which most of the recipes don't require equipment?

Thanks,
Renee

***

Proud to be a tandem breastfeeding, cosleeping, mei tai wearing, natural/homebirthing, cloth diapering, never spanking, non-circumcising mama to two wonderful little leeches. Baby Boy '04, Baby girl '06. :-)

Renee,

I think you may have more luck with "old school" types of raw cookbooks, such as those written by Anne Wigmore. I know she has a blending book ( I'm assuming you have a blender or can purchase a cheepie one at Target/K-Mart/Wall Mart...?) with recipes for blended foods, and her original recipe books make use of a lot of sprouting recipes and the food processor. It will be very hard to create a lot of the contemporary raw recipes with nuts and seeds without at least some basic kitchen equiptment, like a blender or food processor.

...You could make lots of fancy salads and dressings though, in the event that you do not own or cannot buy anything pricey at the moment. A hand grater, mandoline, and the microplane grater make for excellent kitchen tools and can jazz up even the most basic veggie salad.


i breathe in
i breathe out
peace
love
joy
Bikini

Raw in Ten Minutes by Bryan Au uses little to no equipment BUT he also uses ingredients that I no longer will eat.... I'm pretty creative and use it as a guide when I'm trying to think up something new. If I had it to do over again, I wouldn't buy another book.

I've heard of ppl who are trying new ways of living w/o appliances and staying raw. One girl on some post somewhere (sorry I don't recall where) was trying out blending with her hands - reminded me of playing w/our food or making mud pies - but she was delighted and very happy. To each his own. Of course, she won't have all that extra air whipped into all her 'smoothies' either.

I think Doug Graham is coming out with an 80/10/10 recipe/preparation book soon (educated rumor) that should have some good ideas as well.

Hope it's helpful,
Lesa
oh ya & Keep it Simple while you Take what you need and LEAVE the rest.

I'll second the Raw in Ten minutes suggestion, good book for people starting out and want some recipes that are good but take minutes rather than days to make.

Ian.

Hmmm...

idea...

maybe I could use my hands like she did and then use one of those little handheld whips (like for coffee) to put the air in the smoothie.

Renee

***

Proud to be a tandem breastfeeding, cosleeping, mei tai wearing, natural/homebirthing, cloth diapering, never spanking, non-circumcising mama to two wonderful little leeches. Baby Boy '04, Baby girl '06. :-)

My main equipment consists of:

a knife
a cutting board
a personal-sized blender

Sometimes I use a cheapy food processor. You can get a little one from Walgreen's for about $10.

I don't dehydrate much. Or juice much. I have a cheap dehydrator and a cheap Waring juicer.

I just met a fellow RFoodie and she uses only a coffee grinder for her 'mini' food processor - I'm going to pick one up next week and see if it fills in for the extra jobs I've been wanting to do.

My equipment list: (good idea btw)
Knives from IKEA ($2 -$4 sets)
A homemade cutting board that someone made me its about 9" across and about the size of a dinner plate.
A personal size Back to Basics Blender, the container is a mug -- cost $14 and you can get extra mugs w/an extra blade for under $20
An electric citrus reamer w/pitcher, maybe Proctor Gamble? $12 at discount store - I do use this a lot right now w/tangerines and I've made great pomegranete juice on it to - but I add all the pulp back into the juice when I'm done
A Hamilton Beach juicer $29 at a discount store -- I've only used it a handful of times and wouldn't bother to buy one again.
A Nesco American Harvest motot on the top food dehydrator that I bought from WalMart online for $50ish -- I've used it a few times, but not very often, it sits on top of the kitchenette. I probly wouldn't buy one if I had it to do over again.
Oh and my spiralizer - which I use a couple times a week for zucchini pasta! This was a pretty good investment although there are other less expensive ways to get pasta shapes from vegyies

My wish list:
A kitchen mandoline - I'm looking at one that has julianne blades (for vegy pasta shapes), grater blades (cause I'm always getting my knucles), french fry blade and a citrus reamer. The one I'm considering is about $50 and I think it folds flat for storage [www.creativecookware.com] --- not sure about this yet cause I'm doing pretty good w/what I have.

The Raw Food Detox Diet by Natalia Rose has a recipe section that at least doesn't need a food dehydrator. I just got one of those for Christmas but I wonder just how much I'll really use it. THanks for the other book suggestions.

remeek,
i am in the same boat as you.
i have a knife.i have a cutting board.and i used to have a grater.thank God for creativity!!!!

PLEEEEASE do not use a coffe grinder as a food processor, the grinding compartment is NOT sealed from the motor (at least mine isn't) and the liquids will get into the motor.

If you want to do something like that, do a small food processor. My first food proccessor is the one in the link below and it cost me $10, I've done pine nuts in it, I don't know if it would do heavier nuts.
[www.amazon.com]

It only does a cup which is a bit of a pain, if you wanted to do a small food processor I'd go with a bit bigger one like this 3 cup one for $15 (I have no personal experience with this model though).

[www.amazon.com]



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/07/2007 02:15AM by tropical.