In the Kitchen: Raw Spaghetti & (Un)Meat Balls
This post is part of a series in which I share recipe assignments from my culinary nutrition program. Each week, we have two to three recipes to make, photograph, and review. I’ll include links to the recipes when they’re available so you can follow along with me if you like.
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Raw Marinara Sauce
Notes: It was raw food week for my class and this marinara sauce was one of my favorite recipes we’ve made to date! The flavors were so bold and fresh, and the color a gorgeous, vibrant red. I used sun-dried tomatoes that were reconstituted in water, not oil, and the only change I made to the original recipe was to use about a third of the dried oregano because I was running low. The flavor was still fantastic, so this did not seem to negatively impact the recipe. That’s one of the things I enjoy about raw meals – they tend to be forgiving! Also, the (un)cooking process couldn’t have been much easier and this beats pre-made jarred sauce hands down.
The original recipe doesn’t appear to be available online, but there is a similar variation here.
Raw Zucchini Noodles with (Un)Meat Balls
Notes: These kind of look like raw turkey burgers to me. Although, I couldn’t tell you the last time I had turkey so…who knows. For meat eaters, maybe this is a good thing. For vegans, it might be a turn off. I really liked the consistency of the (un)meat balls and I thought the walnuts lent a very hearty texture to otherwise light zucchini noodles. However, something happens to me with a lot of nut-based raw food where I love the first couple of bites and then suddenly can’t eat more than that without feeling overly full and bloated. I’m sure part of the reason is because it’s so calorically dense, but I literally mean that I take two bites and never want to eat it again. Weird, right? I do the same thing with coconut butter, full-fat coconut milk, and peanut butter from time-to-time. I’ve been playing around with my meals recently to be higher protein/carb and lower fat (not low-fat, just less nuts, seeds, and oils) and my stomach has been SO happy. Maybe that’s a post for another day.
The original recipe doesn’t look like it’s available online, but I did a little digging and here’s a similar recipe if you’d like to give it a try. As you can tell from the middle photo, it’s basically soaked raw walnuts, onion, parsley, lemon juice, garlic, tamari (I would skip this and use sea salt – I found the flavor to be odd here) and extra virgin olive oil. Toss everything in the food processor and go!
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What are you up to in the kitchen this week? Do you ever find that the same thing happens to you with raw, nut-based foods?
xo
Amanda
Photography by Amanda’s iPhone.
