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Let me show you how simple it is to cut uniform cubes with potato and carrot in this video I shot with Vegetarian Times Magazine. Wardrobe provided by my favorite eco luxury designer Linda Loudermilk.

Labor Day marks the weekend my Rhodesian Ridgeback, Kanga, and I rescued one another….9-years ago! How time flies. (and yes, I cake sunblock on my face, as you can see).

Kanga had been at the Humane Society for over 2 weeks, and no one adopted her. Surprising, since she is a beautiful specimen of this breed. Plus, she came fully trained, so someone had spent a lot of time and energy with her. She was skin and bone, and 50+ pounds underweight with kennel cough and dusty fur. Poor baby.

Luckily, a truck intercepted 20 dogs on their way to get euthanized, and brought them back to a no-kill shelter in Portland, OR called Family Dogs NW. This was where I found Kanga early the very next morning. I applied the same raw food principles to Kanga as I do for human healing, and over the next month or two she gained 50 pounds and regained radiant health on a Raw Food diet. You can read more about her journey in Ani’s Raw Food Kitchen, where Kanga has her own dog food chapter.

My brother Max saw this photo of Kanga and said she looks like she’s “mugging”. I had to ask him what the heck that means. Max said “mugging = posing, like rappers do for pics”. Hahaa. Yup, Kanga is a superstar, and very popular too. Folks always stop us to pet her, especially young children.

Kanga’s from Rhodesia, which is now Zimbabwe Rhodesia, and the Sahara so she loves the sun, warmth, and sand. She hates water, but it was so hot out that Kanga got her paws wet. I love dog beach because here she can roam off-leash, and run free to play with other dogs.

Kanga and I love laying in the sand and soaking up the sun. It’s never hot enough for us, and soaking up sun is one of our favorite past times. I’m happy I got to take Kanga to Huntington Dog Beach yesterday on the final hot day of the summer (it was 90 F) to celebrate her 9-year Bday and Dogversary with me. Thank you Kanga for being my family, love, and for hanging out with me for the past 9-years! I love you.

I visited Erewhon Natural Foods in Los Angeles on May 28, 2011 along my book tour for Ani’s Raw Food Asia. Erewhon is my favorite Raw Food store. These beautiful photos are courtesy of the very talented Sherman Lee at http://www.digitalslimages.com.

Juan Hernandez, the store manager, makes sure to offer the largest range of Raw Food products and brand, and has created the nexus for Raw Foods here in LA. Juan was one of my earliest supporters of my SmartMonkey Foods packaged and prepared foods products.

Each year’s visit celebrating my new book always draws a packed house. I love Erewhon!

I showed everyone how easy it is to make my Mushroom “Bul Go Gi”, from Ani’s Raw Food Asia, page 186, using mushrooms marinated in tamari or nama shoyu (raw soy sauce), toasted sesame oil, asian pear, and sweetener of choice like agave or brown rice syrup. We topped off these beautiful Lettuce Wraps, from page 188, with my version of a traditional Korean Gochujang Sauce, page 225, made with miso, sesame oil, chile powder, and sweetener like agave.

Following my food demo and Q+A…next, I get to sign books and meet people 1 on 1!

This tour, many people had me sign multiple copies of Ani’s Raw Food Asia for friends and family. I do love when people bring their entire collection for me to sign too…..a blessing for me.

My friends Ron Gilmore and Caroline Jue create an awesome animated series called Rawman & Green-Girl. They are doing great work educating and sharing information about our food sources.

Elaine R. Johnson hand delivered this beautiful porcelain sculpture she made to me all the way from Arizona with her mom. Elaine is amazingly talented. I can’t even begin to express my gratitude for such a beautiful gift.

This is the beautifully talented Elaine R. Johnson. She told me how challenging porcelain is to work with….cracking as it dries, or cracking out of the kiln during baking. A labour of love, it shows!

Grab a copy of the April 2011 issue of Delicious Living Magazine and enjoy my Raw Power cover feature with 6 raw food recipes for a preview of the flavors I’ll be bringing you in my newest East West Fusion raw food book Ani’s Raw Food Asia, available everywhere May 10, 2011.

Today was Day 3 of food prep at the Test Kitchen. My GastRAWnomique molecular gastronomy inspired dinner is just days away. Chris Ochs and Josh from SunFood personally delivered a ton of superfoods. Diane Paylor and I were elbow deep in cacao. And Top Chef Alex Reznik was cold smoking my cashews for me.

To cold smoke, Alex uses a smoking gun packed with chips to push smoke into a sealed container of raw cashews. The cashews absorb the aroma of the smoke, but stay raw. Pretty cool. No pun intended.

Restaurant Mo-Chica’s Ricardo Zarate and I making Cheddar Kale Chips.

Richi helping me set up 8 Excalibur Dehydrators. These are my favorite dehydrators, and they come with Paraflexx reusable non-stick sheets. Thanks for sending them over to me Excalibur! So much love from the community, sponsors have been super generous and include: Excalibur, Sambazon, Earth Circle Organics, Sunfood, Gold Mine Natural Food, Frontier Natural Products Co-Op, Big Tree Farms.

Chef Seth Greenburg at the Huntley Hotel Penthouse Restaurant invited me into his kitchen where he shared with me some of his favorite molecular gastronomy techniques.

Chef Seth and I compressed melons and cucumbers, and put chemicals into water and fruit puree to create popular spheres or ‘caviar’. We even made ‘noodles’. See what could be done using chemicals got my creative juices flowing thinking about ways to create similar effects without chemicals, and instead 100% natural and raw.

Test Kitchen brings together the best Chefs in LA, and has become much like a think tank where Chefs share their creativity, ideas, and time. Great energy in this space! Chef Christian Page, a locavore sourcing his ingredients locally and seasonally, is to the left of the photo, and is about to open Daily Dose Restaurant in downtown LA in mid Dec.

A super easy salad to make, this is my go to when traveling. Made by massaging avocado into torn leaves of kale and then adding a squeeze of lemon to soften the leaves, and then tossing in sprouts.

Full of vitamins, minerals, chlorophyll, and antioxidants to combat travel stress (including time zone changes, sitting on airplanes, and living in hotel rooms) while boosting my immune system. I carried this yummy creation onto my last flight from NJ to LA, and took it with me to Las Vegas for my raw food debut at ACAM’s medical conference at the Paris Hotel last week, where they served up 5 of my raw food vegan recipes to over 500 doctors!

Kale, Avocado, Sprouts
Makes 2 servings

• 1/2 bunch of kale, de-stem, and tear leaves into bite sized pieces
• 1 avocado
• 1 lemon’s juice
• 1 container of sprouts, any type
• sea salt, to taste

Into large mixing bowl, place kale and massage with avocado. Squeeze lemon juice, and massage. Add sprouts and salt, if using. Massage and toss to mix well.

Will keep for several hours at room temperature. Store in fridge for a day or 2.

I was invited onto FOX in San Diego for a 6-minute segment on the benefits of the raw food diet and to talk about the Sambazon Warrior Up Campaign. I made host Raoul Martinez a few smoothies including a Banana Butter Breeze with Cacao. I planned to make him a Tomato Tarragon Bisque, but ran out of time.

Almond Buttered Banana Freeze + Açaí (adapted from Ani’s Raw Food Essentials)
Find Recipe Here

I’m using my favorite blender, the Personal Blender. It costs about $69, and you can find more about the Personal Blender and find organic ingredients at www.GoSuperLife.com.

Weekend anchor Susan Lennon loves my Acai smoothies. She had a glow that shows how well she takes care of your health.

Preparing smoothies ahead of time was a good idea! Thanks for Kaia Lai and Kato for helping me shop, prep, and set up this beautiful shot.

Raoul initially seemed a bit scared of my smoothies, but once he tasted them, he was a believer! He finished off the cacao banana smoothie, and said he was really impressed.

I was invited to Rockefeller Center for a guest appearance on LX New York with hosts Janice Huff and Jane Hanson. I talk about 4 key ingredients in the raw food diet, and made 3 recipes using ‘secret’ ingredients: Marinara Pasta, Strawberry Tartlets, and Chocolate Pudding “slash” Frosting.

(this video’s audio is totally out of synch, and I’m trying to get my hands on a better copy of the segment, which I’ll upload later)

I was a guest on San Diego Living with host Erin Mikael’s Green Scene segments on June 24, 2010, and then again on June 27th. We make Cashew Kream with Fresh Red White and Blue Berry Parfaits and Fruit Tartlets.

I had the honor of meeting Dr T. Colin Campbell at the Farm Sanctuary Hoe Down last weekend in Watkins Glenn, New York, where we were both invited to speak about vegan lifestyle, health, and diet. He’s pictured above with his wife Karen.

Dr Campbell is the author of the best selling book The China Study. Campbell says about his research in the Philippines “In this project, however, I uncovered a dark secret. Children who ate the highest protein diets were the ones most likely to get liver cancer…” A 20-year research project partnership between Cornell University, Oxford University, and the Chinese Academy of Preventive Medicine found that “People who ate the most animal-based foods got the most chronic disease … People who ate the most plant-based foods were the healthiest and tended to avoid chronic disease. These results could not be ignored,” said Dr. Campbell.

In the Farm Sanctuary ‘People Barn’, I spoke to a full house about the benefits of the raw food diet, why whole and unprocessed foods are important, showed everyone how fast and easy it is to make a healthy Strawberry Kream Pie using just a handful of ingredients, from page 267 of Ani’s Raw Food Essentials, and then passed out pies to taste. Folks thought the pie was delicious. You can’t really go wrong with dates, cashews, almonds, vanilla, and strawberries.

Next, Dr. T. Colin Campbell took the stage, and reinforced many of the same concepts I had presented. He explained why taking supplements doesn’t work, and emphasized the importance of avoiding processed foods like all the junk vegan convenience foods on the market. He explained how protein turns-on cancer cells in the body.

In the USA, we promote high protein diets made up of about 80 percent protein. Most Americans eat around 50 percent protein. However, Dr. T. Colin Campbell advocates a diet of at most 20 percent plant-based protein for optimal health and longevity.

My mom and step dad came to the Farm for the weekend, and left inspired by all the great speakers and information, as did everyone! I can’t wait to visit the Farm Sanctuary again very soon.