Going Christmas-free

I’ve made the decision. I am going Christmas-free. I am not a Christian. I don’t see any reason to celebrate this holiday. Especially when I consider how awfully I am handling this time of the year.

In my country Christmas mean basically this – supermarkets and shopping malls are full of stressed people buying unnecessary expensive presents. Mothers are being stressed with cooking, baking (at least 4-5 kinds of sweets – full of butter, sugar, chemicals, white refined flour etc), cleaning the house… This starts at the beginning of December, or sooner. I was trying to resist it but every year I get stressed as well – you HAVE to buy presents to every member of your family, all your friends, schoolmates, work collegues, partner, his family, your pets…list goes and goes. Even when I try to buy my presents in advance it isn’t possible.

I am very picky in choosing gifts for my beloved ones. I want the gifts to be nice and useful and make them surprised and happy. But what if the person doesn’t have any hobbies at all? I mean the people who spend most of the day watching television, go to work, go drink with their friends or eat unhealthy meaty dishes. Maybe some sport in the meantime… but my creativity stops there. I am not going to buy any meat, alcohol or things which I don’t resonate with AT ALL. I like buying beautiful presents, filled with love, healthy, organic, hand-made, natural… but it is not possible when you “HAVE TO” buy presents for so many people so sometimes I end up buying something just to have something for that person. Magic disappears.

Christmas should mean being with your family, friends, partner and basically- feel good. It is not like that at all.

happy family and carp waiting to be killed and eaten

 

First of all – people don’t know anything about history of this celebration. They don’t know the meaning of traditions but still do it. In my country people eat fish (carp to be exact) and potato salad (potatoes, steriled vegetables, mayo, cheese, ham, boiled egg, pickles). Why? Nobody knows, but they still do it. There are stalls on the streets where you buy fish alive and kill it at home (nice tradition, isn’t it?) or they will kill it for you (example), blood is everywhere and it smells awfully. People are then carrying bloody plastic bags back home with smiles on their faces. One more task completed. Now 1000 more are awaiting!

sugary fatty sweets covered in more sugar

 

Okay, than you have to bake all that delicious sweets (not delicious at all, sugar, flour and fat combined together), it’s good for one thing – it will make you crave MORE of it, make you bloated and will feed your Candida very well. Plates are beautifully covered with sweets (which I like and it smells beautifully as well)…but- it makes people think that Christmas is about eating and “enjoying” what you have been resisting the whole year. I have been thinking the same. But why should I ruin my Christmas with stomachache, nausea and being tired with digesting? That’s what I ask… If people don’t have such a sensitive digestion as I do and they don’t gain tons of weight after Christmas, they are very happy people, haha. But there are not many of them, so I will keep being negative and hateful towards Christmas 😛

Then you HAVE to have a Christmas tree. Why? Again, nobody knows but everybody buys it and decorates it proudly. I actually quite like decorated Christmas tree, but could it please be stress-free?

they had to buy her AT LEAST something, didn’t they?

 

I mentioned presents before, but now I will mention them from the other side – as an accepter. I begged my parents many times – please don’t give me any unnecesarry things, which will just hang or lay in my room. I like to keep my room neat, clean and empty not filled with “decoration” which are only good for carrying dusty cap, lol. My parents should be people who know me, shouldn’t they? But I realised they don’t. I got unnecesary decorations for my room (no comment), too small panties, grey and black clothes (I hate these colours) and many other things which are nice, but… I don’t need them. I could have bought so much other, more useful and more beautiful things for that money! The presents just didn’t make me happy because they weren’t bought with love. They were bought as duties, with stress and absolutely without creativity.

fried carp with mayo potato salad

 

A little more complaining.
Christmas dinner, it starts quite early in my family. Parents are hungry because the whole day they are “fasting”. Or they call it fasting. Basically it means, eating Christmas sweets and drinking coffee, being stressed, tired, wrapping presents, preparing food for the evening. Two kinds of soups, two kinds of fish, two kinds of potato salads. They get very hungry around 4/5, so we HAVE TO have dinner at 5 eventho not all of the members are hungry ( I was actually stuffed from the lunch still, but who cares?). They drink alcohol (as cheers for “good health”), then we have bean soup (they add sausage in theirs), then they have second soup – fish soup, then we have second course – fish and potato salad (I had just vegan potato salad). Everybody is stuffed, full, bloated, overeaten and then we fakely watch Christmas fairy tales (every year the same ones) and go unwrap our presents.

With this stress ends. But shouldn’t it be ALL stress free. We have been arguing and yelling the whole day all just because of this fake holiday. And I am not going to be part of this anymore. The Christmas spell is gone. I don’t enjoy the Christmas athmosphere, because there is not any.

That is my opinion about Christmas as it is “done” in my family. All I ever wanted for Christmas is relaxed athmosphere, cozy room, cuddling on the sofa, watching a nice movie, drinking yummy tea and be in love with my life. I want to feel good, the year is ending, winter is here, celebrate everything amazing which happened during this year. I am going Christmas-free and going to create my OWN celebration which won’t include stress, hurrying, overeating, pushing myself, arguing, gaining weight and feeling depressed. I spent my Christmas Day crying and I don’t want this to happen next year as well. I want to be naked, dance, celebrate beautiful Goddess and free myself from the feeling that this part of the year…is horrible.

stay positive and clean the unnecessary negativity from your life.

Vegetable chippies

Lately I have been craving vegetables so much! Especially the root ones so I am trying new recipes and trying to include them into my diet in a tasty way. This is just easy recipe, steamed vegetable slices and then baked. This recipe is oil-free, low-fat and very nourishing and grounding.

Ingredients:

• 2 potatoes
• 1 big beet, peeled
• 3 carrots, peeled
• 1 Tbsp organic shoyu
• 1 tsp dried garlic powder
• dash of chilli and sweet paprika

Preparation:

Slice all the vegetables into chips. Steam for 10 minutes and preheat oven in the meantime – at 200 degrees Celsia. Them remove chippies into a bowl and mix with soy sauce and all the seasonings you like. Place on the baking parchment and bake for about 15 minutes. Done ❤

I enjoyed this dish with some tomato sauce.

Healing imbalances – ayurvedic approach to secondary amenorrhea

Lately I have been struggling with my body imbalances again. My only health problems are these – indigestion, acne-prone skin and MENSTRUATION IRREGULARITY. I suffered from amenorrhea for 3 years after my anorexia period and during my first vegan attempts. Then I healed myself. Now it is back again and now I am finally starting to understand it.

My body constitution from ayurveda is Pitta-Kapha. But my body and also mind imbalance is VATA. And that is very much what is AMENORRHEA caused by.

I was googling through many articles about it, so I will write some of the facts here, I hope it will help someone as well. Amenorrhea (or at least in my case, I think!) is caused by low pitta dosha and too much vata. (My basic body constitution is pitta but my lifestyle and diet is very much the opposite and I suffer from cold feet/hands, thin nails…etc).

Causes of too much vata (and blocks of menstrual channels) can be: the ones in Italics are mine

• stress, anger, tension, travelling, emotional duress, changing of school/job…
• increase of cold temperament od body
• excessive lethargy, sedentary lifestyle
• vata promoting diet

Vata increasing diet: (Basically all I eat… dry grains, no oils, cruciferous vegetables, flour, yeast, dried fruit, corn, peas…)

• cold, light, dry, airy foods (basically low-fat vegan lifestyle,lol)
• gas forming vegetables (cabbage, broccoli, beans, lettuce, peas, cauliflower…) – I have been eating them lately a lot
• yeast-based products – also a thing which I eat few times a week when heaving some store bough whole grain breadrolls
• white flour, white sugar – yes yes, white sugar in teas in tearoom where I work

Some other interesting factors which can cause amenorrhea:

• excessive exercise
• artificial subjects for orgasm (that’s interesting one!)
• no exercise
• cold temperature

And here is the list of the things, which I resonate with and I believe can be helpful:

• warm, moist meals – veggie, miso soups, stews, grains cooked with lots of water, herbal teas
• drinking warm and hot water during the day
• nutritious but easily digested foods
• taking flax-seeds (or psyllium) for better digestion and fatty acids
• ayurvedic herbal supplements – Triphala, Shatavari
• hot and spicy foods, cooked in oil (vegetable oil or ghee – I will stay vegan, so just vegetable ones)
• SPICES (very important one) : black pepper, cinnamon, coriander, cardamom, fennel, ginger, cumin, clove, celery and mustard seed, garlic
• avoid eating old, cold and dry foods!!!! (that means foods from yesterday, too much bread, dried fruits…)
• avoid using dry cooking methods – not enough water, sauteeing, baking, grilling (yes yes, my “dry” frying and sauteeing all the time, no soups, no oils)
• don’t skip breakfast (have been doing this and then I always had heavy dinner, which is absolute opposite of what is good for my digestion)
• not so much raw fruits, veggies, salads

So basically, to balance VATA:

• eat warm foods, with added fat (coconut, sesame oil)
• warm soups, stews, freshly baked bread
• have heavier breakfast – something warm, milky and sweet (cooked oatmeal with almond milk and rice syrup and cinnamon for example)
• sweet fruits – bananas, peaches, figs, mangos, persimmons, soaked raisins, melons
• avocados
• nut butters
• cold-pressed, fresh sesame oil
• root vegetables – beets, carrots, yams, potatoes; pumpkins, celery, turnips, mushrooms, squash, garlic, onion
• beans in moderation (well soaked and cooked) – chickpeas, pink lentils
• molasses, brown rice syrup
• spices mentioned before 🙂 + basil, caraway, anise, thyme, allspice, nutmeg, horseradish
• hot herbal teas, warm flax or rice milk
• soaked and well cooked grains – basmati rice, brown rice, oats, wheats, couscous

Just to mention- I am not a proffesional and this is just what I found on the Internet because I want to make changes and be happy. Menstruation is a very important thing for me, if it would mean to stop being vegan I will do it. You can judge me, but it is my health and my decisions. Anyways no need to do that, I am staying vegan, love animals and don’t want to promote animal cruelty. I believe that this can be solved with just some changes of fat intake, cooking methods, supplementing(ayurvedic tea, pills and evening primrose oil + psyllium), adding more spices and also include – OILY massages of my body, drinking tons of fluids, exercising yoga for fertivility improvement.

I will write about my healing journey soon and how has my diet and health changed. I miss that feminine part of me – menstrual flow, releasing, relaxing… ❤ I hope this gift will get back to me very very soon.

Chocolate orgasm – or you can call it fatty vegan brownies

This is not a low fat recipe, it’s HIGH in fat and it is DELICIOUS. Very nourishing, satisfying and helps with vata-imbalance in your body (I have been eating just DRY,LIGHT,AIRY,COLD,LOW-FAT foods lately and this has made my body very imbalanced, gonna write about it soon). Found this recipe on the internet, but managed it a little.
This brownies have to be enjoyed without any distractions – television, youtube videos or I think even music. Just sit, chew slowly, devour the best chocolaty taste and nourishment which this sweetnes GODDESS gives you.

Ingredients:

• 1 3/4 cup whole flour, sieved
• 1 small banana, mashed
• 80grams dark vegan chocolated, chopped
• 3 Tbsp carob + 3 Tbsp cacao powder
• 1/3 cup hot boiling water
• 1 tsp instant coffee
• pinch of sea salt
• 1 tsp organic baking powder
• 6 Tbsp coconut oil, melted
• 1 1/2 unrefined cane sugar (or coconut sugar)

Preparation:

Preheat your oven at 180 degrees celsia, prepare baking dish and put parchment in it.

Sieve the flour and baking powder into a medium bowl. In another (bigger) bowl mix together cacao, carob, chocolate pieces, coffee, salt. Add 1/3 cup of boiling water and mix with a spoon into a paste. Add mashed banana, sugar, melted coconut oil and mix with hand-mixer until smooth. Add flour, stir well. The batter will be very thick, that’s okay. Mix completely, don’t use hand-mixer anymore. Put into a baking dish, use hands/fingertips so you’re in touch with this goodness. Bake at 175-180 degrees Celsia for 25 minutes. Cool completely, than slice.

Share, enjoy and have an chocolate orgasm.

Oatty vegan pudding in seconds!

Lately I have been loving oats, quick recipes, cacao and actually…everything which is starchy, sugary and sweet! Haven’t been craving fats at all, just starches – oats, fruit, pancakes, jam. I don’t know what’s happening with me, just thinking of green salad makes me wanna puke a little, haha. But I should definitely get more greens in…

Anyways, I want to share this simple sugary recipe with you. Low in fat, high in carbohydrates, vegan, healthy and satisfying.

What you need:

• oats, I used about 1/2 cup
• oat milk, about 1/2 cup
• 1 heaping Tbsp rice flour (used glutinous one from Japanese shop)
• 1 tsp low fat cocoa powder
• coconut sugar – 1 Tbsp or as much as you like, you can of course use maple,agave or rice syrup…
• banana (optional)

Steps:

Put oats into a mug, add cocoa, sugar and flour. Mix well. Put boiling water over it, until it’s all covered (about 1/2 cup), than add 1/2 – 3/4 cup of oat milk. As thick or as liquid-y as you like it. Let it sit for 1 minute or so, slice a banana on the top and enjoy. Yum, yum, yum!

Baked apple ‘pocket’ pie

Another one of my intuitive creations 🙂 Low fat, vegan, high carb yuumy dish. Just flour and water for dough and filling is upto you. Here’s how I made it.

Ingredients:

• for 2 huge pockets I used about 200-250g of whole spelt flour
• water to get desired consistency of batter:) should be tough enough to form a pocket from it
• for filling I used 1 huge apple, grated (or use 2 medium ones)
• cinnamon
• about 3 Tbsp brown sugar
• 1/2 cup rice milk cooked with 1 Tbsp of rice flour to make pudding for thickening the filling mixture
• raisins if you wish to

Preparation:

Sieve flour into a medium-sized bowl, slowly start adding water and mix with spatula. Form a tough dough and let it sit for 5 minutes. Prepare filling in the meantime – bring milk to boil, add rice flour (more than 1 Tbsp if neccesary) and sugar, boil for 2 minutes and stir well. Peel and grate your apple(s), add cinnamon, pour pudding onto it, add raisins, mix well.

Roll out your dough (separate in 2 pieces, because we’re making 2 pies out of this amount of flour), add half of the filling mixture, create a pocket, seal edges well and pierce top of the pocket with fork for better baking:)

Bake in preheated oven at 190 degrees celsia for 15-20 minutes.

High Carb Vegan Pizza Recipe

Very easy, again. Just few ingredients and I wasn’t able to measure them (again) so get intuitive about the measurements and add by sight 😉

Ingredients:

• whole grain flour – I used whole barley flour, about 250grams for 2 small pizzas
• water at room temperature
• yeast – compressed fresh yeast. I like my dough with yeast, it’s very soft and airy, I don’t eat pizza often so why not:)
• tsp of brown sugar
• toppings you like – I used canned crushed tomatoes, tomatoes, onion, zucchini and canned corn
• seasonings – oregano of course, dried garlic

Preparation:

In a bowl mix 1/2 of a small cube of yeast – that’s about 15grams I guess? you can also use dried yeast, about 1 tsp. Put 1/2 cup of water (room temperature) and 1-2 tsp of brown sugar, mix well and let sit for 5 minutes. Add flour and mix and then add more water/flour until you get desired consistency- you can roll the dough with your hands and form a big ball out of it, dash with flour, cover and let sit for 10-15 minutes.

Preheat your oven at 220 degrees Celsia in the meantime and prepare your toppings. Slice tomatoes, chop onion and zucchini.

Form a pizza crust(s) into the oven for 5 minutes. Then put on tomato sauce, veggies and spices. Bake for 15-20 minutes at 200 degrees.

Serve and eat with love ❤

Adorable oatmeal w/ dates and cinnamon

Just another variation of my basic oatmeal. Yum yum, I progressed myself- I eat my oatmeal even for dinner sometimes! But this is mostly a perfect breakfast dish, warms you up and satisfies until midday or longer.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup rolled oats, blended into flour
• 1 cup water + 1/2 cup oat milk
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1 Tbsp rice syrup
• dates and apple jam for toppings

Preparation:

Put oat flour into a small pan, cover with boiling water, mix well and bring to boil, then to medium heat. Add more water if necessary, cook for 1-2 minutes, mix in rice milk, cinnamon, syrup and cover with lid. (turn off your stove)

Top with pitted dates and apple jam. Enjoy this autumn warming healthy vegan high carb recipe!

Sweet potato dumplings – yummy high carb vegan recipe

I have fallen in love with dumplings lately. I don’t eat them daily because they take longer to prepare and I like to have variety in my diet but I do them at least once a week. This time I used mashed sweet potato in the dough and it tasted wonderfully. I don’t know exact measurements, I cook intuitively and also it depends on quality and type of your flour – how much water it soaks and how well you mix and roll it!

asymetrical dumplings (ehm) with steamed kale leaves

Ingredients:

• 1 big sweet potato
• whole grain flour (I used whole wheat soft flour)
• water
• bit of rice milk
• sea salt, turmeric, saffron, marjoram, dried garlic – as much as you like!

Preparation:

Boil your sweet potato, don’t peel or anything. Just boil until very soft and mash with a little bit of rice milk (about 2 Tbsp) in a medium sized bowl.

 

Add about 1 cup of flour, I ended up using about 2 cups in total. Mix well, add a little bit of water and spices. I used dash of sea salt, 1 tsp turmeric, 1 tsp dried garlic, 1/2 tsp saffron and dash of sweet paprika. Add more water or flour and mix with spatula until you get nice thick consistency. Add more flour and roll with your hands until your dough is firm.

mixing my dough

Form balls, roll them in flour so they’re covered. Put them in boiling water and boil until they start to float on the water surface (about 3 minutes?). Strain and let them cool a little.

 

I served my dumplings easily – with a little canned tomato sauce, steamed kale leaves and fresh tomato. Yum! (Dumplings taste amazing eaten just like they’re actually…)

 

High carb low fat vegan pancakes, McDougall style

These pancakes are very very easy to prepare and need just few ingredients. I don’t eat them very often as I’m in love with my oatmeal (which is also easy to carry around) and I want them to remain special and have them on the weekends to pamper myself with something which I used to eat as a child (butter covered thin crepes with Nutella, jam and quark actually, but still this recipe reminds me of those times, haha).

Ingredients:

• 1 cup whole spelt flour (or wheat or barley works well)
• 3/4 cup organic rice milk
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 Tbsp rice syrup (isn’t necessary)

Preparation:

Mix all the ingredients in a bowl. How easy is that! Let it sit for few minutes and in the meantime heat your non-stick pan to medium. Use NO oil, fat or butter (not even water). Pour small blops of batter on the hot pan and bake for about 5 minutes on first side (until the batter starts to make bubbles and it’s visibly easy to flip), much less on the other side (until it’s slightly brown from the bottom, just about 1-2 minutes). Cover your pancakes with whatever you prefer – I love maple syrup and banana slices or rice syrup and sprinkled cinnamon. This time I used just apple purhee. Enjoy ❤