Well, this is not exactly a tutorial for how to make fake meat, and, to be honest, I don’t even know what fake meat is. The fact is that today, mostly by chance, I found myself eating something that fantastically resembled to chopped meat. No, I’m still on my raw food diet allright, don’t worry, but it just happened that one of my meal courses for today came out like this, with a surprising, both visually and as taste, meat similarity. And I just thought you might be interested to know how I did it. I read a lot about people struggling to get on a raw food diet, and one of the most popular complaint is about the “awful taste” that raw food may have. Completely and totally wrong, at least from my experience: raw food can imitate, if you want, all the familiar tastes in the world: from chopped meat to pancakes. But, for now, back on my “fake chopped meat” story, let’s start this the easy way…
After my first 60 days of raw food diet, I made a commitment on trying to “cook” more. Cooking refers to the fact that I felt the need for more elaborate meals. In the first two month I only ate fruits and vegetables and the only processing I’ve done was blending all together. Quite spartan. The main goal was reached and that was to completely switch to raw food, but after that, something interesting happened. I started to feel the need to spend less time preparing the meals, while at the same time I needed something more elaborate, a regular meal, with main course, second course and dessert.
One week ago I made my first raw food chocolate and since then I made it again twice. Each time I experimented a bit and each time the chocolate came out better. And several days ago, not knowing how and what exactly am I going to “raw cook”, I started to make some stock. I thought it would be a good idea to store some of the main ingredients for my meals, like celery (and that would be the white root, not the leaves), carrots and avocado, after I blend them. Sort of a “fast food raw food” ingredients. I processed them with a slicer and chopped into small, rice like, parts. It took me about 25 minutes, and this is what it looks like:
The next days I started to take a spoon from there, a spoon from the other casserole, and try to play a little with quantities and taste. I will be honest and share with you that I initially aimed for some dumplings, but I didn’t know how to bring into the mix the dry, cereal-like part. Will see later about that.
Anyway, today I thought it would be a good idea to make some garlic and tomato sauce, and blend it with some “celery rice” and “carrots rice” to  see what happens. I took 2 cloves of garlic and two tomatoes, and in around 2 minutes I had a nice pinky hot sauce. A sudden inspiration told me to add first two spoons of blended avocado. The mix started to gain some consistence.
The next thing was to add the celery and the carrots. I don’t know the exact measurements, but maybe a small celery root and one carrot. Chopped in the mixer and very close to rice. I started to mix and at some point it hit me: man, it just looked like chopped meat:
I tasted and it also tasted like chopped meat. Ok, I accept the fact that I might be just a little bit delusional on this part, knowing the fact that I really don’t remember the chopped meat taste. I haven’t had meat in the last 3 years, so I might be a little out of track with this one. But it had a very interesting consistency and it was playing with my brain connections very different. It seemed to me that I was actually eating something cooked. Except it was raw and fresh.
Well, that called for an immediate salad, and, helped by Diana, I came up with a tomato, cucumber, onion and olives salad in like ten minutes. I also squeezed a whole lemon in it, just to make things spicier.
All in all, it was one of the most tasteful and nutritious meals I had. I ate it simultaneously, until both the salad and the fake meat bowl were empty.
I won’t hide the fact that I had raw chocolate for dessert. But I don’t have a picture, because I actually ate it before I think I will need one. Maybe next time, if there will be need to share my raw food chocolate experiences, I’ll post a step by step tutorial.
