I like to think of myself as a healthy person. I eat a strict vegan diet, and to most people, it appears that I am super healthy. Though I don't eat prime rib, or lobsters drenched in butter, I still indulge. And fairly often, I feel kind of gross. I don't like eating chips, french fries, and stay away from greasy things like chinese food most of the time. Eating those things make me feel awful-- and if we're going back to basic principles of veganism, I always believed that how good something tastes shouldn't be the reason I eat something, especially if it's hurting someone or something. Vegan foods aren't hurting animals, but sometimes they're hurting me. If I'm not feeling good a lot of the time, I'm not eating the right way. 

I want to take baby steps to becoming a truly healthful person. If you dive right into a diet that requires you to count your calories and eat no cooked food, you are probably going to fail. I have failed a lot when it comes to sticking with a diet. I think I need to figure out what is going to work for me and be sustainable, and that won't make me want to scream all the time. 

I've been sick this weekend, and it's uncomfortable and annoying. I am trying to eat foods that heal me, and energize me. I don't simmer my own beans often, but I can remember the first time I boiled my first batch of fresh chickpeas. The taste of them when they are first drained is so fresh! I remember eating them by the handful. So I made some this morning  and they were just as fresh ;)

I have had a bag of chai spices on my counter for the whole summer just waiting for the first day of fall. It's finally chai time! I simmered 2 teaspoons of chai spices in 1 1/2 cups unsweetened almond milk and added 2 teaspoons coconut sugar. The longer you simmer, the stronger the chai. I missed chai this summer. Iced Chai just isn't the same.

This is my trough of fresh boiled chickpeas. It was about a pound and a half dried beans that I soaked overnight, then boiled with a strip of kombu and a pinch of salt for and hour and ten minutes. I tried peeling them, then realized they taste no different and the vitamix doesn't care if you peel them or not. 

I decided to make a tonic to try and "cleanse" my body today. I used this recipe with a few modifications. I made 55 ounces of it last night, and drank it all. Feeling slightly better today, but still no where near perfect. So I made another batch. I just called it "spicy lemonade" and it made it more fun to drink.

It's the juice of 2 lemons, which I juice over the blender container so that I don't have to worry about seeds. As you know, the vitamix doesn't care if there are seeds. There's a 2 inch piece of fresh ginger that I sliced, and about 1 teaspoon of cayenne pepper. The ginger is supposed to "detoxify" you, and the cayenne pepper is to keep your sinuses clear. The lemon is supposed to help with digestion. I feel like people are too polite on the internet about what this food is going to make your body do sometimes. The people need to know.

I put some coconut water ice cubes in there, that I had left from making smoothies from my book that is all about bananas. If you don't have any coconut water ice cubes, use regular ice. I just put them in there to seem fancy.