Raw Holiday Dinners

Just wanted to let you know that Kim Lemberg and Pat Umbel, the two fabulous ladies who slave over dehydrators and blenders so you don't have to, have raw food Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners coming up.

With two of their raw dinners in my pocket and another on the books, I can attest that everything Kim and Pat make is beyond delicious. See that unassuming brown square of raw apple crisp up there in the lower left corner? That apple crisp is the best dessert, raw or cooked, I've eaten all year long! Plus, you're going to feel really good about yourself for eating healthy amidst all the holiday gorging.

Thanksgiving Dinner
November 13 - Kinzers, PA
November 20 - Wilmington, DE
Autumn fruit soup, mock turkey loaf with cranberry sauce, sweet potato casserole, Waldorf salad, pumpkin pie with vanilla cream.

Christmas Dinner
December 4 - Kinzers, PA
December 18 - Wilmington, DE
Fruit-filled crepes with strawberry sauce, "meat" loaf with bbq sauce, cheesy "better than mashed potatoes", holiday green salad, pecan pie with vanilla cream.

$20 per person
Dinner starts at 6pm
Reservations required
Contact Pat Umbel to make a reservation: patumbel@yahoo.com
Kinzer's Firehall, 3521 Lincoln Hwy, Kinzers, PA 17535
Limestone Presbyterian Church, 3201 Limestone Rd., Wilmington, DE 19808

Raw Food Dinners and Potlucks

Thanks to a couple of friends that are into eating raw, I had the pleasure of being invited to tag along with them to a raw dinner in Newark, DE, catered by Kim Lemberg and Pat Umbel. Kim is a Certified Holistic Health Counselor. Pat is a Certified Natural Health and Holistic Nutrition Counselor. Both Kim and Pam are Certified Raw Food Instructors through the Alissa Cohen program, and together these two ladies host catered raw food dinners, and also host raw food potlucks.

For the extremely reasonable price of $20, I was treated to a truly delicious raw dinner that included a mango smoothie, chili, enchiladas, crackers with salsa, and key lime pie. If you're curious about raw food, these dinners are a great place to discover just how good raw food can be. And that would be seriously good!Kim and Pat are hoping to have one raw food catered dinner in the Newark, DE, area once a month, and one raw food catered dinner in the Gap, PA, area once a month. Here is the schedule so far:

August 27 - catered raw food dinner at the Kinzer Fire Hall in Kinzers, PA
September 11 - catered raw food dinner at the Newark Co-op Limestone Presbyterian Church in Newark Wilmington, DE

Pat holds a raw food potluck the third Monday of each month at the Kinzer Fire Hall in Kinzers, PA. Kim's first raw food potluck will be September 15 18 at the Newark Co-op.

To attend any of these events all you have to do is RSVP by email to Pat (paumble@yaoo.com). And be sure to get on their email list for monthly notices of events, or check Kim's events page (presently not up to date) and Pat's events page.

One Lucky Duck

Had some really good eats in New York recently, despite the fact that we traveled on a whim and didn't do any research into restaurants. One of those places was One Lucky Duck, the teeny-tiny raw foods takeaway with three teeny-tiny tables that's around the corner from and connected to the kitchen of Pure Food and Wine. Pure Food and Wine is one of New York's most hyped raw food restaurants, but, alas, it's only open for dinner. That's how we found ourselves around the corner at One Lucky Duck, essentially Pure Food and Wine's takeaway venue.

I've been interested in a raw food diet for a couple of years now, and have only recently started purposely trying to incorporate more raw food meals into my diet (going solid for even a week would never happen with my zero willpower), for no real reason other than I'd like to eat a little more healthfully. I have no intention of giving up cooked food, but am simply looking at raw foods as a new type of cooking...or, I guess, that would be non-cooking.

You probably eat raw occasionally without even thinking about it. That smoothie with bananas, berries, and ice: raw! That salad with lettuce, cucumber and tomato dressed with vinegar and olive oil: raw! Well, maybe the olive oil and vinegar you used weren't technically raw, but there is raw olive oil and vinegar out there to be had.

Those are simple raw dishes to make, but the lengths that some raw foodists go to make some foods -- soaking nuts and blending them into creams, sprouting grains, dehydrating flax slurries to make crackers -- is more than I have patience for, or proper equipment for in my own kitchen. And that's why I was excited to have Pure Food and Wine's kitchen do the prep for me.These spicy Thai lettuce wraps with mango, pea shoots, carrots, cabbage, cashews, and tamarind sauce were great, and not unlike lettuce wraps found at non-raw food restaurants. The outer wrap was actually a collard (or maybe a cabbage) leaf oiled and lightly massaged to make the leaf more tender. The spicy sun dried tomato tortilla wraps with corn cilantro guacamole, tomato-lime salsa, and cashew sour cream were my least favorite, and I would not order them again. The sun dried tomato wrap was a bit salty, and that's a lot of guacamole! Even eating just one was a bit much, so don't ask how one eats all three. Since I'm not on a 100% raw food diet -- heck, I'm not even on a 10% raw food diet -- I don't need to fat-load on avocados and nuts like raw foodists do to get fats and feel sated. I have baked cookies and bread for that. I did enjoy the cashew sour cream, as it reminded me of Tofutti sour cream, and for some reason I just love Tofutti sour cream. Remember back on Top Chef season 4 when the lovable spaz, Andrew "I've got a culinary boner" got kicked off for making raw sushi (not with raw fish, but with all raw vegetables) as a healthy lunch for fatso cops, and Padma and Tom were less than thrilled? Well, I thought it was a brilliant idea, and afterward was just dying to try raw sushi, so jumped at the chance to try One Lucky Duck's sushi rolls.

There's not much different with a raw sushi roll than a regular veggie sushi roll other than the soy sauce is unpasteurized, the nori is untoasted, and, well, you gotta substitute something for the cooked rice. One Lucky Duck subbed grated jicama and pine nuts for the rice (Andrew used parsnips and pine nuts), and the results were quite nice. There was a slight textural difference with the "rice," but nothing that would make me twist my face like Padma and Tom. Really, the raw sushi was almost identical to normal sushi. I even dug the raw slices of ginger. Oh, good God, the raw desserts looked decadent. And they had decadent price tags! Most single servings of desserts were in the $5-$12 range, but a square of tiramisu will set you back $15!

Yeah, nothing at One Lucky Duck is cheap. Raw food restaurants ain't cheap, people. But it can be amazingly good...and good for you.

One Lucky Duck
125 1/2 E. 17th St., New York, NY, 10003
212-477-7151