About Me

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Northamptonshire, United Kingdom
My name is Peace Ravenwood and I am a Living Foods educator and experimenter, founder of the School of Living Foods and Alchemy Elixir Cafe ~ based in Northamptonshire UK. I love sharing the gifts and benefits of a life rich in raw foods, and also love spending as much time as possible outside in the garden, growing lots of fresh organic produce to use in the recipes. Wild foraging is also a passion of mine, one which I am constantly learning more about. My life is dedicated to learning and sharing every aspect of life in the raw, from seed ~ stomach ~ spirituality and sensuality. My other loves are of spending time with loved ones Anthony and our tribe of furry companions, reading, researching, writing and a little radical rebellion...my aim here to you is to walk with you while we change our world, one meal at a time Inlakesh Peace xxx

Friday 6 December 2013

"Go Fruit Yourself" ~ Yes it is all change for me!

I am LOVE-ing the title of this post - thank you Freelee Banana Girl for coining the phrase for us all to share!

This has come at last, the realisation that not all has been a happy ship for me this last year or so, and I am rejoicing that I am finally coming to realise that calorie restriction and eating high fat foods to boost the restricted calories just HAS NOT worked end of.

I have had a HUGE amount of support and encouragement from dear friends Nichola Fruityroots Sherlock, Em Smedley, Lynn Bunny Paws and all the beautiful Goddesses in the group Raw Till 4 on Facebook since I began this NEW chapter of life and living all things fruity - thank you so much ladies, I know my hand and heart will reach out to you often as the journey continues.

In my life quest to be the best I can be at 46 years in this mortal body, I have tried so hard with raw and living foods, giving my whole being to sharing the love of foods that are 'better' than all the cooked and fake foods we are deluged with on a minute by minute basis.  I was just not resonating with the facts that fruit is Queen of all the foods and as such she ought to be our first and foremost food source, not a tiny end thought as I have been doing for over 18 months, being led to think that fruit was going to stop me releasing weight and stop me healing my body!
NOTHING I have done has brought me the results I sought, no matter how hard I 'tried'  the only thing that did work was juice fasting, but that cannot be sustained by myself, with deep seated ED and a love of actually chewing yummy foods - I wonder who out there feels the same?  Yeah, sure, if I went on a swanky retreat and paid $£$£$£$ for a month somewhere nice and sunny and was fed fresh green juice every day, I would LOVE that, sadly this is not reality, being a little frugal faery.

So, it is with GLEE that I embark on the HCLFRV way of being (High Carb Low Fat Raw Vegan).

Now, at this stage I have been transitioning into eating more fruit, steadily for just 2 weeks now, aiming to increase the amount my shrunken, malnourished stomach can cope with as the weeks go by.  At this stage I am not 100% Raw, it is bloody cold here in the UK and potatoes are SO lush AND part of the Raw Till 4 meal plans - the main rule is we are RAW till 4pm so it is all about the FRUIT, some greens if we want them, either all blended into smoothies, or enjoyed as mono meals - all the papaya you can eat if you like!
After 4pm we can either stay Raw, or, as I am at the moment, have a cooked carb meal - aiming for about 1kg in total - I am not there yet - that is a mean feat for me to eat!  I get in about 700g of mixed veggies, slowly increasing it so it is always a mix of veggies to even up the taste etc.

I have just ordered a CrockPot slow cooker to make winter cooking a breeze - this will arrive either tomorrow or Monday!  I have to add in here, that we have NO COOKER in our house, so reliant on a camping stove for warm meals - the slow cooker will make this so much easier to create warming stews, casseroles and curries without going outside in the freezing cold and hoping the wind doesn't blow out the gas whilst you are having a pee!!

We chose not to buy another oven when we moved into this cottage - it would have gotten used far too much - and our desire is to be as raw as we can be - so, the freezer sits in its place, with our EVA water filter system on top, next to our SWAN tea urn which is on constant brew with Chaga tea.

Today for me is Day 5 of the RT4 plan and it is the 1st day of not eating any salt or added oils as fats in my cooked dinner - this is HUGE for me and has been the toughest change so far.  I am hoping that in a couple more days I will wonder why I ever added them in the first place, as my taste buds return to full function.

What does a typical day for me look like?  Well, this is an example of where I am at just now, with changes to come.

I wake up and drink as much water as I can before having some Chaga Tea
around 9am I have my first banana and mixed fruit smoothie - making about 44oz - which is all I can manage to eat at the moment.

I drink tea through the day.

sometimes I will make another smoothie or eat some fruit, just one kind, as much as I like.

Afternoon I make another 44oz smoothie, adding in some greens this time.

Dinner is currently either steamed quinoa with spices and herbs plus some form of veggies OR a huge plate of potatoes and veggies - I am aiming for more stews as soon as the CrocPot arrives!

In all my carbed up calorie intake is coming in around 2000 each day - working on getting it up to 2500 minimum to be able to re-set all the damage my body has been loaded with, and then the weight will release far more easily.

I am exercising each day too, with 2 brisk dog walks of 45 - 60 minutes each and I work on the CrazyFit vibration machine 2-3 times a day too - I hope this will bring about more fitness and more healing.

More to come soon xxx

Love and Faery Dust
Peace xxx

Saturday 16 November 2013

It's All About Chocolate…RAW That is!

Hey, we are in November now and I am shunning all the rubbish that is Movember Madness - we all know that the hairy-wash surrounding any cancer charity work is just bullshit - don't we???  Well, if you didn't then please do some digging to find out the truth.

Right, so, what is this chocolate thing all about?  I seem to be inundated with orders and craftings of the raw cacao variety right now and that is making for some mind bending adventures for sure, and a happy cacao faery am I.

I have always LOVED working with raw cacao, both in ceremony and for fun especially as this little sacred bean was responsible for me taking to the whole raw journey 3 years ago, so I have much to be thankful for.

These days I am truly blessed to be sharing the how to of crafting raw chocolate and to still be seeking to learn and improve my own way of making cacao look and taste amazing along the way.

I have even made a little venture into writing an e-book of Alchemical Elixirs - published and awaiting your calling, which contains my love of both the liquid form of magical foods and of course venturing into chocolate and Cakery!

I actually feel we live on cacao and greens a lot of the time, most days we share a lovely chaga and cacao hot chocolate for a meal and nibble on some goodies when we feel peckish - is that terribly bohemian?  Oh GOODY

As I am writing this, whilst the mac is working rather slowly today, I am wondering if it will indeed be saved and sent as there are error messages coming up every few minutes…oh the joy of technology eh!

In our little thatched nest, deep in rural idyl, we are enjoying the crisp sunny days walking the fields, Autumn dog and I, occasionally tripping over wild mushrooms (yes those kind too) which I bring back for our neighbour to enjoy - I admire the abundance of a good start to the winter - lots of yummy wild greens still looking good enough to juice - and the wild mallow is in full leaf meaning I know where to pop and forage a root or two next spring to transplant into the garden.

I ponder how to make my Blog all sexy like a lot of the blogs I see, full of lovely pictures and recipes - I am a bit daffy when it comes down to making stuff on the pc look nice - still my sentiments are there.
I will take time in the coming instalments, to write down some recipes, take a pic or two and throw them on here to see what happens.  Will that do you?  Argh…

Oh I do like a good old ramble, writing down any old thought as it comes into my head, free from worry about boring folk stupid - sharing my free flowing cacao fuelled love as I go - I am sure some of you will 'get it'.

I have been a bit lax juicing for the last couple of days - just been in the other space of eating loads of quinoa, milky shakes (nuts of course, not nasty cow juice) and generally no time to make juice - been making a great deal for orders too so this takes up my juicing time.  Still, all is good and balanced and I am feeling in good order mostly.  Life is for fun and freedom after all, not dogmatic discipline.
One thing I am really thankful for are my supplements, all of them from Touchstone Essentials and the zeolites are amazing - having big things happen on a small scale, and I know that makes sense some how.
I feel lots of brain work is being thankful of the cacao and quinoa feasting - we are in process of forming a housing co-op and writing a book, nutritional therapy training homework and other interesting gubbins happening, so, juice aside, we are healing our bodies on a high vibrational matrix of love, forming an awesome future for ourselves (you know who you are) and enabling much space creation for assisting many folks shift out of their physical, emotional and energetic bodies crap loads - I am totally committed to feeling awesome and assisting others to feel this way to, no matter what circumstances may be presenting themselves real or imagined! We are more than our bullshit, so there!


Watch out for recipes coming up soon, until then, keep warm, enjoy breathing the air, grounding on the earth and opening your hearts to the one emotion that matters above all else - LOVE

Monday 4 November 2013

New look to my blog and new content direction - sharing MY journey with you - warning, may not always be pretty!

Hello there!  Well, over a year since I last wrote anything here - all I can say is that life has taken me all over the place and it was not in my orbit to blog for such a long time.
I am a bit rubbish when if comes to venturing off FaceBook for posting what is happening in the life of this little raw faery and for that I am deeply deeply, well, not apologetic, just busy!
However, thanks to my FB friend Sarah (you will know who you are if you read this, fellow blogger)  I have come back to the fold as it were and here is, I hope, the first of many NEW vibrational blog entries, taking me away from FB land a little in favour of the land of the Blog.

What I wish to share with you here, and I may not be very technical mind, is just what is going on in my world of living foods and focussing on the healing aspect of raw.

For the last year I have spent in what I feel is purgatory - in the Welsh wilderness of wet land, damp, cold and darn right not good for my body-ness - I kind of went into a bit of depression as I felt trapped on the side of the hillside, with debilitating knee issues meaning I could not get the exercise and fresh air my body so deeply needed.  When we made the choice to return to our home place of Northamptonshire I was so very very happy!  We landed another pretty postcard cottage to rent, thatched in a very unique way and a nice sized garden, lovely neighbours and rolling nature all around us. Perfect, for now!  More of that in a follow up post.

So, it is my mission now to get my fitness and health back on track, and I share this with you here - in all the good, the bad and the sometimes ugly details.
I will not hold back, I promise you, for I wish it to be as real and authentic as it feels for ME - then, you, the reader, may find some similarities in your own journey perhaps and gain insight as to what moves to shake next?

I have been through it I can tell you, still am, yet I never stay knocked out for long and always keep focussed on the positive long term outcome of this merry dance with healing I am jigging to.

I  love life and all it has to share with us and this involves eating a rather good amount of raw cake and chocolate - so, please do pour yourself a cuppa herbal yumminess and let us settle down to some serious back to nature stuff - basics and beyond here we come.