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#19 ...
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Picks for
Raw Food Made Easy Equipment
Many people ask me which juicer, blender,
and food processor they should buy. These pieces of
equipment are used almost daily for the raw-food diet,
and they are an investment, so it pays to pick the best
brands. Here are my recommendations:
Blenders
I recommend the Kitchen Aid KSB560 5-speed model blender
(Amazon.com ),
or the Osterizer Classic (Amazon.com).
I tested all of the recipes in my book using the Osterizer
Classic. The Kitchen Aid is the one I use in my DVD, and
it’s the blender I’m currently using to test
the recipes for my next book, Raw
For Dessert (due out in 2009). Eventually,
you may wish to purchase a high-speed blender such as
the Vita-Mix 5000 (Amazon.com)
or the BlendTec HP Total Blender (Amazon.com).
These blenders can hold a large amount of food and can
easily pulverize nuts to a silky-smooth cream. However,
these high-speed blenders are much more expensive.
Food Processors
I recommend the Cuisinart 11-cup Pro Custom food processor
(Amazon.com).
If you have a smaller food processor, it will work fine,
but you may need to make a recipe in two or more batches.
The 14-cup size is great if you routinely prepare food
for larger numbers of people, or if you teach raw food
classes.
Juicers
I recommend the Tribest Green Star and Solostar juicers
(Amazon.com).
Centrifugal juicers (the ones that spin around and have
a strainer with blades that the produce passes through)
are good for hard fruits and vegetables, such as apples,
carrots, and beets, and they are very fast. However,
they are not effective at extracting the maximum amount
of juice and nutrition from leafy greens, such as celery,
parsley, and kale. I drink green leafy vegetable juice
almost every morning, and I’ve used the Green
Star and Solostar juicers exclusively over the past
several years. If you don’t want to invest in
either of these juicers, the Breville juicer is a good
centrifugal juicer (Amazon.com).
Other Equipment
One piece of gourmet raw-food equipment I couldn’t
live without is my ice cream maker. I’m using
it right now to test ice cream and sorbet recipes for
my next book, Raw For Dessert. Here are some of the
delicious things you can eat on the raw food diet if
you have one: Grape, blackberry, strawberry, raspberry,
and pineapple sorbet; vanilla, chocolate, cookies and
cream, and mint-chocolate chip ice cream. I’m
still refining these recipes, so stay tuned for some
of them in future newsletters. My favorite ice cream
maker is made by Cuisinart and costs only about $50
(Amazon.com).
If you get into gourmet raw food preparation, you may
decide to invest in a dehydrator. My book,
Raw Food Made Easy for 1 or 2 People,
doesn’t require a dehydrator for any recipes,
and I never use one except when I’m teaching gourmet
classes. But they are useful if you plan to make flax
crackers, fruit leathers, and certain kinds of cookies,
bars, and granolas. They are also useful for warming
raw food dishes, such as lasagnas, pies and crisps,
and soups. My favorite brand is the Excalibur (Amazon.com).
Get the 9-tray size if you plan to use it a lot; otherwise
the 5-tray size is fine.
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