Living Cuisine [antikvár]

FOREWORDThough it was years ago, I still remember that meal. I had heard about a master raw chef named Renée. Long before I met her, I had heard rave reviews from various friends about her "rawesome" culinary skills, and in particular, her raw pies. Though I wasn't raw at the time, I knew enough to know that raw food and its emphasis on enzymes being the life force of the food is the way to go for optimum health and energy. Still, you can talk theory all you want; if the taste isn't there, color me a cooked-food junkie. A life of lettuce, cucumbers, and garbanzo sprouts just wasn't happening for this meat-and-potato-raised Texan. I mean, I admire Gandhi, but I didn't want to eat like him. So I was still taking in a hefiy percentage of cooked and processed foods at the time, but eye-balling the benefits of a raw diet from a respectable and flavor-filled distance.In my pursuit of knowledge (while yearning for taste), I had the opportunity to meet someone whom I greatly admire, Gabriel Consens, well-respected author of some of the quintessential books on vibrant health and possibly the world's leading expert on nutrition and the raw foods diet. We had dinner in Paia, Maui, at a sweet little restaurant called the Raw Experience.That night, I discovered what raw food could taste like if you could sit and dream a little dream with your tongue. Up came a striking green-eyed wonder, full of energy and confidence. Little did I know at the time that while I was sitting at the feet of the raw knowledge master, the raw taste master had appeared. Renée began dropping one amazing, sumptuous dish after another onto our table. Gabriel and I were ecstatic about the food to the point where we stopped talking and were solely focused on the edible delights before us. We were struck dumb by our taste buds. All energy in the mouth was