Why Green - the Serendipity of Change

Changing to green and raw has always been in my consciousness.  But I never really got around to it.

I became a vegetarian in the '70s when I was a teenager because the ethics seized me. I began to question why killing was necessary for our survival. Certainly the killing that goes on today in the mass production of meat is something to question. The hidden ingredients in meats brings a whole new level into the equation - antibiotics, added hormones and steroids. I stopped eating meat.

From vegetarian to vegan - and then one day in London in April 2013, whilst attending the death of a close family member, and living at my cousin's home, I had to leave for a week as she was expecting an international student from Russia. Serendipity arrived in the form of a B&B in Fulham, a url provided to me by my daughter totally on the off chance that this B&B would have a vacancy in the area that I wanted to be in.

Nadia Brydon came into my life and I am forever grateful.

I was tired and depressed with the deathing journey of my aunt, and although I was eating soups and healthy salads and fruits, I was topping up with wines and G&Ts, and the occasional Benedictine night caps. I looked and felt a wreck with wide blue patches beneath my eyes and the feeling of tiredness was beginning to overwhelm me.

I checked into Nadia's B&B, slept like a log in her single suite, and in her wise, inimitable style, she heard my story.

Nadia opened the fridge door and as I peered inside, the view was astonishing. It was jam-packed with greens and vegetables of every kind.  The large bottom fridge read on the outside VEGAN, and the small fridge up on top read NON-VEGAN.

"I have way too much in here," she said, "feel free to just plough your way through anything you like."

And so began my Green London Adventure.

For breakfasts we would plough through this

We would make veggie boats on large Cos lettuce leaves, smeared with hummus with lots of sprouts. With each green meal, we'd drink fresh green smoothies.  I would usually halve my breakfast and take the rest with me to the care home where my aunt resided.

One day whilst eating my salad in the lounge area of the care home, 92 year old Leonora said:
"I want to eat those greens!"  "Demand it!" I answered.  The food fare is enough to kill these old folks off within a few months of being there.

Nadia's home is surrounded by sprouts of all kinds - the most noticeable being sunflower sprouts which are highly nutritious.

Here is Nadia in her kitchen - soaking seeds to sprout, trimming her sunflower sprouts, soaking almonds overnight to make almond milk, cracking a coconut in half, scooping out the flesh and blending with water to make a delicious no additive coconut milk.  She is a dynamo of energy and her own story to raw is a fascinating one.