Aaron Ash - Gorilla Food: Living and Eating Organic, Vegan, and Raw

GORILLA FOOD Living and Eating Organic, Vegan, and Raw GORILLA FOOD Living and Eating Organic, Vegan, and Raw AARON ASH ARSENAL PULP PRESS VANCOUVER GORILLA FOOD Copyright 2012 by Aaron Ash All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any part by any meansgraphic, electronic, or mechanicalwithout the prior written permission of the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may use brief excerpts in a review, or in the case of photocopying in Canada, a license from Access Copyright. ARSENAL PULP PRESS Suite 101 211 East Georgia St. Vancouver, BC V6A 1Z6 Canada arsenalpulp.com The publisher gratefully acknowledges the support of the Government of Canada (through the Canada Book Fund) and the Government of British Columbia (through the Book Publishing Tax Credit Program) for its publishing activities. The author and publisher assert that the information contained in this book is true and complete to the best of their knowledge. All recommendations are made without the guarantee on the part of the author and publisher.

The author and publisher disclaim any liability in connection with the use of this information. For more information, contact the publisher. Note for our UK readers: measurements for non-liquids are for volume, not weight. Design by Li Eng-Lodge, Electra Design Group Cover and interior photographs by Tracey Kusiewicz, Foodie Photography Back cover photograph of author by Amanda Bullick, Brutally Beautiful Editing by Susan Safyan Copyediting by Angela Caravan Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication: Ash, Aaron Gorilla food : living and eating organic, vegan, and raw / Aaron Ash. Includes index. Raw foods. 2. 2.

Raw food dietRecipes. 3. Vegan cooking. 4. Cookbooks I. Title.

TX837.A79 2012 641.5'636 C2012-903262-X

I bow to all those who have reminded me to find joy in the service of humanity and to those who have reminded me that service is a path to liberation. I feel blessed to be serving this food. I am honored to share these recipes, many of which are favorites from the Gorilla Food menu. They stem from a love for being vegan and a joy for sharing food with others. They come through friendship, travel, synchronicity, and magic. I give a lifetime of thanks for all of the amazing and inspiring people who have been a part of and remain Gorilla Food family.

I hope you will enjoy these recipes and create upon them. I also bow deeply to all of my teachers. One Love!

A s Ive been compiling these recipes, its allowed me to reflect on the times in which they were created and the experiences Ive had with them. Going through my old recipe journals has reminded me of what Ive learned, where Ive been, all the great people Ive met, and all that Ive eaten on this journey of discovering these different foods. The mission of Gorilla Food is to encourage and promote peace through food as well as through holistic supercharged health and nutrition, environmental and social activism, economics, arts, and culture. The idea for Gorilla Food, and my ambition to make it happen, started in 1996 when I was twenty years old and just discovering the great wide world of raw, vegan, and organic foods.

At first, I was especially enthusiastic about the vibrancy of fresh-pressed juices and felt the whole world needed to know about their health benefits. I became eager to start a juice bar and to create a community hub for social interaction and for sharing holistic information. After years of travel, studies, experiences, and experiments, that idea for the small juice bar has come to be, and its now blossomed into Gorilla Food, where we serve juices and so much more. I feel blessed that I have been able to serve and learn from so many amazing people. Ive gotten to do summer festival vending and travel to other countries to cater for various groups, yoga retreats, and individuals. Ive worked in collaboration with friends on other cafs and restaurants.

This service has been a joy and a journey! It seems like both yesterday and a lifetime ago that I was jokingly calling it Guerrilla Food because, at first, when I couldnt afford to open a restaurant space, I served, catered, and delivered raw foods privately from an underground a.k.a. guerrilla kitchen. I would email weekly menus to customers, who could either have it delivered or pick up their orders themselves at the small garden-level suite of the house I had rented. With the support of many amazing customers and through word-of-mouth, more people found out about it, and bit by bit it grew to become a small takeaway window in the downtown core of Vancouver that in 2006 operated for two years. Then we moved to a larger sit-down space two doors away where weve been operating as a small caf restaurant since 2007. There is an entire community of us working together to create the next phase of the Gorilla Food dream.

This book is a great part of that dream. Thank you for being a part of it! I hope it will encourage you to discover the health benefits of the raw vegan lifestyle, and that you will enjoy making these recipes for yourself and for others. It has been such a joy creating these foods for our loyal customers over the past few years, singin and dancin in the kitchen all the while. And now its my joy to share the Gorilla Food experience with you!

F resh, natural foods are what humans have always survived and thrived on. We used to eat only organic foodwhich was then known simply as food. This is the central foundation of Gorilla Foodwe stand for organic food! We use only organic ingredients because of the clean and vital living and growing techniques used to cultivate them, resulting in produce that is healthier and better-tasting. This is the central foundation of Gorilla Foodwe stand for organic food! We use only organic ingredients because of the clean and vital living and growing techniques used to cultivate them, resulting in produce that is healthier and better-tasting.

Organic food is also often grown by really, really amazing peopleI sometimes wonder if all the amazing organic farmers I know add magic to their crops, or if the amazing food they grow puts the magic into them! I once read about a study conducted on gorillas in which zookeepers offered them both organic and non-organic bananas. The gorillas would first select the organic bananas and eat them with the peel on; when it came to the non-organic ones though, they would peel and discard the skin before eating them. Smart monkeys! (Source: Organic Consumers Association: organicconsumers.org/Organic/bananas022403.cfm) To meet the highest organic food standards, certified growers and farmers must prove they follow sustainable food production methodssomething we should all support! They pay attention to where their seeds come from, where their water comes from, what kind of inputs they add to the soil, and how close they are in proximity to toxins from other farms. They also often have a deep appreciation for Earth and how she sustains us. With every penny we spend on their products, we vote for our collective future; we are saying yes to the creation of peace and harmony and sustainability. Support local organic farmers to protect the future of our planet, our communities, and future generations to come.

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