Christian Bates

Archive for May, 2010

Raw cacao is considered by some the best food ever, by others a stimulant not part of an optimal diet, and by others the most nutritious food ever but they don’t eat it because its too stimulating in their experience. It’s so funny how things in the raw food world are seemingly conflicting, but of course there is truth behind it all. I’d like to appeal to everybody here and show you what I do with cacao that cancels the stimulation side and turns on the balancing side. If you have sworn to yourself that you are done with cacao, or if you are currently eating bags of cacao every week, either way this is the blog for you.

Tonic herb ice cube tray nougats drenched in blue green algae chocolate

My technique of eating cacao without the stimulation is a new way of looking at chocolate that is also the ancient South American way of looking at chocolate: eating cacao with an abundance of tonic herbs and other superfoods.

Blueberry pie with chocolate-shilajit seed crust

So, next time you make an all raw cacao drink, chocolate ice cream, hard chocolate, fudgey pudding, chocolatey bliss balls, cacao-containing energy bars, chocolate pie, or any other raw recipes you enjoy, consider ammending those recipes with the rich earthy flavors of these tonic herbs and superfoods (each ingredient is a link to a source of the ingredient I really like):

Internet orders + blender + cacao + herbs = gourmet cacao without the stimulation

~Astragalus Powder

~Blue Green AFA algae

~Chaga Mushroom powder

~Cordyceps Mushroom powder

~Ginseng Bude Blossom Crystals

~Goji berries (Up to you to decide whose goji’s you like best)

~He Shu Wu extract powder

~Host Defense multi-mushroom mycelium powder

~Lion’s Mane mushroom extract

~Mucuna powder

~Noni powder

~Pearl Powder

~Reishi Mushroom extract powder

~Rhodiola extract powder

~Royal Jelly (Sean Lee Gardner’s Organic Powder)

~Shilajit powder

~Spirulina powder (“Azteca” and “Manna“)

~Tonic Herb Tea (Bethanne’s blog shows you how to make this; this tea is perfect to make as part of the nut mylk base for the cacao drink! We get all our tea herbs from Mountain Rose Herbs)

~Vanilla Bean powder

I am going to request that you let loose some ideas you might have about your chef skills and realize that you are ALREADY a deeply skilled master alchemical chef ready to whip up a cacao recipe with this technique – even if it is just simply bliss balls (bunch of coconut flakes, hemp seeds, cacao, a couple teaspoons of tonic herb powders and sweetener mashed and rolled into small balls!). Another simple quick recipe is to mix raw cacao powder with melted coconut oil, some sweeteners, pinch of salt, and your choice of herbal powders, and then put into ice cube trays and chill.

My very Edible Goddess sipping a reishi "hot" chocolate

There is one more variable to the situation of how stimulated or balanced you feel with cacao and that is the quality, processing temperature, and sprouting of the cacao. Sprouted cacao (hardly available on the market today, but will be available soon) will likely be the ideal cacao as the spouting may lower the theobromine content and boost the more calming constituents. We will see, and you can bet I am really excited to see, if a sprouted cacao revolution comes about. Of course, if the cacao has been pressed or even secretly roasted despite being labeled “raw,” then that can also mess with the desired more balancing effects of cacao. We hope that truly raw heirloom and wild quality cacao will only grow in the market and that all the sources will get much better at consistently having the best ever cacao beans, powder, butter and paste – all made with integrity and love.

For now, don’t fear cacao. Eat as much cacao and herbs as you can handle so that you can enjoy the best health ever with therapeutic amounts of minerals, antioxidants, amino acids and spirit-boosting effects contained within all of these superfoods and herbs.

Colon hydrotherapy is one of the most important practices to add in on your health journey, and we do ours with a special superfood touch. We make ours so delightful, that if you are already seeing a colon hydro-therapist for colonics, you may wish to stay home now and do our version of a deep cleansing “superfood” enema. Enemas are the process of oiling up your behind, laying in the bathtub in preferably a warm comfortable candle-lit bathroom, gently inserting into your rectum a tube that is attached to a bag or crock of warm water, and letting gravity slowly and gently fill up and drain your colon several times until your whole colon has been cleaned of all matter.

Clean, serene, warm, ideal setup for an enema

In this process, two things are accomplished. First is that with every colonic, you have a chance at knocking out any intestinal plaque that might be gummed up in the folds of your colon. The exit of this most toxic debris that was continuously poisoning your body for who knows how long, is absolutely key to restoring the integrity of your body’s health. Intestinal plaque tends to be something along the lines of 10 year old pizza putrefying with heavy metals and parasites. These pockets of waste never should have been there in the first place, but because of a past of eating aberrant foods, having a stressful lifestyle and getting constipated, weird things can happen to your organs.

The second huge benefit of a deep enema is that it makes room in your intestines for an accelerated dump of waste from all the cells of your body, speeding up both short term and long term healing. If you are already healthy, but feeling a bit sluggish one day, try doing an enema our way and it can turn your energy around and give you that “edge” again as a short term healing. If you have a small or big pooch in your belly, do an enema today as part of your long term goal to flatten your abdomen and attain excellent digestive and metabolic health.

How we do enemas at our house: Instead of using a one gallon or smaller enema bag, use a 2 or more gallon jug or crock with a spigot. Slide the hose off your current enema bag and stretch it over the spigot. If it slides off a tapered spigot, wrap one or two rubber bands around the connection to keep it on, being careful not to pinch the hose. Fill your enema container up almost all the way with spring water. Prepare a pot of tonic herbs tea (Click here for a great recipe from my girlfriend The Edible Goddess’s blog). Fill the pot of herbs up with some of the enema container water with the hose. Brew until it begins to boil, then strain the tea into the container. If your tea pot is small, fill it up with the container water again and rebrew. Repeat the process several times if need be until the container water is quite warm and deeply tea colored. Add in MSM only or add in shilajit and/or fulvic acid. We are currently avoiding combining MSM with high mono-atomic mineral containing foods like shilajit to avoid the potential sulfuric reactivity of the combination. Also its an excellent idea to add in coconut water kefir, or probiotic powders of your choice (with MSM or shilajit is great.) You can also add organic coffee for great liver cleansing effects and zeolites for their heavy metal, viral and volatile organic compound pulling effects. Bring your enema container into the bathroom and place at least 3 feet above the floor on a stable counter, stool or table so that the hose can reach well into the bathtub or shower stall.

Crock full of enema superfood spring water

Warm up the bathtub or shower stall by blasting some hot filtered showered water. We also use a space heater blasting in the direction of the bathtub, keeping it away from any water, and leave it on during the 30-45 minute enema experience. Lay a towel down in the tub for your back and some folded towels for your head and neck. We prefer enemas laying on our back with our legs up, rather than face down on all fours. Light some scented organic beeswax candles and play some music or inspirational audio. Take your pants off, put coconut oil or any organic raw oils around and in your bum and all over the enema hose insert nozzle. Stir the enema container one final time to make sure no mineral-rich sediment is stuck on the bottom.

Lay down and slowly let the water fill you up until gentle tension (no extreme pressure holding, be gentle with your intestines), then let the water go out down the drain. Ideally you take your time with this and eventually get the water to go up your descending colon, across your transverse colon, and down your ascending colon towards your cecum where your small intestines dump into your colon. This means that quite a bit of poops and not-quite-fully digested food particles will have exited you many times. You might not be able to go this deep every time, so do a series of enemas (e.g. an enema every other day for 2 weeks) so that you are more likely to tone and cleanse your ascending colon at least some of the times.

Doing an enama our way eliminates the fears associated with enemas. We boost the probiotic content of the gut with the coconut water kefir amendment, instead of stripping the colons Bifidus-dominant colony. We keep the experience in the bathroom warm and nurturing so that you finish feeling more comfortable than ever, rather than cold or invaded. We make your body feel nourished with the uptake of the water amendments (tonic teas, shilajit, fulvic acid, etc.) so that you finish fairly balanced out, instead of deprived or dizzy. However, every enema is different and just know that the discomforts of purification will pass. Hydrate well after an enema, and then consume something light and nourishing, preferably full of your favorite superfoods.

My disclaimer on enemas: Please take responsibility for your own health and health protocol. Please seek the advice of a professional colon hydrotherapist before embarking on your own enema project. Do your first enema/colonic with a colon hydrotherapist before taking the leap to do it yourself. Do not let the water fill your colon forcefully. Be very gentle with yourself and take your time.