Book Review

Fresh: The Ultimate Live-Food Cookbook

By Sergei and Valya Boutenko
Review by Laura Bruno
The precocious Boutenko duo is all grown up! Having co-authored Eating without Heating during their teenage years, Sergei and Valya of the famous"Raw Family" now present wisdom from fifteen years of raw foodism.

Fresh includes "over 250 recipes from the Raw Family test-kitchen," both favorites from earlier Boutenko books, as well as new recipes using raw cacao, goji berries and wild edibles. They offer full color photographs of common"wild foods" like nettles, sheep sorrel, chickweed and purslane often belittled as"weeds" and show how such no-cost foods can supercharge salads and smoothies without breaking the bank. Readers who recall stories of the Boutenkos foraging for wild lettuce and berries on their Pacific Coast Trail hiking journey can now harvest some of nature's best superfoods at home. The book lists the twenty-three most toxic plants (excluding mushrooms) and encourages readers to be safe and learn how to identify them. Despite this warning, Fresh focuses on the abundance of nutritionally dense and beneficial plants available sometimes, quite literally, in our own backyard!

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All recipes exclude meat, fish, eggs, and dairy, but some do contain honey. Vegans can easily substitute raw agave nectar or dates for the honey, though. In fact, Sergei writes an entire section on the importance of improvisation and customization. For those with gluten allergies, this book offers an almost gluten-free experience. A few recipes call for sprouted barley or rolled oats, but the vast majority are completely gluten-free, vegan and tasty!

Besides recipes, Fresh offers some of the best advice on how to thrive in mixed-diet relationships. Whether vegan, raw, vegetarian, carnivore or omnivore, you will find valuable tips on how to maintain your dietary preferences in a non-judging and non-threatening way. Valya, in particular, offers valuable insight into helping children choose and enjoy healthier foods. Given the epidemics of childhood obesity and childhood diabetes from which Sergei healed naturally this information provides hope and instruction to well-meaning parents dealing with"rebellious" eaters. Because Sergei and Valya spent much of their childhood as raw foodists, they can offer insider advice from both angles that of instructors and that of children forced to embrace a new and unusual dietary regime. From them, we learn how they dealt with teasing, peer pressure and social services. With humor, gratitude, and wisdom beyond their years, they reveal a perspective that few, if any, others can share yet.

Chef Cherie Soria, founder and director of the Living Light Culinary Institute, where both Sergei and Valya have trained, provides a heartfelt forward. In Cherie's words,"Sergei and Valya shine as living examples of what is possible when we resolve to squeeze every drop of juice out of life." On a recent visit to Living Light, I repeatedly heard this idea validated by students, visitors and employees. The compassion, presence and creativity one finds in Fresh will touch the lives of anyone who reads it, just as Sergei and Valya's love, clarity and maturity continue to impress and inspire in person.

Laura Bruno is an intuitive life coach, author and natural healing teacher at www.internationalrenaissancecoaching.com. She is also the author of"If I Only Had a Brain Injury: A TBI Survivor and Life Coach's Guide to Chronic Fatigue, Concussion, Lyme Disease, Migraine or Other Medical Mystery." For more information, please see www.ifionlyhadabraininjury.com.

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