Fruit envy

I have fruit envy!

I have been reading a lot about fruitarianism. I have been reading around on mango's blog and am so jealous of everyone who lives in places where there is fruit! I have lived in rainy Oregon since I was a baby and have to wait until nearly August every year before we have glorious amounts of fresh peaches, blueberries, blackberries, huckleberries...yum-yumberries. I have been trying to imagine what it would be like to live in a place where beautiful ripe fruit grew on trees all the time! Of course, I don't know that fruit does grow year-round in tropical places, but I imagine that it does. It's called a tropical paradise for a reason, right?

I'm all for local food. Globalization has had a dire effect on nearly everything - human rights, the environment, the economy. But I have to wonder - does eating locally take care of our body's nutritional needs? Which is more important, taking care of our bodies or making a slight difference (I say slight because the modern diet is so global; rice, beans, wheat, etc) in how much pollution and suffering is caused by purchasing tropical fruit while living in the northern hemisphere?

Out of all the creatures on this planet, humans are the only ones who manage to scrape out an existence in all biomes. What marvelously strange and stupid creatures we are! I read that in some places in Africa and Mongolia people live primarily on animal milk and blood. Now why should we want to live in places where milk and blood are the only food available? I say yuck! I think most of us would say that such a diet does not lead to optimum health and is not natural, to say the least. But who knows? What is natural?

I think my logic is starting to circle.

PISTACHIO ICE CREAM
Unfortunately I didn't get a picture of my ice cream, because we ate it all first IT WAS THAT GOOD! yumyum in my tum..

Ice cream base:
1 young coconut meat
4 cups pistachio milk (2 cups soaked pistachios, 4 cups water, blended and strained through a cheesecloth)
1/4 vanilla bean
1 cup dates, pitted and soaked

1. Stab open your young coconut and pour the water off into a glass to sip while you are waiting for the ice cream.
2. Blend all ingredients
3. Pour half of the ice cream off into a bowl and set aside to make two different flavors. I blended cocoa beans into one half of my mixture, and blended 1/8 cup fresh mint leaves into the other. The mint was by far our favorite flavor.
3. Refridgerate and then use an ice cream maker if you have one. I don't, so I poured mine into mason jars and stirred them with a spoon to try to keep them from turning into ice-cream-cubes. It kinda worked.

It was my first time working with pistachios. They made a far creamier and thicker milk than any other nut milk I have ever made. I was quite pleased.

Tomorrow Rob and I are journeying up to Portland to go on an adventure, so I'm sure I will have some fun pictures plus a review of the raw food restaurant up there, called The Blossoming Lotus.

Have a loverly end of the week!