Soak Your Nuts

Hahaha! I can't even write that blog post title without snickering like a 12-year-old boy. Raw food guru/restauranteur Karyn Calabrese has successfully come up with the very best vegan cookbook title ever with Soak Your Nuts. Yes, I'm that girl who laughs every time I say "nut cheese" or "nut bag." Those are phrases that, if you're not vegan, might actually warrant a giggle since they're probably not something you say very often — or ever.

But for vegans, soaking your nuts for cashew cheeses, raw ranch dressing, or live pie crust is a fact of life. Yet I still find the whole thing hilarious. What's even better is Karyn's lovely and very sophisticated face graces the book's cover. This woman owns five businesses and sleeps on four hours a night. She doesn't look or seem like a lady who would smirk about soaking nuts. But apparently, she has a great sense of humor, so I was immediately biased in favor of this book before ever cracking it open.

Thankfully, the awesomeness inside lives up to the title. And since the Book Publishing Company has re-released Karyn's book in a double-book format, it's even better! One side is Karyn's Raw Recipes. Then you flip it over, and the other side is Karyn's Conscious Comfort Foods (all cooked deliciousness).

Both sides are filled with mouth-watering dishes and a few color pictures. On the raw side, there's raw Nacho Chips (made with dehydrated flax, corn, bell peppers, onion, and spices), Onion Crisps (raw onion rings!), raw Falafel in raw Pita Bread, raw Bean Burros (like burritos made with cabbage wraps and soaked, food-processed raw adzuki beans), Nutty Pimiento Cheese (made with cashews), and raw Banana Pudding.

On the cooked side, there's Slab o' Tofu Ribs, Veggie-Potato Pot Pies, Curry-Cashew Pasta, Sprouted Black Bean Soup, and No-Bake Chocolate Peanut Butter Pie (made with a pretzel crust and a coconut-cashew cream topping!).

I wanted to try something from each side for last night's dinner. I chose my entree from the cooked side — Jerk Tofu Wraps:

There really aren't words to describe how amazing this was. The tofu is just pan-fried and plain, which might sound boring. But the sauces on this wrap are so ridiculously flavorful that the plain tofu totally makes sense. The jerk sauce is a combo of BBQ sauce and lots of spicy jerk seasoning. And then there's a garlic sauce that really sets this wrap over the top. It's made with raw garlic, soymilk, parsley, and sugar. And IT IS SO GOOD. I wrapped it all up in an Ezekial sprouted grain tortilla.

On the side, I chose a recipe from the book's raw side — Curried Cauliflower Salad:

This is unlike any other salad I've had before. The veggies are orange cauliflower, sliced red and orange peppers, and red onions. All are generously tossed with a cashew-based curry dressing that could make even the blandest raw veggie taste like magic.

So Soak Your Nuts completely lives up to its awesome name. You should probably pick up a copy and get to soakin' your own nuts.