I have finally come to a decision as to my stance on young Thai coconut. It is not green.
Just about every other “glorious” raw food recipe contains young Thai coconut. Curiously, the self-same people who claim that they believe in a low or zero fat lifestyle think young Thai coconut is the be-all and end-all. Although I do not necessarily believe in the current 80-10-10 craze, I do think that I can do without young Thai coconut. It is expensive, it is high in fat (albeit good fat), and it has a high carbon footprint, i.e., is not very green at all.
When I started raw, there was no such thing as young Thai coconut. (Okay, they probably had them in Thailand, but we did not have access to them here). When I found out about young Thai coconuts a few years ago, I went out and bought one for about $3.00), only to find that it was only about 1/4 of the recipe, i.e., I would need to spend $12.00 to make the recipe. While I surely enjoyed the coconut “juice”, and found the recipe tasty, I never again bought a young Thai coconut – I just do not have that kind of money to spend.
Furthermore, in this day and age, when everyone is interested in going green and reducing their carbon footprint, young Thai coconuts just seem entirely too frivolous to me.
I realize that I will not be able to enjoy what look like scrumptious “like not raw” recipes, but there has to be a place where I draw the line.
I further realize that my decision means that I will be restricted to older raw food recipe books – so be it. From here on in, I will have to query authors of e-books as to their inclusion of young Thai coconut-based recipes, and I will have to carefully go through new cookbooks I find in bookstores in order to be sure that their recipes do not include young Thai coconut.
I have enjoyed participating in a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) group for the past two years. Our vegetables come from a local farm. I also shop at a greenmarket where local farmers sell their produce.
“Green” has snuck up on me. I feel comfortable in my decision to refuse to use young Thai coconut in my recipes.
PRETTY SMART RAW FOOD IDEAS 