Transcription of Elizabeth Fraser & Maggie Knowles for the show Back to School #52
Dr. Lisa: This is Dr. Lisa Belisle, and you are listening to the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast show number 52, Back to School airing for the first time on September 9, 2012 on WLOB and WPEI Radio, Portland, Maine. Today’s show features Tom Shepard or Shepard Financial and also Currency Camp, Maggie Knowles and Elizabeth Fraser of Kids Gone RAW, and Travis Wiggett, licensed clinical professional counselor.
As our listeners may know, this is our 52nd show which means we’re almost at a year, and we’re pretty proud of it. We know that many of you are going back to school yourselves or perhaps are bringing your own children back to school. We know that here at Dr. Lisa Radio Hour, education is an ongoing process. We’re constantly looking for people who can enrich our lives with their insights and their experience, and this is what we think we’re doing today with Tom Shepard, Maggie Knowles, Elizabeth Fraser, and Travis Wiggett.
Whether you get information from Tom Shepard about how to educate your children on financial issues, whether you decide maybe I’ll try some raw foods after listening to Maggie Knowles and Elizabeth Fraser, or whether you get insight from Travis Wiggett about some of the emotional issues surrounding going back to school, we know that you’re enriching your own life and being a part of our community, so we thank you for that.
The Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast is pleased to be sponsored by the University of New England. As part of our collaboration, we offer a segment we call Wellness Innovations. The University of New England recently hosted a ceremony to celebrate the construction of its patient care center. This will be the clinical home of the University of New England’s College of Dental Medicine teaching clinic and dental simulation facility.
We’ll provide space for the University of New England to explore new models of inter-professional healthcare education and practice. The patient care center will be the first facility of its kind in Northern New England combining comprehensive dental education with high quality delivery of oral healthcare, as well as clinical training space for patient-centered primary care. For more information on the patient care center and the University of New England, visit UNE.edu.
Recording: This portion of the Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast has been brought to you by the University of New England, UNE, an innovative Health Sciences university grounded in the Liberal Arts. UNE is the number one educator of health professionals in Maine. Learn more about the University of New England at UNE.edu.
Dr. Lisa: On Dr. Lisa Radio Hour and Podcast, we are firm believers of the importance of education as it relates to health, and especially the importance of education when it relates to food. We have two very lovely guests here today with us. We have Maggie Knowles and Elizabeth Fraser from Kids Gone Raw. It’s an exciting title. Thanks for coming in.
Maggie: Thank you.
Elizabeth: Thanks for having us.
Dr. Lisa: I think of raw in different ways but you’re talking about raw food.
Maggie: Yes.
Elizabeth: Yes. Not sushi.
Dr. Lisa: No, not raw fish per se. You’re talking about raw food and really raw vegetables primarily. You’re talking about the plant-based diet.
Elizabeth: You’ve got it. We’re talking about fruits, vegetables, nuts, and seeds, and sprouted greens, and some dehydrated foods that aren’t heated above 188.
Dr. Lisa: What got you interested in raw foods?
Elizabeth: I think we both have our own journey. Mine started, I lost my mom to breast cancer when I was 18 and I became aware of a need to be healthy. I just didn’t know what that looked like, so it’s really been a lifelong journey for me. I became a pescetarian at that time. Then, four years ago, I went vegan. That year, vegan raw food just kept coming up, and I got really curious about it, and decided to try it for a week, and that week changed my life, and I haven’t looked back.
Dr. Lisa: A pescetarian, for those people who are listening?
Elizabeth: I was a fish-eating vegetarian for like 17 or 18 years.
Dr. Lisa: What about you, Maggie?
Maggie: When I was pregnant, I lost my taste. I was never a big meat eater but I stopped eating fish and things like that, and when I had my son, thinking about family, and what that meant, I just couldn’t bring myself to go back to anything that had a family. Then, I was introduced to raw food through one of Elizabeth’s classes and fell in love with it. I took a bunch of her classes, and been friends for few years, and then Kids Gone Raw was born from there.
Dr. Lisa: How old is your son now?
Maggie: Four-and-a-half.
Dr. Lisa: Four-and-a-half. Has he always been a raw vegan?
Maggie: He is about 85% raw vegan. His pediatrician says he’s the healthiest kid in his practice. He’s never ever sick. I can definitely attribute that to his diet.
Dr. Lisa: That’s an interesting question that I get a lot because I eat a primarily plant-based diet although I guess, I am more of a pescetarian myself, and occasionally, I will have other protein sources but I get a lot of questions from patients on the health aspects of eating vegan. Where do you get your protein source? Where do you get your iron? When you’re talking about children that’s of special concern because they eat what we put in front of them.
Maggie: Exactly, and that can work into your benefit. They will eat what you put in front of them.
Elizabeth: Exactly.
Maggie: There is that whole concept of mindless eating. If you’re in front of the TV, you’re sitting, you’re eating and eating, and not really aware of what you’re eating. It’s the same with kids. Instead of putting chips and jellybeans, you could be putting carrots, grapes in front of them, and they’ll sit there and eat it not really realizing what they are eating but they are getting the benefits from the real food.
Dr. Lisa: Are there specific concerns that parents have? If you’re doing Kids Gone Raw, are there … Yes, your kids will eat whatever you put in front of them but sometimes, they don’t necessarily want to eat fruits and vegetables, or are there other concerns?
Maggie: I think kids are actually incredibly drawn to natural foods, the colors, the natural sweetness, they fit in their hands. Kids are very natural beings, and I think if they’re supposed to be eating that sort of food, what is unnatural is when we’re forcing them to eat chemicals and processed foods, fats, greases, and sugars. I understand the concern where parents are like, “My kids will never eat that,” but if you switch the viewing of that, it’s like why would you want them to eat something that’s been sitting on the shelf for three months that you have to microwave versus something that the earth has grown for them to eat?
I think it’s more of a shift of perspective that parents have to wrap around. I know it’s hard because we do what we do. We’re used to what we’re used to but I don’t know, when you step outside of it and you realize that earth grows what we’re supposed to eat and not a laboratory, then it’s not scary.
Elizabeth: I’ve made some interesting observations. I am not a mom. I am an auntie to ten kids, and I spend a lot of time with two of them in particular, and I see the other ones pretty regularly. The really interesting thing for me is seeing kids that have a standard American diet come into my home, or my space, or come to a party where I’ve prepared some food, and they just gobble it up. They are so drawn to – like what Maggie said – the color, it is finger food, it’s fun, it’s creative.
Often times, I have them help. I babysit my two-year-old nephew and my five-year-old niece every Wednesday, and if we don’t make three things in the kitchen on a Wednesday, their day is not complete. They’ll cry at the end like, “We didn’t make our smoothie, and we didn’t make our doughnut hole.” It’s really, really cute. They naturally gravitate to it if you give them a chance.
It takes kids like 15 tastes to like something. That’s another thing we forget. We give it to them once and they won’t eat it, but it doesn’t mean they won’t eat it the fifth time or the sixth time. My little nephew who is, like I said, two, he has gone from a macaroni-and-cheese-crazed toddler, like that is all he would want, to eating my salads, eating our kale chips, and of course he loves fruit and anything sweet. It’s pretty remarkable to witness that shift.
Dr. Lisa: I am asking these questions. I really am on your side. I am asking more as the devil’s advocate and because I’ve dealt with a lot of this in my own life because I’ve also done a lot of work with macrobiotics and cooking vegetables, so I’ve had the skeptics asking me these questions, and that’s what I am wondering from your standpoint what types of experience you’ve had but I am with you. I do think you’re right. You put stuff in front of children and they will gravitate towards things that are healthy for them.
Maggie: I think as parents, we have to be excited about that. They’ve picked up on that. If you’re like, “Eat this up or I’ll …” Of course, they’re not going to want to eat it. If you’re like, “Look at this.” We have a big garden and my son is out there every day picking the broccoli, and the cucumbers, and from a young age, they are learning that awareness that food, where it comes from, and that they can help plant it, and they can pick it. We’ve never met a kid that won’t eat something that they’ve made. They are so excited about it.
That’s part of what Kids Gone Raw does. At the end of the day, kids are kids. They want to eat pizza, and macaroni, and chicken tenders. We’re not saying you have to eat sprouts to be part of this lifestyle. We take chicken nuggets, pizza, sushi, ice cream, kids’ favorite foods. We just make healthy version of them.
Elizabeth: It’s pretty fun.
Maggie: That’s why we love what we do because we’re in the kitchen playing, making ice cream sundaes and cake, and these are healthy versions of it.
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Dr. Lisa: When we had Charlotte Clews on as a guest last year at some point and I know she does a lot of work with raw foods and has these detoxification things that she does with Ayurvedic practices, so I think it’s recognized in lots of other cultures as well, and it’s been around a long time. It’s also gotten some press recently. There are some stars that are out there in Hollywood doing raw foods. Do you think this is contributing to the popularity?
Elizabeth: Definitely. I think, the more mainstream it becomes, the more accessible and easier it is for people to wrap their heads around it. I think yeah. I think that is a good thing, and we can all benefit from more raw food whether it’s one snack a day or one meal a day or a week of raw food, I think we all benefit from whatever we can take.
Dr. Lisa: Talk to me a little bit about this back-to-school idea. We’re sending our children back to wherever they’re going to school, and obviously, they could have school lunches which maybe are not so healthy or they could have what you send them with. Give us some tips for creating things that kids will want to eat, contrast with those things that are being offered to them that their friends are eating.
Maggie: The first thing I’ll say is it is so cliché. Breakfast is the most important meal of the day and that doesn’t mean just eating in the morning. That means being very mindful of what you are eating. Chocolate milks, sticky buns, sugary cereals, bagels, bacon, eggs. That stuff goes in our body and our bodies want to fall asleep because they don’t know what to do with it. Instead of energy in mind, learning, and focusing, it is in the stomach going, “What do I do with bacon again?”
Starting your child off with a green smoothie, or a fruit smoothie, or a fruit mix like chopped fruit with some nuts, and raisins, and shredded coconuts, something that is true energy that will help sustain them until lunchtime. Again, you slept forward after lunch, after school lunch, and kids are falling asleep in Math class because they probably missed recess because they were falling asleep. Again, giving them foods that will keep them sustained instead of a sports drink or a Redbull. I know a lot of schools who don’t do nuts but you can just have sunflower seed, milk, and even put raw kale in there so they’re still looking like they’re drinking chocolate milk.
Elizabeth: Chocolate milk.
Maggie: They look like what Bobby down the hall is drinking instead of traditional fruit rollups, we make fruit leather. My son was somewhere a week ago, at a party or something, and they were giving out those fruit cocktail cups, those sugar. He’s been obsessed with that, and I won’t buy them for them.
Elizabeth: You can even make anything. Chop up some pears, pineapples, cherries, and put a little pear juice in it so it looks like from the grocery store. Anything in the processed food world, you can pretty much mimic.
Maggie: They love finger foods, colorful foods, containers, compartments, the bento boxes are really popular, and I can see why because I love them too. I love putting my lunches in them and eating out of them. It doesn’t have to be complicated food. Kids will gravitate to pretty simple foods. Some chopped fruits and chopped veggies with their favorite dressing. Get cookie cutters out, shape the fruits. We make raw breads but you can shape the sandwiches and breads. There are so many fun creative things you can do.
Of course, you can make a fruit pudding. You can make a chocolate pudding with avocado and some raw chocolate powder. There are so many yummy tasty things that kids will actually not want to share. It looks so good.
Elizabeth: I was going to say that. Everyone is going to be wanting their food.
Dr. Lisa: You have a cookbook that you’re working on right now that’s going to have some of these recipes.
Maggie: Yes.
Dr. Lisa: What’s your projected timeline for that?
Elizabeth: We’d love to see it come out this spring of 2013. We’re still working towards that. I think that’s a good goal.
Dr. Lisa: Our listeners are going to put that on their calendars. In the interim though, you also have an e-book, I believe, that will be probably out when people are listening.
Elizabeth: By September.
Dr. Lisa: Tell me about that.
Elizabeth: It’s called Smoothies Gone Raw. We think smoothies are the best way. If you’re interested in raw food, trying it, smoothies are an amazing way. It’s sort of like the gateway drink. We have three sections of the book. We have all-fruit smoothies, and then you can move on to your green smoothies where you’re adding your kale, your spinach, your sprouts, and then we also have a dessert section. They’re really fun delicious smoothies.
We touched on it a little bit but greens are great source of protein. To sneak them into a smoothie that still taste delicious is a great way for adults and kids who like to reap the benefits of greens. It is cool.
Dr. Lisa: This is an e-book. How can people get this?
Elizabeth: On our offer website. We’ll have a link to it off of KidsGoneRaw.com.
Dr. Lisa: KidsGoneRaw.com.
Elizabeth: You got it.
Maggie: We’ve also got a bunch of recipes up there now. They’re searchable. I think we posted a pizza recipe recently. There is a raw vegan pizza posted, and we’ve done some fun salads, and desserts, and smoothies. There is a nice array right now.
Dr. Lisa: As we were coming in, I was mentioning to you that we’re going to have girls on the run. They’re going to be incoming to talk to us in a very short period of time. You said, “We’re going to run in that race,” which I think is October.
Elizabeth: We’re not running. We’re giving smoothies away.
Dr. Lisa: You’re giving smoothies away.
Maggie: Yes.
Dr. Lisa: That just leads me to ask, do you feel like having a raw vegan lifestyle is compatible with having an active athletic lifestyle?
Maggie: For sure, yeah. In fact, there is so many vegan athletes out there and even raw vegan world-class athletes which is really inspiring, and it’s fun to Google them and see their stories because some of them have some really interesting journeys. Even the William sisters, the tennis stars, have recently gone raw vegan. I forget which one. I think it’s Serena that has some sort of illness that she was treating with a raw food diet. They’re both doing that.
There are just so many examples of people living a really active lifestyle. We both are very active in our day-to-day life. It’s really possible. In fact, people flourish and even improve their athleticism, I think, by giving this a shot.
Elizabeth: Absolutely.
Dr. Lisa: Yeah, and I have to say that in talking to you and even looking at your Facebook page, and it’s just Kids Gone Raw. That is your Facebook page for people who want to like it. There is a sense of joyfulness and happiness. It’s not a sense of punitive, you have to eat raw vegan food or be punished for the rest of your life. It’s more of a sense of this life force and that you’re embodying what you’re discussing. I think that that’s a really happy and healthy association for people to have.
Elizabeth: Definitely.
Maggie: It is so happy. We never, like we said … If people want to try this one, two, three times a week, that is all they need. Once they start realizing how amazing they feel and how great their kids are, how happy, and how great their kids are sleeping, and how even-tempered they are, they are going to keep it going.
Elizabeth: Yeah, it’s snowballs. It’s pretty cool.
Dr. Lisa: I appreciate you’re coming in and talking to us about Kids Gone Raw.
Maggie: Thank you.
Dr. Lisa: For a back-to-school show. We’ve been talking with Elizabeth Fraser and Maggie Knowles. I hope that everybody goes to your website, download some recipes, and look at the e-book, and likes your Facebook page.
Elizabeth: Yeah. We wanted to offer your listeners a little specialty. We’ve recently launched the line of dehydrated snacks which are really great for lunchboxes. We’ve got five flavors of kale chips and five flavors of fruit leather, and some granola. It’s all raw vegan, gluten-free, and really healthy and yummy. We’ve got an Etsy store. You can find it from our website, and we’ve got a coupon code for Dr. Lisa. You just enter Dr. Lisa, and you’ll get 10% off an order through the end of October.
Dr. Lisa: Wow. That is really great. I am so glad that you’re going to do that. We’ll see how many people who are listening will take advantage. I encourage everybody who is listening to go in there and order something, and put in that coupon because we want to show Elizabeth and Maggie that we are all about the life force of food, and bringing happy healthiness to the planet.
Maggie: Thank you.
Elizabeth: Thank you.
Dr. Lisa: Thanks so much for coming on today.
Maggie: Thank you.
Elizabeth: Thanks for having us.