If my brain and my body could have a conversation, it would look more or less like that:

Brain: Oh Body life is hard, let's just sit on the sofa and eat ice cream all day! 
Body: No f***ing way! I don't want to be bloated and in constant crave for something sweet! 
Brain: C'mon girl, don't be so stiff let's have some fun and buy a bag of chocolate cookies, you know, the one "freshly baked in store", they're delicious...
Body: Brain, you know we've been there and you don't like it. We always end up feeling like shit. I'm telling you!
Brain: So maybe just one small ice cream tub?...

Yeah, if my body could speak, it would say all that things. Unfortunately (in this case) my brain can speak and sometimes it’s very convincing. Recently we decided that for couple months we will take a break from keto, so we started experimenting with other foods. OK, I wish I could say experimenting, but it’s rather giving a brain freedom to choose. And in the shop brain likes colourful packaging, crispy looking stuff and big ice cream tubs 😉 So there was: cheese crackers, bread sticks, crisps, “freshly baked in store” (!) cookies and buns and obviously tubs of ice cream. And what’s the most odd – even though our taste buds were telling us: these potato crisps have unpleasant artificial flavour, we’ve ate whole pack of it. What I want to say, that even though our taste buds were saying: OK, that’s enough, I don’t need more, brain was eating until the box was empty. There must be something about these foods that you feel the urge to eat more even though you really don’t want them anymore.

So for the last couple weeks my brain instead of focusing on the things I want do do, constantly whispers: I would eat something… And that’s pretty much annoying! So for example I noticed that two big portions of rice with veggies does not only makes me feel still hungry but also bloated and uncomfortable. Do you feel me?

Furthermore when turn of winter and spring I cant wait to eat more fresh and raw foods. I miss freshly made salads, fruits and smoothies. But it’s still a bit cold and my body needs something warming and comforting. (And everybody knows that sugar cookies and cheese crackers brings comfort – for the moment when you eat them.) That’s how the idea for this raw beetroot salad came to me. And you know – I had a giant bowl of it and I felt nourished and fresh.

It’s a great idea for quick breakfast or lunch idea. You can grate the carrot and beetroot in the evening before, prepare dressing and store it in the jar and in the morning just take them all from the fridge, pop on the plate or into a bowl, crumble some feta add broad beans (don’t bother yourself with peeling them, I did it just because it looks more pretty), drizzle with vinaigrette and grab a fork.

It works for my body. And what works for yours?

raw beetroot salad

INGREDIENTS for 1 large portion:

• 1 small carrot
• 1 small beetroot
• handful of rocket
• handful of cooked and cooled broad beans
• small piece of feta cheese

INGREDIENTS for #ketofriendly vinaigrette:

• 3 tsp apple cider vinegar
• 3-4 tsp extra virgin olive oil
• 1 tsp your favourite mustard
• good pinch of lemon pepper
• pinch of dried or freshly chopped parsley
• pinch of natural rock salt or Himalayan salt

DIRECTIONS

Start with preparing dressing: mix together all the ingredients and set aside. You can use a small jar, close it tight and shake until ingredients combine.

Peel and thoroughly wash beetroot and carrot. Grate them both on large hoops. Thoroughly rinse a handful of rocket, if you want, you can peel broad beans like I did. If you don’t want to bother yourself with it, just leave it with skins. I did it just because I like the fresh green of them.

Place rocket on a plate and layer the rest of ingredients: carrot, beetroot, broad beans and crumble some feta on top drizzle everything with vinaigrette dressing. Grab a fork and enjoy!

You can also pop all ingredients to a bowl and give it a good stir if you like it more that way, bowl is also more convenient if you like to eat your salad on the sofa rather than at the table 😉