Raw mini pizza with pesto and more B12-talk

The crust:
1 C buckwheat
½ C hemp seeds
1 C sprouted garbanzo beans (chick peas)
some tahini
olive oil, water, salt, thyme, oregano, marjoram

Grind buckwheat groats and hemp seeds into flour in a food processor. In Finland unhulled hemp seeds are cheaper and easier to find, so that is what I used and they required fine grinding. The hulled variety is tasty (nutty flavor) and more moist, so less oil/water is needed. Once the buckwheat and hemp seeds are finely ground, add beans, oil and spices. Taste and adjust flavorings. Shape into rather thin minipizzas, dehydrate on one side for a few hours and on the other for a couple more. Altogether mine where nice and crunchy (the way I like them) in little over 7 hours.

Top with your favorite marinara and pesto sauce. I posted my favorite pesto recipe earlier, and that really rocked on this pizza. Leftovers from that marinara were used on these pizzas.The toppings were rather traditional too, thinly sliced zucchini, tomatoes, organic calamata olives and orange bell pepper. I find that when making raw pizza, mini-sized is the way to go if you (like me) enjoy picking up your pizza and eating it with your hands. My pesto has such a rich cheesy flavor so for the first time I did not miss the cheese.

Now once again about vitamin B12. Some raw foodists claim that if you are on a 100% raw vegan diet you don't need to supplement this vitamin because your "extremely healthy" bowel will synthesize it's own. This is NOT true and no one should rely on this hazardously inaccurate information. Any vegan, even raw vegan, will need some source of vitamin B12 to avoid irreversible damage to brain cells. Even the so-called raw food guru, David Wolfe, has enough sense (he is one of the few with actual degrees in related fields) to admit that B12 is vital and that our inherent need for this vitamin will not be adequately met by a strictly vegan diet. Wolfe has his concerns about supplements though, which is why he eats ants and moths. So, unless you are eating insects on a regular basis (and getting regularly tested to make sure you are getting enough B12), you need to supplement or eat meat. There is no ambiguity. Maybe one day we will discover some type of plant source for this vitamin that is in the form our body needs it, but this day is not here yet. Until it is, it just is not worth the risk.

As you probably notice I am pretty passionate about this. I am very worried about many bloggers with absolutely no degree in nutrition giving out nutritional advice. Some restrict their diets to just smoothies and liquids thinking they'll get all they need from superfood powders. Did our ancestors have VitaMix blenders? Were we really built for that kind of a diet? No one knows everything about nutrition and new information becomes available to us constantly. Not only that, but we are all individuals. In my opinion, it is always best to think back and consider how we were meant to eat. What in our fridge would our counterparts thousands of years ago recognize? Natural is the key. Since our bodies clearly need B12 to function properly, it is reasonable to conclude that we are meant to consume some form of meat. So when you eat, make sure you eat a plentiful variety of foods. As fresh, unprocessed and organic as possible.
Meet your body's needs for all vitamins, minerals, fiber and other nutrients. Don't count calories.

Vitamin D can also be a problem for us living in the dark north and not consuming fortified milk products, fish or eggs. Scientists are realizing we need far more of this vitamin that was previously thought and it is key in preventing many serious diseases such as cancer, MS and osteoporosis. It plays a huge role in bone health together with calcium. Again, unless you wish to take supplements, you should consume fish, fish oils and eggs regularly.