Eating Healthy on the Road

Summer is the season of family outings, picnics, and
vacations. Making these events healthy, however, can
pose challenges for those pursuing the live food lifestyle.
Most social gatherings and restaurants only offer Standard
American Diet favorites, so what is the Hallelujah Dieter to
do? Eating a diet of living foods thus becomes a lesson in
strategy and logistics for those who want to 'eat healthy!'
Thankfully there are ways to make eating healthy on
the road not only possible but fun and easy!

Once committed to eating healthy, finding food to eat away
from home that is safe, affordable, and most of all- living-
is a rare treat. Therefore one must develop a strategy for
survival, so to speak, in order to function outside the usual
toxic SAD offerings. Here are a few strategies for eating
healthy while away from home:

1. As you plan your trip, research restaurants, health
food stores, and supermarkets along your proposed
route. Surf the internet to locate places that are likely to
carry living foods. Write down addresses, phone numbers,
and print out a map for directions to prospective restaurants,
hotels, health food stores, food co-ops, farmers' markets,
etc. Contact local Chambers of Commerce for information,
also. Call ahead to inquire what each establishment offers
and how they could best accommodate you. Many vegetarian
restaurants will cater to vegans. Let the proprietor know your
specific dietary needs. If necessary, use extra leverage by
telling them that you are eating according to 'doctor's orders.'

Many restaurants (including steak houses), health food
stores, and supermarkets have salad bars. These bars
can be good meal solutions. However, most salad bars
offer only conventionally-grown foods that also might be
GMO in origin.

2. Take along your own food. This strategy works best for
short trips, but with a little creativity can be stretched for
longer journeys. Pack a large cooler with prepared salads,
drinks, and snacks. Ice it well, especially if you are
transporting fresh vegetable juices. For quick, easy meals
on the road, here are a few suggestions:

- Make salads ahead of time and take them in plastic containers.
Keep in mind that fresh salads will usually last only two days on ice.
- Slice a variety of vegetables for 'finger food' and put them in
zip-lock bags or plastic containers
- Make raw soups or smoothies and transport them in glass
canning jars or plastic containers.
- Take a variety of nuts and seeds in plastic bags or
containers.
- Take a variety of sprouts in a zip lock bag or take a sprout
bag to grow sprouts on the road.
- Take a variety of fruit. Peel and slice ahead of time, if
necessary
- Take healthy snack bars
- Take BarleyMax, Carrot Juice Max, etc.
- Pack filtered drinking water
- Take a picnic basket that is equipped with a tablecloth,
eating utensils, serving spoons, napkins, vegetable wash,
bug spray, condiments, etc.

When your food supply is exhausted, shop local supermarkets,
health food stores, co-ops, and farmer's markets/stands.
Many large supermarkets now carry a selection (though limited)
of organic produce.

3. When staying in a motel or hotel, ask for a room with
a kitchenette. Having a small kitchen with a refrigerator will
give you the option of making your own meals or keeping cold
those foods that you have either brought with you or
purchased along the way. Ask if the kitchen has a juicer or
blender so that you can order fresh juice or smoothies.

4. Take your equipment. Pack your juicer or personal
blender. It can be used in a hotel room or at a campsite.
Purchase the produce you need locally to make your own
fresh juices and smoothies.

5. When staying with family and friends, make your
dietary preferences specific. Most people are unfamiliar
with a vegan lifestyle and need your input in order to best
accommodate you. If necessary, offer to purchase the food
you need and help prepare it. To be on the safe side, bring
your own food.

6. If traveling outside the country, research your
destination ahead of time. Search the internet or talk to
your travel agent to determine how you can maintain a
healthy, living food diet. Many countries (European included)
have daily farmer's markets in cities and towns. Contact
prospective hotels to see what they offer for vegan diets.

7. Forage for food. If you are planning to hike or camp
in the outdoors for an extended time, consider foraging
for your food. Educate yourself on wild edibles and how
to sustain yourself the natural way on the trail. It is surprising
how much food grows of itself in the wild. Best of all, it is
FREE!

Lessons from The Living Way
After adopting the Hallelujah Diet in 1996, we ceased
frequenting restaurants, since they offered nothing that
we could eat. To this day, we live outside the restaurant
mentality. When we traveled to Hallelujah Acres in 1997
to attend Health Minister Training, we took our trailer
along with all the equipment and supplies to support our
new 'Hallelujah'-found lifestyle. We bought produce along
the way (including 50# bags of carrots) and juiced our
way from Maine to Tennessee and back. At campsites,
we made our meals and planned our eating strategy
daily. Though the logistics were challenging at times, it
worked. With a little creativity, a lot of determination plus
much prayer, we continued on our pathway to ultimate
health with considerable success.

We are now fourteen years into the live food lifestyle.
Though we do not travel much, we do take day trips
and plan our meal strategy accordingly. To date, we
take our food with us. As the ministry's official
'raw chef', I arise at dawn (or earlier!) to make our
meals for the day: salads, raw soups, smoothies, and
snacks. Everything is tucked into user-friendly plastic
or preferably glass cover dishes or jars. As much as
possible, we are consciously eliminating plastic from
our lives.

We place our food in a large cooler with plenty of ice.
Sometimes we take a smaller, separate cooler for our
fresh vegetable juices and salad dressing.

We also have a canvas 'utility' bag that houses our
silverware, paper plates and bowls, napkins, and
condiments (shakers for kelp, curry, cinnamon, etc.).
I also tuck in our BarleyMax, snack bars, a small spray
bottle of vegetable wash, bug spray, and an all-purpose
natural disinfectant for hands/table tops, etc.

In the car we carry extra water (in gallon glass jugs), a
blanket for sitting on the ground (if necessary) plus a
well-equipped picnic basket should we need additional
plates, cups, etc.

Our years of 'eating healthy on the road' prove to us that
it is better to be prepared than disappointed or go hungry.
It is better to make and take your own food than to cave in
to traditional Standard American Diet selections found in
restaurants and stores. In case you have not noticed,
there is very little prepared, raw food available on the
market. As George Malkmus says, 'Once you leave
the produce department, you enter the non-food section of
the store.' This is true for large supermarkets as well as
health food stores.

Therefore, since the world has yet to understand and
embrace living foods, it is up to the individual to blaze his
or her path through the jungle of existing non-foods in order
to 'eat healthy' in an unhealthy world. Staying on the
'straight and narrow' is not as difficult as one might think.
However, it does take dedication, determination, and
discipline.

In the final analysis, we would rather take the time and
effort to ensure healthy meals for ourselves on the road
than suffer the consequences. We don't like to be sick.
Compromise is not in our vocabulary. We are committed
to eating healthy no matter where we are and what it
takes. Hopefully you feel the same.

So it is that eating healthy while traveling is not only possible,
but it is fun and easy, also. If we choose to be healthy, we
will find ways to make it happen. Afterall, life is what we
make it. Therefore prove that 'eating healthy' no matter
where you are is worth the effort. Ultimate health is the
prize of a life well spent.

For a handy 'ON THE ROAD' checklist, click here.

Back to Living Letter #32/index