Introduction
Conception of Baby Greens

I hadn’t questioned the established tradition of boiling, baking, frying, and sautéing until I read Why Suffer, the autobiography of Anne Wigmore. Charmed by her tales of a childhood kinship with nature, I read on as she told of the whole new world of the city and the perils of disease that met her there. In awe I continued as young Anne recovered from terminal gangrene, a solitary struggle for life and limb, and was rescued by none other than earth’s miracle workers: flowers, grass, sunshine, water, and a puppy. Further inspired by her later discoveries, I began to grasp for the first time a concept of living nutrition. Like most everyone else whose everyday sustenance has always been cooked, the inherent life of my food was more or less unknown to me. In its natural simplicity the idea of eating raw food rang true, but making a radical change in my lifestyle was more difficult to swallow.

My curiosity piqued, I started taking baby steps. I grew wheat grass and sprouts, dusted off my juice extractor, and began to experiment with raw-food preparation. As my repertoire of recipes began to grow, I noticed that the more alive my food became, the more alive I felt. After years of having been failed by dozens of skin products, fistfuls of vitamin supplements, and a prescription for a drug that is known to cause birth defects (in children of women who take it while pregnant), the acne-plagued complexion I had been suffering since my adolescence was slowly beginning to clear. Healing continued to snowball as I was introduced to spinal therapy at a Network Spinal Analysis clinic, and I gained, through this, a new understanding of the relationship between my habits of thought and their expressions in the physical body. Past traumas and bottled emotions found new release, and greater self-acceptance began to unfold. Children were no longer inquiring as to my “chicken pox.” To the contrary, people began to tell me that I was “glowing”—“radiant” even. They wanted to know what I was doing differently!

Having married and moved to the Southwest (from the Midwestern U.S.), I started working for the Tree of Life Rejuvenation Center in Patagonia, AZ. In this living-foods-retreat setting I gained more insight for my dietary transitioning. Talking with others making similar changes, I compared notes on what had worked for us, and what had not. Raw-food chefs and apprentices also served up fresh ideas and inspiration for my own new culinary dabbling. My work, which involved taking dictations for the writings of Dr. Gabriel Cousens (author of Conscious Eating and Spiritual Nutrition), also became a generous helping of food for thought.

It wasn’t long after I began my work at Tree of Life that Michael and I discovered we were going to have a baby! As we prepared for her arrival, resources in natural childbirth fell serendipitously into place. When the time approached to introduce little Quinn to her first solid foods, however, the more that I researched, the less I seemed to find on living nutrition for young children. From leading authorities on infant care I gleaned general insights such as when she might be ready for initial samplings and which foods can pose potential hazards or sensitivities; but aside from breast milk, I found their suggested diets to be almost exclusively made up of cooked foods (and in the case of commercial baby foods heated up to twelve times!).

Within the arena of raw-nutrition I found that despite its growing interest, with health testimonials by the thousands, precious little has been written on the integration of these ideas into the lives of our children. I found this to be especially true when addressing the specific needs of infants and toddlers.

One reason for this information gap seems to be the increasingly controversial nature of nutrition in general. The more that is discovered of our food elements and their varied effects on the body, the more theories, fads, and diets seem to follow. Even with the basic, common-sense approach of eating food in its raw and natural state, one need not look far to find opposing viewpoints. “Take carrots, for example,” said a man I had spoken to for advice. “One person says they’re the best thing for you, another claims they’re the worst, and both have the research to prove it.” With this endless range of conflicting expertise it is not hard to imagine how some parents have been intimidated by the subject.

In addition to the controversy, there is significant motivation to turn a blind eye to the discoveries made in living nutrition. Although we are seekers of health and wellness as an over-consuming nation, we are very attached (if not addicted) to the way that we eat; and in my experience, change to our way of life is seldom met without some resistance. Having even more profound of an influence on the nutritional information we read are perhaps the financial investments at stake. From meat and dairy to pharmaceutical products, many corporate structures’ security depends on our eating habits and dietary beliefs remaining loyal to them.

Nutrition’s stormy debate with its host of divided interests becomes all the more emotionally charged when it comes to feeding our children. As parents we seek what is best for their developing bodies, but as we look to the experts for their counsel, we often find ourselves blown and tossed about by the rapidly shifting winds of opinion. It was after one such series of failed fact-finding missions that I stumbled upon an epiphany. I recognized within myself more than the desire to be well informed. I saw also the presence of fear. I hadn’t found a final authority on living foods for my baby and was becoming increasingly uneasy. Revisited by my previous lessons with authority, I began to see my social conditioning to look outside myself for the final word on what is best for my own family. In my own reflection, I saw a society that urges unquestioned allegiance to leadership at the expense of individuals not recognizing their own distinct voices of discernment, intuition, and instinct. And so my final authority emerged. With the grace not to banish conventional wisdom altogether, my innate intelligence took throne. I felt a new confidence to care for my young, an ability that although hidden from me had been underlying all along.

It was after this revelation, interestingly, that more information began to find its way to me. It didn’t come in the form of an entire book devoted to the subject of living foods for little ones, as I had so fervently sought out. Instead it arrived in bits and pieces, trickling in steadily from a diverse range of sources. Baby Greens has become the book I’ve been looking for and was written in the spirit of self-trust and empowerment.

The lack of resources on living nutrition for children has moved Michael and me profoundly to write this book, but rather than to stake claim of unique authority on the subject, we hope to hold up a light to the instinctive wisdom within each reader and within each reader’s child. In addition, it is not our intention to promote rigid dietary perfectionism or to set one standard for all families to measure against. Observing many attitudes often surrounding food (including my own), I have come to believe that a balanced diet involves more than simply that which enters our mouths, and this strike of balance may appear fairly different from one household to another. This book aims to serve the needs of a variety of nutritional lifestyles. We have sought to help fill a gap of information and form a bridge between the standard American animal-based diet and a whole-and-living-plant-based lifestyle. To help with dietary transitions we have included some cooked food ingredients in a portion of the recipes. The “Family Activities” section for children reflects what we’ve learned as parents and in our professional relationships with children—that is: The desire to learn and to grow is inherent, and it will naturally thrive in an environment that nurtures children’s innate joy and autonomy. In the recipes you will also see an element of play, for it is our final hope in writing this book to bring more life into your mealtime together and laughter into your kitchen.

— Michaela Lynn
Patagonia, AZ
February 16, 2003