Plant-based Inside and Out | Pangea Organics

Plant-based Inside and Out

Thinking about doing something kind for yourself this January? Consider going plant-based for a month and see how you feel. Pangea Founder & CEO, Joshua Onysko, swears by a plant-based diet for feeling your best and looking your best. Plus, you are helping to change the world when you eat low on the food chain.

In order to get the best advice, we turned to Joshua to get the lowdown on eating a plant-based diet.

“The one thing I tell people when they try to go more plant-based is don’t forget what protein is,” Joshua said in a recent conversation. He points out that when people eat animal protein, they don’t have to think much about all the other available sources of protein out there. “Plant-based protein is everywhere. So, you can sneak protein into everything you eat - and it’s better for your body to do it that way.” Joshua explains that we can’t process a lot more than 25g of protein per meal, so whatever you eat over that is kind of wasted. And he says, “Getting 25g is easy because protein is everywhere. But don’t buy the idea that mushrooms or cauliflower have protein, they are not where you should turn to meet your body’s needs.”

What Joshua suggests to eat for protein:
- Nuts
- Seeds
- Nut butters
- Seed butters
- Tofu
- Tempeh
- Beans and lentils
- Quinoa

Joshua says he created this nut and seed mix that he eats on everything and it helps him get protein in every meal. You can sprinkle it on a salad, use it as a dip for bread with olive oil, use it as a topping for veggies, or add it anywhere a savory crunch would be welcome.

This recipe makes two cups of nut crunch which you will go through pretty fast, so you can double or even triple it. Use organic ingredients.

Nut Crunch
- ½ cup pumpkin seeds (raw)
- ¼ cup sunflower seeds (raw)
- ¼ cup almonds (raw)
- 2 Tablespoons olive or avocado oil
- 2 teaspoons spice mix of your choice
- ½ cup hemp seeds

1. Mix all the seeds with the oil and the spice mix. You can use any spice mix that you like - there are great ones in most grocery stores or at places like Savory Spice or Trader Joes. This is especially good with chili lime seasoning, Italian or Mexican spice mixes, or Middle Eastern spice mixes.
2. Roast in a 350 degree oven until it smells wonderful, about 20 minutes. You don’t want the mix to get too dark, but you want to warm it up enough that the oil and spices sink in.
3. Let the mix cool. When it is cool, add in the hemp seeds.
4. Now you can put it in the Cuisinart or a spice grinder and make a really rough chopped mixture. It only takes a few pulses to get it there. If you don’t have either of those you can use a mortar and pestle or even put the mix into a cloth bag and use a rolling pin to crush it. However you do it you want to end up with big but even chunks
5. Store it in the fridge where it will stay good for a week, but you will use it up much faster than that.

Joshua reminds us that it’s not all what you take out that makes you healthy, but what you put in. So when you use this nut and seed mix, you are adding in some great stuff. The next step is to go plastic-free in your kitchen as well as your beauty ritual. That means eating more whole foods and cutting out the stuff with plastic packaging.

Pangea’s Superfood Smoothie Mask came out of one of Joshua’s kitchen favorites, so it is the crossover hit of beauty products. Joshua makes a smoothie that has goji berries, acai, matcha, and coconut milk in it. He makes it good and thick and this is one of the ways he gets great food into his body. But, one day he looked at it and said, it looks so good I could wear it. Half joking, he put some on his face and left it there for a while.

It would have just been one of those funny kitchen moments except that Joshua went out to dinner with some friends and they all complimented him on his skin, asking him what he’d done differently. He told them he wore his smoothie, and thus, the mask was born. Joshua added clay and seaweed to the mix, and it became the Superfood Smoothie Mask. Since then it has been a top-selling product at Pangea and it’s not a surprise to Joshua at all.

What you eat and what you put on your skin are the two biggest factors in how your skin looks and feels. Your skin wants your care inside and out.

Explore Our Products:

Leave a comment