Raw Food Diet

[martin]

I am really thinking about switching to an all-raw vegan diet. The health benefits seem to be amazing, and I believe this is the best way to eat if done correctly. I already am vegan.

Anyone have any advice?

[Jaben]

I was vegan since February 2003 and switched to all raw vegan in September 2006. I've stayed completely raw except for a few weeks in July when I managed a vegan food booth for our local vegetarian group. Since then I've joined other raw fooders in my area for potlucks and information sharing. My girl friend is currently transitioning to raw.

If you have any raw food restaurant or raw food potlucks near you, go to one and ask them this question. If not then maybe you can start a potluck later on.

Free Recipes:
A very useful online free recipe database: Welcome to Gone Raw - a place to share and discuss vegan, raw food recipes!.

Research:
Victoria Boutenko's 12 steps to raw and Green 4 Life are my favorite informational books. RAW430DAYS.COM, Living and Raw Food World Summit and Living and Raw Food Summit 2 are great resources for comparing what all of the experts have to say.

3 revelations for me along my path were:
1. Green smoothies. 1 lb of organic greens (kale, chard, spinach, red leaf, dandelion, beet, carrot, collard etc) has the RDA of protein, vitamins and minerals you need. Add your favorite fruit to make it taste great and add carb calories for energy.

2. Seeing cooked food as an addiction. Free glutamic acid contains MSG and has the same effect on your body. It's an excitotoxin and prevalent in most processed food in many forms including hydrolyzed protein. See wikipedia for more information on msg and excitotxins. Vicotoria Botenko's 12 step's to raw has additional references on addictive substances in meat and wheat. She also explains how our tastes are developed at a very young age when we first start eating solid food. That shapes what food we crave for the rest of our life.

3. Don't try to convert anyone. When you find out how great eating all raw is you may feel the urge for fanatical proselytization. People will love to try your raw food if you present it well. I think it's best though not to explain it's raw unless they ask and don't tell them anything else about raw food unless they're dying to know and begging for information.

I've learned that raw food cuisine is actually quite easy to prepare. I enjoy green smoothies, salads, soups and collard, kale or lettuce wraps on a daily basis. I've learned how to make up recipes that taste great based on what ingredients are available. A dehydrator can be nice for making cookies and crackers but is not necessary.

I'd also recommend eating organic to avoid pesticides and fertilizers and very importantly organic produce contains many fold the quantity of nutrients (especially minerals) than the conventional counterparts.

I started off trying to sprout beans and grains and dehydrate a lot of things. I haven't done much of that lately. If anything I'll sprout buckwheat and use it for cereal or bread.

My 4 food groups are:
greens
sweet fruits
vegetables and sprouts
nuts and fats

You may benefit by forming clear motives for why you want to be raw. Specific goals can help you through any challenges that arise.

If you experience detoxification, transition slowly.

Do what you need to in order to enjoy the experience.

If you have any questions let me know.

[Andrew Michaels]

I wrote about my experiences raw here.

[escapee]

I believe you can't go for 100% raw diet because certain food are not meant to be consumed raw .

Example : Patotoes and it's leaf ( Toxin : solanine ), Whole grains, Soy, beans (lectin phytohaemagglutinin) ,certain mushroom, certain vegetables and etc. Be forewarned ...

Dangers of Eating Raw Vegetables. : Chef 2 Chef Forums

Let us look at the dangers of food coming not from the man-made pesticides, fungicides, or herbicides, but from the true danger, that is the fresh and natural poisons manufactured by the plant to stay alive and be able to multiply.

There are four categories of chemical armaments that salad deploys against human predators: nutrition blockers, toxins, mutagens (which alter genetic material), and carcinogens.

Nutrition blockers are chemicals that bind with some desirable vitamins or minerals and prevent your body from absorbing it.

Oxalic acid in raw spinach forms an insoluble complex with calcium and iron and renders uncooked spinach a non-nutritious green. The same is happening in raw beet green, Swiss chard and rhubarb. (But eating raw rhubarb could produce death due to toxic anthraquinone glycosides.)

Antithiamine substances bind with the vitamin B thyamine and stops its absorption. They are in raw red cabbage, Brussels sprouts and beets. Similarly in in mustard seeds, some berries, cottonseed oil and some ferns (fiddlehead).
Raw egg contains avidin, which binds up the vitamin B (biotin) and acts the same way.

Uncooked grain protein (wheat germ) which contains magnesium, zinc and copper, is bound by phytates. Raw soybeans contain neutralizing agent to vitamin B12 and vitamin D.

Raw kidney beans, alfalfa and some of the peas block the vitamin E and could cause in some incidences a liver disease.

Protease (enzyme that breaks down proteins) inhibitors in raw turnips, rutabagas, chickpeas, bamboo sprouts, cashews, peanuts, and most beans counteract the enzymes in our body that digest protein. The same way amylase inhibitors in raw red kidney beans and navy beans make their carbohydrate unusable.

These salad ingredients act as anti-nutrient only in their raw state. It is important to know the right method, temperature and cooking time for each vegetable.

Toxins are chemical compounds in food that are toxic when consumed in small or large quantities.

Cyanogens are found in Lima and other broad beans. They are also in unripe millet, young bamboo shots, cassava, manioc and tapioca. They must be carefully peeled, washed under running water and boiled without a lid.

Goitrogens are chemicals that cause extreme enlargement of the thyroid glands among people with little iodine, by preventing intake of iodine from the food. Goitrogenes are found in raw cabbage, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, kale, turnips, rutabagas, cauliflower, mustard seeds and horse radish. These are broken down by cooking.

Chickpeas could cause lathyrism (neurological lesions of the spinal cord.) The sale of chickpeas is illegal in many states in India. If you soak chickpeas overnight and cook them in excess of boiling water, they will not give you lathyrism.

Favism is a disease named after fava bean. Mild cases could result in fatigue and nausea, acute cases in jaundice.
Cooking will not protect you if you make potato salad with green immature potatoes, which could contain LETHAL mount of solanine in their sprouts and skin.

Undercooked kidney beans (al-dente) contain hemagglutinins, which make your blood cells stick together and account for poor growth among children.

Soyabean sprouts and yams are high in estrogenic factors that can inflict havoc with woman’s hormones.

Aflatoxin is among the most potent carcinogen known and is present in the mold contaminated grain and nuts. Almost as hazardous are the hydrazines in some raw molded mushrooms or basil which contains lots of estragole. Safrole is a compound related to estragole and it is the reason natural root beer is now banned by the FDA.

That much about salad components. And what about raw fruits? Unlike the antisocial vegetable, ripe fruit is friendly and loves to be eaten and have it seeds widely dispersed.

(Sources: Bruce Ames, chairman of the biochemistry department at Berkeley. Jeffrey Steingarten food writer at Harvard College. Awards from James Beard foundation.)

[Jaben]

Thanks Escapee,

After reading your post I had a fleeting urge to steam some spinach.

There's no doubt that eating certain plants raw can be dangerous. See Into the Wild.

Greens may be antisocial, but most don't mind being munched on as long as you leave the majority of their leaves in tact to absorb the sunshine Victoria Boutenko explains that if we eat a wide variety of greens we can still get 1 lb a day with out being affected by the toxins. According to Boutenko, over 20% of the Chimpanzees diet includes greens. They don't need to
know the right method, temperature and cooking time for each vegetable. They just eat over 100 different varieties and that way any particular toxin isn't consumed in quantities too great to eliminate without harm.

I feel the benefits of eating raw outweigh the cost of eliminating the toxins because of the loss of nutrients destroyed by cooking. However, if you have some good peer reviewed scientific research on the cost benefit analysis of eating raw greens versus cooked I'd like to read it.

[bdp]

I switched to a 99% vegan diet about a year ago. I did extensive research about raw foodism over the summer and decided against it.

This article summarized the issue very well: FAQ | Dr Fuhrman.com

[martin]

Thanks so much. ;D

[kcsing1]

I appreciate and agree with your beautifully written post!

[kcsing1]

Victoria Boutenko recommends 40% greens, not 20%. She bases this in the percentage of greens in the chipanzee diet.

[Lauxa]

Originally Posted by bdp

I switched to a 99% vegan diet about a year ago. I did extensive research about raw foodism over the summer and decided against it.

This article summarized the issue very well: FAQ | Dr Fuhrman.com

Thank you for this.

[Andrew Brunelle]

I think the raw food diet is an excellent health booster and I totally would love to go raw for a few months to see what effect it has on me. It is definitely a more natural and healthy diet that many people have thrived on. I'll have to get some books about it so that I do it correctly and don't get any deficiencies. That's the main issue for me. I don't want to get deficient in a nutrient I'm getting now from my current diet.

I would argue it is almost a full-time job at first getting to raw foods. I've tried going raw before, for a couple of weeks, and while I experienced detox and felt much better afterwards, I found it to be very time-consuming. I still drink green smoothies at least 3 times a week and eat salads maybe twice a week, but eating raw foods all the time seems like a daunting task. I don't think I could do it right now, but in time I feel I will be able to eat raw at least 90% of the time.

Changing my eating routine and habits will take time. But I will report back on this thread or create a thread once I have transitioned to a fully raw diet. I'm not looking forward to detox or cravings I can't satisfy, but if I can get raw forms of what I satisfy, then I should be okay.

I guess it's time to do some research on how to make a raw foods diet practical in this modern world of frankenfoods.

[ginkgo]

Here is a woman on myspace.com that tells how she was depressed for years and she cured it with a raw food diet.
MySpace - Rose Goddess - 27 - Female - Dallas, Texas - myspace.com/rosegoddessbliss

Here is a page about depression but it tells about a group that heals all sorts of problems with an 85% raw food diet with 15% healthy cooked food at the end of the day as a reward. It is under the section about Most Dramatic Healing That I have Ever Come Across.Depression Self Help. Natural Healing of Mental and Physical Issues

[Nameless One]

Raw vegan is a pretty simple term, but you'll find that there can be 100s of different raw vegan diets which are extremely different and can have extremely different effects on a person

So just remember that before you talk about "the raw vegan diet"

[LauraJane]

Yep, I made the switch from unhealthy vegetarian to 100% raw vegan in August 2009. I am still going strong and sticking to 100%. It's been wonderful for me. Life-changing, really. I've written at length about it on my blog, but many people have found this article helpful. It explains why I advocate eating 100% raw (instead of sometimes cheating). Basically, my thesis is that your appreciation for foods changes, and you start to actually enjoy the taste of healthy foods. If you cheat, you reset your tastebuds and you're shooting yourself in the foot.

[Mabel]

I eat a primarily raw food diet and find that if I get at least 70 to 80 percent of my calories from raw foods that I enjoy great benefits. Based on my own personal experience and research my feeling is that a 100 percent raw food diet is not necessary nor appropriate for most people. I think that all sorts of factors need to align for this to be a good choice, including you really need to know what you are doing, you need the social support, and you need to live in a climate conducive to being 100 percent raw just to name a few. However, why let that stop you from deriving the great benefits of a primarily raw food diet!

I must say, that going mostly raw has brought a whole host of great foods and food preparation techniques into my life that make it easy for me to prepare very clean cooked foods. The beauty of going raw is that it has made eating a whole food diet very easy. It is more difficult to strive to be raw than it is to eat a whole food diet and by focusing on the former it made the later much easier! An example of this is that I have learned to make very tasty raw marinara sauces out of ingredients such as whole tomatoes, dates, strawberries, oil and herbs. Once in a while I will want to have a cooked marinara sauce--so I now make it out of whole foods instead of having the canned version which is loaded with processed ingredients and preservatives.

I view raw foods as a very powerful tool to reach a state of vibrant health, but not as a dogma that I need to follow 100 percent. Since there is a place for cooked food in my diet, I do not define it as cheating.

I would encourage you to eat more raw foods and pay attention to the affects they have on how you feel and make your own decisions. As you clean up your body it gives you more immediate feedback on the actions you take I enjoy many benefits being high raw including weight control, great mood, clear skin, shiny hair and nails, fast recovery from lifting weights and other exercise, and a deeper spiritual connection. My story is available in more detail on my websites.

[TheTimeisNow]

I have been raw vegan off-and-on for about two years and sticking to it a lot for the past couple of months. My system just seems to like raw foods, especially juices and vegetable soups, better than cooked things. I think our bodies know what we need, more than any doctor or health expert.

[Harald]

I had my first encounter with raw foodism in the late nineties, but it was only about three years ago that I gave it a real try myself. And to be honest: it was an absolute revelation. I didn't know how bad I had been feeling until I went [mostly] raw and felt how I SHOULD be feeling. It really is amazing. I'm about 75% raw now, and that works very, very well for me. Sometimes I go 100% for a short time period. I never go below 50% - I could never do that again with what I know now. A mostly raw diet makes me feel absolutely great, and gains in the gym have been a lot easier as well. And - personally - I now think eating a mostly COOKED diet - like I used to eat - is nuts.

[Mabel]

Originally Posted by Harald

I'm about 75% raw now, and that works very, very well for me. Sometimes I go 100% for a short time period. I never go below 50% - I could never do that again with what I know now. A mostly raw diet makes me feel absolutely great, and gains in the gym have been a lot easier as well. And - personally - I now think eating a mostly COOKED diet - like I used to eat - is nuts.

Wow Harald--your experiences and current attitude mirrors my own very closely. It is hard to deny the value of eating a high raw diet when achieving tangible results in how good you feel and your performance at the gym! Do you also find that you need less sleep than you did before going high raw?

[votoshka]

I eat about 80% raw, and have lots of that as smoothies because they're so easy to make AND consume! I wanted to go 100% raw, but I think for me right now, having a balance is best. Otherwise I get cravings when I smell everyone else's cooked food (if I lived on my own I think 100% raw would be much easier).

I do think eating raw is more natural. After all, humans are the only species that cook their food! Back when humans first developed we didn't cook... so not cooking seems a lot more normal than cooking!

[alenmcmilan]

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