Many people will have heard of the Raw Food movement but could you explain it? Because it turns familiar cooking on its head few people really understand the philosophy of the . Why would anyone want to eat uncooked food?
Enid Taylor, who is the founder of Taymount Lifestyle Clinic, sent us an article explaining just why. So, what is the Raw Food Diet? Is it just another fad or is there more to it than that? Read on…
When I first told my sister I was eating a 100% raw diet, she pulled a face of disgust. “How do you eat things like chicken raw?” She asked. Hmm, even I pulled a face at that thought!
We have strayed so far from what human beings were biologically designed to eat, that we fail to see the natural attraction of eating the right way. We try and drag our current “normal” ideas of eating into the raw framework and it doesn’t fit.
No animal is born with a frying pan or barbecue! You don’t see a gorilla with a griller! We are the only species on the planet who cooks its food. No animal in the wild suffers from the degenerative diseases that we do. Our domestic pets get as sick as we do and we feed them cooked foodsi. Kind of proves a point really?
Natural, fresh, living foods have enzymes in them which are active biological elements that make living changes (growth and function) possible. Once food is heated above 40°C all those enzymes die and the food becomes inert (dead). Eating cooked, inert foods attracts the attention of our immune system and our digestive tract is flooded with white blood cells (the soldiers of our immunity army) – a reaction called “digestive leukocytosis”. This means that the body has reacted to the cooked foods as if they are invading foreign bodies. This would also explain why so many conditions of the bowel are immunity related – like IBS, Crohn’s and food sensitivities and allergies.
This has very serious implications for cancer prevention; we all have the potential to manufacture cancer cells each and every time any one of our billions of cells divides and recreates itself – a process taking place continuously in our bodies, every moment we are alive. Sometimes the cell replication process makes a mistake and a mutant cell is born. This cell would then replicate itself and produce a tumour if it was not recognised early on by the immunity army and eaten up – Pacman-like – by the white blood cells (a process called phagocytosis).
If our immunity army is fully occupied with taking out the rubbish from the digestive system, then we are left defenceless against these life-threatening cellular mistakes. This is how cancer starts. Fill the body with dead, immune-system provoking processed “foods” and you are asking far too much from your immune system to keep you safe.
So when we eat fresh, living organic foods, we are allowing all of our systems to function the way they were designed to and we are not putting heavy work loads on the immunity and detoxification systems. It gives the body the nutrition it needs without the hard work. This means that changing to a raw, living foods diet can have far-reaching effects on your body, your health and your energy levels.
Among the rapidly growing range of books written by devotees of a raw and living foods diet, there are many stories and case histories of remarkable recoveries from serious and life-threatening diseases and conditions. Certainly when you start eating a high percentage raw diet, you can expect many niggling and unpleasant chronic conditions to disappear, such as constipation, IBS, eczema, asthma, acne, to name just a few. More serious illnesses like diabetes and even cancer have been successfully treated with a 100% diet in many documented cases. You will age more slowly. Skin glows, eyes sparkle and there is a zest and passion for life that cannot be bought in a tin.
The Hippocrates Health Institute in Floridaii is just one of several health clinics where you can go and learn how to incorporate fresh, living foods into your daily life and these establishments are regularly curing cancer and other terminal illnesses with such an approach.
Cleanliness inside is just part of the picture, we also need to stop using chemical preparations in our cosmetics and toiletries as the body absorbs nearly everything that is placed on the skin. This was not realised when some of the formulations for toiletries were established decades ago. Now that we are aware of the skin as a transport mechanism for substances like nicotine and hormones, it makes sense to avoid putting poisonous chemicals on our hair and skin if we want to be healthy.
An excellent example of the remarkable healing effects of raw food eating can be found in Victoria Boutenko’s booksiii: 12 Steps to Raw Food, or Raw Family. She has recently published books on Green Smoothies which are the staple of a healthy fresh diet and can bring marvellous health benefits just by adding them to your existing diet. She describes how we are 99.4% identical in DNA to chimpanzees and they eat 55% green leaves, 45% fruit and 10% seeds, pith, bark and a few incidental insects (more by mistake than on purpose!).
Fresh, organic produce comes complete with natural soil-based micro-organisms which help to strengthen our bowel flora and natural immunity. So if we eat the same proportion of greens, fruits and nuts/seeds as chimpanzees, we will be as healthy and energetic as our Darwinian cousins!
So get real, get raw, get healthy! Start eating the way your body was meant to be fed – eat like a chimpanzee (but don’t start swinging from the trees on the way to work!).
References and Further Reading:
the problem with this is that humans are NOT chimps, our digestive tract is not the same as theirs.
Furthermore, many chimps actually eat insects on purpose, and some actively hunt and kill other animals including fellow chimps for food.
Humans cannot digest cellulose so a diet composed primarly of raw fruit and veg is difficult for the digestive system, and doesn’t yield much energy.
eating foods raw is a brilliant concept but it should not be vegan. The eskimos eat a diet that is primarly raw fish (no plant foods) and are free of disease, they are extremely strong and healthy.
Nowhere on the earth has there ever been a vegan human society, or even vegetarian until very recently.
look into the weston price foundation, read good calories bad calories by gary taubes, learn about the paleolithic diet.
I’ve seen raw vegans succumb to disease and illness, and become weak/malnourished, and I think it’s very important that people are more educated so they don’t go down a dangerous path
That was very informative article about raw. I’ve read that it has lots of vitamins and minerals, good for our body, but I am just concerned with bacteria, which can be bad for our system and can lead to some illness.
We may not be chimps, but is that who we really wish to emulate, or would we rather evolve? I don’t really care how people ate thousands of years ago; I don’t really care how chimps eat, I am interested in having the most healthy life possible so that i can be all that I can be. We make new advances and discoveries all the time – why not in health and nutrition too? Being ‘raw’ is more viable than it has been in many many years; exciting equipment, new products, an internet crammed with information, abundant food in the shops…..it’s hard to go wrong.
One only has to look at the internet and youtube videos to see the transformations that people have gone through – they are truly amazing.
I have been researching the raw food diet for most of this year and currently eat 2 meals out of 3 raw, as this is the best way to transition. I am feeling the benefits after only 1 month; weight loss, shining eyes, clear skin, comments about how well i look. (I usually ate the typical ‘wholefood’ vegetarian diet and have been sick and fatigued for the last 5 years)
It’s fascinating that when you change your diet for the better, all your friends (and blog commenters) suddenly get concerned about your protein and vitamin intake when they never gave a stuff when you quietly ate toast for breakfast and sandwhiches for lunch. Now I eat loads of greens, fruit, nuts, raw ice cream, avocados – and people are worried about my health! Hilarious!
People dont like change and don’t want to give up familiar comforts, those of us who have had serious health issues have no choice if we are to have any control.
Ignore the critics; try it, see what happens, then you can speak from experience. Don’t dismiss it beforehand.
Thankfully there are pleanty more positive people out there.
Up until very recently humans had little choice over food supply. They just ate what was available in order to survive. We are very fortunate in our society… ..we can choose.
I believe there is enough evidence out there to validate both vegan and raw food vegan diets. For every anecdotal scare story of people wasting away through lack of animal flesh there are others that will testify to fantastic vitality.
For myself the choice to show compassion to other sentient beings and not be responsible for creatures undergoing the horrors of the slaughterhouse is the primary reason for being vegan.
I fully support the comments about us not being chimps (well most of us!) and I agree that we are different. I just make the point that chimps eat what chimps are naturally supposed to eat but we don’t. Our diet should be more like theirs – perhaps with a 0.6% variation? I also believe that we should eat some animal products, I am not saying we should be vegan. Raw eggs, unpasteurised milk made into kefir and yogurt and some raw fish would be ideal. Good quality meat can be eaten raw (steak tartare) and is much more digestible than cooked meat. A lot of the raw food proponents are now considering that we should not be vegan as we need some B12 from natural sources, animal foods being the best one. We just do not need cooked animal proteins. Think how easy it is to wash off raw egg white, then remember how hard it is to wash that pan that you cooked the eggs in. Once protein has coagulated, it is harder for the body to digest.
Let’s think outside the box, let’s not spend time pedantically dissecting analogies, think about the digestive leukocytosis and what it is trying to indicate to us. Raw does not mean vegan, it means everything uncooked, with a strong bias towards plant-based foods as a base. Read about a non-vegan raw foodie in: Eating in the Raw by Carol Alt.