Why go Raw?

I went on a little dinner date with two of my besties last night to LIVE, a super cute and fantastic ‘organic food bar’ in Toronto. Live specializes in inventive raw food dishes, although they do offer cooked cuisine as well. Everything is organic, vegan, and they cater to gluten free and nut free diets as well.

I’ve been interested in the raw food lifestyle for a while. I’ve read a lot here and there about the other benefits of keeping food fresh and uncooked, but while we were feasting yesterday I realized that I couldn’t fully put into words/explain what was so attractive about this way of eating to me. And that’s silly! Why do something when you can’t explain why?

So although I won’t (yet, at least) commit myself to a wholly raw-food diet, I DO want to keep up what has been my recent phase of health/food related challenges and the next one on my list is “GO RAW” one day a week. And because any change in diet is faced with inevitable questions, here I attempt to answer:

why go raw???

The Science of Digestion.

Our friends in white lab coats have proven that when you heat food above 46.6 degrees Celsius (that’s 116 Fahrenheit) that the enzymes in food that help aid our digestion start to die. Why is that a bad thing? Well, our digestive organs have to work harder , maybe causing them to (eventually) not function as well as they could. As well, when everything is digested easily, everything flows through you smoothly, leaving you with a light feeling and the type of BM’s that have you bragging to your friends (or is that just what my friends are like?)

Reduce free-radicals (our worst enemy!)

When food is cooked, it also produces free radicals…wee little molecules that have been directly linked to cancer. (sidebar – this is why you should never heat up oil to the point where it is smoking...this is suuuper bad for you.)

Supports local agriculture.

For me, my move towards more raw foods goes hand in hand with my move towards purchasing local, organic, sustainable produce. Less distance from the farm to my plate means supporting my local farmer and economy, and fresher more delicious food!

More Energy

When your body doesn’t have to concentrate all its efforts on digestion, the energy you get from your delicious raw food can be used for something else! Cooked and processed foods take up so much energy to digest as your system does its best to figure out what the heck you have bombarded it with and how best to get rid of it.

You don’t have to be a vegan, a hippie, an extremist, a person with an eating disorder, or a rabbit to recognize the benefits of incorporating more raw foods into your diet. Try having one totally raw meal a week, or check out a raw food restaurant in your area. It doesn’t have to be all salads (even though they are a big and delicious part of the raw food diet.)

In an ideal world (or at least MY ideal world), we would all be eating foods that are local and organic. Because I live in a country that experiences drastic seasons, its going to be much harder to eat raw in the winter (raw turnip? Hmm) than the summer. Try eating 25% raw in the winter, 50% in the spring, and 75% in the summer.

If you’re still not sold on the nutritional benefits of a raw food diet, I’d urge you to check out this trailer for Raw for Thirty:

http://www.rawfor30days.com/trailer.html