Raw Till 4: Taking The High Road to More Raw
In the beginning, for a few short weeks, I dabbled with a Raw Till 4 kind of scenario. But, the dope that I was, Raw Till 4 just wasn’t good enough for me. I should have stayed there, where it was relatively easy and comfortable. But I had this idea to go whole hog: all day, all raw. It was like a shock to my system. I was hungry. Like some ravenous predator on the Discovery channel. I was bordering on dangerous. Honestly, I could have eaten my own arm. For sure, I did it all wrong. For people who are genuinely ill with diseases like rheumatoid arthritis. drastic measures…
The Raw Food Diet: What’s In a Name?
The raw food world does this really interesting thing to make the raw food diet appeal to the greater masses and the tentative novice: it gives everything names that evoke cooked food versions of itself. Exhibit A: Not Tuna Salad. Exhibit B: Rawmesan Cheese, Exhibit C… I could go through the alphabet. But I’ll stop myself. All these things sound more than vaguely familiar, right? But are they? I think not. Have you ever had raw pizza? I rest my case. Now, on some dimension, I understand this trickery. Because on the base level what we are all trying to do is fool ourselves into not feeling cheated out of…
In The Raw Kitchen: Gadgets and Knives
Embracing any kind of a raw food diet poses some new questions in the kitchen: is there anything special required to truly reap all the benefits that the raw food diet has to bestow? What does a raw kitchen need? This subject is near and dear to my heart because the ‘Raw Food Equipment’ class was the first I ever taught with my first Partner in Raw, Alisa. It was baptism by fire. My whole kitchen had been transformed into what I then dubbed ‘Alisa’s Chamber of Torture’. Everything looked impressive and imposing but mostly it just looked like ALOT! In this version of the Raw Kitchen there was not…
Digestion is A Bitch: Light to Heavy Eating
My father, who recently passed away at the ripe old age of 92, grew up in Germany. Over there they ate a hot meal in the afternoon and at night everyone had sandwiches – which, not for nothing, could be a pretty big deal as well, what with the endless array of cold cuts and fresh breads and potato salads. Dinner is called Abendbrot which, literally translated, means ‘evening bread’ and that pretty much says it all. I don’t think anyone ever thought about ease of digestion and I know for a fact that Alka Seltzer and Pepto Bismal were constants in my fathers medicine chest. As a kid, it…
Think and Grow Raw: Manifesting Health
I thought myself into raw. For me, it was my first big experiment in ‘manifesting’. I started identifying myself as raw long before I really was. You might think, “Wow, that was bold! What a fake!”. But let me tell you… it wasn’t really. I wanted it so badly. And I was ready for it. I figured that if I told people, it would encourage me to further solidify what I claimed to be – if only out of sheer pride and mortification of embarrassment. And it did, too. They say that you dress for the job you want, not the job you have. And if you can imagine something…
Enzymes? The Raw Vegan Booster
I don’t know about your mom but mine was always harping on me to eat my fruits and vegetables. Naturally, she didn’t have a clue about enzymes, but she was, definitely, on the right track. Adopting a diet that’s high in raw vegan foods supports digestive enzyme activity better than any other. Basically, it’s one of the great raw vegan claims to fame. And, undeniably, enzymes are necessary. We need them in the same way that Frankenstein’s monster needed that electrical charge. They give us life. Enzymes are micro-proteins, largely composed of amino acids. They trigger all chemical reactions that go on in our bodies. From digestion , metabolism, detoxification, brain…
Dairy Dangers: 6 Reasons to Say No to Milk
Dairy is a controversial subject these days. Of course, there are a lot of supposed experts who claim that dairy is important for everything – from strong bones, healthy teeth and athleticism to everything in between. And we’ve been bombarded for years with advertisements flaunting stars with milk mustaches. Lately, however, there’s disagreement brewing. Maybe dairy isn’t so great after all? I remember when this information started leaking out; my mom and dad couldn’t believe it. They had spent their entire lives being duped into believing that milk was, somehow, integral to development. Oddly both my sister and I stopped drinking milk immediately and naturally upon being weaned and could…
Finding Yoga and Other Adventures
When it comes to health, food and fitness form two sides of the same coin. We really do need both to keep our bodies and mind functional and vibrant. A vegan diet high in raw foods sets the stage for optimum health but combining it with exercise really kicks everything into high gear. It can be anything from yoga to kickboxing but the fact is that we all really need to get off our asses and do something! Being a country girl and living on a farm has forced me into the inevitability of physical activity. I’m always doing something: stacking hay or shoveling manure or planting a garden. But…
Food Combining : A Potent Combination
On the surface you would think that going raw or vegan would solve all dietary or weight woes. Like you could just go on your merry way eating anything, in any way, that wasn’t restricted by that diet. But it doesn’t necessarily work that way. And it’s most likely that any problems that do ensue, come from really bad food combining. Prominent doctors and nutritionists have studied the whole science of food combining. There are many charts out there reflecting their findings. The general consensus is that properly combining food, whether raw or vegan or vegetarian or omnivore, is essential to good health. This is due to the fact that digestive…
The Organic Raw Shopping Experience
Very early on my raw lifestyle timeline, I had myself convinced that I could go 100% raw. I was always trying to eat consciously. Looking at packaging and trying to avoid anything that contained ingredients that I couldn’t pronounce was second nature to me. What I fed my husband and children was carefully considered; even if they clamored for ‘Lucky Charms’, I would undoubtedly force muesli and organic fruit upon them. And it seemed like it would be simple for someone like myself to just go completely raw since I had – for the most part – always preferred fruits and vegetables anyway, albeit not exclusively. Avoiding the Bad Stuff…
