The Raw Secrets Click Here! The Most Complete Book On Living On An Optimal Raw Food Diet For Better Health.

by Frederic Patenaude

For many people, a diet high in raw foods is a real challenge. For most people, including myself, changing to what I call the "sunfood lifestyle" is not an overnight transformation, but rather a gradual process. I will show you how you can ease into this lifestyle, at a pace that is comfortable to you. I will also give you tips on how to cope with the difficulties you may encounter along the way.

First, understand that no matter the state of your health, you can benefit from eating more raw fruits and vegetables. Some people will feel that they are ready to eat all uncooked, vegan foods, while others will gradually work their way into a healthier lifestyle, by eating more and more of the good foods, and less and less of the cooked and processed foods. We often hear about percentages to determine the level of commitment one has to a raw-vegan lifestyle. Some say, "I’m 80% raw," or "I eat 100% raw," meaning that 80%, or 100%, of what they eat is uncooked and unprocessed. These percentages reflect how far a person has decided to go with the sunfood diet.

The first step to becoming a raw-vegan is obviously to eat more raw foods. Everyone should be eating at least 50 to 70% raw fruits and vegetables, no matter where they live, or what they do. Eating 50 to 70% raw fruits and vegetables is easier than you might think. As explained in the book Fit for Life, one should eat fruits, and/or juices in the morning. Because the body has been in an elimination period during the night, it is better not to stress the body with heavy food in the morning. So by eating healthy every morning, your body can continue the job of elimination that it was busy doing during the night.

It is good to start the day by drinking water. I suggest that everyone should drink at least 10-20 ounces (one large glass) of water with some fresh lemon juice every morning. This will hydrate your body, and help flush out the toxins that have been eliminated from the cells during the night. It may also help the body to eliminate. Make sure that the water you drink is pure. Either purified, distilled, or a good-quality bottled water. When possible, get your water in glass bottles. Glass is cleaner, and does not carry any of the toxic components that plastic does.

After you have your morning water, you may have some healthy beverages, such as fresh juice. Have only liquids within the first two to three hours after waking. This will give your body a rest, and leave your mind clear and fresh.

Later in the morning, you may have some fruit if you feel hungry. Do not limit yourself on the quantity of fruit that you need to eat in order to satisfy your hunger. Eat as much as you want. You may eat two or three apples if you want. Most people are used to eating one apple once in a while. However, if you are to make a meal out of fruit only, you can eat more than one piece. Your taste buds will tell you when you have had enough of any one food.

For lunch, have a salad, with avocado, or some nuts. If you are eating cooked food, have one variety, and eat it with a salad. Always eat raw vegetables every time you eat cooked food. Have the salad first, and then have whatever else you want. Have one type of cooked food, like a rice dish, or some bread, or a soup. If you feel satisfied with your salad meal, why eat something else that would be less than excellent? Get on with your day. If you do not feel like having anything cooked for lunch, but do not feel totally satisfied with your salad meal, have something heavier. You could bring guacamole, or other raw dips, and eat that with your salad. Or you may bring along a nut pâté, or simply some nuts and seeds to much on. Also, olives can be very satisfying as a lunch-time snack.

During the rest of the day, eat some fruit, or raw vegetables when you feel like munching on something. Try to reduce your consumption of hot beverages, such as tea or coffee. Instead, drink more water. You may also bring a mix of nuts, seeds, and dried fruits as a snack.

For dinner, when you are home, make yourself a living soup, and/or a salad. Experiment with some of the recipes in this book. You may accompany your meal with salad. If you feel like having an all raw meal, you could have guacamole, or nut pâté in a "burrito" form (inside a lettuce or cabbage leaf).

If you still eat cooked food, but eat fruit in the morning, and a salad with every meal, and have fruits and vegetables as snacks, you will be eating 50-70% raw, with almost no effort. Eating that way is both easy, and healthy. And you will enjoy it too. Prepare great dressings in advance, then bring them along with you to work. When you make something, make extra, then save some to bring with you to work. If you do not have time to prepare a meal in advance, then bring some fruits and raw vegetables, along with nuts and seeds. You can also bring an avocado with you, and eat it with a spoon, or add it to a salad at a restaurant. Many people bring their own salad dressings with them when they eat at restaurants.

Get in the habit of eating more raw fruits and vegetables. Eat lettuce and celery with everything. Bring carrot sticks with you in a plastic bag. Just get the raw food in. That is the first step. If you desire a beverage, make yourself a great juice in the morning. Apple-celery juice is a good choice. For dinner, start your meal with a green drink. Eat salad as a meal whenever possible. Experiment with fruits and vegetables you never tried. Go to the market and purchase exotic fruits. Buy a new unfamiliar fruit or vegetable every week. Experiment with the variety Nature offers. Get your taste buds back into shape. Once you start eating more fruits and vegetables, it will become what you mainly want to eat. By filling your body with good nutrition, you will feel much better, and your body will request more.

After introducing better foods into your diet, you can start eliminating all that is not healthy. The first type of food you want to avoid is processed food. Processed food is anything that comes in a can, or from a factory, and contains additives and preservatives. It is also all the junk food that is served at the popular snack bars. So become health conscious, and refuse to eat refined sugar, refined flour, table salt, and foods that contained additives and/or preservatives. Stop shopping at the supermarket, and start shopping at the health food store. Buy organic food, and avoid anything that has been refined or processed in a food factory. Purchase everything fresh.

Other foods to be avoided are animal products and cooked starches. Animal products include fish, fowl, beef, and chicken, as well as dairy products, such as milk, cheese, yogurt, and eggs. The consumption of animal products has been shown to be related to a variety of diseases, including cancer, heart disease, and diabetes. If you need a more in-depth explanation of what eating animals does to your health, and the planet, I suggest that you read the book "Diet for a New America," by John Robbins.

Many people in America are now becoming vegetarians for various reason, health being one of them. It is known that, on average, vegetarians live longer than meat eaters, and experience fewer organ diseases. A vegetarian diet can do a lot for you, when it is practiced correctly. Vegetarians are becoming more a part of the mainstreams society, and most restaurants now carry vegetarian options. Many people try to cut down on their meat intake, as they are learning about what a plant-based diet can do for them.

The downfall of the vegetarian diet is the high amount of cooked starches it often contains. Cooked starches includes cooked grains and legumes, as well as food items made from them, such as bread, pasta, cookies, and crackers. It also includes baked potatoes. Most vegetarians eat a lot of these foods, and, as a result, are not experiencing a high level of vitality. Many of the new diets in vogue these days, such as the Zone diet, promote fewer cooked starches (also called "carbohydrates"). Why? Because many people have found how eating cooked starches make you gain weight, and cause or aggravate many health conditions.

The trick to reducing, and eventually eliminating, the amount of starches you are eating is to eat starches no more than once or twice per day, and have only one type of starch at each meal. If you are to have bread at one meal, then have the bread, but not bread, and potatoes, and rice. Also, there are some cooked starches that are easier on the body than others. Cooked sweet potatoes, or yams, for example, are a better choice than white potatoes. Brown rice is better than white bread. Sprouted bread is better than regular bread. Wheat products tend to be the worst type of cooked starch for many people. Wheat is a common allergen, and many find great relief in eliminating wheat products from their diet.

The last category of foods to reduce are all the other cooked and processed foods. This includes all the cooked vegetables, stewed fruits, and other cooked items. We have already discussed the issue of refined foods, so I am not going to talk here about all the condiments (ketchup, mustard, etc.), canned foods, and refined foods that you already avoid, and know to be bad for you. So that just leaves us with anything else that has been heated or processed.

Few people go as far as to eliminate all cooked foods from their diet, and for many it would seem an impossible goal that they would never be able to achieve. Many people would view such a move as quite radical and extreme. Yet, thousands of people throughout the world every year are learning about the benefits of eating raw plant foods, and decide to let go of all cooked and processed foods. There is a point in your dietary progress where you will realize if you are ready to take this step. When this happens, just relax, let go, and embrace your new and fresh raw-vegan lifestyle. Nature will welcome you back into the world of pure and simple eating.

For other people, who are not ready to make such a move, or who feel it is not time for them, they can still benefit from increasing the amount of raw fruits and vegetables they are eating. They will still eat cooked foods, perhaps only on some occasions, but far less with every month that passes. For these people, we recommend cooked vegetables as the best choice of cooked food to eat. Starchless cooked vegetables, such as steamed kale, broccoli, spinach, zucchinis, celery, peppers, cauliflower, and other vegetables, are quite healthy in comparison to cooked starches. Cooked or baked sweet potatoes (yams) are a more healthful food to eat than baked white potatoes.

When eating cooked foods, always eat a salad or other raw foods. If you bake a sweet potato, mash it in a bowl with some avocado, olive oil, and other favorite seasoning. When eating steamed vegetables, top them with the salad dressings in this book. Or with any of the raw dips and raw sauces that you enjoy. Get the raw in with everything that you eat which is cooked.

Can I still drink coffee and tea?
Some people are in the habit of drinking coffee and tea, and want to know if they can still have these while following a raw-vegan diet. The first answer we can give is that, anything liquid is better than anything solid, as far as cooked food is concerned, and with few exceptions. Solid food has to be turned into a liquid for your body to absorb it. This can be a real challenge when your body has to deal with foods, such as bread and meat, which are quite heavy on the digestive organs. Something like tea, on the other hand, while not viewed as a "living" food, is nothing more than some herbal flavoring steeped into warm water. Yes, it is relatively harmless to drink an occasional warm beverage on a raw-vegan diet, but like everything, try not to nurture that addiction too much. Tea is better than coffee, which is higher in caffeine, a substance that has been proven to cause some health problems, especially when taken often in large quantities. Tea may also be made by not boiling the water, and, instead, placing tea bags in a large, glass container, and letting this sit in the sun for a few hours. This is "sun tea," and is a very nice raw beverage in the summer.

If you are used to drinking tea with sugar, try honey or maple syrup instead. Use almond milk or sesame cream instead of dairy cream. If drinking an occasional cup of tea or coffee is your only guilty pleasure, you are way ahead of most people.

Foods in the Winter
Another challenge that many people face when eating a raw-vegan diet is that of maintaining the lifestyle during the cold winters. Winter, for many of us, equals snow, cold, and a lesser variety of fruits and vegetables in the stores. Many people are used to drinking warm soups, and other hot foods, in the winter to stay warm, and feel that it would be hard for them to eat mainly raw foods during that time of the year.

First, it is good to know that eating hot foods will not necessarily make you warm. They will give you the illusion of being warm. Eating foods at room temperature will not necessarily make you feel cold, as long as you do not eat freezing foods, or fruits straight out of the fridge. The temperature of the food, in reality, has little effect on the ability of your body to produce internal heat. There are millions of animals living in the wilds of Earth, eating only raw foods during the cold winter, and every one of them can handle the cold better than any of our so-called civilized people. Would they be better off eating hot foods? I don’t think so.

Meanwhile, we are not living with the animals in the wilds, but in cities where things are quite different. Although our living conditions may be different than those of wild animals, our physiology is not. We are still bound by the same natural laws. As you improve your health with your diet, you should be able to withstand the cold much better, and will loose your desire for hot foods. It is possible that you might feel colder in the first months of your change of diet, as your body is adjusting and releasing toxins. But after a while, you will find that you can resist the cold much better.

I understand that warm foods, such as soup, may be comforting and enjoyable. If you would like to have a warm soup, here is a recipe that may help you:

Warm miso soup

2 cups water
2 Tbs. miso
Small pinch of sea salt
Drops of tabasco sauce, or pinch of cayenne pepper
1 garlic clove
1/2 cup of your favorite herb, such as cilantro, parsley, or dill. (Optional)
2 Tbs. olive oil

Blend at high speed for a few seconds, and then pour into a pot. Warm up to desired temperature. Add 2 Tbs. of olive oil, mix well, and enjoy.

You can also warm up all of the soup recipes in the book The Raw Secrets, if you feel you want to have something hot. You do not have to cook them, but just warm them up. It is much better to have something warm that is liquid, rather than a hot meal that is heavy. Liquid foods are always easier on the digestive organs.

Also, in order to go through the winter more easily on a raw-vegan diet, there are a few other things you may want to try. One of them is to get some sunshine. I know that sun is scarce in the winter, but it is possible to get some sun on your skin. Exposure to the sun is great for your immune system, and enables you to go through the winter with more facility. The lack of sunshine during the winter causes many people to feel depressed. Some people have named this condition the "winter blues." To avoid this, get some sun onto your skin regularly. You can stand naked behind a window when the sun shines through. Another way is to engage in outdoor activities. The sun tends to reflect greatly on the snow, and people often get sunburned while going skiing. You will benefit from even limited exposure to the sun. Try to get the sun on your face, your hands, and as much of your body as you can expose.

Exercise is also a great way to fight winter depression. There are many types of outdoor exercises that can be enjoyed during the winter, such as going for a brisk walk, or skiing. Don’t get lazy because it is cold…keep going with your exercise program, and if you do not have one, think about starting one. If you can take time to go outside and play only on the weekends, keep exercising indoors by engaging in cardiovascular and resistance training.

Also, when you eat a lot of fresh fruits and vegetables, you will go through the winter with ease. Dr. Kristine Nolfi, who wrote the book "Raw Food Treatment of Cancer," said that fruits and vegetables carry with them the sun energy. She said that when one eats a diet based on fruits and vegetables, they go through the winter without getting sick, and with much more ease and enjoyment. She was living in Denmark, where she had a successful retreat center treating people using raw fruits and vegetables. We should all listen to her advice, and understand how powerful these foods are for us. Many people eat a terrible diet during the winter, often eating food that Isaias totally devoid of life. Without the proper vitamins and nutrients, the immune system cannot function properly. Then these people get sick and wonder why. If they were to base their diet on fruits and vegetables, they would find that they would not get sick so often, even during the winter. They would go through that period with much more ease, and enjoyment.

By eating raw fruits and vegetables, exercising everyday, and getting some sunshine, you will go through the winter with ease, and may even find yourself looking forward to the next winter. You can view winter as a time of cold, isolation, and boredom, or as a time of excitement, fun, and magic. Remember, how much you enjoy life has a lot to do with your selected perspective.

Detoxification process
As you improve your diet, it is inevitable that you will go through a healing process. Just like the smoker who stops smoking and proceeds to experience headaches and other discomforts, after you start following a cleaner diet, you process through what we call "detoxification." On a conventional diet, toxins accumulate in the body faster than they can be eliminated. The body, not being able to cope with all this toxic assault, stores these toxins in various places, with the plan of being able to eliminate them later. When you improve your diet by eating less, and by eating lighter foods, there is more energy available to the body. Digestion takes a lot of energy, and when you are eating heavy foods, such as bread and meat, a lot of this energy that your body has at its disposal is used to digest these heavy foods. When you eat a diet based on raw fruits and vegetables, you are freeing much of that burden, since these foods are easy to digest, and also due to the fact that you are bringing less toxins into the body. Fruits and vegetables, when eaten raw, contain much fewer toxins than cooked and process foods. They also contain plenty of vitamins, minerals, and other nutritional components that your body may use to heal and maintain itself.

Someone said, "You have to feel worse before you can feel better!" This is often true. We cannot expect to eat junk food for decades, and suddenly stop all of that, then instantly feel better. Our bodies, when given the chance to heal and detoxify, will use that opportunity to get all of the garbage out.

To learn more about the process of detoxification, you should read David Wolfe’s book, "The Sunfood Diet Success System," which goes into great details on how to deal with conditions that may be experienced while the body is eliminating toxins. After you have improved your diet, remember to go easy on yourself. If you feel low one day, rest more and do something you enjoy. Keep your smile, and know that these discomforts are only temporary, and soon you will feel much better. Also, by spending more time outside and exercising, you will hasten the process of detoxification.

Dealing with friends and family
When confronted with friends and family, a good attitude to have is that of someone who is not trying to convert everyone around them to their a lifestyle. Confronting someone about their diet is taboo, this is because people do not like to be told that what they are eating is not healthy. They certainly do not want to be told what to eat. So do not try to convince anyone. Simply go on with your life. People who are interested in what you are doing will come to you. Then you can give them a book, and answer their questions. But, unless someone comes to you for guidance, there is no reason to try to convince anyone.

You do not have to talk about your diet. You do not have to tell anyone what you are doing. When you are invited somewhere, bring along your own food, and eat whatever healthy option they have for you. If they ask a questions, just say that you are on a special diet.

Remember, the idea here is to avoid confrontation. Do not engage in conversations about diet and food every time you visit friends and family. If you are in a more relaxed situation, with people who are open and understanding, you may then share some of your experience. If you are not totally sure about the factual aspect of the vegetarian diet, just talk about your experience of it. Talk about the benefits, without expecting them to believe every word.

In any case, do not fall into the fanaticism that prevails with people following a particular diet. As you cannot be entirely sure that what you are doing is 100% right, there is no way you can know what is right for someone else. Don’t think you have all the answers. Don’t even think that your diet is "better." Simply follow what you think is best for your health, and if it doesn’t seem to work for you then try something else. Everyone is different so there is no way of eating that can work for everyone.

I have assumed in this chapter that you are already aware of unhealthful, but common, substances, such as alcohol, tobacco, drugs, caffeine, and other obvious health-sapper . I have not discussed these topics, this because I feel you are probably aware of this issue.

Your health is your most valuable asset, and you should care for it as well as you can. Your body is like the best instrument or vehicle, and the only one you can afford. So invest in the best fuel to put in it, and treat it like you would treat your most valuable possession. See your body as a temple, and with every mouthful of food that you put in it, see it as what you choose to bring to your temple.

Quick Trim Click Here! 14 Day Fat Loss Cybergenics Diet Program

Click Here For Free Diet, Health and Fitness Tips
Full of useful information, exercise tips, diet tips and inspiration for us all,
also you will be automatically entered in our monthly drawing to
win Free Supplements and other great prizes.
Stay informed, stay motivated, win free stuff, join today!

Sign up free by sending an e-mail to
fitnesstips@trulyhuge.com

[Home] [Articles] [Cuisine] [Recipes] [Resources] [Links]

© 2007 SunFood.net