Vegetarianism Vs. Raw Foodism - What's the Difference?

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Is there a difference between vegetarian and raw food diets? A raw foodist is a vegetarian, but one who generally is not going to cook his vegetables or fruits. A vegetarian is someone who simply doesn’t eat meat, fish or poultry, but only consumes vegetables, pasta, and rice. A vegetarian might eat meatless spaghetti sauce or order onion rings in a restaurant. (Not the healthiest choice, but sometimes it’s hard to find something to eat in a restaurant if you’re vegetarian – even harder if you’re a raw foodist.)

There are different categories of vegetarians, like vegans, or fruitarians, and raw foodist is a category of vegetarianism. We haven’t seen anything about sushi being considered a raw food, but it is. Raw food, though, generally means eating raw, uncooked fruits, vegetables, dried fruits, seaweeds, etc.

But to be a raw food purist means raw broccoli, not steamed. To a vegetarian, someone committed to not eat meat or fish or animal products, steamed vegetables are just as good, although everyone would agree that steaming can take out nutrients from foods, rendering them less nutritious. A vegetarian might consume dairy or egg products; however a vegan will not consume any animal products at all. And a raw foodist is a vegan who consumes only uncooked, unprocessed raw foods.

Proponents of the raw diet believe that enzymes are the life force of a food and that every food contains its own perfect mix. These enzymes help us digest foods completely, without relying on our body to produce its own cocktail of digestive enzymes.

It is also thought that the cooking process destroys vitamins and minerals and that cooked foods not only take longer to digest, but they also allow partially digested fats, proteins and carbohydrates to clog up our gut and arteries.

Followers of a raw diet cite numerous health benefits, including:

• increased energy levels
• improved appearance of skin
• improved digestion
• weight loss
• reduced risk of heart disease

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Raw Food, Water and Your Skin

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Starting from the inside out is the best way to get healthy, glowing skin, and one of the first steps you take should be eliminating caffeine in the form of coffee and soda. Caffeine dehydrates the body, and it shows in the skin - a lack of moisture is a sure way to create lines and wrinkles. Caffeine functions as a diuretic, causing increased urine output, and so depletes your body and skin of the moisture it needs. We try to combat this with moisturizers, lotions and creams, but the better way is to put the moisture INTO your body, instead of on it.

Drinking pure water, unprocessed fruit juices and coconut milk will give your body and skin the hydration it needs. The colors in fruit juices are the colors of the earth and these colors will reflect themselves in warm and healthy skin tones.

The overall effects of caffeine on your body will manifest themselves in your skin. Heavy caffeine drinkers can experience osteoporosis, headaches, depression, sleeplessness. These can all be reflected in your skin.

When you replace colas, coffee and teas made with boiling water with water, fruit juices, herbal teas and coconut milk, you’ll soon start to feel better and sleep better. The health and vitality of your organs and cells will be reflected in the glow of your healthy skin as soon as you kick the caffeine habit.

Another reason for drinking lots of pure water is because it helps your body with detoxification. When the body rids itself of toxins, it passes not only through urination, but also through the skin which is the largest elimination organ. Raw food increases your detoxification rate. Drinking water helps the body rid itself of toxins.

To achieve a healthy complexion, drink plenty of water and eat plenty of raw food. What goes into your body will be reflected in your overall appearance.

Food Dehydrators for a Raw Food Diet

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Making dried fruit and fruit leathers isn’t hard and it doesn’t have to be expensive either. While some food processors and juicers can get really pricey, a dehydrator isn’t going to cost that much and it’s a lifesaver to have fruit leathers, dried fruit or fruit jerky on hand when you can’t get out to the store for fresh food.

When buying a dehydrator, some things to consider are the materials and construction used to manufacture the product, the size, heating elements, fans and guarantees. Make sure you have room for the dehydrator in the space you have planned for it. Look for one that’s multi-purpose, with multiple trays and special trays for fruits and herbs. A side-mounted or horizontal fan is best when choosing a food dehydrator.

Here are some food dehydrators to consider. But do a little research to find just the right one for you!

If you're looking for an 'entry level' type of dehydrator, you can't go wrong with the Nesco American Harvest – an inexpensive food dehydrator with five trays that don’t have to be rotated. Priced approximately $55-65

Or if you're serious and ready to invest a bit more, the Excalibur Dehydrator has over 12 square feet of drying space. Comes with 9 polycarbonate trays and has a horizontal fan for maximum drying efficiency. Fast drying times, no tray rotation needed and fast cleanup. Price approximately $200-$220.

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Dehydrating Fruits for a Raw Food Diet

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One of the problems facing anyone trying to eat healthier, especially for someone trying to move towards eating more raw foods is the convenience factor. Raw and natural foods are so much healthier for you, but it’s not as if there are drive-through raw foods restaurants on every street corner in the country.

And of course, there’s no such thing as a raw foods snack machine, is there? So if you get hungry during the day, you’re going to have a challenge of finding something appropriate to eat if you haven’t packed any raw fruits and vegetables. And when you’re rushing around in the morning, sometimes it’s next to impossible to find the time to put together a selection of healthy snacks to take with you.

One thing to try so that you have healthy snacks available quickly is to dehydrate your fruits or make fruit leathers. Those fruit roll-ups you see in the grocery store are derived from a pretty good idea – fruit leathers. But it’s better to make your own – commercial fruit leathers are going to be loaded with preservatives and sugars – just the things you want to avoid. In the picture, you can see fruit leather being made in a dehydrator.

When you’re switching to a raw foods diet, that doesn’t always have to mean fresh off the farm. It means not cooking foods with processes that strip all the essential vitamins, amino acids and enzymes from them. Drying fruit is a great way to add variety to your diet and make yourself tasty snacks of dried fruit or fruit leathers. It’s not hard to do. There are recipes and inexpensive food dehydrators on the Web. These are also great snacks to pack for your kids’ lunches!

You get all the benefit of the raw fruit, just packaged and preserved in a healthy, nutritious way!

Helping the Digestive system

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Even if we are not sick and look healthy, we may not be getting enough adequate nutrition. We can improve our state of health by simply knowing what nutrition we need. Nutrition is, after all, what food is all about - the amount we need, its function, and the basic materials we need for our body in order for it to continue on with its daily activities. By knowing how to take care of our body through nutrition, we can better maintain its high performance levels.

Eating raw foods helps our bodies with nutrition in so many ways, but the digestive system is one of the body processes that benefits the most. The extra fiber and moisture in raw fruits and vegetables helps keep the digestive system functioning regularly and actually keeps the system cleaner. Cooked foods - especially meats - are much harder for our bodies to digest. Eating healthy, living, raw foods can help to prevent certain cancers, most notably cancers of the colon and intestines.

Eating large meals, high in fats and proteins, often makes us feel sluggish afterwards - because the body is working so hard to digest these foods, it sends a large part of the body's oxygen to the digestive system. Eating lighter meals, full of raw food that is easy to digest helps us maintain our energy through out the day. It is believed that about three hours between meals is an appropriate interval for maintaining energy and facilitating digestion.

Detoxifying your Body - A Neccessary Step

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The process of detoxifying our bodies results in the purging of harmful environmental and chemical poisons. The buildup of these toxins can overwhelm the body’s capacity to detoxify and may lead to such problems as hormonal imbalances, nutritional deficiencies, inefficient metabolism, and digestive and respiratory disorders. Switching to a raw food diet will help to clean and detoxify your body, which many find can result in improved energy levels, mental capacity, skin tone and clarity, digestion, metabolism, and breathing while decreasing joint pain, body aches and headaches, constipation, anxiety, irritability, and aiding in weight loss.

Though the end results of detoxification are very beneficial, the actual process of detoxifying can be difficult. Headaches, nausea, and diarrhea can result as toxins exit your body. It’s important to keep in mind that, even though you’re doing a good thing for your body by detoxifying it, you may even develop a cold or flu-like symptoms as your body works to purge the germs and poisons from the cells. Skin breakouts, anxiety, irritability and lethargy can also occur.

The healthier a person is when beginning the detoxification program, the less severe these symptoms will be. If the body has a great deal to purge, the process will be harder on the body. If the process is a huge change from the previous lifestyle, these side effects might be more pronounced.

Don’t interrupt the detoxification process by taking any type of drug to relieve these symptoms. They are a natural side effect of the process. Try instead to get some rest and focus on the end result. Try treating yourself extra special during this time. Sit down and enjoy a good book, meditate, or even write in your journal about your detoxification experiences. Remember that what you're going through is a natural occurrence, and concentrate on how wonderful and healthy you'll feel when the process is complete.

Tips On Switching to Raw Food

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Understanding that it's difficult for many people to transform their diet completely, you do not have to go 100% raw. If you can incorporate natural alternatives to the foods you were eating (such as organic raw peanut butter and not regular peter pan), purchase all organic foods, incorporate plenty of fresh fruits and veggies and only drink water, you'll be making a dramatic change to your life and health, even if you aren't eating an all raw diet.

Changing over to 100% raw foods right away can be hard for some people due to their personal preferences, and also when it's necessary to compromise with other family members. And remember, when you change to a raw diet, your body will begin to detox within a few days. Making a slower, more gradual change can be a wise decision, so you don't through detox so hard at the beginning.

One method is to use six days on, one day off, which seems to work well by letting your body become used to the the choices you're offering. With time, the body starts to crave the healthier foods when given a choice. Contrasts between food types and their tastes will be noted, and you'll begin wanting more of the raw food choices as you feel the difference in how you feel.

Another option is too eat all raw food during the day, and then have some cooked foods in the evenings. This is a good way for people who still want to eat some meat products - a very small portion of lean turkey or fish in the evening can help prevent cravings at other times.

Keep in mind that you do not have to incorporate a full 100% raw food diet forever! As long as you maintain at least 75% of your diet raw, you'll see huge improvements in your health and well-being. Just eating more fruits and veggies alone will change your health drastically.

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Raw Food Dessert - Sorbet!

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Sorbet is probably the one dessert that is both good for you and incredibly delicious. If you aren't familiar with sorbet, it's a frozen dessert made from iced fruit puree, sometimes with other ingredients added. Sorbet should not be confused with sherbet, which is made with fruit and milk. Sorbet is more similar to gelato in that it has no milk in it - so it's a great choice for vegans or anyone who is lactose intolerant or with dairy allergies. Some sorbets contain alcohol to lower the freezing temperature; that makes it have a slightly softer texture. It is a very dense and flavorful dessert, matching ice cream for quality and taste.

Sorbet folklore claims that the Roman Emperor, Nero, invented it during the first century AD. The story said Nero had runners along the Appian way, passing buckets of snow to the mountains to his banquet hall, where it was mixed with honey and wine. However, the Chinese are also known to have been serving a food made from snow and fruit juices and pulps for thousands of years.

While the truth of it's origins may never be known, there's no doubt that mixture of ice and fruit is absolutely delicious and is known in nearly every corner of the world now. Depending on the fruit used, it's an excellent source of vitamins, naturally fat free and low in calories. Villa Dolce Gelato makes a great sorbet base that you can buy online, and use to produce your own sorbet at home. There's also a delicious recipe for homemade sorbet at Joy of Baking.com. So, buy or make your own sorbet now, and enjoy a delicious, raw fruit dessert!

No More Canned Foods!

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When you buy canned fruits and vegetables, you're getting lower quality food that lacks in nutrition and is usually loaded with salt and preservatives. On a scale of healthiness and freshness, fresh fruits and vegetables are best, followed by frozen foods and then canned. Last on the list, canned items are slowly becoming a thing of the past.

When foods are canned, they go through a cooking process that destroys up to a full half of the vitamins A, C, riboflavin and thiamin. And sitting on shelves in storage, the deterioration continues with the foods losing an additional 5% to 20% of these vitamins. The remaining vitamins only decrease their values slightly.

The thing to remember is that everything depends on the time between the harvesting and the canning and freeing process. Generally, the vegetables are picked immediately and taken to canning or freezing divisions when their nutrient contact is at its peak. How the food is canned affects the nutrient value also. Vegetables boiled for longer than necessary and in large amounts of water lose much of their nutritional value as compared to those only lightly steamed.

Another real concern with canned foods is the presence of Bisphenol A - a chemical used in plastics and also a part of the lining of virtually all food and beverage cans. While originally determined safe for humans in small amounts, recent studies have found that people are absorbing much higher amounts than previously thought. This can have dangerous effects on developing fetuses, small children (especially those who use plastic bottles and sippy cups), and in general can have possible effects on obesity, the thyroid and reproductive organs. The US National Institute of Health has expressed concerns about neurological effects, also. In general, it's just another reason for canned foods to be avoided.

When we pick fresh vegetables or fruit at the farm, they are always more nutritious than canned or frozen – this is a fact. If you cannot buy fresh, at least buy frozen.

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Is the Raw Food Diet just another Fad?

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I've had some people write me saying that by encouraging raw food diet meal plans, I'm just pushing another 'fad diet'. I completely disagree. Eating raw fruits and vegetables isn’t the "new South Beach Diet" - it's not a fad diet at all. Believe it or not, humans have been eating this way since LONG before we were eating processed junky foods. We didn’t have access to most many foods, and we were scavengers, picking fruits and eating vegetables. Nuts were also eaten for protein. It was either that or starve. Humans ate these fruits as is, no additives, no cooking. One and a half million years ago we learned how to cook. So for a half million years we ate the food raw, as it was intended.

Today, things are different. We have access to every type of food we might want, right at our fingertips. We can order Oolong tea (which must be handpicked on cliffs in china) from the internet. You would think that since we have come this far, we would be super human, so healthy we would be living 500 years. Unfortunately, it hasn't worked out that way. In fact, in some ways we actually have worse health now. Some of us are developing cancers at an early age. Some of us are dying of heart disease or obesity. We are not eating correctly. We are stuffing our faces with hydrogenated oils, fake products, high sodium and sugary foods, and gaining weight at an alarming rate. It shows in bad skin, rolls of fat, and sluggish attitude.

What people need to realize is that eating fat free or sugar free foods isn’t going to help. It really isn't any better for you to stuff yourself with SnackWells instead of Oreo’s. What will help is to completely change what you eat. Remember, you are what you eat, so eat the right things and it will show in your body, mind and spirit.

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Raw Food and Water

When you make a switch to a raw food diet, you might start to notice you don't feel as thirsty as usual. One reason this might happen is that raw fruits and vegetables have a high volume of water, so your body receives more hydration from the food itself.

However, that doesn’t mean you should stop drinking water or juices. First of all, you should always listen to your body, because it will tell you what you need. If you’re overweight, sluggish, tired, depressed, your body may be telling you to make some dietary changes, and raw foods might be one way to alleviate some physical disorders.

But if you’re overweight and have symptoms of Type II diabetes, overwhelming thirst can be one symptom. When you start consuming more raw foods, with a higher fiber and moisture content, you may start to lose weight, and that can go a long way to reducing your blood sugars.

If you’re not overweight, or don’t have Type II diabetes, you still might find you’re not as thirsty as you normally are. First of all, if you’re drinking water and juices, you’re not consuming caffeine, which is so dehydrating and makes you thirstier. And by not consuming as much in the way of cooked foods or especially highly processed foods, which have astronomical sodium counts, you won’t be as thirsty either.

By consuming more raw, uncooked food, and pure water and fruit juices, you’re putting your body into balance. Keeping sodium to normal levels found in foods means you’ll start to require a more balanced amount of water. Don’t think of this as changing or taking away. Think of it as adding balance, and it will make the process of eating healthier much easier.

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Raw Food And Healthy Skin

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Did you know that your skin is actually the largest organ in your body? Its job is to provide a protective covering for all the other organs of the body. It changes to regulate your internal body temperature, and is an excellent indicator of your overall health and well-being.

There are people who spend thousands of dollars on lotions, creams and other skin preparations in an effort to make their skin look young, vibrant and glowing. But if we took just a fraction of the money we spend on all these topical preparations and used it to buy raw foods for our diet instead, we’d begin to see an immediate change in the texture of our skin.

When you eat raw foods, you put more of the essential vitamins and amino acids your body needs into it. You’re also adding moisture – naturally. Raw foods have a much higher water content than cooked foods, simply because the heat cooks out so much of the moisture.

Also, if you're eating a lot of cooked and processed foods, you're putting toxins into your body. When you switch to a raw food diet, you'll find that your hair and skin will clear up quickly as your body detoxifies.

Your skin is a mirror of what’s going on in the rest of your body. And when your organs and blood are fed the nutrition they need to function properly, that shows in your skin. Get your vitamins and moisture from foods like apples and carrots. When you do, then phrases like “inner beauty” and “inner glow” will be applied to YOU. Your skin is what’s presented to the rest of the world and healthy, glowing skin makes the best first impression. When your body and skin are getting their essential nutrition with raw, uncooked foods, you’ll look and feel your best, NATURALLY

How To Start a Raw Food Diet

Getting started on a raw food diet is not all that difficult but does require some attention to your body and to the foods you will be buying and preparing. For some people there really isn’t much preparation involved, while for others there is more. Preparation will basically be a matter of taste and choice.

There are some things you should know about before you switch to a raw food diet. First and foremost, you should talk to your doctor or nutritional advisor for guidance. Switching to a raw food diet will cause your body will go through changes initially and some of those changes could impact your overall health.

A raw diet consists of 75% or more raw foods. But to switch over from a cooked diet to an uncooked diet from one day to the next can actually shock your body, especially your digestive system. For years you have consumed cooked foods and your body has become accustomed to processing those types of foods. As a general rule of thumb for beginners, you should start out gradually, maybe eating only one raw meal a day, and then slowly work your way toward eating raw at each meal.

One very important thing to note is that a raw food diet has a detoxifying effect on the body. Eating raw foods will actually cleanse the body of toxins and your digestion will improve. However, there are some possible side effects as your body adapts to this new raw food diet. You could experience headaches and nausea, as well as a mild depression.  Have no fear as these are only symptoms of your body making adjustments. If these symptoms persist over a long period of time you should decrease the amount of raw food you are consuming and talk to your doctor or nutritionist.

An important part of raw food dieting is to plan your meals. This especially important in the beginning because your body will be craving certain foods as you change your dieting habits. Sugar and salts are a good example of such cravings because our body doesn’t make these on its own but needs them. Many raw fruits and vegetables have natural salts and sugars in them. The point is to monitor your bodily changes and adjust your dieting plan according to your body’s needs.

If you find it difficult to accommodate your body’s needs with the raw foods in your diet plan you might want to consider adding dietary supplements to your diet. Aloe vera gel is a good example of a dietary supplement. However, there are many more supplements available at your local health food store. It is important for you, as you create your raw diet plan, to research raw dieting options. The purpose behind a raw diet is to improve your health, not make it worse.     

Another important point about raw food diets is not to mix it with a cooked diet. This doesn’t mean you can’t eat cooked foods while on this diet. But it does mean that, during a meal, you don’t want to mix them. The reason for this is that cooked foods, when mixed with a raw diet, will neutralize many of enzymes and nutrients in the raw food, basically defeating the whole purpose of being on a raw diet. Also, mixing these two types of diets can actually make your digestive system work harder, again defeating the purpose of the raw food diet.

As you get further along in your raw food diet don’t be afraid to try eating your raw foods in different ways. Some people on raw food diets prefer eating their foods in their natural state and don’t cut or blend. On the other hand, there are some who slice, dice, chop, and even blend their raw foods. It’s all pretty much a matter of personal preference, as neither way diminishes they nutritional value of the food.  There are many raw food diet books with information and recipes to help you make the switch.  Visit RawFood4Life.info for more information.

Why Should I Eat Raw Food?

Now don’t go getting all squeamish on me. We’re not talking about eating raw meat here. The raw food diet is a largely vegan diet. There is also some room for maneuver in the raw food diet too as the people who support it say that to get the maximum health benefits from the raw food diet you only have to make sure that approximately 75-80% of what you eat needs to be raw.

People who support the raw food diet as a healthy lifestyle argue that foods in their natural state contain the optimum balance of enzymes, vitamins and minerals that we need. They argue that the enzymes contained in raw food - which are killed off by cooking -  help people to digest their food more fully and so derive more nutritional value from it. That places less stress on the body to produce its own digestive enzymes.

Raw food supporters also believe that the cooking we normally do to our food destroys their natural vitamins and minerals and that food takes longer to digest in this cooked, unnatural state. The cooked food therefore hangs around longer in the gut while the body attempts to digest it. The proteins, carbohydrates and fats which have not been fully digested also become waste products. These waste products slow down the food’s transit through the gut, causing constipation, bloating, stomach cancer etc, while the fats tend to clog up the arteries. A raw food diet, which is higher in fiber too, pushes the food more quickly through the gut and there are fewer waste by-products which are left around to cause problems to the body.

Basically, a raw food diet makes your whole digestion process a lot more efficient. It delivers more of the essential vitamins and nutrients which our bodies need and leaves behind fewer waste products which can become harmful to our bodies.

The health benefits of the raw food diet include an increase in energy as your body is maximizing the amount of nutrients it actually gets where it needs it; plus the body has to work less hard in order to process the raw food.

You should find that your skin looks more clear on the raw food diet. That is because your body is taking in fewer toxins which would cause skin eruptions. The raw food diet is a good detox!
Your digestive system will work more efficiently on the raw food diet. Food will pass through the gut more quickly and waste will be expelled regularly. That is great for avoiding health problems like IBS and stomach cancer.

You may also find that you lose weight and manage your weight more effectively on the raw food diet. It is lower in fat that most people’s eating habits. There is less fat hung around in the body to clog up arteries and pile on the pounds. That in turn reduces your risk of contracting heart disease.

All in all, then, you can see that if you eat at least 75% raw food diet foods it will be much better for your health. Visit RawFood4Life.info to find out how you can lessen your risk of serious diseases and generally look and feel better while by following the raw food diet.

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Just What Is A Raw Food Diet?

Those who do not really know what a raw food diet is might think it’s a diet that only rabbits like. These same people might think that a raw food diet is equal to a vegetarian diet in that a person on a raw diet eats nothing but fruits and vegetables, hence the thinking a raw food diet is for rabbits. It is true that rabbits eat fruits and vegetables, but a raw food diet has much more to it than eating just eating carrots, lettuce, or apples.

What is meant by a raw food diet? This popular eating habit is a diet consisting of not only the eating of fresh fruits and vegetables. But it also includes eating nuts, seeds and sprouts. It includes drinking purified water, and dairy products that are not pasteurized. In addition, a raw food diet can include the consumption of any unprocessed food that is free of chemicals. In a nut shell, this is what a raw food diet is, no pun intended.

Raw food dieting is in no way a new, quirky idea. Mankind as a whole has been a raw food eater since the dawn of time. In fact, raw food is all our early ancestors ate, primarily because at that time in our existence we were rather nomadic, moving from place to place from day to day. We hadn’t invented fire yet. It was easier just to pick and eat berries, nuts, fruits, and vegetables as we moved about the earth’s surface.  

Today the raw food diet has a well established following and has even attracted many celebrities to its followers like Woody Harrelson and Demi Moore to mention just two. There have also been many books written and published on the subject to guide anyone interested in raw food dieting. There are even specialized classes in colleges and universities for the nutritionist to study in the raw food diet.

To be a true raw food dieter the diet consists of between seventy-five to ninety percent raw foods. That is, foods that are not cooked by any means. The balance of the diet might consist of foods that are sun-dried or dehydrated, but with this done at temperatures below 120 degrees Fahrenheit. The key element of a raw food diet is not to eat any foods that are cooked, baked or microwaved.

It is believed by advocates and followers of raw food dieting that preparing foods by any form of cooking damages the food and cooks out many valuable nutrients. And there is considerable scientific evidence to support this belief. There are many foods that when cooked, have some nutritional elements that become neutralized and therefore of no real value for the body and when consumed the body must then waste energy to eliminate them.

There is also medical evidence that suggests the body benefits from a raw food diet. Studies indicate that those people who are on a raw food diet have greater energy and are at a lower risk for blood pressure and heart issues. In addition, there are fewer complaints about digestive issues, not to mention reports of significant weight loss from raw food dieters.

The raw food diet, although good for most, may not be good for everyone. In considering a raw food diet menu, it is always best to consult your physician before getting too far along in the diet. Visit RawFood4Life.info for more information.     

The Raw Food Diet - Not Just for Rabbits!

It’s been said that a raw food diet program is the most influential diet trend to hit the scene in years. For many people, they hear that term: raw, and they figure they know exactly what’s involved in it. However, you’d be surprised as what it really encompasses.

Of course, a raw diet is nothing new. Looking back over the history of humanity, primitive man ate a raw diet prior to the discovery of fire. In modern times, at the beginning of the 20th century, a number of people began to advocate a return to such a diet as being the healthiest way for people to live.

Your mouth is – quite naturally – the means by which food enters your body. A key benefit of raw foods is that you have to chew them well before swallowing. No doubt your parents may have told you to chew your food a certain number of times before swallowing! The reason for this is that the digestive process starts in the mouth. Chewing releases saliva, an enzyme that helps you digest your food better. In the case of starches, it begins the process of breaking it down into its component sugar molecules.

Some people wonder if a raw food diet means you eat raw meat. No, that is not the case. For the most part, a raw diet is a vegetarian diet. In general, your diet will be composed of things like fresh fruit and vegetables (and their juices), nuts, seeds and sprouted seeds, purified water and unpasteurized dairy products. There are other foods included in the diet, but it’s important that they be unprocessed and free of any chemicals or preservatives. Typically, a raw food diet means that about three-quarters of the food you eat is raw. The remaining components of your diet are usually dehydrated fruits and vegetables. You can either buy them that way, or get yourself a dehydrator specially made for food. The one caveat with such a device: be sure that it operates below 116 degrees Fahrenheit; a good dehydrator functions best at this temperature.

Now, once you start eating the raw food diet, you’ll start to see some of the benefits and then you won’t miss those steaks and chops you once ate. A raw food diet will lower your risk of developing heart disease or diabetes, give you more energy, improve the glow to your skin by erasing some of the signs of aging, diminish your digestive troubles, help you to control your weight loss, and even get rid of some of those illnesses and chronic health conditions you may be suffering from. Most processed foods have so many chemicals that we still don’t know the long-term health impact of. By purging your body of these things, you can see a real improvement in your overall health.

Of course, deciding on a raw diet isn’t as simple as starting to eat a vegetarian or vegan diet, and that’s it. No, you should always meet with a doctor or dietician to design a diet just right for you. For one thing, you may have a food allergy that can cause you trouble, for example, if you are lactose or gluten intolerant.  If so, you must avoid dairy and/or some grains. Gluten is present in most grains; so the doctor will tell you to substitute whole grain rice. Then there are certain vitamins and minerals that you need on a daily basis. If you don’t eat certain foods (maybe you don’t like certain vegetables), then you’ll need to take supplements.

Raw food diet meal plans aren't ideal for everyone, but you can find more information at RawFood4Life.info, and talk to your doctor about the benefits of a raw food diet.