When you think of food in its most healthy and beneficial state, as something green for the body, mind and environment, you may likely think of fresh and natural raw foods.
A raw twist on sushi, nori filled with carrots, peppers, avocado and sprouts then topped with lettuce and a raw nut sauce made from garlic and macadamia nuts.
The raw food diet appears at first to be just another crazy and intense food diet, but for many it has proved beneficial and has thus transformed into a lifestyle.
Philip McCluskey is a celebrity among “raw foodies”. He is an author and motivational speaker and also runs the popular website lovingraw.com. A few years ago, McCluskey reached a staggering 400 pounds. After becoming fed up with over 30 extreme weight loss procedures, including everything from hypnotism to personal training, Atkins to veganism, he stumbled upon the raw diet.
“I made the switch to 100 per cent raw overnight and haven’t been off it since.” McCluskey said.
Since that day he has lost over 200 pounds. However, weight loss is not the only side effect from the raw diet that he has experienced.
“Everything in my life has changed, from confidence, spirituality, relationships, business, attitude, relationship to the planet,” McCluskey said.
“It was basically a shift in consciousness.”
Madeline MacKinnon, a second year nutrition student at SAIT, first discovered the power of raw food when she became fed up with the food offered at SAIT’s various food outlets.
“We only were able to eat in the school cafeteria, so I bought a second hand blender and made a classic raw green smoothie with frozen banana and baby spinach.” MacKinnon said.
She has also experimented with many other food lifestyles such as the vegan diet.
“I went vegan two years ago,” MacKinnon said.
“I liked the idea of eating a raw food diet because it was more solution orientated while a vegan diet seemed to be all about how you can substitute animal products with products that seemed to be just as unhealthy.”
Eating raw allows for a diet that consists of live food, which comes from unpasteurized and raw nuts, sprouted grains, fresh and live vegetation. A raw meal is anything that has not been cooked or heated, pasteurized or processed, and is fresh and organic.
Raw diet eliminates foods like dairy, meat, breads and anything else that has been cooked. This is because the cooking process is believed to destroy valuable nutrition and enzymes required for good digestion.
Katrina Ward is a third year ACAD student, majoring in ceramics. She discovered raw food after participating in a strict cleanse for a couple months last summer.
“I ate primarily raw on my cleanse because it was the easiest solution for me to get healthy fast,” Ward said.
“After I completed my cleanse, I just stuck with eating raw because I loved it.”
The raw food diet is not a diet that one might stress about, but one to get excited about and creative with. Food choices range from raw deserts, made of nuts, fruits and super foods, to dinner entrees like ‘spaghetti’ made from zucchini or squash and other various blended, chopped and prepared vegetables.
Many critics wonder how one could acquire nutrients that are thought to be essential to everyone’s diet, like protein from meat and calcium from dairy.
“We are told that we need a lot more [protein] than we really do,” Ward stated.
“Either way I get a lot of proteins from everything I eat, probably more than many who eat meat. And I am getting them in healthy and conscious ways.”
The consumption of raw foods is said to purify not only the body, but also the mind.
“Hearing about the spiritual, emotional and physical transformation that people have gone though inspired me to eat raw food, as well as the guarantee for high energy and the general feeling of wellbeing.” MacKinnon said.
