There are numerous things I really enjoy about a raw vegan diet. Environmental and ethical boons aside, a high-fruit, high-carbohydrate raw vegan diet is simple to follow, allows you to feel great, and is downright sweet and juicy. Eating all the fruit you care for is appealing to a lot of people for obvious reasons. There are few greater feelings than sitting down to lunch and seeing 2, 3, 4 or more pounds of perfectly ripe, fragrant mangos sitting in a bowl and knowing that they are all for you. Yes, just you.
But with that all being said, I do believe that there are certain things that some people can adjust on their raw or mostly raw vegan diet to provide better results.
What inspired me to experiment even further with my diet and do more research?
I was cold. Downright chilly, in fact.
I never really saw it as an issue though. I just thought it was completely normal for me, during the wintertime, to need to wear 3 layers of shirts during the day and sleep with an electric blanket and a space heater. Granted, winters in eastern South Dakota USA can be pretty brutal, but it did get to a point where I wondered if it really was ideal to be so chilly all the time. I wasn’t under-eating by any means either (3,000 +calories from fruit every day), I was just cold.
I even objectively measured my core body temperature with a thermometer placed under my arms first thing in the morning. Most mornings, following the strict high-fruit, high-water, low sodium raw vegan diet I was, it was a frigid 95.4 degrees F.
Now there are some people in the raw food/health movement who believe that a lower body temperature like this is closer to ideal.
The theory is that most people are following an unhealthy lifestyle and eating plenty of unhealthy foods that cause their body to be in a constant fever, hence the average 98.4 F. And that made sense to me for the longest time. But then again, at the time I was more willing to accept what was said without doing my own research. That’s not what I want to teach anybody else to do. The wise words of George Carlin have taught me something important: “Question everything.”
So I started asking questions and starting to do a bit more of my own research. Are all forms of salt (sodium chloride) deadly poison? Is every single bite of cooked food you eat toxic? “Why are you asking me all these questions?” Good point. I’ll start answering some now.
The first thing I experimented with was adding just a little bit of salt to my evening salad. If you are wondering, it was just a pinch of that fancy pink salt you can buy in health food stores. It’s probably not any better or worse than most other kinds of salt, but from what I’ve researched, the high-heat-treated, chemical-laden salts many people use more than likely aren’t the best choice.
Dr. John McDougall, a medical doctor who’s promoted a low-fat vegan diet since the 1970’s, has some interesting fact-based things to say about salt in this presentation here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZ3hS9jpmm0
Honestly, it felt weird adding salt to my otherwise whole, fresh, ripe, raw, organic salad. Sacrilegious even. I had been told, and believed for years, that salt was deadly poison. Lucky for me, I didn’t die of heart failure or a stroke after the second bite.
It tasted amazing. And this is coming from just the very tiniest pinch of salt, mind you. After the first 2-3 days of doing this, I started to notice myself feeling less stressed and ultimately just more at-ease than I ever had before. I gradually added just a bit more salt after several days/weeks as well and felt better than ever.
Before, after eating my typical evening salad of water-rich foods of 3-4 or more lbs. of tomatoes, lettuce, celery, and cucumbers, I would feel like while in my mind logically I should be relaxed, my body just wouldn’t follow. Not to mention having to pee 3-5 times in the next few hours before bed.
Now it just felt like my body was happier, I could feel blood and warmth rush to my hands and feet, and I enjoyed my food more. Something was working. I also noticed a profound difference in the quality of my sleep. No more 4am adrenalin-surge wakeup coupled with a near exploding bladder.
But I also decided to experiment with something else totally crazy. After 2 ½ years of following a very strict, 100% raw diet (no pasteurized fruit juice or questionably raw dried fruit at all), I decided to try to eat some cooked food again. I figured organic steamed kale would be a good choice. I did end up burning my finger and realized I was a bit rusty at working with hot pots and pans, but the kale tasted fantastic.
Then in the coming evenings, I decided to steam up some winter squash. And then potatoes. All of them digested perfectly with no issues and the only side effects I experienced were sounder sleep, warmer hands and feet, feeling more at-ease, hair and nails growing significantly faster and thicker, and enjoying my food more. Since then, I’ve bumped my core body temperature back up into the 98’s degrees F. as well. Overall, I just felt better.
So what are the big takeaways from this? What am I doing differently? I’m eating a 100% vegan, fruit-based diet, predominately raw, but I also eat a bit of salt and some choice cooked foods when I desire them, like steamed root vegetables, rice, quinoa, and legumes. I don’t eat cooked food every meal, just when I desire it. Sometimes that’s every night of the week (mostly in the evening) or maybe just once or twice per week. Raw fruit is still my staple and where I get most of my calories.
Do note when I say, “cooked food” that I’m referring to healthy, clean, mostly whole, plant foods. I think most of us can relate to how silly that raw-food enthusiast sounds when they eat deep-fried soy protein fritters bathed in MSG sauce, feel pretty stodgy, and then conclude that all cooked food is no good. Sigmund Freud may have said that sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, but cooked food is not just cooked food.
I also just drink water and fluids until my thirst is quenched, not passed it, and balance the juicier foods I eat with drier foods. If I eat a mess of mangos, I’ll eat some raisins with them. If I have a big juicy salad, I’ll have some dehydrated vegetables with it. My bladder is feeling much better as a result, and I’m feeling warmer and happier.
Besides faster and thicker growing hair and nails, better sleep, and a less stressed mind and body, my skin is also moister (no more dry, flaky skin in the winter) and my physical endurance and strength gains have improved significantly. It feels good being able to consistently lift more weight every time I go into the gym. Now if I could just find a personal trainer to help me with my bench-press form…
Again, I’m not telling you that you have to put some salt on your salad, that you need to eat some cooked food, or that you need to do anything differently than what you’re doing now. I’m just encouraging you to ask some questions and think for yourself.
The way I see it, if what it takes for someone to be happy and healthy on a conscious, compassionate vegan diet is to eat some steamed lentils with a splash of coconut milk and a pinch of salt and abandon their “100% raw” label, then I say go for it. I’d rather see a society of happy, healthy people eating plants vs. intermittent 100% raw foodists who flip-flop between banana smoothies and bacon sandwiches. Consistency and sustainability is the goal.
So maybe your diet doesn’t need an upgrade. That’s awesome. Keep doing what you’re doing. But if you feel you might be able to experience better health by opening your mind just a little further, then I’ll be waiting right here with a bowl of potatoes mashed with coconut milk…
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I think it’s far more sensible to tailor your diet to suit your needs than be fixed on some purity for purity’s sake. In cold weather it makes perfect sense to eat yanger foods to balance the yin of the cold, and do the opposite in summer, yinner foods to balance the yang heat. I’m not 100% raw, though I can be in summer and often am. I like solar-infused* root veg and tamari-marinated tempeh to complement my salads. This is especially so when I have guests and also in winter. As long as I’m eating in season I’m happy. I do like a lot of the macrobiotic approach but turned on its head a bit, if you know what I mean (some cooked, mostly raw). My motto is have fun with food, make it tasty, keep it relatively simple, combine it pretty well, don’t be hardline or fixed in my thinking and appreciate it. It works. You can go to my website (http://www.steviebee.id.au/html/food.htm) for ideas; I’m not selling anything on there.
Happy travails, Chris
* I have a solar oven, which slowly infuses warmth into the food at lower temperatures over time; I find it hard to use a stove top anymore.
Ok trying not too sound like I am critisising. But the salt one gets me mad. ok as long as you use celtic sea salt ..that is natures salt, or any other totally natural salt, not supermarket salt ..then salt IS INCREDIBLY IMPORTANT. Why do you think our blood tastes salty. It really worries me when people do not have any salt, the worse thing though is when they suggest to their readers not too have salt, everyone always needs to do their own research, but believe me salt is important and avoiding it in the long run could kill you!!! so a very important topic for sure.
It’s all about balance, and about your own personal make up. Like you say – ask the questions! My raw diet is constantly changing, with the seasons, with my own healing process, and just because I fancy a change sometimes.
Hi Chris,
I totally agree.
Especially with “I’d rather see a society of happy, healthy people eating plants vs. intermittent 100% raw foodists who flip-flop between banana smoothies and bacon sandwiches.”
If it takes cooked food for one to maintain a high fruit/plant diet, that’s ok to me. It makes one a vegan. Of course, raw vegan, especially raw fruitarian, is still ideal to me.
One can keep the ideal, even if one slips. I just keep trying.
Excellent article, Chris. Thanks for sharing. I enjoyed your talks at the 2013 Woodstock Food Festival.
Congrats for being open to change!. Yes all raw is very colling to the body which is terrific in the sumermonths but not so pleasant in the winter. Any diet can be very dogmatic and
linear so many people feel it is either all or nothing at all. Some people can be happy and healthy on 100% raw for many years, good for them. I really feel it is too much of a stretch for most people to do. I was all raw on and off for years and ate plenty of healthy foods but kept finding i got too skinny (femail at 5’8 1/2″ raw weight was 118 pounds) and did not want to exercise and lose any weight. I finally started eating some cooked foods again and have been much happier since.
Please do NOT use electric blankets or heating pads as they are filled with electrical wires and offput harmful EMF’s. namaste’, rachel
Hi Chris-
I wholeheartedly second the agreements that others have also made to your post. Not only did I have the same problem of being cold at times (this is a circulation problem, and one of the ways to counteract it is with some specific exercises and warm foods), I had a VERY hard time losing the weight that I needed on a raw diet, and my blood tests showed that I was not getting enough protein, esp. considering my blood type and family history. As soon as I moved to a diet that included beans, cooked vegetables, grains and soy, the blood tests normalized, and the excess weight dropped off effortlessly, as did the constant chilliness (on cool days). Like you, my need/desire for raw ebbs and flows with the weather. I make a lot of soup…most I still make all or partly raw so that I can then eat them that way or else heat them up if the desire strikes me. The cornerstone of my dinner meal is always a big raw salad, but everything else can be either cooked or raw as the mood and weather strikes me. I have never as an adult enjoyed eating as much as I do now, after discovering raw, and then re-discovering whole, plant-based cooked food!
In my experience with raw foods over quite a few years, I have settled into exactly the same experience. I enjoy a very high raw food diet and am known in some circles as “that nurse that goes around the world electrifying people with water and Himalayan salt”. I had so many amazing water and salt stories that my daughter was inspired to become a salt vendor! So I am definite about including high quality salt in my life. After about a year on mostly fruit, my teeth were seriously falling apart. So I switched and now eat way more raw greens than I did. For me, eating a dish of steamed veggies at the end of my meal several days/week is what cake or pie used to be in the old days. I relish lightly steamed green beans now far more than I ever loved cake or cookies! Thanks for this really great article!
What I really love about this diet path is that it’s so easy to experiment and see exactly how foods affect me. There’s no mystery food in my body. I know exactly which foods give me acne, migraines, mucus, etc.
I had almost the exact same experience as you, Chris, while experimenting with a LFRV diet, living in northeastern Wisconsin and eventually shifting to a high raw, low fat diet including cooked starches and vegetables and some added salt. I used to sit in my office with the heat set to 75°F, three layers of cloths, a blanket over my shoulders and sometimes gloves, still feeling cold! Now, I’m warmer in the winter and have more energy. I’d still rather live in a warmer climate, but at least I’m not miserably cold here anymore.
That’s really great Chris. I say do whatever it takes to stay a HAPPY, HEALTHY, HIGH-RAW ***VEGAN*** Cheers to you brother!
Good article! I think some natural salt is good for the adrenals and thyroid. That brings up the core temperature and settles the mood. I find several meals a week of bean/vegetable stew or cooked frozen vegetables with ground hemp seeds, a bit of good oil and salt really cuts down on cravings. Maybe i will be be 100% raw sometime in the future but right I just get can’t do it. What i have managed now is to be mostly raw, vegan, and not overeating. And I have extended my nightly dry fast to about 15 hours; something I can do as I have a bit of excess body fat to convert to metabolic water and do not suffer from any obvious glycemic issues. Not ideal but achievable whereas the ideal wasn’t achievable. The best is the enemy of good enough. This is not meant to be a criticism of a 100% raw diet.
Great post. As regards to cold body temperature, I found this site when my daughter was having issues. They quickly resolved once her core temperature was back to 98.6: http://www.wilsonssyndrome.com/
I have found that i am healthier on a “low salt diet”; I don’t add it gratuitously to anything, especially before or while cooking, but at the table I do add a little himalayan crystal salt if the food will taste better with it.
I also had terrible gum problems from eating sweets; about 10 years ago I made xylitol my sweetener of choice and pretty much stick with the less sweet fruits (mostly black raspberries and strawberries–and banana skins have some great nutitional value and are great thickening agents!). As a result I have completely cured myself of gum disease (no more cavities either!) and as I studied the value of xylitol I discovered that over time it eliminated my allergies to cats (what a great side benefit!). While eating almost all raw for a while the one thing I refused to change was my use of xylitol (and also some mannitol which also has some great health benefits for the lungs, kidneys and digestive system).
It is amazing how many people had the same experience. In my case besides the coldness and low stamina, I was diagnozed with hyponatremia (extremely low levels of sodium). Instead of salt of added dulse to my salads and smoothies. I consulted with a ayurvedic healer at a conference who told me that I had a Vata dosha (affected by cold and dry). he recommended adding ginger or cayenne pepper to cooling foods and the seaweeds helped to balance water retention in my mostly liquid raw diet. Most of us learn about raw nutrition from books and the internet, but it is essential to individualize the raw program.
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I was cold during winter as a meat eater, as a vegan, and as a raw vegan. But, I think I feel the least cold as a raw vegan.
And, I do not understand this thing about salt. Why not just eat seaweeds instead of salt ?
I understand that 100% raw may not be better than mostly raw, but still I do not understand why salt would be necessary.
I use some kelp granules if I want a salty taste 🙂 It’s just ground up kelp, so it’s really a whole food, plus it has iodine and other minerals that are hard to get from other fruit and veg. It is also low-sodium.
The only time I have salt now is if I go out to a raw restaurant. I think I added a pinch to some avocado a couple weeks ago, just for a thrill, but now I know about the kelp granules and I love them 🙂
Hope yer doing good Chris.
Hi, I like this article. Who cares about having a certain “raw” label.
One thing I do is cook a vegan meal at dinner with the base always being rice or gluten free pasta.
I steam whatever vegetables I like (try to lean towards the higher carb veges)
and the secret is to add organic simmer sauces like the “ozganics” range.
This makes the meals more palatable.
I make a whole fruit smoothie to accompany my meal.
This works great for me.
I hope someone can copy my idea.
thanks