Whole Food Value

Have you started hearing about the Raw Food Diet? It’s gaining popularity and buzz, not just as a diet to lose weight, but a diet for a long and healthy life. We eat so much in the way of processed food that we don’t even stop to think about what we’re putting into our bodies, and how far we’ve come nutritionally from our ancestral, agrarian roots.

A raw food diet means consuming food in its natural, unprocessed form. There are several common-sense rationales for why this is a good idea. Processing and cooking food can take so much of the basic nutritional value away. Think of some of the conventional wisdom you’ve heard about for years, such as: If you cook pasta just to the al dente (or medium) stage, it will have more calories, yes, but it will have more the nutritional value in it than if you cooked it to a well-done stage. Or you probably remember hearing not to peel carrots or potatoes too deeply, because most of the nutrients and values are just under the surface.

The raw food diet means eating unprocessed, uncooked, organic, whole foods, such as fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, legumes, dried fruits, seaweeds, etc. It means a diet that is at least 75% uncooked! Cooking takes out flavor and nutrition from vegetables and fruits. A raw food diet means eating more the way our ancient ancestors did. Our healthier, more fit ancestors. They cooked very little, and certainly didn’t cook or process fruits and vegetables. They ate them RAW. Their water wasn’t from a tap; it was natural, spring water. Maybe they drank some coconut milk on occasion.

Doesn’t it just make sense that this is how our bodies were meant to eat? It’s a way of eating that’s in harmony with the planet and in harmony with our own metabolisms. Our bodies were meant to work, and need to work to be efficient. That means exercise, certainly, but it also means eating natural, raw foods that require more energy to digest them.

Why The Raw Food Diet

Because cooking takes so many nutrients and vitamins OUT of food, you automatically start feeding your body what it needs when you stop cooking food and start eating uncooked, nutrient-rich foods. A raw carrot has exponentially more nutrition than a cooked carrot.

Cooking also alters the chemistry of foods, often making them harder to digest. Why do we have so many digestive problems in this country? Because we’re putting foods into our bodies in a form that we weren’t designed to absorb. High fiber, high water content fresh produce abolishes constipation of the bowels, cells and circulatory system. Obstructions are cleared and blood flow increases to each and every cell in the body. Enhanced blood flow is significant for two reasons: as mentioned above, blood delivers nutrients and oxygen to living cells, and carries away their toxic metabolites.

Obesity is endemic in this country. The diet industry is more profitable than the oil companies. Why? Because the way we eat and prepare our food practically guarantees that we’ll overeat. Psychologists tell us that we overeat because our souls are hungry. But in reality, our bodies are hungry, even though we may feel full. When you start giving your body the nutrients it craves, overeating will cease.

Eating raw foods is a boost to your metabolism as well. It takes a little more energy to digest raw foods, but it’s a healthy process. Rather than spending energy to rid itself of toxins produced by cooking food, the body uses its energy to feed every cell, sending vitamins, fluids, enzymes and oxygen to make your body the efficient machine it was intended to be.

You’ll naturally stop overeating, because your body and brain will no longer be starving for the nutrients they need. A starving brain will trigger the thoughts that make you overeat. The brain and the rest of your body don’t need quantity; they need quality.

Things To Take Into Account Before Starting Your Body Building Routine

It goes without saying that nutrition is a crucial element for anyone starting an exercise habit. I would even go as far as to say that one of the first things to be considered when contemplating a body building routine is your nutrition. The two, body building and nutrition go shoulder to shoulder. Within the body building nutrition, you need to pay attention to two aspects: frequency of meals and meal ratios

Frequency Of Meals

The main goal of body building nutrition is to stimulate the assimilation of the nutrients into the growth of lean muscle, clearance of body fat and the diminishment of water retention. A good way to do this is to increase your meal frequency, meaning smaller but more frequent meals. In practice you can eat every two and a half to three hours. This higher frequency keeps your metabolism going and ensures that your body’s engine never stalls. Not only is the frequency of the meals important but also the characteristics and composition of the meals.

Additionally to a higher frequency, it will also be important to plan your meals in a strategic way. As stated before, body building and nutrition go shoulder to shoulder, but also in regards to when the meals and nutrients should be ingested. The intake of calories should be geared towards the times of exercises: more intake when doing the routine and less in times of inactivity.

Constituence and Composition Of Meals

Frequency of your meals is not the only thing that relates body building and nutrition. The composition of your meals is another relating factor between the two. The most important factor here is the arithmetical proportion of carbohydrates and proteins in your nutrition. The ideal ratio would be 40% carbohydrates, 40% proteins, and 20% fats. As for fats preference should be given to the fats found in lean meats or in plant oils. Proteins consist of amino acids and these amino acids are assimilated by the body to form muscle tissue. Carbohydrates produce the energy needed to get going during a workout. And although fats have been attributed with a bad name, they too are a fundamental element. They work in two key parts in the body: the protect essential organs by procuring a cushion around them and they also work as an insulator and coating for nerves. Needless to say that a smart body builder makes sure that his nutrition contains enough fats.

Did I hear you say water?

Body building and nutrition can’t go without water, it is again one of the important and essential constituents and indeed water is critical to your body building excellence. Water has many uses for every person but certainly for a body builder: it can help in cooling the body down after an intense workout. Water also flushes out any toxins that build up in the body. Making sure you get plenty of water controls the appetite and some research shows that cold water helps to spruce up metabolism.

The commercial food we now consume is grown in soil that has been seriously depleted of its minerals because of continuous farming without crop rotation or rest. In addition, there is a total dependence on chemical fertilizers and pesticides to grow produce.

Depending on the soils they are grown on, there can be a significant difference between commercially grown and organically grown vegetables. One study concluded that organically grown foods were richer in minerals than commercially grown products. By comparison, there was 87% less content of magnesium, potassium, manganese, iron, and copper in conventionally grown foods.

It is now a proven fact that when soil is made healthy with organic humus and natural minerals, plants become healthier and more pest-resistant.They do not contain “weakness attractors” for pests.Even though we may be eating adequate quantities of fruits and vegetables, if they are not grown organically, or if they have been irradiated,our bodies are not receiving the nutrition required to build and maintain health.

We are consuming incomplete nutrition because the food lacks the natural vitamins, minerals, amino acids, and enzymes necessary to maintain life and build vitality.

Food Processing

The following food preparation processes are listed in order of nutritive
value, from best to worst:

• Raw
• Juiced, and consumed immediately after preparation
• Dehydrated, or dried, without chemicals or additives (2-5% loss of nutritive value)
• Frozen (5-15% loss)
• Lightly steamed, so that the vegetable is still a little crunchy (15-40% loss)
• Cooked (40-100% loss, depending of length of time cooked)
• Leftovers
• Microwaved (90-99% loss)
• Commercially canned
• Fried, and deep fried
• Processed foods with additives (contain toxins and have zero nutrient value)

Food industries process food so that it can be sold to consumers. In our fast-paced world, we have been conditioned to expect food that is conveniently packaged, easy and quick to prepare, has a long shelf life, and tastes good. Tantalizing taste is now the main criterion for choosing food.

Food loses its nutrient value when it is processed. For example, refined white flour contains only two or three nutrients, compared to more than fifty in whole-wheat flour. Whenever food is heated to temperatures in excess of 112 degrees fahrenheit (44 degrees celsius), most of the natural enzymes in it are destroyed.

Original, living, natural food becomes more or less unnatural dead food, lacking life force energy. Enzymes contained in raw food function as catalysts to assist with the digestive process and with other functions in our bodies.

Without live enzymes in food, our bodies must manufacture them from vitamins and minerals in our own tissues to be able to digest the nutrient-deficient processed foods we eat.Whenever we prepare foods by canning or overcooking, we are killing the live enzymes. When we consume these foods, we are depleting our body’s nutrient reserves.

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What’s a whole food vs. a processed food? Nutrition by Natalie explains. Whole foods can help your health and help you lose weight. Processed foods like fast food can make you fat and cause health problems. A whole foods diet will ensure you get the nutrition you need.

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Organic food is food that has been grown without the use of toxic chemicals, pesticides or fertilizers. The food is as natural as can be, safer for the environment and usually tastes better too. Most importantly though, eating this food is healthier for you and may provide many health benefits, which is what this article is all about.

Even though further research needs to be done to gain a better understanding of the benefits of organic food, there is still much valuable information to share with you.

Before we discuss the actual health benefits of eating whole food, lets take a look at the advantages it has over non-organic food.

It’s a fact that this food is highly nutritious and contains higher levels of vitamins and minerals. Vitamin C and minerals like magnesium, calcium and iron are just some of the nutrients organic food contains higher amounts of.

Whole foods also contain higher amounts of antioxidants, which help reduce the risk of developing cancers.

You may be surprised to know, but the vegetables we eat today are nowhere near as nutritious as they were 50 or even 15 years ago. Farmers tend to take shortcuts when growing food, and the fastest way is generally not the best way to do something. This trend is expected to continue, so if eating highly nutritious food is important to you, looking into organic foods is something worth considering.

If you were wondering why organic food hasn’t exactly taken the world by storm, it’s mainly due to the extra cost associated with organic growing. Demand is greater than supply and as a result, you can expect to pay about 20% extra for this kind of food..

Numerous studies have been conducted to find out the benefits whole foods can provide us humans. Many results are still fairly inconclusive however there have been many reported cases of benefits when animals are fed organic food.

The reason for the vagueness in health benefits is due to many reasons such as: incorrect method of testing and the lengthy time it takes to determine results of this nature. However several studies have shown benefits such as:

Decline in colds and other conditions
Improves dental health
Improves flow of your overall system
Greater chance of sprains and fractures
Reduces chance of injury
Better over health

As mentioned, the subject of organic food vs non organic food is very iffy and many researches believe that this food provides little to no health benefits.

Thinking about it logically, surely food that has been grown as it was intended to and that contains no added toxic chemicals has to be considerably healthier for us.

Whether the extra cost associated with organic food is worth the money is entirely up to the person. There is insufficient evidence to say something like “eating whole foods will reduce the likelihood of getting heart disease”.

Even though it’s likely that eating organic food will produce significant healthier benefits long term, as of now it comes more down to ones opinion than solid fact.

I'm looking for some typical whole foods?

If you can help you get 10pts

Brown rice, fresh fruits and vegs, whole grain breads, pastas, cereals.

Do you have a favorite site that has yummy whole food recipes vegetarian recipes or vegan recipes?

please be so kind as to post the link!

thank you!

http://www.cooks.com/rec/search?q=vegetarian

as an american living in the UK I cannot find a good whole food store here. Can anyone tell me where I might find one in the Marlow/Wycombe/ Maidenhead are?

You can check this website to do a search. Unfortunately, outside of the major cities, the UK doesn't have the same range of choices as in the States, although you can find some small shops here and there. However, there are quite a few organic produce box schemes that will deliver a box of fresh organic fruit and veg right to your door. They also tend to carry fresh breads, dry goods, tofu, etc.

I'm interested in a whole food vitamins, meaning that the vitamins are not synthetic and they are made from whole, organic foods.
Thanks in advance!

I use and recommend Vita-Lea multi-vitamin. They have the best disintegration time (Howard University Pharmaceutical Dept), conduct outside clinical trials to prove absorption and effectiveness, balanced nutrients work together, highest standards for ingredient quality, purity, and efficacy, what's on the label is in the bottle, products developed for scientific reasons, not "fads", 50 years of quality and integrity, and 100% money back guarantee.

Hope this is helpful and feel free to contact me with questions.