The number 1 reason peeps don’t stay raw…

Had a marvellous challenging day today… was dragged along to a 12km hill race!… apparently the hardest competitive run in South Australia, the incline was horrendous!…

Durianrider has been looking forward to it for a while, I wasn’t planning on going in it until this morning but I’m glad I did because it was easily the most discomfort I have put myself through in a long time and yes i believe that’s a good thing! I have never done much competitive running except for sprinting in my younger years and also more recently a few 5km races… so this was definitely out of my comfort zone.

DR & the 'fruit train'

I learnt some valuable lessons on the run too – like taking it easier on the downhill, drinking less at the water stations (almost puked a few times) and also to do the course at least once prior to running it!

Anyway had a fantastic intense time & was ultra impressed to see a table loaded with oranges waiting for me at the end, nothing else just oranges… I proceeded to munch away at them while others grinned at my apparent ‘sweet tooth’

Oh yeh speaking of ‘sweet-toothes’… today’s blog I’m going to address under-eating and carbohydrates.

The number one reason peeps go back to cooked food from a low fat raw vegan diet is undereating on fruit. I see it all the time and I succumbed to it myself in Sept 07 when I went back to cooked food for a month. It would’ve been a longer stay on cooked food if I didn’t learn how to eat enough calories from sweet juicy fruits. I never used to be the type to count calories although I did have a stint in my youth because I went through anorexia and bulimia, calorie-counting became my friend in a way… I enjoyed the certainty I felt the system provided.

So why do we need plenty of carbohydrates in our diet & briefly what are they?

A cool pic I found demonstrating our tastebuds clearly

Well carbohydrates are our body’s most efficient source of energy. Carbohydrates are created by plants and stored in their leaves, stems, roots and fruit through a process called ‘photosynthesis’.

Most of the time a fruit is more than 90% carbs, making it the ideal food to meet our nutritional requirements.

We have sweet tastebuds on the tip of our tongues for a reason, these tastebuds are the first point of contact with our food…so naturally we seek out carbohydrates hence everyone is familiar with the ‘sweet tooth’ term.
We need a steady supply of glucose to our brains and body to function optimally.

What are the foods that peeps always go back to when they return to cooked foods?… Carbohydrate rich foods like pasta, breads, cakes, pizza, pastries, icecream, chocolate, cereals, rice…why? Because one’s cells are starving for carbohydrates and as a result the brain will search for the most dense caloric source available which is cooked carbohydrates! When we are hungry our brain doesn’t care if the carbs come from an unhealthy source (like cooked food) it just cares about getting blood sugar levels back up again…It’s really quite simple.

I feel a big part of the reason peeps avoid eating sufficient amounts of fruit is because they think it will make them fat! If carbohydrates made us fat then this would be reflected with soaring obesity levels amongst Asian countries like Japan, (where eating large quantities of rice is the norm) but actually the opposite is true. The countries that have the largest consumption of carbohydrates are always the slimmest & the most fit.

If we try to replace much needed carbohydrates with fat then we will not thrive long term and also we will gain fat more easily…Fat is very dense in calories (9 per gram in comparison to 4 per gram for carbs ) and is processed very differently to carbs, fat is stored almost effortlessly, and have you ever noticed that fat provides little appetite satisfaction?

This is a lovely pic

How often do you want to reach for sweet juicy fruits after a high fat meal? The reason is because you did not satisfy your ‘sweet carbohydrate tooth’. When we undereat on carbs we overeat on fats and we all know high fat diets are unhealthy right? I like this little article on fats

The reason sugar gets a bad wrap in the mainstream is to do with the company it keeps…
The common SAD diet includes large amounts of meat, dairy, and refined grains, with this also comes a lot of simple refined sugars… Making the sugar’s role in this mix therefore hard to determine. Sugar then becomes the scapegoat, taking focus off the animal products and saturated fats which definitely impact health more significantly than any simple sugars would.

Another reminder of our sweet tooth is reflected in how most of the population eats… always looking for reasons to ‘sweeten up’ dishes…I find it very interesting to watch others at meal times, have you ever noticed that the majority of peeps don’t eat butter, mayonnaise, or sour cream unless they have a carbohydrate to go with it?

In fact, one way to lose your attraction to foods like beef, bacon and butter is to not accompany it with carbohydrates (no sauces, gravy, honey, jams etc), there is a good chance you will soon lose your appetite for these foods… (although salting foods will keep you addicted which is another topic). How often do we eat one food at a time until we are full like every other animal in nature? Should we really have to ‘dress’ a food up??…Fruits and tender greens are the only foods that taste great alone, meet our nutrtional requirements perfectly and are easily attained in nature.

I recommend peeps who want to attain vibrant health, fitness and high energy levels through a 100% low fat raw vegan lifestyle count their calorie intake for at least the first month, this should provide a good solid base for long term success. Go to nutridiary.com and work out how many calories you need to MAINTAIN your current weight and aim for this with sweet juicy fruits.

Lastly you shouldn’t have to discipline yourself when it comes to eating and you don’t have to if you are meeting your physiological requirements of sufficient carbohydrates everyday from a clean natural source such as fruits. There is a reason I haven’t had a mouthful of cooked food for 2years…hopefully after reading this post you can work that one out
So don’t be afraid to eat fruit to your heart’s content!
Lovefreelee