I'm doing 34 things
Ok, honestly, I always was concerned about this diet and the validity of it, and while the whole “more nutrients” thing seemed like a better option, it always made me a bit uncomfortable.. not to mention ridiculously hungry.
WELL, I read a very wonderful article from a harvard professor who studies the evolution of humans, and it turns out we NEED to cook our food. Sure, we can survive on raw food, but we end up having to eat far more than necessary to fuel our bodies. Why? Because cooking foods helps make the nutrients in it more digestible for our system. Sure, we are consuming more nutrients if we eat all of our food raw, but we are not actually ABSORBING more. We are simply pissing it all away, to be blunt. And because cooking food allows it to be quickly digested, our bodies spend a lot less energy processing our food- whereas on an all raw diet, our bodies are working overtime to digest. No other animal in the world cooks, it is true, but we DO, and it enables us to get a maximum amount of energy in a short amount of time- which helps us fuel our powerful brains (which take up more energy than any other process in our body). This professor (Richard Wrangham, PhD) proposes that the invention of cooking is what fueled the dramatic increase in our brain size to begin with- the ability to cook food so it’s easily digested, you get a big energy payload and don’t spend much to process it, and a huge amount of all that food energy can go to brain processes.
It makes perfect sense to me, and I’m going to have to take this goal off my list permanately. Obviously, eating raw foods is good for you, but certainly not exclusively. I am so glad to have all that cleared up- whew!
