Daily blog: Raw food

There has been great discussion of late about what being vegetarian means.  I have been vegetarian now for about 24 years.  I have only been experimenting with raw food for the past three years.  I am not ready to go completely raw yet.  It could happen one day. For now, I am content to occasionally make a vow and stick to a raw food diet for 2-3 weeks depending on the time of year and the number of stressful or traumatic events on the agenda.  The first few days are by far the hardest.  Visions of pasties, baked goods and warm potatoes dance through my head.  But, as I try to convince myself, here on day one of a three week commitment, that it will be different in a few days.  Relationship to food changes and the taste improves as there are fewer additives and preservatives. The less fat, the less salt, the less mysterious ingredients in my food, somehow it begins to taste amazing.  Very much so at this time of year. Harvest, could food really taste any better?

A very sweet, well meaning, young man was trying to understanding eating raw and asked about cooked vegetables.  I looked at him askance and said, "Well, only raw food is raw." He replied, "They were once raw." To which I immediately replied, "Exactly." I am still not sure that he gets it.  I am accustomed to misunderstanding around food in my life.  Very few people actually commit to eating vegetarian let alone raw.  It is rare and somewhat of a novelty at parties.  

I have been asked what led me to becoming a vegetarian and there is a good story behind that. I will not bore you with it here. If you want to know send a message in the comment section here and I would be happy to talk about it.

If you would like to learn more about Raw food and the benefits of eating raw you can speak to my friend Rosemary Radford here in Cambridge or visit my favourite Raw restaurant, over in Guelph, call WOW Cafe, I think that stands for Wild Organic Way, the owners are lovely and Karen is a very special, incredibly knowledgeable raw food chef.  

Great Raw food website:

http://www.rawfoods.com

WOW Cafe

http://www.wowrawcafe.ca

Be conscious in all that we do, in all that we are, wake up, and wake up again,

Denise