Is Raw Food The Way To Go?

Even on a cold winter's day, business is brisk at Catch a Healthy Habit Café in Fairfield. As one of the few restaurants in Connecticut offering raw, organic, vegan, gluten-free food, few items are piping hot, but it's a magnet for vegetarians and vegans craving an "almond milk" fruit smoothie or zucchini pasta primavera.

Some people stop in to grab a healthy snack; others are on a cleansing five-day juice diet or gluten-free diet. For a growing number of people, however, eating raw food isn't something they do occasionally. It's a way of life.

Born in Germany, Andrea Kolwicz of Danbury was raised on a raw food diet. "I was always healthy and never had to go to the doctor. My immune system was perfect," Kolwicz says. As a teenager, she tried many different diets but says she became a vegetarian at 15 because she didn't want to eat animal products. A year ago, she decided to go vegan and went back to the raw food diet shortly thereafter.

"A lot of people say as soon as they went raw their whole mindset changed. They got more spiritual and more interested in personality development and meditation and yoga, but I already did that," says Kolwicz. "I just loved the taste and knew it was good for me and for the planet."

WHAT IS A RAW FOOD DIET?

Raw foodists believe that cooking food at any temperature higher than 116 degrees F destroys enzymes that aid digestion. The theory is that if you eat raw food, the body needs to use fewer of its own enzymes to digest it, and so has energy to spare to boost the immune system.

For maximum health benefits, raw foodists suggest that at least 75 percent of the diet be raw, unprocessed food. There are different types of raw food diets, however, and people follow them to varying degrees. "People are interested in raw food but they don't put up with it because they think they have to commit 100 percent," says Kolwicz, who gives workshops on raw food. She says the diet doesn't have to be that rigid for people to feel the benefits. Raw food comprises 50 to 80 percent of her diet, but she'll eat cooked food if she has a particular craving or if she's dining out with friends.

Raw food diets can include raw meat, raw fish, raw eggs, and raw (unpasteurized) dairy but, for the most part, people who make the switch do it as the final step along a path that has already taken them from vegetarianism to veganism. The live raw food diet (as opposed to one that might include sushi-grade raw fish, for instance, or beef carpaccio) consists of raw fruits and vegetables, beans, grains, nuts, sprouts, seaweed, purified water and coconut milk.

For Glen Colello, co-owner of Catch a Healthy Habit, the journey to a raw food diet began in 2003 when, on the advice of his chiropractor, Colello cut out dairy. Meat and refined sugar were the next things to go. "In the course of 6 months, I was dairy-, meat-, and sugar-free," he says. "I was feeling good and wanted to know what was the next step." After attending several seminars by raw food guru David Wolfe in 2005, both Colello and his partner Lisa Storch, a longtime vegan, decided to take the final leap to a live raw food diet. "It's definitely a lifestyle," Colello says.

Two of the biggest myths about the raw food diet, says Storch, are that everything is cold and that raw foodists live on carrots and celery. Storch, a trained chef and nutritionist, says she found the raw food diet opened up a whole new world of culinary possibilities that include warm soups, nut-based crackers, and pasta made from vegetables.

Beans and nuts typically are soaked until soft to make them more digestible. Seeds, grains and beans often are eaten after they have sprouted for greater nutritional value. Raw foodists have little use for the oven but the food processor, blender and juicer get quite a workout. Raw vegetables, particularly dark leafy greens such as kale and fibrous tubers such as yams, need to be broken down or liquefied to make them more digestible.

Like many raw foodists, Colello and Storch also use a dehydrator, set to temperatures below 116 degrees F, to turn mixtures of grains, nuts and fruit into flatbreads, crackers or crusts for pies, or to give vegetables a sauteed flavor. "The food is very flavorful," Storch says.

HEALTH BENEFITS AND RISKS

Nutritionists recommend that fruits and vegetables fill about half the plate at every meal -- but does it follow that a raw food diet would be even more beneficial? Raw foodists count increased energy, clearer skin, weight loss and a strengthened immune system as additional benefits.

"They feel it prevents a variety of diseases: migraines, diabetes, high cholesterol, asthma, inflammatory bowel problems, joint pain," says Andrea Valenti, clinical nutrition manager at Bridgeport Hospital. "One thing to remember is there's never been any type of large medical study on any of that. If it has been studied, it's been in an extremely small population of people."

Some studies have found that people on raw food diets have less bone density. Raw foodists also are prone to higher levels of homocysteine -- an amino acid that may be linked to heart disease -- due to a lack of folic acid, vitamin B6 and B12 in their diet. Nutritionists recommend taking vitamin B supplements, particularly B12, which you can't get from fruits and vegetables, and vitamin D and calcium if you cut out dairy. People on vegan or vegetarian diets also need to make an effort to ensure they get enough protein and iron.

Valenti doesn't recommend eating raw meat, fish or dairy, all of which needs to be cooked to a specific temperature in order to kill bacteria such as salmonella or E. coli, and vegetables need to be washed or peeled for the same reason. Nutritionists don't recommend the raw food diet for young children, women who are pregnant or nursing, or people who have anemia or osteoporosis, either.

While many nutritionists consider the raw food diet to be healthful, Valenti says, the biggest health benefit may have more to do with what's off the menu -- fried foods, processed foods, refined sugar, red meat -- than what's on it.

For most raw foodists, however, the proof is in the (raw) pudding. "I have much more energy," Storch says. "I lost about 30 pounds, am more clear-headed, and have a better sense of well-being. I hardly ever get sick. I used to get colds a lot and that doesn't happen anymore."

A LIFESTYLE CHANGE

Like many people, Blackrock resident Mark Sosnowski, 48, initially turned to the raw food diet to lose weight. He started off slowly with fruit for breakfast and salad for lunch, but after attending a raw food cooking demonstration at a "meet-up" group in Naugatuck, he says, "it just evolved."

"If someone had told me `You're going to be a raw vegan or follow a plant-based diet,' I'd have said, `Right!' That was nowhere on my radar," he says. As he began to add more and more raw, whole, unprocessed foods to his diet, he says, "My tastes simply changed. Just by changing breakfast and lunch, I made a lifestyle shift."

Sosnowski has been on the raw food diet for a year now and has lost a whopping 113 pounds. Although his results aren't typical, most raw foodists report losing weight on the diet. Colello doesn't recommend it for that purpose, however, noting that other diet plans are more proven. In fact, he's seen people gain weight once they shift to raw food because they overindulge in desserts or gorge on nuts, which are a dietary staple of raw food entrees.

It's not easy to stick to a diet of raw food, however, and even the most committed raw foodists cut themselves a little slack when they have a craving for favorite comfort foods such as pizza or bread. For most raw foodists, however, this isn't just a diet, it's a lifestyle. "As dramatic as the physical change is, it's much more than that," says Sosnowski. "It's totally changed my life." HL

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