Raw Foods

People try to obtain vitamins through supplements, but artificially synthesized vitamin products aren't as effective because of their low absorption rate. In addition, excessive vitamins at one time are lost through our waste system. That's why it's absolutely best to obtain vitamins through meals of raw, natural, organic food.

Here are a few power packed foods!

1. Embryo Bud (Sprouts)

The first secret of raw food is the embryo bud. This is where grain starts
its life. The milling process eliminates this embryo bud, which makes a huge difference. For example, brown rice is whole rice with hulls (husks) still attached; when stripped of hulls and embryo buds, it becomes white rice. When steeped in water, brown rice produces buds; white rice just rots -- proof that it's life is gone. White rice contains only 5% of the fiber, vitamins, minerals and other nutrients of brown rice. That's because 66% of vitamins and minerals are in the embryo bud, 29% in the hulls. It's little wonder that the Chinese characters for "white race" contain part of the character for "waste." To intake living nature, we need to eat whole grain.

2. Chlorophyll

Animals maintain life when they eat other organisms, either plants or other animals. They mostly can't make nutritive substances on their own. Plants can make nutrients, such as glucose, protein, and vitamins, by photosynthesis. When they spread their leaves toward the sun, the chlorophyll that colors them green absorbs solar energy and produces glucose from water and carbon dioxide -- an economic method of nutrition productivity.

Chlorophyll bears a striking chemical similarity to hemoglobin, the vital component of blood. Chlorophyll's phorphyrin structure has magnesium as its central metallic element; hemoglobin has iron. When an animal eats grass, a metathesis occurs in its intestinal villi, transforming a large amount of magnesium into iron. Metathesizing chlorophyll creates increased hemoglobin in the blood, which is why vegetarian animals can maintain life by eating only green grass. That's also why some people call chlorophyll "green blood."

Chlorophyll makes fresh, clean blood, and helps revive damaged cells, limits cancer cell growth and virus occurrence, and functions as an anti-allergen. In green photodynamic therapy (PDT), chlorophyll reduces side-effects and increases the effectiveness of standard PDT, a therapy which kills cancer cells with light.

According to a 1999 study by the Eighth Asia Nutrition Study Board, chlorophyll also helps prevent cancer by defending against harmful variations in meat produced by cooking. But chlorophyll is also easily damaged by heat -- you'll notice that steamed vegetables produce greenish liquid, which contain the dissolved chlorophyll. That's why it's better to eat green vegetables raw.

3. Enzymes

Enzymes participate in all processes of life: birth and death, growth and maintenance. They are the catalytic elements that accelerate chemical reactions by 108 to 1011 times. Some laundry detergents contain enzymes to accelerate the dissolution of proteins and removal of dirt.

No matter how much good food we eat, the food can't become part of our bodies without enzymes. Protein, for example, is too large to pass through our blood vessels alone; enzymes must first dissolve it into molecularly-miniscule amino acid. Enzymes also produce necessary substances, dissolve unnecessary substances, and help eliminate harmful ones from the body.

As we get older, enzymes decrease their production. That's why elders often have more difficulty digesting food than younger people do. For digestive problems, we generally take peptic medicines that contain enzymes, such as amylase that dissolves rice starches, proteolytic enzyme, and fatty lipolytic enzyme.

As stress and environmental pollution increase, so does our need for enzymes. Since cooking and processing food destroys enzymes, you can see why modern urban people with busy lives often lack sufficient enzymes in their diet, and often suffer from digestion, stressed bodies, accelerated aging, and diseases.

Enzymes also need vitamins and minerals to function properly, and these are also damaged and destroyed by cooking. Raw food supplies the enzymes, vitamins, and minerals you need.

4. Dietary Fiber

In the past, food-processing techniques focused on eliminating fiber, considering it unnecessary and difficult to digest. Now, fiber is recognized as useful in preventing and treating such ailments as diabetes, obesity, and cancer.

A British scholar first addressed the importance of dietary fiber after realizing that the English suffer a higher incidence of colon cancer than Africans do. He noted that an English person's average daily stool quantity was 110 grams, and it took 45 to 60 hours for the excretion to pass through their colons. In contrast, Africans had average daily stool quantity of 200 grams for urban dwellers, 300 grams for rural people, and their stool took 30 to 40 hours to pass through their colons. He found that saprogenous bacillus existed largely in English stool, while African stool contained more beneficial bacteria. The reason: the Africans' greater amount of vegetable intake gave them more fiber, which reduced their chances of colon cancer.

Fiber is an excellent internal cleanser. It absorbs and removes harmful waste products and poisonous materials, while reducing cholesterol and heavy metal levels. Fiber absorbs water like a sponge, and adheres to digestive tracks, which reduces digestion duration. This cuts the time carcinogens stay inside the body.

According to a study at Washington University, lab mice with large fiber intake were less likely to develop cancer, even when injected with carcinogens: 39% of the mice fed a large quantity of fiber developed cancer, compared to 69% of those not fed fiber.

Your colon contains approximately one hundred types of bacterium, with a total of about a hundred trillion bacteria. Such beneficial bacteria as lactobacillus or lactobacillus bifidus thrive on fiber in the colon, thus retarding the growth of harmful bacteria. They dissolve fiber to make vitamins and amino acids.

Fiber can be obtained through vegetables, whole grains, marine plants, and mushrooms, but not through most processed food. And more fiber is obtained by eating raw food and fruits with rinds than through cooked food.

5. Phytonutrients

As the name suggests, phytonutrients exist only in plants. They're usually found in the rinds and other exterior features of plants to defend against outside attacks by insects, etc. To strengthen the immunity of our own bodies, we must consume the immune substances of plants. That's why it's better to eat fruits and vegetables with rinds, leaves, stems, and roots. Known phytonutrients include carotenoid in carrots, tomatoes, and oranges, soy's isoflavone, and catechin in green tea. Only 10% of functional phytonutrients are known, but as more are revealed, phytonutrients will factor greatly in health plans. And since phytonutrients are more effective consumed fresh and whole, we need to consume them raw.

6. Vitamins

Our 60 trillion cells continuously react chemically. Vitamins give them life and vitality, turn food into energy, and abet growth, strength, and disease prevention. A person only needs a teaspoonful of vitamins per day, but since our bodies can't produce vitamins on their own, we must obtain them from food.

All natural foods contain vitamins, but we destroy them through processing and cooking. Cutting and chopping food in small pieces, even washing it, causes vitamin loss.

Vitamins differ greatly in stability. Vitamin B1 and folic acid are easily destroyed by heat, and vitamin C is the most unstable of all -- it's easily affected by air, heat, acid and metals, and readily dissolves in water. Even when rinds of certain fruits and vegetables are scratched or peeled, they lose a great amount of vitamin C.

Vitamin B1 dissolves in water and is easily affected by temperature and contact with metals, alkali, and oxygen. Although vitamin B2 is less sensitive to heat, it is vulnerable to light and can be lost in water during cooking.

Fat-soluble vitamins are more stable than water-soluble ones, but can easily be destroyed by high temperatures or contact with oxygen.

Vitamins are destroyed in great quantity during the storage process, in both warm and cold conditions. Asparagus, for example, loses 50% of its vitamin C at 0„a C, and 90% at -21„a C. Chinese cabbage loses all its vitamin C in just a few days. B1 in a humid place easily loses its potency. That's why there's no benefit to buying fruit and vegetables in bulk at a discount. To reduce vitamin loss, buy small quantities as fresh and as frequently as possible. Store them in a dark place without airflow. Don't soak them in water but wash quickly.

When stressed, we waste the vitamins inside us, especially such antioxidants as vitamins A, C and E. With a lack of vitamins, our immune systems weaken, causing insomnia, loss of appetite, over-sensitivity, and lack of energy. These symptoms can occur long before vitamin deficiency diseases develop, such as scurvy (vitamin C deficiency), and beriberi (vitamin B1 deficiency). Each vitamin has its unique deficiency symptoms, but vitamins also have relationships with each other. Missing or lacking only one causes physical imbalances.