Fasting

I know this is supposed to be a blog about eating, but I thought I'd talk about not eating for once. Talking to a beautiful girl about Ramadan (the ninth month of the Islamic calendar where Muslims fast -- and refrain from certain other activities -- from sunrise to sunset) reminded me that fasting is an important part of life for many raw foodists and others as part of a healthy lifestyle.

To start, what is fasting? Well it's not just about not eating -- it's about not eating for at least about 24 hours (or at least about 16 hours). At that point your body begins efficiently using carbohydrate stores in the body for energy. If you fast for long enough without break, your body will begin using protein stores for energy. At this point fasting actually morphs into starvation -- a transition that obviously should be avoided.

I don't pretend to really understand the meaning of Ramadan, but one aspect of the holy month is certainly related to purification and cleansing. So is the act of fasting for non-religious reasons. One argument is that humans were never meant to eat as much and as consistently as we do. There were always periods of time under almost any conditions globally that humans went periods of time without eating. The human body would use these times to eliminate and neutralize toxins, and rejuvenate. Rejuvenation and healing during fasting may seem counter-intuitive. We think of food as energy and therefore as the best thing for the body when it needs to be fighting disease, healing itself, etc. But the fact is that digestion is a very energy intensive process and takes a lot of the body's focus (just think of your post-lunch afternoon slump). When people are sick, controlled fasting can be the greatest cure as it allows your body to focus all of its energy on the problem. But regardless of your health, fasting diverts digestive energy towards the immune system, and many believe cell rejuvenation is facilitated and expedited. This could also explain why fasting is attributed to a slowing of "aging" and extended life expectancy. When fasting is incorporated into one's lifestyle, people experience a reduction in their metabolic rate, more efficient protein production, improved immune functioning, and increased growth and other hormone production. This attribute is what many "detox diets" have seized upon. Indeed, studies on mammals and other creatures (particularly earthworms) have shown that life expectancy increases with fasting -- so long as fasting is controlled and does not involve malnutrition. One study on worms showed that controlled fasting allowed an isolated worm to outlive its relatives by 19 generations -- which is the equivalent of a human living between 600 and 700 years. The same worms exhibited much more prolonged youthful traits as well -- whatever exactly that means for a worm.

Fasting also causes the body to use fat stores, etc. that may be holding certain unnatural environmental chemicals. Burning those stores releases the chemicals and allows them to pass through the body. This is one reason that water should never be avoided and it helps the body flush itself of toxins (same idea after a massage when muscles release toxins and drinking water is critical). Overall, fasting is a cleansing process. The body cleanses itself in every manner -- waste, blood, and on a cellular level if maintained long enough. "Juice fasts" are often utilized to aid in this function.

Many degenerative diseases have been shown to decrease with fasting. Tumors, for instance, begin a process of self-destruction during extended fasts. Some holistic practitioners also swear by fasting as a way to help aid with diabetes and a variety of other health problems. Can't hurt to try.

But it goes without saying that fasting should be done carefully and always in a controlled manner. Just as Muslims made exceptions to fasting (such as for travel), non-religious fasting should be done in moderation, and you should not exert a lot of energy during periods of fasting (such as sports, etc.). Depending on how long you fast, you should ease back into eating. Raw foods and a vegan diet are the best way to begin, adding heavier foods and animal products later on.

Interestingly, I'll just add that fasting has been attributed to a higher spiritual awareness. Perhaps this is why Muslims are encouraged to fast during their holiest month, and perhaps why agnostic raw foodists I know are nearly addicted to controlled fasting as a slowing down of their life and a time for reflection. Sadly I have to admit I've barely ever attempted fasting. But this has motivated me to try and work it into my life a bit :)

Real chocolate

I just finished my Gnosis Chocolate bar (pronounced "nosis") and thought I'd drop a little note about it here. Gnosis is a New York company started by the beautiful Vanessa Barg. All of their chocolates are handmade (meaning they use absolutely no machines whatsoever), raw, and vegan. Even those fancy chocolate bars you find at Whole Foods will often be filled with emulsifiers, have unnecessary dairy added, etc. None of that here. It's pretty well known now that chocolate is extremely good for you in moderation. The issue, though, is what's chocolate? A Hershey's bar is not, if you get my drift. Gnosis' products are. This is one of those things where we ate chocolate, industry and food companies took over and gave us a watered down, artificial version, and companies like Gnosis are giving us options to eat the real stuff. I highly recommend you seek it out, which is available at some Whole Foods, Hanna's Bretzel in Chicago, and on their website here.

Grass fed beef: Part II

My second experiment with grass fed beef occurred last night when I ate grass fed steaks with my parents. They live on the "northshore" of Chicago, which is sufficiently wealthy to have some specialty stores and grocery stores that care different products then many others in the Chicago area. I bought last night's meal at Sunset in Highland Park, where you can get a variety of different steaks, roasts, and ground meat. It is apparently not too difficult to find one brand of grass fed beef that has really done a great job infiltrating grocery stores and restaurants in the Chicago area. While I have yet to find it at any normal grocery store in Chicago, it is sold at Fox & Obel. The brand is owned by newsman Bill Curtis: Tallgrass. You can also read a NYT article on it here. My parents each had a strip steak and I had a boneless ribeye. Grass fed steaks cook a good 30% faster due to lower fat content. I was very worried I'd overcook them but overall they turned out well (the ribeye cooked a little slower as it had a little more fat). The meat had a bit of a gamey taste to it and I felt like I could taste the grass though my father disagreed. The steaks were not cheap (about $14 for a steak not much over half a pound) but no one at the table could eat more then half of theirs.

Tallgrass is available at a variety of nice to very nice restaurants in Chicago. Their website lists most of the restaurants that carry their product. Some grass fed beef is "finished" with corn (sometimes called "grain finished" or the like). This helps fatten up the cows before slaughter. It does, however, pose some of the very same problems with feeding cows corn their whole lives. Tallgrass, like many but not all grass fed brands, is 100% grass fed. Just something to keep an eye out for if you care.

How did I feel? Well I did have a lot of trouble falling asleep. I found this particularly ironic since raw foodists often say that when you eat your first big raw dinner you can't sleep because you have so much energy from all the nutrients. Well that never happened to me when I went raw but it did when I at a big steak. I take no pleasure in admitting this as someone who believes there are many benefits to raw and vegan diets (and few to carnivorious ones). Nonetheless the point of this blog is to be honest during this journey. Today I feel pretty good. Maybe a slight noticable increase in energy but honestly difficult to tell considering I didn't sleep well as I layed awake for hours.

The last thing I'll mention is how it felt eating it. Some vegetarians have commented to me that they couldn't get themselves to eat meat again because any "flesh" makes them nauseous. The burger was easy as it was hidden in bread and covered with condiments, lettuce, tomatoe and onions. I was worried about the steak. Frankly, it was easy. I didn't have any negative reaction and it brought back not so distant memories of what a good steak tasted like. So while everyone's different, I apparently can go back to meat pretty easily.

Eating in the Dark

This is my first post. A quick attempt to explain where I am coming from and why I am writing here.

Food has always been something I think about carefully and choose diligently. This most likely started before I can remember when my mom never let me eat fast food as my friends all dug their teeth into happy meals and the like. More recently, I can recall a desire to avoid processed foods -- chemicals I didn't recognize, high fructose corn syrup (that always struck me as suspicious), and so forth. I began thinking about meat and animal products really seriously in my mid-20s and by my late 20s I decided to become fully vegan. I was a strict vegan for a while and even attempted to pursue raw foodism. But strict veganism was exacting a cost too great at the time -- among the problems were that no one wanted to eat out with me, I found myself massively struggling to eat a decently healthy meal while traveling, and I was starting to not enjoy food since great restaurants were surefire disappointments when all I ended up with was some boring bowl of steamed veggies and rice. I decided to incorporate fish when eating out. If there was a vegan option I usually took it but more often then not at fancier restaurants I found my fork digging into fish (hopefully wild, but I don't pretend it always was). Then talking to other vegans and vegetarians, and continuing to read up on the subject, I decided to do some further experimenting. My energy levels were low and everytime someone asked: "So do you feel amazing eating vegan?" I'd hesitate, wanting to say yes but only able to answer: "Not really." So I came to the conclusion that I might try eating some meat again. Not any meat and not like before. But once in a while, being extremely picky about how I do it, I'd try it out, listen to my body, and go from there.

This started last night -- my teeth chewed beef for the first time in years.

I thought that at the very least I should pay close attention to myself and take notes. More substantially, I should probably make the time to keep a journal of sorts. And then it dawned on me -- I have spent so many hours looking into where to find the foods I want in Chicago, what to eat generally, and pursuing countless other related questions, that perhaps my journal should be public. Maybe someone else will hear my struggles and give suggestions -- or perhaps someone will read this and find it helpful. After all, with few exceptions, we never precisely know where our food comes from, or what went into growing and raising it, how exactly it was killed, and so forth.

Those of us who pay attention to food the way I do know we try to shine as much light onto the subject as possible -- or at least our plates -- but it never seems enough. Add to that the problem of living in the real world: big cities, long hours, travel, budgetary constraints. We are doing our best but we are all eating in the dark. Come sit in the dark with me.