On Sun, 28 Jan 1996, Michael Clingman wrote:
> What do people eat for the bulk of calories?  Salads all the time?
> Large amounts of nuts and avocados?  My idea was to eat lots of
> sprouts (for calories and protein) and some veggies.  But large
> amounts of sprouts a day seem bitter and a bit overwhelming.  How do
> you keep from having to eat constantly?

Well, I've found that if you stick to raw un-molested foods, you do end up
eating constantly, but I like that, so to each his own.  As far as
calories/protein/whatever - Perhaps it's just me, but my attraction to a
raw-foods diet is that it is more natural - eating gobs of sprouts does not
seem very natural, not for a higher primate like ourselves, anyways.  I eat
lots of fresh raw fruit in season, lots of fresh raw veggies.  I don't do a
lot of preparation, most fruits and some vegetables (carrots, celery,
cumcumber etc) don't need any.  I wouldn't call myself a real "raw-fooder"
but I definately think it's pointing in the right direction, and I know that
I feel *much* better after a few days of that than after a few days of more
cooked food.. (as I have been doing of late, given the cold and all)
However, I've found that even if I cook food, as long as I stick to whole
foods and avoid sugar and refined grains like the plague, I still feel
awesome from day to day, if perhaps a bit dried out after a while.

> Is there any way to make rice or other carbohydrates without cooking?
> Isn't white rice dead anyway, so does it matter?  (Can you sprout

White rice is whole brown rice stripped/polished of it's hull (?) making it
unwhole, unbalance, refined etc etc.  Dead/alive is irrelevant as far as I'm
concerned - white rice sucks.

> brown rice?  Is it alive?)  And similarly with tabouli and couscous -
> I've read that you can "cook" them in cold water, but I wonder about
> couscous especially - seems to me that they probably pre-cook it
> before they sell it to you.

I've found that lentils soften up just fine soaked a few hours, but I've
never really gotten into eating that way.  But I suppose if you really
wanted to.

> Are dried fruits kosher or not?  (Prunes, dates, raisins...)

Who determines whether they are kosher or not?  It's *your* diet - make your
*own* criteria and decide by them.  I hate it when people ask me what I am
"allowed" to eat - it's a small but important difference I tell them.  I can,
or am "allowed" to eat anything I want, from sirloin to asphalt, but I make
an effort to nourish my body and it is my firm belief that my body is not
best nourished on asphalt, mcdonalds, sugar, caffiene, to name some obvious
ones, so I avoid them accordingly.  NO ONE tells me what to eat - I would
hope most people who can see the logic in a "more raw" food diet can also
see the logic in that.

Happy noshing...

ps - fruits will make up for your calories handily, if you want to talk
numbers & nutrients - but better advice is to listen to your body.  If your
body tells you that lots of sprouts taste bad and are bitter, then don't eat
lots of sprouts.