the following is a concatenation of 3 e-mails (edited) on enzymes. I am
posting them simply in case some are interested here. If this
touches off a huge debate, I won't get involved as I am busy
on other projects (but others should feel free to discuss the below
if they wish). I had more material than is below, but deleted
a file while clearing away old files.

Tom Billings
====================================

Q: Is there any merit or value to the practice of cooking foods?

A: Some foods: none, whereas other foods benefit from cooking.

Enzymes are NOT alive, in anything but a vague metaphysical sense. They
are nothing but proteins, and are mostly (but not completely) destroyed
in the stomach (by stomach acid). Whether the small amount that survives
the stomach, is significant later in digestion, is unknown/uncertain.

Cooking is a trade-off, like other things in nature.

Cooking can reduce certain vitamins, make a few foods harder to digest.
Certain types of cooking create new, powerful toxins (e.g., BBQ meat).

But cooking also:
* makes starch more digestible by degrading the crystalline structure
* destroys many anti-nutrients that inhibit digestion, e.g. lectins,
hemagluttins, etc.
* softens coarse foods like kale, cauliflower so you can eat a nutritionally
significant amount of said foods (eating raw kale is akin to eating plastic
-
not very easy)
* make some foods more palatable, esp., starches and some bitter foods
that are not bitter when cooked.

So, cooking is not all bad, and raw is not all good. Foods should be
evaluated
on an individual basis.

Comment to clarify one point:

Enzymes are NOT the life-force
Enzymes are NOT alive

Additionally, enzymes do not meet the first pre-condition of life: the
ability, in general, to reproduce. When 2 enzymes meet, they don't
have sex and make a 3rd enzyme (and they don't split like simple
cels do, either). Enzymes are just chemicals, and the "live enzymes"
are a myth - a myth that I personally used to believe in and even
teach.

I'm afraid enzymes are over-sold and over-emphasized in the raw community.

Assumptions of the Live Enzymes School of Thought

Basically, the "eat raw foods because they contain enzymes" school of
thought is based on a set of assumptions (which are usually not stated
clearly, if they are stated at all).  The assumptions appear to be as
follows.

Note: my comments below are in brackets [*].

1. Raw foods contain many important enzymes used in your body  [varies by
type of food; not true for all foods/enzymes]

2. The enzymes in raw foods will survive digestion (stomach acid). [Only
tiny amounts of enzymes actually do survive the stomach, and reach the
intestines.]

3. The small amount of enzymes in 2 above that reach the intestines, will
be absorbed and assimilated by the human body. Further, this amount of
enzymes is somehow nutritionally significant  [little real evidence for
this assumption].

Tom Billings
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