>From:	"Roy P D'Souza" <[log in to unmask]>
>In his book "Instinctive Nutrition", Severen Schafer explains
> how eating cooked eggs raises one's serum cholesterol levels,
>while eating them raw actually  lowers them. He claims that
> this is because an enzyme that  occurs in raw eggs is
>absent after cooking. (Since I don't have the book with me
> right now, I can't supply the name of this magic enzyme.)

Roy,
There is something about a missing substance in raw eggs (a B
vitamin? choline?) which can cause a deficiency if too many are
consumed.  But for some reason cooked eggs are O.K. (this applies to
the whites of the eggs only).  Or it may be that if you eat taw egg
whites it will cause a deficiency of choline or something.  I think
that is it.  This is all I can remember.  Maybe if I ate a couple of
eggs I could recall it.

>If this raw egg claim were true, it might be the case that
> our protein/carb/fat  equation for optimal health holds only for
>a cooked, enzyme-free food. Perhaps we need to dissect what
>exactly it is about protein that shortens one's
>life span. Is it the wear and tear due to "dirty burning" of
> calories, the  consequent uric acid, or is it the cholesterol that
> accompanies most commonlyconsumed high-protein sources?

As Kurt or somebody noted, essentially all the experimental data
comes from denatured foods used in labs.  But we still have a lot of
human anecdotal records, & the stuff on Eskimos I just posted
addresses this, as do a lot of other anecdotes (both human &
animal).  There is little question that protein is big-time bad,
cooked or raw. I just don't have much time this week, but I'll try
to post some stuff next week to back this up.  Cholesterol I would
not worry about.  It is only in the past century that heart disease
even showed up, & anybody on a raw diet should be fine. Cholesterol
is required for life, & synthesized in the body.

>By the way, thanks for the pointer to the glycemic index infor
>mation on the vrc page!

Roy, it has been a while since I read their WWW pages, but I think a
lot on this list might like you to summarize what is there if you
have the time.  Their pages are well worth reading, & they are
always putting up new stuff which is generally real solid work & of
interest to anybody who wants technical details.  Read their one on
carotenoids, & how something like 600 are KNOWN now, & who knows how
many will be discovered in the future.  The underlying theme of
their stuff is: wouldn't it be nice to eat all raw & get all these
wonderful substances, but since we [read: THEY] can't do this then
we will go out & extract them so we can sell them in pills.

--Doug Schwartz
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