Hi Raw-Al

Not entirely sure where I read this - I think possibly mercola.com but potentially other medical websites I read. You're absolutely right though, it does depend on the person but I think mainly down to skin type and pigmentation. There is a specific amount of sun you need depending on various factors such as skin type, time of day, latitude, cloud cover etc. in order to produce appropriate amounts of vitamin d - anything after that is not necessary. In some places, at some times of year, that could mean spending the whole day in the sun, in other places at other times of year it could be 10 or 20 minutes, even if you're dark skinned. Getting burned is bad for you but the easiest solution is to get out of the sun - the point about being in the sun when it's at its most intense is to do with getting balanced UVA and UVB rather than with getting really strong sun or large amounts of sun.

I came across a sun exposure calculator a while back, created by the Norwegian Institute for Air Research, that can help you work out how much time you need in the sun depending on where you are in the world, time of day, skin type etc. See my post here: http://www.rawpaleoforum.com/general-discussion/how-much-time-do-you-spend-in-the-sun-each-day-and-other-associated-thoughts/msg40650/#msg40650

So, I don't want that intense? Is it that my body can't utilize that high of intensity and it is actually doing damage? Is this just anecdotal or is there some science behind this?

From what I've read you do want that intense. Something to do with UVA & UVB - for vitamin d production you want UVB but this is much more easily blocked / scattered by atmospheric pollution - between 10am and 2pm the sun is more directly overhead so you get much more UVB. UVA can be dangerous if you get too much of it in isolation - there's some speculation that the rise in skin cancer is due to working behind glass - window glass blocks the UVB but the UVA gets through so you get an unbalanced dose and skin cancer...

It sounds like your grandmother picked a perfect spot! I love the mountains - got into them via skiing / snowboarding but it's the space and scale that brings me back every year, just so good for your head space and makes you feel glad to be alive. The sea has a similar effect on me though unfortunately I've had several ear surgeries since age 13 and I can't really get them wet so it's difficult to fully appreciate - before that happened you couldn't get me out of the water.

Vienna to Ventimiglia - that's quite a drive, though as you say some pretty spectacular scenery on the way. As you go further south in Italy the landscape really changes and it has a different feel about it, especially from Rome down. By the time you get to Sicily it's like you've gone back in time 100 years and you're in North Africa, very different flora & fauna. A really nice country for a road trip or a long train journey...

Thanks for the LFM tip by the way, had a look at the website and will definitely check out the Twickenham & Wimbledon ones - I've tried Borough Market but I think I'd need a 2nd job to shop there regularly!

Cool! I went skiing some years back in Limone and since then I've always fancied the coast along there as a perfect spot for a holiday home as you are really near the mountains but also the sea there is supposed to be good & clean.

Where my mum's family are from you're about 45 minutes from a beach (Lignano) but it's the Adriatic so it's a very green sea and often quite dirty, and the drive up to the mountains takes a good couple of hours... (though they're the Dolomites and breathtakingly beautiful)

What made you choose Liguria? Have you travelled much around the rest of Italy?

I did a raw food dinner for some friends the other night. They are not RAFers but they do all like their food. I think because they can see I'm looking really healthy after only a couple of months doing this and because they know I'm a bit out there with food & diet they gave me a chance.

To make it as easy as possible for them I chose 'restaurant' dishes they might be familiar with - started with oysters, then a monkfish ceviche, then a raw take on a 'tagliata' (an Italian dish, thinly sliced sirloin or ribeye with flakes of unpasteurised parmesan, rocket and some garlic, rosemary & olive oil) and finally a raw cheeseboard & raw honeycomb for dessert.

Doing the more familiar dishes helped them relax and by the third course they were in the kitchen with me trying chunks of suet and the fat trimmed off the sirloin! (though the wine may have helped...)

I think the key is to treat it as normal yourself and other people will more likely accept it without questioning - if you are unsure or nervous that gets communicated. The other thing I find is it helps to have some science to back it up - things like the role of enzymes and ease of digestion, the differences in bacteria found in grass-fed vs grain fed meat, the fact that the body releases white blood cells in response to cooked food and not to raw etc. these sorts of little snippets are easy to accept and can allow people to go with it.

I also really liked GoodSamaritan's post the other day http://www.rawpaleoforum.com/important-info-for-newbies/at-least-127-million-people-eat-raw-meat-every-single-day!/ - just point them at that - how can anyone argue?!

Ah ok, will ignore it from now on then - there are often little bits of kidney attached too - I haven't tried raw organ meat yet so I guess that could be a gentle introduction!

I've been quite lucky with the butcher in that they just give me the suet as they'd only throw it away normally - although I do spend a bloody fortune on the grass-fed beef so I guess they're still doing ok!!

Hi Susan, Tyler

Thanks for the clarification - and I had in indeed forgotten about Bechamp's work that AV raises - so, would this be better:

• Bacteria are not a cause of disease but instead a sign of an unhealthy environment - any breakdown they perform is actually a cleansing function.
• If one's system is healthy, naturally occurring bacteria will not thrive to the extent that they will cause problems - it is only when the individual is unhealthy that bacteria will perform a cleansing function which is mistaken as the 'disease' itself.
• Eliminating bacteria may allow an unhealthy body to continue functioning longer but eventually the body will break down because the 'disease' is still there, it is just no longer being highlighted by the presence of bacteria. This break down is what we commonly understand as chronic disease.

(effectively I'm paraphrasing what Susan said I think...)

All this said, Tyler's last point about aged cooked foods confuses me a little in that these will likely make one ill (and I assume this is because of the bacteria) so I have trouble finding an explanation that fits with the above.

I'm guessing the fact that the food is cooked makes it an unhealthy environment and this is why bacteria thrives? Also it is an unnatural environment and perhaps because of this stronger or mutated forms of bacteria thrive and your body cannot regulate this type of bacteria and, because they are stronger, they are more likely to cleanse healthy tissue? Or perhaps it's the large numbers of bacteria and these overwhelm the body's controls?

So... this makes me wonder if there is an element of acclimatisation to bacteria if one has only recently started eating raw - in that their body is likely in need of cleansing and so perhaps some care should be taken with exposure to bacteria until the body has (re)learned / is healthier and therefore able to regulate bacteria so the cleansing process doesn't go unchecked?

Apologies if I'm being over-complicated - I realise I am fairly new and therefore have quite a bit of residual fear of bacteria as a result of years of conventional thinking (& scaremongering cleaning product advertisers!) - it just seems to me that in certain circumstances bacteria can still pose a danger to humans and so perhaps should be avoided in those cases whether because they are in large concentration or of a different form to that found under natural conditions... does that sound right?

I read up on this as I was confused that eggs were stored unrefrigerated in the supermarket but on the box it says to store them refrigerated when you get them home...

Basically, the explanation I found was that eggs are quite sensitive to changes in temperature and so in a supermarket, which is typically air conditioned and at a constant temperature, it is fine to keep eggs unrefrigerated, however when you get them home, because most homes aren't refrigerated and you might, for example, put them in a cupboard next to the oven or boiler or whatever, the advice is to refrigerate them because that's the closest thing to a temperature controlled environment.

This would fit with what AV says in that refrigerating the eggs and then removing them would be a couple of big fast temperature changes. That said I always keep mine in a cupboard that is not near anything that gives off heat so I think they stay pretty constant or temperature changes are very gradual.

I'm eating salt marsh lamb suet at the moment - I tend to chop it up and then sometimes dip it in paprika or cumin for a little flavour otherwise yes, it can be a bit bland. Don't really like it mixed in with meat as the chewiness stops me wolfing down the steak!

Actually, I do have a question about suet - when I get it from the butcher it's sometimes covered in blood from where it's been cut away. If I'm eating it then and there that doesn't bother me but usually I keep some of it for the next few days - at that point is it better to rinse the blood off? I just wonder if blood goes 'bad' in some way easier than meat?

I get eczema - at the moment on my right hand and both wrists - due to food intolerance / allergy / candida - mainly gluten but dairy too...

I use apple cider vinegar diluted 1:1 with filtered water and bathe the areas of damaged skin. It might sting a bit but after a couple of minutes it stops the itching and then over the next half hour or so it dries out the dead skin so you can brush it off, helps to seal any weeping skin and generally soothes the area. Then after about an hour I moisturise and leave it for a while before repeating the cycle when it starts to get itchy again.

Has really helped me manage it while I'm sorting out my diet / candida

I've had a couple of food intolerance tests over the last few years and in the last one I came up as intolerant to all the land meats they tested apart from chicken - I think my gut lining was f**ked...

Since going raw I've been eating mainly grass-fed beef and fish - it doesn't seem to affect me at the time but the reactions can be delayed by several hours so I'm not sure whether it still affects me eaten raw - the lab said they test the blood sample with raw organic ingredients to avoid false readings from pesticides, hormones etc. and also it strikes me that they're testing the blood directly rather than with digested raw meat...

My feeling (hope) is that eating raw is leading to better digestion so less problems - my only concern is that eating the beef might stop the healing of the gut wall - does anyone have experience with intolerance and gut wall damage? Would it be better to avoid the beef entirely or will it heal anyway if I eat a better diet?

Hi GS, thanks for the tip - I've been wondering about the sanitising thing - I've actually been rinsing my meat & fish before eating, in the same way I would rinse an apple or whatever because my feeling is that I don't know how it's been handled so it might have some other, not so good, bacteria on it...

Do you sanitise all food or just prawns / seafood? Do you always use vinegar and does it leave a taste?

I do wonder if rinsing with water really does anything...

A while back I came across this sunlight / vitamin D calculator:

http://nadir.nilu.no/~olaeng/fastrt/VitD-ez_quartMED.html

It was developed by the Norwegian Institute for Air Research and it calculates the amount of exposure you need to produce 25mcg / 1000 IU of vitamin D.

Takes into account date, time, location, skin type, cloud cover, altitude etc.

You need to put lat / long values in - you could just look at these pages:

US cities: http://www.realestate3d.com/gps/latlong.htm
World cities: http://www.realestate3d.com/gps/world-latlong.htm

Alternatively you can get them from Google maps if you put a place in, then click the 'link' button upper right, then scroll along in the first line 'Paste link in email or IM' - you'll see something like this:

maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=SE1+1TL&sll=53.800651,-4.064941&sspn=17.937521,39.506836&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=London+SE1+1TL,+United+Kingdom&t=h&z=16

The bit in red is your lat & long values... (for where the red balloon icon is)

Hope this helps...