How do you get over your addiction to cooked food?

[surfsteve]

I love eating raw fruit and meats but if I don't eat anything cooked, after a day I start going nuts. Like I'm going through some kind of withdrawal. I've been thinking about it for some time and I've come to the conclusion that I have an addiction to cooked food. How did you guys get over it? How long did it take before you no longer desired anything cooked or maybe actually became repulsed by it? How bad did your cravings get? Is there anything you would compare it to?

[TylerDurden]

Strictly speaking, one never gets over the addiction as cooked foods activate opioids in the brain thus engendering addiction. However, there are easy ways to avoid this such as buying much richer, nutrient-denser raw foods such as raw organ-meats, raw wild game etc. I was lucky in that I slowly lost all taste for all cooked animal foods pre-RPD diet, so it was easier for me.

[raw-al]

Congrats for taking the plunge!

There is lots of answers to this question in older threads. It's a normal question.

I did it cold turkey. Was a bit difficult as I was a vege for 23 years prior. I had about a 6 month acclimatization period where my digestion was sluggish. I suspect in retrospect that it would have been wise to make some sauerkraut or some other type of fermented food to ease the transition. Putting raw honey in with the foods certainly helped though.

The issue is that (as TD says) there is a certain amount of addiction to the cooked food as some sorts of bacteria thrive on it. Your body has about 10 pounds of bacteria in it. There is apparently more bacteria in your body than your cells and some PPL theorize that the reason humans have done so well with a DNA that is not particularly different than lower animals is that we have co-opted the DNA of the bacteria to do a lot of our digestion, disease fighting etc. However when you think about it this makes your body a community or large city with trillions of inhabitants and when you suddenly change whole neighbourhoods by a dietary change, you get a revolution. Hey we want that crap you were eating before and so out the pitchforks come...  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BGLGzRXY5Bw

Bread is a seriously addictive food, but I have gone cold turkey off of it and although it is subtle, I notice the improvement.

Some PPL do better easing in, like yourself.

Eating cooked food is not some sort of mortal sin. It's just better to eat raw and the the higher the percentage the better.

[surfsteve]

Hmm. When I think about it I guess I don't realize how far I've come. I've been on a 50% or more raw diet for some time now. I remember giving up grains. Sometimes I still crave them and it's been years. When I do I make sprouted wheat bread that I bake for 4 to 8 hours on my oven's lowest setting so in a way it's almost raw. Also I make my steaks so rare that they are actually raw in the middle. Probably close to what the paleo's ate when they discovered animals burned to death from a forest fire. I still cook pork and chicken all the way through though I don't eat that much of it. A well done steak actually grosses me out. I'm also starting to get tired of canned sardines. I think I eat them for the hot sauce (my favorite flavor) more than for the fish.

[dariorpl]

You can easily make all kinds of raw hot sauces. Hot peppers of all varieties, radishes, garlic, onion, ginger, mustard seeds, etc, etc

As far as the addiction part, I struggle with that too, especially when the quality and variety of my raw foods is lacking. And even though I went over 1.5 years without a bite of anything cooked, and over 2.5 years with only 1 cooked meal in between (that I had only for social reasons related to work), I recently "relapsed" and had about three months where initially I started having a bite of cooked foods here and there when out with friends, and realizing how amazing they taste, and eventually I got to the point where, for 1 or 1.5 months, about 50% of my food intake became cooked. I think I've got it under control now, but I still get cravings.

The type of cravings I get are always about food groups I'm not having in my raw diet. So right now I'm lacking dairy and sweets and starches and high fat content in my raw foods, so that's what I crave. I don't crave cooked steak or chicken because I have plenty of those raw.

I remember when I was just starting with this, 3 to 5 months in, I was craving cooked chicken like crazy, until I finally ate some raw chicken, and my craving for cooked chicken went away instantly. Before that, I didn't eat raw chicken because I couldn't find any with a decent enough quality (all I could get up til that point was factory farmed chicken)

I do pay the price for giving in to cravings. Headaches, heartburn, unhealthy weight gain (whether it's cooked fat or water, I can't say, but probably both), and other digestive problems, along with requiring more sleep which is of far lower quality, often waking up with blocked muscles (perhaps from an incorrectly finished REM sleep cycle) that only function at about 20% of normal strenght and coordination for some time.

[surfsteve]

As I mentioned in a post in another thread I'm beginning to think my craving for cooked food is more mental than physical. I wonder if the answer lies in some sort of mental exercise to tell myself and what that should be. According to the bible even god liked the aroma of burning flesh saying it was “a pleasing odor to the lord”. What a load of brain washing hooey!

[surfsteve]

Well after three days it happened. I started thinking about roasted pumpkin seeds and craving cooked food. I been thinking about it and it's possible that it's the salt I am craving. Most raw foods I eat I do not salt but I did use a lot of salt on the raw tartare I made and I haven't had any since early this morning around 12 hours ago. I tried eating some raw nuts instead of the pumpkin seeds and it just didn't hit the spot. I ordered some powdered salt that will stick to them but it wont be here for a couple days. I actually put some salt on a few of them and very carefully ate them without knocking it off and maybe the craving is going down a little bit. I'm thinking maybe I should experiment with putting salt on some of the raw foods I normally eat plain. Normally I start craving cooked food the next day but I made it three days so it might be worth holding out a little longer and consuming some extra salt to find out if that is what is causing the cravings and not so much cooked food like I originally thought. It's worth a try!

[Drengr]

I don't crave cooked foods in general, my main problem is sugar because I have a major sweet tooth.

[surfsteve]

It's probably worse than you thought. Unless you are addicted to raw fruit you have an addiction to both!. Sorry for the bad news.

[surfsteve]

I broke down and ate some smoked sausage last night. I had the worst nightmares. Come to think of it I've been having really good dreams lately. I thought it was due to juicing citrus with the peelings on but maybe some of it had to do with the fact that I've been eating so much raw food. Does raw food affect your dreams?

[surfsteve]

Another day and a half of 99% raw food and I think it's getting easier. I am still drinking coffee. That is where the 1% comes in.  Looking back my raw food consumption over the past week is up to about 90 percent. If it stays that way for a few months I will consider it a lifestyle change like the way I've been around 50% over the past year or two.  For the first time I am seriously considering giving away all of my chicken and pork and only eating raw beef and fish. I also have quite a few cooked nuts but I may just keep them to eat as junk food for my 10% cooked food potential long term goal along with canned sardines.

[surfsteve]

Wow today is already the 12th. I been eating over 99% raw still and even gave up coffee. It's getting easier and it's hard to believe I am coming up on a week already. It seems like it's only been a couple of days.  I thought I was really going to miss cooked nuts. Looking back I used to eat a lot of them. I don't eat near as many raw ones. I used to think of all nuts as being healthy but now I realize that smoke house almonds, roasted pecans and cashews fall into the potato chip category.

I am still eating the same amount of vegetables raw as I used to eat but find myself eating a lot more fruit. I thought the carbs would be fattening but instead I seem to have lost three pounds, which is good because my weight plateaued before after loosing nearly 30 pounds in the last year and a half on a half raw diet.

I've really acquired a taste for raw beef. Though I like it with some sort of lemon juice or raw vinegar. I'm thinking that maybe that will change after my dehydrator arrives and I start making beef jerky.

[surfsteve]

I don't know how long I'm going to stay on a raw food diet. It could be tomorrow or it could be for the rest of my life. I only started it to try but I feel pretty good on the diet so far and if anything the thought of cooked food grosses me out much like the way raw food used to.

Right this minute I don't feel addicted to cooked food but I can't honestly say what would happen if I went back to eating it for a  while. Maybe I would begin to crave it again. I honestly don't know.

About the only thing I crave for some reason is a cup of coffee after I've had a big meal of meat. Fruit seems to satisfy that. although fruit and meat according to the rules of food combining are a no no. I've paid attention to those rules for the past few years but am permitting myself to bread them, at least for now because I think it is much better than drinking coffee. Another thing that satisfies that craving is a nice big glass of cold water. Which is what I do most of the time.

Fruit and nuts is another thing I've taken up that goes against the rules of food combining. I had forgotten how good it tastes to eat an apple and alternate it with eating bites of raw cashews.

Though I'm still in the experimental stages of this diet I got a feeling it is a diet that I should stay on and that it will greatly benefit my life if I do.

I'm really enjoying it so far. Wish me luck in sticking to it!