Just starting out - some questions about food prep, UK suppliers & books

[maxscan]

Hi

I live in London and am looking to start adding raw meat to my diet but I have a couple of real newbie questions that are holding me back.

I'm completely convinced of the benefits of a raw food diet and via Dr Atkins & Dr Mercola / Nutritional Typing I have been eating a high meat, low carb diet for a long while now. I like my meat rare and always take the opportunity to eat sashimi or steak tartare if I find it in a decent restaurant but I'm a little concerned about making the jump at home, mainly because of a (highly irrational!) fear of food poisoning...

I've read various articles on this forum and on www.rawpaleodiet.com which I've found really helpful and encouraging but I just wanted to double check a few things:

1. from what I've figured out, I should just buy the best 100% grass-fed organic meat I can find, then simply open the pack, slice it up and eat it? That simple? No other preparation, washing etc? Apologies if this is a really naive question - I just have this niggling feeling that maybe I'm missing something, especially in the preparation / washing bit...

2. living in London there aren't that many good farms around here but I was thinking of either www.rothervalleyorganics.com (within driving distance) or Wild Beef when they're at Borough Market - has anyone tried them? Does anyone have any other recommendations? I'm based in Kingston (South West) if that helps?

3. when you're getting meat from a supplier do you tell them it's for eating raw? If so, would you expect them to take particular care with it or do something different? Wash the knives or chopping boards or something?

4. it seems most of the meat comes vacuum packed - should I keep it sealed until I want to eat it or should I take it out and store it some other way - I've read conflicting things about botulism, shelf life, storage open to the air etc.

5. is it worth me getting hold of a copy of Aajonus Vonderplanitz book (or any other book?) on this to help me with questions / guidance or should I just go for it and ask questions here as they come up?

I think that about covers it for now - apologies again if these are really naive newbie questions or if I've missed the answers elsewhere (and for being a bit of a hypochondriac!)

Thanks very much for your help,

Max

[miles]

If it is vacuum packed competently, I think you should leave it in as it keeps it fresh. Then again, if it's done badly you should probably get your money back.

I think it's better not to do any preparation with your meat, but just to bite off what you want to eat. That means you'll eat by appetite. You can eat as much or as little as you want(as opposed to just what you prepared), and what you do leave will stay fresher as it'll be more whole. When you take meat out of a vacuum pack it should smell fresh and appetising. If it's not, they haven't packaged it properly, or something else has gone wrong. However it will be dark. I don't know if it's just a visual thing, but I enjoy the meat more if I let it go a brighter red from exposing it to the air for a few minutes before eating.

Once it's out of the vacuum pack, what's left should be stored fairly open to the air. If it's going to be sitting on a surface on one side, some are better than others. Polystyrene for example is pretty good, but smooth ceramics are terrible. Also, placing more the skin/fat down with more of the meat up is best if that's an option.

[maxscan]

Hi Miles

Thanks for the quick reply!

So it is really that simple - straight out of the pack, straight into your mouth, nothing else in between?! I guess I do that with organic veg so why not meat but just wanted to be sure...

Btw - when you say 'eat by appetite' - I read some posts about raw meat being more nutrient rich so not needing as much - when I'm cooking I tend to go for 6-8 oz of meat twice a day plus veg (no grains / starchy veg) and some oils, nuts etc. - would I expect to eat much less than that raw?

Thanks again

[miles]

I don't know. I've only eaten Cooked meat+raw fruit/veg/nuts/seeds, and raw meat only. So I don't know what the difference would be if you continue to eat other stuff. When I started eating raw meat I stopped having desire to eat anything else, it all seemed inferior. When I ate cooked meat there was like a ying/yang hot/cold thing so I got the desire to eat raw to balance out the cooked or something.

My intake varies depending on the type of meat, the fat/meat ratio, my activity amongst other things. I've eaten from ~500g-1500g in one sitting(Almost always one meal per day).

[maxscan]

Fair enough - actually I can relate to the temperature thing even from cooked meat - I wouldn't for example eat cold sliced roast beef the next day with hot veg... Same with sashimi or steak tartare or carpaccio when I've had the chance to eat it - doesn't seem right with cooked food alongside.

So when you eat the raw meat you just tend to eat that, no veg or anything?

Also one meal a day?! Are you very active? I do a fair bit of various things - running, kung fu etc. Does one meal a day sort you out energy-wise? (I tend to be ravenous after training!)

[miles]

Well I have ~20minute walk each way to the supermarket to buy my food each day, which I sometimes run on the way there. I do judo twice/day during the week, although if something distracts me, sometimes I don't recover enough so I'll miss 1or2 sessions here and there. The first training is in the morning/early afternoon and the second is in the evening. I eat soon after the first.

Yeah I just eat raw meat, nothing else. When I eat, I eat to my hunger. After that, I don't feel like eating again until the next day. After the evening training, I sometimes get a slight hunger-like feeling, but if I actually do eat then, it doesn't taste nice and also I can't sleep for hours. When I ate cooked meat, my taste could not pick up on it properly, so I would eat at this late time and be up late into the night before I could sleep. Cooked meat tasted the same all the time. I ate mince, and I could eat any amount and the taste would be the same however much I ate, whenever I ate it. Raw meat however... If I'm hungry it tastes EXTREMELY nice, but if I'm not, it actually tastes bad. So when I start eating raw meat, hungry, it's delicious, and then there's a tipping point where I just don't want any more, and it's not because my stomach's bursting.

I wake up not hungry, but then after a few hours it starts to build. Then I eat, and don't feel like eating again until the same happens the next day. If I eat a small amount, then I'll want to eat again later, but it's much nicer to eat one satisfying meal.

[maxscan]

Ok - sounds like you're pretty active then!

And just noticed the ZC under your profile pic so I'm guessing that means just the raw meat! How did you end up at zero carb? Was it a conscious choice or just trial and error?

Out of preference I'm not a massive veg eater and even less fruit but it's always being drummed in to eat 5 a day or whatever so I try to be 'healthy'...

[miles]

I started trying to not eat fruit, as I could feel it was having negative effects on me. However, after eating cooked meat, I couldn't go long before I just felt like I had to have some juicy fruit. I felt much better in most ways if I could go without fruit, but then something was clearing missing because I just had this massive desire still for it. I thought that if I ate my meat raw, then maybe I would no longer have this desire for raw fruit. It worked, and I've been eating like that since.

[actionhero]

5. is it worth me getting hold of a copy of Aajonus Vonderplanitz book (or any other book?) on this to help me with questions/ guidance

Yes, get both books and the Primal Diet Workshop DVDs. They are filled with gold. Most of us here don't do raw dairy or vegetable juices but the rest of his stuff is top notch information.   

[maxscan]

Miles -
Hmm, yeah, listening to your body - I think I'm pretty clumsy at that at the moment - perhaps it's just learning to trust your instincts a bit more - I did the Nutritional Typing test and came out as a Protein Type, which fitted with previous experimentation on Atkins, and it's pretty specific about which veg I should be eating - mushrooms, cauliflower, avocado, asparagus, spinach - all things I used to love as a kid when I didn't think too much about food...

Fruit I'm totally with you - more or less all berries give me instant indigestion / heartburn, same with any citrus. Shame because they do taste quite nice!

Thanks for all the feedback by the way - really appreciate it.

Actionhero -
Thanks for the recommendation - I'd looked at the two but also noticed the different diet types in the forums so wasn't sure whether the advice had moved on - guess I can just choose the bits that apply...

I also can't tolerate even raw dairy - have found that out through trial and error. With raw veg it's a weird one - I like some but not loads - I had a medical checkup 6-8 months back and they had a strange machine to measure anti-oxidant levels (you put your hand over an ultraviolet light and lens and it worked something out) and got quite a low score despite being healthy in all other areas so have been trying to up the veg count for that reason...