Glycogen in muscles/short bursts of energy on zero carb

[achillezzz]

Sounds great Achileziz!  Ill get right on that Grains, Dairy and Sugar breakfast! That sounds like an absolutely fantastic way to start the mornings!
but wait!
Some cooked chicken for lunch? FANTASTIC! mabye all those stomach cramps will be making me pump my legs faster during sprints!

How many weeks do i have to eat desert for breakfast before i start to notice my althaleticism gaining in leaps and bounds?!

I just explained the thing with oats...

But hey honey and milk? in raw form those are miracle foods man...

[proteus]

now wtf is wrong with soaked oats?

why would anybody want to eat oats ?

honey and milk? in raw form those are miracle foods man...

you seem to be stuck in the traditional Russian diet way of thinking.  you probably also eat 3 meals a day starting with soup.  you're like my parents.  all my father eats is oats, honey and "sgushenka"

[achillezzz]

no lol I have 2 workouts a day I need carbs fuck sgoushonka

[cliff]

Oats are a horrible food, loaded with PUFAs and not raw(I assume you eat the rolled oats? which are steamed).  If your gonna eat cooked carbs Underground storage organs are by far the best option.

FYI soaking oats doesn't do anything, especially if you using rolled oats as oats are very low in the Phytase enzyme.

[proteus]

no lol I have 2 workouts a day I need carbs fuck sgoushonka

to be honest i find it hard to think of any good raw source of starch ( glucose polymers ) other than bananas.  if anybody has any ideas i would be interested too.

[KD]

well, there seems to be a little more than 'carb-phobia' to this concept

there are some actual prejudices against the components of plant carbs (fructose, fermentation of fresh fruit, in-adaptability to grains or whathaveyou) then you have the basic macro-nutrient concerns.

These would not only include criticism of high carb diets (regardless of source) but more importantly for many people this would mean not efficiently breaking down fats (and proteins to a lesser degree) as fuel, making a diet that depends on the nutrition and raw materials of large quantities of animal based foods to be fairly inefficient for even basic energy concerns - nevermind serious performance.

If one is not limiting carbs to whatever magic number is agreed upon 0g, 30g, 100 g etc..then essentially no matter what the makeup of the diet, the way their body processes energy is akin to a SWD diet or veg diet or any other diet. Being low in carbs at that point would then be providing not only a lesser amount of energy for physical activity but would result in the same kind of uncomfortable symptoms of a SWD (and quicker) when these stores are depleted. The advantage then of eating very little or any plant carbs would then be the eventual efficient conversion of the fats they consume (minus carbohydrates) as usable energy. Theres plenty of other arguments re blood sugar and other things but essentially after carb intolerance or whatever this seems to be the major reason for limiting carbs.

the actual science and practice will show that carbs are the only non-essential macro-nutrient, while its impossible with whole food to construct a diet that contains no protein or fat.


now this doesn't account too well for some of the possible issues of micro nutrient deficiency, absorption of high meat/fat diets, or practicality of long term practice for modern humans that might have damaged organs and glands and so forth or poor quality meat..nor does it account for the fact that carbs (specific kinds) seem to provide the mechanism for manipulating circumstances in the body, allowing it to perform and grow to degrees it probably would not eating just meat and fat in nature with whatever seasonal carbs might be available.

---

unless I switched my diet radically, I probably wouldn't eat oats myself, but this idea that you are going to replace oats with raw foods and have skyrocketing performance or even health is just incorrect. Theres massive amounts of research in raw food camps to paleo nutrition into what types of foods are damaging to the body or better at providing the right kinds of components for muscle gain. Even in the raw camps from all the long term raw vegan practitioners to Primal Diet to cooked paleo/primal camps will agree that even processed starches can be less damaging than fresh fruits. Also worth noting is clearly when you look at anyone in the athletic fields they are not even remotely engaged in some of the suggested practices as far as their optimal performance. You could inject whatever 100% raw person you like with steroids and HGH and I can pretty much guarantee if they are eating just within the categories of fruits and meats that they will not ever grow to the size of a competitive bodybuilder..perhaps not even an "all natural" bodybuilder who knows all the other tricks of such manipulations.

Basically this idea that one is going to avoid 'toxic' food and both their performance and health will increase is just as wrong. If the body doesn't have the right components to actually detoxify and build new materials...and is constantly engaged in the same kinds of insulin type reactions as people on SWD diet then its just as possible that all these raw materials are just stirring around old wastes in the body and not helping the situation any more than a bunch of oats. In fact eating as bunch of dense crappy food seems to keep the majority of the population at a pretty even homeostasis where they can build muscle and things quite well albeit probably at some long term expense.

[cliff]

whatever seasonal carbs might be available.

Carbs are always available in the tropics and even most temperate climates and they can be stored for prolonged periods. I.E. underground ground storage organs and certain fruits like baobab

long term raw vegan practitioners to Primal Diet to cooked paleo/primal camps will agree that even processed starches can be less damaging than fresh fruits.

Who says this and what is it based on?  Are they claiming white flour is better then fruit because it has no simple sugars?? 

Basically this idea that one is going to avoid 'toxic' food and both their performance and health will increase is just as wrong.

Carbs aren't toxic... 

[KD]

Who says this and what is it based on?  Are they claiming white flour is better then fruit because it has no simple sugars??  

It isn't a 1:1 thing as in eating ONE piece of fruit vs 1 ounce of bread but how how foods over time effect the body and how much. As for individuals..pretty much everyone who has ever wrote on nutrition or performance including the the entire low fat movement except Natural Hygienists. Aajonus, Kurt Harris, Mark Sisson, Gabriel Cousens, Brian Clement, Fred Bisci, all the ZC 'gurus', conventional medicine, a large section of athletes and strength trainers etc...will agree in the very least that this is a relative issue based on how much of each you were speaking of. For the more scientific and study minded in the raw community who analyze how the body is effected by raw food/cleansing etc...its based on how certain foods effect the bodies internal terrain through various research and blood tests and peoples actual results when not thriving on such diets....even as opposed to other diets (even other vegan diets sharing similar deficiencies) high in processed food and grain foods.

Carbs aren't toxic...  

never said they were. I implied those who pursue the ideas of avoiding toxic foods without considering of how to actually remove toxins from the body will remain perpetually confused as to why many people can live long healthy lives free of most of this 'knowledge' not to mention totally burn them on athletic performance.

it really matters little if carbs are 'toxic', only if there are advantages for restricting them. If people don't care about those/don't believe in those, threres certainly plenty of carb options for people that live in today's world..whether they live in the tropics or not. Personally I think vegetables and fruits are fairly free of 'toxins' other than whatever environmental factors of which they are grown, the contemporary (non caveman/islander) body just seems to have alot going on that doesn't always seem to benefit from such foods in the way we think.


anyway, this is a performance thread


for something diametrically opposite to what I just said above

here is probably the ideal if one was to eat without discrimination to carbs and wanting their best results. yes it is this complicated


"In an ideal situation, I’d like to place approximately 80% of the day’s total calorie intake in the post workout window. As a consequence, the pre-workout meal is often the “fast breaker” on workout days. For the pre-workout meal I usually recommend a meal consisting of an equal carb/protein ratio – for example, 50-60 g carbs, 40-50 g protein and some fat for taste (about 500 kcal total). The goal of this meal is to provide satisfaction, provide enough carbs to fuel the workout, and maximize protein synthesis for the workout (another reason for the high protein intake is to induce satiety).

One of my typical pre-workout meals may consist of 8 oz lean meat with veggies or potatoes and a large apple. A bit of fructose might mediate the effect of the post-workout feeding, since liver glycogen is beneficial to hormones involved in anabolism, therefore the fruit. Keep in mind that the pre-workout meal is dependent on training volume, but I’ve found that these general guidelines work for most people doing moderate volume resistance training (about 10-15 sets of 6-10 reps, per workout, in total). Athletes and others, subjecting themselves to a greater training load than the average weight trainer, require different pre-workout guidelines.

The post workout meal is, ideally, a high carb, moderate protein and low fat feeding. This is what I have found most beneficial in terms of maximizing growth, recovery and limiting whatever extra fat might get stored during hyper caloric conditions. The absolute majority of carbs should be starch based, since we want carbs that gets stored as muscle glycogen primarily, but as noted before, some fructose might also be beneficial to allow for muscle growth processes to occur. The post workout meal should be the largest of the day and you may split your remaining calorie intake as you see fit. I usually have two substantial meals post-workout; one directly following the workout and another one an hour before going to bed."

Martin Berkhan

http://hbfser.wordpress.com/2011/02/17/the-exercises-that-count-what-the-top-minds-say/

[cliff]

Aajonus, Kurt Harris, Mark Sisson, Gabriel Cousens, Brian Clement, Fred Bisci, all the ZC 'gurus', conventional medicine, a large section of athletes and strength trainers etc

All these people eat fruit though and none eat processed carbs.  There is no scientific evidence or real life evidence that processed carbs>fruit.  Robert Lustig the authority on fructose thinks there is nothing wrong with eating very large quantities of fruit.  Unless your a total fructose phobe I don't get how anyone could ever claim that processed carbs are better then fruit.  I guarantee you that if 811ers did processed carbs instead of fruit they would be majorly fcked.

[TylerDurden]

All these people eat fruit though and none eat processed carbs.  There is no scientific evidence or real life evidence that processed carbs>fruit.  Robert Lustig the authority on fructose thinks there is nothing wrong with eating very large quantities of fruit.  Unless your a total fructose phobe I don't get how anyone could ever claim that processed carbs are better then fruit.  I guarantee you that if 811ers did processed carbs instead of fruit they would be majorly fcked.

  Quite correct. Most RVAFers find that eating raw fruits is far healthier than eating processed carbs.

As for Aajonus, he used to recommend a little cooked starch to slow down detoxing, but doesn't any more.

[KD]

heh... well I can tell you for sure that many of these people eat some processed carbs including the only people that generally disagree that there are any problems with eating modern fruits or claim to eat all or mostly fruit.

To me there is nothing wrong with eating fruit. I believe there is something wrong with the idea that just because it can be guessed that our ancestors ate something that this food is AUTOMATICALLY appropriate for all contemporary peoples in all circumstances. I particularly think that when we are talking about performance..which is essentially an issue of manipulation of materials weighed against risk. Also on top of that...with the original foods of our ancestors and how they might have eaten one has to account for the qualities and types of things available today and labeling them as being 'natural foods'.

Interesting enough I have lived in the tropics and grown fruit in one of the highly most dense fruit growing areas with a variety of artificially abundant growing and even jumping into other peoples property there is many times in the year where there is not enough fruit in season for 1 person..never-mind 100s of people that are non-nomadic.

Fructose is really a small piece of the puzzle. I have met a large portions of long term soy eating processed food eating vegans and i'd say few of these people are as ill as many high fruit eaters I have met. At that point it has little to do with carbs or no carbs..but exactly what all the raw figureheads above will tell you which is that these raw foods can feed all kinds of internal problems and incite issues that traditional carb based diets do not even when they also see those as bad. Some of these raw leaders might not eat white flour but they do eat grain based foods. Aajonus seems to have been big on white flour at least in the past and I have read some cooked paleo teachings that considers white rice superior to brown etc (of course both being 'bad')..

anyway, I don't really care who or what science acknowledges this. I think the health people actually exhibit or not speaks a lot to these things.

 but yeah I think in general it would benefit a lot of people to try to figure out why and what results people get from doing things..rather than try to debunk them through some kind of 'understanding' of what may or may not happened millions of years ago.

like for me, I'm not so convinced about liver cleanses and that sort of thing, but I have the mindset where if someone could document what they did and show me images of the stones and medical sign off as to being actual thing from their liver..i'm not exactly going to go around saying theres no epson salt trees in nature of where they would extract enough olive oil to do such a thing.

so yeah to me I am more interested in the advantages or risks involved in eating very low or no carb diets and not so much whether the rationalizations behind these things have to do with certain possible myths around fructose or processed/nonprocessed kind of stuff.

[TylerDurden]

No, Aajonus only recommended a little cooked starch, solely  in order to slow down  detox, hardly a sign that he thought it was a health-food  . He did NOT recommend it as a staple, and has since discontinued this advice, for obvious reasons re health.

Personally, I would rather take GS's word for it re the sheer abundancy of fruit in tropical areas. Most people foolishly assume that, despite the fact that the vast majority of the world's surface is now highly "managed" by humans, that  the wild areas of modern times are somehow reminiscent of what they were like in palaeolithic times, which is , of course, laughable.

[KD]

actually the above is not true in that he still prescribes some cooked starch to certain individuals as with the nut-formulas and similar things and this is as a type of detox and not to slow down detox.

also worth noting is Aajonus has not wavered from recommending a single fruit a day on average (expect for certain circumstances) in like 30-40 years.

all the other people mentioned that are in the raw community have 40+ years experience as practitioners seeing 10,000s of raw foodists some with records of 100,000s of people on various diets in regards to blood work. Robert Young having the most recorded data saying he has never seen healthy blood of a higher fruit eater and that its basically mutated and diseased. I've had physical conversations with other people in the movement for decades who say the same things. You cannot continue denying these statistics without actually doing the research and contacting these people and hearing what they have to say.

You have never met a single one of these so called rvafers or attribute any sensible assessment any sensible person would believe as to what is healthy and what is not..relying entirely on adherence to a raw diet as a sign of 'success' in how toxic a person is. The very fact you accept massive amounts of 'evidence' you have read or heard off the internet merely from other individuals say so is actually what is unacceptable. All of these people I mentioned including AV see tons of people and make the concluions that they make. One doesn't have to agree with them but to say that some unknown people who aren't presenting their actual statistics or evidence debunk their notions is ridiculous.

GS buys food at markets. there isn't sustainable wild uncultivated food anywhere for even the smallest populations. I bet there is not a single RAW vegetation farm in the Philippines with is entirely self sustainable for even just the people that run it.  Any speculation of the past is just speculation. If there is a dearth in fruit production when there is acre after acre of diversified tropical fruit plants then I suspect even in the most wild humid areas that there would be periods with no fruit and the body would be forced to go into some horrid ketosis will all kinds of terrible symptoms from lacking carbs....Also as I experienced..the most unkempt wild fruit areas that are unsprayed are mostly filled with rotted decomposing fruit and insects.

---

 Even the high fruit promoters would say that eating sustainable amounts of fat (anything over a very low percent) inhibits sugar absorption and feeds fungal issues. Therefore by that definition its unhealthy to consume more than small amounts of fruit on diet that includes animal foods. Even if they are wrong there, the issue at hand is that if one is eating large ammounts of animal fats for health it doens't make sense to then eat any more than very lowest maintenance levels of carbs for basic health or physical performance because at whatever breaking point they won't be able to function as well doing so, making it fairly non-productive.

[proteus]

the problem KD with trying to squeeze all your protein post workout is that muscle recovery begins roughly 3 hours after workout and lasts for weeks.

i like to focus my protein and carb intake post workout simply because that's when insulin sensitivity is likely to be shifted towards the muscle so the muscle will absorb the food like a sponge before it can get stored as fat.

but the muscle will continue to need protein around the clock for weeks for the recovery to complete.  so i use protein all the time, i just use MORE of it post workout.

Ronnie Coleman didn't use any post workout shakes but he had 7 meals a day or so each consisting of basically a truck load of chicken with something starchy like grits.  in other words he was growing around the clock rather than just post workout.

[KD]

the problem KD with trying to squeeze all your protein post workout is that muscle recovery begins roughly 3 hours after workout and lasts for weeks.

I agree.

I'm not personally a huge supporter of IF. It was more an illustration that even for people who choose to eat carbs there is all this complicated shit to how food interacts in the body. It's not a matter of supplying adequate calories or other concepts you see thrown around.

I tend to eat 3-4 meals a day including fat and some proteins perhaps a smaller 'meals' of plant foods, eggs things like that. I might eat more or less frequency if I was trying for some kind of goal. At the moment I ted to think its only a small amount of protein that is necessary and that carbs don't combine very well with proteins (obviously not in line with Martin's stuff.) I think clearly my diet is not the most efficient for athletics, but it seems to be for the time being the best way to build health and to make some fairly significant gains in regards to such things.

your body uses protein not just to rebuild muscle but all kinds of processes including healing and repair on the more microscopic level. Whatever advantages of IF..the body is resting but not necessarily providing the materials it needs to create healthful processes. It will burn fat and other things when on a carb/protein based diet so that seems to be a motivator for many people - probably not raw folks. Its also one of those things that of course is incredibly rational as part of nature...when talking about truly healthy humans..although even then probably not yield the most athletic bodies.

anyway this is supposed to be about whether people can perform certain types of feats on next to no carbs. So again it seems to be not a question of whether this is something that is necessary for survival or that everything else is wrong but whether it is something that works. The science and peoples experience seems to suggest that when you eat more than some set minimum of carbs that it ceases to burn fats efficiently as its fuel and from a performance level that your body will not have consistent energy and wll store some combination of fats and carbs as fat if not targeted intelligently like the way athletes do. Being raw some people might not experience any kind of weight gain or whatever but that doens't mean they using the energy from the fats they eat efficiently..which one can find out very easily by removing most carbs on an extended trial and eating whatever they believe to be an abundant calorie level from fat.

[TylerDurden]

actually the above is not true in that he still prescribes some cooked starch to certain individuals as with the nut-formulas and similar things and this is as a type of detox and not to slow down detox.

Yet in the closed primal diet yahoo group, it has been mentioned by his acolytes that Aajonus recommends cooked starches in order to slow down detox.Seems schizophrenic of Aajonus. I'll check back with them to see what their verdict is as several actually know Aajonus personally.

all the other people mentioned that are in the raw community have 40+ years experience as practitioners seeing 10,000s of raw foodists some with records of 100,000s of people on various diets in regards to blood work. Robert Young having the most recorded data saying he has never seen healthy blood of a higher fruit eater and that its basically mutated and diseased. I've had physical conversations with other people in the movement for decades who say the same things. You cannot continue denying these statistics without actually doing the research and contacting these people and hearing what they have to say.

  No doubt, just like with Aajonus, this data cannot be obtained without paying some million dollars to a mysterious owner of the documents etc. *Sigh* It's not wise to spout such nonsense claims, when they are easily disproven just by contacting a raw vegan long-termer like DurianRider or the multitude of raw omnivores here who do fine on plenty of raw fruits as long as they are eating some raw meats as well.

You have never met a single one of these so called rvafers or attribute any sensible assessment any sensible person would believe as to what is healthy and what is not..relying entirely on adherence to a raw diet as a sign of 'success' in how toxic a person is. The very fact you accept massive amounts of 'evidence' you have read or heard off the internet merely from other individuals say so is actually what is unacceptable. All of these people I mentioned including AV see tons of people and make the concluions that they make. One doesn't have to agree with them but to say that some unknown people who aren't presenting their actual statistics or evidence debunk their notions is ridiculous.

That, of course, is an outright lie as I have actually met a few RVAFers in person. Not many, as I am in the UK, of course, but that means nothing. I have also communicated with multitudes of people via private e-mails over a long period, and also on other rvaf diet groups, so I am rather more sure of my position than you are.Besides, the whole point of rawpaleoforum is that gurus like Aajonus are wholly misguided on many issues such as raw fruit amounts, raw dairy etc., and that their claims are often at odds with what the RVAF diet community, as a whole, experience.

GS buys food at markets. there isn't sustainable wild uncultivated food anywhere for even the smallest populations. I bet there is not a single RAW vegetation farm in the Philippines with is entirely self sustainable for even just the people that run it.  Any speculation of the past is just speculation. If there is a dearth in fruit production when there is acre after acre of diversified tropical fruit plants then I suspect even in the most wild humid areas that there would be periods with no fruit and the body would be forced to go into some horrid ketosis with all kinds of terrible symptoms from lacking carbs....Also as I experienced..the most unkempt wild fruit areas that are unsprayed are mostly filled with rotted decomposing fruit and insects.

Wrong again, or perhaps "nearly right" as some very amusing US-based teachers like to say instead. GS has pointed out how abundant wild fruit is in his country and how he uses it from time to time:-
http://www.rawpaleoforum.com/omnivorous-raw-paleo/share-your-typical-menu-for-the-day/10/?wap2

Simply put, all your foolish claims are based on the here and now, so have absolutely no validity. One only has to look at the Czernobyl area re wildlife documentaries to see just how quickly the wildlife regenerates once the human population collapses in numbers. Therefore, logically, raw plant foods would have been far more easily accessible in palaeo times when a) the human population was much lower and b) the humans in those times did not have the technology available to raze all the plant life and replace it with cultivated fields.

Even the high fruit promoters would say that eating sustainable amounts of fat (anything over a very low percent) inhibits sugar absorption and feeds fungal issues. Therefore by that definition its unhealthy to consume more than small amounts of fruit on a diet that includes animal foods. Even if they are wrong there, the issue at hand is that if one is eating large amounts of animal fats for health it doens't make sense to then eat any more than the very lowest maintenance levels of carbs for basic health or physical performance because at whatever breaking point they won't be able to function as well doing so, making it fairly non-productive.

The point is that the human body, despite such naive claims, is a hell of a lot more adaptable to a varied diet - if it hadn't been, we would have died out long ago. One only has to look here, where many people simply do not do well on RZC, or even RVLC, in quite a number of cases.

[cliff]

there isn't sustainable wild uncultivated food anywhere for even the smallest populations.

I'm sure you've searched every inch of earth and have found this to be true... 

Are you just talking about fruit?  Because there are plenty of sustainable plant foods that could sustain the whole world, cattails being the biggest example.

It seems you have a major bias against plant foods and fruits because you think they fucked you up?  You speak as if you have authority but in reality you have no idea what you're talking about and how could you when no one really knows.

[pioneer]

I'm sure you've searched every inch of earth and have found this to be true... 

Are you just talking about fruit?  Because there are plenty of sustainable plant foods that could sustain the whole world, cattails being the biggest example.

It seems you have a major bias against plant foods and fruits because you think they fucked you up?  You speak as if you have authority but in reality you have no idea what you're talking about and how could you when no one really knows.

Well, hate to burst your bubble, but you seem to be contradicting yourself. If you're saying that he has to search every inch of earth to find this to be true, you are also implying that fruit and cultivated edible plants are not abundant in most places, which is true. Sure, fruit is available in the tropics all year, but what about the northern areas? What about the areas of colder climates? And dont start with that BS of how humans are "supposed" to live in tropical areas. Humans can live wherever they want as long as there is food there, and regardless of what that food is. If the area just so happens to have a lot of fruit, fruit will probably make up some portion of their diet. If the area happens to have very little edible plant/fruits and a lot of animals, then animals will make up a lot of their calories.

And he may not in fact have a major bias towards fruit, he just recognizes the fact that fruit as a large portion of the diet is just not possible for the paleolithic human. Recognize the fact that fruit was bred to be larger and have more sugar hundreds of years ago. Also recognize that without the use of modern technologies such as GMO and pesticides, fruit and veggies would absolutely not be able to sustain the whole world. I'm sticking up for KD here and saying no, he's not an authority, and nor is he acting like one, he just recognizes the obvious fact that the paleolithic ancestor simply could not have obtained a large portion of his/her diet from fruit and vegetables. It just is not possible. This is also not to mention the amount of antinutrients vegetables have, but that is a whole other argument...

We are not saying that carbs are bad, or fruit is bad and whatnot. When I say carbs are bad, Im speaking of 99% of carbs people consume, which are those such as HFCS, grains, dairy sugars, dextrose, etc... I am not talking about fruit, even though fruit can still cause insulin issues if consuming high glycemic fruits in large quantities, in a short period of time with little to no fat or protein to slow the insulin spike.

[KD]

when they are easily disproven just by contacting a raw vegan long-termer like DurianRider or the multitude of raw omnivores here who do fine on plenty of raw fruits as long as they are eating some raw meats as well.

I'm sure you've searched every inch of earth and have found this to be true... 

Are you just talking about fruit?  Because there are plenty of sustainable plant foods that could sustain the whole world, cattails being the biggest example.

It seems you have a major bias against plant foods and fruits because you think they fucked you up?  You speak as if you have authority but in reality you have no idea what you're talking about and how could you when no one really knows.

Cliff, mostly what you have done is attack extraneous parts of comments that were replies to some stuff that you said....that you are right...no one really knows. You picked apart a number of these things again and than I addressed these things to the best I could and now you are basically saying this weakens my other arguments that you didn't even bother to take apart that actually have to do with why someone would restrict carbs.

If you or Tyler truly think many of these people are truly well (based on their lack of cooked foods) are automatically healthier than regular prescription free people that populate the planet, or that their problems are merely because they lack b-12 and other animal foods, I'm basically suggesting you think again and use at least the same level of scrutiny a regular person would use in addressing whether someone is physically, spiritually, and mentally healthy. To me, I believe many of these people are far sicker than when they started (due not just to 'fruits' but carelessness to proper cleansing) , and this was information I had before my own experiments..and seems more and more clear.

Regarding to your initial point about why people would choose to do low carb diets. I think I addressed that a number of ways. Whether there is abundant foods now or in the past this really isn't that related to why some people chose to remove carbs form their animal foods diet. I don't know that a diet that restricts carbs is long term healthy and don't claim that. The only claim that seems to ring true is that there are certain things that take place when the body restricts carbs that have little to do with what types of carbs that they are or what nutrients or toxins they provide.

I don't pretend to be the authority on wild foods. I hope its possible to cultivate all kinds of plant foods that will feed people. I said there aren't farms that produce enough foods that are eaten 100% raw year round. Of course there are sustainable farms with starchy or animal foods.  But yes i'm talking about peoples assumptions that areas would be abundant in easily obtainable sources of fruit that would be edible, tasty, present in huge quantities and sizes, and not picked clean by birds and insects. Even many leaders in the fruit movement will agree that modern shipping technologies and increased sweetness of fruits allow for their diet to be possible when it wouldn't be as easily done in nature or as enjoyable. Usually when people are suggesting there was some pure environment.they aren't accounting for....fire ants.

[TylerDurden]

Well, my own experience was that cooked food was far worse for me, healthwise, than eating raw fruits, especially cooked animal foods of any kind. Raw fruits did me no specific damage when I was fruitarian, indeed a small handful of my health-problems, pre-RPD diet, went away completely on a 100 percent fruitarian diet. It was a concern over potential nutritional deficiencies, after a couple of years or so,and a realisation that my main health-problems weren't improving one bit that made me change from 100 percent Fruitarian to a RVAF diet . I also have noted that most people who go fruitarian report getting some initial improvements in health - this is unsurprising as they are no longer taking in heat-created toxins in a big way, plus they are getting some enzymes and bacteria with their raw fruits.

Now, I happily grant that some people cannot endure a 100 percent fruitarian diet for any serious length of time. GoodSamaritan is a typical example, only being able to handle it for 2 months. But most people who come here have varying intolerances to all sorts of different foods. Some may only have a slight food-intolerance to raw dairy and handle lightly-cooked animal foods reasonably fine, while others like me find cooked animal foods and raw dairy to be the worst offenders re health etc.Put it this way, if the raw aspect of rawpaleoforum truly was so inferior/unnecessary by comparison to the palaeo aspect of rawpaleoforum re popularity/effectiveness, most of us long-termers  would be cooked-palaeo by now, since it's a lot easier for us to eat cooked meats  than to eat raw  meats, on a social level.

[KD]

In order to 'debunk' something you don't just find a single outlier that applies (if it even -objectively- does) but that the original concept has no merit or value for anyone. No one here I think doubts the potential for a raw diet of our ancestors to be the healthiest diet (or at least a very healthy diet) hopefully for both general wellness and reversal of disease. Personally I think its fairly wise to be skeptical on the latter part considering many people seem to accomplish these things many different ways - sometimes not even involving diet. Its actually these people that 'debunk' the notions that 'all one has to do is this' or 'all one has to do is not do this'.

I would really like to see how people actually define 'success' when we are talking about high fruit diets in comparison to cooked primal blueprint diets and cooked zero carb diets or other things I don't necessarily stand behind but acknowledge. This perhaps has alot to do with the health of people going into those very programs but certainly many of these 'cooked' camps contain ex raw foodists of various persuasions. Yes these people could then be getting some more nutrition from animal foods..but obviously there is more at play than that. After that then one could do a comparison to the people on the actual diets that should have been in question here in terms of results compared to these 'high carb' versions.

The issue is people are not currently supplying the type of data that anyone can reasonably assess as wellness. Not having symptoms is not wellness. there are people who have been upwards of 40+ years on raw vegan diets, so by that logic even the the idea that people need small amounts of meat or need to eat organ meats or high fat or some carbs or any other thing would become just arbitrary discussion if one isn't actually defining what that health is with concrete information. So someone adds meat to such a diet. Would that make their diet automatically healthy if they didn't pass just basic benchmarks for health, weren't reversing any problems that they have, or visibly not thriving in the same ways as other raw foodists that didn't have a 'balanced diet'?

What the people I pointed above out would say is that things can deteriorate in ways that don't manifest necessary as negative symptoms (although often they do and people cover them up) but that over time people actually start developing issues FAR GREATER even than massive deficiency and toxic food would  'stir up'. To me if this is present in a single person (never mind thousands)...this 'debunks' the notion that fruit is by default healthy to eat even if our ancestors ate ENTIRELY fruit.

We already know that people that actually live in jungles and what they eat and what they don't eat...it never lines up with ANY of these methodologies or ideas. It may be true that people in the past adapted to a large variety of foods and could 'switch' between foods but this is the same argument for promoting 'neolithic' foods. People today can get away with eating less of these kinds of foods and having reasonable health because their systems are not in order. So therefore the very same logic is true that people aren't as able to say eat tons of animal fat for days and then binge on fruits like our ancestors might have done..because of those very internal distortions. Also its the science that shows in terms of burning ketones there really is not a lot of fudge room to say that our ancestors functioned that way where they regularly ....as in :through the year....ate both high amounts of fat and plant carbs.

Basically what it comes down to is what I said before. It not that this or that (carbs, not eating carbs) is 'bad' its that having some blanket IDEA that something SHOULD be good based on x,y,z ...is bad. So the purists of any theory are equally guilty when referencing things that aren't lining up with physical data.

anyway, it would be good if more people shared their experience of both (extended) low carb trials or with high carb diets in terms of performance and athletic ability.

[TylerDurden]

I merely gave myself as an example.The serious problem you have is that cooked-palaeodiets are notorious for only providing some minor benefits re health, in most cases. Testimonials from raw food diet forums of every type are rather more impressive by contrast. I'll grant that, later on, reports of fruitarians/raw vegans get  progressively worse, but that is understandable given nutritional deficiencies gained in the long-term.

The ex-raw-foodists/ex-raw vegans who go cooked-palaeo usually do so only because they either have never heard of raw animal food diets in the first place or because they have some irrational phobia towards raw meats re bacteria/parasites.

My own symptoms were easy to distinguish. On a cooked-palaeodiet, I got massive stomach-aches after consuming any cooked animal food whatsoever. The more cooked animal food I ate, the worse it got. I also got extra symptoms such as chronic constipation, rectal bleeding, huge weight-gain etc. into the bargain. Not one of these symptoms did I get on a 100 percent Fruitarian diet. So it was pretty easy to work out that a 100 percent Fruitarian diet was "less worse" than a cooked-palaeodiet one.

As for your claims re other issues appearing, aside from the long-term nutritional deficiencies, while that certainly applies to those RZCers here, for example, who cannot tolerate any carbs, however raw, it doesn't apply to those raw omnivores  like GS who can eat lots of fruit(but not 100 percent fruit long-term) without any health-problems gained from such.

The point of rawpaleoforum is, anyway, not to state that any and all raw foods are fine, given that some are best suited for RZC diets. But we also have to acknowledge that there are those who do not thrive on raw, low-carb diets, let alone cooked, low-carb diets.

As for HGs in palaeo times after cooking arrived,  it seems that they sometimes ate things like cooked tubers. These were not ideal foods given a study I cited a while back, and I'm sure they would rather have eaten raw or cooked animal  foods instead but during times of famine/winter.....

[pioneer]

I think everyone needs to look at things on the epigenetic level and look at the work of Dr. Peter Rouse and other geneticists. Epigenetically speaking, any diet devoid of meat that may or may not make one healthy now, will be negatively effecting one's children and grandchildren. It may not always be "you are what you eat," but rather "you are what your grandparents ate." If your ancestors live in a stressful environment, your body will have excess cortisol because it thinks it will live in a stressful environment. This was shown in the concentration camps when Jews of later generations were smaller and weaker than their previous counterparts who were in concentration camps.

That being said, I dont think that an experimental fruit only or vegetable only diet will be a sustaining diet for future generations. An all fruit diet or vegetation only diet will be no doubt degenerating. Id like to see fruitarians live past 4 generations. On another note, most contemporary societies have been eating cooked meat for thousands of years and many generations.

Point is, whether meat is cooked or not, it is essential for the healthful life of humans and anytime we abandon it we experience degeneration.

[TylerDurden]

The whole point is that cooked meat is also degenerative re health. The fact that we have eaten it for thousands of years is irrelevant in view of the fact that most HGs also ate some raw animal food as well, which helped to counteract some of the negative effects of cooked meats. Since we humans  mostly, unlike HGs in the past, no longer go in for caloric restriction or exercise, and also go in for increasingly heavily cooking/processing our meats, our susceptibility towards the harmful effects of cooked meats is ever-increasing.

Basically, what you lot are saying is that cooked animal food is "less worse/less unhealthy" than raw plant foods, so that, therefore, it must be healthy. This is such deluded, illogical reasoning, it's absurd. It also ignores the multitude of RVAFers who do fine on lots of raw plant foods provided they also eat some raw animal foods as well. KD and others blithely ignore that most RVAFers today are(happily) of the high-raw-plant-food/low-raw-animal-food-variety such as Carol Alt deal with.

[klowcarb]

At what point does warming meat in a pan turn to cooking? A genuine question. I do not really like my meat cold, and I hate raw eggs. So I semi-cook!