A Vegan Diet Can Help You Achieve Your Weight Goal
A Vegan diet can lead you on the road to
heart health.
The purpose of a diet is to give you the proper
boost; giving you the tools you need to begin living a healthy active
lifestyle. Each person has different needs, wants, cravings strengths
and weaknesses. Choose the diet or technique
that helps you in your unique way to achieve the goal we want
to obtain. This is to live a happy active lifestyle, avoiding
heart disease and other life threatening diseases.
The Vegan Diet
The Vegan diet or raw food diet is a dietary
regimen consisting of uncooked and unprocessed organic food. Most
of the foods consumed on this diet are fruits, vegetables, nuts,
and seeds.
The exact definition of raw food varies, but the
general consensus is that a food is considered raw if it has not
been heated to more than 115 degrees Fahrenheit (46 degrees Celsius),
and if it has not been frozen.
The diet is followed by those that do so for ethical
reason, and follow the Vegan philosophy and lifestyle, and those
that just follow the diet for health reasons.
Those who avoid animal products for reasons of
health due to allergies, or to avoid cholesterol), rather than compassion
sometimes describe themselves as "dietary vegans" and not vegans.
The Vegan diet has gained recent mainstream acceptance.
Restaurants catering for this way of eating have opened up in California
and New York City, and numerous all-raw cookbooks have been published.
.
They see this as a remedy, together with an active
lifestyle, for obesity-related illnesses which are prevalent in
developed countries.
The Vegan diet is thought to reduce the risk of
many health problems, including heart failure, obesity, diabetes,
asthma, high blood pressure, constipation, cancer, psoriasis, and
Eczema though this should not be confused with overall health or
longevity.
This seems to be because a properly planned vegan
diet will supply high levels of fiber, micro-nutrients, and anti-oxidants,
as well as limiting the intake of saturated fats and cholesterol
found abundantly in meat and dairy products, all of which promise
positive health effects.
So far no statistical study has shown that vegans
will live longer than those who eat meat. Many vegans feel, with
justification, that although there are no guarantees of good health
and longevity, the adoption of good dietary and lifestyle habits
stack the odds in their favor.
The main idea behind the raw food diet is that
cooked food is supposedly toxic, because cooking destroys the enzymes
contained in food.
Raw food proponents believe a raw food diet consisting
of enzyme-rich raw foods will reverse health problems and strengthen
the immune system.
The benefits of the diet are said to include maintaining
stable body mass index, clear skin, more energy, and minimizing
a range of common illnesses, from the flu to obesity-related illnesses.
There are others who believe
Some research does not support the idea that enzymes
in foods somehow survive the stomach; pepsin in the stomach quickly
breaks down nearly all proteins, including enzymes.
Although, it is agreed that foods cooked at high
heat contain toxins not found in raw or boiled foods, such as acrylamide,
benzopyrene, and methylcholanthrene. There is no consensus as to
whether these toxins introduced by high-heat cooking methods are
cause for alarm, and the World Health Organization is sponsoring
continued research.
The critics say :
Raw food diets have been criticized by some in
the mainstream medical community as being too harsh and restrictive.
A raw food diet requires special care to include
the recommended amounts of several important vitamins and nutrients,
including vitamin B-12, calcium, and protein.
If adopted for an extended period of time without
special attention to essential nutrients, any restrictive diet can
lead to nutritional deficiency.
Much of the research advocating raw food diets
has been criticized. Critics say that food enzyme cannot be fully
utilized by the human body, since they are destroyed during the
digestive process.
Also, some nutrients are only fully released in
cooking, including lycopene in tomatoes, and beta carotene in carrots.
It is also argued that humanity has been cooking for such a long
time that the human body can hardly be ill-adjusted to cooked food.
You can read more about the raw foods, at these
websites
Living
and Raw Foods - Recipes, articles, and community chat room
relating to the raw food diet.]
Raw
Food Restaurants around the world.
Beyond
Veg - Several critical responses to the raw food diet
American
Vegan Society
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