Food for Thought?

Depressed by the election results? Overjoyed? Either way, here's a sobering thought: A hundred years, all new people.

So speaking of resurrecting the dead (That is what I was doing there, right?), today's discussion addresses the difference between raw food, processed raw food, and living food.

Raw food was attached to the ground, or was plucked off a vine or a stem, or was gathered from the water. It's a carrot, an apple, or algae. You eat it.

Processed raw food started off as a cashew or a dandelion or a strawberry, and was then

• squeezed
• juiced
• grated
• blended, or
• dehydrated (at a low temperature).

It retains its amino acids (the building blocks of protein), its enzymes, its vitamins, and its essential raw nature. It was neither cooked nor hydrogenated nor homogenized nor pasteurized. It's just raw food you played with before biting into it. And you do remember what your mother said about playing with your food? Umm, yeah. Ignore that.

Living food is a whole 'nuther animal -- er, vegetable -- altogether. Generally speaking, living food is food that is still growing, still alive. No, we're not talking about live goldfish. Living food generally started out raw (though some of it passed through heat), then it becomes living -- resurrected? -- food through:

• fermentation
• soaking (to remove inhibitor enzymes)
• sprouting

Living foods include miso, soaked raw beans, wheatgrass, raw apple cider vinegar, and lots of other foodstuffs loaded with nutrients (phytochemicals) that do wunderbar things for your health.

And that, dear friend, is the least you should know about raw food!

* Click here for an excellent primer on the role of enzymes in digestion and health.

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Greetings from the state that legalized both pot and same-sex marriage yesterday. The gay stoners are Livin' La Vida Loca.