On why we should incorporate raw foods in our daily diet.
Cooking, Malnutrition and Cancer
ARTHUR BAKER, MA / Living Nutrition Magazine v.10 2001
Eighty million species on earth (about 700,000 of which are animals) thrive on raw food. Only humans apply heat to their food. Humans on average, as a race, die at or below half their potential life span, from chronic illness that is largely related to diet and lifestyle. Domesticated pets also are fed cooked, processed, packaged food that likewise is denatured by heat. As a consequence, they suffer from the diseases of humanity, including cancer, arthritis and other degenerative diseases.
Excessive Heat Denatures Nutrients
Burn your finger and skin tissue dies. With the heating of food at high temperatures, nutrients are progressively destroyed.. Fresh food prior to wilting or rotting provides for a high degree of wellness. Harvested food from field and orchard provides raw materials to replenish your cells and tissues. Food with the life cooked out of it destroys live plant and animal tissue so that their nutrients no longer bear any relationship to your living body. A diet containing an abundance of raw, unfired food maximizes well being.
The chemical changes that take place to individual nutrients, as excessive heat is applied will now be examined. It is well understood and recognized in scientific literature that heat breaks down vitamins and amino acids and produces undesirable cross-linkages in proteins, particularly in meat. These are the changes that take place as food is cooked above 117 degrees Fahrenheit for three minutes or longer. Damage becomes progressively worse at higher temperatures over longer periods
of time.
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proteins coagulate,
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high temperatures denature protein molecular structure, leading to deficiency of some essential amino acids,
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carbohydrates caramelize,
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overly heated fats generate numerous carcinogens including acrolein, nitrosamines, hydrocarbons, and benzopyrene (one of the most potent cancer-causing agents known),
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natural fibers break down, cellulose is completely changed from its natural condition, losing its ability to sweep the alimentary canal clean,
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30% to 50% of vitamins and minerals are destroyed,
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100% of enzymes are damaged,
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the body¹s enzyme potential is depleted which drains energy needed to maintain and repair tissue and organ systems, thereby shortening our life span,
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pesticides are restructured into even more toxic compounds,
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valuable oxygen is lost,
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free radicals are produced,
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cooked food pathogens enervate the immune system,
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heat degenerates nucleic acids and chlorophyll,
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cooking causes inorganic mineral elements to enter the blood and circulate through the system, which settle in the arteries and veins, causing arteries to lose their pliability,
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the body prematurely ages as this inorganic matter is deposited in various joints or accumulates within internal organs, including the heart valves.
As temperature rises, each of these damaging events reduces the availability of individual nutrients. Modern food processing not only strips away natural anti-cancer agents, but searing heat forms potent cancer-producing chemicals in the process. Alien food substances are created that the body cannot metabolize. For example, according to research performed by cancerologist Dr. Bruce Ames, professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at University of California, Berkeley various groups of chemicals from cooked food cause tumors:
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Nitrosamines are created from fish, poultry or meat cooked in gas ovens and barbecues, as nitrogen oxides within gas flames interact with fat residues;
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Hetrocyclic amines form from heating proteins and amino acids;
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Polycyclic hydrocarbons are created by charring meat;
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Mucoid plaque, a thick tar-like substance builds up in the intestines on a diet of cooked foods. Mucoid plaque is caused by uneliminated, partially digested, putrefying cooked fatty and starch foods eaten in association with protein flesh foods;
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Another toxin, lipofuscin, is an accumulation of waste materials throughout the body and within cells of the skin. This manifests as ³age-spots²; in the liver as ³liver-spots²; and in the nervous system including the brain, it possibly contributes to ossification of gray matter and senility.
From the book Diet, Nutrition and Cancer published by the Nutritional Research Council of the American Academy of Sciences (1982) and the Food and Drug Administration Office of Toxicological Sciences, additional carcinogens in heated foods include:
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Hydroperoxide, alkoxy, endoperoxides and epoxides from heated meat, eggs, fish and pasteurized milk;
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Ally aldehyde (acrolein), butyric acid, nitropyrene, nitrobenzene and nitrosamines from heated fats and oils;
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Methyglyoxal and chlorogenic atractyosides in coffee;
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Indole, skatole, nitropyrene, ptomatropine, ptomaines, leukomaines, ammonia, hydrogen sulfide, cadaverine, muscarine, putrecine, nervine, and mercaptins in cheese.
It is no coincidence that since the proliferation of processed food, beginning about 1950, cancer rates in the United States have steadily increased and are now at an all-time high. The consumption of overcooked food leads to malnutrition. The body, forced to raid its dwindling supply of nutrient reserves, remains hungry for quality nutrients. The effect of the Standard American Diet (SAD) is to leave one hungry even though the stomach is full. The result is the chronic overeating and rampant obesity seen nationwide.
source: editor http://www.livingnutrition.com 1oct 2003
