by Bart on December 3, 2009
Note: This post contains description of certain bodily functions. You have been warned! 
After having been eating between 90 and 100% raw for almost 50 days, I wanted to try a larger cooked meal – to see what happens. Given that transitioning to raw, and later incorporating small amounts of cooked foods back into my diet, I experienced no problems, I did not expect anything out of ordinary to happen this time either.
I have been eating vegan foods exclusively since 2001, so I was not going to try a turkey carcass, but I decided to eat as badly as I could – let’s call it… for scientific reasons 
Like in years past, I prepared my Thanksgiving feast, which was made of:
- half of a Tofurky
- half a container of mushroom gravy (made by the same company that makes the Tofurky)
- 2 very large potatoes, mashed with quite a bit of Earth Balance
- 1 can of jellied cranberries, yes the kind with high fructose corn syrup – I am living on the edge here!
The result looked like this:
Cooked Thanksgiving feast
This was A LOT of food and I have to admit, it tasted great.
But at the same time, it was not as satisfying as I had expected it to be. This was especially true of the mashed potatoes. They were ok, but that comforting feeling that eating them usually creates was all but gone.
I had this meal quite early on Thanksgiving Thursday, and due to its size I did not have to eat again that day.
The next morning, I decided that since I had the other half of the Tofurky left over, I should repeat the meal for brunch. This time, however, I cut back on the mashed potatoes by about a half, and on the Earth Balance in them by about three quarters.
This meal was also pretty good, but because it was much smaller, few hours later I started to feel hungry. It was time to get back to eating raw and a green smoothie seemed like a good idea.
It was not.
Only about 15 minutes after I had the smoothie, frequent and fairly… violent trips to the bathroom begun. The discomfort (that’s such a mild word!) lasted only for an hour or two, but for the next two days I had a problem with gas like I have never experienced before. To put things in perspective – even I did not want to be in the same room with myself
Eventually, thank goodness, that too went away.
So the lesson learned is as follows… eating an occasional bigger cooked meal won’t cause me too much trouble… if I let it digest before having a large raw meal.
Now that I got this experiment out of the way, I am back to eating great majority of my meals raw, except for an occasional chocolate tofu knish I am finally planning on going to Kaya’s Kitchen, a local vegan restaurant, this Saturday, but I will definitely have something much lighter and smaller than what I ate for Thanksgiving.
And it won’t be followed by a smoothie!
by Bart on November 25, 2009
It’s been a little bit over two weeks since my 30 day raw food trial ended, so I thought an update would be in order.
At the end of the trial I decided to continue eating a lot of raw vegan foods, while increasing my cooked meals to about 50% of my total caloric intake. At least for the duration of the upcoming colder months. This has been harder to do than I had expected.
During the first 14 days after the trial, I’ve eaten a little bit over 24,000 calories, 1,500 of which were in the form of 5 chocolate tofu knishes – the only non-raw item, aside from tea, that I’ve had so far. This means that I’ve been around 93 – 94% raw during that period.
I wanted to have a full cooked vegan dinner, either from Kaya’s Kitchen or Veggie Brothers, but I just could not bring myself to eating one. Don’t get me wrong, I am not denying myself… it was actually the same voice that normally says: “Oh, come on, have that extra piece of cake”, that was saying: “have a green smoothie, have a green smoothie”. That voice is hard to ignore, and so I ate raw instead
But I think I can do it. I think I can have a cooked Thanksgiving. I really want to see what the effect of eating a bigger cooked meal will be, especially since eating raw, and now eating few small cooked meals, made little difference in how I am feeling. I am just very curious to see what happens.
And of course, I will report my findings here.
During the last two weeks I have been eating much the same meals I had during the trial. I’ve made raw zucchini pasta, lazy man’s hummus, almond milk and a few other things. I also had a chance to try two new meals made by one of the local raw food chefs.
The first one was Flautas, which were very similar in taste to pizza rolls, although the dipping sauce was more like chunky salsa with corn, than marinara sauce. They were quite good.
Flautas
Flautas label
The other item I tried was Chunky Chili.
Raw chunky chili
Raw chunky chili label
Wow… this thing was spicy. I had to eat a banana and a few dates immediately afterwards.
After having it for the first time I did not think I’d buy it again, but I could not stop myself going back for seconds… and thirds Other than the spiciness, which I came to appreciate, the raw chunky chili tastes excellent. The only unusual thing about it is the crunchiness of raw veggies in it – something you do not normally experience in a cooked chili, and as such is not associated with the taste of chili. It did not take anything away from the quality of the meal, though.
I also decided to continue to write down everything I eat, although I do this in a private notebook in Evernote, rather than on a web site. Doing this really helps to plan meals. In addition to writing down my meals, I also note the day’s weather and whether I am working or have a day off, as well as general activity level, if unusual. I want to see if there are any patterns in how my diet changes over time.
And finally, my weight has stabilized in the 143-145 pound range. I am eating more calories than I ate during the 30 days of the trial, so I think that accounts more for the lack of further weight loss than adding the few chocolate tofu knishes to my diet.
That range might change as of Friday morning, though
Have a wonderful Thanksgiving everyone!