12 Steps to Raw Foods: How to End Your Dependency on Cooked Food is written by Victoria Boutenko.
In 1993 Boutenko and her family were all experiencing serious health problems ranging from asthma and diabetes to cardiac arrhythmia. Due to her concern about the side effects of pharmaceutical medications Boutenko began to search for natural solutions.
She learned about the raw food diet and she and her family started eating this way practically overnight. Almost immediately they noticed their health issues improved and after four months on the diet they all completed a ten-kilometer run.
Boutenko wrote this book to help readers to avoid the pitfalls of adjusting to a raw food diet as well as to maintain this way of eating as a long-term lifestyle.
The diet that Boutenko recommends consists only of plant-based foods that have not been cooked or processed. The diet will include primarily fruit and vegetables with small amounts of nuts and seeds.
12 Steps to Raw Foods is known for introducing green smoothies to the general population, which are a blended combination of fruit and leafy green vegetables. She advocates the inclusion of green smoothies in the diet every day for their high content of protein and minerals, which are important for maintaining long-term health on a raw vegan diet.
Boutenko emphasizes the point that each person requires a different diet and she advises us to pay attention to cravings for natural healthy foods.
Conversely she says that cravings for cooked foods are more likely to be related to their addictive nature rather than a true biological need. She created a 12-step to raw foods program to help people overcome their addiction to cooked foods so that they will be able to successfully sustain a raw food diet.
Fruits, vegetables, green smoothies, raw nuts and seeds, avocado, durian, coconut.
Breakfast
Mango and kale green smoothie |
Morning Snack
Fresh peach |
Lunch Raw vegetable soup with avocado |
Afternoon Snack
Raw carob truffles |
Dinner
Nut or seed cheese |
12 Steps to Raw Food recommends exercise, especially walking, as an effective natural way of managing stress. Boutenko says that doing some form of exercise or intense physical activity for at least thirty minutes each day will provide a wide range of benefits including increased energy, improved metabolism, better self-esteem, less body fat and a reduced risk of many serious diseases including cancer, heart disease and osteoporosis.
12 Steps to Raw Foods: How to End Your Dependency on Cooked Food retails at $16.95.
Boutenko offers dieters practical tips, recipes, and strategies and supports her recommendations with real-life experience as well as scientific research.
12 Steps to Raw Foods will appeal to dieters who would like to start a raw food diet as well as those that have tried this way of eating in the past but have had difficulty sticking to it over the long-term.
hi i have been trying for many years to stick to raw living . when i have stayed on raw food i feel wonderful and energtic, i always stick to it 2 to 3 weeks and then relapse. Im determined to keeping trying always learning new things about how healthy it is to have wholesome food. please emaile me more info love to know more and love to hear about other peoples experience. eve
very difficult at the first month then i feel great and eat good not hungry and losing height very good iam say 70% raw in future want to go 100% raw