What is uncooking??? The term comes from the “raw” diet but I’ve adopted it to mean something slightly different. To me, uncooking defines those times when I’ve lost my motivation to cook and instead of eating proper meals at set times, I allow my body to “decide” what it wants when it’s hungry. In some ways this is a more “reckless” approach to eating but I love that it allows me to break out of fixed patterns, routines, and food ruts. It’s a “re-set” for my body.

During this time, I usually crave healthy fruits and vegetables that I eat “raw” and why I’ve adopted the uncooking definition. I’ll make crazy salads with lots of red cabbage and raw broccoli or enjoy a bowl of fruit and seeds for dinner.

The Raw Diet

About 2 years ago, I followed a strictly raw diet for 3 months. Raw vegan diets win accolades for being highly nutritious and extremely beneficial for overcoming disease and illness. The logic is that heating foods above 118⁰ destroys their valuable nutrients so eating foods in their raw, natural state not only eases the digestive system but preserves rich vitamins, minerals and anti-oxidants. Raw foodies abandon the oven and stove for blenders and dehydrators and eat raw fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds and sprouted grains. They often swear by this diet.

Raw is ideal for people who need a radical lifestyle change. In fact, a trusted friend of mine insists that going raw cured her breast cancer. From my experience, eating a raw diet feels amazing. It’s extremely cleansing and you light and energized. I never felt sluggish, bloated, or foggy.

So why did I stop the raw diet?  I decided it was too isolating. It is important for me to share meals with my husband and friends so I returned to my appliances and incorporated more raw meals into my regular vegan diet.

Here is more information on the raw diet and some of my favorite raw enthusiasts:

• Lou Corona (this is delicious soup and he is very knowledgeable and informative)
• Fully Raw Kristina (she has a ton of great videos on utube)
• Rawmazing (gourmet raw recipes that really are amazing)
• Rawmanda (lots of decadent raw treats)
• This Rawsome Vegan Life (amazing photography and recipes. All around incredible site)

What I Eat During Uncooking

I love cooking but I also love these times of uncooking where I get to “play” in the kitchen without any plan or pressure (granted these times often coincide with my husband being away). I let go of the external pressures to eat at prescribed times and simply eat when I am hungry. Here is a sample of what I ate during this last period of “uncooking” that lasted about 3 weeks.

I ate a ton of pears. My favorite way is to cut them into chunks and top with organic golden ground flax, my seed mix, and walnuts. I craved this a lot.

This is my “go-to” seed mix. I sprinkle it on everything from fruit to soups and salads. I love it.

I ate my fair share of blueberries (often directly out of the colander).

I make raw smoothies. This one was with red chard, frozen banana, one softened date, almond milk, raw protein powder, cinnamon and cayenne.

I made a delicious detox soup with broccoli, spinach, zucchini, a few potatoes and lemon.

I wanted to eat a rainbow of veges so I made this tasty salad and threw in some soba noodles for company.

I observed myself feeling, “inspired to cook” these amazing oatmeal cookies from Oh She Glows. They are every bit as good as they look.

I subbed dried cranberries for the raisins and added a few chopped chocolate chunks – they were cookilicious.