Welcome

Hi and welcome to my blog!

My name is Sophie and this is a blog about my year of 2015 on the high raw vegan lifestyle.

I've become more and more addicted to the raw food lifestyle, since I started to incorporate raw food in my diet four years ago, and since then the raw style has become a more and more natural way of eating and living.

I live in an area, a small community in the northern part of Sweden, where I'm the only one (as far as I know) eating raw food, well actually until now a pescetarian diet, with a lot of raw foods included. From 2015 no cooked food or animal products will be included. I need this blog to stay motivated and give this lifestyle a true chance.

What is raw food?
Raw food is raw fruits, greens, nuts and seeds that you eat without heating it more than 42 degrees Celsius to keep it as nutritious and natural as it can be. It may sound extreme and maybe fanatic to eat cold uncooked food in such a cold climate, but actually it isn't. It is just eating food in its natural state, so that cannot possibly be unnatural, can it? It is just different from what we've been taught, and we do have strong social habits in our society. I've never been a part of the social norm anyway. I'll go my own way. So can you.

Why raw food?
I love food. All different kinds of food. I'm kind of a gourmet, so it doesn't really match up to eat food that is so simple, or can it be a true match? To learn to appreciate the food it its purest state is an epic feeling and really a part of being a gourmet as I see it. Most people can make food taste good by adding some butter or cream to it, but I can't appreciate that any longer for many reasons.

It is though important to me that food tastes good, or else I cannot eat it, so I'm not a purist that does this because of strong belief, but I'm convinced that we're actually supposed to eat raw foods and that it will fit our body and health the best.

Health 
Some people start to eat raw food to lose weight. I'm not one of those. I would actually prefer to gain weight, but I cannot do that even if I eat fat food, I've tried, I only get high blood fats, ergo not so good. That's not the way to go.

There are some health benefits with this lifestyle that I cannot be blind to and that partly motivates me doing this. My body do feel worse when I eat animal products. My joints get stiff and achy and swollen, but not when I eat raw foods!

I will come back to the vegan aspect later on, because it has other and more important sides than the health aspect. It feels like my body just craves for raw food and thrives on it!

I see this year as an experiment on myself and what kind of health benefits I can achieve.

The rules
So I'm doing this for a whole year which I haven't done before, even though I have been eating high raw for months now and then these last four years. For the first time I will try to not make so many exceptions.

To make this a project possible to go through with I have to adjust it so it will fit my job situation. I'm the CEO for a national organisation in Sweden and I travel a lot for work and for about half of the time I'm not at home, and when I'm home I work a lot too. Sometimes I'm really in a hurry and have to eat something fast, most restaurants don't serve raw food, but some do, and some of the hotels I use to stay in serve raw food. Most of the time it is possible to get a hand on some bananas or other fruits. I will not go hungry. I will though consume quite some amounts of green, white and herbal tea to get some real heat along with my meals.

I don't see this as an impossible project and I will make exceptions only when I have to. I won't make this a fully raw project, because I'm going to use some products that aren't raw, like vinegar and nuts, and I will permit myself to eat some cooked vegan meals if I really crave for it, because I don't wanna make raw food my enemy. I will do it and I will love it! This will be a totally vegan year though. I can promise you that.

Now is when it all starts. Come along with me!

Finished off last year and started this year with this late night snack!