The Importance of Omega 3 in our diet
Victoria Boutenko is one of the pioneers of the modern raw foods movement. She’s been a raw gourmet chef, and her books—like Raw Family, about her whole family’s 1994 conversion to a 100% raw diet—have helped scores of people learn about raw foods. But in Boutenko’s latest book, Raw Beyond, she and co-authors Elaina Love and Chad Sarno (both raw chefs) explain how they’ve moved “beyond raw,” largely due to new science regarding omega 3. We posted a recipe from Raw Beyond for merlot pickled onions yesterday (in addition to essays from each author, the book features recipes and a great chart of the ratio of omega 3 to omega-6s in various oils and nuts). The following is an excerpt adapted from Boutenko’s section of the book, explaining what motivated her to start eating (and advocating) cooked foods again after nearly two decades eating 100% raw foods.
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In 2010, I became aware of the serious deficiency of omega 3 fatty acids in our diets. As soon as I read several scientific articles on the importance of omega 3, I felt that I had arrived at an explanation for the questions I had been struggling with concerning the 100 percent raw diet. What I discovered was shocking, and it completely changed our approach to our raw food diet.
The omega 3 deficiency, common today for most people, not just raw foodists, resulted from modern dietary changes and a lack of knowledge about the effects of essential fatty acids (EFAs) on health. The omega 3 molecule is unique in its ability to rapidly change its shape. This exceptional flexibility of omega-3s is passed to the organs that absorb it. Omega 3 thin the blood of humans and animals as well as the sap of plants. As a result of these qualities, omega-3s are utilized by the fastest-functioning organs in the body. For example, omega-3s enable our hearts to beat properly, our blood to flow freely, our eyes to see, and our brains to make decisions faster and more clearly.
Omega-6 fatty acids, on the other hand, serve the opposite function: they thicken the blood of humans and animals as well as the juices of plants. Omega-6s solidify and cause inflammation of the tissues. Some scientists link an excess of omega-6s in the human diet to such conditions as heart disease, stroke, arthritis, asthma, menstrual cramps, diabetes, headaches and tumor metastases. I would like to emphasize, however, that the omega-6 fatty acids are not “bad”; they serve an important function in the body as well, but must be consumed in a proper ration to omega 3.
Because the unique flexibility of the omega 3 molecule makes it highly perishable, in recent years genetic engineers have been manipulating the DNA of seeds, trying to develop strains with higher omega-6 and lower omega-3 content in order to prolong the storage life of seeds and the oils made from them. In addition, most farm animals, such as cattle, sheep, pigs and chickens, have increasingly been fed soy, corn and other grains instead of grass and hay, which has altered the balance of omegas present in meat. People who consume animal products would benefit from knowing that the meat from animals that consume grass is high in omega 3 while the meat from animals that consumer corn and other grains is high in omega-6s. Even fish aren’t guaranteed to be a good source of omega-3s anymore. Omega 3 fatty acids are the main reasons doctors recommend eating fish regularly, but farmed fish are now fed a grain heavy diet, vastly reducing their levels of fish oils. A very popular fish in recent years, tilapia, contains twice the level of omega-6 as omega 3. Our modern grain- and oil-heavy diet has resulted in most people, whether vegetarians or meat-eaters, consuming way too many omega-6 fatty acids and not enough omega 3.
[...] New information about omegas has radically changed the foundation on which the raw food diet is based. A typical raw food meal used to consist of raw fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds. Many popular raw recipes, such as nut loaf, nut patties, nut burgers, cakes, and pies, contain large quantities of nuts and seeds. My family created a large number of these traditionally rich recipes ourselves, which were published in our early books and videotapes and were discontinued a couple of years ago. In our latest recipe books we have replaced nuts with grated vegetables and greens.
I now understand that relying on nuts or energy bars can be unhealthy because of their high level of omega-6s. Of course, some bars can be made of seeds high in omega 3, such as hemp, flax, walnuts or chia, but their shelf life will be very short due to the tendency of omega 3 to quickly become rancid.
Raw foodists who want a healthy, sustainable raw food diet need to focus mostly on whole foods, salads, smoothies, and juices, with occasional tiny portions of nuts and seeds. It can be touch to maintain a 100 percent raw food diet with such restrictions. Many long-term raw foodists have already intuitively adopted this more limited version of a 100 percent raw diet, and others have shifted to a high-raw diet, adding back some cooked foods.
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Adapted from Raw and Beyond: How Omega 3 Nutrition is Transforming the Raw Food Paradigm by Victoria Boutenko, Elaina Love, and Chad Sarno, published by North Atlantic Books, copyright © 2012 by Victoria Boutenko, Elaina Love, and Chad Sarno. Reprinted by permission of publisher.
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