The Raw Food Detox Diet: The Five-Step Plan for Vibrant Health and Maximum Weight Loss (Raw Food Series, 1) Paperback – December 26, 2006

If you are intrigued by the current trend of eating real food, want to take this concept to the next level but are skeptical as to how to implement the raw food lifestyle on a practical everyday basis, pick up a copy of Natalia Rose's "The Raw Food Detox Diet, for a fast and fun introduction that does not require a cold turkey approach to eliminating cooked foods.Rose is in agreement with French dieting guru Michel Montignac on her definition of what constitutes a "legal" food on this plan. Montignac, a long-time proponent of eating real food as opposed to processed junk, urges us to forego the old dieting adage of counting calories and all the newer macro nutritional phobias with regard to too much or too little fat, protein or carbohydrates and instead analyze each food choice with an eye on the food's metabolic reaction with regard to fast and easy bloat-free digestion and elimination.Rose agrees, emphasizing that whereas natural foods are easily recognizable by the body and therefore easily broken down, utilized and eliminated, the processed foods that make up so much of the typical American diet are deemed by the body as the worst kind of illegal aliens that sadly deteriorate into waste that the body can neither utilize nor expel. Waste in this case, has no other recourse than to morph into a variety of problems like weight gain, a degeneration of the organs, a slowing of the metabolism and premature aging.By utilizing a method of food combining where mixing foods in different categories is verboten, similar to that of the Montignac method (minus the glycemic index factor), Rose further expands this theory by grouping nuts - an iffy category on most food combining plans (Somersizing immediately springs to mind) - as a separate category (starches, fleshes and fruits being the other three categories) , to be combined only with dried fruits and vegetables.She provides an extremely helpful hierarchy of eleven types of quick exit foods, where level number 1, the best, contains fruits and vegetables and level number 11, the worst, contains chemicals and artificial colorings and sweeteners. She adds that as eating from quick exit levels 1-8 is doable by everyone; the higher levels of health will be reached when eating only from levels 1-5. In addition an indispensable transitional food grocery list is included to provide brand name items that act as substitutes for mainstream comfort foods that must be eliminated to insure success on this program. She is not a big fan of dairy and as expected pans the consumption of power shakes and bars. Surprisingly she eschews the current 'soy is nirvana' bandwagon, labelling soy products as mucus-forming poisons. Neutral foods, those which may be eaten with any category except fruit include such treats as nut milks, 70% chocolate, olivess and olive oil. how refreshing! Way to go, Ms Rose!On the practical side, the book abounds with menu plans, recipes, and suggestions on what to eat in a restaurant or at social occasions. For the aspiring raw foodist, separate chapters are dedicated to detoxifying all aspects of your lifestyle including your bathroom, your living space, your kitchen, your family, fasting, traveling, holidays and your colon.I emailed Ms Rose with questions that pertained to the diet as juxtaposed with my lifestyle and was extremely pleased that the author very pleasantly answered all my questions promptly and professionally and made suggestions that I was able to implement quite easily.Bottom line: Ms Rose achieves the impossible, a raw food diet that doesn't force you to eat only raw foods, but urges you to discover your own lifestyle at your own pace for achieving optimal health. With a combination of guidelines, recipes and a fresh common sense five part transitional approach, Ms Rose sends you out into unknown territory, with the option of staying on one particular phase of the diet for as long as you wish.

I found this book amazing. I'm not going to lie, it's a lot more work to eat raw (or even mostly raw) than anything else I've tried but the rewards were more than worth it.I gained 70lbs with my first child (I know, I know... =P) and it took me nearly a year to loose 50 of those 70lbs.(unfortunately nursing wasn't the miracle weight loss cure I was led to believe!)With my second child, I gained 50lbs. 6 weeks after he was born I decided to follow the recommendations of Natalia's book and after 6 weeks, I had lost 35 of the 50lbs I had gained. After the 6 weeks I still had 15 pounds to loose to get back to pre-pregnancy (not pre-pre pregnancy) weight but I decided to take a break from the regimine.The good news is that even though I stopped the diet and began eating 'normally' again, I didn't gain any weight back. It was like my body was clean and efficient enough to deal with a regular diet that eating typical foods did not translate into gaining the weight back as it has with any other diet I'd ever tried. The weight stayed off and then slowly I lost the rest of the extra weight.I have revisited the diet anytime I have felt like I need to feel better or I've indulged in one too many treats and need to drop a few pounds. It's actually pretty amazing I think how the body responds to fresh, healthy vegetables - after the first week you have more energy than you've had in ages and feel great.I will warn you however, that during the first week, all the juicing (don't skip this part) will induce a detox that can make you feel horrible. For me, the first week is hell - my energy is zapped and I just feel gross. But once my body has flushed all the gunk out, I feel amazing! - and chastise myself for not eating this way all the time... So if you feel bad, that's the good news - your body is taking out the garbage (did you really think you could eat all that crap without consequence?!? ;)...) and IF you stick with it, you will get to the other side and feel great. But do yourself a favor and stick with it until you do feel better or you'll have done most of the heavy lifting without getting to the reward. No fun in that... (nor any weight loss I would guess).Anyway, I have 100 raw food and diet books and every time this is the one I pull off the shelves for my directives and recipes. Highly recommended.