High Raw Food Diet Challenge - Day 13

by Trina
(Growing Raw Health)

I have limitless potential.

I’m attempting to be more responsible about my calorie counting, at least while I’m reporting to you on my raw food intake. The easiest to use and free calorie tracker that I’ve found so far is the dinky little widget on igoogle. It doesn’t give you additional nutritional information, but the food items and calorie totals load quickly without having to refresh the window each time. The search and type-ahead functions are good and the portion sizes vary enough for accurate measurement.


When I ran my body stats through this simple energy needs calculator, it indicated that my calorie requirements were 2247-2500 calories daily for moderate to very active. This tells me that although I’m not feeling hungry, I’m falling well short of my calorie needs. Actually I feel like I’m stuffing myself. This would be good news if I wanted to lose weight, but I don’t.


Looks like I’ve been under-estimating the food value of fatty items; nuts, avocados and olive oil. Somehow the increase in dietary fats from the extra avocados, cold-pressed oils and raw nuts I’m eating doesn’t translate into kilos.


Even though a raw food diet is high in healthy kinds of fats, I’d like to keep the fat ratio below about 20%. The Heart Foundation recommends that you try to choose the healthier polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats and limit the amount of saturated and trans fats that you eat to reduce your risk of heart disease. The Mayo Clinic recommends limiting total fat intake to 20 to 35 percent of your daily calories. It seems sensible to keep fats on the low side whether they’re making me gain weight or not.


Day 13 High Raw Food Diet Menu


Breakfast: Green smoothie (baby spinach, pear and banana). 2 apples. Coffee with soy milk.

Morning snack: 1 banana, watermelon, leftover green smoothie.

Lunch: 1 pear, 2 apples, market strawberries and a glass freshly squeezed orange juice.

Afternoon tea: Watermelon, Ruby Red grapefruit with agave nectar and a handful of mixed nuts.

Dinner: Vegetable salad with baby spinach, avocado, red capsicum, garlic chives, tomato, ½ zucchini and balsamic/olive oil/wholegrain mustard dressing. 1 bbq’d egg. Chamomile tea.


Day 13 Ratings


Attitude: 8/10

Energy: 8/10

Raw calories: 95% of approx. 2100 calories