Why VA Shiva Loves Slow Cooking
VA Shiva’s article explains why slow cooking can save your health and prolong health and longevity.
There are many theories on combining food: Don’t eat starches with protein, don’t eat fruits with starches, only eat melons alone, etc. While some of these food-combining principles have a legitimate basis, for most of us such rules can become onerous and not practical in modern-day life. A solution to the food-combining rules is slow cooking, which provides an efficient way to get the right combination, any time, any place, by anybody.
What is Slow Cooking?
Nearly all systems of traditional medicine and traditional foods advocate slow cooking. Slow cooking involves cooking foods at a low heat – below 200 degrees Fahrenheit. The ancients recognized that cooking at lower temperatures permits the combining of foods in a nutritive manner that is more conducive to the body’s natural systems. More importantly, slow cooking enables the merger of differing food types even when food-combination rules may restrict them from otherwise being combined. For example, most food-combining rules recommend that proteins and starches not be eaten at the same meal. You may have seen food-combining charts that recommend you eat protein with leafy greens, but never protein with mashed potatoes. With slow cooking, these rules can be disregarded because pre-digestion takes place, making these foods more easily digestible.
A Simple Slow-Cook Recipe
You will need a slow cooker (crock pot) and the following ingredients
- Two yams
- Two sticks of celery
- Two tablespoons apple-cider vinegar
- Two turkey legs
- Pinch of turmeric
- Pinch of coriander
- Pinch of sea salt to taste
- Pepper
Combine all ingredients in the crock pot and add water to fill to the brim. Slow cook for six hours.
The Benefits of Slow Cooking
Modern research has shown that when foods, particularly proteins, are cooked at temperatures above 200 degrees, that carcinogens are generated which directly effect DNA damage. Analysis has shown that these carcinogens not only cause cancer, but also lead to inflammation and a range of disruptions in natural molecular pathways. The raw food movement arose out of the recognition that such cooking can hurt the body; however, raw foods are not for everyone. Raw foods may contain parasites, and some people’s systems cannot tolerate the cold that raw food generates. Spices can be combined to alleviate some of the side effects of raw foods, but one has to do this carefully and artfully – something that is not easy to learn. The simplest way to cook at low temperatures is with a crock pot. The temperatures are 200 degrees Fahrenheit or below, and the food is cooked slowly over four to ten hours, so all ingredients mingle and combine and are pre-digested, increasing the absorption of nutrients significantly.Slow cooked foods are the equivalent of a smoothie, but warmer, heartier, and far more communal.
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