Raw food diet

I am working towards the goal of eating primarily raw foods, but I'm just starting out so don't have much to add just yet.

Hello! I've been on a mostly raw diet for three months now and absolutely LOVE it! I've become obsessed (in a good way) with green juices, green smoothies and food combining, too. I hope that you're enjoying your raw diet as much as I am

Here are a few books that have been really helpful to me:

~The Raw Food Detox Diet by Natalia Rose (this is a great book for beginners, in my opinion)
~The Crazy, Sexy Diet by Kris Carr (great if you're looking for an upbeat and spunky attitude about raw foods)
~Green for Life by Victoria Boutenko (mostly about green smoothies)
~Fit for Life by Harvey Diamond (about food combining; the studies are dated but the theories are still relevant)

I also bought a Breville juicer and recently splurged and bought a Vita-Mix blender.

I eat as much fruit as I want in the morning until noon. Then whenever I'm hungry after noon-time, I either make a big (16 oz..) glass of green juice or a green smoothie. I drink green juice/smoothie every day of the week. I think it's one of the really important things about a raw diet.

If I'm hungry in the middle of the day, I make a simple salad (raw, of course) and top it with some olive oil and lemon or a homemade raw dressing. Green smoothies fill me up more than the green juice -- they're both good for different reasons. So on days that I have a green smoothie around noon, I'm not really hungry until dinner.

For dinner I eat something cooked as well as a big salad. For instance, I'll have a teriyaki brown rice bowl with cooked veggies and a big salad. I'm not a vegetarian but I haven't been eating much meat, just because meat and dairy products pretty much work against weight loss (the dairy/yogurt folks will hate me for saying it, but there's too much research that proves this is true!!).

I'm not sure about all of your experiences, but it took me about three weeks to lose some of the cravings and for the hunger pangs to go away. I also found it difficult to eat a mostly raw diet in the dead of winter when it was so cold outside! However, now that the weather is starting to warm up, I'm having an easier time eating raw salads. On those really cold days, I'd have a cup of vegetable broth of miso soup. What's worked for me is that I don't combine certain things -- theories I've learned from the food combining books I've read. Just food combining alone has been amazing!

When I first joined MFP, I was addicted to counting calories and eating foods chalk full of chemicals. No wonder I was having such a hard time losing and keeping the weight off. Transitioning to a mostly raw diet has definitely been a lifestyle change for me. I've always liked fruits and veggies, I just wasn't eating them the right way, or in the right combination! I haven't counted a calorie since I've started and I've lost weight and felt my best over these past three months. My skin glows - I used to suffer from extremely dry skin and eczema in the winter -- gone! The belly pooch I've always had went away about a week after I started juicing. I have more energy and my body just feels 'good' in general.

Sorry for such a long-winded response -- I was just so thrilled to see a raw foods string of posts! Hope all of you are enjoying your raw food diet as much as I am