HEY ALL!
im new to this joint - been experimenting with raw food for the last 3 months, slightly on and off, and i absolutely love the freshness, energy, all that stuff. i feel like a plant!

I am a fruititarian in this encarnation, my question concerns daily calorie intake. has anyone ever counted it and compared? does it matter? i think im floating somewhere around >1000 calories, but i am never hungry.

I usually eat fruit mornings, forage for other greens here and there in the afternoon and evening if necessary.

any ideas? THANKS

I remember years ago...when I was eating mostly fruit....I would sometimes eat HUGE amounts at a sitting. Later, as I ate simpler, this improved. Now that I have eaten only one thing at a sitting for many years (mono-eating) this has self regulated. Back then, though, I would often eat 3000 or even 4000 calories in a day. I still lost weight though! True story. These days I eat all fruit of course (for many years now. I figure I probably eat close to 2000 calories a day. Pretty normal stuff.

-David Z. Mason

WWW.RawFoodFarm.com

Aguerrer, if you are happy with your weight this is not something that should concern you.

But if you want to be neurotic about it, you can get a food scale and weigh everything you put in your mouth before you put it in your mouth and use a nutrient tracker like cron-o-meter or nutritiondata.com or fitday.com and figure it out exactly.

If you are eating high fiber and not too much fat, subtract about 15% for the fact that high fiber reduces metabolizable energy.

I don't really know for sure on any given day but it varies, 1400-1800 is probably my typical range (before subtracting). Basically if I watch my fats I can eat any raw food as much as I want.

I think, over time, ESPECIALLY as you transition in the beginning, the body gets used to working with raw foods and starts absorbing better. Even comparing now (5 months raw) to my beginning, I am eating much less. I still get at least 2000 calories/day... but in the beginning, I was probably eating twice that, with a lot of nuts. (And I still lost weight then! O.O )

I remember grocery shopping... My roommate used to get SO mad because my half of the fridge was JAM PACKED with fruit, the entire top of the fridge was piled with fruit, and sometimes it flooded onto the counter--this was for a week. Oh, and don't forget fitting 3-4 durians in the freezer (I was eating a big one every day for a while--2000 calories right there!) Now, I can comfortably cover the top of the fridge, and inside, I usually just have a carton or two of strawberries. My weight is the same... the only difference is, I feel like I am absorbing much better. My fullness/hunger signals are really cleaning themselves up, too.

Your personal energy levels and sense of well being (read: not feeling bizarrely ill) should be the #1 indicator of whether or not you're eating enough.

The body will also go through weird phases as it is cleaning/healing, so don't be surprised if your needs change several more times before stabilizing.

If you still feel genuinely hungry, and you've eaten more than 2000 calories--go ahead and eat! If you feel genuinely full, and you've only eaten 1500 calories--stop. Don't force yourself--your body is going through an amazing transformation and knows a lot more about it than it will ever tell you.