Favorite fruits and vegetables

[Lucian Hodoboc]

As an aspiring raw vegan, I like to start a thread every now and then about healthy eating. Let's talk about fruits and veggies. Everyone says that including them in our daily diets, especially in their raw form, can help us improve our health. Do you have any favorite fruits and vegetables? Let me know which do you prefer and how often do you eat them. 😛

[Burl]

5 hours ago, Lucian Hodoboc said:

As an aspiring raw vegan, I like to start a thread every now and then about healthy eating. Let's talk about fruits and veggies. Everyone says that including them in our daily diets, especially in their raw form, can help us improve our health. Do you have any favorite fruits and vegetables? Let me know which do you prefer and how often do you eat them. 😛

My new hobby is hydroponics, but my favorite vegetable is asparagus and it will not grow in Florida.

Veganism is a poor idea, imo.  Man is related to the meat eating apes as evdenced by our teeth, and veganism is a mental construct unrelated to natural diet.  Animal fats and protein are dietary essentials.

Raw vegetables can be good, but many benefit from cooking.  My favorite meal is a ribeye steak, tossed salad, asparagus and mushrooms sauteéd in garlic butter & parmesan and a baked potato.

[Lucian Hodoboc]

10 minutes ago, Burl said:

Man is related to the meat eating apes as evdenced by our teeth,

That's... not true.

[Burl]

I don't think your chart is correct.  Where did you find it?  

The pointed canine teeth are a distinct morphological marker, and there is overwhelming anthropological evidence that Homo Sapiens is naturally an omnivore.  

[romansh]

5 hours ago, Lucian Hodoboc said:

That's... not true.

Welcome Lucian

I must admit I don't agree with you as well.

A better indicator of whether humans are omnivores or not would be the digestive tracts.

https://www.quora.com/If-humans-aren’t-herbivores-then-why-are-our-teeth-so-dull

and Wiki of course

 

 

[JosephM]

I think vegetables are a healthy choice but i would not say that man is by design limited to vegetables, fruits and nuts seeds and legumes.

Welcome Lucian,

Joseph

[Burl]

Some people prefer only eating light.  Literally.

 

[PaulS]

My favourite vegetables would include bok choy, asparagus, and potatoes. Oh, and rhubarb for some home made wine!

Fruit-wise I love mangoes, watermelon and grapes (again, for the wine!).  

A few years ago I gave up meat for over two years primarily because I felt for animals.  I must admit that even though I didn’t miss eating meat from a dietary perspective, I did miss eating it and sharing the experience from a cultural/social perspective and so reverted to my meat-eating customs.

[Burl]

Can you make watermelon wine?  I think if something can be made into wine an Aussie has probably done it.

[PaulS]

12 minutes ago, Burl said:

Can you make watermelon wine?  I think if something can be made into wine an Aussie has probably done it.

I’ve never considered it but it appears to be goer!  I will have to give it a crack!  Just about any fruit can be used to create wine.  I see too that watermelon mead wine is also possible.  As it is currently melon season here I shall look into both.  Thanks.

[romansh]

This might help dispel some misunderstanding

My favourite vegetable … potato accompanied by my wife's vinegar garlic sauce. Roasted leek is not bad.

My wife wants me to live longer so she force feeds me salad.

[PaulS]

I think the table you provide actually may contribute to more misunderstanding, Rom. It paints a misleading comparison.

For instance, in reality our guts better reflect those of our immediate anscestors (primates) than they do a carnivore such as the wolf (which has a much stronger stomach acid and much shorter gut).  Clearly primates eat a largely vegetarian diet, with some insects and very, very infrequent meat eating.  Also, comparing our system to that of a species that has developed to eat nothing but low nutrient grass, naturally shows a huge distinction.

It seems that eating some meat may have moved our ancestors in a different direction to other similar species at the time.  In today’s modern diet though, eating meat actually has very little to offer nutritionally and without a doubt, generally we all consume way too much meat!  Countless studies demonstrate the benefits of vegetarian diet.  

I think if we were honest with ourselves our diet should best reflect that of primates, but that wouldn’t be all that popular I imagine.

 

[Lucian Hodoboc]

Why are you welcoming me in this thread? I think I posted an introduction thread in the introductions forum. 🤔

Also, science proved that we were not designed to be omnivores. Well, we can tolerate certain amounts of meat, but we thrive on fruits and vegetables. There's a long list of scientific data here:

https://www.patreon.com/posts/science-verifies-4459105

[JosephM]

Fish is a meat i like and seems basic and essential to man. I like collard greens, black-eyed peas, carrots, celery, spinach, onions, cabbage, sweet peppers and broccoli  in that order and for fruit, apples, pineapples,  peaches, blueberries, and watermelon in no particular order. 

Also Watermelon makes a great wine. Unfortunately my body at this age can't tolerate much alcohol in any form. 😄

 It seems to me that most humans will thrive on fruits and vegetables but i wouldn't say we were designed to be  frugivores. We were designed and have developed to be what we are today at this point in time. Omnivore. One is free to go either way as we have adapted to handle a mixture of both.

[romansh]

12 hours ago, PaulS said:

I think the table you provide actually may contribute to more misunderstanding, Rom. It paints a misleading comparison.

I think the table compares a predatory carnivore with a predated herbivore and to me the human digestive tract is somewhere in between. I agree our guts are similar to our close primates.

Here is an example of apes (Bonobos) being omnivores and also it references them being predatory. Sure at one point in our ancient lineage we might have been more "vegetarian". From Wiki

Quote

Physiological: This definition is often used in academia to specify species that have the capability to obtain energy and nutrients from both plant and animal matter.^{[4][18][23][24]} (e.g. "humans are omnivores due to their capability to obtain energy and nutrients from both plant and animal materials."

If humans were not omnivores they would have had much greater difficulty populating northern America after the last ice age. Even today the Inuit have a diet rich in meat. 

 

Lucian

Science does not deal in proof … it deals in evidence,  definitions and models. While I understand your desire to be vegan or vegetarian and even to proselytize on their behalf, but if you are going quote "science" please do it accurately.  

 

[romansh]

For those interested on carnivorous behaviour of the great apes … in a bit more detail

[PaulS]

Rom, do you think humans eating meat like the Inuits did was an adaptation or has our species evolved to eat meat like it does (and digest it)?  

[PaulS]

11 hours ago, romansh said:

For those interested on carnivorous behaviour of the great apes … in a bit more detail

With meat only comprising of 3% of their diet, that would be like us eating one meat sausage per week!  I think we go far and beyond that certainly.

[romansh]

13 hours ago, PaulS said:

dRom, do you think humans eating meat like the Inuits did was an adaptation or has our species evolved to eat meat like it does (and digest it)?  

I think humans are omnivores. If they were not they could not have crossed the Bering Straits. Do you think bats' echo location is evolved or an adaptation? Evolution and adaptation are not somehow separate.

13 hours ago, PaulS said:

With meat only comprising of 3% of their diet, that would be like us eating one meat sausage per week!  I think we go far and beyond that certainly.

I agree and I am not sure of your point here? Is it humans are more omnivorous than our simian cousins? So when we say humans "should" have X% of their diet as meat, there are generally two meanings of the word "should". Moral (as I think you had suggested was your veggie stint) and health objectives. Here is Wikipedia on the longevity of vegetarians: 

 

Quote

 

In Mortality in British vegetarians,^[114] a similar conclusion is drawn:

British vegetarians have low mortality compared with the general population. Their death rates are similar to those of comparable non-vegetarians, suggesting that much of this benefit may be attributed to non-dietary lifestyle factors such as a low prevalence of smoking and a generally high socio-economic status, or to aspects of the diet other than the avoidance of meat and fish."^[115]

 

ie Vegetarians are not better off than people who care about their health or are socially able to do so.

We need to deal with the elephant in the room. Nietzsche's dragon with "Thou Shall" inscribed on the underside of its scales.

Edited January 19, 2019 by romansh

[romansh]

It's funny, I always thought of dogs as carnivores … but the omnivore wiki page identifies them as omnivores. Having said that there are dissenting arguments on this. This link gives an interesting point of view on the subject. Now if dogs have changed that much over the tens of thousand of years from being wolves that the  prevailing view is that they are omnivores rather than carnivores then what could primates adapt/evolve into over a million or so years?

Just doing a quick review on the contents of dog food (dry) while mostly meat in some form … the second ingredient seems to be starch in the form of potato, rice or corn. (this was a quick skim).  Interesting.

[Burl]

Eat whatever you want.  It's pizza night at my house.

[romansh]

That's the plan in this part of Canada too.

[PaulS]

10 hours ago, romansh said:

I think humans are omnivores. If they were not they could not have crossed the Bering Straits. Do you think bats' echo location is evolved or an adaptation? Evolution and adaptation are not somehow separate.

I question that logic - just because we can survive as omnivores (perhaps as carnivore like a dog can on high protein, vegetable dog biscuits) does that mean that is the diet we are best off following? Is it the penultimate diet our stomachs evolved for?

10 hours ago, romansh said:

I agree and I am not sure of your point here? Is it humans are more omnivorous than our simian cousins? So when we say humans "should" have X% of their diet as meat, there are generally two meanings of the word "should". Moral (as I think you had suggested was your veggie stint) and health objectives. Here is Wikipedia on the longevity of vegetarians: 

It was more just an observation that often people defend meat eating as part of our natural diet but often totally overlook how very little a part of our diet that should probably be.  And when I say should, I simply mean it in the sense concerning how our guts evolved and what our guts may expect as the most beneficial way of eating.  One could of course take a moral stance, which I have done in the past and which I have now abandoned, but that wasn’t my meaning in this discussion.

10 hours ago, romansh said:

 

ie Vegetarians are not better off than people who care about their health or are socially able to do so.

We need to deal with the elephant in the room. Nietzsche's dragon with "Thou Shall" inscribed on the underside of its scales.

I hear you about the “thou shall”, but I am simply questioning here what we have evolved to be, not necessarily just how we have adapted to deal with our limited environment.  I’m not favouring one view over another, just having the discussion.

[JosephM]

Perhaps we can all agree that a majority of humans have evolved or adapted to be omnivores but that they may choose to be frugivores and can thrive on either diet?

Joseph

[romansh]

11 hours ago, PaulS said:

22 hours ago, romansh said:

Evolution and adaptation are not somehow separate.

I question that logic - just because we can survive as omnivores (perhaps as carnivore like a dog can on high protein, vegetable dog biscuits) does that mean that is the diet we are best off following? Is it the penultimate diet our stomachs evolved for?

Firstly … dogs by definition are not carnivores, they are omnivores. Over time their close coevolution has turned them into omnivores, at least by definition. Of course we would have to either get rid of our pet dogs and cats to minimize if we want minimize meat eating. A classic omnivore is a pig, their digestive system is used as a proxy for that of humans. When you say 'best' … what do you mean by 'best'? Meat is easier to digest and richer in protein than most of common foodstuffs.

11 hours ago, PaulS said:

It was more just an observation that often people defend meat eating as part of our natural diet but often totally overlook how very little a part of our diet that should probably be.  And when I say should, I simply mean it in the sense concerning how our guts evolved and what our guts may expect as the most beneficial way of eating.  One could of course take a moral stance, which I have done in the past and which I have now abandoned, but that wasn’t my meaning in this discussion.

If you mean how little it can probably be then I would agree with you. In evolution there is no should. I quoted the wiki article contrasting vegetarians with comparable practicing meat eaters. There is little 'benefit' one way or the other in terms of longevity. Also from an evolutionary point of view to be 'successful' we don't care if we see our grand children, only that we have them.  So I don't buy the argument that evolution has done something therefore we should comply with that something.

12 hours ago, PaulS said:

I hear you about the “thou shall”, but I am simply questioning here what we have evolved to be, not necessarily just how we have adapted to deal with our limited environment.  I’m not favouring one view over another, just having the discussion.

Fair enough. I am not arguing that we should eat meat. I am arguing that humans are classic omnivores and the argument that humans are not omnivores is at best specious. Also I am not enamoured by argument by herbivores came before omnivores, therefore [insert any 'should type' argument here]. Also be careful of the term adaption when talking about evolution. As an example if we move to a higher altitude our bodies will acclimatize to the higher altitude. The acclimatization is not an adaption; but the ability acclimatize is. Similarly our bodies can get used a high meat diet, this is not an adaptation, but the ability is an adaptation. And if we were Inuit, we moved to herbivorous culture, we too would get used to the little meat diet. An acclimatization.