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By Robin Robertson

The Virginian-Pilot and The Ledger-Star, Norfolk, VA
December 16, 1998

LOREN LOCKMAN LIKES to eat in the raw. In fact, he's been doing it more than seven years. No, he's not a nudist - he's a raw foodist. The raw-foods, or "living" foods, diet he enjoys is gaining increased awareness from medical and nutrition professionals, vegetarians and the public. People are becoming aware that whole fruits and vegetables - as fresh as possible - are essential for good health.

Lockman, who lives in the Washington, D.C., area, has been the guest speaker at several Living Foods Potlucks held in Virginia Beach on the fourth Sunday of each month. His 30-minute presentations often stretch into hours with the question-and-answer sessions that follow. On Nov. 22 he spoke at the Thanksgiving Potluck held jointly by the Living Foods Group and the Hampton Roads Vegetarian Society.

Lockman explained that the raw-foods diet consists mainly of fruit, leafy greens and other vegetables, soaked nuts and seeds, and occasional soaked or sprouted beans and grains. He told us that all primates are frugivorous animals, and frugivores consume a diet based primarily on the items listed above.

Raw foodists believe that humans, too, are designed to eat this way, based on our physiological structure, which is designed for fruit-eating: our hands to pick it, our teeth to chew it, our weak stomach acid, and our long, winding intestinal tract - all better designed to digest plant food.

When asked why living-foods advocates consume their food raw, Lockman told me: "We consume our diet entirely raw because cooking food destroys its vitality, specifically the enzymes in the food. Cooking also destroys most of the vitamins, returns most of the minerals to an inorganic state, and coagulates the proteins, making them unusable.

"Many people are surprised to learn that all plant foods contain protein - up to 45 percent for some dark leafy vegetables. What's critical to understand is that we only need small quantities of protein and that consuming excess protein contributes to disease. Also, when we eat concentrated proteins, our bodies have a lot of work to do to obtain their useful amino acids. When we eat ripe fruit, the plant proteins have already been broken down into their amino acids, which we can then assimilate with very little work. Like any other machine, the more work we force our organs to do, the faster they wear out."

When asked if there were any side effects from this diet, Lockman answered: "Yes. There is one major one: glowing health. In my own life I consulted doctors for two years to resolve an undiagnosed general malaise which left me exhausted all the time.

"With no relief from traditional medicine, I started doing my own research and ultimately changed to a raw frugivorous diet. I not only quickly eliminated the problems I was experiencing, but I reached a level of health I had never felt before. In the years since, I have experienced no sickness at all."

Whether or not you think the raw foods diet is for you, a certain percentage of raw foods in the diet is generally considered to be a good idea. This can be as simple as eating more fresh fruits, raw vegetables and salads.

In a recent article in Vegetarian Voice magazine, Michael Klaper, M.D., writes: " . . . you don't have to completely change your dietary habits or `go raw' to reap the advantages of raw foods. It's easy to include large portions of fresh raw foods at every meal - it's just a matter of cultivating our appreciation for the taste of whole, unadulterated, unfired foods - just as nature made them."

If you'd like to learn more about the raw-foods movement in Hampton Roads, call Jill Harrington at 437-9447. She can fill you in on the Living-Foods Potluck to be held in Virginia Beach on Dec. 27 featuring Loren Lockman as guest speaker.

To prove that raw foods can be more than just biting into an apple, try some of these scrumptious raw recipes and try eating in the raw yourself.

(Copyright 1998)

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