In this Q&A video, the presenter addresses the debate over cooked versus raw foods, arguing that an extreme stance—whether fully raw vegan or fully raw carnivore—is unnecessary. He explains that humans possess traits of both herbivores and carnivores, so a balanced diet incorporating both animal and plant foods, and both cooked and raw preparations, is optimal. The speaker outlines how cooking improves digestibility of proteins and complex carbohydrates, while raw foods retain higher enzyme content and preserve heat‑sensitive vitamins such as vitamin C and B. He also notes that cooking can increase the bioavailability of certain phytonutrients (e.g., lycopene in tomatoes, beta‑carotene in carrots). Personal taste, texture, and flavor preferences influence whether an individual prefers foods cooked or raw. Additionally, genetic ancestry, climate, and activity level affect where on the cooked/raw spectrum a person may benefit most, with northern‑origin individuals tending toward higher protein/fat intake and equatorial‑origin individuals leaning more plant‑based. The presenter suggests rotating and mixing cooked and raw foods throughout the week, and mentions that temporary therapeutic phases (e.g., short‑term vegan or carnivore) can help reset the body. He concludes by encouraging viewers to listen to their bodies, adjust based on individual reactions, and ask further questions in the comments.
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Hey guys, what's up? And welcome to today's Q&A. So today's question of the day is, what do I think about eating cooked versus raw food? Is a, uh, what's the next bit? Sorry, is a bit of cooking important and is focusing on raw important? So this is a question that popped up on one of my YouTube videos recently, um, and Well, let's dig into it. I'll let you guys know exactly where I stand on this, this idea around cooked versus raw. Now, the reason we even have this debate going is kind of because of the extremists in both the vegan camp and the carnivore camp. So extreme vegans will be like, everything should be plant-based and everything should be raw. And then extreme carnivores are like, everything should be animal-based and everything should be raw, and so on. So we've kind of ended up with this bit of an argument in the industry from both ends of the scale, but also in the middle, as to whether we should be predominantly eating cooked foods or raw foods. Now, just like carnivore versus vegan, guess what? We should be eating both because we're herbivores, essentially. We have characteristics and traits of both carnivores and, um, and our herbivores. So therefore having both set, both traits, we tend to get better. Sorry, we tend to do better and get by much better in a healthier state if we partake in both ends of, of the spectrum. So we want to eat animal foods and we want to eat plant-based foods, and then we would tweak, adapt, or adjust that based on our own individual needs. And of course, based on what our body tells us when we're eating certain foods. So like, if you eat something and you blatantly get headache after it, or you get stuffy, or you get bloating and gas, or you get digestive cramps and so on, But maybe, you know, excuse me, maybe, you know, that food is not ideal for you and it's not going to serve you at the best level. So maybe you'll completely wipe that out of your diet or you would just keep it to a minimum. Now, when it comes to eating cooked versus raw, it's kind of the same type of game. It's like if we have something that we know is working, keep doing it. If it doesn't, then obviously we would try and avoid that thing. But when it specifically comes to whether I think you should eat cooked versus raw, As we've already said, both. And the reason for that is we need to look at things like digestibility for a start. So for example, proteins and your complex carbohydrates will tend to be much easier for our body to digest once they've been cooked. Now, this doesn't mean we have to cook the hell out of them and cook the life out of them, but quite often, for example, the proteins get broken down into more easily digestible components which then makes it easier for our body to absorb and assimilate those and obviously make use of them versus when they're raw. Same goes for our complex carbohydrates. When they're bound up in lots of fiber and the carbohydrates are still in their complex formations, then it's harder for our body to make use of those particular compounds and nutrients and so on. So sometimes a bit of cooking in those instances is going to help, it's going to unlock certain nutrition. Now, on the flip side of this, with the raw food or eating those particular foods raw, what we know is true about raw foods is they tend to be higher in enzymes. Now, of course, enzymes, digestive enzymes, etc., are going to be essential for ensuring that we get good quality digestion and high nutrient extraction from the foods that we're consuming. So eating plenty of raw food at the same time as our cooked food is going to, one, we're going to have the cooked food that's broken down to, to make it easier to digest. And then we're going to have the enzymes from the raw food again to help us break down any of those foods that we're eating and enable us to digest them better. So that's our first thing. We need to look at digestibility and ideally we want benefits from both camps. Then we also want to look at nutrient availability and nutrient density. So, for example, certain nutrients are going to be more available to the body once we cook. So, for example, tomatoes, we, we find that lycopene becomes more available to the body once we cook the tomatoes. Beta-carotene from carrots becomes more available once we cook the carrots, and so on. So that doesn't mean never eat these foods raw. It just means we're going to want a good mix of the two because certain nutrients will be more available once cooked. But we also have to consider the fact that in many foods, the nutrient availability or density is higher whilst they're raw. So for example, vitamin C and B tend to be damaged very easily by cooking if we're not careful. If we're, for example, cooking too high, too fast, and so on, those can be damaged quite easily, which then makes it harder for our body to extract that particular nutrition or make use of it because it's been damaged. So again, we're going to want cooked versions and raw versions in order to get the most benefit. And of course, we don't have to do this at every single meal. This is just a case of kind of rotating and flipping things throughout your week to ensure that you get the best benefit or the greatest potential benefit from what you're doing with your foods. Now, the final thing to consider for most people is flavors and textures. So many foods will actually have their flavors enhanced by cooking. And people would then tend to prefer them because it's, oh, actually this tastes much better. So for example, with myself, broccoli, I hate raw broccoli. To me it just tastes like rubber, but some people love it. I don't. So I then, so in order to make it more palatable for me, I will just lightly steam it or lightly boil it. Now by doing so, that then makes it far better in my opinion, in terms of taste. The taste profile is improved, the texture profile is improved, and therefore I can eat a greater amount of it and obviously get the nutrition from it. But for, for some people, they will maybe find the opposite. Oh, actually, I don't like it when it's cooked. I prefer it raw. And this could be for any, any given number of foods and so on. And a lot of that will come down to personal taste and what you like in terms of textures and so on. But in reality, the truth is, like most things within our industry, very little of it really exists in the extremes, in the black and white. Everything is kind of within the grayscale somewhere. And then the only thing that makes it more black or more white is how it specifically works or reacts with you and your body. So no different from, oh, carnivore is great or vegan is great or both are shit. It doesn't matter. In that same vein as, as, as having those, those arguments, it will come down to, well, what can your body do with it? Now, temporarily or therapeutically, for any of us, it might be beneficial to go vegan temporarily or to go carnivore temporarily in order to give our body a rest from certain compounds that we may have been consuming that aren't benefiting us from one or the other camp. But for the large majority of us, settling somewhere within this range is actually what's going to serve us best. And what we tend to find is it will come down to our genetic and ethnic background, our environmental demands on a day-to-day basis. Things like, believe it or not, the weather can make a big difference. And you know, if you live in a warm climate versus a cool climate and so on, that will dictate where on this scale between extreme carnivore and extreme vegan you would likely benefit most. And what we tend to find as a basic rule is northern, summer, and sorry, northern and southern hemisphere. So if you are ethnic and genetic background is from the north, northern or southern hemisphere, you will likely do, do better when you lean more towards the protein side of things. So you'll have a higher proportion of proteins and fats or animal foods versus plant foods. And then if you are more from the equator— sorry, the equatorial area, man, struggling to get my words out tonight. But anyway, yeah, so if your ancestry is more from around the equator and those warmer regions where they would have been able to get access to plants and fruits and things all year round, then you may find that actually you tend to do better at the opposite end of the scale where you've got more plant-based foods and so on with just a little bit of animal food in order to help buffer your protein needs and so on. Now, of course, this does shift and change based on what you're doing day to day. You know, if you train once a week versus someone that trains 5 days a week, this is going to have an influence. But either way, regardless of where you find you sit on this scale, you're going to want both cooked foods and raw foods in order to get the most benefit from it. So I will leave it there tonight, guys. Um, we've got into quite a few little aspects of nutrition there, um, so I hope you found it helpful. If you have any other questions, just drop them in the comments below, and of course I will get back to you guys as soon as I can with an answer. Thank you for watching, people. As always, I appreciate your time, and I look forward to chatting with you in my next video. Take it easy.
