Seven: The Effects of Food Preparation
Raw foods are nature undiluted. They offer us their pure being, without distractions. A raw carrot is a pure carrot; raw wheat or potatoes are unmistakable; raw meat is just that. Yet we do not always accept nature’ s bounty unadorned. All cultures modify their foodstuffs, either by the application of heat( cooking) or by engaging the services of microorganisms( fermenting or pickling). Preservation is not the only reason for using these transformative techniques. They have both metabolic and psychospiritual effects on the human organism. It is important to consider these effects when making food choices. COOKING All cultures cook. Perhaps not all of their foods, but certainly some. Why this strange and laborious activity? Why not eat everything as we find it, pure and natural, as the animals do? Anthropologist Peter Farb, author of Consuming Passions— The Anthropology of Eating, believes that the curiosities of human behavior always have a rational explanation. Thus, there must be a sound reason for the universality of cooking, or else it wouldn’ t have lasted this long. And indeed there is: Cooking softens the cellulose and fiber in starchy foods and thereby makes their nutrients more available to digestion. In the case of animal-protein foods, though heat in fact toughens the proteins, it helps inactivate bacteria and microorganisms that could cause putrefaction and disease. Although cooking alters the energy field of foods, this need not be construed as negative, even though some nutrients may appear to be lost. We obviously do better with cooked meat or chicken, boiled rice, beans in soup or casserole, rather than any of these foods raw. Warmth, moisture, darkness, time— those are the elements of cooking. They are also the elements of digestion. Thus, as Farb points out, cooking is a sort of predigestion. 1 It takes over some of the work done by the stomach, pancreas, and liver, so that it’ s easier for the body to absorb the nutrients that it needs. But why do we need this extra help? The digestive system is intimately connected with the nervous system. A stomachache from emotional turmoil, a mental block from constipation— both illustrate that two-way connection. When a lot of energy is spent on digestion, there is little left for thinking. After a heavy meal we need a nap, a walk, a few turns on the dance floor; we’ d be hard put to write a doctoral thesis. Conversely, when less energy is used up in digestion, more of it is available for the brain to use. Therefore, when cooking or fermenting simplify the digestive processes, we do have that extra bit of energy needed for specifically human activities, such as writing, building bridges, designing clothes. * Because cooking makes digestion less stressful, people with digestive problems have found relief when they avoid all raw foods. The purported“ loss” of nutrients in cooking is negligible if we take into account the fact that those nutrients that are present will be better assimilated. The higher amount of nutrients in raw foods is useless when these nutrients are not absorbed. If the raw foods cause digestive disorders, as they do for some people, they can even be harmful. Cooking contracts vegetable foods, reducing their volume; thus we get more nutrients with less bulk. This reduction in bulk also means that the food is more concentrated. For most people cooking will therefore support mental concentration— better than, say, expansive salads with many different ingredients. The application of fire to food may have resulted in the development of civilization by creating mental focus and concentration. 3( Of course it could have been the other way around: First we became mentally focused, then we found the way to eat to support that state.) There are seven major cooking techniques, with variations according to each ethnic cuisine. They are, from the most expansive to the most contractive:
• Boiling
• Steaming
• Sautéeing or stir-frying
• Broiling( under heat)
• Baking
• Deep-frying
• Pickling Boiling and pickling are opposite methods: The first one adds water and removes minerals, thereby expanding the food; the second adds minerals and removes water, thus contracting it. Let us also note, at this point, that boiling has undeservedly gotten a very bad name in the past thirty or forty years.“ Boiled to death” is a commentary often made about overcooked food. The fact is that boiling will sometimes make inedible food