The discovery of fire and its subsequent mastery was without doubt a good thing for the human race. It must have been a very happy moment when one of our precocious ancestors realized that a hunk of well-marbled mammoth flesh held over a fire sputtered and dripped fat and tasted especially delicious. Since then, the practice of cooking food is one of the things that has separated Homo sapiens from other beasts: We have pots and pans and propane to transform groceries into dinner.
Fie on that, says the raw food movement, which started about the same time Sylvester Graham and John Harvey Kellogg were touting big, regular bowel movements as the secret of good health. Raw foodists believe that any cooking whatsoever messes up anything edible. “Cooking foods makes them addictive,” recently declared a customer at the Chicagoland restaurant Karyn’s, where absolutely nothing is warmed beyond 115 degrees Fahrenheit. Proprietor Karyn Calabrese explained that the act of heating something destroys its enzymes and makes it toxic. Karyn’s restaurant, which shares space with a holistic health center offering cellulite treatment, colon therapy, and ear coning (don’t ask!), offers ravioli-like food that is actually turnips, pâté made from almonds, pasta that is zucchini, and crepes that are mashed cashews.
Among the proponents of rawism are celebrities Demi Moore, Laura Dern, Woody Harrelson, and Uma Thurman. While most raw foodists also are vegetarians, Mel Gibson represents the Paleolithic branch of the movement, adherents of which believe in eating maximum amounts of raw meat, just like our forebears did before they knew how to start a fire.