Hello Beautiful!

It looks like you're new to The Community. If you'd like to get involved, click one of these buttons!

In this Discussion

Nuts: how much is too much?

So many recipes call for cups and cups of nuts, but how much should we be consuming daily? I could eat pounds….
;)

Comments

  • pianissimapianissima Raw Newbie

    i think nuts and seeds are WAY overvalued. they are mainly transitional foods, but even then, i’d sooner eat a baked yam than a pound of nuts. they just don’t sit well once you’ve been doing this for a while.

    see how you feel, you’ll want less and less as you go along, especially if you are getting a good daily dose of GREENS! a couple of handfuls seems reasonable to me. but basically, your body will know when it’s ENOUGH.

    p.s. if it weren’t for super modern technologies that shell nuts and seeds for us, it would be SUPER time consuming to eat a cup of nuts. you might want to base your consumption on how much you would eat if you had to do it by hand.

  • Yes, that’s true. When I first attempted to go raw, I couldn’t get enough nuts! Of course, I gained weight & felt terrible, but it did help me to transist. I try to use seeds in my recipes & nuts for special occasions. You’ll find your cravings change. For instance I used to have to have chocolate everyday! Now, I can’t remember the last time I’ve had chocolate. When I want something decadent I crave a banana & mango smoothie with hemp seeds.

  • I have had a similar experience. I’ve only been raw for two weeks and at first all I wanted to do was make dessert items… which used a lot of nuts and cocoa. But now I love making salads, especially with kale, and using my juicer! BTW one day my local healthfood store only had brazil nuts in their shell.. I didn’t have anything to crack them open so I had to smash them with a hammer and then pry as much of the nut as I could out of the shell. It was a lot of work so I know what pianissima is saying :)

  • Think SERVING SIZES sometimes. Everyone says go with your cravings, but sometimes all I would eat would be nuts by the bucket full! I would say that everything in moderation. A dessert made with 3 cups of nuts probably has at least 4 to 8 servings in it. The wider variety of foods the more healthy.

  • alpdesignsalpdesigns Raw Newbie

    Actually nuts and seeds are very healthy in moderation. Three Brazil nuts provides enough selenium for the day. 2 tbs. of pumpkin seeds provides plenty of zinc. You need 2 tbs of ground flax to provide enough omegas, DHEA and fiber. The recipes may call for a lot of nuts, but you don’t have to eat the whole thing at once or make the gourmet nut recipes every day! Eat a small portion of the nut dish with a larger salad.

  • I used to have 1-2 ounces of nuts/seeds a day (or half an avocado instead of an ounce). Now that my weight has stablized (and I’ve always been very active), 3-4 oz is better for me.

  • CarmentinaCarmentina Raw Newbie

    Thanks everyone. I guess I should cut back somewhat. Because I’m transitioning, I’m craving desserts and chocolate daily, but I suppose I should just make a banana “ice cream” !!

  • I generally feel much better when I eat very few nuts… or heavy fats [lots of oils etc] but I find myself discouraged because EVERYTHING calls for nuts, seeds or flax. :(

    Does anyone have a pate, cracker, or other dish that doesn’t call for nuts? What do people do when they are raw but allergic to nuts and seeds?!

  • pianissimapianissima Raw Newbie

    it’s weird for me that everywhere i go “raw” has come to mean raw fats. the other day i ordered a raw pizza which was an avo salad with a seed bread topped with a thin sheet of marinara sauce and then pine nut “cheese.”

    shouldn’t vegans be eating VEGETABLES??! nuts and seeds are great, but they are not the basis of raw. bring on the organic produce!

    so, mango woman- i would say someone allergic to nuts and seeds would thrive on the best stuff on earth: fruits, greens, veggies…

    p.s. avocados and olives are great sources of fat as well, and more easily digestible in my opinion.

    p.s. carmentina- even though i feel this way now, i too binged on nuts and seeds in the beginning, cuz we want to feel FULL! so i wouldn’t worry too much about all this! have you tried manna bread? or some sort of raw bread, i found that was really helpful for the transition.

  • I have always heard that we need no more than one ounce of fat per day, including nuts. A lot of raw food recipes are LOADED with nuts. I agree that this is okay to help you transition, but should definitely be scaled back as soon as you are able.

    I also believe that you should enjoy everthing in moderation…including moderation. Gotta have some raw pie or raw pizza with a nut crust occasionally!

  • i just made some really good oatmeal cookies that don’t require any nuts (although i did add some chopped walnuts, but they’re totally not required.) great transition food. they’re from Living Cuisine by renee underkoffler. i’ll post them.

    yes, it’s easy to overdo the nuts, but they do have great nutrition in them. salads and smoothies are great because you can get them anywhere and they have what you really want to be eating… fresh produce!

  • i dont follow recipes that call for a million cups of nuts. It sounds expensive, hard to digest, and disgusting to me. I make my own recipes and don’t rely on other peoples recipes. Last night, I ate avocado wrapped in dried seaweed dipped in a sauce made of soy, agave, pepper powder and sesame oil. If I eat nuts, it’s only a few in it’s basic form not blended to look like something else. I also ate some dates and put a few almonds inside of them. It wasn’t like cups of nuts blended into the shape of a fish or something.

  • So I don’t want to start any trouble but I don’t agree with cutting back too much on nuts. In my experience I eat tons of nuts and still loose weight. I think Americans have this idea in their head that Fat=Enemy but if you look up info and do some research non-saturated fats are actually good for you and help to release toxins and saturated fats. I am not saying eat buckets full of nuts, but unlike some people I think it’s ok to eat them. I would not call them a

  • elizabethhelizabethh Raw Newbie

    i eat a moderate amount of nuts, maybe a handful or two (usually the max) per day. nuts are very nutritious in relatively small quantities, although i must say i’ve gone through periods where i ate almost exclusively nuts and didnt gain a pound.

  • RawKarateGirlRawKarateGirl Raw Newbie

    Just listen to your body!! (smiles)

  • I KNOW…so much varying info out there. 1 oz is a little less than 30 grams. I will have to find out where I heard 1 oz and the relevance of that amount.

    ANYWAY, as far as weight loss/gain goes, I have had a raw banana cake binge with a nut date crust on a few occasions and never gained weight. Don’t know if that was good for me, but I never seem to gain or lose weight when eating raw foods. I must get some sort of glow when I eat mostly raw that seems to make my friends/family ask “did you lose weight or something?” I just tell them I am not SAD anymore : )

  • ambergirlambergirl Raw Newbie

    this has been on my mind a lot lately. Even keeping me up at night. I know it’s not healthy (i’m working on this) but i am obsessed with my weight. I’m always paranoid that i’m too “big”. Last night, my boyfriend was looking up the caloric info on nuts, and i was floored. I just figured that since they’re “raw” that they were a “go” and that i was fine. But now i’m paranoid! there are so many many recipes on here that call for mac nuts and cashews (the highest in fat) and i’m scared! I have put on weight lately, and i’m not sure if its the nuts, or because i’ve been working out, or both. But i know that trying to wean myself off of nuts is going to be hard and painful, since within the last couple of weeks i’ve become very accustomed to it. Is there no balance? I have the biggest sweet tooth ever!

  • ambergirl, I know the feeling. I have been obsessed with calories all my life until eating raw. Don’t beat yourself up about because you are just starting on a HEALTHY journey!

    I truly believe that you can train yourself to crave more veggies and less fat and sweets just by kind of ‘tricking yourself’ into eating them at first. Like drinking green smoothies for your sweet tooth.

    Try putting in more veggies than fruit and a sweetner like stevia. That helps my sweet tooth. Also, high water content fruit. I LOVE papaya and pineapple. Both are high in digestive enzymes, so I like to eat them first thing in the morning and then wait about an hour before eating anything else.

    Hang in there! I know it is not easy at first, but take it easy on yourself…you need your sleep! : )

  • ambergirlambergirl Raw Newbie

    :) thanks Sedona! And i love pineapple and papaya too!! And i will try the green smoothies.. I’m getting excited again!!! :D

  • I just read the other day on the homepage for AOL “Foods that fight fat” and I was happy to see avocado’s, almonds, macadamia nuts, pumpkin seeds, etc..They said that these good fats actually help remove bad fats from your body..They didn’t give specific amounts but it was encouraging nonetheless.

  • When I look at most of the raw recipes here and elsewhere, I don’t even bother to try them because they’re usually mostly nuts or dehydrated. I don’t really even cook these days. I make green smoothies and eat a tablespoon of pepitas, flaxseeds or almonds and that’s it for nuts/oils for the day. I’m not totally raw, so I also eat sweet potatoes and brown rice with seaweed but those have no fat so they don’t make me sleepy (a big concern since I work and go to school full time)

  • I too, love nuts, but was concerned with my nut intake so I did come up with a salmon spread that calls for red lentils (which are fairly low fat) instead of nuts. I posted it on here as mock salmon spread.

Sign In or Register to comment.