Healthy Eating In Bangkok and Bali

I was happily surprised to find so much health food consciousness in Bali. Wherever you looked, at least in Ubud, restaurants had signs that said "No MSG" and "organic food." Ubud has several that serve raw vegan food and there really was a lot of options for people concerned with good nutrition. Putu and Made, our cooks happily made delicious, healthful meals everyday combining organic Balinese vegetables with raw food preparation techniques and, homemade food is always better than restaurant food. Still Bali Buddah and Kafe always had good, healthful food including raw dishes.

I was even more surprised when I got to Bangkok. I have to admit I had some anxiety knowing my favorite Thai restaurant had closed this year. I'd been eating at Bussaracum for decades. Last year I even wrote a post, Lunch In The Same Bangkok Restaurant Everyday For A Month-- Bussaracum, The Best Restaurant In Thailand. Where would I eat? The food in Bangkok isn't always so wonderful and a number of my favorite restaurants have closed down or moved away to locations miles away.

Looking back over my own 2006 Bangkok restaurant guide, I was reminded that someone had told me about a raw food restaurant called the Rasayana Retreat. I ate there today. HEAVEN!

Clean, beautiful, wonderful vibes and the food... unbeatable. The food was very seriously raw and health oriented and SO DELICIOUS! I had lasagna and key lime pie and I can't wait to go back tomorrow to try some more. Here's their raison d'etre:

From the moment that a fruit or vegetable is harvested it undergoes change in it’s chemical and nutritive make up. The fresher a fruit or vegetable is, the higher it’s nutritive content. When you cook food a huge percentage of available nutrient is destroyed, and its chemical make-up is altered, in essence stripping the food of the very nutrients that your body is requesting when it signals hunger to your mind and stomach. Nutrient stripped food does not satisfy the body’s hunger, leading to overeating and dissatisfaction with food for many people. But there are also much greater consequences.

In order for the eliminative systems and organs of the body to function optimally a person must eat at least an 80% alkaline diet. The majority of alkaline foods are fruits and vegetables. The majority of acid foods are animal products, such as meat and dairy, or processed foods that have been heated (as in cooked), ground and separated, and/or have added sugar, salt, preservatives, stabilizers, colorings and many other additives as well. If acidic foods are the greater part of the diet, elimination from the bowels, lymph, kidneys, respiration and skin becomes sluggish, allowing a build up of toxins to collect in the organs and tissues of the body. This ultimately leads to unpleasant symptoms and chronic disease.

Eating raw food is like giving yourself high-octane fuel so that your body can be energized, run efficiently, cleanse efficiently, think clearly and work out toxins so that health and beauty can be a reality instead of a distant goal. On a cleansing program a 100% alkaline diet is a necessity if one wishes to get maximum results from the cleanse. A cleansing diet treats food like medicine, using food to assist the body in healing and rejuvenation. A wonderful aspect of this is that Living Food also tastes good.

It's open everyday. It's real close to the skytrain that runs down Sukhumvit. And it is very inexpensive.