Diet: In the Raw

Few Americans had heard about the raw food diet until, Sex and the City's Samantha, the show's sex-crazed character, drank a shot of wheatgrass juice before seducing a waiter.

The raw lifestyle gained attention after sprouting cookbooks, restaurants and Web sites. It seemed poised to be the next big thing in a country that digests fad diets at a rapid rate.

The main appeal of the regimen is weight loss—due to filling, high-fiber fruits and veggies. Enthusiasts also say they have more energy and better resistance to colds.

But what's wrong with cooking, you ask? Raw foodies argue that major health problems—including diabetes, obesity and heart disease—arrived with the modern, processed, fat-laden diet. Food that has not been cooked is healthier, because it is high in fiber and no vitamins have been lost in cooking, says Natalia Rose, author of The Raw Food Detox Diet.

Raw foodies are essentially vegan, eschewing most animal products. Instead of a hamburger, raw restaurants might serve a nut-meat patty.

Any restrictive diet has a psychological component that's appealing to some, says Madelyn Fernstrom, a nutritional biochemist and director of the University of Pittsburgh Weight Management Center. Raw food is no exception. "Heating instead of cooking is ritualistic, so it helps people latch on to the diet," she says. "Many people feel devoted to this style of eating because it gives them structure."

Few nutritionists are raw converts. There's nothing inherently unhealthy about cooked food, not to mention that going raw is impractical for most people. And cooking actually increases the availability of nutrients in many foods (beans, tomatoes, carrots). Still, most Americans would be healthier if they took a few cues from raw enthusiasts and ate more fruits and vegetables.