Did cooking make us cleverer?

Raw food diets have often been in trend during the past century. Although fresh vegetables and fruit, much of which can be eaten raw, are key constituents of a healthy diet, how would we live if all of our food was raw?

A book entitled ‘Did cooking make us human?’ provides some interesting insights. Written by Richard Wrangham, a Harvard University professor, this book suggests that if we ate all raw food, we would be compelled to spend most of the day chewing. Without cooking, the average person would have to eat around 5kg of raw food to obtain enough energy to survive, which would mean chewing for six hours a day.

The introduction of meat into our ancestors’ diets (about 2.3 million years ago) caused their brains to grow but, according to Wrangham’s book, a more significant shift happened around 1.8 million years ago, when Homo erectus appeared on the scene.

He had learnt to cook and this gradually led to the endof the hitherto large vegetable-processing gut. Smaller guts meant that individuals could save energy and survive better.

Cooking breaks down the cellular structure of food and the gastrointestinal tract needs to expend less energy to release nutrients. This energy saving allowed the human brain to grow.

According to Professor Wrangham, it is no coincidence that humans, with their large brains and high intelligence, are the only species that has learnt to cook.

Whither raw food diets?