Gary Yourofsky is known for being vegan, but just what kind of vegan is he? In this interview, Gary shares his favorite vegan foods, restaurants and his top fruit picks
If there’s one thing that’s clear about activist Gary Yourofsky, it’s that he’s vegan. But what kind of vegan is he exactly? There seems to be an ever-expanding number of vegan “types” from raw to cooked to junk food vegan to raw till 4. So while i was with Gary shooting the interview series for the channel, I asked him to talk about his “vegan type.”
To hear his entire answer, you can watch the video above but here are some choice nuggets:
I like all types of vegan food…tofu and barley and yams, those are my three favorite foods. Give me that and I’m a happy guy up and down all day long. I don’t really adhere to any type of thing. I try to be organic when I can, again, to me that is not a vegan issue. I just don’t know why we are putting chemicals on the earth and we’re altering products. Probably 100% organic vegan when I’m at home. On the road a little tougher to do, but definitely organic vegan at home.
I also asked a question posed by well-known YouTuber Freelee the banana girl about what kind of fruits Gary favors:
“I always love my fruit, I love mangoes and my mango chunky and I love my berries. I’m really into berries nowadays. So give me some blackberries and some raspberries and some blueberries and I’m a happy guy. Eat your bananas and of course I always love my bananas.”
Now I’d like to hear from you! What kind of vegan are you? And if you’re not vegan, what kind of vegan would you like to be? Or perhaps you have a label for your current way of eating that you can share? Or are you someone who can’t be constrained by such artificial boundaries as a label? Let me know in the comments!
— Emily Moran Barwick
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I would love to learn new recipes and share them with my wife. I am a raw vegan and she is an omni.
happy to help in any way i can, Charlie. have you seen the Thanksgiving Recipe post? that may give you some ideas :)
I guess I’m a HCLF-vegan, who has raw food and fruits for most meals. I love raw and I LOVE my carbs, which has given me the energy to go out and get crackin’ with gym and work-related assignments ;) Coffee tho
that’s awesome Michelle! thanks for sharing!
I haven’t really seen the type of vegan diet I’ve transitioned to. Some aspects of my diet are well known: vegan, whole-foods, minimally-processed, low-fat. And while I am not raw, I try to be “raw strong” and to include more often. (Also trying to eliminate or reduce my use of olive oil, the only oil I use) Mostly avoid pasta (see “minimally processed”) but for exceptions, I usually use whole grain (e.g. browth rice) based. But..
But other aspects I have not seen discussed in depth as a particular “type” of vegan, let alone named.
The main “in between” I am aware of, that is between cooked (or cooked and raw) at one end, and 100% raw at the other end, is “raw till 4” (which, don’t get me wrong, I’m happy has been put out there so give more ‘space’ than just the “100% raw” diet, which I am not convinced is the healthiest either, for reasons I won’t get into here)
So compromise is good…But wait, not all “cooked” are created equal! We are mixing together boiling, steaming, microwaving, baking, frying, deep-frying, stir-frying, broiling, and roasting and so on, as if they are “the same” in terms of health.
I am not 100% but I avoid the ones above (you can guess which) that I think of as “lightly BURNED food” which there are reasons to believe carry health risks.
Especially avoiding: roasted, and the many types of “fried” (and of course, flame-broiled). I have have some (but very little) baked goods. Other than sweet potatoes I rarely use the microwave for anything other than re-heating (soup, and in the winter, tea as well as pure water). So mostly steaming (my #1 choice) and some boiling. I do steam sweet potatoes, but sometimes too much of a hurry to resist the micro, but that’s the main exception..
I use the liquid not just for nutrition but for the amazing taste. Try drinking and really savoring “broccoli water” after steaming broccoli (and maybe some onion and bok choy, celery, also: carrots, which I love to have raw and juiced but are also great steamed) it is fantastic and fantastically rich and complex and nuanced, “essence” of veggies!
I also avoid dry-roasted nuts; when the nuts are almonds it is raw 99% of the time (the 1% is on the road etc) and almonds are by far the most common nut in my diet. I also have pine nuts (second most common) raw, and walnuts/pecans raw(small amounts to avoid allergies), I avoid peanuts (sensitivity). Only roasted semi regular one is pistachios. I rarely have cahews.
I really do question whether “raw till 4” is any healthier if at 4pm they regularly have Roasted (let alone Flame Broiled/Char Broiled), or Fried (let alone deep fried) including “stir-fried” and suspect the science will suggest that “raw-strong” healthier-cooking-types are as good or better for health than raw till 4 and maybe even raw.
The science to suggest that roasting, frying, etc, even possibly baking, create questionable compounds, is too lengthy to review. My own taste buds even detect a “cleaner” taste to raw almonds vs. roasted, so I’ve lost my taste (mostly) for the roasted kind.
I know I’ve seen Freely (I do like her videos very much!) use roasting, to example…..NOT ALL COOKING methods were created equal though….
I am terrible at coming up with names, how about SCMV, for Selective Cooking Methods? ;-)
Or to be more specific: GWCV for Gently-Water-Cooked (water cooked meaning, steaming plus boiling) Vegan?
Or GWCV-RS adding “raw strong” to the GWC concept? :-)
If I had to wager, I’d bet that in the next 10 to 25 years the science will be even stronger, but will our lingo catch up anytime?
I’m glad “raw till 4” has “opened the door” to a middle ground on cooked/raw….and I guess I’m now officially Lobbying for the above health and science based middle ground diet(s) that I’ve evolved towards, as *another* type of middle ground on the cooked versus raw..I just need someone whose better at names to coin a better phrase, and take it viral! Any takers? ;-)