Here’s a brief synopsis of what we recommend people do in terms of eating
and drinking. These are not ho-hum guidelines. They are meant to represent the
optimal means of getting healthy, staying healthy, and extending our quality
life years. There is mounting
evidence-based research supporting our guidelines. Remember, the food we eat is
the number one determinant of our overall health. Unfortunately, in our
country, and in the Western world as far as that goes, we are exposed to way
too much conflicting, inaccurate, and biased information about nutritional
research. We continue to have epidemics of heart disease and stroke, cancer,
type II diabetes, weight control challenges, dementia and other medical
conditions, most of which are preventable. We fully understand that some people
are unwilling or believe that they are unable to align with these fairly
detailed guidelines. Well, that is what it is, and we just ask that people will
do their best and at a minimum, add to their daily eating rituals more
plant-based foods, perhaps five or six servings per day; there is nothing but
advantage in doing that.
These principles we believe will provide us with optimal body weight,
energy and vitality, superb longevity and disease avoidance. Our goal as we
seek enhanced physical, mental, and spiritual health is to have more quality
life years where we are not dependent on medications or overly dependent on the
traditional medical system. Our goal is to enhance our health span. There are many lifestyle factors that interact to
determine our health status, but food intake is primary … we must get this one
right!
1.)
Consume a ‘whole- food plant-based’ (WFPB) eating
plan. This helps to avoid the toxicity found in many animal-based foods and ‘Keto-like’ diets that are disease
promoting.
2.) Processed food:
In order to
prevent many of the principal chronic diseases, we recommend that you minimize
consumption of processed foods; these foods contain many undesirable
ingredients including unhealthy refined grains, food dyes, multiple types of
unhealthy sweeteners, extracted oils and many unspecified natural flavorings;
these foods promote illness, and lead to weight gain. If you consume processed foods, be sure to see the ‘Nutrition Facts’ label to verify that
the item contains no saturated fat, no trans-fat and no cholesterol per
serving.
3.)
Food Labels: One of the most
important things regarding our health that we can know about is a few facts
about reading food labels. We should be able to glance at the ingredients label
and make a decision in 10 or 20 seconds about whether this is an acceptable
food or not.
4.)
Moderation: Buying into the idea that we can
consume all things in moderation can be very risky and lead to ill health. So,
we must use moderation in moderation because of the inherent ‘slippery Slope’ involved.
5.)
Be sure to limit or eliminate extracted oils in
your daily eating. Even olive oil and coconut oil can contribute to ill health,
because of saturated fat, high calories and related predisposition to disease.
6.)
Vegetables:
We recommend that you eat a large raw
salad every day that includes a variety of green leafy vegetables like
kale, spinach, and baby bok choy; also include foods like cucumbers, carrots,
olives, tomatoes, red onions, broccoli, cauliflower, celery, bell pepper, beets
and other tubers, and red cabbage.
7.)
Fruit: Consume several servings of fruit daily. Berries
contain particularly potent, healthy plant compounds. Limit fruit juice is it
contains concentrated sugars and lacks some of the nutrients in the whole food.
8.)
Other plant foods: Eat whole grains (preferably 'intact'
grains), onions and garlic, beans of all sorts, seeds and nuts, cooked mushrooms;
starchy vegetables like potatoes and squash, corn, sea vegetables, healthy
herbs and spices and all other plant foods that you have a preference for.
Starchy vegetables should probably be limited for those with pre diabetes or Type
2 diabetes.
9.) Select the most colorful foods that you can find
and consume them regularly. Examples are prunes, red bell pepper, pomegranates,
beets, red lentils, black rice, kiwifruit, and etc.
10.)
You do not need to count carbohydrates, protein grams or
calories as long as you are consuming a variety and sufficient quantity of plant-based
foods.
11.)
Eat until you are satisfied, not full.
12.)
Always select certified
organic and ‘Non-GMO’ food when you can.
13.)
Eat most of your food raw or gently cooked.
14.)
Food Supplements and Super Foods: always take a
low dose vitamin B12 supplement and assure that your vitamin D levels are
within limits. Never use vitamins or other food supplements as a substitute for
a poor, unhealthy diet. Foods like organic Cacao powder, Maca powder, Amla
powder, Chia seeds, hemp seeds, and all berries can be used in smoothies.
Actually, all plant foods are super foods because they contain about 100,000 healing
nutrients that act in an amazing synergy to keep us healthy.
15.)
Sweeteners: we recommend not using artificial sweeteners, table
sugar and products that contain high fructose corn syrup. Date sugar is an
excellent and nutritious sweetener. Guard against sugar addiction as it is a
major contributor to the disease epidemic that we have. The natural sugars in
whole fruit are quite healthy for us because they are packaged with a huge
number of healing nutrients and fiber. Blackstrap molasses is loaded with
important minerals.
16.)
What do I drink? The best beverage is clean, filtered water; we
recommend reverse osmosis as one good filtering method. The healthiest teas are
green white tea. Coffee in moderation has benefits, but also some downside.
Organic and non-GMO nondairy milks are okay but be sure that they are not
overly processed, containing too many unhealthy ingredients. In our house we
drink Non- GMO soy milk that has 2 ingredients: filtered water and organic
soybeans. Fruit juices are processed, high in calories, foster sugar addiction
and the dietary fiber is altered resulting in less polyphenol nutrients that
are chemically bound to the fiber.
17.)
If you decide to
consume animal-based foods, we would recommend that you limit this to
not more than 5% of calories consumed. Be careful of the ‘slippery slope’ involved in this decision as you can easily find yourself
consuming hot dogs, barbecued pork, luncheon meats and cheeses regularly. And,
choose only certified organic, drug-free, grass fed &/or pasture-raised
meat, poultry, and dairy; but know that even these foods have many drawbacks
because they are acidic, contain no fiber, contain too much fat and raise
levels of hormones that may be linked to the onset of cancer. Avoid all
farm-raised fish. Those of us with chronic disease like cancer, heart disease,
Type-2 diabetes, dementia, autoimmune disorders and weight management issues
must avoid all toxic foods.
18.)
As I have stated before, fast Food is mostly a
nutritional nightmare! And, restaurants in general present many
challenges. We are advocates of using our kitchens,
doing our own food selection and preparation, and using restaurants selectively
and sparingly.
19.)
Blended 'green' drinks as freshly prepared organic vegetable
juices have their place as tonics or additions to an in place healthy
plant-based eating plan.
20.)
Is it important to seek variety every
day in the plant foods that you eat because each category of plant foods may
contain different nutrients that act together to promote health. We believe
that small amounts of food with more variety may provide more diverse
bioavailable nutrients and be more healing than larger amounts of food with
less variety. So, making chili with a 15 bean mix may be more desirable than
making chili with only black beans; also, making chili with only tomatoes,
beans and onions would be less desirable than making chili with tomatoes beans,
onions, carrots,, corn, green bell pepper, red bell pepper, garlic and five
different spices. The variety we seek is diversity in plant parts, plant food
categories, and foods within plant food categories.
21.)
Tastes Good! Do not
confuse good tasting food with healthy food. Most Americans will say:’ oh, that was sooo good!’ Well, was it
good for our health? Our task is to prepare dishes that are both tasty and good
for us, like our meatless chili. Here are the ingredients: several types of
beans, organic corn, chopped tomatoes, grated carrots, tofu crumbles (a
soy-based meat substitute), green and red bell peppers, onions, garlic and
several great seasonings including turmeric, chili powder, curry powder, and cayenne pepper. This is one of our staple
meals that is hugely nutritious, contains no animal-based foods and is a very
satisfying meal. We
recommend that everyone use their kitchens generously and have 8 to 10 great
meals/recipes that they rotate regularly. These should make up the bulk of
their eating and will typically include a variety of soups, stews, stir-fry
dishes, and salads, as well as seven or eight delicious sandwiches. Unhealthy dishes are not in good taste!
Five to One Fiber
Rule: Dietary fiber is a super
ingredient in plant-based foods; it reduces the risk of many if not most of the
chronic diseases. To assure that you get more fiber, just check out the
processed food Nutrition Facts Label
and look at the ratio of grams of carbohydrates to grams of dietary fiber; we
want to have a result of 5.0 or less. Using this measure, Ezekiel bread and Genesis
1:29 bread are examples of the best foods.
Those consuming plant-based
foods often neglect to consume enough appetite satisfying starchy vegetables
like potatoes, rice and corn. However, there is evidence that starchy
vegetables may be a problem for overweight, prediabetic and diabetic people.
Fasting: Fasting provides us
with a powerful means of minimizing the toxic load that we are confronted with
everyday. These toxins are a major input to many of the chronic diseases. Water
fasts as well as juice fasts can yield very significant health benefits. But Be
very sure to check with your physician before initiating a fast because there
are many medically-related issues that need to be considered.
References:
Campbell, T.C.:
‘Whole, Rethinking the Science of Nutrition,’ Ben Bella Books, 2013.
Davis, Garth:
Proteinaholic: How Our Obsession with Meat is Killing us and What We Can Do
About It,’ Harper Collins books, 2015.
Diehl, Hans and
Ludington, Aileen: ‘Dynamic Health: a Simple Plan To Take Charge Of Your Life,’
Thomas Nelson Incorporated, publishers, 2003.
Fuhrman, Joel: ‘The
end of dieting,’ HarperCollins Publishers, 2014.
Greger, Michael:
‘Carbophobia, the scary truth about America’s low-carb craze,’ Lantern books,
2005.
Katz, David: ‘Disease
Proof: Slash Your Risk of Heart Disease, Cancer, Diabetes, and More By 80%, The
Penguin Group, 2013
McDougall, John: ‘The
Starch Solution,’ Rodale, Inc., 2012.
Zahler, William:
‘Health, Inertia, and Information: Why Are We Sick?’ Create Space, March 2018.
Zahler, William:
‘Synergy and the Dynamics of Lifestyle Change,’ Create Space, January 2019.
William A. Zahler, MSW, DipACLM
November 2019
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