How I eat

This is the diet that makes me feel great.

Vegetables:  all that stuff in the "produce" aisle; whatever looks fresh;  boiled, steamed, baked, add an onion if you want.  A funny thing is when you cook them up and then refrigerate them, they get sweeter!   The great thing about cooking without oil is the food is great cold too.  One of my favorites is broccoli and onion.  Even well-cooked collards and onions taste sweet to me after refrigeration (not sure why that is).

Starchy vegetables:  Legumes (beans), potatoes, sweet potatoes, squash, corn; and intact whole grains (intact means not ground to flour).

Salad.  Lettuce, tomato, mushroom in the summer when the tomatoes are fresh.  Cabbage, lettuce, carrots is another favorite of mine.  Top with vinegar and sunflower seeds (or avocado or any nut or seed) and 1 T ground flaxseed.  

Fruit. Sometimes I like to combine it with homemade soy yogurt or nuts. I wrote a post just about this because it's so good.

Some avocado, nuts, and seeds.

I personally don't eat dried and blended fruits, or flours of any types.  I have had times in my life when my eating was out of control, and giving up these stimulating foods has worked well for me.  I hardly eat any nuts or seeds either, since I tend to overeat them.

I prefer not to eat these foods and drugs:

salt, oil, sugar, refined grains, animal products, caffeine, chocolate, alcohol.
Despite that, some of my friends still love me, and they still invite me to restaurants and parties, and we still have fun.

Following the Calorie Density Approach

My eating has evolved over the past year and I think I’ve settled on something that is both easy and healthy.   I follow Jeff Novick’s principles of a healthy diet, which he briefly describes as “plant-centered, minimally processed, calorie dilute, low SOS (salt, oil, sugar)” in this interview.   The calorie density approach is summarized in this newsletter article.

Calorie density is the number of calories per weight of a given food.   For most people, if you keep your average calorie density below about 600 calories per pound, you can eat satisfying volumes of food and lose weight without going hungry.  It turns out that a lot of the most satiating foods have a calorie density around 300-600 calories/lb, and the most healthy foods have a calorie density below 800.   So that tells me all I need to know:   Eat mostly foods with calorie density below 700 calories/lb, and consider the higher calorie density foods as condiments, or avoid them altogether.  Here is a table of calorie density of foods:

Foods                                                                           Calorie/lb

Vegetables                                                                     60 - 195

Fruit                                                                              140 - 420

Potatoes, Pasta, Rice, Barley, Yams, Corn, Hot Cereals   320 - 630

Beans, Peas, Lentils (cooked)                                        310 - 780

Breads, Bagels, Fat-free Muffins, Dried Fruit                   920 - 1360

Sugars (ie, sugar, honey, molasses, agave, corn syrup   1200 -1800

Dry Cereals, Baked Chips, Fat-free Crackers, Pretzels    1480 - 1760

Nuts/Seeds                                                                  2400 - 3200

Oils                                                                                 4000

 You don’t have to count calories or measure foods to use this chart.   My approach is to eat mostly from the top 4 lines (vegetables, fruit, starches & grains, beans), consider everything else condiments, and eat when I’m hungry and stop when I’m full.  I try avoid salt, oil, sugar, caffeine, chocolate (yeah, sucks!), and alcohol altogether because of their disease-promoting and addictive qualities.  The rest I limit or avoid as well. 

If you don’t see a particular food on the above table, you can determine its calorie density by looking up its nutritional information (google it or check it out in a calorie counting website, e.g., cronometer).   For example, take popcorn:  Type into google “nutritional info air popped popcorn” and you find that 24 grams has 93 calories.   Divide 93 by 24 to get calories per gram and then multiply by 454 to get calories per lb.  This gives you 1760 calories/lb for air-popped poprcorn!   It’s okay to eat it, but don’t use your stomach sensations as a guide for when to stop—that’s a key point of this is that your satiation mechanisms don’t work well with the high calorie-dense food because they pack a lot of calories in small volumes.   If you use your stomach as a guide, you’ll eat a lot of more the calorie-dense foods before you decide you are full.   Another example is rice cakes, which are right up there with the popcorn.  Meat ranges from 600-1200, and ice cream from 1000-1500.   Isn't it interesting that even fat-free bread, crackers, rice cakes and dry cereals have more calorie density than meat?   This might explain why many diets promote meat and fish over breads and crackers.  However, I would bypass the meat altogether and go straight for the potatoes and vegetables and fruit.

An easy way to follow this plan is to fill “1/2 your plate (by visual volume) with intact whole grains, starchy vegetables and/or legumes and the other half with vegetables and/or fruit.”

Another important point JN makes in his article is to not drink your calories (even fruit juices and smoothies):  “Liquids have little if any satiety so they do not fill you up as much as solid foods of equal calories.”

You might be wondering:  Aren’t there certain foods we should eat every day because they are so important?   JN says there are no superfoods in this article.  If you don’t like a particular food, that’s okay.   However Dr. Esselstyn suggests we eat leafy green vegetables at every meal, or at least, regularly.  I eat a lot of the green and yellow veggies (e.g., kale, collards, spinach, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower) and salads and raw vegetables.   I also eat potatoes, sweet potatoes, intact whole grains (rice, oats, quinoa, buckwheat), and beans.  And I eat some fruit, and very occasional nuts, dried fruit, and avocado.  That’s all there is to it.  If you want added insurance that you are getting enough essential fats, add a tablespoon of some ground flaxseed or chia seeds.  But Drs. McDougall and Campbell say it’s not necessary if you eat leafy greens and don’t consume oil (I talked about it more in this post).

Since the low-calorie dense foods regulate appetite, and are also the healthiest,  it’s win-win to eat this way. 

I asked JN some followup questions about how this works, and you can see his replies here.  

If you follow this approach, it ends up being very similar to that outlined by Dr. McDougall for his Maximum Weight Loss plan (summarized here and here) and by Dr.Esselstyn for reversing heart disease.

The calorie density approach is explained more in this DVD and this newsletter article. 

A Common Sense Approach to Sound Nutrition

I thought this was a great post from Jeff Novick.  He posts a lot of good things on Facebook.  You can "like" him to see them as they are posted:
https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-novick-ms-rd/a-common-sense-approach-to-sound-nutrition/10150095257231819

Princeton Immersion, Thanksgiving, soup, and stuff

I went to Dr. Fuhrman's Princeton Immersion last weekend.  It was a wonderful trip for many reasons!  It was a great road trip with my friend Suz.  We stopped in Pittsburg to see my best pal Gail, sadly, only for a few hours.  I worked with a student for a day at Princeton which was very productive.  We visited with Suz's parents in Philidelphia.  And the immersion was fantastic.  It was jam-packed with lectures. Dr. Fuhrman is so energetic and interesting, you really can listen to him for hours.  Even better was the food.  This is the main reason I go, though I did learn a lot from the lectures.  I thought I knew it all by now, but one thing I get out of the in-person lectures is what Dr. Fuhrman is passionate about, and what is less certain scientifically.  It helps reinforce what the most important things are to keep in mind.  But the food!  It was the best I've ever had at one of these events.  I think that was in large part due to Chef Martin Oswald's contributions.  He owns a nutritarian restaurant in Aspen, Colorado!  (called the Pyramid Bistro).  He gave a talk on the last day and I have been having fun putting his tips into practice!  We got the recipes from the immersion and slides from his talk.  They are worth a lot!

So today I'm back from the holidays and putting some of my new knowledge into action.  My soup today has Indian spices and I cooked up the onion as Chef Martin described:  first you heat up a stainless steel pot until hot, then put the onions and garlic in.  They sizzle up, slightly brown, and then release their juices.  You don't need oil, and they still gain a nice flavor.  Fun, it worked!  I did that with the leeks, celery, collards and kale too.  Then the pot was looking pretty burned and I thought, this will take forever to clean up.  But then I did the mushrooms the same way.  Well, they release so much liquid that it just ended up cleaning up the pot.  When they were done, the pot was clean.  ha!   a nice accidental discovery.  My soup was just my usual pile of things that I found in the co-op or my freezer.  I soaked beans, red himalayan rice, lentils, and purple barley overnight, and started cooking them in the morning.  Then cooked up the onions, garlic, celery, leeks, mushrooms, even the collards and kale, like Chef Martin described.  Added them to the pot one by one.  Oh I cooked up a festival squash in the oven, then added it to the soup after it cooled.  Oh yeah, and while cooking up the onion and other veggies, I added some graram masala and curry powder as they cooked.  Add the end I added some currants and fresh ground ginger.  It made for a nice hearty soup.  I froze most of it in single-serving containers.  yum.  I think I'll have it for breakfast every day.   I'll be doing my food prep at night this week.

My food plans for the week are soup for breakfast, and salad and roasted veggies for lunch and dinner.  The salads will be micro-salads made from lettuce, cabbage, maybe some broccoli and cauliflower, all cut up finely in the food processor; and topped with pomegranate seeds, grapefruit or orange, seed mixture, and flavored vinegar.  I love these.  The name should be changed from micro-salad to high-powered salad because it is so nutrient rich.  Tonight I'll experiment with roasted veggies.  I hope I can get this right.  I'm going to follow Chef Martin's advice to cover with foil at first so they essentially steam cook (before burning on the outside), then take of the foil to roast at the end.  I'll top with fresh herbs.  The veggies available now (that I like) are broccoli, brussels sprouts, carrots, onions, leeks, and sweet potato.  I'll do a little of each.  I am just learning to do this.  It would be nice to do a big batch and eat them for several days but I'm not sure how well they will keep.  I think I'll start off by just trying to do one day at a time and hope it isn't too time consuming.  I will add some flavored vinegar and mustard as marinate.  I got some fresh sage and rosemary at the co-op and have some basil from the garden in my freezer.  I hope this works!

Well, this post is long enough so I won't go into Thanksgiving much except to say I made apple sauce for my "brother-in law."  He had two 18 lb bags of apples!  holy cow, we had all the burners going:

It was fun though.  I nibbled a lot on the apples.  In fact, it was so much fun, we decided to make some for ourselves when we got home.  My batch has no sugar in it.  I'm not sure what I will use it in as I am not a great dessert maker or baker, the usual use of apple sauce.  But, heck, it probably could go in soup.

Here's tonight's quick salad I threw together, which is yummy, as salads always are:

That's got lettuce, cabbage, broccoli, blueberries, banana, small orange, seed mixture, and d'angou pear vinegar.

whew.  time to go fold laundry, then start tomorrow's food prep.  whew!  

Guidelines for Healthy Nutrition and Weight Loss

Howard at Lifestyle Power developed this graphic that describes how to eat healthy.  It looks pretty good.  What do you think, is it useful for you?
http://lifestylepower.blogspot.com/2011/08/guidelines-for-healthy-nutrition-and.html
His blog has lots of good information and links to articles, including a recent show from CNN called The Last Heart Attack.

Another dietician's advice

I’ve recently been reading and watching material from Jeff Novick, a dietician who used to work with Dr. Fuhrman and now works with Dr. McDougall.  It’s been interesting to compare advice from all three of these guys.  I think they all offer very healthy eating plans.  The average advice is pretty similar but the ranges are different.   Here is a description of Dr. McDougall’s Maximum weight loss program.  Here is a description of Dr. Fuhrman’s 6 week plan.

From what I’ve read, I think all three would agree that 1-1.5 oz of nuts and seeds per day is an okay amount to eat.  All of their food plans include some nuts and seeds in some of their recipes, and none in others.  They differ in their minimum recommended amounts.  Mr. Novick says you shouldn’t go above 1-2 oz for normal activity, or 2-4 oz for very active folks per day.  Dr. Fuhrman says active people and athletes can go up to 4 oz or more.  Both Novick and McDougall say your minimum can be 0 and I think they recommend that when trying to lose weight.  In Novick’s video on fats, he says you can get all you need from vegetables:  “Where do you think corn oil comes from?”   I’ve asked Dr. Fuhrman explicitly even for small people or overweight people with low metabolism, and he says everyone should eat a minimum of 1 oz of nuts or seeds per day and more active people should consume more.  I find nuts hard to digest and feel better when I stick to under 2 oz per day.  Dr. Fuhrman says that some people need nuts to regulate their heartbeats and I have found that in the past too.  However, I don't need much, as little as 1 teaspoon of flaxseed will do it for me.   Dr. Fuhrman says you need to eat fat to burn fat.  Dr. Mullin, who is on Dr. Fuhrman's staff, explains why:

Healthy fats communicate with your genes in a different way compared to unhealthy fats. Healthy fats bind to receptors called PPAR receptors which improve insulin sensitivity and enhance fat burning. Trans fats do the opposite.

I'm not sure that fully answers it for me or demonstrates that it's a big effect.  I think women are fat producing machines and that combined with our lower metabolism when we hit our mid-fifties, makes me wonder if we all really need 1 oz a day.  Plus it squeezes out other calorie-rich foods that I might enjoy more.

Regarding sweets, I like the advice of Novick.  He says all sweeteners are the same as far as health goes.  Pick whichever one you want and keep it to less than 5% of your calories—and he includes that with all unhealthy calories including oils, etc.  So he’s saying your total unhealthy calories should comprise 5% of the total, not just your sweets.  This is consistent with Dr. Fuhrman’s “Life Plan”, where he says no more than 10% of your calories should come from less healthy sources.  Dr. Fuhrman distinguishes refined sweeteners (sugar, agave nectar, honey, maple syrup)from dried fruits such as dates and raisins, which are whole foods.  Almost all of his dessert recipes use dried fruits as sweeteners.   I think many Fuhrman followers go overboard with their use of dates and other dried fruits.  I know I did for a while.  I thought it was okay because it was a whole food.  But after a while I realized it’s having the same effect on my body, a sugar surge (probably an insulin surge too), and cravings for more.  Combine this with nuts and you have very high-calorie, hard to digest food.  I once got sick on “healthy” brownies made from dates and walnuts and cocoa powder.  I learned the hard way that I can eat too many dried fruits or nuts.  I tend to agree with Novick and prefer to think of all sweeteners, including dried fruit, as in the 5% category.

With salt, Fuhrman wants you to include no added salt in your diet.  McDougall is more relaxed about it.  He allows people to add salt at the table in small amounts and most of his recipes include some sodium in the form of salt or soy sauce, though it is much less than processed foods have.  McDougall’s advice might be easier to follow and it still cuts way back on salt.  I started out following McDougall’s advice and then eventually decided to go cold turkey, following Fuhrman’s advice.   There is an advantage to this, which is that you taste all the subtle flavors in produce.  I can taste the difference in sweetness from one carrot to the next, and one pea pod to the next.  Even kohlrabi and broccoli taste sweet when your taste buds are sensitized again.  My sweat still tastes salty, so clearly my body has learned to extract what it needs from whole foods. Dr. Fuhrman talks about the many harmful effects of salt in his teleconferences, mainly related to heart disease and stomach cancer and the increased risk of hemorrhagic stroke for people with lower cholesterol.  There are two disadvantages to going without salt completely:  1) Some recipes and especially grains can taste bland.  However, this can be solved with spices or a little sweetening (e.g., carrot juice, fruit, dried fruit).  2) It makes it harder to find acceptable food to eat in restaurants.  Soups are especially bad.  Your best best is salads without dressing or fruit plate.  Unfortunately, these can be pretty lame at a lot of restaurants.

Another way I agree with Novick is that he seems to like simple recipes, and he isn’t a big fan of smoothies and juices and other ways of processing your food.  I think of smoothies, “ice creams”, and sorbets as treats, a once a week type thing rather than daily.  Even carrot-juice sweetened beans and soups I save for special occasions, partly because it’s more work, ha. 

Regarding supplements, I think McDougall and Novick say that you only need to supplement B12.  On vitamin D, Novick says get your levels tested and if you are deficient, take a supplement.  McDougall is anti-Vitamin D and says you can get enough D from exposure to sunlight.  Dr. Fuhrman says that vitamin D is so important to your health (in fighting cancer for one thing) that if you don’t want to take the supplements, get your blood levels checked to verify that you are not deficient.  He says the same thing about DHA.  I'm following Fuhrman's advice on this currently but I kind of wonder if I really need the DHA. 

Regarding animal products, I think McDougall would recommend an all-vegan diet, Novick probably too, though I’m not sure, and Fuhrman says animal products could be included in your 10% of unhealthy calories, unless you have certain conditions such as heart disease and some autoimmune illnesses where an optimal diet is required to reverse your condition.

Then there is the grain/starchy vegetable debate.  Again I think all their recommendations intersect and you can design a diet that agrees with all of them.  Dr. Fuhrman emphasizes eating more leafy green vegetables.  He also emphasizes cruciferous vegetables, onions and mushrooms to fight cancer.   That sounds good to me.   Then how should you fill out the rest of your calories?  I think many Fuhrman followers eat too much fruit and nuts and therefore too many calories (I speak from experience)—and for me, that also leads to a stomach ache which I have no interest in getting.  Novick says it’s better to fill out your calories with starchy vegetables and grains.  Dr. Fuhrman would say the best starchy vegetable to eat is beans.   Novick and McDougall don’t put particular emphasis on beans and include it as one of many healthy options, including white potatoes.  Fuhrman thinks white potatoes are one of the least healthy vegetables and would recommend other vegetables above them.  Fuhrman recommends a minimum amount of beans per day (1 cup).  Novick and McDougall have no such minimum.  Once you get your GOMBS in, (Greens, Onions, Mushrooms, Beans/Berries, and Seeds/nuts), Dr. Fuhrman is fine with filling out your calories with starchy vegetables and grains, though he would prefer you eat sweet potatoes instead of white.

What do I do?   I really like Novick’s advice, which is practical and makes a lot of sense to me.  I think McDougall’s or the Engine 2 plans might be easier to adopt for a person starting out.  I eat a starch-based diet--that is, things like potatoes, squash, corn, beans, intact whole grains like brown rice, quinoa,  oats, and whole grain pastas.   I eat yellow and green veggies (e.g., leafy greens, bell peppers, broccoli, zuccini) but because they are of low calorie density, they don't comprise the majority of my calories.  I eat some fruit, about 2 1/2-cup servings a day.  I don’t like to eat many dried fruits or smoothies or juices, in agreement with Novick, though I put a small handful of raisins in my daily oatmeal.   I like the idea of 5% play calories, even though I usually eat much less.  But I like the idea that I can indulge occasionally if I want to.  That is of great psychological value to me, given the culture we live in. 

My 6-week plan

I just finished Dr. Fuhrman's 6 week plan on Sunday!   Okay, for those who know me, I'm a long-time nutritarian (at least 5 years) so why would I go on the 6-week plan?   Because I needed some motivation!  I was overeating the healthy foods and even craving the unhealthy foods!   I was in a dangerous position.  So I figured I needed a reset.  The 6-week plan did it.  I feel great, motivated, and not at all desirous of unhealthy foods.  Those Paul Newman peanut butter cups no longer call to me.  Though I might try one some day, I'm totally not in the mood for it right now.   

Here are some things I did that aren’t exactly what Dr. Fuhrman recommends:

1) I monitored my calories (using CRON-o-meter).  Not only does it help me to eat enough calories, it also shows me the foods to limit. It teaches me that nuts and seeds are a condiment, not to be eaten in large quantities. And it shows me that I can eat a lot more of some of my favorite foods like sugar snap peas, yum!    It also helped me proportion my food during the day so I wouldn't go too hungry before exercise.  As time went on, I saw my appetite correspond with my calorie intake, so I was getting in touch with my body's true hunger signals. Now i don't feel like I need to monitor my calories.
2) I ate rather enormous amounts of raw veggies during the week (Dr. Fuhrman recommends ~1 lb raw and ~1 lb cooked a day, and I eat at least 3 lbs of raw veggies per weekday). Every weeknight when I get home I prepare tomorrow’s meals, which consist of confetti salads, which I divide into 2 meals. The third meal might be manna bread or sweet corn, bean soup and raw carrots and sugar snap peas. I make big batches of bean soup on the weekend and freeze it in 1-cup servings for the week. The salads taste great, and take a long time to eat and I enjoy that.

Here is what motivated me:
A friend of mine likes to get streaks going to motivate her to exercise. For example, she has a daily walking streak going that started in February. I asked, how do you deal with breaking the streak? I mean, if you end the streak, do you lose your motivation? I’m worried if you applied that to dieting, you could set up that binge routine where if you go off plan, you say, okay I’ll start my diet tomorrow and go crazy today. She said she has a little flexibility: If she misses a day, she can make it up by walking twice in 1 day within 5 days, and she can bank days for later by walking twice in one day. That factors in real life. So I came up with these rules for myself to be in the healthy-eating streak:

1. Allowed: unlimited veggies, 1-2 lbs fruit, beans(1-2 cups/day), whole grains (1 serving/day), nuts & seeds (max 2 oz/day), very limited dried food on occasion (max 2 oz).
2. Not allowed, mostly (see item 9 below): Animal products, refined grains, processed sugars, oils, salt, caffeine, alcohol, chocolate (the caffeine bothers me, unfortunately!).
3. Eat lots of GOMBS: greens, onions, mushrooms, beans/berries, seeds.
4. No Overeating.
5. Limit snacking
6. Limit tea (herbal)
7. Max calories per day: 2000. That's way more than enough for me, but allows for an occasional splurge. Typical calories should be at or below 1500 for me to maintain.
8. Try to eat while sitting down most of the time. Try not to eat during food prep most of the time.
9. To stay on streak, no more than 500 calories of "unhealthy" food allowed in the last 7 days. This is not expected to be used every 7 days! Just on special occasions.

My streak is now 43 days and counting. The only unhealthy food I ate was a spoon of a nut-apple mixture that contained honey--I didn’t know it until later, or I wouldn’t have eaten it (it was supposed to be made with figs).  Overall I was more strict than my own guidelines because I was doing the 6-week plan, so limited to 1 oz seeds per day and 1 cup beans and no dried fruit until the last night (1 small fig).

Here are some of my observations:

1. I feel great. I’ve felt great for about 3 weeks now. I’ve been happier and more alert than I have been for months. I need less sleep.
2. Prior to this, when I overate on Fuhrman allowed foods, especially fruit and nuts, I felt crummy. And they led to food cravings, including SAD (Standard American Diet, i.e., junk food). Conclusion, overeating on even Fuhrman-allowed foods is not healthy, especially fruits, dates, and nuts. For me, Dr. Fuhrman desserts need to be carefully portioned. But I welcome them occasionally!
3. The 6-week plan does a great job resetting your taste preferences. Dr. Fuhrman and others are right: this is enough time to change your habits and preferences. It really does work to do this as close to 100% as you can for a period of time. I’d say it was at around the 30 day mark when the habits and preferences were established. I have no desire for SAD treats that I was craving a few months ago. Now I’m wondering why I was craving them, why would you want that? In other words, now it’s not hard to stay on plan, it’s a preference. I don’t want to spoil my taste buds with too intense sweet because I really enjoy the subtle flavors I taste in vegetables now.
4. My weekly treat was a portion of the smoothies I make for housemate.  Other than that, I don’t eat smoothies. They are a bit too sweet, go down too fast, and leave me wanting more. I prefer my more leisurely eaten chopped salads. They are finely enough chopped that I think I am absorbing plenty of nutrients from them.
5. My average calorie intake over the 6 week period was 1370. It increased a bit over the 6 week period as my activity levels increased. I suspect that 1400-1500 is a good maintenance value for me when exercising regularly. My calorie intake varied with activity levels. This shows I was in touch with true hunger. Also of interest to me was my average protein intake of 58 g per day. That’s about 1 g/kg of body weight for me, sufficient for an endurance athlete but not a strength athlete, according to Dr. Fuhrman’s newsletter #42 (Fueling the vegan athlete). That’s good enough for me because I’m not an athlete, just a person who likes to exercise.
6. My weight dropped a little. I am already thin, though I gained a few lbs after I broke my elbow in January, because my activity levels were low and I wasn’t paying attention to true hunger. I weigh a few lbs more than I did 6 months ago but I think I prefer this weight. It feels right. I am 5’9”, weigh 121.  Now I know what you are thinking--you are too thin!  No, I actually saw Dr. Fuhrman last summer and he said I was fine.  I just naturally do not make a lot of muscle mass which is why I'm not a great athlete, darn it.
7. I need goals and motivation. I posted recently about the excellent books I've been reading on positive psychology and meditation. Sarah Taylor said at last year’s Health Getaway: motivation is a daily practice. I lost my motivation for a while both as a nute and in my work. Fortunately I have both back now, and realize I need to actively work on my motivation. Right now, the streak is a fun game for me.
8. I listen to audiotapes while preparing food (lately on books mentioned above). This is very enjoyable and it also helps me not to eat during food prep because it’s harder to hear the audio when I’m crunching on a carrot.
9. I learned what exercise I really like to do. This was an accidental discovery during my arm rehab. My pre-broken elbow workouts were intense exercise classes that I think wore me out too much. Now I do a gentle and relaxing stretching and dumbbell weight routine in the morning (1 hour), ride my bike to work (1 hour), and do swimming or yoga in the evening (1 hour). I’ve realized that I love these forms of exercise and will give up other things to include this in my daily routine. I might try to add running into the mix. In the summer, weekends will be more biking and kayaking.

So yesterday started my new 6 weeks. What should my goal be this time? I think I will try to get in touch more with hunger and fullness. My secondary goals can be to try to eat mindfully, eat while sitting down and not eating while preparing food—most of the time, (let's go with 51%, heh).

Food = Health

This was a post from Darryl (aka "Nutritarian") from the Fuhrman forums about how changing your diet from the Standard American Diet to Dr. Fuhrman's plan will affect your health:

Here is what one might hope to achieve by really following Dr. Fuhrman's instructions:

First few weeks -- turning the ship around: Initial detoxification, improving cholesterol numbers, lowering of diabetic glucose levels, lowering of high blood pressure, etc. Some health conditions may resolve fairly quickly. Bowels start to work the way they are made to. Ability to taste and enjoy healthy food gradually develops.

Next few months - nutrient saturation: It takes quite a while for the body to readjust its complex physiology, so the entire system continues to work better and better as the months go by. The "healthy glow" develops, as phytochemicals diffuse through the body's nutrient-starved tissues. Detoxification is completed, excess inflammation resolves, immune system becomes stronger and more well-regulated. Weight moves toward ideal. Some kinds of health conditions may gradually resolve during this period.

Longer-term -- transformation: Ideal weight becomes just a normal part of life. As artery damage is gradually repaired, blood pressure works its way lower and lower until reaching extremely healthy levels. Nutritarian food just keeps tasting better and better. Skill for buying and preparing it develops to higher and higher levels. Tastes diversify, as one discovers more and more different wonderful-tasting vegetables, fruits, and legumes. Digestion and elimination become optimal, working exactly the way they are supposed to. Colds become mild and very infrequent. At the cellular level, the body's detoxification and anticancer mechanisms start functioning at maximal levels, gradually lowering (although unfortunately not eliminating) the probability of a cancer outbreak. Cellular damage that can lead to dementia and other premature degeneration later in life stops and perhaps is even reversed.

Dr. Fuhrman lecture in Clearwater, FL

By coincidence I planned my vacation to Florida when Dr. Fuhrman was speaking in Clearwater, so I attended his lecture there. I also got to meet Holly from Milwaukee who I'd met online (Furhman forums) but not in person yet. So it was funny that our first "meetup" is in Florida. I also saw Lynn, June and Arnell. We heard about the lecture from Arnell, who arranged it. She has created this amazing community of people who attend her lectures and potlucks centered around Dr. Fuhrman's plan. The talk was sold out and there were over 400 people there. The audience was well-informed too. I was just amazed. I was amazed by Arnell and how she has transformed a community! And then there was the lecture. It was just great, with lots of jokes and interaction with the audience. Dr. Fuhrman had to talk fast to get all the information in and that was part of the fun as he rattled off all the things that will go wrong with you when you eat the Standard American Diet (SAD), among other things. His answer to the himalayan salt question was hilarious (non-funny version: it's bad for you). I got at least 3 useful things out of the lecture: 1) reinforcement of information I knew pretty well; 2) some new information about heart disease that explains my family history some more; and 3) Good old fashioned motivation and reinforcement that this is the greatest way to eat on earth, and to resist feeling different and funny about it.

Regarding point #2, Dr. Fuhrman said that heart disease doesn't affect everything at once, but starts first in the places with the most turbulence. So that got me thinking, my mother and I both have heart murmurs (mitral valve prolapse). My mother had a heart attack in her late 60s, a day after running 5 miles. She prided herself on eating healthy and being an avid jogger. She wasn't overweight by American standards. When that happened, I concluded that what you eat has no effect on your health because I thought she was a healthy eater. Well, by Dr. Fuhrman's standards she wasn't a healthy eater and she was overweight. Plus, I wonder if the heart murmur contributed to more heart disease because that causes more turbulence in that valve. She had atrial fibrillation which was either the cause or consequence of the heart attack. Well, before I started eating healthy, about 5-10 years ago, I was getting more and more of these irregular heartbeats. And I didn't seem to have as much oxygen capacity as others when I exercised. I told people that I know how I"m going to die: of a heart attack; hopefully at a late age, but that appeared to be my weak link. Of course, little did I know there are many other things that can kill you from the American diet, like cancer. Now I have great aerobic capacity (it's my muscles that give out first), and no irregular heartbeats. I'm so glad I accidentally discovered how to eat healthy because it will definitely mitigate the consequences of this heart murmur I have.

Regarding point #3 about motivation: While I was just posting about what I am eating on this trip, I was thinking, people who read this are going to think I'm crazy, eating salads while on vacation instead of enjoying food at restaurants. But Dr. Fuhrman reminded me, nope, I'm not crazy, I'm healthy! I'm kayaking and mountain biking and hiking and running on this vacation. I'm not hobbling around, overweight, taking pills for my cholesterol, diabetes, and high blood pressure (not that I feel superior, I don't! just lucky...). Those are the direct consequences of eating the Yucky American Diet (I think we should start calling it the YAD instead of the SAD). All that packaged processed "food," isn't real food, because it has no nutritional value and is addictive. It's poison! So yeah, I'm weird, but I'm not crazy. Sometimes I think I'm crazy because I'm different from everyone else. So it was fun in the lecture to see that I'm not different from Dr. Fuhrman and at least 100 other people in that audience.

Healthy eating

I've been studying for my Nutritional Excellence Trainer exams, and was reminded that most cancers are initiated in your childhood and puberty, when the body is growing fast. It is kind of depressing to think I didn't adopt a healthy lifestyle until I was 45 years old. So that reminds me that I should really try to be as healthy as I can to give my body the opportunity to reverse whatever cancers may have been initiated in me. Dr. Fuhrman recommends juicing vegetables, blending salads into smoothies, and eating lots of raw and cruciferous veggies. I've been lacking in the first two. I don't like vegetable juice. But, usually when I make soup, like today, I juice veggies, so I'll do some extra and drink some and freeze some, and maybe I can manage a few servings a week that way, which is what Fuhrman recommends. And I'll start eating the spinach/berry smoothies again. Spinach is great for long-term memory and learning ability (in middle-aged rats anyway). And it has lutein which is good for the eyes (to fight macular degeneration). You don't want to overdo spinach because the oxalates interfere with calcium absorption, but a couple oz a day in my smoothie at brekky should be okay. Fuhrman's top 7 foods for longetivity are black raspberries, strawberries, blueberries, flax seeds, leafy greens, tomatoes and broccoli sprouts. hmmm, last time I ate broccoli sprouts I got diarrhea. Maybe I ate too many.

According to one review article, raw veggies are the most cancer fighting, followed by allium (onions & garlic), carrots (yea!), greens, cruciferous veggies, and tomatoes. Looking these up just now, I came across the right answer for one of the exam questions I got wrong. Oh well, so far I've passed two of the exams, but I think the hardest one is yet to come. Anyway, suggestions for raw veggies include: raw sweet potato sticks (yum), asparagus (raw? never tried that), green beans (never tried that raw either), jicama, red pepper rings (yum), zucchini (pretty good raw), broccoflower (I don't like broccoli raw but I like cauliflower raw), and carrots and celery sticks (yum, yum).

Here's the juicer in action. I made carrot, kale, celery juice for my black-eyed pea soup:

I decided I'll drink one of these today and freeze the other. I drank one today and it was better than I expected. Maybe the celery juice diluted it enough. It was actually pretty good.

Here's a review of Dr. Fuhrman's recommended eating plan.

Dr. Fuhrman's Eating Plan

I realize I never posted what Dr. Fuhrman recommends you eat on a daily basis. It's pretty simple.

Eat at least:

1 lb raw veggies (e.g., leafy greens, snow peas, raw peas, cucumbers, sprouts, carrots, peppers, and tomatoes)

1 lb cooked veggies (e.g., leafy and non-leafy greens, including string beans, broccoli, artichokes, asparagus, zucchini, kale, collards, cabbage, brussels sprouts, bok choy, okra, swiss chard, turnip greens, escarole, beet greens, spinach, dandelion greens, broccoli raab, cauliflower, eggplant, mushrooms, onions, peppers, and water chestnuts)

1 cup beans, beans sprouts, or tofu

4 servings of fruit

Eat limited amounts of these foods:

1 cup or less starchy veggies and grains (e.g., winter squash, corn, potatoes, rice, cooked carrots, sweet potato, bread, cereals).

1-2 oz nuts and seeds (0.5-1 oz if you need to lose weight, more if you need to gain)

dried fruits (1-2 oz or less), fruit juices (1/2 cup or less), none if you are trying to lose weight.

Avoid:

salt, oil, caffeine, alcohol, refined grains, sugar.

I find I get plenty to eat with the veggies (including some starchy), beans, fruit and nuts and seeds, and those are my favorite foods anyway. I think grains taste boring, except I do like barley in soup occasionally, and I like oats occasionally too.

My new staples

Before I learned to eat healthy, my breakfast and lunch were actually pretty boring--the same thing every day: cereal for brekky, sandwich for lunch. Dinner was kind of boring too, some meat, some veggies, some pasta or potato. I have so much more variety now. But I'm starting to find some staples that are repeatable, with variation, every day. Maybe it's boring but it also saves time and energy and I like them. These staples are:

beans, greens and/or veggies, seeds. These beans, and these beans are good, because they have carrot or other veggie juice in them and that makes them sweet and flavorful. So they end up flavoring the other stuff too. Greens can be raw lettuce or other greens, bok choy (raw or cooked) or cooked greens (kale, collards, mustard, etc.). Veggies can be almost anything: chopped celery, cook brussels sprouts, broccoli, cauliflower, etc. Then ground flax or hemp seeds to make it creamy, or unground sunflower or pumpkin seeds for crunchiness. You can make something different every day with this combination.

salad: greens, seasonal fruit, seasonal raw veggies, edamame, sweet pea dressing or some other favorite. See the dressings label for a bunch of them. I usually develop a seasonal favorite salad that I repeat for a few weeks because I just like it.

fruit: whatever's in season, or frozen berries in the dead of winter. Right now it's pomegranates.

These three staples make up my three meals a day usually. At least that's been my habit the last few weeks. Lately the biggest meal, beans & veggies, has been my late brekky. Then a salad at dinner. Fruit in between. But sometimes the fruit meal will switch with brekky or dinner, depending on my schedule.

my eating plan

Here is where I am in my eating plan. At the Health Getaway Dr. Fuhrman talked about different levels of being a "nutritarian", analogous to karate: so white belt, yellow belt, brown belt, black belt. I feel I'm a brown belt but I'm close to being a black belt. I think to get there, I will focus on the simple diet plan in the Eat to Live book where every day you eat 1 lb of raw vegetables (including lots of leafy greens), 1 lb of cooked (lots of leafy greens), 1 cup of beans, 4-5 servings of fruit, and at least 1 oz of raw nuts and seeds (in my case, that should be 2-4 oz). Okay, I don't think I'm going to count the lbs of veggies, or maybe I might try it once just to see if I'm close. To start off, I'm going to aim for 1 cup of beans, 2-4 oz nuts and seeds, lots of veggies, and some fruit. The 1 cup of beans is the part I have been working on since returning from the Getaway. I find I have to regulate the other quantities in order to get this in comfortably. I now see why people say when you eat this way, you won't be hungry. I also want the beans and nuts&seeds to provide protein to add some bulk to my frame if my body chooses to use it. So that's my plan. I will try to be simple at first because that's easiest. I don't like to prepare more than one dish for a meal because of time constraints, so a main dish + salad is too much food prep for me at lunch (the meal I spend most of my time preparing because of house-mate's schedule). So here's a plan that could work for me:

brekky: salad+ fruit , e.g., avocado-mango salad, big easy salad, arugula salad, banana-berry-cashew sauce over spinach, banana-blueberry walnut salad,

lunch: this barbiebeangreens (my new name for beans, greens, nuts&seeds dish; too dumb?) or this one (my favorite). + sweet corn right now---ooh, I could add it to the main dish. maybe fruit another time. 1 raw carrot while preparing (I love raw carrots).

dinner: leftover barbiebeangreens (or should I call it beangreens?), salad+fruit. 1 raw carrot while preparing

When I'm out, a smoothie + 1/2 cup beans can substitute at lunch or dinner. It satisfies the requirement of the big 4: beans, greens, nuts&seeds, and fruit.

Okay, I'll see if this works and report back...

healthy eating

Here's a great post from Howard on principles of healthy eating.

How to transition to healthy eating

I was thinking yesterday that if everyone cut back their meat and dairy intake by 50%, that would have 50 times greater impact than if 1% of the population became vegan.  50 times fewer animals would be killed!   That's huge!  And I was thinking, that wouldn't be so hard to do and would be a good way to transition to healthy eating.  So here's a healthy eating transition plan I came up with.

Step 1:  Cut back your meat and dairy intake by 50%.  Replace it with starches (potaoes, squash), multi-colored vegetables, fruit and whole grains.   You will probably start losing weight and noticing some health benefits.  Maybe you want to hang out in this stage for a while and enjoy some weight loss and the huge impact you have made on the well-being of animals and global warming!   Oh, and if you really want to lose weight, cut back on the cheese.   If you are feeling up to the challenge, you can try cutting back on the refined grains and sugars too--replacing them with whole grains and fruits.

Step 2:  If you want to experience more healthy impacts, probably the most effective step to take is to cut out dairy.  The growth hormones in dairy (even in the non rBGH fed cows) and the animal protein (casein) are great for growing cancer cells (see The China Study).  And dairy contributes to a host of allergies and auto-immune diseases.  Finally most of us are lactose intolerant to some degree and don't know it.  Once you get rid of the dairy, watch that indigestion disappear!  And weight will continue to drop off when you cut out this high fat food (yes even the "low-fat" varieties).   Just add in more of those lovely vegetables, fruits, and whole grains to replace the dairy.  Oh, at this stage you probably want to try cutting down on the refined grains and sugars (replace with whole grains and fruits).

Step 3:  Now if you really want to improve your health dramatically, you just have to take one more step and that is cut back even more on the meat.   If you can cut down to just a few servings a week, now most of your diseases will go away.  No more heart disease, diabetes, autoimmune, allergies (see this link from Dr. Fuhrman's website and the linked articles off there on the right panel).  No kidding.  Replace with, what else, starches, vegetables (including lots of leafy greens), fruit, whole grains, and nuts and seeds (in small quantities).  Oh, and pretty much cut out the refined grains and sugars except for special occasions.  Ta-da!   

How to Eat Healthy

This is the hard part for the beginner: What do you buy and how do you cook it up?

Here is what I do. I grocery shop 3-4 times a week on my bike. It's usually on my way home from somewhere, so it's convenient. I can only carry what my pretty-big bike bags hold. This is just as well, so my produce doesn't rot in the fridge. I buy whatever looks good in the produce section, so things like:

berries, grapes, cherries, peaches, plums, watermelon, cantaloupe, honey dew melons in the summer; figs, apples, pears, in the Fall; apples and oranges in winter; grapefruit in spring; and the imported things from around the world while still affordable: avocados, bananas, mangoes.

Then the veggies: In the summer, we get lots of local leafy greens: kale, collard greens, mustard greens, and veggies: broccoli, zuchinni sweet corn; in the fall and winter: carrots, beets, potatoes, sweet potatoes, broccoli, cauliflower, rutabaga, lots of greens still. the list is huge. Get what looks good today, hopefully local and organic. Don't get too much so it doesn't go bad. After a few weeks you'll be able to judge how much you can carry if you are on foot or bike, and how much is too much if you have a car and it sits in your fridge for too long.

flavorings: onion, garlic, lemon, lime, ginger, herbs.

Then in the bulk section: raw cashews, walnuts, brazil nuts, almonds, flaxseeds, hemp seeds, dried lentils and beans, rice, oats..

then in the frozen section: frozen berries, mangos, cherries, peas, corn (unless it's fresh corn season!), edamame (unless fresh).

If I have a recipe in mind, of course I buy what's in the recipe. I compile a grocery list as I run low on staples, such as nuts and seeds, beans, etc.

Then I cook them all up or make smoothies or sauces. My "recipes" are often just combinations of whatever I have in my fridge.

The fruit is often unripe when you buy it (things like, peaches, plums, mangos, bananas, cantaloupe). So let it ripen for a few days in a fruit basket. You'll learn after a while how long this takes. It varies with the fruit. This does not apply to oranges, apples, and berries, which should be refrigerated and best eaten right away. Bananas are ripe when they start getting little brown spots on them. Then they are sweet, yum. I've done a side-by-side comparison and organic do taste better. I buy lots of bananas, and when they ripen, I peel each one, break it into about 4 pieces, put it in a ziplock bag, and throw it in the freezer.

Let's say you don't live close to the super fabulous organic store with raw nuts and date sugar. If there is one somewhere in your vicinity, you can go there once every month or two and stock up on the raw nuts (which you then freeze) and date sugar (a healthier replacement for sugar) and dates. Or you can order online, e.g., at organicfruitsandnuts.com

Hopefully your local store has organic produce. It is usually better tasting, better for the environment, and was better for the workers who grew it for you.

Equipment: The one thing I highly recommend is a high-quality high-powered blender. Unfortunately these cost a lot of money (though it costs a lot less than prescription medications that you can stop using when you eat healthy). I recommend the Vita-mix. The cheapest one is about $400 new. I have that one and it works great. It will blend anything, and the damper thing works great for smashing things down to the bottom to make them blend. You can make so many fabulous healthy low-fat desserts, soups, sauces, dressings this way.

Oh, I kind of like my food processor too. I'd go for the moderately price ones, not the super cheapo like my aunt has--that is a piece of crap.

Then I have become a recent convert to adding carrot juice to soups, so I recommend a juicer. I think you can get by with the cheap ones for doing carrots. Oh, and I have a citrus juicer too.

Another somewhat useful item which is affordable is a food scale to measure weights. It's useful for measuring nut portions. Nuts are high in calories and fat, so you should only eat 1-3 oz of nuts a day (1 if you are trying to lose weight, 2 if you are normal weight and activity level, 3-4 if you are very active or trying to gain weight). You can also weigh spinach amounts for your smoothies if you want. It just comes in handy. But it's not necessary. An ounce of nuts is about a handful.

FAQs and Comments and Answers

Here are the most commonly asked questions and comments I get about being vegan and eating healthy, along with my answers. I tried to give references for all of them. Note: see my unfrequently-asked questions post for things you might not have thought of (I only have 2 so far).

Where do you get your protein?  Guess what, vegetables, especially green ones, have a lot of protein.  So do legumes (beans) and nuts and seeds and soy products.  So that's how I get my protein.  Plant protein is not a problem. In fact, animal protein is a health problem. Here's a link from Dr. Fuhrman's site discussing it. Eat to Live has more info on pages 136-140 and chapter 4. Here are additional links from Dr. McDougall's website and PCRM (Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, led by Neal Barnard). Becoming Vegan, a nutrition book, has a chapter on protein with tables showing amounts for various foods.

Where do you get your calcium? Leafy green vegetables (kale, collard greens, romaine lettuce) are loaded with calcium, as are squash (yea, I love squash!), and beans (also known as pulses or legumes; for example, red kidney beans, lentils, navy beans, chickpeas, pinto beans, and many many more). You actually need less calcium if you don't consume animal products (including dairy). That is because the high acid content of animal protein leaches off minerals like calcium (summarized in Eat to Live, pp. 84-90). Fuhrman summarizes other foods that make you pee away your calcium in a table on p. 86. These include animal protein, salt, caffeine, refined sugar, alcohol, vitamin A, antacids and several drugs. Here are some links on Fuhrman's, McDougall's, and PCRM websites. Another great resource is the book The China Study, which talks about how animal protein (which dairy has a lot of) is correlated with higher rates of hip/bone fractures, osteoporis, type I diabetes, multiple sclerosis, cancer, and more.

Why are you so down on dairy? Yeah, I am down on it. I think dairy is worse for you than meat. It has a lot of fat and calories and harmful animal protein and not a lot of nutrients. If you go vegetarian but still eat dairy, you'll likely get an iron deficiency (Becoming Vegan, p. 105). From an animal rights point of view, dairy animals lead miserable lives. The cow has to be continuously pregnant to make milk, the calves are wrenched away from her at birth, and if it's male, it's chained up in a small pen and becomes becomes veal in a few months. The dairy cow is slaughtered when she's done producing milk, usually after about 4 years. Cows produce much more milk than they used to and suffer from infections in their udders, which results in pus in your milk. Antibiotics are added to her diet to limit the infection. Most cows are given growth hormones to increase production which you ingest later. Most people are lactose intolerant to some degree, yet most processed food has dairy buried in the ingredients, because it is such a cheap additive. No wonder there is so much indigestion medicine on the market! I think it's criminal that our government allows the dairy industry to continue to promote misinformation campaigns while the medical evidence builds that it is harmful to your health. We don't eat milk from any other animals (except goats, whatever). Would you want to eat dog's milk? Cow's milk has much higher protein content than mother's milk. We should drink only mother's milk and then stop when we're done nursing. Cow's milk is liquid meat.

Why do you avoid salt? Salt is correlated with higher mortality rate and risk of coronary heart disease, independent of other cardiovascular risk factors (Eat to Live, p. 240). Even if you eat a healthy diet and have lowered your risk of heart disease, salt causes you to excrete calcium and other important minerals from your body, and it increases your risk of hemorrhagic stroke. Here's more from Dr. Fuhrman's website: here and here.  When I log my food in cronometer, I get about 350-500 mg of sodium from natural foods.  I add an additional 200 mg per day from salt (less than 1/8 tsp).  My understanding is you can add up to 500-1000 mg of salt to your diet and still be healthy.  That's 1/4-1/2 tsp so that's a good compromise if you love the taste.  Salt is hard to give up. But once I got used to it, I taste more of the food and now prefer it without salt. Also, once your body adjusts to not ingesting so much salt, your sweat and urine are no longer filled with it. This means if you exercise a lot and sweat a lot, you don't lose too many electrolytes so don't have to replenish them. You can just drink water, or a little juice, no need for the gatorade.

What's so bad about oil? Each tablespoon has about 100 calories. It raises your cholesterol and has no nutritional value. I'd rather eat 100 calories of healthy fats like nuts, seeds, or avocado.  Not only that, most oil is rich in omega-6 fats.   Your body only has so many enzymes for digesting both omega-6 and omega-3 oils.  So if you flood it with omega-6 fats, you won't digest the omega-3 fats, which are essential to healthy functioning.  I learned that from one of Jeff Novick's DVDs.  It's also discussed in Becoming Vegan.

What about olive oil? Same answer as before.

Yeah, but... the mediterranean diet... I grant you that olive oil is less harmful than saturated fats like lard and butter, and trans-fats. That doesn't mean it's good for you. The mediterranean diet, which uses a lot of olive oil, was relatively more healthy than the SAD (Standard American Diet) because they traditionally ate more fruits and vegetables and exercised a lot. Now, most people in the Mediterranean eat more meat and less vegetables, they are more sedentary, and their health has declined accordingly.

What about margarine? That's even worse if it has trans fats in it. Check the labels. You can put jam on bread without butter. Or make up new toppings for your bread (using tomatoes, salsa, mushrooms, avocado...). Boiled sweet corn is so good (if you got it fresh), that you don't need margarine. Try it a few times and see what you think. It's different at first but that's because you're used to slathering it in grease and salt. Chives is good on sweet corn, as are no-salt seasonings. My favorite is a mashed up avocado, I call it avocado butter. really good on corn. But like I said, fresh sweet corn is also good with absolutely nothing on it.

Do you eat any fat? Yes, I eat some fat, but in the form of nuts, seeds, and avocados. These taste way better than oil.  Think guacamole instead of oil, way more appetizing. But I'm convinced that low-fat is the way to go if you want to lose weight.  Potatoes and squash are more satiating, even more nutritent dense, than nuts (see Jeff Novick's DVDs), and help keep the weight down.  Drs. McDougall, Esselstyn, and Jeff Novick recommend a diet with less than 20% of your calories as fat.

I enjoy life and want to enjoy my food. It sounds like too much of a sacrifice to cook without oil, salt, dairy and meat! If you really like to cook and like to think of yourself as adventurous and creative, what could be more creative than inventing delicious recipes without oil and minimal salt? Oil and salt are crutches. You can make anything taste good by frying it in oil, and adding salt and/or sugar and/or hot peppers. Where's the challenge in that?  Nuts and fruit are great additions to entrees.   I enjoy life and want to enjoy my food, and I do.

I suppose I have to give up caffeine too? Hey, you're catching on! Actually, Fuhrman says 1 cup of coffee a day is probably okay. More than that can interfere with sleep and cause food cravings and stuff (Eat to Live, p. 242). Here's something to consider: Who is benefiting more from your caffeine addiction, you or the corporation you work for? They get increased productivity from you during the day, and then after work when you are coming down from the high, you get to be exhausted on your own time. Maybe you should save the caffeine for the weekend for yourself and give your corporation what it deserves, a normal level of human work output. I gave up caffeine a few years ago. I didn't like being addicted to a drug. It took me a few years of gradually decreasing. I got down to one cup of green tea a day, then cut that out when I was being supportive of a friend who had to give up caffeine for health reasons. Even from that low level, it was noticeable. And it took a few months for my energy levels to get back up. They say it takes only a few days to a week to break the caffeine addiction. Sure, that's how long it takes to get rid of the horrible headache, but it takes months for your energy levels to go up.  My understanding is that the dopamine receptors in your brain have to regrow. However, once that 3 months or however long it takes, is over with, then things get good. I do have more energy throughout the day now. And if I am tired I can take a cat nap at any time. Before if I had too much caffeine and was tired, I couldn't take a 10 minute nap because of the caffeine so then I was wired and tired and that felt pretty awful. So I'm glad I gave it up, but I sympathize with anyone trying to do it. It is hard!

And alcohol? Well, Fuhrman says one drink a day is okay, but it can set up food cravings. If you are a small woman, you might watch out for this. Since I lost weight, alcohol (and caffeine) affects me a lot more, and one drink is pretty strong. I'm getting old and since I'm off caffeine, alcohol usually just makes me tired. So I personally have lost interest in it. I don't forbid an occasional drink for myself, but I am usually not interested.

I could never give up cheese. That is the most common comment after the first two questions about protein and calcium. I've read in various places that the casein in cheese is addictive--here's one link. Maybe that is why it's hard to give up. For some strange reason I didn't have a problem giving it up even though I used to eat it all the time. A lot of the flavor of cheese comes from salt. I bet it wouldn't taste as good without the salt. I guess I just find that there are other things that taste great. I don't try to reproduce the flavor of cheese, just enjoy the flavor of other things, like a cashew sauce instead of a cheese sauce. Ground lightly toasted pine nuts are a great replacement for parmesan cheese. I say replacement, not substitute because I'm not trying to reproduce the flavor of parmesan cheese. I like the flavor of toasted pine nuts. I guess I think there are so many delicious vegan foods that have replaced cheese that I don't miss it. I feel that I eat more delicious food than I ever did before.

I don't like fruit. A lot of people say this too. You must not have had the right fruit. Often, the produce at the supermarket is sub-par and usually not ripe. Try organic fruit (only if it looks reasonably fresh!). Buy a bunch of different kinds of fruit and berries. Let it sit in your fruit basket until it's ripe (maybe a few days)--not the berries, apples or oranges. They are best eaten soon and kept refrigerated. Let your bananas develop small spots--that's perfect ripeness to me. Make a fruit salad with the mixture of fruit and berries. Add a little maple syrup if you are in transition. That usually appeals to fruit naysayers. Add fruit to vegetable salads. Make fruity salad dressings from the blender. Next thing you know, you'll start craving it. Maybe you'll even want to eat an apple and an orange! Start buying all kinds of weird fruit. I just learned how to slice a pineapple (I was dumb for not trying before). Boy is that ever good!

I don't like vegetables. Boy, you are one tough cookie. Well, you can change your tastes. Most people don't like milk, coffee, beer or wine when they first taste it. It usually takes from 3-10 tastings before your preferences change. It's like listening to new music too--it usually takes a few listenings before a song grows on you, especially classical music. I didn't like falafel the first time I tried it, but by the third time I really liked it. If you've conditioned yourself on processed foods, vegetables may seem unfamiliar and tasteless. Note that most processed foods have chemicals that make the food seem to taste better than it does, so they can get away with lower-quality ingredients and just fool your taste buds.

I exercise a lot, isn't that good enough? Most people think diet has only a minor effect on your health. I thought so too until I stumbled on this vegan kick. Well, minor tweaks to the Standard American Diet (SAD) do indeed have minor effects. However, changing your diet completely from SAD to one dominated by fruits and vegetables has dramatic effects. Exercise alone will not prevent you from getting heart disease and cancer. My mother was an avid jogger and had a heart attack a day after she ran 5 miles. Diet alone has a more dramatic effect, but won't prevent your muscles from atrophying as you age. Both exercise and diet are the magic formula. And it's fun too. I found that as I lost weight and gained energy I was more enthusiastic about exercising than I had been in years.

What supplements do you take?  I follow the advice of Dr. Fuhrman and several of the vegan R.D.'s.  I take B12, vitamin D, and a tiny amount of iodine.  I take Dr. Fuhrman's vitamins since they are low dose compared to most.  I also take his DHA/EPA supplement for insurance.  I am not sure it's needed but I don't think it's harmful in small doses--at least I hope not.  I'm not sure about the vitamin D either.  It's controversial.  My blood levels for vitamin D were low.  But does raising the blood levels from supplementation have the same effect as getting it from the sun?  I don't know.  Dr. Fuhrman and most of the vegan RDs recommend it, Drs. McDougall & Campbell are against.  Here's Pam Popper's take on it (she's in the McDougall camp).  It is pretty convincing against.  

What sort of health improvements can I expect from changing my diet? The list of ailments this diet can prevent, halt, and often reverse (unless damage is done) is astounding: heart disease, alzheimers, parkinson's disease, diabetes, cancer, depression, multiple sclerosis, allergies, headaches and migraines, rhuematoid arthritis, lupus, diverticulitis, irritable bowel syndrome, acne, asthma, fibromyalgia, psoriasis, osteoporosis, kidney stones, gallstones, constipation, hemorrhoids, macular degeneration, appendicitis, gout, indigestion and gastritis. A better way to state it is, those are ailments the SAD (standard american diet) causes; and removing the cause heals or improves all these conditions. These medical conditions are discussed more here: Fuhrman, McDougall. Success stories are described here: Fuhrman, McDougall. Here is a post about how my health has improved.

How do I learn to cook healthy vegan food? I wrote a post on how I do it. This website is full of wonderful recipes: fatfreevegan.com and her blog. There are lots of great vegan cookbooks out there and many can be adapted to a healthy diet by eliminating most of the oil and adding more vegetables. There are easy, healthy and good-tasting recipes in Jennifer Raymond's books: e.g., The Peaceful Palate, and Fat-Free and Easy. She wrote a lot of recipes in Neal Barnard's older books. I like a lot of the recipes in this book, Very Vegetarian.

Can I just be 90% vegan? Actually, yes I think you can. I'm vegan primarily for ethical reasons. For health reasons, 90% may be enough if you don't already have serious health issues. Dr. Fuhrman says that a diet with animal products (all meat, dairy, eggs, and fish) under 10% of calories can still maximize your health and lifespan (Eat for Health, p. 167). This is discussed in this article. Let's see, if you consume 2000 calories a day, that amounts to 200 calories per day, or 1400 calories per week of animal products allowed to maintain optimum health. Fuhrman doesn't recommend cheese in any case since it's high in saturated fat. Also note that the higher up you go in the food chain, the more toxins will be in your food, compared to fruit and vegetables. Fish are the most toxic.

Why are you a vegan? I first became a vegetarian for environmental and humanitarian reasons. It turns out the most effective thing you can do for the environment is become a vegan, unless you are really powerful and can make big corporations to change their behavior. Then I learned about how meat and dairy are produced and that was the end of my participation in the system. Other people have summarized the animal rights/cruelty issues much better than I can. I'll reference Dan Piraro's site which has a nice summary of why he's vegan, cartoons, and links to the horrible realities. Now, an interesting healthy side effect of being vegan for ethical reasons is that I think people are more likely to remain vegan for ethical reasons than for health reasons.  However, I think all vegans need to learn a little about health so they can thrive, and that will encourage them to stay vegan.   If all you ate were fritos, oreos and cokes, I think you would suffer some serious deficiencies and you might not last long as a vegan.  

What is a vegan? A vegan eats no animal products. Most vegans prefer not to wear them either.

Do you eat fish? No, a fish is an animal, with a nervous system and a brain.

Do you eat eggs? No, eggs are an animal product.

Do you eat butter? No, that comes from a cow's udder. It is an animal product.

Let me be more explicit. Vegans don't eat dairy (for example, milk, yogurt, butter, powdered milk, casein, whey, cheese). We don't eat eggs (neither yokes nor whites). We don't eat fish (for example, salmon, trout, scallops, shrimp). We don't eat meat (beef, chicken, pork, deer, dogs, cats, monkeys, horses, and all the rest). We don't even eat honey. Great replacements for honey include agave nectar or maple syrup.

But how do you get your protein and calcium? See the top of this post.

What's left to eat? Tons of wonderful varieties of vegetables, fruits, beans, grains, nuts and seeds. I eat a more varied and delicious diet than I ever did as a meat eater.