food

I have had recently had a lot of questions about Xylitol, So I have decided to post some information that has come largely from one of my favorite sources which is the Western Price Foundation. Hope you find it helpful. Xylitol is a sugar alcohol, a low-calorie carbohydrate made from birch bark, fibrous vegetables and fruit. Xylitol has no known toxic levels and was approved by the FDA in 1963. Some diarrhea or slight cramping may occur at first if a large amount is consumed all at once. It is recommended that one start small and let the body's enzymes adjust, which they will do. Xylitol is deadly to dogs even in small amounts. Gums, candies, baked goods, and table scraps containing xylitol must be kept far away from, and inaccessible to dogs, including ladies' and children's purses, and the garbage for dogs who are foragers. Xylitol had been known to the world of organic chemistry since it was first manufactured in 1891 by a German chemist. A natural, intermediate product, xylitol regularly occurs in the glucose metabolism of animals as well as in the metabolism of several plants and micro-organisms. Xylitol is even produced naturally in OUR bodies, up to 15 grams daily during normal metabolism. Because it metabolizes without using insulin, there is no blood sugar spike. Xylitol's Dubious Health Claims Since xylitol is an industrial product, it pays to be dubious about the industry’s health claims for it. First among these is the claim that xylitol prevents cavities. Indeed, many studies can be cited to support such a claim. But not all. The results of a recent two-year trial found no difference in cavities between those who chewed xylitol-containing gum and those who did not. 2. In an earlier study, researchers concluded that “Overall, consumption of xylitol-containing snacks and candy did not reduce S. mutans levels.” 3.As for the claim that xylitol is good for diabetics, the fact that this sweetener is not completely absorbed comes at a cost: bloating, diarrhea and flatulence. In a study performed on 18 diabetic children who consumed a dose of 30 grams of xylitol per day, researchers found a significant elevation of the uric acid concentration.4 And since 80 percent of xylitol is metabolized through the liver, a danger to liver function similar to that of fructose is a distinct possibility. The Public Relations Story The official website for xylitol, xylitol.org, states, “In the amounts needed to prevent tooth decay (less than 15 grams per day), xylitol is safe for everyone.” Fifteen grams of xylitol is about 0.5 ounces. What about doses over 15 grams? In a long term toxicology study on rats researchers found that xylitol caused a significant increase in the incidence of adrenal medullary hyperplasia in male and female rats in all dose levels tested (5%, 10% and 20%).5 That means it caused abnormal cell growth in the adrenal glands. In one higher-dose study in which mice consumed 20 percent of their diet as xylitol, there was a significant increase in the mortality of the males as compared to those consuming sucrose.6 A major study in dogs found an increase in liver weight associated with xylitol use.7 Conclusions About Xylitol Xylitol’s own promotional material says it is not safe for everyone to use. Since children are smaller and less developed than adults, they will obviously be much more sensitive to xylitol’s effects. There are no safety data or tests to indicate a safe dosage for children. And foods containing xylitol may also contain additional sweeteners that are undeniably harmful, such as aspartame. As for claims that xylitol can prevent tooth decay, I can only say, “Buyer beware!” Such claims are based on the faulty theory that bacteria cause tooth decay. We know from the work of Weston Price that tooth decay is a problem of nutrient deficiencies—the bacteria are just there cleaning up dead tissue. Finally, and most importantly, this industrial product is just not necessary. Nature has provided us with many wholesome sweeteners that can be used in moderation without adverse effects in the context of a diet of nutrient-dense traditional foods. Natural Stevia... the real thing is a better choice: Spoonable Stevia By Stevita: Spoonable Stevia by Stevita uses only stevia extract with at least 95% pure glycosides (extremely sweet tasting ingredients of the Stevia herb leaves), and a little erythritol, a crystal granulated naturally produced filler found in fruits, vegetables and grains. It is best for baking and sprinkling. Order Spoonable Stevia By Stevita from iherb ENGLISH TOFFEE STEVIA: Wisdom Natural, SweetLeaf, Liquid Stevia, English Toffee Sweet Leaf liquid stevia with all natural flavors is convenient and easy to use. As a supplement, add this nutritious stevia to water, tea, coffee, milk, sparkling water, protein shakes, plain yogurt or anything else you can imagine. It comes in many different flavors including lemon but English Toffee flavor is the best by far. Order English Toffee Stevia from iherb ORDERING FROM IHERB.COM: If you decide to order any products from Iherb.com, you will automatically receive $5 or $10 off your first order. Their products are the cheapest and best in the world…I use them for everything no matter where I am. Get it sent to you via DHL. It will be with you in three to four working days… iHerb.com ship all over the world very cheaply. IMPORTANT - Do not be fooled by the artificially made Stevia products such as Truvia and Purevia. These products are not the natural Stevia plant. To learn more read my post here called beware of Truvia. Some research if you want to look at it Dehmel KH and others. Absorption of xylitol. Int. Symp on metabolism, physiololgy and clinical use of pentoses and pentitols. Hakone, Japan, 1967, 177-181, Ed. Horecker. Int J Paediatr Dent. 2008 May;18(3):170-7. J Am Dental Assoc, 2002;133(4):435-441. Förster, H., Boecker, S. and Walther, A. (1977) Verwendung von Xylitals Zuckeraustauschstoff bei diabetischen Kindern, Fortschr. Med.,95, nr. 2, 99-102. Russfield, A.D. (1981) Two-year feeding study of xylitol, sorbitol and sucrose in Charles River (UK) rats: Adrenal Medulla. Unpublished report. World Health Organization, Summary Of Toxicological Data Of Certain Food Additives and Contaminants, WHO Food Additives Series NO. 13 Joint FAO/WHO Expert Committee on Food Additives* Rome, 3-12 April 1978 accessed at: http://www.inchem.org/documents/jecfa/jecmono/v13je11.htm. Heywood, R. et al. (1981) Revised report: Xylitol toxicity study in the beagle dog (Report of Huntingdon Research Centre).

It‘ll change your life. As soon as you begin to incorporate freshly-extracted raw vegetable and fruit juices into your lifestyle, something amazing starts happening to you. First you notice the terrific lift that just one glass of fresh juice can give you, particularly if taken first thing in the morning on an empty stomach. Ten to fifteen minutes after drinking fresh-made juice, you can feel yourself perking up. Your head clears. Even your vision seems sharper. These are the characteristics of the Raw Energy Rush. I never tire of initiating someone to the experience. Sometimes they're skeptical, but are persuaded to try our freshly-extracted juice because it tastes so delicious. Half an hour later they're back, with a gleam in their eye, demanding to know `what is the secret ingredient?' LIFE POWER HOLDS THE SECRET This is the most profound mystery of the universe—and raw juice is bursting with it. Raw juice is a perfect fuel, since it's easily assimilated to cleanse and nurture the body while supplying it with a full range of essential nutrients—especially minerals which are so lacking in most people’s diet. Raw juice also has another property—the mysterious factor X. Scientists have yet to understand it. Sometimes it’s ascribed to the high redox potential of live juices, or the inscrutable action of enzymes, or just the vibrational energy that live raw foods carry. The nutritional and recuperative value of raw juice has become well known to doctors and natural health practitioners since the 19th century, when several of the most eminent pioneers in the field started experimenting with raw foods to improve their own health. The famous Rohsäft Kur (raw juice cure), developed by Dr Max Bircher-Benner and Dr Max Gerson in the early years of this century, is acknowledged to be the single most potent short-term antidote to fatigue and stress, but until recently it's been the preserve of the privileged few who could afford to go to an exclusive health spa. GO FOR BODY MIND TRANSFORMATION Never forget that body and the mind are inseparable, interdependent, synergistic parts of the same whole—YOU. People working in the soul-sapping environment of, say, a modern office building will reach for coffee and fizzy drinks in the middle of the afternoon in the hope that these will give them enough mental energy to make it through to the end of another hectic day. Then they experience a corresponding energy slump on the way home, arriving irritable and exhausted and good for nothing but going early to bed. The end result of living like this is a kind of chronic fatigue that often manifests itself as indifferent, fatalistic lethargy. As you master the basic principles of juicing and get into the practice of drinking raw juice on a daily basis, energizing your life and rejuvenating your body, you will find yourself becoming better able to cope with the debilitating stresses of modern life. Raw juice will help you to build the stamina to cope, but it will also transform the way you see the world around you. As your body re-balances itself, you'll find that your moods stabilize, too. Trivialities cease to upset you, and you are able to keep things in perspective. Detoxifying the system and flushing your colon with raw juice actually helps you to think more clearly and rationally, concentrate for longer, and maintain a more optimistic frame of mind. Want to experience a juice high for yourself? Start with one of these: APPLE ZINGER This is a terrific breakfast time enlivener that perks up the whole system and really wakes up your taste buds. 2 or 3 whole apples 1 whole lemon, peeled 1 centimeter cube of ginger (or more!) GREEN SATIN This is a delicious aromatic introduction to drinking green juices. Smooth as satin and beautiful to sip at sunset. 2 - 3 apples 2 stalks celery bulb of fennel

Remember food combining, developed by William Howard Hay MD? It has changed thousands of people’s lives, protecting them from fatigue, weight gain, degenerative diseases and early aging. The basic principles behind food combining are simple: Don’t mix foods that fight. Never eat proteins and starches at the same meal. Never eat fruit and vegetables at the same meal. And do not eat dessert after a meal. If you do, the dessert gets trapped in the stomach and starts to rot, since it can’t be digested properly. These fundamentals of what has long been known as Conscientious Food Combining are easy to learn and even easier put into practice. The benefits of doing so are many, including freedom from reflux, poor digestion and long-term fatigue. DIGEST TO THRIVE Your body expends more energy on the digestion of food than on any other function. Think how sluggish and sleepy you feel after a traditional Sunday lunch. It may surprise you to learn that the energy your body needs to digest food is even greater than that which you use when taking strenuous exercise. When you take in food, your system has to redirect blood supply—and therefore vital life energy—away from the brain and other organs towards the gut. Once there, your energy reserves get busy breaking down your meal. When you eat foods that fight each other, or more food than your body needs, you greatly diminish your overall vitality. You also build up body pollution. Any food—even good quality food—in excess tends to pollute the body. PROTEINS AND CARBS ARE NO-GO Leave behind the old practice of meat-and-potatoes or fish-and-chips. When the wrong foods are mixed together, this further delays digestion and produces toxicity while increasing both appetite and digestive upsets. Most people’s bodies are not designed to efficiently digest more than one concentrated food in the stomach at once. In the simplest terms, you need an acid medium to digest protein and an alkaline one to digest starch. Eat concentrated proteins and starches together—fish and chips, bacon sandwiches, meat and potatoes—and nothing gets digested. An awareness of this principle lies at the core of virtually every tradition of natural healing. Eating concentrated proteins and starches at the same meal wreaks havoc with digestion. It increases the number of incompletely broken down food particles that find their way into the bloodstream to cause food allergies, depression and exhaustion. Concentrated proteins such as cheese, eggs, fish and meat must have an acid medium for good digestion. If there are any starchy or sugary food including breads, pastas or sweets in the stomach at the same time, they neutralize the acid medium, so the proteins remain incompletely digested and poorly assimilated. All carbohydrates foods need an alkaline medium for digestion and must be eaten at a separate meal. What you can get away with is the occasional garnish for protein foods or fruits—such as sesame seeds or raisins—but you would not want to add them in greater quantity. OUT WITH Convenience FOODS Ready-in-a-minute pre-cooked meals, junk foods, and the standard meat-and-two-veg Western meals are incredibly energy-draining. They present your digestive system with the greatest difficulty of all. Virtually all of these manufactured items are grossly deficient in essential nutrient. for it to break down and make use of. Convenience foods and junk foods are also grossly deficient in essential nutrients as well. So are chemically fertilized fruits and vegetables and foods which have been excessively processed to alter their natural state. Convenience foods contain additives such as artificial colorings and flavorings which are potentially harmful. Such foods include breads, sugar, most meats, sweets, and coffee and all the ready-in-a-minute snacks and meals that fill the shelves of our supermarkets. They have no place at the food combining table. CREATE VITALITY If you want to build energy quickly, start right now to separate your concentrated starches from your concentrated proteins, eating each at separate meals. This will help protect your system from a build-up of acid wastes, restore metabolic balance, and resolve the energy crisis which takes place when digestion is overtaxed. Most important, it can bring you a whole new kind of energy which can have you looking good and feeling better than ever with each week that passes. It is not only separating the kind of foods that you eat that matters for an abundance of energy. You need to be just as conscientious about what you eat. The human body is not genetically equipped to handle the refined flours, sugars and excess quantities of poor quality proteins that make up the typical western way of eating. Our ancient ancestors, whose genetic makeup we share, had no bread, sugar, junk fats or pre-packaged, pre-cooked convenience foods. They ate simple, ordinary, wholesome foods—as much of them as they could kill or gather. Their diet was high in green leaves and vegetables—all complex carbohydrates—and moderate in protein. This is the way our own bodies genetically expect to be fed: Good, wholesome, preferably organic foods, simply prepared and eaten as closely as possible to their natural state. FREEDOM TO THRIVE This way of eating calls for real foods rich in fiber, and plenty of the best fats: Organic coconut oil and extra virgin olive oil, for instance. The health-enhancing properties of real living foods have long been tested and eulogized by highly respected European and American physicians—from Gordon Latto and Philip Kilsby in Britain, Max Bircher-Benner in Switzerland and Max Gerson in Germany, to Henry Lindlahr and JK Tilden in the United States. Eating for energy asks that you combine your foods sensibly, and that as much as possible you choose foods grown on healthy organic soils and served as closely as possible to their natural state, either cooked or raw. This is not as complicated as it sounds. Here are the basic principles of eating of high vitality eating. They quickly become second nature. EAT FRUIT ON ITS OWN Fruit passes through your digestive system very rapidly. It needs little help from digestive enzymes to break it down. If you try to eat fruit at a meal with other foods, its digestion and assimilation are slowed drastically and you can get fermentation in the gut causing indigestion, wind and discomfort. If you have a blood sugar problem, insulin resistance or an overgrowth of Candida albicans, then stay away from sugary fruits altogether, or eat no more than a couple of servings of berries a day. Instead of fruit for breakfast you might have a green drink made from the tops of green vegetables in a juicer or a blender. MAKE ONE MEAL A DAY A BIG SALAD A vibrant, living salad based on home-grown or store-bought sprouted seeds and green vegetables is the mainstay eating for high energy. It’s the best way to get optimal support for rebuilding cells and tissues, rebalancing biochemical processes, and restoring normal metabolism. Sometimes, of course, this is not possible—for example, when you have to eat in restaurants all the time. In this case, you can replace the living salad with a big dish of lightly steamed or wok-fried fresh vegetables cooked in coconut oil and served with a side-dish of soup or a protein food. That being said, the more often you are able to make a living salad the focus of the meal, the sooner you will reap the rewards of your new lifestyle. Remember that your digestive system needs time to complete the digestion of a meal before you put anything else into it. Four or five hours need to elapse between lunch and dinner. Otherwise digestion is not complete, and increased toxicity ensues. Always drink as much filtered or spring water or herb teas between meals as you like. But don’t drink liquids at a meal as they will dilute the important digestive enzymes. AIDE MÉMOIRE Eat fruit or a green drink in the first half of the day followed by a protein or carbohydrate lunch and dinner, both of which should include a big, fresh, raw salad. Leave four to five hours between lunch and dinner for efficient digestion. Eat as much as your body needs and listen to its signals of how hungry you really are. Take your time, chew thoroughly and stop as soon as you feel you have had enough. Never overeat. Get rid of packaged convenience foods that rob you of vitality and undermine well-being. These include breakfast cereals, breads, pasta, sugar and all the so-called goodies made from it. Cut back on tea and coffee. If you drink either, make sure it’s organic so you avoid taking chemicals and pesticides into your body. After wheat, coffee is the second most sprayed commodity in the world. Restrict alcohol to a glass or two of good wine with a meal, once a day. Never eat a concentrated starch food with a concentrated protein food at the same meal. Eat fruit on its own, or leave at least 20 to 30 minutes between a fruit starter and the next course of your meal. You can pick and choose your own foods and make up your own menus once you get your head around these basic principles. Practice Conscientious Food Combining for a month and I think you’ll be delighted with how you look and feel. You can also say goodbye forever to mainstream medications designed to treat GERD—gastroesophageal reflux disease—with all their nasty side effects. Meanwhile your energy will just keep on building.

Our Western Diet is based on foods of convenience—the fast food items we buy at the local corner shop or supermarket. These products are gross distortions of the REAL foods which human beings have eaten throughout history...foods to which our bodies remain genetically adapted. Our ancestors did not have bread, sugar, junk fats and all the other nutritionally depleted pre-packaged, pre-cooked stuff that we do. They ate fresh wholesome foods. Palaeolithic man’s diet was high in wholesome fats, moderate in proteins, and rich in fiber, thanks to whatever vegetables and simple fruits they could gather. CHEAP AND NASTY The modern convenience foods on which we now feed depleted of natural fiber and filled with chemicals. They are manufactured from grain-based carbs, and altered milk products then riddled sugar and dangerous trans-fatty acids—oils which have been separated out from the foods from which they are taken, then chemically altered by solvents and heat processing. FOODS CAUSE ADDICTION Apart from the destructive power of GMO foods, which are not only destroying human health but the health of the planet, another major change has taken place: Today we also swallow a kaleidoscope of colorants, flavorings, additives and ‘enhancers’, not to mention pesticides, herbicides and fungicides, which our ancestors could never have imagined in their wildest dreams. We slurp down chemical pollutants with each sip of our diet cola, and every bite of our pre-cooked meals. Quite simply, this is the fast food diet that 95% of the Western world now lives on. And, next time you upbraid yourself for what you perceive to be your lack of willpower as you reach for yet another biscuit and feel guilty about it, let the guilt go. It does not belong to you. The denatured, degraded, food we eat bears the lion's share of blame, not only for the plague of obesity worldwide, but for food addictions and cravings that lead to illness and weight gain, the development of potentially fatal degenerative diseases, from heart disease and cancer to metabolic syndrome; Alzheimer’s disease; diabetes, and dozens more. DEGENERATION BEGINS It was Weston Price, early on in the century, who first brought the scientific community's attention to the devastating effects the rise of processed foods and the destructive ways in which they damage human health. Price, a dentist, traveled the world recording the changes in the shape of the jaw and teeth which take place slowly but inevitably as each culture discards its traditional dietary practices, based on real food, in favor of our more ‘civilized’ Western fare. Price's many studies—each of which lasted between 20 and 40 years—carefully plotted the onset of degenerative diseases. It is not surprising that, after living on a diet of simple whole plant foods rich in natural fiber and a health-giving synergy of nutrients and micro-nutrients throughout evolution, the human body continues to this day find the foods we eat now anathema to health. Our genes have been attuned to naturally grown, unprocessed foods for more than a million years. Our metabolic biochemistry as human beings is designed for it. Sir Robert McCarrison—brilliant British doctor also charted the relationship between food and health. More recently, two more British doctors, Dennis Burkitt and Hugh Trowell, carried out their own extensive studies, taking Price and McCarrison’s work a step further. They carefully documented the exact sequence of events which takes place when a people's diet changes from simple, primitive, real food to packaged fast foodstuffs. Stage One: The primitive, unprocessed diet of hunter-gatherers, complete with plenty of healthy fats, good quality proteins, plus vegetable and fruit-based carbohydrate is eaten. Degenerative diseases do not exist. Stage Two: Western diet is introduced. Obesity and diabetes become common among privileged groups able to afford foods of commerce, and degenerative diseases begin to appear. Stage Three: A culture's diet becomes “moderately Westernized”. Obesity becomes more widespread, as does constipation, haemorrhoids, varicose veins and appendicitis. Stage Four: Westernized diet is now widespread. Overweight and obesity are common in all social groups. So is heart disease, high blood pressure, diverticular disease, hiatus hernia, cancer and other Western diseases. FRAGMENTED “FOODS” Like our soils, the industrially manufactured foods we eat today—from biscuits and pasta to pre-cooked convenience meals—have quite literally been taken to pieces. High-tech food production works something like this: To create a great variety of palatable foods from raw materials, you have to reduce the foodstuffs—grains and seeds, vegetables and legumes—to simple, malleable ‘nuts and bolts’ that lend themselves to whatever manipulations you want to perform on them. Take soya beans for instance. They were once considered an excellent source of complete protein as valuable as meat or eggs—more valuable in many ways, since they are so cheap. Nowadays more than 95% of soybeans grown worldwide are genetically modified. Food manufacturers still take whole soya beans, in which 30% of each bean is protein, and process them physically and chemically to extract this protein and make it ready to accept dyes and flavorings. hen they alter its texture through more processing until eventually it becomes ersatz meat. This end product—from which soy-based foods from tofu to soya milk are made—is a long way from the natural soya bean. In the course of such manipulations the little soya bean, which, pre-GMO devastation and high processing, once offered asynergy of nutrients, complex carbohydrates, essential fatty acids and fiber. By now however it has now been turned into a highly concentrated artificial material. During the operation, vitamins and minerals are destroyed. The soya bean's proteins and natural fatty acids have been denatured and chemically altered into new forms, many of which are not usable by the body. The soya has also lost most of its fiber too—a vital part of any food's health-promoting wholeness, and something absolutely essential for protection from degenerative diseases and obesity. To this artificial “food”, manufacturers then add a lot of phoney colors and flavors. Canadian expert in food science, Ross Hume Hall, puts it rather well when he says: "The product contains the same number of calories as the original soya protein, but it now consists of a set of naked molecules completely divorced from any natural context." The same is true of the way in which cereals and grains are processed. NUTRITIONAL DESTRUCTION From milk to meat to garden peas—whatever food is involved—processing destroys nutrients. According to official government handbooks, 50-70% of vitamin B6 is lost when meats are processed. 50-90% of folic acid—a vitamin of particular importance to the functioning of nerves and the actions of hormones, especially in the female body—is shed when grains are milled, while more than 80% of the mineral magnesium disappears in the same process. The multi-national food industry covers the packaging of its products with endless ‘nutritional’ information, which would have you believe that any goodness lost in processing can be made up for by ‘enriching’. Enriching is just another chemical whereby a few cheap vitamins and minerals in synthetic form are pumped back into the now fragmented food. It is categorically impossible to restore the health-giving power of wholeness to any food which has been fragmented in this way. BIG COVER-UP Similar nutrient losses happen during other phases of food handling—artificial ripening, transport and storage. Store asparagus for a week and it loses 90% of its vitamin C. Keep grapes for the same time, and they shed 30% of their B vitamins. Freeze meats and you can lose as much as 50% of two important B vitamins— riboflavin and thiamine. These are just a few examples of nutrient losses which occur every day. They are only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the ways in which modern food handling and manufacturing processes have created highly concentrated, calorie-dense foods filled with masses of sugar (more about this in future entries) which are dangerously destructive of health, and promote both weight gain and rapid degeneration of body and mind. REAL FOOD CREATES REAL HEALTH OK, so where do you go from here? It is easy to change your food-buying habits once you clear your cupboards of the manufactured rubbish we all collect. You’ll find the healthiest, freshest, and most natural foods for lasting health at the outside edges of your local supermarket. These include crunchy fresh vegetables and fruit, fresh game and meats, seafoods and eggs. Skirt the edges, steer clear of the middle, and you’ve got the secret to becoming a successful modern-day hunter-gatherer. Remember this: Natural wholesome foods are perishable. They have to be replaced often, unlike the ready-in-a-minute, pre-made stuff that you find in the inner aisles. You will be shopping “at the edge” in another way too: You’ll be looking for foods as close as possible to those that our ancestors ate—with a wide variety of crunchy, living vegetables, especially bright-colored ones. Foods with a long shelf life don’t belong in your body. Processed high-carb foods often have a very long shelf life. This makes them great sales material for food manufacturers and retailers, since they can sit on the shelves for a long time, and are cheap to produce with high profit margins. Virtually all convenience foods and fast foods have been whipped up out of processed grains and cereals, masses of sugar in all forms, junk fats, chemical additives. Avoid them for your sake, as well as the sake of your family. You’ll be able to turn your lives around in short order. Find our for yourself. Try it.

Each year we hear about some “deadly” new strain of flu. The powers-that-be incessantly spread fearful propaganda about their dangers. So much so that vaccination has now become widespread from cradle to grave. Despite all the media hype, we know little about the long-term consequences of most inoculations being forced upon us today. We do know that some of these vaccines provoke illnesses they are supposed to be preventing. Meanwhile, what few are aware of as yet is this: Microchip implants have become so small now that they can be, and frequently are, injected direct into the human body via a hypodermic needle while a vaccination is being given. This is without consent. Many are injected into the bodies of newborn babies. There the implant remains. Thanks to its presence in the body, with the help of satellites, any implanted person can potentially be tracked anywhere on the planet, since these minute implants respond to low-frequency radio waves. Enough about these questionable high-tech practices. When it comes to prevention and treatment, I’ll opt for nature power every time. Simple herbs work better and are far safer. They keep me from being laid low by illness even when people all around me are dropping like flies. NATURE’S WAY If you are generally healthy, yet lead a stressful lifestyle, the occasional cold is simply your body’s way of getting rest and clearing out toxins. However, if you find yourself spending most of the winter with your nose in a handkerchief, then it is time to take preventative action. Both colds and flu are viruses. There are many plant friends that can help protect from them. Viruses cannot replicate themselves without entering your own cells and altering their function. If you can prevent a virus invading your cells, you will stop cold and flu in their tracks. Giving your immune system a boost for the colds and flu season is the key to doing this. Eat well—plenty of fresh vegetables and some low-glycemic fruit, and cut out all the packaged convenience foods. They are worthless when it comes to protecting or enhancing your health. AT FIRST SNIFFLE The moment you feel you may be coming down with something, it’s time to listen to your body. You might like to stop eating cooked food and go raw. In such circumstances, I often don’t eat anything at all—just take live, fresh organic juices like carrot, spinach, apple, celery, kale—whatever I have in the house or can pick up at the market. Animals stop eating when they feel unwell. So do children. The body needs all its strength to get rid of the invasion. Trust this. Boost your immunity by wrapping yourself in your favorite blanket, watch your favorite film or listen to music you like. Have a glass of juice or, if you prefer something warm, a bowl of tonic soup. Remember, your body is trying to clear itself of stuff that does not belong in it. Make time to let the clearing take place. GOOD OLD VITAMIN C Remember the discoveries of two Nobel Prize winners—back when the Nobel Prize still meant something: Begin by taking at least 4 to 8 grams of vitamin C a day. This may sound excessive, but if you are under-the-weather or your immune system needs a boost, you will soak up vitamin C like blotting paper. It’s worth remembering that we don’t make our own vitamin C like other animals. If we were goats, we would be making 5 grams of vitamin C per day or more for ourselves. The body simply flushes out any vitamin C it doesn’t need. If you find your bowel movements are loose, reduce the amount you are taking a little. You can rest assured that your cells are being adequately flushed in ascorbic acid. Look for a supplement that has bioflavonoids in it as well. And if you have a delicate tummy, go for a brand that’s “buffered.” Personally, I take 3 grams of Vitamin C 3 or 4 times a day when I feel a cold or flu threatening, until 2 days after all symptoms have disappeared. SWEET PROTECTION Astragalus is the root of the yellow vetch plant. Unlike many herbs, it actually tastes good. Creamy yellow, it’s a favorite among the Chinese for strengthening digestion, overcoming chronic weakness, and enhancing wound-healing. Astragalus brings deep strength to the immune system, increasing the number and quality of white blood cells used to fight infection. It even boosts the production of interferon. This is why it is often used with HIV and cancer patients whose immune systems have been undermined by chemotherapy or radiation. Astragalus is also an adaptogen, a plant which is often called a ‘medicine for well people’ that, taken over time, brings strength and support to the whole body. Three cups of astragalus tea a day helps ward off colds and flu, so long as you take it consistently every day during the cold season. Chinese medicine defines ailments as being either ‘hot’ or ‘cold’ and herbs as being ‘warming’ or ‘cooling’. Astragalus is a warming herb to be used with ‘cold’ illness. Use it for protection as well as an immune boost after any bout of cold or flu. Organic astragalus is increasingly available in herb stores dried and shredded. Bought from Chinese pharmacies and Asian markets, dried astragalus root looks like ice-lolly sticks. It is cheap and simple to prepare, and it makes a mild, sweet tea. Look for sticks which are long and thick, firm yet bendable with a few striations. They should have a sweet taste when you chew on them. DRINK ASTRAGALUS TEA I make enough for three or four cups at a time. This recipe can make a sweet chilled drink, but I prefer to reheat mine and drink it warm. Here’s how: Put 6 sticks of astragalus, 3 pieces of licorice root sticks and a 2 inch piece of fresh ginger, peeled and sliced thinly, into a saucepan (not aluminum or non-stick). Pour 1 ½ liters (just over 2 ½ pints) of cold water over the herbs and bring the mixture to the boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for 20 minutes. Take it off the heat and allow to stand for 10 minutes. Strain and keep in the fridge. (You can also buy astragalus herb tea in a packet, which you can prepare as you would a cup of ordinary tea.) ELDERBERRIES FROM THE GARDEN Elderberries too make an excellent healing tea. It has been shown in trials to help protect from infection. If ever you do succumb to flu or a cold, elderberry tea can shorten the length of time you are ill. If you are one of those people who tend only to be recovering from one illness when another hits, these wonderful berries can help break the chain and give you time to recover completely. The way it works against flu is fascinating: The flu virus breaks into healthy cells by piercing them with spikes on its surface. Elderberry appears to make these spikes useless, so defeating the virus before it has had a chance to do any damage. You can make your own Elderberry tea from the garden. Here’s how: Put 2 tablespoons of crushed fresh or frozen elderberries in a tea pot. Pour three cups of boiling water over them and steep for 5 minutes. Strain and drink. JAPANESE HELPERS Shiitake and Maitake mushrooms not only taste delicious, they contain excellent immune strengthening compounds, among them the compound lentinan. This phytochemical helps lower elevated cholesterol. It also boasts anti-aging and anti-tumor properties. You can take Shiitake and Maitake in capsules or as extracts, but I prefer eating the mushrooms themselves. I soak the dried mushrooms and put them in salads, soups and stir-fries. All of these will help you to ward off colds if you make them a part of your daily life. You won’t get their full benefits, however, unless you support your body with a good supply of all the nutrients it needs for good health. HOW TO LIVE A COLD-FREE LIFE 1. Cut back or eliminate completely cereal-based, grain-based and sugar-based carbs. 2. Eat a large, raw salad once a day. This is the best possible way of enabling your body to rebalance and rebuild itself, restoring metabolism to its peak level. Choose high-quality real foods. Shun all packaged convenience stuff. 3. Eat plenty of ‘high water’ foods. Your body is 70% water. For it to cleanse itself properly, it’s useful to make at least 50-75% of your daily diet high-water foods—fresh, low-glycemic fruit and vegetables—most of them eaten raw. This is one of the easiest stay-healthy guidelines to keep. If you are eating fruits or vegetables for breakfast and at least one big salad a day, it just about takes care of itself. 4. Don’t eat between meals. If you are truly hungry, have a piece of non-sugary fruit such as berries or some crunchy raw vegetables. Your system thrives when you give it time to complete the digestion of a meal before you put anything else into it. Four or five hours should elapse between lunch and dinner, otherwise digestion (never at its best when you are unwell anyway) can be incomplete. 5. Drink plenty of clean water—up to 3 liters a day if you have a cold or feel yourself coming down with one. Avoid coffee, milk, which is mucus forming, and alcohol. Instead, drink plenty of filtered water. Take advantage of the huge number of delicious herb teas now available. 6. Try sprinkling a handful of sage or eucalyptus (or a few drops of the essential oil) onto a bowl of hot water and inhale the steam to ease any respiratory difficulties—cover your head and the bowl with a towel to keep the steam in. Celebration Herbals Organic Astragalus Root Tea Astragalus is one of the most famous herbs used traditionally in China. The long oval leaves have a feathery appearance and the Astragalus puts forth handsome bell shaped flowers with pale yellow petals. The root, which is used in herbal preparations, has a yellowish white interior and faint sweet taste Buy Celebration Herbals Organic Astragalus Root Tea Celebration Herbals Organic Elderberry Herbal Tea The Elder is a legendary tree, considered magical and sacred in folklore and myths. Some herb manuals refer to it as the medicine chest of the country people. The Elder Tree produces creamy-white flowers in late spring which give way to bunches of juicy, purplish black berries in early autumn. Birds love Elderberries and will eat entire crops if given the opportunity, so harvesting must be done quickly. Buy Celebration Herbals Organic Elderberry Herbal Tea Mushroom Wisdom Super Shiitake Tablets Paradise Imperial Mushroom Blend is a Full Spectrum hot water extracted concentrated formula. It provides a complete full spectrum with active levels of polysaccharides in the balanced ratio nature intended without isolating, fractionizing or using toxic solvents, harsh chemicals or gases to ensure all active and synergistic constituents are present. Buy Mushroom Wisdom Super Shiitake Tablets

The shelves of health food stores are chock-a-block with vitamin and mineral supplements. If you want to get the very best of them for the sake of your own health and that of your family you’ll need to choose them carefully. Despite their big price tags and the sexy designs that appear on their labels, the vast majority of multi vitamin and mineral products consist of synthetically manufactured chemical lookalikes of no value to your health. You’ve got to go for feed-state multivitamins and minerals if you want health supporting benefits. More about this in a moment. WHO NEEDS VITAMINS ANYWAY? We all do, despite the fact that a myriad of medical professionals completely untrained in good nutrition continue to tell their patients that taking supplements does nothing but produce expensive urine. This is nonsense. As far back as 20 years ago impeccable research was being published in reputable scientific journals making it obvious that human beings benefit from taking the right kind of multivitamin supplement. For instance, one excellent study which appeared in The Journal of the American Medical Association showed that women who take over-the-counter multivitamin supplements in the first months of pregnancy dramatically reduce the risk of giving birth to a neurologically damaged child. Neural tube defects are amongst the most horrible and most common birth defects. They cause everything from death to paralysis in the child and they affect between 1 and 2 babies in every 1000 births. The study was carried out under the direction of Aubrey Milunsky, director of Boston University's prestigious Center for Human Genetics. It involved 23,000 women, half of whom took multivitamin pills containing folic acid (a B-group vitamin in particularly high demand during pregnancy). The results were astonishing. The incidence of neural tube defects in babies born to the women who took the multivitamin pills was only a quarter of what it was amongst those women who took no supplements. SHAKING THE FEDS So remarkable were these results that they shook United States Federal officials who have for generations claimed that taking nutritional supplements is not only unnecessary but can be damaging to an ordinary 'healthy' person's wellbeing. Nonetheless, the FDA and CODEX still insist that “nutrition is not relevant to health” and that if any vitamins and minerals are to be allowed on the market they will only be permitted in ultra-low doses. Clinically effective nutrients and doses are month-by-month being treated as “toxins” and removed from public access. How do we get around this? By taking good quality Food State Supplements instead of the run-of-the-mill chemically produced varieties. WHY YOU NEED FOOD STATE Most vitamins sold in stores and online are synthetic man-made vitamins that have been produced in the laboratory in an attempt to match the molecular structure of naturally occurring vitamins normally found in our foods. As a result they tend to contain high doses of the chemically-made nutrients in an attempt to make enough of each nutrient biologically available to the body. It is just these high dosages that the FDA and CODEX are targeting by making them illegal to be sold over-the-counter. But there is a wonderful way around this which I strongly urge you to explore—to shun chemically made vitamins (which over 90% on the market are) and go for their Food State cousins. Our bodies have been accustomed to absorbing with ease the vitamins and minerals that we get from our foods. Man-made synthetics, even though they try to match the molecular structures of vitamins and minerals, are not the same. Our bodies do not handle them as well, so you may be taking a high potency man-made synthetic that has come recommended, but you may not actually be absorbing the vitamins and minerals it contains. This is one of the reasons why I am so passionate about whole-food, natural multi-vitamins and minerals. GROWN NUTRIENTS Good manufacturers of whole-food vitamins and minerals grow the majority of the foods and botanicals that go into their formulas themselves. Then, using state-of-the-art scientific instrumentation, they test, validate and document the potencies of all the raw materials that make up the formula. This is achieved by using high performance liquid chromatography to test vitamin potency and inductively coupled plasma optimal emission spectrometers to test mineral potency. They are also very careful in how they handle the food extracts that are often added to these supplements. For instance, they use a very specific system of drying which transfers heat gently and efficiently, removing moisture from delicate foods and botanicals while preventing oxidation of the raw materials. This protects the integrity of the food and the botanicals as well as protecting against the degradation of their nutrient content, maintaining the color and the flavor. TREMENDOUS BENEFITS Because natural Food State vitamins are indeed natural and food-state, you will find that the recommended daily serving of vitamins per person is usually somewhere between six and eight tablets a day in order to be able to obtain the full benefit. In addition to the usual vitamins, i.e. vitamin A, C, D3, E, K1, folate, and so forth, there should be a good broad spectrum of minerals: calcium, iodine, magnesium, selenium, chromium, molybdenum, manganese, etc. These wonderful food-state vitamins also often contain extracts taken from other plants that are beneficial to the body, things like extract of barley grass and green papaya, extract of carrot for instance, as well as astragalus. They may also contain many of the Ayurvedic herbs or the herbs that are used in Chinese medicine—reishi and shitake mushrooms, foti and kudzu root. This is the kind of vitamin that I think you will benefit most from. BUYER BEWARE There are many vitamins on the market that claim to be whole-food vitamins but that are not of top quality. Always make sure, whatever vitamin/mineral complex you choose, that it is free of corn, soy, yeast, wheat and dairy products, and it has been formulated without the use of preservatives, artificial flavors or coloring. Here are some food-state vitamin and mineral supplements at the top of my own list. Tried and tested, they are worth every penny you pay for them. I have used all of these products personally and can’t recommend them highly enough. If you try some of them, I’d love you to let me know how you have found them yourself. MegaFood, Women's, Whole Food Multivitamin MegaFood cares about doing things the right way - they refuse to take shortcuts, and never compromise on quality or the things that matter. Since 1973, they have been going out of their way to source fresh and local foods from trusted farmers. They then make all their wholesome supplements using a one-of-a-kind process to deliver the most authentic nutrition - much more than vitamins alone. Order MegaFood Womens Whole Food Multi from iherb MegaFood, Baby & Me, California Blend, Whole Food Multivitamin Ideal for pregnant and lactating women Order Baby And Me Multi from iherb MegaFood, Men Over 40, Whole Food Multivitamin & Mineral, Iron Free Formula MegaFood cares about doing things the right way - we refuse to take shortcuts, and we never compromise on quality or the things that matter. Since 1973, we have been going out of our way to source fresh and local foods from trusted farmers. We then make our wholesome supplements using our one-of-a-kind process to deliver the most authentic nutrition - much more than vitamins alone. Order Men Over 40 Multi from iherb MegaFood, Skin, Nails & Hair, Whole Food Multivitamin MegaFood cares about doing things the right way - we refuse to take shortcuts, and we never compromise on quality or the things that matter. Since 1973, we have been going out of our way to source fresh and local foods from trusted farmers. We then make our wholesome supplements using our one-of-a-kind process to deliver the most authentic nutrition - much more than vitamins alone. Order Skin, Nails & Hair Multi from iherb

Many years before Ayurvedic medicine arrived in the West, I made a journey to hospitals throughout India to learn all I could about this ancient healing tradition. I was bowled over by all the marvelous things I did discovered. When I arrived at the Ayurvedic Hospital in Kerala—land of the coconuts, I found thousands of acres, interspersed with twisting waterways lined with organic coconut trees. Doctor’s there taught me how inexpensive organic coconut oil can heal your whole body using a technique which is called “oil pulling.” I am excited about sharing this with you. Oil Pulling There are literally thousands of types of bacteria in your mouth, including Streptococcus mutans—an acid-producing bacterium that is a major cause of tooth decay. During oil pulling, coconut oil produces acids which breakdown these toxic pathogens. When you take coconut oil into your body through oil pulling, your system converts one important ingredient, lauric acid, into monolaurin, which has antibacterial, antiviral and antiprotozoal properties. In truth, coconut oil contains the largest amount of lauric acid of any fruit or vegetable on the planet. Monolaurin is a monoglyceride with the ability to destroy negative invaders in the body that have a lipid coating. The lipid-coated viruses and bacteria that it attacks include the HIV virus and the influenza virus as well as a number of other pathogenic bacteria and protozoa. Another ingredient in coconut oil, capric acid, also boasts antimicrobial properties. Finally, coconut oil is about 66% medium chain triglycerides or MCTs. These offer a huge variety of health benefits, including sating your appetite. Powerful Detoxifier The oil pulling technique has been used for some 5000 years, not only because it reduces plaque in the mouth, but as a means of healing conditions throughout the whole body—from inflammation, pain in the joints, chronic fatigue, sinusitis, back pain and diabetes, to migraine, PMS, and chronic skin problems. Oil pulling is powerfully detoxifying to the body as a whole. The mouth is home to billions of bacteria, viruses, fungi and other parasites and other toxins which undermine health and can trigger disease. It is these beasties and their toxic waste products that create gum disease and tooth decay. They are then passed on to the rest of the body. The immune system is constantly fighting off these pathogens. When we become overloaded from excessive stress, poor diet, or environmental toxins, they leak into the whole system and can create secondary infections, as well as a wide variety of other health issues. Pathogenic oral bacteria, and the toxins that they produce, harm far more than just your mouth. They circulate through the bloodstream and are carried all over the body. reduce plaque by at least 50% Coconut oil is highly responsive to temperature changes. In a cool room it goes solid. But set it in the sunlight or immerse a jar of it in hot water for a few minutes and it will turn into a crystal clear liquid oil. Oil pulling is believed to reduce plaque by at least 50%. It involves rinsing your mouth with coconut oil, much the way you would use a mouthwash. Even in its solid form the coconut oil will quickly change into a white liquid as it responds to the heat of the mouth. So how do you do oil pilling? You’ll need a container of organic raw coconut oil that is natural and has not had any fragrance taken out of it. Put a teaspoon to a tablespoon of oil in your mouth. It will probably be in its solid state. But it will melt as soon as you get it in your mouth. Swish the oil around in your mouth for around 10 to 15 minutes. Then spit it out completely. Finally, brush your teeth. This is best done twice a day after which you brush your teeth. You must never swallow the oil. You see, by the time you’ve done your oil pulling exercise each time, the oil will have become loaded with bacteria, toxins and mucus. You must then spit it out. I did oil pulling for eight months, after which my teeth were whiter, my breath was fresh and my tongue and gums had a healthy pink color to them. I was so pleased that I figured “I probably don’t need to do oil pulling any more”. So I stopped. After about three months, I realized that I was getting some slight swelling in my mouth. So I resumed oil pulling and have continued ever since. I actually enjoy it. So will you I predict.

In Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol, Jacob Marley, Scrooge's dead partner, appears to him as a ghost: `You don't believe in me', observed the Ghost. `I don't', said Scrooge. `What evidence would you have of my reality beyond that of your senses?' `I don't know', said Scrooge. `Why do you doubt your senses?' `Because', said Scrooge, `a little thing affects them. A slight disorder of the stomach makes them cheat. You may be an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of an underdone potato. There's more of gravy than of grave about you, whatever you are!' Scrooge was right. Biochemical changes brought about by what you eat, how well you eat, and how often you eat, can affect your brain and alter consciousness enough in some people to produce imaginary fears—even hallucinations—not to mention depression and anxiety as well as chronic fatigue and chronic insomnia. The very worst of the body snatchers are the sugars in their myriad of forms. More about this in a moment. Meanwhile, everybody knows that fruit contain a kind of sugar known as fructose. Does this mean we should ban fruit from the table? GOOD FOOD BAD RAP Somehow fruits seen to have have earned themselves a bad name. Why? Because fruits contain fructose—fruit sugar. Nonetheless, it’s fructose that gives glorious organic navel oranges, blueberries, apples, and golden kiwis their marvelous sweetness. And the right amount of organically grown, whole fruits do as lot to keep us well. Fruit plays an important part in any high-raw way of eating. These colorful gifts of nature cleanse the body of the toxicity we absorb from our environment, the water we drink and the dreadful packaged convenience foods people eat. That’s why fruits are so valuable to any serious detox program. So what’s the problem with fructose? First of all, there is evidence which indicates that people who eat too much fruit can make themselves vulnerable to chronic problems like insulin resistance, diabetes and obesity. And this is important. For most fruits we eat today contain between 30 and 50 times the amount of fructose compared to the fruit our hunter-gatherer forefathers munched on. This has come about because, during the 20th century, enormous hybridization projects continue to make fruits sweeter and sweeter. As a result, not only has the incidence of chronic illnesses—from heart disease and diabetes to cancer and mental disorders—exploded in developed countries: So has our consumption of sugar in its many forms—of which fructose is one. WHERE DO YOU STAND If you are someone with high cholesterol, diabetes, obesity, insulin or leptin resistance or hypertension, then it is best to limit your fruit intake so you only get, say, 15 grams of fructose a day. How do you do this? Choose your fruits carefully so that most of them are low-fructose. If you do not fall into these categories, you should be able to eat a lot more fruit and have it do you nothing but good. That is, of course, provided the fruits you choose are organic and therefore not sprayed with chemicals. Make sure they have not been GMO grown. Under no circumstances do you want to put genetically modified foods of any kind into your body. All GMO crops are dangerous, despite all the corporate hype designed to make us think otherwise. BIG CONTRADICTIONS But findings about the effects of fruit eating are contradictory, to say the least. The British Medical Journal published three observational studies that examined the effects of fruit-eating on human health. These studies analyzed the diets of almost 200,000 people between 1984 and 2008—none of whom had indications of heart disease, diabetes or cancer when the studies began. On completion, the studies indicated that, far from fruits predisposing us to degenerative diseases, some fruits including grapes, blueberries and apples may actually reduce the risk of diabetes. This is great news and somewhat unexpected, since apples and grapes contain a lot of fructose. But beware. Drinking juices made from these fruits that are bought rather than being homemade from fresh produce do contribut to the development of the same diseases that eating whole fruit can help prevent. Steer clear of all packaged and tinned fruit juices and fruit drinks. DEVIL IN DISGUISE One aspect of fructose is as dangerous as hell—high fructose corn syrup (HFCS). The ultimate body snatcher it is. If you value your health and the health of your children you’ll want to avoid it at all costs. But avoiding it is not easy. HFCS is added to just about every packaged food and drink you buy. So read every label on every packaged food or drink you buy and reject every food or drink containing it. HFCS is deadly stuff. A highly processed form of liquid sugar extracted by a nasty chemical solvent called glutaraldehyde, is not only HFCS frequently contaminated with mercury. Putting it into the body is a major cause of obesity, insulin resistance, diabetes, and mood disorders, and hyperactivity in children. High-fructose corn syrup is similar in composition to sucrose, with levels of around 45% glucose to 55% fructose. And, as with sucrose, its harmful effects are concealed from view. It does not raise blood sugar, as it is processed by the liver. There it promptly turns into fat. In 1978, HFCS was brought in as a substitute for sugar in soft drinks. This quickly became a real game-changer, but not in a good way. By the year 2000, sugar consumption in America increased by 25 pounds per person per year, nearly ALL of it in the form of HFCS. These days the average American consumes a massive 35 pounds of HFCS each year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. It’s no coincidence that the obesity rate in the US has reached epidemic proportions worldwide. SNEAKY AND SINISTER You’ll find HFCS in thousands of grocery items, even in places you might never suspect—such as pizza sauce, salad dressings, foods from sodas, drinks and sweets to sauces, breads, and delicatessen foods like smoked salmon, luncheon meats and salami. Farcically, HFCS is often labeled "all natural" because fructose is found in fruit—even though it is mass-factory-produced, using a process which dramatically increases the fructose content of corn syrup. Fructose in these protucts bears little resemblance to fructose found in fresh fruit. It also lacks the fiber, antioxidants and nutrients found in fresh fruit. As pediatric specialist and childhood obesity expert Robert Lustig puts it, high-fructose corn syrup is “a poison all by itself”. Lustig doesn’t distinguish between plain sugar and HFCS when it comes to health perils—they are “equally dangerous”, he insists, like two sides of the same coin. And what’s so insidious about HFCS is that it is sold to the public as a “healthy alternative” to regular sugar. You should avoid it at all costs. MY OWN FRUIT EXPERIMENT Most of you know that I am a passionate fan of organic raw food and have been for almost half a century. A high-raw way of eating in my mid-twenties healed me from so many illnesses contracted as a result of being raised on junk food throughout most of my unpredictable childhood. A few weeks ago, Aaron and I decided to experiment by returning to being on an all-raw fruits and vegetables diet for a period of six weeks. We wanted to check out what, if any, ill effects eating an all raw diet containing lots of fresh, organic fruits would have on us. The results of our little experiment have turned out to be excellent. We ate a lot of fruit. We put it in our salads, we made juice from a mixture of fruits and included in it much of the pulp produced from the juicing. We loved the way this made us look and feel. I’m happy to report that the results of ouro little experiment has been nothing but good. Like vegetables and herbs, fruits are not only a storehouse for vitamins and minerals; they boast high levels of phytochemicals. These powerhouses for health and vitality are not nutrients like vitamins and minerals. Yet they carry colored plant factors which play an important role in our health. A good supply of these phyto-nutrients helps minimize the incidence of cancer and heart disease and protect from degenerative conditions associated with aging, such as inflammation of the joints, loss of memory and concentration. They even help slow the aging process itself. Large quantities of these plant factors with many different names are found in common fruits, from berries, oranges, lemons and grapes to cantaloupe, kiwis, cranberries and cherries. However, in any diet based on manufactured convenience foods, they are scarce as hen’s teeth. MEET THE GOOD GUYS Berries, grapes and cherries as well as citrus fruits are excellent sources of water-soluble phyto-chemicals known as flavonoids. Flavonoids guard the integrity of collagen within the body. They work together with vitamin C and—as do many of the other phyto-nutrients—enhance the positive effects of antioxidant vitamins, improving the function and the integrity of tiny blood vessels known as capillaries, which deliver nutrients and oxygen to our cells. This helps raise overall energy. It also helps keep skin smooth and elastic, protects against bruising while improving memory and eyesight. Phyto-nutrients often carry weird names like catechin, quercetin and hesperidin. Among the more than 20,000 known, hesperidin, rutin, quercetin, catechin and pycnogenol are especially important. Catechin reduces allergic reactions by calming histamine release in the body. Rutin helps guard the integrity and health of capillaries, veins and arteries, as well as the skin itself. Many phytochemicals protect our health by interfering with or blocking specific disease processes. They do this either by acting as antioxidants and preventing free radical damage, or by inhibiting enzymes which promote the development of diseases like cancer. Some plant factors found in fruits and vegetables clear our cells of toxins and other damaging substances such as herbicides and pesticides we take in from our environment. HEALTHY SUPPORT HERE At Tufts University in the United States, scientists developed a method of quantifying the anti-oxidant power of specific fruits and vegetables by measuring their ability to quench free radicals in a laboratory test tube. To test a food’s oxygen radical absorbance capacity, called the ORAC test, scientists have been able to categorize a fruit or vegetable according to its overall anti-oxidant power. Fruits like blueberries, blackberries, strawberries and raspberries are at the top of the list. They can be highly protective of our health. While we’re talking of lists, here is a list of some of the most common fruits indicating how much fructose is in each. Become familiar with it and, given the state of your own body, you can easily make your own decision about what kind and how much of each fruit suits you best, as well as how much you want to eat of it. FRUIT SERVING GRAMS OF FRUCTOSE Lemon 1 medium 0.6 Passionfruit 1 medium 0.9 Apricot 1 medium 1.3 Raspberries 1 cup 3.0 Kiwi 1 medium 3.4 Cherries 1 cup 3.8 Strawberries 1 cup 3.8 Pink grapefruit ½ medium 4.3 Nectarine 1 medium 5.4 Peach 1 medium 5.9 Orange 1 medium 6.1 Banana 1 medium 7.1 Apple 1 medium 9.5 Persimmon 1 medium 10.6 Pear 1 medium 11.8 Grapes 1 cup 12.4 Mango 1 medium 16.2 Here are my suggestions on how to get the very best from fruits, now and always: If you know you have insulin or leptin resistance, suffer from food cravings and are overweight, it’s pick your fruits from those with the lowest levels of fructose and limit your fruit intake to around 15 grams of fructose a day. If you are not troubled by any of these conditions, you can experiment by eating fruits which give you from 20 to 40 grams of fructose a day and work out by trial and error what the levels of fructose best work for you. Always eat your fruits whole if possible. If you choose to juice them yourself, make sure you keep the valuable pulp from the juicing process and add a good quantity of it back to the juice. Go for organic fruits. You might even try growing a lot of your fruit in your garden if you have the space. Never eat GMO fruits...something difficult to ascertain in most countries these days since corporate interests have lobbied hard to prevent GMO labeling. This is another reason to choose organic. Never eat or drink anything with high fructose corn syrup in it. It’s deadly stuff—so read labels carefully. Fruits are one of nature’s most glorious gifts to us. Know the ones that work for you and shun those that don’t. Above all steer clear of high-fructose corn syrup and read labels carefully to make sure you do.

People at the higher reaches of human health don’t face the future with fears of getting old and falling prey to degenerative disease. They live with a sense that the best is yet to come. They know they’re capable of moving toward an even higher state of health and fulfilment as the years pass. They’re not ruled by run of the mill notions about aging which teach that getting older includes illness as a “natural” part of life. They know different. Their view of aging is closer to that of the world famous age researcher Johan Bjorksten, who insists that aging is a question of bringing “as many people as possible as many more healthy vigorous years of life as possible.” LEARN THE SECRETS Thirty years ago my daughter Susannah and I wrote a ground-breaking bestseller about the wonders of high-raw eating called Raw Energy. Ever since then, I have been flooded with letters from around the world. People write to tell me about their experiments with high-raw eating and all the payoffs it has brought them. Together, with new information from many areas of natural medicine, they have added missing pieces to the original Raw Power puzzle. All this has expanded exponentially the understanding of how to use diet to encourage healing and enhance health. MY SEARCH FOR HEALTH I had been chronically ill as a child—one “infection” after another, nightmares, anxiety. But no-one seemed able to help me. Then a wonderful break came my way. I met some remarkable doctors. These were men and women highly trained in orthodox medicine where drugs are the primary means of treating symptoms. Yet these were doctors with a difference. Disillusioned with the conventional, symptomatic approach to medicine, they chose to look deeper and ask questions: “What can be done to help a living body heal itself from inside without the negative side effects of toxic chemicals in drugs?” These physicians in Britain, the United States and Europe, were enormously generous with their time and their knowledge. They shared with me research findings and information which they had spent decades learning: How to detoxify my body using a high-raw or all-raw diet. How to enhance my energy. And—most important of all—how to trust my body’s ability to heal itself. CHECKING IT OUT I practiced what they taught and experimented with countless natural techniques. Their knowledge and generosity turned my life around. I learned that my tendency to “infection” was in fact food allergies. I learned that, after years of eating convenience foods, my body had become toxic. I watched and marveled as high-raw eating cleared the toxicity, the illness, and the depression. I lost fat from my body spontaneously. I felt great. I had so much energy that my children used to tease me by suggesting I start smoking to put a damper on my vitality. (There is nothing worse than waking up to an ultra-dynamic, hyper-cheerful mother.) I never looked back. It was these changes that threw me into a career in health: TV programs, articles, books, seminars, workshops, creating teaching modules for universities—the lot. I saw clearly that few of us ever live out our potentials for dynamism, creativity, good looks and radiant health. I felt passionate about sharing what I had been taught and had experienced for myself with others. My children also became intrigued by the changes they saw happening to me on a high-raw diet. They loved the delicious foods and natural sweet treats which we learned to prepare together. WHAT WE FOUND OUT Here’s what we found out happens when you eat high-raw, low-grain foods: You have more energy and vitality and look better. You lose weight more easily and keep it off without counting calories. You benefit from the “information” that organic live foods carry to your cells in the form of electro-chemical light energy and complex nutritional information which improves health and radiance. You get the best possible complements of vitamins, minerals and trace elements as well as essential enzymes that are destroyed when foods are cooked. Eating raw foods strengthens immunity, making you more resistant to disease, degeneration and allergies. Many chronic conditions disappear when people switch to a high-raw low-grain diet and—best news yet—they often don’t return. Long ago, I’d learned that the Germans, the Austrians, the Swedes and the Swiss had for generations catalogued the health promoting effects of eating foods high in raw fresh vegetables and fruits. Such a diet had long been credited with the healing of long term crippling diseases like arthritis and cancer, gastric ulcers, diabetes and heart disease. I unearthed reports of how athletes, taken off their usual diet high in cooked foods and put onto a way of eating in which between 50-75% of their foods were raw, not only lost none of their physical prowess, they even improved their performances. MEET RAW POWER An optimal experience of human health and vitality is possible when what we eat and the way we live is in line with what we have been genetically predisposed to thrive on. Such a simple idea. Yet what dazzling payoffs it can bring. New information from many areas of natural medicine can add missing pieces to the original Raw Power puzzle, expanding exponentially the understanding of how to use this way of eating to encourage healing and improve health. Raw foods carry light energy—photons—gathered by plants and animals from the sun’s own energy. These biophotons interact with our body’s own light-based, energy-based cellular control and communication systems—the living matrix—to heal, to energize, to bring mental and emotional clarity and to help keep our bodies strong and resistant to the buildup of toxic waste which invites disease and degeneration. And, Raw Power eating has three beneficial characteristics to it: A high-raw diet is the way our ancestors ate to which we are genetically adapted an on which we therefore thrive. It has to include adequate adequate but not excessive top quality proteins. It’s a way of eating which is low-or-no-grain and low-or-no-sugar that does not include manufactured convenience foods. RAW POWER TRUTHS An all-raw diet is useful temporarily for deep detoxification and encouraging the body to heal both acute and chronic diseases. It is not advisable for most people to eat nothing but raw foods for long periods. People who carry on with eating all-raw for years may continue to feel well, yet they often lose power and stamina both physically and mentally. Sometimes they even find it hard to live in the “real” world. This is often because they do not get enough top quality protein foods which establish firm architecture for body and psyche. Adequate protein is far healthier for bones than a low-protein diet. Organic and free range meat, fish, game and eggs can contribute enormously to your power and vitality and help protect from premature aging and degenerative disease (this is something I, like many others, for years did not know to be true). Too much sugar and too many sweeteners like honey, raw sugar, rice syrup and malt extract which all-raw foodies often get, are not good. They disturb insulin balance, predisposing us to insulin resistance and all the degeneration that brings with it. The majority of people living on a conventional Western diet show signs of insulin resistance syndrome. This epidemic of abnormalities includes high blood pressure, distorted blood fats or triglycerides, high cholesterol and blood sugar disorders. It carries with it an increased risk of just about every age-related disorder you can name: from eye problems, heart disease, nervous system disorders, obesity, diabetes and Alzheimer’s to chronic fatigue, exhaustion, anxiety, depression and poor sense of self worth. Why? Because the way they are eating and living is so far removed from what their bodies are genetically programmed to thrive on. Eating a no-grain—or a low-grain—diet, together with moderate quantities of quality protein foods and plenty of non-starchy vegetables and fruits reduces fatigue for virtually everyone while it eliminates weight problems, banishes inflammation and further enhances health, energy and good looks. Today’s fruits and vegetables lack yesterday’s nutrition, so a few well-chosen natural nutritional supplements can further enhance well-being. We need if at all possible to go for organic foods and so help avoid the toxic build-ups that can occur from foods grown using conventional farming methods. Finally—and most important of all—high-raw low-grain eating helps rebalance metabolism, allowing the body’s own remarkable inner power for healing to regenerate and rejuvenate the whole person. YOU DESERVE TO THRIVE Few of us reach our potentials for radiant health, energy, clarity, emotional balance and creative power. This is what I call life at the peaks—quantum health. By this I mean a real leap into a totally different way of life—which most people don’t think is possible. I mean a way of living where you awaken in the morning feeling fresh and good about yourself and your life—a state of being in which your physical and mental potential have the best chance of being used to full effect—that realm of consciousness in which your capacity for fun, passion and excitement over just being alive can soar like a joyous child. For real health is not just the absence of disease. It is a dynamic state of mind, body and spirit which makes it possible for us to participate fully and spontaneously in life, whatever it throws at us. I suggest you get into Raw Power and thrive.