who comment on the healthiness of Chinese and Asian cookery – although this is dependent on the quality of the ingredients, the way it is cooked and what with!
Of course, most Chinese and South-East Asian diets are mainly based on fresh ingredients – vegetables, rice, grains and little meat – but they can also be high in sodium and sugar. Yes, we don’t use butter – but we do cook with a lot of oil and sometimes MSG. In the same way that Westerners have introduced the concept of eating salads (via Pizza Hut salad bars) that are deemed healthy to the Chinese and Asians in their respective countries, I have come to realise that a combination of the two disciplines, an East–West integrated approach, may be the way forward for people striving to achieve a balanced healthy diet and a healthy weight that can be maintained in the long term.
There are many different approaches to diet and dieting. Some people suffer terrible allergies to specific foods and therefore have to eliminate certain ingredients from their diet – for example, nuts, shellfish, meat or dairy. Some people have so many problems that they need a drastic overhaul of their diet and so turn to raw veganism, and some are pescatarians. I believe there is no need for drastic measures but rather for a balanced way of eating that combines a little bit of everything, that contains the highest amounts of Yíngyǎng and ‘clean’ ingredients. Here are a few simple truths – and some of them might even challenge your pre-conceived ideas of optimum nutrition and health!
Did You Know?
1 Juicing is a good way to get a large hit of the vitamins you need in a handy glass, but it contains little fibre. Be aware of smoothies and juices: they can spike your insulin levels, as you are basically drinking liquid sugar. Instead, eat five portions of vegetables a day and limit yourself to one portion of fruit at any one time. It is worth noting that eating fruit as part of a meal will stop the sugar from being absorbed so quickly. Or choose low-GI (glycemic index – see here) fruits such as apples).
2 If you do juice, don’t just juice fruit, juice vegetables as well – for example, broccoli, kale and cabbage, with lime or lemon juice. Be sure to buy organic fruit and vegetables (or grow your own), otherwise you are drinking juice plus pesticides.
3 If you can stomach eating the peel and seeds of fruit such as oranges and lemons, do chew well. Papaya seeds are known to be healthful cures against parasites and harmful bacteria. You can grind these and add them to shakes or porridge. These are nature’s natural detox cleansing pills. Consult a herbalist, as some fruit seeds can contain toxins, but from my own experience, fresh seeds from grapefruit, lemons, oranges and papaya seeds are OK. Of course, dried seeds from watermelons, pumpkin and sunflowers are all good nutritional mineral sources, too.
4 Traditional Chinese medicine (similar to Indian Ayurveda) advises that you should eat the five tastes every day – sweet, salty, bitter, spicy and sour. Bitter is perhaps the hardest to take in daily, but teas and spices deliver on this. It is most important to look for natural ingredients, such as wholefoods, that contain these tastes.
5 Be aware of too many soy products. Buy organic or non-genetically modified sources of soy. Some studies have proved that soy can lower testosterone, block essential minerals from being absorbed and cause gastro-intestinal problems.
The Chinese philosophy states the 7 daily essentials: firewood (as a heat source), tea, rice, oil, salt, vinegar and sauce (natural fermented pastes that contain healthful bacteria). Oil and salt are good for you as long as they are from natural and ‘clean’ sources – free from as many pesticides and chemicals as possible. Salt should be from mineral-rich sources such as rock salt or sea salt, although conventional medicine would recommend avoiding added-salt and high-salt foods. Generally, our modern diets mean we consume more salt than we should.
6 Sweat – go to a sauna once a week and drink plenty of water. All the toxins collect around our cells and one way to help expel them is to exercise and sweat. Our skin is the largest detox organ found in our bodies and we never think to make full use of it. We think of sweating as gross and do all sorts to block sweat, but we are hindering our body from working at its optimum level. Anti-perspirants are full of chemicals that are absorbed directly into the body. If you are sweaty, then sweat! It is the body’s way of clearing the toxins.
7 Drink more water, especially in the morning. Drinking water on an empty stomach helps to cleanse the colon and gut, thereby increasing its ability to absorb nutrients. It also helps prevent constipation, increases the production of new blood and muscle cells, helps with weight loss and can boost the metabolism. Chinese dietary practices believe that water should be drunk at room temperature or body temperature, which is 37.5ºC. Ice-cold water can ‘shock’ the stomach into inactivity. Drinking water helps improve the skin, gets rid of toxins from the blood and keeps your skin clear and glowing. Keeping hydrated also balances your lymph system, which helps perform daily functions like fight infection. Water also helps your skin look plump and youthful, so you stay looking younger for longer. And who doesn’t want that? Just make sure you buy a good filter to filter out any pollutants or chemicals found in tap water.
Clean Eating = Good Health = Lean and Slim
If you have picked up this book in the hope of getting lean, then unsurprisingly the answer is clean, consistent eating. Consistently choosing the right foods over time WILL deliver results. This is hardly a revolutionary idea. However, the clean recipes in this book are so easy to cook and taste great that it makes being consistent that much easier.
If you are currently at a body weight you are unhappy with, it’s important to recognise that you did not get that way overnight. It was most likely gradually crept up on you. The same goes for losing weight – it’s a slow journey that takes time. Consistent actions will produce lasting results.
Weight loss is not about starving yourself but rather about feeding your body with all the precious, essential nutrients that will help build the body of our dreams: by looking good, we feel great and by feeling great, we look good. This is the balance of yin and yang (light and dark), energy and matter, body and mind, soul and spirit, conscious and unconscious.
Eating to sustain the body is crucial for our well-being, but we have lost our way and people now eat ‘emotionally’ to fill a void. When we eat to fill an emotion, it often leads to disaster! We make poor choices and we don’t eat to fill the body with nutrients, and often we put more stress on it by eating the wrong foods. This balance needs to be tipped as obesity numbers are rising faster than ever.
The world works in perfect unity – from warm to hot to mild to cold. Just as our planet needs our love and care, our body is our world and its ecosystem is regulated by how much we nurture it with love and nutrients. This connection between all things and all emotions is the key to what you desire.
This mindset is important, because the desire to achieve your full potential will drive you to understand nutrition and to learn how to cook and eat so that you can get those results. Having this knowledge will empower you to make positive changes to your diet.
So every time you reach for something to eat, ask yourself if you are truly hungry. And question why you are eating. This is the first step to being honest with yourself and fully aware of your habits so that you can avoid emotional eating and therefore overeating! Keeping a diary, being on track of what you eat, is not an obsessive thing to do – in fact, it is an obsession we should keep. Our bodies have to function every day for the rest of our lives, so why shouldn’t we be obsessive about keeping them strong and healthy?
The Science Behind Our Food
Macro-nutrients
The foods that we eat are primarily comprised of three different macro-nutrients. These are fats, proteins and carbohydrates. We need a balance of all these nutrients in order to have good health.
Fats
Although fats have got a bad name in the past, it is now clear that they are very important for humans to maintain good health and metabolic function. It’s more about the kind of fats that you are consuming.
Monounsaturated fats and polyunsaturated fats are better for you. These are usually liquid at room temperature and when