A personal guide and my experiences with food experimentation

How do you consume things without dairy, garlic or onions?

San Francisco, the birthplace of food intolerance requests! If you’re from the Bay Area then you’ll probably get the joke. If not, you might just be inclined to eat everything on your plate without question.

“Not so!” says the couple from Portlandia.

By now you’ve probably seen more advertisements regarding the path to dietary health in the past couple scores than you have on actual scientific studies completed by GI (gastro-intestinal) physicians – most of the ads coming from agrarian investment. In the western world, the “gut” is not a well studied sum of organs. The more common diseases, stemming from what we put into our body, cover Type 2 Diabetes, Crohn’s Disease, Cancer, Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS)… and the list goes on. Believe it or not, but the belly has been studied for millenniums, just not in the West.

In the East, you may recall movies that portray practitioners going to a doctor and being prescribed herbs, tea, and other natural remedies for health. Many of these aren’t meant to treat the matured effects a progressive disease, but are more focused on preventative medicine. Didn’t I mention earlier that it was going to be a difficult path, creating a balanced routine that fit your lifestyle and needs? Imagine having to eat a block of ginger root every day…

So here’s where we come full circle. Due to some health guidelines we have, our family generally avoids eating dairy and alliums. Ayurveda has been practiced for over five thousands years, and is a template to improving your gut health. More than the majority (close to 90%) of your hormones, which regulate your body, stem from your gut. And your gut is a great indicator if a particular food is easily digested for nutritional content. Ever get gassy? No one every does… We’re too genteel for that type of behavior …But bloat and the stinky byproduct of that process is an acute reminder that your gut may not be copacetic with what your tastebuds’ fancy.

So we’ll work towards the balance of what sits on your plate and rests well in your belly.

Come back later, and I’ll begin to cover: Gut Flora, Ayurvedic Diets, and Tasty Recipes

Check out my latest recipe here: Sweet Potato Sandwiches