Healthy Diet Plan

My Healthy Diet Plan is simple, quick to cook, and I can eat all I want of it. It changes somewhat with the seasons, depending on what is available in the way of fruit and vegetables.

I always start the day with about 6 grams of A.C.T. Energy drink made as a hot tea. It's a gentle way to wake up, plan my day, do some floor exercises and stretching.

Breakfast: Always Oatmeal(slow-cooked, not instant), with a little Bob's Red Mill Ten-Grain Cereal mixed in. Total dry amount for one person comes to two-thirds of a cup. No sweeteners, NO milk, and (for me) no fruit because it seems to make me sleepy. I do like to eat peanuts or some other unsalted nuts with my oatmeal. Walnuts are probably best from a health perspective. Unsweetened soy milk would be okay for me, though Dr. McDougall would say it has too much fat, as do the nuts.

On top of the oatmeal, I sprinkle ground flax seed meal and may add some flax oil(also not approved by Dr. McDougall). The flaxseed meal is loaded with fiber and Omega-3 essential fatty acids.

After breakfast, I take a multi-vitamin("Life Force Multiple" by Source Naturals, a great bargain, highly rated by Lyle McWilliam in his book Comparative Guide to Nutritional Supplements), two Calcium/Magnesium/Vitamin D-3 capsules. I also drink about one ounce of Majestic-Earth plant derived minerals.

Then a half cup of weak green tea, mixed with another 4-5 grams of A.C.T. and I'm ready to go.

Lunch: Usually a sandwich on Ezekial Bread(which contains NO sugar or MILK). Sometimes I fry in minimal oil(Sorry, Dr. McDougall!) a grainburger to put in my sandwich, along with mustard on one side and Hummus on the other. Lots of redleaf lettuce in the sandwich, too. Usually a big piece of organic celery and a few slices of organic carrots to go with the sandwich. Another half-cup of A.C.T. energy drink.

Snack: Usually at about 4:30pm, I'll eat some sliced apple and some roasted, unsalted peanuts. The ones in the shell taste best, but are messy. I may have a slice of Ezekial Bread with this. If good ripe pears or blueberries are available, I may substitute them. I find fruit relaxes me, so I don't include it in my meal plan until late in the day. Do what feels best for your particular metabolism. Dinner: This is my main meal, though they're all important. Usually, I will have a vegetable stew with some beans cooked in with it. Rarely, I might add some shrimp, a free-range egg, or fry a piece of fresh fish to go along with it, if I feel the need for some animal protein. I don't claim to be a perfect vegan, but rather I am trying to be sensitive to what my body tells me it needs to function optimally. Most of the time, though, 95%, I am quite happy with a vegetable stew and a bowl of quinoa, millet, or brown rice.

Here's how I prepare the Vegetable Stew:

For just myself, I half-fill a small sauce pot with water, a pinch or two of sea salt, and slice up garlic and/or onions, jalapeno pepper, celery, yams, turnips, carrot, maybe a red potato, maybe some crimini mushrooms, and some broccoli stems(the flowerettes go in last, so as not to overcook them).

You basically use what is in season for your area--try to eat organic, locally-grown vegetables. It is winter as I write this, so broccoli, brussel sprouts, and root veggies are fresh and at their best, so that's what goes in the pot.

Beans add good protein, but they take a couple of hours to cook. If you have a pressure cooker it's much less. A crock pot is a good option, too: just let them slow-cook all day while you're out of the house. All legumes are good, but it's best to cook them yourself to save money and to avoid the sugar and preservatives that go into most commercial canned beans.

If you slice the vegetables thinly, they will cook in about twenty minutes at low medium heat. I don't want to overcook them because the heat destroys some vitamins and enzymes--not to mention hurting the flavor.

When the veggies are almost done, toss in the broccoli flowerettes to steam on top of the stew. Cover the pot for five or ten minutes--don't overcook

them. Then spoon out the vegetables into your bowl. Save the broth. Before you sit down or turn the heat off, put in a couple of handfulls of quinoa or millet to simmer in the vegetable stock left in the pot. You may need to add some water and another pinch of salt. Cover and let this cook while you sit down to eat your vegetables and beans.

Quinoa cooks faster than millet and is higher in protein. Both are a good whole grain to complement the vegetables in this healthy meal plan. I never measure them, but it looks like you need about three times as much water as millet or quinoa. Pre-cooked brown rice is good to keep in the fridge to speed the final course of the meal, instead of cooking the millet or quinoa. Of course, there are many whole grains options, such as whole-wheat cous-cous; I'm just in the habit of using the quinoa, millet, or rice.

For seasoning, I like curry, which has turmeric in it, a source of powerful antioxidants. Sometimes I put in oregano when I'm out of curry. Spices are an important part of a healthy diet plan.

Don't put in any commercial seasonings that contain MSG/monosodium glutamate! You're probably already aware of MSG, but--just in case--I thought I should mention it.

Dessert: More sliced apples or berries, with peanuts or other nuts. Drs. McDougall and Esselstyn advise against any nuts in your diet if you're a heart patient. I don't have that problem. This is one area where I feel I should cut back, because the oily nuts contribute to higher triglycerides in the blood. In time, I'm sure I will evolve out of this nut-eating-phase.

Occasionally, I will have about four ounces of red wine or a small glass of one of our fine local ales, but that is optional. It helps me slow down to enjoy the meal. Dr. McDougall advises against alcohol use, as well as caffeine. I'm finding I feel more productive in the evening and the next day without the alcohol. It's especially useful, though, to ensure a good night's sleep.

I usually take an herbal/melatonin mixture(NuNaturals' Fast Asleep Plus) about an hour before I plan to go to sleep. It has valerian extract(where Valium was derived), Passion flower extract, Lemon balm and Chamomile extracts, a hefty dose of vitamin B-6, and a milligram of melatonin, an important nutrient your body makes less of as we age. This lets me sleep soundly and wake up feeling refreshed, not groggy.

That's my healthy diet plan in detail. If you eat like this, you can eat all you want, and not worry about calories. It may take some getting used to, but it is worth it. Just eliminating meat, dairy products, and eggs will make it easy to lose about 10% of your body weight, with or without exercise.

The simplicity of this healthy diet plan allows you to listen to your body, something that most of us don't do. You can make more elaborate meals if you like, guided by recipes in Dr. McDougall's Cookbook. They key thing is to avoid animal foods, oils, and refined carbs, especially sugar. The more you do this, the more you will be attuned to feeling their effects when some sly food processor slips some sugar into your spaghetti sauce.

With this healthy diet plan as a guide, you don't have to be perfect--I'm certainly not--but give it three weeks or so before you lapse and dive into some cheesecake or cookies. See how much better you feel before you ate whatever it is you jumped off the wagon for. Notice how you feel the next day, especially.

I am especially sensitive to sugars. You may not be, though I believe we all get far too much refined sugar(mostly High Fructose Corn Sweetener these days). The figures I've seen say most Americans eat a half a pound of sugar a day! Everything I read indicates we should cut way back on these empty calories. They stimulate our appetite unnaturally and they spike our insulin production over and over, which leads to insulin insensitivity, then to pre-diabetes, and finally diabetes.

If you want to lose weight, this healthy diet plan will do it. Like riding a horse, if you fall off, get back on the diet plan again until it becomes a habit. The health and emotional stability benefits are hard to imagine. Eventually, you won't miss the meats, dairy, and desserts. You will become a lot more attuned to the world around you and not lost in your food-craving thoughts. And you won't have to worry about the many diseases that are caused by the standard Western diet.

Remember: Chew your food well(30 times per mouthful), don't drink a lot of water with meals(it dilutes your digetive juices) and eat slowly. Enjoy your food. Be grateful for it. Good food is sacred. Food, real natural food, is life energy...totally renewable, beautiful, delicious solar energy.

The Secret Ingredient of the Healthy Diet Plan