The End of Dieting: How to Live for Life (36 page)

3 Medjool or 6 Deglet Noor dates, pitted

½ vanilla bean, split lengthwise, or 1 teaspoon alcohol-free vanilla extract

1 tablespoon agar powder (see Note)

For the Sauce:

1½ cups frozen strawberries

½ cup soy, hemp, or almond milk

3 Medjool or 6 Deglet Noor dates, pitted

¼ cup raw cashews

Blend strawberries, nondairy milk, and dates in a high-powered blender until smooth. Add blended mixture to a medium saucepan. If using a vanilla bean, scrape pulp and seeds from the pod with a dull knife. Add pulp, seeds, and pod to the saucepan along with the agar powder. Cook over medium heat until mixture starts to boil. Reduce heat to low and simmer for 5 minutes, stirring constantly. Remove vanilla pod.

Pour into 4 glasses or small bowls. Refrigerate overnight. It should be firm.

To make the sauce, blend frozen strawberries, nondairy milk, dates, and cashews in a high-powered blender until smooth. To serve, spoon some of the berry sauce on top of each panna cotta.

Note:
If using agar flakes instead of powder, double the amount.

PER SERVING: CALORIES 297; PROTEIN 9g; CARBOHYDRATES 54g; TOTAL FAT 7.5g; SATURATED FAT 1.1g; SODIUM 85mg; FIBER 8.3g; BETA-CAROTENE 621mcg; VITAMIN C 3mg; CALCIUM 95mg; IRON 2.8mg; FOLATE 42mcg; MAGNESIUM 90mg; ZINC 1.4mg; SELENIUM 9mcg

Summer Fruit Pie

Serves: 8

For Pie Shell:

1 cup almonds

1 cup dates, pitted (Medjool, if available)

2 tablespoons unsweetened shredded coconut

For Pie Filling:

2–3 bananas, sliced

1 teaspoon lemon juice

2 kiwis, sliced

1 quart organic strawberries, sliced

1 pint blueberries

½ cup vanilla soy, hemp, or almond milk

1¼ cups frozen strawberries, or 1 pint fresh organic strawberries

2 dates, pitted

Make pie shell by placing almonds in a food processor or high-powered blender and processing until very fine. Add dates and process until chopped and mixed well. Remove from food processor and knead shredded coconut in by hand. Add a small amount of water if needed to hold mixture together. Press into 9-inch pie plate to form shell.

To make the filling, spread bananas on the crust, pressing down slightly. Sprinkle lemon juice over bananas. Place kiwis, strawberries, and blueberries over bananas. If desired, reserve some fruit to decorate top of pie.

Add nondairy milk, frozen strawberries, and dates in a blender and blend until smooth. Pour blended mixture over the fruit. Decorate with additional fruit as desired. Cover and freeze for at least 2 hours before serving.

PER SERVING: CALORIES 245; PROTEIN 9g; CARBOHYDRATES 47g; TOTAL FAT 6.8g; SATURATED FAT 0.6g; SODIUM 11mg; FIBER 8g; BETA-CAROTENE 101mcg; VITAMIN C 76mg; CALCIUM 70mg; IRON 1.6mg; FOLATE 47mcg; MAGNESIUM 75mg; ZINC 0.8mg; SELENIUM 2.7mcg

Vanilla Coconut Nice Cream

Serves: 4

20 walnut halves

½ vanilla bean, split lengthwise, or 1 tablespoon alcohol-free vanilla extract

4 medium bananas, frozen

½ cup unsweetened creamed coconut (see Note)

¼ cup soy, hemp, or almond milk

Using a high-powered blender, blend walnuts on high speed until the consistency of dust. If using a vanilla bean, scrape pulp and seeds from pod with a dull knife and add them to the blender along with remaining ingredients (discard vanilla bean pod). Blend on very high speed until silky smooth. Serve immediately, or store in freezer for later use.

Note:
Creamed coconut is unsweetened dehydrated coconut meat ground to a semisolid creamy paste.

PER SERVING: CALORIES 292; PROTEIN 3g; CARBOHYDRATES 33g; TOTAL FAT 18.3g; SATURATED FAT 13.5g; SODIUM 10mg; FIBER 3.4g; BETA-CAROTENE 31mcg; VITAMIN C 11mg; CALCIUM 17mg; IRON 1.2mg; FOLATE 30mcg; MAGNESIUM 60mg; ZINC 0.8mg; SELENIUM 1.4mcg

Vanilla Cream Topping for Fruit

Serves: 8

1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise, or 1 teaspoon alcohol-free vanilla extract

1⅓ cups raw macadamia or cashew nuts

1 cup soy, hemp, or almond milk

2/3 cup dates, pitted

If using vanilla bean, scrape pulp and seeds from pod with a dull knife; discard pod. Blend vanilla pulp and seeds, nuts, nondairy milk, and dates together in a high-powered blender until smooth and creamy. Serve over strawberries, other berries, or fruit. May also be used as a topping for fruit sorbets or baked desserts.

Note:
For a Chocolate Cream Topping, add 2 tablespoons of natural nonalkalized cocoa powder.

PER SERVING: CALORIES 184; PROTEIN 6g; CARBOHYDRATES 20g; TOTAL FAT 10.7g; SATURATED FAT 1.9g; SODIUM 20mg; FIBER 2.3g; BETA-CAROTENE 111mcg; CALCIUM 26mg; IRON 2mg; FOLATE 13mcg; MAGNESIUM 81mg; ZINC 1.5mg; SELENIUM 6.4mcg

Epilogue

I
f you’ve come this far, you have demonstrated a respectable interest in nutritional science. Nutritional science is interesting and fun, because we can take what we’ve learned and put it into action every day, thereby taking control of our own health and fate. Nothing in life is more powerful than driving your own vehicle.

Despite diverse dietary beliefs, dietary camps, and the popularity of fad diets that come and go, sufficient scientific evidence exists to show us what the most healthful, weight-optimizing, and life-extending diet style should be. We have sufficient data, coupled with clinical experience, to take life-extending and life-saving actions with a strong degree of certainty. With time, as more and more science adds to this body of evidence, these same principles will remain irrefutable. In other words, superior nutrition can never go out of style, and further science will only support this information more and more—not change it in any significant way.

Some people—with their diverse motivations, beliefs, and preferences—may object to and fight the reality of this science-based nutritional guidance.
I don’t want to eat like that
.
I can’t eat like that
.
I would rather be dead than eat like that
. The nay-sayers are typically food addicts fighting to maintain their addictions with the “myth of moderation.” Unfortunately, these are the same people who most need change, the same people who are so helplessly addicted that they can’t even think about giving up their toxic and dangerous food habits, no matter how convincing or important the evidence.

What people claim they prefer or can or cannot do is irrelevant. People like what they are used to; change produces anxiety. The addicted mind sets up a whole series of rationalizations and excuses to avoid conflict. Nevertheless, nutritional science is not a popularity contest. The information should not be muddled and watered down to meet the objections of those people who seek mediocrity. Science continues to march forward, leaving behind those entrenched in conventional, established thinking and beliefs. The facts are that all people can follow this nutritarian diet style, and they can enjoy it immensely.
However, that enjoyment comes only to people who stick with it long enough to allow their taste preferences to change.

So, should you follow a nutritarian diet style 80 percent, 90 percent, or 100 percent? Certainly, you’re behind the wheel, and how you steer is entirely up to you, but what I and many other long-time nutritarians have found is that we don’t feel well after we eat second-class foods. Nor do we like them as much as we did in the past, because our tastes have changed. We simply choose not to eat them because we prefer healthier foods and recipes made in a healthier way. The miraculous benefits come predictably to those who maintain superior nutrition. It will take strength, it will take effort, but the pleasure and rewards you will get from a healthy life will be priceless.

Keeping yourself healthy so you can avoid needless medical care is one of the most important things you can do to improve the quality of your life. When you don’t eat healthfully, you don’t just shorten your life, you live a more troubled, sickly, and unhappy life. You can’t enjoy living if you don’t feel well and are sick all the time.

When you eat a nutritarian diet, on the other hand, you can enjoy eating more, because you don’t have to skimp and eat thimble-size portions of food. You don’t have to count calories, measure portions, or restrict eating healthy foods you enjoy. A nutritarian diet is focused on eating larger meals with more food volume.

And when you get yourself free of the pleasure trap set by super-stimulating junk foods and salt, your taste buds return to normal, which makes foods that promote health taste awesome.

Regardless of the economic power of the food, medical, and drug industries; regardless of the pressures of societal norms; regardless of the special interests trying to use questionable and distorted data to justify their preferences and influence government, nutritional science marches forward and will not be swayed.

Remember that excellent health also involves sufficient sleep, rest, recreation, and intellectual pursuits; healthy interpersonal relations;
exercise; and satisfaction in your personal accomplishments. When you strive to have a kind and positive effect on those whom your life touches, you will experience profound positive effects on your well-being—like eating wild berries and kale. Living isn’t all about food, though food is our body’s largest physical interaction with our external environment and affects all aspects of our lives.

Time and time again in my medical practice, I see the most troubled eaters: the emotionally and physically addicted eaters who need to abstain from their binge triggers and simply don’t do as well if they keep torturing themselves with their addiction and constant decision-making about what to eat. If you are one of those people, I hope you can recognize how your own food preferences and decisions haven’t worked for you in the past. This time, allow me to make these decisions for you. Let
me
decide what you should eat, and stick with it 100 percent. The results will be miraculous. Like thousands of others, you’ll not only achieve a favorable weight, you’ll feel so well and vibrantly healthy that you’ll never turn back. I’ll be rooting for you.

As nutritarians, it’s on us to drag a resistant society with us, whether they like it or not. Change is always slow; we can’t expect society to change radically overnight, but correct information lives on, and incorrect information very slowly fades away.

I hope you can be a leader and not one of those pulled along after you let your health deteriorate to a dangerous place. I hope you fix your health now, while the opportunity still presents itself. Set an example of excellent health. Know the scientific foundations of your food choices, but don’t let food become a source of conflict in your life. Support others with love, compassion, and understanding, especially those who are on a one-way train to an unhealthy life, committing slow suicide with food. Your chance to be useful to others will be possible only if you are an example to them of radiant health and happiness and grant these individuals understanding, compassion, and love, in spite of their poor food choices. That doesn’t mean you have to
enable their poor decisions; it means that you understand them with compassion and continually contemplate what it means to have goodwill for them and others. Then, hopefully, they will eventually take an interest in learning what you are so enthusiastic about. Your creative goodwill may create a crack for you to enter their world and facilitate their change.

Stand up for what’s right. Be a role model; walk the walk, and don’t hide your conviction about excellent nutrition. Trying to fit in, trying to be a people-pleaser when others are on an addictive, self-destructive course isn’t good for them or for you. Every time you eat with another person—every dinner meeting, every party—is an opportunity to have a positive, encouraging influence on someone else. Your example of good eating, and sharing how enjoyable a healthful life can be, can eventually have a positive effect on others.

I wish you a long and pleasurable life. It can be yours.

Appendix: Considering Supplements

Once you start to eat healthfully, using supplements judiciously and conservatively is often a wise choice. Your diet may be the major part of the health pie, but it is not the whole pie. It’s also necessary to assure that you aren’t hurting yourself with the wrong nutritional supplements. Remember: Too little of something can be suboptimal, but too much can be as well. We have to be cautious and informed to do the right thing, because very few people understand these complicated issues.

Certain supplemental ingredients are controversial, and my comprehensive review of the available science reveals that many of the synthetic elements in typical multivitamins have, alarmingly, been linked to an increased risk of cancer. Proving a definitive link between a supplement and cancer takes many years to accomplish. Don’t be persuaded by a five-year study looking at the potential cancer-promoting risks of folic acid and claiming that it’s safe. Five years simply isn’t long enough for the potential risk to arise. We must give heavier weight to studies that look at outcomes after ten to thirty years.

It’s also still important to consider that even the healthiest diet may not supply you with the optimal amount of every potentially beneficial substance or nutrient. Supplementing those nutrients may be advantageous for long-term health.

Use supplements wisely and conservatively to assure that no deficiencies exist.