“The food you eat can be either the safest and most powerful form of medicine or the slowest form of poison.”
Dr. Ann Wigmore
Eating healthy is one of the most important steps to healing. (Refer to the “7 Steps to Healing” article under Educational Articles page.) Try to do your best to eat healthy, but you do NOT have to eat a perfect diet to heal your body/mind. Even if you eat healthily 80% of the time, your health will improve.
Dr. Sharif
Please consider reviewing all the materials on this page to help optimize your diet.
- Optimal Diet, Part 1
Dr. Sharif - Optimal Diet, Part 2
Dr. Sharif - Coffee Handout
Dr. Sharif - Gluten Free and Dairy Free Food
Dr. Sharif - Standard Process Purification and Weight Loss Program
Dr. Sharif - 76 Ways Sugar Can Ruin Your Health
Contributed by Nancy Appleton, Ph.D, Author of the book Lick The Sugar Habit
If you have food cravings, please refer to the EFT page.
The types of fluids you put in your body is actually more important than the solid foods you consume. Instead of drinking unhealthy liquids such as alcohol, soda pop, and coffee, it’s much healthier to drink lots of pure, filtered water and herbal teas. Caffeinated teas (black or green) are fine as long as your consumption is limited to no more than a couple of cups a day. Read the pages on “coffee” and “water” below for more information.
A vegetable/protein powder smoothie makes a great breakfast:
Ingredients to consider for your protein shake:
-A non-whey (i.e. non-dairy) as well as non-soy protein powder: 1-2 scoops. (Note: dairy and soy are common allergenic foods.) I recommend protein powders that are derived from rice and/or vegetables such as peas, etc. We have a variety of protein powders at Whole Health Clinic for our patients. My favorite is Biocleanse Power Plus from Biogenesis. This supplement is a protein powder that also cleanses your liver. We have a very delicious protein powder from Arbonne which is favored by many of our patients for its great taste. A chocolate-flavored protein powder or meal replacement is also a good idea.
-A non-dairy milk alternative such as rice, coconut, or hemp. Even nut milks such as almond milk are questionable in some cases although most people do fine with almond milk.
-If you would like to make a yummy smoothie, you can always add some yogurt to the mix. I recommend using coconut yogurt since it is much less allergenic than regular yogurt.
-Organic chia seeds which are a great source of fiber as well as healthy fats: 1 scoop
-Vegetables of all kinds, with various colors, including green, red (red bell pepper, beets, and tomatoes), orange (carrots), purple (purple cabbage), and yellow (yellow bell pepper). Think of the colors of the rainbow!
Consider using a variety of green vegetables, including red chard, cilantro, parsley, spinach, asparagus, kale, broccoli, etc. Lettuce is not very nutritious. Use different vegetables on different days so that your body does not get used to the same ones and develops an allergy to them.
Note: If you decide to juice beets, try to not drink more than ½ a beet in one setting as it can make you nauseas.
-Fruits of various kinds, fresh or frozen. Berries go very well in a smoothie. Tropical fruits such as bananas or pineapple are too sweet, but a small amount of OK. ¼ cup of berries would be a good addition to your shake.
Make sure you have significantly more vegetables than fruits (80%-20%, or 90%-10% ratio) since even the natural sugars found in fruits are not necessarily very healthy for you, specifically in juice form and especially in individuals with digestive problems. Basically, you just add a bit of fruit for taste. You should ideally be getting most of the nutrients from the vegetables.
Place all the above ingredients in a powerful blender such as Vita-mix blender (or Ninja Master Prep Pro which is a much less expensive alternative to Vita-mix blender) that can blend even root vegetables such as carrots and beets. You can add some filtered water in addition to some alternative milk as the base. Blend the mix for only seconds, no more than 10 seconds (as the blending process can destroy some of the nutrients), and drink it up immediately! If you store vegetable juices, the live enzymes die by the minute. I dont recommend drinking vegetable/fruit juice that has been sitting more than a maximum of 30 minutes.
Make sure you alternate among various foods in your shake as well as in your meals. If you do not have variety in your diet, you will likely develop allergies towards the foods that you consume. Our immune system likes variety as most of us do! For example, one week use rice milk, the next week use coconut milk, etc. Or, one week use rice protein powder, and the next week, use a vegetable-based protein powder that does not contain rice (and of course no whey and no soy).
You can add other foods such as various spices to your shake. For example, if you have bodily aches and pains, you can add a good amount of turmeric since it has anti-inflammatory properties. If your blood sugar levels are elevated, you can add a tsp of cinnamon powder. Or, add a bit of slippery elm powder to the mix if you have digestive complaints.
It’s noteworthy that a vegetable/protein powder smoothie is not only highly nutritious, but also a great way to detoxify/cleanse your body.
Dr. Sharif