Now, what can you eat?

The Don'ts: Salt, eggs, all refined sugars, meat, all milk products, flours and flour products.

The following food (secondary, denaturized, or inorganic) substances are to be eliminated from
the individual's diet:

Salt:
For those who are accustomed to large amounts of salt, this may sound difficult, but if you will substitute coarsely ground pepper and savory herbs, adding powdered kelp, you will find that the craving for salt will immediately begin to disappear. Black pepper is a good nutritional herb and helps rebuild the body when used in its natural state. But when pepper is cooked in food, the molecular structure changes, so that it becomes an inorganic irritant (as high heat changes cayenne, black pepper, and spices from organic to inorganic), and this is the only time when damage results. The use of salts that are of a vegetable or potassium base (such as Dr. Jensen's, Dr. Browner's, and other various ones, which in some cases contain some sea salt) is all right, providing it is not overdone.

Eggs:
No eggs should be eaten in any form. (mucus forming) Sugar and all sugar products: You may use honey, sorghum molasses or blackstrap molasses, but no sugar of any type.

Meat:
Eliminate all meats from the diet. A little white fish once a week, or a bit of young chicken that has not been fed commercial food or inoculated with formaldehyde and other antispoilage serums, would be all right (as these are the higher forms of edible flesh), but do not use them too often. (mucus forming)

Milk:
Eliminate all dairy products: butter, cheese, cottage cheese, milk, yogurt, etc. These are all mucus-forming substances and in most cases, are extremely high in cholesterol (especially butter). As a substitute for butter or margarine (hardened vegetable oils, etc.), you can train your taste buds to enjoy a good, fresh, bland olive oil on vegetables, salads, and basic meals.

Flour and Flour Products:
Flour is eliminated because, when heated and baked at high temperatures, it changes to a mucus-forming substance. It has no more life. All wholesome food is organic, where unwholesome food is dead and inorganic.

The Do's: any whole, live, raw foods. Fruits, vegetables, whole grains, nuts, seeds, and a small amount of fresh fish or chemical free chicken.

When you start the mucusless diet, Dr. Christopher suggested some supplements which can speed your healing. Take a teaspoonful of cayenne in cold water three times a day. This is quite a bit to start with, so you should begin with 1/4 teaspoonful and work up to the full amount. [Or use the liquid cayenne extract (working up to a full dropper ) in cold water three times a day.]

To assist digestion, put one tablespoonful of honey and one of apple cider vinegar in warm water, stirring until mixed. Sip this three times a day. This helps produce hydrochloric acid for digestion.

Use kelp instead of, or in addition to, sea salt. This provides many trace minerals and helps the thyroid gland rebuild. You can also take the kelp in tablets. If you cannot stand the taste, try dulse, which is milder, but still wonderfully full of minerals.

Take a tablespoon of molasses three times a day in warm water. You can also take it plain, but the molasses "coffee" is often preferred as a vitamin-B complex pick-me-up.

Take a tablespoonful of a good, fresh wheat germ oil three times a day. This provides vitamin E, which helps the system use oxygen.

See Dr. Christopher's Regenerative Diet for charts on how sample diets fulfill amply the RDA recommended for adults and children.

Basically, the mucusless diet consists of fruits and vegetables, grains, nuts and seeds. This diet, along with the supplements mentioned above, supply all the nutrients that the body requires. In addition, the high quality of the foods gives new life and health to the system. As we mentioned in the text, some people have been completely healed by the use of the diet alone, although the herbs surely speed recovery.

But what does this diet mean in practical terms? For most of us, it means the elimination of some of our basic foods: milk and milk products, meats, flours--including whole wheat flour but most especially refined flour, sugars, chemicals of all kinds--prepared foods of all kinds.

Instead, we use foods in their wholesome state, fresh, raw or home prepared. Dr. Christopher used an eclectic approach in diet. He didn't recommend all-raw food, because the cooked foods can act as a broom to sweep toxic matter out of the intestines. Cooked food is also familiar and comforting, while a raw diet can be hard to take for many people. He did, however, emphasize using plenty of both raw and cooked foods, not just cooked or just raw.

What do we do with the various categories of foods?

For grains, Dr. Christopher recommended that you soak whole grains in water for sixteen to twenty hours (some say that you should do this in the refrigerator so that the grains will not ferment). Drain off the soak water, and cover with water that has been brought to a boil, along with some sea salt to taste. Low-heat at 135 degrees F. or under (using a food warmer-cooker from a restaurant supply house, a modified crockpot, a stainless steel double boiler, a low temperature in the oven, or a thermos bottle). For the last method, put the soaked grain into the bottle, about 1/3 full. Add the boiling water, turning the thermos a few times so that all the grain is treated. Let this sit all night, and in the morning the grain should be soft and palatable. This only works if you have a small family, however.

You can use wheat, barley, millet, buckwheat, rye, oat groats, and so on. Sprouted grains can also be used.

Some people like to briefly blend the cooked grains in the blender. I especially like this method for children, who do not often chew their food properly.

Serve these grains with a little oil or butter, some honey, some cinnamon, etc. If you are still craving milk on your porridge, soak some almonds overnight. Blend them in the blender with water to cover and one apple, cored but not peeled, and a touch of maple syrup and possibly a bit of pure vanilla. This is so delicious on porridge that you won't miss your milk topping.

You can also slice some fresh fruit, any kind including berries, on your morning cereal.

During the morning and afternoon, don't hesitate to take a glass of juice (some people like to dilute it, but be sure to swish it around in your mouth), a piece or two of fresh fruit, a few pre-soaked nuts or seeds--whatever you like to snack on. Paavo Airola's research has shown that primitive people in their natural cultures eat a little something every couple of hours or so to keep their energy up. If you are working under real stress, make a "smoothie" by blending soaked almonds, water, honey, pineapple juice, a banana and brewer's yeast together until smooth. This will satisfy your body's needs when demands are high.

We usually prepare a vegetable meal by including something cooked and something raw, something for starch and something for protein. For example, we might steam some zucchini, eat a raw salad, have a baked potato, and have a handful of nuts or a serving of beans. Dr. Christopher recommended using only one cooked vegetable per meal, although you can sometimes prepare more than one. You can vary your vegetables with sauces, herbs, tamari soy sauce, olive oil, a little fresh butter, Vegit, etc. For salad, you can combine almost any vegetables; just be sure not to combine vegetables and fruits, although on occasion you might have a carrot and raisin salad. Dress with olive oil and vinegar, or with homemade mayonnaise.

Mayonnaise

Place in blender:
1 organically-grown egg
2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar, or one T. each vinegar and lemon juice
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground mustard seed (optional)
1/4 cup unrefined oil (olive and safflower are both good)
Blend on high. Take small cap off blender top and add more oil in a stream until the blender seems to speed up or oil pools on top of mayonnaise. Turn off immediately. If it curdles, take mixture out of blender, clean blender, dry it, start with one egg, and add the mixture to it slowly. It should come out okay. You can also mix this by beating slowly with an egg beater, adding the oil a drop or two at a time, but that method is much more tedious.

You can season the oil-and-vinegar dressing and the mayonnaise almost any way you like. Garlic and basil are good standby seasonings, making an Italian-tasting dressing. But you can add cayenne, almost any herb, more lemon, even natural peanut butter, for different-tasting dressings.

Although you can make salads according to recipes, we usually stick to a miniature salad bar. We prepare raw vegetables as we have them, using leaf lettuce and never iceberg, which has few nutrients but lots of chemicals. We cut or shred what we want, placing the items in nice heaps on a large platter. Each member of the family takes the vegetables that s/he wants. Don't forget to include vegetables that are often served cooked, such as raw, shredded beets--very tasty raw, cauliflower and cabbage, raw peas, etc. Some people eat the starchy vegetables, such as yams and sweet potatoes, raw, but we prefer these cooked. Don't forget a nice little pile of minced garlic, green onions, or chives. Avocados, tomatoes, jicama (a delicious Mexican root vegetable), Jerusalem artichokes, and other unusual vegetables make great, satisfying salads.

For a starch, baked potato is our favorite standby, but baked squash, yams, pumpkins, etc., are also good. You can prepare a grain casserole by mixing soaked, low-heated grains with steamed vegetables. Although this may sound a little plain and mundane, you can come up with some very good combinations, varying seasonings. One of our favorites:

Lentil-Rice Casserole

Soak and low-heat:
2 cups lentils
2 cups brown rice, long or short grain
When the grain is nearly done, add:
2 cups cut carrots, cooked
2 cloves raw garlic large onion, sauteed (optional) bay leaf
1/4 cup blackstrap molasses
2 tablespoons (or more, to taste) apple cider vinegar
2 teaspoons salt

Low-heat for a couple of hours. Makes enough for a large family, or for two hearty meals.

For other grain-casseroles, just add herbs and seasonings with a generous hand. You can lightly toast and grind up some sesame seeds for a lovely topping. Almost any grain and vegetable combination is delicious. Transfiguration Diet, by Littlegreen Inc.'s Think Tank, provides detailed recipes and some other information on their application of Dr. Christopher's mucusless diet.

A handful of nuts or seeds, ground up and sprinkled on the vegetables, can provide good protein. You may want to prepare a bean dish, however. Just soak some dried beans for about 24 hours. Then low-heat them until tender, perhaps another 24 hours. You can season them with tomato, garlic, onions, chili, cayenne--almost any seasoning. We love them plain with a little olive oil and tamari sauce; navy beans and garbanzos are delightful this way. You can make soup out of them, or mash them in a pan in which you have heated some oil to make a good dish of refried beans (just be sure to add enough liquid to keep the frijoles creamy). Salt to taste. This simple recipe has a gourmet taste, and it is our family favorite. Most of my children beg me for frijoles refritos!

As you can see, the mucusless diet provides plenty of protein, which is the longstanding lament of those who feel that they can't give up their animal products.

As for nuts and seeds, you can grind them up, mix them with other ingredients, and make a very good confection. For example:

Seed Candy

Sunflower Seeds
Sesame Seeds
Honey
Carob Powder
Coconut
Ground Raisins or other dried fruit (optional)
Grind the seeds in a blender or seed grinder. Add the other ingredients, going light on the honey and adding a touch of water if the mixture needs binding. Roll in more carob powder or sesame seeds or coconut, if desired.

Old-fashioned halvah is nothing but ground sesame seeds and honey, perhaps with a touch of natural vanilla.

Seeds may also be sprouted for use in salads or for eating out of hand. For a long time we enjoyed sunflower seeds out of hand, but when we finally sprouted them, we were amazed at how delicious they are. Soak them overnight, drain them, and in the morning a tiny sprout appears. Sprouted alfalfa seeds are the foundation of many salads, and they are easy to make. Just soak a few tablespoons of alfalfa seeds in water in a wide-mouthed quart jar. Next morning, drain, using a commercial top sold for this purpose, or a nylon stocking, well-cleaned, held on with a jar ring or rubber band. Now rinse the sprouts three times a day or so, letting drain thoroughly each time (that's the secret for sweet sprouts). After four days, they will have grown about three inches long and developed nice green leaves, which you can enhance by leaving the jar for a couple of hours in the sunshine.

Chia seeds make good sprouts, but they are a little gelatinous, which not everyone enjoys (we do). Radish sprouts are spicy and great on salad. Red clover seed sprouts look much like alfalfa but have a slightly different flavor. Mung bean sprouts are sweet and hearty, more starchy than the others, but still great for eating raw. Lentil and garbanzo beans are hefty too. Be sure to cook sprouted soybeans to inactivate the enzyme which makes the bean indigestible.

Some people grow sunflower and buckwheat lettuce by planting the soaked seeds into a small flat of moist soil. This produces tender green leaves which you can clip for salad.

Ann Wigmore suggests a seed cheese which she claims is very digestible. In a blender, blend 1 cup sesame seed, 1 cup sunflower seed, and 2 cups Rejuvelac. Put into a muslin bag and allow to drain for 8-12 hours. This is good with vegetables.
Most people can accept the changes required by this diet except for one thing: they want bread. Bread is considered the staff of life (although it's actually wheat that the scripture refers to). Personally, we have had a difficult time giving up bread. You can provide some substitutes, as follows:

Sprout the wheat until the little sprouts appear but no longer. Place the sprouted wheat in a food processor and grind until it forms a bread-like mass. Take this out and place on oiled baking sheet in little loaves. Bake at 150-165° F. for 30 to 60 minutes, or until done to your liking. Slice thin to eat.

Sprout wheat as above, and blend in blender with only a little water until a pancake-batter consistency. Pour onto oiled cookie trays and low-heat as above. Makes a cracker. One family also places the trays under glass frames in the sun; one hot afternoon should give you good crackers.

Both of the above recipes can be sweetened with honey, lightly salted, or flavored with herbs or ground raisins.

If you are still hankering after regular bread, you can make an improvement on your regular whole wheat loaves by sprouting the wheat as above, perhaps a quart of sprouts, and blending with a very little water in the blender. Use this as the base of your whole wheat bread, adding it to activated yeast, a little honey (though not very much, because the sprouting process makes the wheat very sweet), some sea salt, and adding only as much whole wheat flour as you need to knead the loaf. One baker also adds a cup or two of gluten flour, which is very concentrated, but does really improve the texture. Knead, rise and bake as usual. Although this is not a live food, the acidity of much of the grain is changed to alkaline and the bread is better for us. However, the texture is very heavy and somewhat sticky, not at all like the light fluffy bread we're used to. Still, it's a trade-off, because whole wheat bread as we normally consume it is very mucus-forming, a dead food.

One nutritionist suggests that if you must have bread, you should bake pita bread and then stuff it with good salad vegetables, including avocado if you can. Add plenty of sprouts, and this perhaps will balance the acidifying effect of the bread.

Pita

2 cups warm water
2 tablespoons honey
1 tablespoon dried yeast
Activate yeast
Add:
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon kelp (optional)

Mix in:
5-6 cups of freshly-ground whole wheat flour, as needed to make a dough that you can knead

Flour a clean surface, and knead until springy. Let rest 15 minutes.
Break off golf-ball sized pieces of dough, and roll out about 1/4 inch thick into tortilla-shaped circles. Place on ungreased cookie sheet that has been sprinkled with cornmeal. Let rise about 30 minutes, during which you preheat your oven to 450° F.
Place sheets on bottom shelf of oven, and bake the pita breads for 5-8 minutes, just until they puff and solidify a bit. Remove and cool separately. If you don't have a lot of cookie sheets, let the breads rise on a cornmeal-sprinkled surface, and gently, gently place them on the cookie sheets as they become available. Makes 2 dozen pita breads. Cut in half across the circle to form two pockets and stuff as desired. Homemade mayonnaise is a good dressing.

Another frustration in adapting to this diet is the absence of milk. But to heal quickly, and especially for serious disease, it's best to eliminate milks entirely. However, you can make palatable nut and seed milks that behave quite a bit like milk. Just blend (soaked) almonds in water, in proportions of about one to four. Blend until smooth and strain if desired, although we enjoy the pulp as well. Sesame and coconut also make good milks. Sunflower seed milk is strongly flavored but still pleasant.
You can make soy milk, which many people use as a plentiful milk substitute. The best-tasting recipe we have seen is as follows:

Soy milk

Sort through 1 quart dry soybeans and discard bad ones. Soak overnight in three cups of water. Drain well.
Put on a large pot of water to boil. In a blender which you have preheated by blending 2 cups of boiling water for 1 minute, put in 1 cup of beans to the 2 cups of boiling water. Grind for 2 or 3 minutes. Strain in a muslin bag to remove the pulp, and squeeze well to get out as much of the milk as you can.

Heat the milk at least 30 minutes in a double boiler. Stir occasionally.

Add 2 tablespoons oil, and a little honey, if desired. Refrigerate and use as dairy milk.

The flavor of this milk is mild and pleasant. You should be careful not to crack a plastic or glass blender container with the boiling water.

Some people enjoy sprouted-wheat milk, which is made by blending sprouted wheat with water until creamy. It's a little strong-tasting but very satisfying. Sometimes a little apple or grape juice over grains or other fruits can be delicious and satisfying.

The only safe sweeteners are honey, blackstrap molasses, sorghum, maple syrup, or fruit sugars (that is, ground-up dried fruits, such as date). Any processed sugars should be avoided. They are often the main cause of many health problems.

In the evening or between meals, fruits can be very satisfying. A large bowl of chopped fruits of various kinds, sprinkled with wheat germ, ground nuts or seeds, or a bit of honey, is a delectable treat. You can use avocado with fruits or vegetables, making a rich and satisfying meal.

Dr. Christopher recommended using a potassium broth with vegetable meals. This is most easily made by purchasing Dr. Jensen's or Dr. Bonner's broth. However, we like to make our own. Just simmer potatoes, celery, carrots, onions, garlic, herbs and whatever other vegetables you like in water until tender. When it's done, add tamari soy sauce to taste. You can blend this in the blender if you like. This simple recipe is very delicious and satisfying.

You can make delicious soups by blending fresh, raw vegetables (only good-quality, good-tasting ones that you'd normally eat raw) with hot water or nut or soymilk. Just clean and cut up the vegetables (corn, peas, tomatoes, celery, carrot, etc.) and place them in the blender with seasonings and hot water. Blend until smooth and serve immediately. You might need to warm it up a little on the stove. A little well-sauteed onion makes the soup taste cooked. Our favorite variation of the raw soup is eaten cold:

Summer Soup or Gazpacho

In the blender container place:
Several cut-up, ripe tomatoes
1 clove garlic, peeled
1 stick celery, cut-up
1 green pepper, cleaned and cup up
2 teaspoons basil or 2 tablespoons fresh basil
1 teaspoon sea salt
1/2 teaspoon paprika

Blend until smooth, strain through a colander, and serve cold.

Some people like to purchase or make a nutmeat preparation to stand-in for meats.

Nut Loaf

1 part cashews, coarsely ground
1 part almonds, coarsely ground
1 part celery, finely chopped
1 part carrots, finely chopped
1/4 part minced parsley
1 part tomato, blended in blender or finely chopped
1 avocado, mashed
salt, pepper, herbs, Vegesal, etc., to taste
Mix all together and press into loaf pan. Refrigerate until firm.

You can buy vegetarian meat substitutes, but check the labels for additives. Once we bought some meatless hot dogs, and they contained nitrates and nitrites the same as the meat variety!
You can also make bean loaves by combining beans, crumbs, vegetables, and seasonings, baking for a half hour if desired.

We tend to go more simple than this, however, simply using the foods as they are without making too many combinations.

As for sauces, you can make a lovely off-white sauce by using olive oil or butter, whole-wheat flour, and almond milk. Flavor this as desired. Just alter your regular sauce recipes using the foods recommended in this diet.

Desserts are hard to give up, but you can alter some of your favorite recipes so they are mucusless and delicious. In Dr. Christopher's Regenerative Diet, a pudding is suggested:

Strawberry Barley Pudding

Strawberry Barley Pudding is an elegant spoon-up finish for any luncheon or dinner. And leftovers are quite a temptation to any refrigerator raider. Try this appealing and delicious delight.
2 cups strawberries
2 cups low-heated barley
1/2 cup honey
1/2 teaspoon almond extract

Combine above ingredients in blender, puree and set aside.

2 cups strawberries
1/2 cup honey
2 tablespoons arrowroot
1/2 teaspoon almond extract

Combine these ingredients in the top of a double boiler. Heat to 130° F. and maintain heat for 30 minutes. Remove from heat and add barley mixture from blender.

Place in refrigerator and chill thoroughly. Just before serving top with coconut chips and garnish with fresh strawberry halves.

This method of making pudding can be adapted to other fruits and grains, varying flavors as desired.
You can make a nice fruit cobbler by lightly steaming fresh fruit, sweetening as desired, and topping with ground, low-heated grains, lightly-toasted and ground seeds or nuts, lightly-toasted wheat germ, etc. Top with nut cream, which is just nut milk made with a little less water, sweetened with honey or maple syrup.

You can question the cost of such a diet. Actually, if you eliminate the high-prices processed foods from your grocery list, you free up quite a bit of money that can be used to bring home much delicious, fresh produce. Even if it does cost more than you are used to paying, you will be eliminating visits to the doctor's office, supplements at the health food store, and time lost from work. I consider our grocery budget money invested in health. Once we bought several bags of fruit when we lived in Toronto, Canada. The check-out attendant asked us if we worked for a restaurant!

During the winter, you can usually obtain good vegetables and fruits in most parts of the country, although in some places, such as Alaska, the price can get pretty high. I always wonder what we would do if shipping were somehow stopped, as in an economic disaster. I would hope that we could contrive some sort of storage facility, such as an underground pit. I have seen people store carrots, celery, squash, apples, pears, etc., in root cellars all the way through until the next harvest, and in good condition, too. Dr. Christopher always recommended that people grow their own food, experimenting with varieties that are not necessarily "supposed" to grow in their locales. He recalled that his father had the first bearing almond tree in Salt Lake City, Utah. Everyone else thought they couldn't grow there.

A mainstay of the winter mucusless diet must be sprouts. If you can accustom your family to eating sprouts, they can form an important part of your salads, and soups too. Ann Wigmore suggests a soup made of your favorite sprouts, plus buckwheat lettuce and sunflower greens. Blend this with seasonings and water in your blender, and it makes a high-powered, nutritious soup.

As you begin the mucusless diet, you will feel yourself getting more and more energy and needing less and less food. Sometimes you may be tempted to go off the diet, but you might try this trick offered by a nutritionist. When you feel reasonable tempted by ice cream, chocolate, or some other forbidden food, take just one bite and chew it slowly. Then ask yourself, do you really want more of this? If you feel strongly that you do, take just one more bite and repeat. Often the body's mechanism will deny the need for the food once it gets the vibrations of what's going in. In any case, don't allow yourself to shovel in bad food. Go for a walk if you have to! Take a couple of glasses of cold water. You can eventually overcome bad food cravings.

During the process of cleansing and rebuilding your body, you can expect what is called a cleansing crisis. Your symptoms may all flare up; you may feel bad all over; you may feel like you have the flu. Just keep going, the cleansing crisis will pass, and you'll feel better than ever. Dr. Christopher used to have recurrent flareups of his rheumatism and arthritis; for a week or two every seven years he would have to go back to his wheelchair. He accepted these crises, as hard as they were to live with, and continued on with the business of cleansing and building.

Look upon your new adventure in diet as fun, interesting, and freedom-giving. You will gain your health from it, and also learn to control the sources and preparation of your food. Take it for granted that the food tastes good, that it's good for you, and that it's making you better. Soon you'll be delighted at how good it tastes and how much you enjoy it; it will become a way of life.