Tonight I didn’t take a walk. I watered my plants instead, hoping that Noah would get enough exercise running around the yard (sorry, Dog Whisperer, I know its no substitute for THE WALK.) Anyway, look what was ripe on my little tomato plant! I am such a proud mother. I got some old planter boxes from my mom, and thought they might work like raised beds (because the bottoms of the boxes were rotting out,) so I got one tomato plant and one zucchini plant. I laugh at myself every time I see them, because they were little plants when I got them, so I very nicely planted pink petunias in the corners of the boxes, thinking how pretty and decorative it would be while I was growing vegetables. Poor petunias. They don’t see much sun these days.
Anyway, this is not a good picture of my tomato, but it is the funniest ever. A good follow-up to last night’s photo op.
Along the lines of vegetables (we were talking about vegetables, weren’t we?,) as always, when I come home from a trip I am absolutely crazed for vegetables. Seems I get enough fruit on trips, but veggies are hard to come by. I know, salads. But I like cooked vegetables a lot. So I guess that’s my version of mindful eating. I just really really want to eat a lot of vegetables. Tomorrow I am going to make a pot of steel cut oats and push the envelope to see how much zucchini I can add and still enjoy it. There’s a lot of zucchini in zucchini bread, so I think it will work well. That makes me think that it would also work really well in baked oatmeal. I will try that in the fall.
And at the same time (coincidentally, I think,) I have watched a couple of documentaries: Food Matters and Dying to Have Known. Both are along the same lines, about the great qualities of a vegetable based diet. Dying to Have Known was all about the Gerson Diet/Therapy/Cure, Dr. Gerson was a physician in the 1920’s who discovered that a plant based diet could cure quite a few incurable diseases, including cancer. Even if you don’t believe all of the evidence that they provide, you can’t help but think that eating more fresh fruits and vegetables is a good thing. I know I don’t get sick very often. Dr. Gerson also believed in coffee enemas, which I used to think was REALLY weird. But this time when I heard it, I thought about all the recent articles I’ve read about the “hundreds of helpful components” of coffee, and studies that show that coffee drinkers live longer (raises coffee cup to Lori!) and I thought, why not? If it works good in one end, why not the other? Its not any weirder than some of the other things they use from that direction. And that’s all I’m gonna say about that.
Here’s a couple of other random thoughts I’ve had about these documentaries (and others like them.) One thing they never mention (on both the vegetable and the paleo side of the fence) when they talk about how much better people feel/lose weight/are cured/etc. is that most of these people are going from a highly processed crap-food diet to a purely whole food diet. Whichever end of the whole food spectrum they are changing to, it has to be a wonderful shock to their body.
There is one thing I kinda disagree with the vegan documentary people about. That is juicing. They seem to think its necessary to juice to get enough vegetables in. Is that because it would take too long to eat the vegetables the normal way? Because in America we are in too much of a hurry and couldn’t spend that much time eating? Or is it because your body wouldn’t allow you to eat that many vegetables? They don’t address it. It doesn’t seem right to me. God didn’t put a Veg-A-Matic in the garden. On the other hand, it sure seems like a good excuse to get one of those super VitaMix machines that I see at Costco.
Oh, and now that I’ve mentioned God, let me give you my opinion on the whole Paleo, eat like our ancestors did thing. I kinda think that before the fall, when God first created everything, man didn’t need to eat meat to have a perfect diet. All those plants were plenty. And I think there were grains in the Garden of Eden too.*
(*disclaimer: I did not go to theology school or Bible college. I haven’t even spent a lot of time reading Genesis for proof of my theory. So take it with a grain of salt. BUT NOT TOO MUCH SALT!!!)
debby weighs in 
I love how Sophie is always ready to pose for the camera. She is so sweet. I have thought that the foods mentioned in the Bible are probably good for us. Specifically, I think of milk, honey, fish, bread, figs, grapes, wheat and barley. Oh and don’t forget the fatted calf. 🙂
You made me LOL about the fatted calf. I guess that was before they discovered the “evils” of saturated fat??
Hi Debbie.
My understanding is that juicing is used when you need a super boost of nutrition. For instance I have heard of people using what seems extreme amounts of carrot juice as part of a natural regime to heal certain cancers. I have no idea how good it is except that I do know one person who did this and lives an incredibly vibrant life many years later.
My opinion about juicing is that we benefit from eating whole foods both in nutrition, flavour, mouth satisfaction, (texture), and satiety. I love carrots cooked and raw and I cannot imagine having them juiced on a regular basis. I am also cautious about juices because you get a much bigger hit of sugar which is released much faster into the blood. It looks like a recipe for diabetes 2 if not taken with thought to this.
But then who am I to judge. I simply prefer to crunch and chew, savouring flavour rather than swallow with a fleeting taste experience.
It’s always interesting to read about other ways of eating/lifestyle.
Blessings.
Oh what a cute little tomato! Congrats to you and your family! 🙂
(It looks like Sophie is saying, “What next? First it was this Bess thing, and now she’s got this little red fella.”)
That’s fascinating that you know someone who used this therapy and survived cancer. Do they still eat a vegetable-based diet? Dr. Gerson uses a carrot/apple juice as the base for his diet.
And yes, I get the need for the concentrated boost for healing regimens. But some of the people think you should juice every day as a way of life. I’m like you. I like to crunch and chew.
That really is interesting to hear about carrot juices and cancer. I wonder if there is any scientific research behind that kind of thing.
Dr. Gorman was a brilliant scientist, so there is some research. Its more than carrot juice though. Its a very specific diet.
Thanks for stopping by!
Being out of town, need more time to reflect on this, but the one thing I caught which I totally agree with is that people who make a huge switch from one end of the spectrum to the other with their eating give all credit to what they START eating and how much better they feel. I agree, however, I also think it has MUCH to do with what they STOP eating (junk, processed, modified, etc.) And that in-between space doesn’t get much credit! Thanks for mentioning it.
Sophie is KILLING ME. “Mom…you meant to take picture of ME, right?” Too funny!
P.S. Nice tomato – that’s pretty exciting!
P.S.S. I agree with you and Sharon on the “good food feeling” is due to switching from a processed diet. I’m sure that if I went back to eating as much chemicals and preservatives as I used to, even if I kept the calorie count within a normal range, I’d feel like crap.
P.S.S.S. I want a Vitamix, too. For smoothies! And just general ice-crushing awesomeness. Too cheap to spring for one, though.
LOL. If we lived closer we could “share” a Vitamix.
Too bad, as that would be a great idea!
Umm… coffee enema? What a horrible waste (hahaha) of coffee!! Unless you are talking Folger’s brand, then maybe that is somewhat okay.
I crave fruit and veggies after vacation – even if I have eaten them on vacation because they usually weren’t *my* fruit and veggies the way I like to eat them. It’s the routine thing.
Debbie, have you read the book why we get fat? It’s reminding me a little of the book rethinking thin by Kolata. Why we get fat is by Gary Taubes.
I don’t know how I ended up here, but that’s how the Internet works! It also allows us to randomly comment and give unsolicited opinions. =) So I’ll just say that when some people quote the Bible as saying God intended for our perfect diet to be vegetarian (I’m not saying you said that), they have overlooked Genesis 9, where God specifically adds meat to the menu. This takes place immediately after the flood. We could speculate on the reasons, but those are just the facts.
I was looking at my WordPress dashboard, and couldn’t remember why I commented on someone growing a tomato…so I came here and read the post again. And now I have another comment. =P So silly!
You said, “There is one thing I kinda disagree with the vegan documentary people about. That is juicing. They seem to think its necessary to juice to get enough vegetables in. Is that because it would take too long to eat the vegetables the normal way? Because in America we are in too much of a hurry and couldn’t spend that much time eating? Or is it because your body wouldn’t allow you to eat that many vegetables? They don’t address it.”
I’ve hung around with health people for many years…attending lectures, reading books, learning online, etc. and I believe the answer to that question is that vegetables aren’t what they used to be. In the Garden of Eden, or even 100 years ago in a home garden or on a traditional farm, nutrients would be in the soil through natural processes and organic fertilizers, which would be transferred to the plants, which would end up in our bodies to thoroughly nourish us. But as farming has become more and more commercial, soils are overfarmed, organisms that nourish the soil and plants are destroyed by chemicals, and fertilizers are used which enable plants to produce vegetables that LOOK good but are actually just a shadow of their former selves nutritionally. All of this makes it impossible–yes, impossible, as you would find if you researched this as I have–to get all the nutrition we need from our food.
Juicing is an attempt to gain by quantity what we can’t obtain by quality. In other words, you won’t get what you need from one carrot, but maybe 20 carrots would get you close. =) What I do is to take specific vitamins based on my current understanding of my needs, and drink a “green drink” every day which includes dozens of vegetables and fruits, juiced and dehydrated down to a concentrated powder to be stirred into water. If you’re interested in something like that, my current favorite is the Amazing Grass brand, ORAC “flavor” which has lots of fruit to make it tasty.