Ayurveda has a theory that anything can be a food, a medicine or a poison depending on ‘who’ is eating, ‘what’ is eaten, and ‘how much’ is eaten. For example, fresh ginger root is delicious in cooking as a food to flavour and help digestion. It is a stimulating medicine that can help clear a cold and induce a sweat when taken as a strong hot tea. If too much is taken it can make you sick causing acidity and vomiting, hence acting as a poison in the wrong circumstances. So there is no strict ‘Ayurvedic diet’ per se, only sage recommendations to help you have the tastiest and healthiest diet helping to lead you towards the best health.
However, eating is considered to be the most important activity that can affect health. Whilst eating is a habit, and for some an addiction, it can be empowering to transform your eating habits to only include healthy foods that are rejuvenating and life-giving. This is a healthy habit. Whilst herbal remedies, massage, exercise and spiritual practice can balance and repair health it is a ‘good’ diet that gives us an every day opportunity to take control of our health.
Generally speaking, Ayurveda considers that the best foods to include are rice, wheat, barley, mung beans, asparagus, grapes, pomegranates, ginger, ghee, milk and honey. It also generally recommends that it is best to avoid habitual use of heavy meats, cheeses, yoghurt, refined salt, processed foods, refined sugar, coffee, tomatoes, bananas, citrus fruits and black lentils.
Ayurveda has detailed practical theory covering all aspects of living a positive health generating life-style to specific medical treatments.
Remember that digesting your food properly depends on:
• A strong digestive fire called agni in Ayurveda
• Eating appropriate foods in the correct quantity and of the correct quality
• Healthy food combining based on Ayurvedic principles
Here are some Ayurvedic healthy eating tips:
• Eat according to your constitution
• Eat fresh and seasonal food that is organically grown.
• Eat predominantly cooked and warm food.
• Eat foods that are light, fresh and rejuvenative.
• Minimise the use of leftovers, tinned, frozen or preserved foods.
• Do not eat lots of raw and cold foods straight from the fridge
• Do not eat lots of raw and cooked food together.
• Do not eat contraindicated foods: Dairy and fruit, melon after other food, fruits with other food, fish and milk, eggs with milk, lemons with milk or yoghurt, yoghurt after dark, equal parts of ghee and honey (3:1 by weight), cooked honey.
• Avoid excessive fasting or excessive eating.
• Only eat when hungry and drink when thirsty. Leave 4-6 hours between meals.
• When you travel adjust your diet slowly as the change in water, food and climate can all adversely affect your digestion.
• Antidote extreme qualities of food with digestive spices
Other problems with digestion
A major cause of digestive imbalance is external bacteria and pathogens in the digestive tract picked up off unhealthy food, whilst travelling or from unresolved illness.; giardia, worms, imbalanced bacteria, Candida. These must be removed using effective anti-parasitical herbs such as Neem.
Only use anti-biotics when absolutely necessary as these deplete the integrity of the balance of intestinal flora and can result in pathogenic outbreaks of unhealthy bacteria.
Only use pain killers and NSAID drugs when absolutely necessary. The use of pain killers and anti-biotics are two of the most common causes of imbalanced digestion.
Eating a high volume of refined sugar feeds pathogenic bacteria, so try to avoid it!