Eat To Live

It occurred to me that I should give a background to my veganism and to why I started a blog about healthy eating and living.  Almost a year ago, I read a book by Dr Joel Fuhrman called Eat to Live:  The Amazing Nutrient-Rich Program for Fast and Sustained Weight Loss.  I was very impressed with Dr Fuhrman's presentation of scientific and medical facts, with his logical and systematic debunking of popular diets such as the Atkin's Diet, and with his simple approach to food preparation and consumption.  I'd already spent a couple of decades exploring food and diet and health and nutrition as a lay person, a gardener, a mother, a woman, an environmentalist, an athlete.  Originally inspired and guided by Francis Moore Lappe, Diet for a Small Planet, I have usually eaten a meat-free diet although I've been very fond of fish and seafood and kept dairy in my life until recently.  I found that Dr Fuhrman's words were the culmination of everything food and nutrition related that I'd been thinking about and wondering about and trying to make sense of for 20 years.  It all just made sense.

Dr Fuhrman believes that a person needs to be at their ideal healthy weight before any significant, long-term health benefits can kick in.  Eating a meat-free, dairy-free, no fat, no sugar, no salt diet will allow you to lose weight quickly and painlessly and will improve your overall health dramatically.  When I started the diet in May 2010, I lost 10 pounds in 6 weeks and have stayed at the same weight ever since.  So, now I'm living as a vegan and my partner, "Tom" is doing it too.  We don't eat meat or dairy.  We try for no fat, but usually do low fat.  We've cut out salt, and sugar is around only when those darn mini-eggs show up in the stores!

Sometimes meal planning, no matter what diet you're on, can be a chore and a vegan diet is rather labour intensive, what with all that salad making and vegetable chopping, so we're always looking for new and delicious recipes.  On this blog, I want to share some of our tried and true.  Whether you're a meat and cheese eater or not, I know you'll enjoy these recipes.

By the way, I l-o-v-e potato chips!  What would Dr Fuhrman say?