“Just as food causes chronic disease, it can be the most powerful cure.” Hippocrates
We have known the importance of food being our medicine since around 400BC, but somewhere along the line we conveniently forgot that everything we put into our mouths could either harm or heal us.
Hippocrates was aware that disease was the result of environmental factors, diet, and the way we lived our lives. He greatly believed inthe healing power of nature, and that drugs were always the last resort. The treatments he prescribed included fasting and the consumption of fermented foods like apple cider vinegar. He was well aware that “all disease begins in the gut.”
We have always known this stuff. But Big Pharma conveniently made us forget. We, at Real Meal Revolution, feel that it is our responsibility to provide the truth so that we can all remember and begin to correct our health and that of future generations. That is why we have created a phased approach to lifestyle optimisation, which we will be launching on 1 December 2016. Banting 2.0 is the new era of Banting.
Inflammation is a signal that your body is out of balance and the first sign of disease. It’s vital to have a good relationship with your body so that as soon as it shows signs of imbalance you can take measures to correct it before the situation gets too severe.
Hippocrates said, “Each of the substances of a man’s diet acts upon his body and changes it in some way and upon these changes his whole life depends.” Even 2000 years ago, Hippocrates had a valid point. We can’t pollute our bodies and expect them to run like well-oiled machines. They are going to break down.
Instead of running straight to medication to solve all of our problems, we can turn to food and try and prevent the need for these drugs in the first place. Mother Nature has equipped us with some remarkable healing foods, and one of these is turmeric.
Turmeric is a yellow spice, usually found in Indian food. The active ingredient in turmeric is curcumin. Fascinatingly, there have been 6393 peer-reviewed articles advocating the benefits of turmeric and curcumin. The first paper that was published on the benefits of curcumin was in 1949, and the first clinical trial reported in Lancet was in 1937. “Numerous studies have indicated that curcumin is a highly potent antimicrobial agent and has been shown to be active against various chronic diseases including various types of cancers, diabetes, obesity, cardiovascular, pulmonary, neurological and autoimmune diseases.” Many of these studies have reported that curcumin is better than some prescription drugs, predominantly because there are fewer side effects when using curcumin, unless taken excessively.
“Curcumin has been studied for many years due to its bio-functional properties, especially antioxidant, radical scavenger, antimicrobial and anti-inflammatory activities.”
Some of the peer-reviewed studies acknowledge curcumin for:
Reducing pain: “High concentration of Curcumin was able to reduce the chronic neuropathic pain.”
Healing wounds: “curcumin stimulated the production of the growth factors involved in the wound healing process, and so curcumin also accelerated the management of wound restoration.”
Protecting against cardiovascular disease: “Oral curcumin supplementation may present a simple lifestyle strategy for decreasing the risk of cardiovascular diseases.”
Liver and gallbladder support: “Collectively, curcumin can be served as a potential treatment option for liver injury with cholestasis.”
IBS relief: “We propose that curcumin may have therapeutic implications for human intestinal inflammation.”
Alleviating postmenopausal and osteoarthritic symptoms: “Tetahydrocurcumin and curcumin are effective for treating postmenopausal and osteoarthritis symptoms in OVX rats with MIA-induced osteoarthritis-like symptoms and may have potential as interventions for menopausal and osteoarthritic symptoms in humans.”
Anti-cancer abilities: “Curcumin is a well-known diarylheptanoid constituent of turmeric which possesses anticancer effects under both pre-clinical and clinical conditions. Moreover, it is well known that the anticancer effects of curcumin are primarily due to the activation of apoptotic pathways in the cancer cells as well as inhibition of tumor microenvironments like inflammation, angiogenesis, and tumor metastasis.”
Anti-depression potential: “We conclude that there is supporting evidence that curcumin administration reduces depressive symptoms in patients with major depression.” “Curcumin has a potential anti-anxiety effect in individuals with obesity.”
Diabetes control: “These studies suggest that proteasome inhibitors, including curcumin, may prove useful for patients with diabetes by improving both β-cell function and relieving insulin resistance.”
The presence of inflammation in your body, if left to worsen, could have you reaching for the below common pharmaceutical drugs and treatments:
Anti-inflammatories
Anti-depressants
Anti-coagulants (aspirin)
Pain killers
Diabetes drugs (metformin)
Arthritis medications
Inflammatory bowel disease drugs
Cholesterol drugs
Steroids
Chemotherapy
Don’t let this happen to you. As the saying goes, “prevention is better than cure,” and Mother Nature has provided us with an abundance of preventative remedies in real food.
Start by eating turmeric at least three times a week, while Banting, to prevent inflammation. Curcumin is fat soluble, which means that consuming it with fat will help the body absorb it better. Combing it with black pepper is also thought to improve the bioavailability by 1000 times, due to the peperine found in it.
Some ideas for including it into your diet:
- Add turmeric to any food that contains fat, such as butter or coconut oil, and black pepper
- Make it into a golden paste by combining turmeric powder with coconut oil, black pepper, and a bit of water
- Make “Golden Milk”- add the golden paste to some warm milk or cream such as coconut or almond before bed and combine with spices such as nutmeg, cinnamon, cardamom and ginger
- Add the paste to curries, smoothies, broths, soups, stews, eggs, and salad dressings
- Sprinkle turmeric powder onto an avocado with a crack of black pepper
Although we advocate eating real food above supplements, the curcumin content of turmeric is only about 3%, therefore you may find it beneficial to incorporate a turmeric extract into your Banting diet for greater impact.
Have the extract in a cup of hot water with coconut oil and a pinch of black better for better results – or consume it with a fatty meal or drink, with a crack of black pepper.
Remember to always consult your healthcare practitioner before embarking on a dietary change.
Your health should be your greatest concern. Unfortunately, Big Pharma is more concerned about their wallets than they are about the state of our health.
If you would like some guidance on how to take back control of your health by the food you eat, our Online Program is the best place to start.
