In the preceding lessons, you were taught the foods that are best, as well as those that are bad, and which are the worst ones. 66 You know the exact reason why, and also what is going on in the system—what happens with good foods as well as with bad ones in the human body. You have learned that even the best foods, which have the highest, most vigorous healing properties, can become harmful, even dangerous in the beginning if not carefully used; that they become mixed with the filthy mucus and poisons that they loosen up in the body, and thereby become poisoned, entering the bloodstream in this poisoned condition.
Everything is perfectly performed by Nature through evolutional, progressive changes, developments, and accomplishments and not by catastrophes. Nothing is more incorrect than the mistaken idea that a decades-old chronic disease can be healed through a very long fast , or a radically extended, strict fruit diet. "Nature's mills grind slow but sure."
My experience of over 20 years, covering for the most part the extremely severe cases of all kinds of diseases, has proven that a carefully selected and progressively changing TRANSITION DIET is the best and surest way for every patient to start a cure, especially for the average mixed eater. As long as wrong foods (foods of civilization) are partly used, I call it a MUCUS-LEAN DIET. Transition means the slow change from disease-producing foods to disease-healing foods, which I call the MUCUSLESS DIET.
The speed of elimination depends upon quantities and qualities of food and can therefore be controlled and regulated according to the condition of the patient. The worst and by far the unhealthiest habit is the HEAVY BREAKFAST. No solid food should be eaten in the early morning at all if you desire to secure the best results. It is permissible to take the drink that you are accustomed to, but nothing else. If you find this difficult to do in the beginning, you may drink again later on, so that your lunch is taken in the empty stomach. This is so very important that a number of light diseases can be cured by the so-called "NO BREAKFAST PLAN" alone. (This subject is more fully covered in Fasting Lessons 18, 19, 20, and 21.)
It is best that no more than two meals a day be eaten, even though the quantity you eat is as much as if three or even four meals were eaten. Later, when the stomach is cleaner, a small dish of fresh fruits when in season may be eaten for breakfast if desired. If possible, the first meal, lunch, should be eaten between 10:00 and 11:00 in the morning, and supper not sooner than 5:00 or 6:00 in the afternoon. Another very important rule when eating for health is SIMPLICITY; in other words do not mix too many kinds of food at one meal. Count the different number of items in the average meal of today and the total will startle you.
NEVER DRINK DURING A MEAL. If accustomed to a beverage with your meal, wait a short while after you have eaten before drinking. Soups should be avoided with meals, as the more liquid taken, the more difficult for proper digestion. If a warm drink is desired, for instance as a breakfast drink during the winter time, make a broth by cooking for a long time different kinds of vegetables, such as spinach, onions, carrots, cabbages, etc., and DRINK THE JUICE ONLY. 67
Menus for the First 2 Weeks
LUNCH: A combination salad, consisting of raw grated carrots or coleslaw 68 or both, half and half, and two or three spoonfuls of a stewed or canned vegetable, such as green peas, string beans, or spinach. Add to this one of the following items (whatever is in season): cucumbers, tomatoes, green onions, lettuce, or other green leafy vegetables, celery, etc., but only a sufficient quantity for a flavoring.
You may make an oil dressing according to your taste if desired, using lemon juice instead of vinegar—for flavoring purposes only. 69 The rest of the meal should consist of one baked or stewed vegetable such as cauliflower, beets, parsnips, turnips, squash, etc. If you still feel as though you were hungry, you may eat a small-sized baked sweet potato or one slice of toasted bran or whole wheat bread. 70 Fats of any kind, including ordinary butter, are unnatural and therefore should not be eaten. However, should you crave fats, it is best to use peanut butter or some other nut butter on your bread.
During the winter months, canned vegetables may be used when green vegetables are not available. 71 Drink the juice separately in the morning and mix the green or string beans or spinach, etc., with the salad stock as described above of coleslaw or raw carrots. The object of this menu is to supply the "broom" to provide means for mechanically cleansing the digestive tract by quantities of raw, baked, and stewed starchless vegetables. This may be called "Ehret's Standard Combination Salad," the "intestinal broom" spoken of so frequently and so necessary for properly eliminating the stored-up poisons now being loosened during the body's housecleaning.
SUPPER: Mix (half and half) a stewed fruit such as apple sauce, stewed dried apricots, stewed dried peaches, or stewed prunes with some cottage cheese 72 or very ripe bananas, mashed, sweetened with brown sugar or honey to taste.
The bananas would be for a less "mucused," or less acid, stomach.
Menus for the Second 2 Weeks
LUNCH: First a baked apple, apple sauce, or other stewed dried fruit. After ten or fifteen minutes, a combination salad as suggested in first menu, and bran or whole wheat bread toasted if still hungry. Cow butter should be gradually avoided and replaced by a vegetable or nut butter during the transition. By allowing the cooked vegetables to soak on the salad for 10 or 15 minutes, it serves the purpose of a dressing.
SUPPER: A baked or stewed vegetable, as suggested in the first menu, followed with a vegetable salad made of lettuce and cucumber or raw celery or a little coleslaw.
Menus for the Third 2 Weeks
LUNCH: During the summer, this should be an exclusive fruit meal—one kind only. In winter, a sweet dried fruit, for example, prunes, figs, raisins, or dates eaten with apples or oranges; or the dried fruits can be chewed together with a very few nuts, and then followed by the fresh fruits. If in the beginning this fails to satisfy, wait for 10 or 15 minutes and then eat a few leaves of lettuce or a cold vegetable either cooked or raw, but just a small quantity .
SUPPER: A combination salad as suggested in the first menu, followed by a baked vegetable.
Menus for the Fourth 2 Weeks
LUNCH: Fruits as in previous menus.
SUPPER: First eat fruits, either baked or stewed, or fresh, followed a little later by a cold cooked vegetable, or better still a vegetable salad.
If you find that you are losing weight too rapidly, the elimination should be slowed down by eating bread or potatoes 73 after the vegetables. Should you feel an intense craving in the beginning for meat—a great desire returning which you cannot resist, then eat vegetables only on that day, and NO FRUITS.
A Dissolved Mystery
The reason doctors and even naturopaths in general, as well as the layperson, do not believe in a FRUIT diet or MUCUSLESS diet, is simply this: Whoever experiments without experience with this diet of healing, whether sick or well, loses his faith immediately, as soon as they have a crisis, becomes what he or she believes to be "seriously ill;" that is to say, a day on which a great amount of dissolved waste, debris, mucus and other poisons are taken back into the circulation, a day of great elimination. This produces at the same time a strong, almost irresistible craving for wrong foods and, strange as it may seem, the patient most strongly craves for the wrong food which was once his favorite. This is explained by the fact that Nature is eliminating through the circulation the waste of these foods, and it is when they are in the circulation the craving and desire is naturally enough produced.
This then is why it is of extreme importance that every meal of a diet of healing and cleansing must leave the body as soon as possible. Being mixed with the loosened and dissolved poisons, they cause these "uncomfortable" conditions—a fact that has never before been perfectly understood or explained.
Certain foods prove more laxative under certain conditions. Therefore, eat the foods that you have personally found to be the most laxative in your own body. If you do not experience a regular bowel movement before retiring, always help with an enema, a laxative, or both. 74 A natural laxative that helps, which you will undoubtedly find very efficient, is eating a few dried prunes before the other fruits are taken.
A very good aid to elimination, which can be used during the transition diet period until the bowels are cleansed from the old sticky waste and until such time as the bowels act freely from the new diet, is a harmless herb vegetable compound, perfected by myself, and the most efficient intestinal broom and bowel regulator known.
Formula for Ehret's "Intestinal Broom"
Quantities are given in "parts" so that you can prepare any amount that you require.
Note: All "ground" ingredients should be about as coarse as loose tea, the "powdered" ones about as fine as powdered sugar.
These are all fairly common herbs and you should be able to purchase them either at your health-food store or from any herb shop.
6 parts ground SENNA LEAVES
3 parts ground BUCKTHORN BARK
1 part ground PSYLLIUM SEED HUSKS
1/10 part powdered SASSAFRAS ROOT BARK
1/2 part ground DARK ANISE SEED
1/10 part ground BUCHU LEAVES
1/2 part ground BLONDE PSYLLIUM SEED
l/8 part powdered IRISH MOSS
l/8 part granulated AGAR-AGAR
1/2 part ground DARK FENNEL SEED
Mix the first three ingredients thoroughly. Then, combine the remaining seven real well and add this to the mixture. If you have a blender, it makes an ideal mixer for preparing this herbal formula.
The "Intestinal Broom" is easy to use. Usually a small amount, about the quantity that fits on half a teaspoon or less, swallowed with a glassful of water, is sufficient for adults. It may be increased or decreased according to your own reaction.
Other uses are sprinkled over salads, or brewed as tea: a half teaspoon to a cup of boiling water, remove from the heat, and allow to steep for 10 or 15 minutes. It has a fascinating flavor. 75