Charlotte Gerson Speaks with Jay Kordich About Overcoming Disease

This 48 minute video gives a wonderful overview of the body's ability to heal itself after removing toxic food products, and then be given live food nutrients from daily juicing. Charlotte Gerson is 89 years old in this recent interview and in vibrant health as you can see for yourself. She is the daughter of Dr. Max Gerson who started the 'Gerson Therapies' based on juicing fresh clean organic vegetables and fruits, that have helped so many people cure themselves of chronic disease conditions. Charlotte Gerson discusses what those juice combinations are as well as their effects, and other important information about live foods in this interview. So start the new year by learning what to do for yourself so you can live to be a healthy happy 100 year old!

Although not seen in this video, Jay Kordich is known as the 'juiceman' and has been juicing, and helping others to begin a daily juicing regime most of his life. This video is 48 minutes long and worth watching to learn about the the benefits, and history of juicing. The films about Dr.Gerson are listed on my inspiration page above. I will put this video above those films permanently.

Loaded Vegetarian Chili

We made this big crock-pot of chili to feed the family lunch over the holidays. I also made this recipe for my daughter's baby shower get together, and it was a hit. Everyone no matter their personal food lifestyle, always enjoys this hearty meal. Serve hot out of the crock-pot with some whole grain bread, multi-grain chips, or lentil crackers. Makes fantastic leftovers! Don't forget some refreshing vegetable juice!
   
Loaded Vegetarian Chili

Base:

1 can organic chopped tomatoes
1 can organic tomato paste
4 cups of homemade vegetable broth or (1 box of low sodium organic)

Fresh Vegetables:

1 tsp olive oil
1 cup chopped carrots (2-3 carrots)
2 green or red peppers chopped
2 yellow squash chopped larger
2 zucchini squash chopped larger
2 celery stalks chopped
1 small onion chopped (or half of medium onion)

Beans, tomatoes and corn:

1 can of organic Kidney Beans rinsed and drained
1 can of organic Garbanzo Beans rinsed and drained
1 can of organic Black Beans rinsed and drained
1 can of Pinto Beans rinsed and drained (optional)
1 can of Aduki Beans rinsed and drained (optional)
1 cup of fresh or frozen corn   
1 can of organic peeled tomatoes sliced in half 

Spices:

2 bay leaves
1 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 nutmeg
1 tsp turmeric
1 tsp garam masala
1 tsp paprika
1 tsp curry powder
1 tb mustard powder
2 tbs oregano
1/2 tb Himalayan pink salt sprinkle of table salt 
Sprinkling of Taco seasoning

Optional Superfoods:

2 tbs dulse flakes
2 tbs nutritional yeast
1 tb maca powder
2 tbs flax powder 1
2 tbs chia seeds soaked in a small bit of water 

optional 1/2 cup spring water to make thinner if needed 

Directions:
In frying pan cook onion in oil with spices.  Add the rest of the chopped veggies and cook 5 - 10 minutes. Add this vegetable mixture to your crock-pot. Add the rest of the ingredients to crock pot and cook on "high" for an hour. Lower temp to simmer on "low" for a few hours. Eat whenever you are ready! It's crazy good and so easy!

With any soup or stew recipe if you have your base ingredients you can make anything! So feel free to add or delete anything from this recipe according to what you have on hand, and that you know works well together. I researched a dozen different vegetarian chili recipes before I came up with this version. It's everything and the kitchen sink!

Notes: If you have problems with beans you could just use two or three kinds of beans instead of five! Also we do not like hot foods, so if you need some extra heat add however much chili spice you like to taste!

"Time to chop the vegetables!" (she said like the old "Time to make the donuts!")

Fry them up in the pan! Smells good so do a happy dance!

Spice up your life!

Put your Veggies from the frying pan into the crock-pot, add your base ingredients of broth and tomatoes. Rinse and drain your beans before adding to the crock. Turn crock-pot to high setting.

I used can beans, but you can certainly soak dried beans overnight if you buy them in bulk or bags, and use them instead.

Add the can of whole peeled organic tomatoes. So colorful! I cut some of the tomatoes in half while they are in the mix.

Gorgeous spices! I forgot to mix them in with the veggies in the frying pan. This way worked out fine anyway (and made a super photo)! If you already added your spice at the beginning, this would be a good time to taste test to see if you would like to add more of anything. Especially if you are one of those hotties!

Time to add some superfoods! Chia seeds, flax powder, maca powder, and nutritional yeast.

Soak the chia seeds a few minutes till a jelly consistency and mix the maca powder with some water to dissolve and make a liquid.

Add two tablespoons of Dulse flakes, so good for the thyroid!

Give everything a good stir, cover and let cook through on high setting. You can then lower the temp in an hour or so, and let it keep going for the rest of the day till you are ready to eat. Go do something else!  Ahhh! The beauty of crock-pot cooking!

Mmmm a warm and satisfying meal for these chilli 'chilli' winter days! Enjoy!

Loving The Carrots and Carrot Sunshine Juice

I was in a funny mood at the natural food store recently. I bought the biggest carrots I have ever seen just for fun! As well as giant sweet potatoes! They were cracking me up. I just had to do it! When my grand daughter saw them she squealed! Her first reaction was to give them a hug! So cute!

Look how big they are compared to her!

She started eating the carrot like an ear of corn! She likes eating raw carrots, but not Grandmas juice. At least not yet. I will keep working on that!

Here is a normal carrot compared to my two biggies. Hilarious!

WoW! This is how much pure carrot juice came out of those two carrots!

Carrot Sunshine Juice

3-6 carrots - depending on size! haha! Peeled.

1/2 peeled lemon

1/2 inch fresh peeled ginger root

1 peeled and cored Apple

2 stalks celery

1 peeled cucumber 

1/2 tsp Maca Powder (optional)

Add each item to your juicer except Maca powder. Stir your mixture. Mix Maca with a little water to make a slurry and then add to juice and stir. Clean your juicer parts. Now pour and drink your delicious juice. Best to drink within 15 minutes, but I usually have some extra to enjoy later in the day too. Sometimes I have the leftover juice the next day. I am not that fanatical. Every juice mixture has tasted great! Play around. If you want juice sweeter add another apple. Carrots are pretty sweet so I only add one apple. If you have blood sugar problems you should drink the sweeter juices earlier in your day. Drink up!

Getting Started On The Road To Wellness

I never imagined that I would start a food blog. I am not a chef, or even someone who thought much about food and cooking. In recent years drastic changes and life circumstances created a situation where I needed to fight and reclaim my health. That meant to understand that "I am what I eat."  My body was sensitive to all the pesticides, chemicals, additives, low nutrients, GMO's (Genetically Modified Foods), sugar and carbs that are a big part of the processed food industry. For someone who was raised on the Standard American Diet (SAD) the thought of learning a whole new way of eating and creating food for myself and my husband was overwhelming. We decided we would do this together and give ourselves the time to learn about our new choices. We made a plan to start out slowly as I was still very ill when I started down this road. It has been six months and we are still "happy learners."  The best part is that the effects of eating these whole foods, that are mostly plant based, sugar-free, and gluten free is a positive effect on so many areas of my body and mind. Ultimately this is very exciting, because you get so much satisfaction when something really works! So I recommend that you have fun with this new way of being!

So what was wrong with me? As someone once said to me, "it's as if all your systems are shutting down." I won't go into details here, but I will give a quick overview of the challenges my body was given. I am not exaggerating when I say I went to a doctors appointment or lab test every single week for two years. I was diagnosed with Hashimoto's Hypothyroidism, an auto-immune disease, a few months before I was to be married. This explained why I was constantly gaining weight even whenever I would try the old Atkins diet that had worked so well for me in the past. Nothing affected the weight gain. The thyroid controls your metabolism and I had none. I was then over-dosed with thyroid medication that year that led to my nearly having a heart attack. My body was vibrating like an old lawn mower. I got rid of that doctor. The new team of doctors also found that I had high blood pressure, pre-diabetes, extremely low vitamin D levels, RLS symptoms in my legs, pre-cancerous cells on my uterus, IBS symptoms, diverticulitis, and severe menopause. Because all these problems combined with the menopause I had not slept in three years. This was a cocktail for disaster and my body was shutting down to the point I could only sit on the sofa for months at a time and breathe. Well thank goodness for breathing! This was not the life a new bride has in mind, and at times I was very frustrated. I wanted to live a full vibrant life with my wonderful husband, who was now doing everything for me. I felt ninety, unable to even walk down our steps to go to the doctor visits, and I was needing to rest after walking across a room. I was watching the world go by from behind my eyes. As life would have it, sometimes what seems bad actually changes your life for the good. It was getting the diabetes diagnosis that moved me to actively make changes with food, and investigate what "I" could do about these problems on my own. 

I watched documentaries, read books, and researched on the internet. My new doctors after some time had gotten my medications correct for all my issues except the diabetes. I did not respond well to my medication. So I asked to be given the chance to change my blood sugar on my own, with diet and exercise. My new endocrinologist agreed to give me three months.

I decided to go to an organic and plant based diet so that I could give my body the chance to do what it does best. Heal itself. If your body is constantly fighting toxins then there is no room to heal. My body needs the micro-nutrients found in raw foods. If I actually lost weight from this new way of eating, then that would be a bonus from becoming healthy. In just the first 3 months I lost 15 pounds. The weight comes off very slowly but steady. I will take it! I also kept track of my blood sugar levels daily and what foods I was eating. Just cannot imagine what my blood sugar levels were in the past when breakfast meant bagel sandwiches, then some pasta for dinner and brownies for a midnight snack. After 6 months I have started to get some daily blood sugar numbers in the double digits and my 3 month A1C blood sugar test has come down to the top end of normal. I have lost 25 pounds and I am feeling full of new energy. I still have yet to exercise and all this improvement has been to a new way of eating. The lighter I get the more I feel like I will soon be exercising and working out. Perhaps I will start with some yoga, walking and a moderate routine.

The more weight I lose, the lower my blood pressure medications will be in the future. 
I had many doctors tell me I would never lose the weight because of my Thyroid condition! Well I am proving them wrong with eating whole foods, juicing vegetables daily, and looking out for all the ways corporations have lied to us about materials and foods that contain dangerous chemicals for the thyroid, endocrine and hormonal systems. My goal is to lose 60 pounds. We shall see how it goes. I also take a good multi-vitamin, a high dose Vitamin D prescription every two weeks, and sub-lingual B-12 supplement daily. The daily vitamins pushed my RLS symptoms down to a level where I only notice a sensation occasionally. I can live with that! The B12 helped to dissipate some strange sensations I was getting in my nerve endings. The Vitamin D helped me to walk down steps and have more energy. Also happily my first pap test since my Leep Procedure operation for pre-cancer cells has come back clear. Those are all good things! Vitamins are an inexpensive way to get things under control. Much better than dangerous and expensive pharmaceuticals. Removing the toxins from my diet; by not eating processed, pesticide covered, hormone injected, antibiotic filled, and freaky GMO foods gives my body the head start on using all the new micro-nutrients that juicing vegetables and plants provide naturally.

The good news for me is all of this is working! I have two diseases, plus menopause, that all make you gain weight as a result of having them. If I can feel better and lose weight with these conditions so can others! Supposedly they also cause depression, but I have not experienced that symptom. For the past couple of years I had no energy and would fall asleep every couple of hours, constantly napping. Now with proper thyroid medication, estrogen (hopefully short term), blood pressure medicine (decreasing soon as I just got a lower prescription), juicing and whole foods, I am back to doing normal activities and enjoying playing with my grandchildren. In the past I could not even go outside to take my granddaughter for a walk. Food may not cure my thyroid, but my body will be more able to heal itself and grow stronger in many other areas. Who knows, even my thyroid probably benefits from that. Changing my food certainly did get my blood sugar under control and give me mental clarity.

I am not a doctor and I am no substitute for your doctors medical advice. So talk to your physician, do the research, and ask questions of your medical professionals. Be your own advocate for your health and well being! You can start with what you put into your body right now.

I started this blog with the idea to help others who may find themselves at the beginning of wanting to make a change to whole foods. This is an ongoing process of learning and eating yummy food that has turned out to be fun! Plus you may just help our planet by buying from local organic farmers! Helping yourself, your family, and the world. Now that is social change we can do! I will hopefully in the near future link to a post about the symptoms I was experiencing when my body started to fail in order to help those who may have the same problems get earlier treatment. At first I was blaming everything on having menopause...well that wasn't the whole story. I was not going to talk about those things unless I had something positive to talk about...now I do!!!

UPDATE: (February 2012) I did not begin this new way of eating specifically to lose weight, but after eight months I have lost nearly 40 pounds. It is winter and I am busy with the grandchildren 11 hours a day, so still no exercise routine. Spring is coming and one day we will be able to get outside again and start walking. Unfortunately the estrogen therapy used to help me sleep, may have caused a problem in my breast tissue. I have three areas of pre-cancerous cells in one breast, so I stopped the estrogen treatment and my constant hot flashes that interrupt my sleep are back, they are bad, but only occasionally are debilitating to my sleep. 

UPDATE: (June 2012) I just found out the second core biopsy on my breast is positive for cancer. So that medical trip will be another journey to conquer. Still it is too soon to talk about here. I will be watching the documentary "Crazy Sexy Cancer" again. I imagine I will start a cancer info page at the top of this blog, as I now research that topic, and how I can approach this new diagnosis. I am very glad that I am stronger now, due to my changes to eating organic healthy foods and juicing. So I got that going for me!

UPDATE: (March 2013) I had a double lumpectomy and all margins were clean. My oncologist was amazed at how well my scar healed. My body is awesome at repairing itself now. I also have not gotten a cold or the flu since I started eating healthy organic whole foods, juicing, and making green smoothies. Weight loss so far 70 pounds. Hot flashes still suck.

Here is the link to the in-depth story of my dealing with constant chronic illness, and getting strong and healthy, through eating and juicing organic plants! Juice on rock stars!