Recipes from Tom Monte's book, Unexpected Recoveries, Seven Steps to healing Body, Mind, and Soul when Serious Illness Strikes.  Reprinted with permission from the publisher, Square One publisher, 2017.

 

GLUTEN FREE
 

All the recipes provided are gluten free.  Gluten is a protein in some grains and grain products that can be toxic for many people today.   We have taken into account the growing level of sensitivity to gluten and excluded it from all our recommended foods and recipes.  If you are attempting to heal from a serious illness, gluten is a food substance best avoided. 

 

ORGANIC IS BEST
 

We urge you to eat only organically grown grains, vegetables, beans, and fruit, and to eat only ocean-caught white fish.  Organic plant foods have been grown without the use of synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, and herbicides.  Synthetic fertilizers and pesticides can be highly toxic, indeed, cancer causing, and should be avoided on a healing diet. Organic animal foods have been raised only on organic plant foods and are free of synthetic hormones, antibiotics, and artificial coloring agents.
 

Make sure all your food is non-GMO (genetically free organisms).  GMO foods are genetically designed to require synthetic pesticides, fertilizers, and herbicides, all of which can be extremely harmful to your health.        

 

 

CHOOSE ONLY HIGH QUALITY SALT
 

Only high quality sea salt, such as Celtic gray sea salt, or its land equivalent, Himalayan pink salt, are recommended.  Both are rich in wide array of trace minerals that are essential to health and healing. Standard table salt is highly refined, devoid of trace minerals, and often laced with sugar. 

 

SEA VEGETABLES
 

All the sea vegetables included in the recipes can be purchased from U.S. sources. Alaria, also known as Atlantic alaria, is the American word for Japanese wakame.  The other standard Japanese names for the common seaweeds — such as nori and kombu — are also used in the U.S.  Sources for American and Japanese seaweeds can be found in the Resource Guide. 

 

SOY BEANS AND SOY PRODUCTS
 

Soups stews, and sauces can be made with sea salt or Himalayan salt, instead of miso, tamari, and shoyu, for those who have allergies to soybeans and soy products. 

 

OILS
 

Only organic, cold pressed, extra virgin olive oil and organic sesame and organic toasted sesame oil is recommended in cooking.  While on a healing diet, limit oils to about a single tablespoon of oil daily. 

 

AVOID PROCESSED FOODS AND SUGAR
 

We recommend that you avoid all processed foods and sugar while you are combating major illness.  Virtually all processed foods contain sugar today, though the food industry has become more adept at hiding the sugar under various chemical names.  That list includes Aspartame and its various derivatives, which include dextrose, sucrose, Equal, NatraTaste Blue, and NutraSweet; Cyclamate; Erythritol; Glycold; Glycyrrhizin; Hydrogenated starch; Isomalt; lactitol; Maltitol; Stevia; Saccharin, and its derivatives, which include SugarTwin and Sweet’N Low; and Fruit juice concentrate.  There are a variety of “natural” sweaters that we also recommend that you avoid.  Among the more common of these are Agave, date sugar, honey, and maple syrup. 
 

Until you have restored and stabilized your health — meaning you have been healthy for more than a year — we urge you to avoid all sugars, synthetic and natural. 

 

AVOID PLASTIC BOTTLES AND CONTAINERS AND CANNED FOODS
 

Plastic water bottles and cans containing foods are lined with bisphenol A, or BPA, which has been found to create hormonal imbalances, disrupt the   endocrine system, and create disorders of the brain, nervous, and reproductive systems.  Avoid drinking from all plastic bottles and eating foods packaged in cans.