Following up on previous post, time for some status check on shift to suryaharam. Modern food system involves staggering amounts of intervention between the time food is produced (suryaharam stage) and when it ultimately reaches the mouth. Yesterday, i made a list of the intervening steps.
Stage-1: Food production process itself
- Application of pesticides, herbicides etc, traces of which enter our bodies ultimately.
- Genetically modified foods.
- Treat cows with antibiotics, growth hormones etc, to boost up production.
Stage-2: post-production processing steps
- “Polish”. Remove almost all of nutrient rich husk from rice, wheat etc.
- Add preservatives, colors and other agents
- Pasteurize/homogenize milk
- Treat some foods with radiation
- Long term refrigeration for storage
- Apply wax for shine
Stage-3: Post-purchase processing at home
- Heat, pressure cook, oil fry etc
- Add salts, oils, refined sugar etc
- refrigerate
These are just off the top of my head. Iam sure there are many many more steps involved. We can imagine how much potency of the food is lost, during these steps. My goal is to consume foods which have gone through least number of intervening steps. There’s a limit on how many steps can be eliminated when one lives in an urban environment (for example, difficult to get fully organic food), but there’s a lot i can work on even within those limitations.
So far, following are the specific steps i have taken:
- Increased water intake. I’ve also been conscious of when to take that water (preferably on empty stomach, Atleast 2 hrs gap after meal etc)
- Breakfast is 100% suryaharam. hurray !! Mainly consisting of sprouts, based on MSR’s recommendation.
- Trying to avoid coffee. I used to drink coffee first thing in the morning, but now i almost got rid of that habit. May have small shot sometime mid-morning if needed. The goal is to make it very very occasional, if at all.
- No changes to lunch. Standard indian vegetarian food.
- Have early dinner, say around 7pm. The trick is to make it light and rest the system at night. Some days i just had fruits for dinner, some days fruits + curd rice. Still experimenting..
This is just the very beginning. Over the next few months, I plan to shift to a predominantly suryaharam diet. Lets see how it plays out ….
