What If?

So yesterday in my walk, I passed McDonalds and the thought jumped into my brain about a new restaurant idea. What if there was a fast food vegan restaurant? Would people flock to it as they do to the fat laden, unhealthly cousin? 

I thought it could be named McDaniels and have roasted potatoes, veggie burgers, and green smoothies. Of course it would have to have quick tossed salads and apple snacks, and could offer carrot and celery (organic of course) sticks. It could also have Seitan bites for the kids and there would only natural juices and water. 

I wonder of such a restaurant could make a go of it. I don't know enough of the restaurant business otherwise I would try. Maybe a food truck at first to test the concept. I suppose if the food tastes good enough people would buy it anyway. If you said it was vegan no one would try because you mention vegan and people simple scowl at you. Gee, I wonder...

Why?

I saw this cartoon on a friends Facebook page a while ago and loved it. It was posted shortly after I went vegan and laughed because I have experienced this attitude often when telling others about the lifestyle. I still laugh everytime someone coils at the idea of not eating meat and dairy.

The other day I heard that a coworker has been diagnosed a while ago with an autoimmune disease which could be helped with a grain free vegan diet. I know it is a very restricted diet, but if it made you get better why would you not try it? This coworker has not even tried it and I keep asking myself why.

I guess one can't force others to immediately take on a direction which is considered so out of mainstream like vegan-ism. I guess even if it makes total sense to me, others still find it too extreme. Oh well, maybe they don't want to get better.

Dressing

One of the challenges I have with the Forks over Knives (FOK) diet is the no oil. I love salads and usually liberally pour over straight olive oil and balsamic vinegar before I tuck in. Yummy. So when I read that oil is considered a no-no on this I was a little taken aback. 

After reading further I understand. Oil, no matter what its form is highly processed and contains just the fat and nothing but the fat. High in calories, which it know because I enter things into the recipe analysis app for the recipes I do I see that to be true. Their research has shown that oil does not  help the reversal of the arteries as the plant based whole foods do.

However, I was happy to find this link:  https://sites.google.com/site/hgkprintablerecipes/big-list-of-no-oil-salad-dressings that has all kinds of dressings. Not all of them are FOK approved, but there are some really good ones. In addition I found an oil free mayo that uses tofu,lemon juice, and some others stuff that sounds good on the blog Cooking With Plants. All of these are well worth the trip.

New Recipes!

I always love doing new things in the kitchen and am constantly on the lookout for new recipes. With this vegan diet, a new world of cooking has opened up for me and I find it really interesting to make something delicious that is also healthy. 

After seeing Forks over Knives I realized I used an awful lot of oil on my cooking. I pour in several tablespoons for practically everything and was wondering about the high fat this causes. The Forks over Knives uses no oil so sautéing things without oil is very foreign to me. But I bought the $4.99 iPad app, which Is basically the book to the lifestyle, and the recipes I have tried so far have been really yummy. My only complaint is that there are no calorie content listed so I have to use the app I found online to determine what the nutritional information is for everything.

All in all, this new road in my journey toward health is becoming more delicious at every turn. I am getting less bothered by not eating cheese and now not using oil - or at least not as much as I have in the past. 

The China Study

Last night I attended a screening of Forks over Knives (check out their site at forksoverknives.com) It is based on a book by T Colin Campbell called The China Study. This book entails the work Dr. Campbell has done, along with data from other like minded researchers, who have discovered that a plant based, whole foods, diet will cure everything from cancer to diabetes and everything in between.  As you may know, these diseases are the major causes of death in this country and it is their findings that show these ailments are caused by eating meat and dairy. "Milk does not do a body good..."

As you may know, I have been following a vegetarian lifestyle in the past few years. As of about six months ago I have tried to increase that to vegan. I have noticed some very interesting changes (see my blog entry for my recent dentist appointment). In addition to the dental improvements, I have finally been losing weight after years of trying unsuccessfully. I thought it was just due to the gluten aspect, but according to this film, the plant based diet's first really noticeable change is weight loss.

I got a copy of the book at the showing and will report more as I read, but this is very exciting to me. I have told many about the lifestyle and some have been interested and others have not. If I had a disease (and I do with the diabetes) and fixing it would be as simple as eating differently why would I not try it? You have nothing to lose but the pounds and bad health.

Something to this Gluten free

So I had a dentist appointment yesterday. I have had to start going every four months because my gums are getting bad. There was inflamation and bleeding even though my home care was good. I had pockets in the gums around my back teeth and things were not liking good. 

So almost a half a year ago I switched to a vegan, gluten free diet and my dentist was pleasantly surprised at things looked. My gums were not inflamed, there was no bleeding, and the pockets had reversed themselves and were much less. One went from a six to a four. They asked me what I had done differently and I told them about the new diet.

So I guess the gluten affects everything including my gums. I had heard that gluten caused inflammation in the body and I guess they are affected as well. This diet can be very demanding but with results like this, it makes it so worth it.