Implementation Tips

Helpful tips for those implementing IC Diet

After emphasizing that the sour taste (acid taste in Nature), the salty and pungent tastes should be avoided. In general these are the following: sour fruits in general to include cranberries and surprisingly bananas and peaches both of which have sour and pungent affects once they enter the body; garlic, hot chilies, raw onion, spinach, tomatoes; bread with yeast, corn; soy sauce; beef, seafood, salmon; vinegar; all nuts (fatty acids); carbonated drinks (carbonic acid), coffee chocolate (tannic acid), cranberry juice (hippuric acid), grapefruit juice (citric acid).

The spice drawer is actually a medicine cabinet. Using cooling spices to help with digestion and avoiding the heating spices (in the avoid or no column) can reduce the Pitta energy pattern and stop the Pitta aggravation. The vegetable cilantro, from which we get the spice coriander, is particularly good for cooling. Remember that spices can be used to bring about balance in an imbalancing food. For example, seafood or salmon is meat that has lived in saltwater; hence its meat is salty and would be Pitta aggravating (it would add more of this vibrational frequency to the physiology). Since one is avoiding the salty taste, seafood should be avoided. However if one uses cooling spices such as cumin, coriander, fresh ginger, fresh basil (pesto sauce anyone?) or turmeric or a combination of these spices, seafood becomes less imbalancing.

A diet diary for one-week listing all foods consumed is a helpful way for the beginner to become aware of the foods that are being chosen and potentially problematic.