I’m a big fan. You are doing some great work & I’m looking forward to your book!

I was wondering if you have any thoughts on juice feasting. I have read many testimonials of people who have used a juice feast to “kick start” a change from SAD to whole food diet with a lot of success. I have been in a high raw vegan / minimal grain zone since February. I’m a professional (cooked) chef, so I taste a good deal of foods with animal products, dairy, white flour, vegetable oils etc. I feel like I haven’t really detoxed much because of work related tasting. I should mention that when I stopped drinking coffee in March, I had a metallic taste in my mouth for a few days.

My diet varies day to day, but it starts with kale based green juice. I usually follow that with 2 mono fruit meals, or a green smoothy and 1 mono fruit meal. If I’m at work, I’ll follow that with a salad and my last meal for the day is usually cooked vegan food. When I have a day off, I’ll follow the fruit with a mix of raw & cooked vegan food, whatever I’m in the mood for. I’ll also have 1 cup of green tea in the afternoon, a few cups of herbal tea in the evening, and a few glasses of wine per week. Foods I eat regularly include: all greens, beets, radish, celery, cilantro, carrots, bananas, seaweed, avocado, chia seeds, sprouts, legumes (cooked), and home fermented veggies. I eat fish, eggs, and buckwheat or rice noodles about once a week. I eat about a 1/4 cup of nuts or seeds almost everyday. This time of year I’m enjoying cooked winter squash & sweet potato, apples, pears, cauliflower, ginger, parsnips and other root veggies.

As far as your list of symptoms I should be thinking about, I have some from both lists. I’ll have a few days of feeling great, followed by days where I’m really tired. I have small but frequent acne breakouts. My skin, other than where I’m breaking out, is quite dry (I do live in the desert though). I am digesting food just fine. My only cravings are for my favorite vegan cooked foods like pad thai, chow fun noodles with broccoli, or a black bead burrito. I attribute these cravings, however, to it being cold outside instead of lack of nutrients. I have noticed a loss in muscle tone, but I haven’t had much time to work out since July. And even though over the past 10 months I have really changed my diet for the better and have lost about 5 pounds, I would like to lose 10 more.

I am planing on quitting my job the end of the year and opening a new restaurant in the spring. The menu will be much more in tune with how I want to eat. I am planning on taking the month of January off before the restaurant gets under way and I thought this could be the perfect time to do a juice feast. I’ll have time for rest, yoga, crafty things around the house, and wont have to worry about being around food all day. My boyfriend is willing to do the feast with me… he is trying to transition away from a SAD diet… so we would be able to support each other.

I am thinking we would do a 30 day juice feast relying heavily on green juice. Since it will be January, we would mix in a lot of citrus since that is at its peak at that time. I also have access to locally grown organic sprouts. Do you have any thoughts on whether or not this could be too long of a fast / feast?

I would appreciate any and all comments.

Keep up the good work!!!
Megan

You need to pay more attention to how clever agricultural researchers have become in protecting their appointed beneficiaries: commercial farmers. Yep, Ma & Pa Kettle, not just Archer Daniels Midland.

The agriculturalists have gotten quite expert at breeding cultivars of vegetables which have enhanced fake (ie, cosmetic) shelf lives.

They have also become all too expert at breeding cultivars which have fake “shelf appeal” to several generations of shoppers who were lectured to select strongly-colored veggies!

Denise: can you show me a seed catalog which proclaims the harvest-yield as densely packed in nutrients?

sounds like you stumbled on the same conclusions as him, perhaps you read his books.

amalgams still in your mouth? we can’t ignore swallowing mercury with every bite, or maybe we can.

Thank you very much for the interesting style, approach and information!