The Fresh Network Blog

10 Years Younger in 10 Days

Roe Gallo outlines a health plan that will leave you feeling revivified and rejuvenated in just over a week.

Do you look in the mirror and see a body you don’t recognize? Do you wake up with aches in muscles and bones you didn’t know you had? Are you just too tired by the end of the day to do anything but plop down on the couch? And are you beginning to believe that there isn’t anything you can do about it?

What makes you look and feel old?

I asked this question to many people in different age groups ranging from late 20’s to late 80’s and the answers were, surprisingly, very similar:

• People were concerned about their weight making them look older.

• They felt the stress in their lives showed through.

Win a copy of Raw Freedom - cookery book by Saskia Fraser

Raw Freedom is packed with 80 easy and inspiring recipes, all with beautiful full-colour photos. From breakfasts, soups and pâtés to pastas, main courses and desserts (including raspberry cheesecake and chocolate orange mousse!) you’ll be amazed by the flavours and luxurious textures Saskia helps you to achieve.

Saskia’s approach to raw food is all about making it accessible for everyone, and the book includes tips on incorporating raw and healthy cooked foods so it’s easy to feed yourself, family and friends all in one meal.

A Day With Brian Clement

 

We're delighted to announce that The Fresh Network is hosting another Brian Clement event this year!

After a sold-out event last June, we are excited to welcome back this world-renowned expert from the Hippocrates Health Institute in Florida. Brian has spent the past three decades conducting ground-breaking research into nutrition and health, ensuring that what he shares is always right at the cutting edge.

Go here to find out more...

This New Year Ditch Dieting for Good! says Kirsten Flowers

by Kirsten Flowers

 

Don't start another diet, Stop Counting calories it's NOT the answer! Nor is the latest best selling diet book - Dieting doesn't work!  There I've said it.  If you want to lose weight the very first thing you need to change is your mindset!

Some people like to be seen wearing the latest designer label in fashion.  It is also now a rapidly growing trend to be following the latest diet or food regime eg vegan, raw, 5:2 and so many more. Whether it be what you wear or what you eat and how, it matters a lot ... to some people! How you see yourself and how you are perceived by your peer group and society can seem very important, an insight into the type of person you are, which can feel quite revealing.  People put themselves under a lot of pressure to follow the rules of a diet, detox or fast and it seems anything less than 100% shows weakness, a lack of self discipline.  

Hippocrates Living Foods Programme

Hippocrates Living Foods Programme

A Day of Practical Preparation Demos 

with Nadia Brydon & Jill Swyers, Hippocrates Health Educators

Sunday June 30th , 10-30am - 4.30pm. lunch provided, London SW6.

£70 early booking.

Go here to reserve your seat www.allaboutnaturalmedicine.com. Or call 020 8350 4607 / 07984 592626

Quick, Easy and Creative Ideas for Healthful Lunches for Children

 by Karen Ranzi, M.A.

Much research in the past decade has reported the immense benefits of eating mainly fresh plant foods, or eating them exclusively. Raw fruits and vegetables, sprouts, sea vegetables, nuts and seeds are vitamin and mineral packed. Nutrients can be severely depleted from 70 to 85% by means of the cooking process. Organic, living foods provide “life force energy,” so encouraging children to create healthful and tasty snacks, smoothies, salads, main dishes and desserts with living foods can enhance their abilities in all areas.

After increasing their children’s fresh plant food intake, here are some improvements in their health and wellbeing parents have pointed out to me: Reduction or absence of eye, ear, nose and throat infections, increased energy and longer attention spans, enhanced ability to process information, less hyperactivity, strengthened immune systems, enhanced athletic performance, and increased brainpower.

Spend A Day with Dr. Brian Clement and The Fresh Network

 

VENUE: Camden Centre, Camden Town Hall, Judd Street, London, WC1H 9JE 
(Opposite King's Cross & St Pancras station.)


DATE: Sunday 23rd June 2013 

TIME: 11.30am-3.30pm  

Go here to book your early bird tickets for just £22.00 before 31st March 2013.

 

Seminar with Dr. Brian Clement

After a sold out event last year, we are proud and honored to be hosting this world-renowned leader in the living foods diet and one of the most sought after speakers in the fields of optimum nutrition and holistic health today.

We invite you to join us at The Fresh Network's Inspirational and Informative event with Dr. Brian Clement PhD, Director of the Hippocrates Institute in Florida.

 

 Power of Living Foods to Heal Disease & Conquer Ageing 

'A Day with Dr Brian Clement' will be held in the Camden Centre, London on the 23rd June where he will be discussing the 'Power of Living Foods to Heal Disease & Conquer Ageing.'


 

Dr Clement will address the basic and extraordinary mechanisms that bring about heightened and balanced immunity.

 

The tests that can take the guesswork out of your health regime

Did you know that there are safe – yet extremely under-utilised – tests that can give you valuable feedback about what is going on in your cells, and help you establish which diet and lifestyle will be optimal for you? Nutritional therapist Niki Gratrix reports.

I am excited to be sharing information in this article which is literally at the cutting edge of nutrition and really gives the reader a glimpse into the future direction of this field. This information is very timely and appropriate for those interested in optimum health and raw food. While disagreement continues to rage within the field about what is the “best” diet, in this article I’ll run through the tests which can help you to discover whether or not a particular diet and lifestyle is right for you. 

I’ll be covering two categories of tests in this article. First, some basic “functional” tests which you can use to get information about your level of health before a diagnosable disease state occurs. They can also help you establish if your diet and lifestyle are leading to any deficiencies or imbalances.

At the moment, functional testing is greatly under-utilised by those interested in optimum health and well-being. This is partly because some of the tests that can be really useful have to be paid for, and – in the UK anyway – we’re all used to getting healthcare for free on the NHS. In addition, increased regulation means that these tests can only be ordered by qualified practitioners. There is no direct advertising about them to the public, so they are little known about. 

Yet there are some fantastic tests out there which can give you valuable objective feedback as to how well balanced you are biochemically, and take the guesswork out of your diet and lifestyle choices. Sometimes, having a result in black and white can really motivate you to complete the regime or make the changes you need to. Other times it can confirm you really have cleared that parasite or candida now, or the other goal you were trying to achieve, so there’s no need for the strict diet or supplements any longer.

Dairy didn't work for me, says Debbie Took

2010 has been a year of fierce debate among raw food fans about whether or not our optimal diet is a vegan one. We first chimed in on this topic in January with our article Why the shift away from veganism in the raw world?, and again in February when Doug Graham and Thomas Billings debated the topic in the article Is 100% raw vegan our optimal diet? Later that month we revisited it in Are YOU getting enough vitamin D?

Popular raw food blogger Debbie Took contributed interesting material to the debate in March and April when she announced that she had tested below the normal range in vitamin B12 - B12 being one of the biggest deficiency risks among vegans. 

A raw vegan for around three and a half years at the time, she was forced to choose between taking supplements - something she didn't believe in - and compromising on the vegan part - something else she was dead set against doing. She tells the full story around this tough decision in her articles Debbie Does B12 Part 1 and Part 2.

She eventually decided that compromising on the vegan part was the lesser of two evils - largely because it was the more natural solution of the two - and she added a little soft cheese to her diet. However, she found raw cheese near impossible to source, and as for ethically produced - that unfortunately does not exist at this time. So she was forced to compromise not only on (1) her vegan diet but also on (2) her raw diet and (3) her strong desire not to cause suffering to other sentient beings. Nonetheless, for a while this decision still seemed to be the best option available to her.

However, Debbie privately emailed me an update recently, and I asked her permission to share this information with you, as it is written with such honesty and openness. At a time when there is still so much we don't know about optimum nutrition, all such accounts have something to teach us, and I know this one will resonate with many of you. Debbie kindly agreed to have her comments made public, and you can read them by clicking below. Thank you, Debbie, for sharing your experiences with me, and with our readers.

Vitamin D supplementation - a reader's experience

In February we wrote about the high risk of vitamin D deficiency for vegans living in locations which don't get year-round sunshine. If that description applies to you, this article contains essential information.

Reader Angie Bedson shared her experiences here back in April and she recently sent us a helpful update, which we share below with her permission.

First, a brief explanatory note. Angie mentions the half life of vitamin D. The half life is the length of time it takes for half of the amount ingested to be eliminated from the body. Vitamin D has a half life of approximately four weeks. The advantage of this is that as long as the body has adequate stores of it, you can go without it for this period and not run into a deficiency. The disadvantage is that if, on the other hand, you're supplementing it, you can build up too much of it and run into problems of excess. When we're getting our vitamin D from sunshine this never occurs. It is also hard to get too much from food sources. But when we're taking supplemental vitamin D, overdosing is a risk, as Angie discovered.

"Dear Sarah,

Sorry if this e-mail is a bit long but I promised to keep you updated on my vitamin D progress.... To recap, I had a result of just 12 on my first hydroxy vitamin D test [The Fresh Network notes: according to The Vitamin D Council a healthy level is at least 50] and I have been using 2,000 IU of ‘Sunshine Mist’ [a vitamin D supplement] for a total of 3-4 months now.
 
Firstly, I believe that the raw food community will only progress positively if we all remain as honest and open about our experiences as possible. In some ways we are pioneers and, some might even say, guinea-pigs – but I happily accept this if it will benefit others in their quest for optimum health.
 
Secondly, I want to point out that I fully agree with your stance that vitamin D is vital to good health and that raw fooders, especially those of us in Northern latitudes, are at great risk of being deficient in this nutrient.