Not everyone will do well with these foods, but the vast majority will have health improvement by regularly consuming them. As always, it is important to listen to your body and let it guide you in making that determination. With some foods though, like fermented vegetables, you will need to start with very small amounts and work your way up to a healthy dose over a few months.
1. Fermented Vegetables
Fermented, or cultured, vegetables are teeming with essential enzymes and good bacteria needed for optimal digestion and they are easier to digest than raw or cooked vegetables. When you eat raw cultured vegetables loaded with enzymes, you give your body an opportunity to use its bodily stores of enzymes to rejuvenate itself instead of exhausting them trying to digest overly processed and otherwise dead food. Cultured foods also offer a multitude of medicinal rewards by:
- Alleviating digestive disorders – the flora in living cultured foods form a “living shield” that covers your small intestine’s inner lining and resists pathogenic organisms like Escherichia coli, Salmonella and an unhealthy overgrowth of yeast
- Strengthening immunity with increased antibodies that fight off infectious disease
- Helping pregnant and nursing mothers transfer beneficial bacteria to their infants
- Effectively impacting the behavior of children with autism,ADD/ and ADHD
- Regulating weight and appetite by reducing cravings for sugar, soft drinks, bread and pasta — all foods I strongly advise against
Fermented foods are also among some of the best chelators available. The beneficial bacteria in these foods are very potent detoxifiers, capable of drawing out a wide range of environmental toxins, including pesticides and and heavy metals. And you don’t need to consume huge amounts either. Caroline Barringer recommends eating about a quarter to a half a cup of fermented vegetables, or cultured food such as raw yoghurt, per day. In the following video, she discusses the process of fermenting your own vegetables in some detail, so for more information, please listen to that interview.
2. Kale
Kale contains fiber and antioxidants, and is one of the best sources of vitamin A, which promotes eye and skin health and may help strengthen your immune system. A one-cup serving has almost as much vitamin C as an orange and as much calcium as a cup of milk. It’s simply an excellent source of multiple vitamins and other nutrients, including:
| Vitamin A | Vitamin B | Vitamin C |
| Calcium | Lutein (helps protect against macular degeneration) | Zeaxanthin (helps protect against macular degeneration) |
| Indole-3-carbinol (may protect against colon cancer) | Iron | Chlorophyll |
3. Kefir and Other Fermented Beverages
Kefir is a fermented milk beverage that contains beneficial probiotics that may help give your immune system a boost, among other health benefits. One of the best and least expensive ways to get healthy bacteria through your diet is actually to obtain raw milk and convert it to kefir yourself. All you need is one-half packet of kefir starter granules in a quart of raw milk, which you leave at room temperature overnight. By the time you wake up in the morning you will likely have kefir. If it hasn’t obtained the consistency of yogurt you might want to set it out a bit longer and then store it in the fridge…
Read More: mercola.com
