The Budwig Diet
Have you heard of the Budwig Diet? The word ‘diet’ has a lot of negative connotations for many people. There are thousands of different diets out there, all claiming to promote health, weight loss, muscle gain, or a whole host of other “wonderful” results.
The Budwig Diet differs from these. Put simply, the Budwig Diet is an approach based on common sense; if you eat good, healthy food, you will be healthier. If your diet contains all the essential nutrients and very few harmful substances, you are giving your body its best chance of getting and staying healthy, and fighting diseases.
On the Budwig Diet, we encourage you to make small, achievable, practical changes, like switching out unhealthy food for fresh, nourishing options. You don’t need to go hungry, and your calorie intake is up to you. The Budwig Diet focuses on the quality of your intake. For people with existing health problems and for our patients who are already battling cancer, we believe that strict adherence to the Budwig protocol is the best way to enable your body to fight the disease.
The Origin Of The Budwig Diet
The Budwig Diet was developed by Dr. Johanna Budwig, an insightful clinician with a passion for developing an evidence-based, natural, and effective approach to health. Her research into essential fatty acids and the impact of diet and holistic health on disease progression and prevention has inspired the works of conventional medics and naturopaths alike.
Dr. Budwig created more than just a diet: a blueprint for health, based on a complete understanding of an individual’s physical and emotional needs as well as the benefits of a nutrient-rich diet and lifestyle.
What Is The Budwig Diet?
As already stated, a lot of it is just common sense: eating natural, fresh food and focusing on nutritious organic fruits and vegetables. Add to this an attitude of respect – respect for the body’s ability to maintain and mend itself, given the right tools; respect for the food we eat, seeing the value in good food and natural vitamins and minerals; and respect for our emotions, along with an understanding that every part of the body and mind is interlinked.
The Budwig Diet teaches us to appreciate and consume only truly nourishing food. No one on the Budwig Diet needs to starve themselves, eat anything they don’t like, or miss out on things that they do like. With the Budwig Diet, you learn to understand and enjoy the properties of natural food. It includes simple healthy switches such as:
- Cutting out refined sugars for naturally sweet ingredients such as raw honey, pure stevia, or ripe fruits.
- Replace animal proteins with seeds, nuts, spirulina, plant sources of protein, and Budwig muesli.
- Reduce your dairy intake – try swapping cows’ milk for oat, almond, or rice milk.
- Reduce your wheat intake; gluten-free flour is now readily available, and rye, spelt and oat-based flours and baked products are naturally low in gluten.
- Swap processed or animal-derived oils and fats for cold-pressed, virgin or extra virgin plant oils.
In addition, there are some specific recipes that Dr. Budwig created to help us attain peak nourishment and fight pre-existing diseases. The most important was her ‘Budwig Muesli’, a meal centered around flaxseeds, flaxseed oil, and cottage cheese or quark. This is a carefully planned mix of essential fatty acids that Dr. Budwig found could prevent, inhibit, and actually reverse cancer growth in many of her patients. Dr. Budwig had great success with this mix and recommended it for everyone, not just cancer patients.
The Budwig muesli is one of the few occasions where Dr. Budwig recommended any dairy-based food. Johanna Budwig believed in the unrivaled health benefits of the vegetarian diet, the most direct way to benefit from fresh, raw nutrients with none of the harmful toxins found in meat.
For recipes, advice, a fully personalized wellness package, and much more, contact our expert advisors at the Budwig Center. For clients engaging in our clinical programs, we devote time during your stay with us to create healthy, delicious meals and to teach the Budwig approach to nutrition as an essential component of your journey to health. After all, health comes from within.
Food Chart – Foods To Avoid And Foods To Consume
START YOUR DAY – Drink a glass of pure water.
FRUITS: 2 or 3 servings of fruit(s). The body is in ‘cleansing’ mode in the morning and fruits are perfect. 10 minutes later, eat your breakfast. Fruits take 10 minutes to digest, but others take 2 to 8 hours. So never eat fruits (especially melons) after or with other food as this will cause gas and indigestion.
VEGETABLES: Cooking or boiling vegetables at temperatures more than 105 ºF (41 ºC) destroys important enzymes in the food; instead, steam cook your vegetables, which releases 5 times the amount of vitamins than in most raw vegetables. When possible, eat the potato skins as that is where the vitamins are.
FOODS THAT DAMAGE YOUR HEALTH
SUGAR: White refined sugar, fructose, corn syrup, aspartame, splendida, etc., are very dangerous and ravage the immune system and contribute to anxiety, mood swings, fatigue, premature aging, etc. Store-bought pastries, candies, sweets and soda/fizzy drinks (contain 10 teaspoons of white refined sugar) cause osteoporosis, obesity, tooth decay, heart disease, flu, cold and exhaustion.
PROTEIN: Seafood: Shellfish (clams, oysters, lobsters, and shrimps), octopus and eels are loaded with toxins as they are scavengers and cleaners of the sea, rivers, and oceans. Seafood may be contaminated with parasites and resistant viruses that may not even be killed in high heat. Pigs clean the earth and pork is toxic; it has the roundworm Trichinella spiralis. Ham, sausages, hot dogs, and bacon have additional harmful nitrates and additives that damage our reproductive organs.
DAIRY: Reduce dairy intake but enjoy the flaxseed oil and cottage cheese/quark “muesli” twice a day, if you have cancer. Enjoy a small amount of sheep or goat cheese. Avoid soy as it disturbs the normal functioning of the thyroid and is mostly GMO.
FLOUR: White flour (white bread) has no nutrition. When mixed with water, it becomes glue and causes a multitude of health problems, i.e. digestive issues.
OILS: Consuming refined vegetable oils along with white sugar/fructose causes serious damage to the circulatory system and greatly reduces your energy.
FOODS TO ENJOY FOR GOOD HEALTH
- Use raw honey, 100% pure stevia, Xylitol in small amounts and berries; dates and figs are the two most perfect foods. Make your own desserts. Enjoy natural Budwig Ice Cream and homemade raw chocolate and desserts.* Add sparkling water to fruit juice instead of soft drinks or soda.
- Vegetarianism is the best way to enjoy good health, especially if you have a chronic illness. Protein from plant sources is the best choice. Spirulina has 65% protein – 20% more protein than meat. Consume nuts (raw and unroasted) and soaked seeds. Hemp seeds contain all the essential amino acids and essential fatty acids necessary for human life. No meat, no eggs, no animal protein, if you have cancer. Quark/cottage cheese mixed with the flaxseed oil, as in the Budwig Muesli, is the only exception. (See Budwig Guide).
- Consume oats, rice, almond milk, flaxseed oil and cottage cheese (quark), which are low-fat and, as such, are usually well tolerated. Consume Budwig ice cream as commercial ice creams contain high amounts of refined sugar and other chemicals, i.e. ‘diethyl glycol’, which is also used in antifreeze.
- Spelt, oatmeal, and rye grains are better choices. No gluten flours. Limit intake of wheat, which many are intolerant to. Make your own cereal and pancakes.*
- Cook only with virgin coconut oil. Use only cold-pressed extra virgin olive oil in recipes and salads.
If you are suffering from a chronic illness or an ongoing health issue, improving your food choices will be one of the cornerstones to improve your health. Drink only pure water and herbal teas. Go on YouTube and look for some good stretching exercises to do daily. 2 or 3 times a week, get a good workout, and walk 20 or 30 minutes a day at a good steady pace. If you do not make these “lifestyle” changes a permanent part of your Cancer Program, then you will struggle to overcome sickness and enjoy good and vibrant energy and health. Contact us for more in-depth information at Contact@budwigcenter.com