[soliloquy id=”304″]
Chewing to Liquid
Recently someone I was with vomited. (I won´t use any name to protect the not-so-innocent.) Here´s what I noticed: It had chunks in it! Other people may be sickened by looking at vomit, but because of my biology background it fascinates me. Actually, lots of gross things fascinate me, but I digress. The fact that it had chunks showed that the person was not chewing properly.
To get value from food, it must be chewed until it is liquid. Think about this: If you were to swallow an apple whole, what would happen to it? Nothing! That´s the big picture. Now let´s zoom in for a micro-examination of the chewing process. Humans have teeth for grinding that are very much the same as those of a horse or cow. Our teeth are designed for grinding plant matter. Plants are made up of cells that resemble microscopic bricks in a wall. Each cell is surrounded by both a membrane and a wall which must be broken by our teeth in order to release the cytoplasm (the “cell jelly”) inside the cell where the nutrients are. Since cells are microscopic, it takes a lot of chewing to break down a significant number of cell walls.
Very few of us are taught how to chew. When growing up, food is put in front of us and we eat it. No one ever told me to “chew to liquid” until I was in my 40´s. I went to Palm Springs for a week-long wellness training by Tony Robbins. As many of you know, Tony works with the top experts in their field and I wanted that knowledge. At the beginning of the week, all participants had dark field microscopy done on a drop of his/her blood followed by a consultation with an expert on what can be learned from that drop of blood. The expert was impressed that my blood was not “sticky” like that of meat-eaters. Also, there were no cancer cells in my drop of blood unlike that of many people. He had photographed part of the glass slide on which my drop of blood had been spread thinly, and he set the enlarged picture in front of me. He pointed out some small chunks in my blood which he said were pieces of unchewed food! He said that I needed to chew thoroughly. Obviously when my blood carried those chunks of food around my body, my cells could not absorb them. Though microscopic, the chunks were still bigger than the cells! As they say, the proof is in the pudding, and in this case the proof was right there in my drop of blood. I was not absorbing all the nutrients that I could be if I were to improve my chewing.
We can buy and prepare the best-quality food in the world, but if we are not absorbing it well, it is not doing us as much good as it could if we were to chew to liquid- until it is smooth and there are no chunks. Slow down when you eat. Take the time to chew for a lot longer than you are probably used to doing.
Consider making one or two meals of the day liquid ones. My daughter and I begin our day with an Herbalife shake made in the blender (blended ´til smooth!) with organic fruit. The blender “chews” for us, breaking down the cell walls of the fruit. (Bidi always asks for a few swallows.) We are getting better about juicing organic veggies and drinking that more often. It would be smart to do it daily. (A great organic juice recipe is in our recipe collection with more to follow.) The juicer is “chewing” the food for us- breaking down the cell walls. Another way to solve the chewing issue is to blend soup in the blender. On our website we have an organic pea soup recipe vlog with more recipes to come.
Here´s to your health!