The Zen Diet Revolution (8 page)

However, the most important and powerful meaning behind the lotus, stems from the plant’s mysterious ability to remain pure and unsullied. The petals reject any mud or water splashed on them and remain bright and pure. This quality of being able to remain pure when surrounded by swamp is just what the great spiritual masters of old felt was needed in an individual. If we could cultivate the ability to be unaffected by the negative things around us, then, like the lotus with its lovely scent and beautiful appearance, we could have a positive effect on the world around us.

The lotus teaches us that, in order to create something
beautiful, we need to be able to remain pure and unsullied. We need to learn to let things flow over us. Whenever you need to let something pass by, remember the lotus flower and picture the amazingly beautiful future you are going to create; let the mud flow over you.

One of the great keys to detachment is to keep your mind on your aim. Many people suffer from aim confusion, and this destroys their chances of reaching their goals. Some people join a company because they want a stepping stone to another role, only to become competitive in their job and spend the rest of their life trying to get the most senior role. Some men work themselves to death trying to make lots of money and destroy their marriages in the process.

With food, people get caught up in seeking pleasure, not feeding the body with the best fuel. If you find your aim wandering, let go of the other goal and focus on what you are trying to do here. When you choose your food, you want to feed your body with all it needs, but with fewer calories so that it burns fat. Any other motive needs to be dropped. I find this really helps with all goals.

For most people, work is most of their life. It is something that takes up a huge amount of their energy and focus. When they get home, it is hard for them to leave work
at
work and it’s like a thorn in their side during spare time. Even when they lie in bed, they find it hard to stop thinking about deadlines and responsibilities. They need to learn to let go. Detachment gives us the capacity to be in the moment, to rid ourselves of worries about reports that haven’t been finished and emails that need response. That’s a very powerful stress-busting skill. A less stressed person is a better worker and a slimmer body!

Humans are creatures of habit. We naturally develop routines for everything we do – even if we don’t know it! Many diets take advantage of this by simply attempting to replace our existing food routine with another, normally one that is drastic and unsustainable. In the Zen Diet, we recommend that you work with the natural routine that you have already created and start to improve it. It’s time for a meal-time evolution, not a revolution.

Take a few moments to look at your existing routine. If you get a piece of paper and write down meals you tend to cook regularly, you may be surprised to find there are only about 10 or so that you prepare on rotation. Perhaps
a few more that you cook very rarely, but the main focus is on finding the ones you cook or eat almost every week. Include eating out and takeaways.

Looking at your food routine is a powerful diet tool. Just being aware of it will encourage you to cut out that very high-calorie meal. If you have Chinese takeaway more often than you think, that may be the first thing to go.

Now imagine how much of a difference to your weight it would make if you were to replace a high-calorie meal with a nice low-calorie one. It may not sound like much, but consider the long-term effect of this replacement
every week
. You could cut 1,000 calories a week just with that one small change.

In Appendix Two, you will find a selection of amazing recipes that I have used myself. These are formulas I have used to improve my diet and cut away my body fat. They are all high in protein and bulk, but low in calories. That way, you feel nicely full and the meal lasts for a long time so you don’t feel hungry, but you cut your calories by eating these meals rather than most conventional dishes.

While working through this chapter, the Zen change to your diet is simply to try a different meal from the ‘Recipe’ section each week. If you find one you like, it will naturally become part of your routine. You will notice that all recipes are quick, easy to prepare and can be varied. So if you do choose to go down the standardized diet route and only eat recipes from this book, it’s easy for you to vary your diet and keep it fresh and interesting!

We only have to look at the TV, magazines and any adverts that are flashed at us on the Internet, at bus shelters and on the subway around New Year to know that the one BIG resolution that tops all the lists is to lose weight/get healthy. But often that means yet another weird diet, yet another celebrity-endorsed product or buying exercise equipment that we don’t ever use properly. So how do we change our food habits so that we permanently keep the new habits? The answer once again is
kaizen
– the art of small, simple yet permanent changes.

Thinking about food in a different way is one of the first steps in changing your food habits. What does food mean to you? Is it just ‘fuel’? Is it a source of pleasure? Does it cause you anxiety? We can adapt any of these things to become good food habits – food should be simple, fresh and vital, and importantly nourishing to the body and soul. Don’t think that the term ‘simple’ means bland or boring, think of it as food that is –

•   
Unadulterated
– i.e. not packed full of salt, sugar, sweeteners, chemicals, additives, etc. You don’t need this stuff as it alters the natural state of food. You can easily add seasoning and spices yourself when cooking.

•   
Fresh
– meaning not having been stored in a warehouse for months on end; buy your fruit and vegetables locally
and every few days – food is meant to wilt and rot unless it has been tampered with. Frozen fruit and vegetables are actually pretty good as they usually have been harvested and frozen quickly which retains a lot of the goodness.

•   
Unprocessed
– without having been stripped of its natural goodness, i.e. white bread/pasta/rice. We’re not saying
never
eat white bread/pasta/rice again, but, on the whole, it is a good choice to fill up on whole grain, not only because it gives you stacks of vitamins and minerals that would be stripped away, but it also gives you a great source of fibre, which makes you feel fuller for longer and keeps you regular! Also avoid ‘ready meals’ – they are full of salt and fat because they need to give you a quick option with the most flavour.

•   
Read the labels
– according to researchers at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, people who read the nutritional labels on food packaging eat around 5 per cent less fat than those who don’t. Just because it says ‘low fat’ doesn’t mean it isn’t loaded with salt, sugar or other nasties – many ready meals scream ‘less than 5 per cent fat’, but you need to check what else is in there.

In our modern age we are obsessed with quick fixes – we have gadgets to do things quicker for us, we have meals that
are ready in minutes, but haven’t we lost something along with the super-fast lifestyle? What happened to sitting down at the table to eat? How many people do you know who just chuck a ready meal in the microwave and then schlep to the sofa to almost inhale it in front of the TV? In fact, we all do it sometimes, but it has become a sad fact that more people now eat in front of the glowing screen of their giant plasma TV or their computer than sit down with their loved ones to slowly wind down from the day and absorb some good, wholesome food.

One of the first things we suggest that you try and cultivate is to get into the habit of making food interesting again: not only the meals you make but also the process of eating it. If you are doing something else whilst eating, you are not really enjoying it, so begin by laying the table in the evening and making your meal a pleasant experience. If you have a family, encourage everyone to use the time to chat about what has happened to them during the day, make it a relaxed and fun time, discuss the food you are eating and savour every bite. If you live alone, still make the effort to sit at the table and enjoy your food. I recall reading about a well-known actress who lives alone, and she said that she always makes a point of laying the table with lovely china and cutlery and having a small glass of wine with her supper. She couldn’t see why she should treat herself any differently than if she were preparing a lovely meal for friends. It gave her a sense of wellbeing and was a nightly ritual.

Another problem we now have with our relationship to food is that often people don’t want to go to the effort of
preparing a proper meal. When I was a child, my mother made all our food from scratch; something almost unheard of nowadays. She shopped every few days at the local grocers, greengrocers and butchers; our milk came from the dairy down the road, and bread was delivered in a van from a local bakery, or as a treat on a Sunday, my father would take us to a bakery where they still had a fire oven in the wall. The smell was indescribably delicious, and after waiting for what seemed like an eternity, we would be handed a piping-hot loaf wrapped firmly in greased paper to take home, where we would fight over who got the lovely crunchy crust. This wasn’t back in the Dark Ages, it was the 1970s, when microwaves were things scientists talked about and the closest things to a ready meal were fish fingers! As children we were treated to food that tasted good, fresh and was always an enjoyable experience; it certainly wasn’t cordon bleu, but it was traditional wholesome fare.

It may seem a chore to have to come in at the end of the day and prepare a meal, but with a bit of forethought and planning you can make some amazing meals in just 30 minutes. There is no penalty for using the odd can of ingredients or a pasta sauce, but you will find that after a while you don’t really like processed food and are happier to make your own spaghetti sauce. If you are a working mum, one of the best things to do is to make a ‘Weekly Meal Plan’ and have everything you need on your shopping list and in your fridge. You don’t have to be Mary Poppins and produce a three-course meal from scratch every night,
but with planning you can whip up something fresh and wholesome really quickly.

Try some of the recipes from Appendix Two at the end of the book, such as –

•   Salmon and noodles with mixed vegetables

•   Pasta and chicken with rocket salad

•   Pitta pockets with spicy chicken, mixed peppers and beans

•   Hobo packets

•   Spaghetti and sauce with Parmesan cheese

I tried cutting down on processed and fatty/sugary foods, and after a while, when I did have some, they seemed really artificial and tasted overly greasy or sweet. I haven’t become the kind of health-food freak who shuns everything that isn’t totally unprocessed, but I guess I wanted us to go back to my childhood in a way, when it all seemed so SIMPLE, and I think that simplicity is crucial for your Zen Diet.

One of the things you need to do when simplifying your diet and food habits is to have a good clear-out in your kitchen. You will need to get rid of all the foodstuffs that tempt you and replace them with wholesome goodies. You don’t have to bin them; you can ask friends and neighbours
to ‘help’ you by giving them any cakes, biscuits or overly processed foods. It may sound harsh, but if you haven’t got the tempting stuff in the house, then you can’t eat it. I know we often try and kid ourselves that we are keeping some cake or whatever for ‘emergencies’, but what’s the emergency? If you are trying to lose weight and keep it off, cake is
not
going to make you feel better in the long run; ok, it temporarily makes your blood sugar spike or tantalizes your fat receptors which gives you that initial ‘mmm’ feeling, but you’ll soon crash and regret having eaten 200+ calories in one go. It’s also easy to think that ‘other people eat cake and biscuits, so why shouldn’t I?’, but they might not care about their weight or what they are eating, and so that is irrelevant. Food manufacturers rely on us feeling drawn to fatty, sugary foods; it has been scientifically proven that both sugar and fat give us a buzz, so no wonder we want more!

In several studies, sugar has been shown to be as bad as fat for causing similar health problems. The University of Melbourne found that mice showed signs of impaired heart function after just 12 weeks of a sugar-rich diet, and another study gave indications that a sugar-laden diet does have a link to the development of diabetes. But the biggest revelation to hit the news is that, according to scientists from California University, sugar is tantamount to a poison and compares with the destructive health consequences of alcohol and tobacco. This is not a new suggestion: there have been several books published over the years highlighting the health problems associated with sugar, including
Sugar Nation: The Hidden Truth Behind America’s Deadliest Habit and the Simple Way to Beat It
by Jeff O’Connell and
Pure, White and Deadly
by John S Yudkin. The California University study implies that a regular or high consumption of sugar can lead to a whole host of health problems ranging from hormonal imbalance, heart disease, cancer and, obviously, obesity. Princeton University in turn have also done some studies indicating that sugar, when metabolized, creates a similar effect on the brain as heroin and therefore is verging on being addictive. It certainly makes sense to wean ourselves off sugar or at least cut right down.

The problem we have in our modern diet is that sugar is often hidden in a wide variety of foods. Ironically, savoury foods feature highly on this list. The best way to deal with this is to avoid processed foods as much as possible and to replace sweet, sugary foods with something similar, such as fruit.

The idea of treating ourselves has become an everyday norm and is something that we really don’t need, but we will cover this later. You don’t need to get too puritanical – I keep some very dark chocolate, lots of fruit (even canned fruit in juice is fine) and honey around the place for those ‘I need something sweet!’ moments. But with all these foods it is quite hard to eat a lot of them as they are concentrated tastes. You will find that, as you cut down on the processed stuff, you will begin to appreciate subtle tastes and not really miss the sticky, sugary, fatty foods – in fact, they can almost be slightly nauseating when you haven’t had them for a while.

So, once you have cleared out the shop-bought cakes, biscuits, syrups, jams and other highly processed food, it is time to replace them with the good stuff!

Noodles
– you can get all sorts of amazing ones from supermarkets and specialist Asian suppliers: soba, buckwheat, wholegrain, rice, etc.

Rice
– try wholegrain (basmati or long grain), wild rice (a type of grass, mixes well with white or brown rice), sushi rice. White basmati rice is fine to use on occasions as it has a low glycaemic index – i.e. it digests slower than processed or sugary foods

Pasta
– this can be wholegrain, spinach or tomato (tricolour) or made from ingredients other than wheat, such as buckwheat (a grain), rice flour or other grains.