The title is in all capitals for a reason my friends, the GAPS intro diet is a doozie. Oh people will tell you all sorts of things, like how you will feel so great! and, how there is so many delicious things to eat! Well I am here to tell you the truth. If you have the iron clad willpower to stay with it eventually you will feel fantastic. You may even find yourself dancing to "Walking on Sunshine" in your kitchen, but that, dear reader, is after THE DIE OFF. The die off is not a thing of science fiction. It happens and it is not fun. The first time I did the intro I had 10 days of lethargy and headaches. There is a whole storm of other symptoms that can occur as you switch from a fat burner to a sugar burner and begin to starve out the antagonistic gut flora.
However, the truth is that it IS worth it. You will discover what foods you are sensitive to and heal these sensitivities, as well as sealing your gut. Honestly you should do it, but it is not easy to be sure.
My biggest problem is that I love food, moreover I love a variety of food that tastes delicious, and particularly in the initial phases of the diet your choices or extremely limited and tastes like baby food.
Case in point: Here is what is allowed in phase 1 of the GAPS intro diet:
- Meat or fish stock
-Well boiled broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, onions, leeks, garlic
-Squash, winter and summer
-Boiled meat
-Sea salt
-1-2 teaspoons a day of sauerkraut juice
There are 20,000 edible plants alone on our planet, and on the intro you can have 8/20,000. The odds of deliciousness are not in our favor.
To remedy the bland baby food flavor profile I put a whole bulb of garlic in this soup to bring it back into tasty town. Even though the soup sort of looks like it was regurgitated it actually tastes pretty darn good.
In closing here is my advice: Do the GAPS intro, just be prepared mentally. The Yahoo GAPS group is full of supportive people, and just tell yourself that it is not forever, and you will feel much better having done it. For more information on the intro diet visit the GAPS diet website.
Ingredients:
1 bulb garlic, minced
1 pound grass fed beef
1 head broccoli
5 chopped carrots
1 small butternut squash, seeded, peeled, and cut into chunks
1 1/2-2 quarts chicken stock
1 onion, chopped
celtic sea salt to taste
Process:
This is the best part, it is so easy. Just throw it all in a pot and boil until the meat is cooked and the veggies are soft. I am to lazy to form the beef into meatballs so I chop it into chunks with a wooden spoon while it cooks. Also there is a meat foam that bubbles up to the top that I skim off and feed to the dogs. Mmm, meat foam.
