Anyone living in Hua Hin on a special diet?

[Ace4]

Hello everyone, I need to be on a strict diet for health reasons. Basically I can't eat wheat,rice, flours, grains, etc.
Lots of other things are off the list too, but theres still an amazing ammount of things i can eat according to the guides on local food I've read, so don't feel to bad for me! : ) Meat,Seafood,fruits and vegetables, and nuts make up the bulk of my diet.
Are nuts like almonds, pecans, cashews easily available?
Anyone else on a unique diet plan while in Hua Hin?

[Randy Cornhole]

I think you need to speak to our very own Mr Plum. He is our resident diet expert.

[mr lonely]

I am gluten free also
You will have few problems here although the is very little availablility of special gluten free products. Maybe some places in Bangers but not sure.
Vast majority of needles etc are rice based, wheat flour generally is not used for anything except the obvious.

[margaretcarnes]

Cashews are readily available - pecans and almonds maybe not so easily. The problem with supermarket pre-packaged nuts of course is that you can't always tell whether they have been processed in a 'clean' environment.
Ground nuts ('monkey' nuts) with shells on are cheap and plentiful, and HuaHin Ham and Bacon sometimes supply imported mixed shell on nuts.

[Korkenzieher]

Curious about the rice, as the other stuff points to coeliac disease. Is that diabetes? I have never been diagnosed coeliac, but my father is severely so and both my sister and I have clear sensitivity to any gluten, mainly wheat, of course (my sister is going through diagnosis in the UK right now - it is going to take a stomach biopsy, but my view is pretty simple - you already know, and you feel better without it, so why not just avoid the stuff [quick digression into family medical history almost over]...)? My mothers side is also thyroid deficient, so it pays me to miss out on the carbs too, where I can. That's harder. Overall, I generally feel better eating in Thailand and Asia, than in Europe. I don't find it difficult - though I stress that I am not in a position where I cannot be a little bit flexible. I do an awful lot of my own food prep from basic commodity items, and you might need to do the same. You wont get, as mr lonely points out, any store concessions to 'unusual' dietary needs. Steer clear of bami (or just mee) noodles - they are the wheat ones. Everything else should be rice (usually gway-teow, or just 'sen'). Wise to bring any supplements eg B12, Folic acid etc, that you are on from home if you can.

[MrPlum]

I think you need to speak to our very own Mr Plum. He is our resident diet expert.

I shall try not to disappoint.

If you like your western food, please don't read any further.

Anyone on a typical western diet is IMO guaranteed to be sick by the time they are 50, often seriously. Why? Because western food is so industrialized that it's very difficult to actually call it 'food'. Processing strips out most of the nutrients and putting some back ('fortified') still leaves us deficient in many minerals. Add to that the fact that the food is dead. i.e. no live enzymes and our pancreas has to work overtime to digest it.

The focus for manufacturers is not to produce healthy food but simply any old crap as profitably as possible. If we are daft enough to eat it, they think, then we deserve what we get. With such justifications they absolve themselves of all responsibility. Corporations are only interested in the bottom line. They use a host of tricks to get us to eat their garbage and to maintain their dead foods on the supermarket shelves as long as possible. Once in a while they are actually honest and call it 'Junk Food'. It's JUNK!! Only fit for the trash bin. Why people still eat it is beyond me.

Animals are raw material for the food processing industry and the way they are raised, slaughtered and prepared is very distressing. No longer as nature intended.

There is a direct correlation between the introduction of refined oils and increases in heart disease and cancers. Refined oils are toxic.

What is confusing for most people is the western focus on calories. Traditional thinking considers food to have other properties. For instance, foods have 6 tastes. Sweet, Sour, Salty, Pungent, Astringent and Bitter. In the western diet the first three dominate. If we need all 6, you can see the western diet is automatically unbalanced. Sickness is guaranteed. This is where the Thai diet is better than ours. They include all 6 tastes.

Another way to use food is with their particular 'energies'. Foods have an upward, outward, inward and downward energy. If you drink a cup of hot ginger your hands and feet may get warm. Ginger has a warming and outward energy. If you eat banana, your hands may get cold. Bananas have an inward and cooling energy. Great for a hot climate. We used to eat according to the seasons, now we eat what we want, when we want. This is unnatural.



There are too many 'fake' foods doing great harm. The fake sugars in particular. manufacturers love it because it is cheap to produce. Aspartame was denied a licence for years until Rumsfeld joined the board of Searle and used his political connections to get it approved, even when their own studies showed it caused brain tumours. There has been a 10% increase in brain tumours since it was introduced. The other issue with fake sugars is they make you fat. 'Diet' Coke makes you fat. The brain needs glucose. Fake sugars fool the brain into thinking it is getting it and when it doesn't it says 'eat more'. So you head for the fridge. No wonder people are overweight.

Hydrogenation gives us 'plastic' to eat, the body has no idea what it is or what to do with it, so dumps it in our fat layers. MSG also makes us fat. MSG and Aspartame are excito-toxins. They damage our brains and make us thick!

Genetically-modified foods are a huge danger to mankind by placing control of our food in the hands of one company, Monsanto. Choice is being hugely reduced and these foods have NOT been properly tested. Recent independent studies have shown them to be dangerous. (Not that I have great confidence in studies).

Irradiation, gassing, preservatives, fertilizers, pesticides, Genetic modification. Whatever happened to Mother Nature? Heart Surgeons are having stents put in their own bodies because they haven't a clue. It's a kind of collective madness.

Another aspect of food is are you eating the right food for your type? Someone skinny should not be on a raw food diet, while someone overweight should. 'Fire' types should not be eating chilis. 'Air' types should not eat too much meat. 'Water' types should not eat dairy. With thousands of diets over the years, it's a complicated business working out what is best for us!

I've heard people say 'Just eat a balanced diet'. This is fair enough if you are healthy but even vegetarians are snookered these days because their vegetables are grown in soil deficient in minerals and the veggies are laced with chemicals. If you are sick, a 'balanced' diet is completely the wrong thing for you. Western medicine does not use food as medicine. Eastern medicine does.

Before 35, we can mostly get away with eating poorly, although when you look at our youngsters, problems are obviously beginning earlier. Diabetes and obesity are genuine pandemics.

Food doesn't care how you justify your food choices. You can call something a 'treat' and pretend you are exercising by flipping the newspaper but as far as the body is concerned there are only CONSEQUENCES. No matter how much you delude yourself, because 'it's too difficult', the body does not lie. It suffers anyway. Most ladies have heard the saying... 'A second on the lips, a lifetime on the hips!'

When we salivate over a Big Mac, fries and coke and turn our noses up at fresh fruit and veg, you know our taste buds have been educated not as nature intended but to make the food giants and the doctors rich.

I've said many times that sickness is largely down to two causes. A build up of toxicity in the body and malnutrition. You can eat the best food in the world but if your body is laden with toxins or your organs of digestion and elimination aren't functioning optimally, that delicious nutritious food you just spent good money on could be ADDING to your sickness.

Most of this is COMMON SENSE.

Where people become unstuck is they don't really know where to begin. It feels like you have a mountain to climb, they don't have confidence in their own will-power and they receive a host of mixed messages from a variety of sources. It seems easier not to bother.

If I could offer any advice it would be to make any changes gradually and realize that you DO have power over your own life. You just have to rediscover it and take that first step. And when you take a pace backwards, don't punish yourself. Gently go back to basics. Millions of people are starting to do this because they see that modern industrialized living has taken us too far from nature.

I've seen enough people over the years, who have struggled initially, who then went on to become an inspiration to others. It can happen here too. Even in sleepy Hua Hin!

[brianks]

Interesting advise and no doubt very good. I should be dead already at 69 I guess. Don't know how my body is still holding up for my morning run. Should have fallen apart already.

[MrPlum]

Interesting advise and no doubt very good. I should be dead already at 69 I guess. Don't know how my body is still holding up for my morning run. Should have fallen apart already.

If you are on a morning run then several things are happening. You are moving the blood, the lymph and burning off lactic and uric acid wastes in the joints and tissues. Toxins will be excreted via your perspiration and your internal organs will be getting a good massage. Everything will be moving and the bouncing of your body off the hard floor will be dislodging any sludge and blockages and getting it shifted to your channels of elimination.

Diet is only one aspect of health. Exercise is a good way to get oxygen into the body, lift depression and get everything moving. Where it gets difficult is when people are too heavy or have joint problems. They can't do squat thrusts and grid sprints so need to consider something else, to the point where they sweat. Swimming is good but doesn't aid weight loss. Yoga, great for flexibility. Qigong good for energy and all-round fitness. Walking is excellent. There are many options but asking someone weighing 250 pounds to jog down the road is completely the wrong thing to do.

The hardest task is to get people moving initially. Once they start to feel the benefits they then become self-motivated.

Bottom line. If you rest, you rust!

[Homer]

I've found cashews, almonds, peanuts, pistacios, sunflower seeds, squash seeds and a few I didn't recognize or remember. Most are salted and few are dry roasted. Haven't seen any raw, shelled nuts.

[richard]

You are right Mr. P

I'm 65 and have suffered from DVT for 5 years now and it's down to lifestyle. My DVT was caused through the lack of proper exercise (lying back thinking of England is not really exercise) erratic diet and not enough sleep

Used to think my father who lived to 99 got it right. Walking everyday of his life, food in moderation and wholesome food too. The wholesome food alas has now gone and is replaced by chemically infected substitutes

I have to admit when I'm up in the village I'm healthier. Drinking water off the roof, fruit veg and nuts from the bush, fish from the rivers and meat fed on the land and not cattle feed, slaughtered on site and eaten raw or cooked with fresh spices and herbs.

Some will say 'well why aren't you a pillar of health now' BECAUSE I SMOKE AND DRINK TOO MUCH is the answer but that is my choice in life

[tarakandi]

So true Mr Plum, I kid myself that because I am so busy at work I am getting enough exercise, but in reality I am getting more unfit by the day. So that is why I plan to take a 4 month sabbatical from work starting in September

[STEVE G]

I've found cashews, almonds, peanuts, pistacios, sunflower seeds, squash seeds and a few I didn't recognize or remember. Most are salted and few are dry roasted. Haven't seen any raw, shelled nuts.

Actually I know where there are a couple of cashew nut trees in Hua Hin, but you'll have to find them for yourself because if I put the location on here, there'll be none left for me when I get back!

[lindosfan1]

Mr plum said

Most of this is COMMON SENSE.

Where people become unstuck is they don't really know where to begin. It feels like you have a mountain to climb, they don't have confidence in their own will-power and they receive a host of mixed messages from a variety of sources. It seems easier not to bother
If I could offer any advice it would be to make any changes gradually and realize that you DO have power over your own life. You just have to rediscover it and take that first step. And when you take a pace backwards, don't punish yourself. Gently go back to basics. Millions of people are starting to do this because they see that modern industrialized living has taken us too far from nature.

Very good comment some of the diets I have seen recommended are more likely to cause damage. I avoid tinned food, for a start vegetables and meat has to be fresh, and all vegetables and fruit have to be in season, fresh fish is excellent. Smoking and drinking to much to be avoided. As mr plum said common sense is the best,
Mcdonalds kentucky fried and all fast food western outlets should be banned

[Korkenzieher]

>>There is a direct correlation between the introduction of refined oils and increases in heart disease and cancers. Refined oils are toxic.<<

One of my favourite subject areas!

When the FDA published guidance on increasing the content of vegetable oils in the diet, the important caveat from their statement was missed off which is 'along with appropriate education against heating them'. And what do we use them for - frying!

Refined isn't so bad with oils because the refining process removes the fatty acids which are in themselves toxic (genrally neurotoxic). Rape / Rapse / Canola fields don't need spraying, because the bugs aren't daft enough to eat the stuff! Canola actually stands for Canadian Oil Low Acid.

The lighter fraction of vegetable oils is dominantly linoleic acid (up to 60%), which apart from being the main oil in paint and putty, is also the substance they used to suppress the immune system in early transplant surgery. So to give your heart a break, you are giving every opportunistic cancer what it needs - an opportunity!

Mr Plum rightly points out that hydrogenation produces plastics out of lighter oils. He is soooo right it is scary. If you aren't sure, buy a cheap margarine (no added nutrients) and leave it on the shelf outside. It won't go mouldy, and it won't get eaten. It is about one carbon atom removed from being the plastic tub it is sold in!

Completely with plum on artificial sweetners as well. Nutrasweet decomposes in the body. One of the byproducts is a close relative of formalin. It is a neurotoxin. There is considerable reason to suspect that the upswing of neurological disorders in the US is little more than a bad 'diet coke' habit. Sucron was passed fit for human consumption in spite of producing liver cancer in lab rats.

Most of this stuff is freely available information but unfortunately it tends to get portrayed as though those publicising it have some sort of agenda - well, I guess they do, but not the one they are accused of.

[Homer]

The lighter fraction of vegetable oils is dominantly linoleic acid (up to 60%), which apart from being the main oil in paint and putty, is also the substance they used to suppress the immune system in early transplant surgery. So to give your heart a break, you are giving every opportunistic cancer what it needs - an opportunity!

It's also one of the essential fatty acids the body needs but doesn't produced. Every diet needs SOME.

Mr Plum rightly points out that hydrogenation produces plastics out of lighter oils. He is soooo right it is scary. If you aren't sure, buy a cheap margarine (no added nutrients) and leave it on the shelf outside. It won't go mouldy, and it won't get eaten. It is about one carbon atom removed from being the plastic tub it is sold in!

It's not plastic, it's a plastic. That's like saying air is gas. Nope, it's a gas. Besides, who do you think wins the battle in your stomach between hydrocloric acid and hydrogenated oils?

That said, I avoid hydrogenated products and the crappier of the vegtable oils for health reasons. The problem with seeking information about bad effects of legal foods is that much of what is published is hyperbole with no science behind it.