items separately, i.e., one after the other, makes it easier on the digestive system. Eating raw food
items after having eaten cooked foods will leave them mostly undigested and subject to fermentation.
Avoid cooked foods items in your salad, especially protein foods. (More information on this follows.)
During cold days and in the winter, you may naturally desire to eat salads less often; this is due to their
strong cooling effects on the body.
Note: Make certain that you use a full-fat salad dressing, such as extra virgin olive oil^12 and lemon
juice for your salad. A team of researchers at Iowa State University conducted a study that showed that
the salad’s nutrients are only digested and absorbed properly when consumed with a full-fat salad
dressing versus a reduced or no-fat product.Evening Meal
► In the evening, Ayurveda recommends that you avoid eating meat, pork, poultry, fish, ham, eggs,
nuts or any other concentrated form of protein because AGNI is too low at that time to handle protein
foods. Even during the day these require 4-7 hours of digestion in the stomach. Be aware that
production of digestive enzymes stops at around 8:00 p.m., and heavy food items ingested in the
evening will linger in the stomach until the early morning hours. At that time, the stomach may
discharge the now mostly undigested food into the small intestine, prompting destructive bacteria to
decompose it.
► Yogurt, cheese, fruits and salads should also be avoided in the evening. These foods have a
naturally high bacteria content. When exposed to the warm and moist environment of the stomach and
small intestine during the night, they end up causing indigestion and fermentation (along with plenty of
low-grade alcohol).
► Oily, fried and deep-fried foods, as well as root vegetables such as potatoes (with the exception of
cooked carrots, beets, or white radishes), are also very difficult to digest at night. Coconut oil and
unsalted butter or ghee are fine to use.
► An example for a light dinner is freshly prepared vegetable soup, perhaps blended, served with
whole wheat pita or spelt bread, whole wheat toast or rye crackers with unsalted butter, ghee or
coconut oil. Another option is cooked vegetables with rice or other light cooked grain foods. The
soup/vegetables may be seasoned with spices and herbs, vegetable bullion, unrefined sea salt, as well
as butter, ghee or coconut oil added during or after cooking—about one teaspoon of butter, ghee or
coconut oil per person (avoid other oils in the evening since they are more difficult to digest.(^12) A recent study in Italy found only 40% of olive oil brands were actually "pure" olive oil. The same is true for olive oil sold in
the U.K.. In 1995, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) testing olive oils for purity found that only 4 per cent of the 73
brands of olive oils tested proved to be pure olive oil. Most olive oil products were adulterated with vegetable oils, such as
canola, corn, cottonseed and soy oils, which have been shown to cause, not prevent heart disease. Some “olive oils” contained
only 10 percent olive oil. Buy your olive oils preferabgly at whole food stores. The cheaper the oils are, the more likely they
are not pure. Avoid the Following brands: Andy’s Pure Olive Oil (Italy), Bertolli (Italy), Castel Tiziano (Italy), Cirio (Italy),
Cornelia (Italy), Italico (Italy) Ligaro (Italy), Olivio (Greece), Petrou Bros. Olive Oil (California), Primi (Italy), Regale (Italy),
Ricetta Antica (Italy), Rubino (Italy), San Paolo (Italy) Sasso (Italy), Terra Mia (Italy).