Sequential Eating and Food Combining

[onekingreigns]

This is an article from Dr. Stanley Bass, it's seems pretty useful.

INTRODUCTION
..... In my opinion and experience as a nutritional consultant in Natural Hygiene (I began studying nutrition in 1936), sequential eating represents the most advanced approach to understanding proper food combining.
After testing and retesting the concept on myself thousands of times, as well as on others, including the experience of Dr. Cursio, his family, his patients, as well as other Hygienic doctors - Dr. John Mega, Dr. Marvin Telmar, Dr. Anthony Penepent, etc.
......

FOOD COMBINING
......
Any quick digesting foods must wait till the slowest digesting foods leave the stomach before they can leave - a process which can take up to 6 or 8 hours. While waiting, the fruit, cooked and raw vegetables, and some of the starches undergo some decomposition and fermentation, producing gas, acid and even alcohol along with indigestion. .....


A RADICAL NEW CONCEPT OF DIGESTION
..... If there are 5 different types of food in the stomach at one meal, each eaten separately and in sequence, there will be 5 different kinds of digestion going on at the same time, each layer having different enzymes digesting each food, according to the needs of the food contained in that layer.

But when say 5 different foods are eaten at a meal, where each mouthful or bite is taken of a different food, then the entire stomach is filled with the same mixture. .....


ADVANTAGES OF REARRANGING THE SEQUENCE
One of my patients in my early days of practice absolutely refused to give up any of his accustomed, conventional, low-quality foods. In this case, feeling my hands completely tied, in desperation, I gave him all that he desired. The only change I made was to rearrange the sequence of his foods. Amazingly, all of his digestive problems vanished in just 3 days.
.....

SEQUENTIAL EATING REFERENCES
...... Grutzner fed rats morsels of food of 3 different colors. First the black, then the white second, and third the red color. Shortly after, the animals were sacrificed, the stomach frozen and then cut in sections. The different colored food was found to be in layers......

...... There was a famous case, written about by Beaumont, during the American Civil War, where a soldier received a gunshot wound which caused a large visible opening to appear in his stomach. His digestion was studied for a period of time by several doctors present, and they observed that his food digested in different layers.


SIMPLE TEST FOR ANYONE
One simple test that I used on myself was to eat different foods, one variety at a time, in sequence [all at one meal], for several different meals. Then when nature called, I examined the feces and was able to see different colors in the same feces. Watermelon which was reddish in color, was first, then tossed salad which was very dark brown was next, and cheese was very light tan was last. All were joined together, exiting the body in the same order as they were eaten.
Anyone can try this test, but to be accurate, the different foods must be eaten one at a time, and follow each other in sequence.


STRATA DIGESTION - A FORGOTTEN CONCEPT
..... How such an important concept as the strata digestion of food was bypassed and almost completely unnoticed for over 50 years since Howell's book was published, is a great mystery to me. .....


STOMACH - ILLUSTRATION
For purposes of illustration, I am presenting a diagram of the stomach and how 6 different foods eaten in sequence at one meal would form 6 different layers, during the time spent in the stomach.

In this diagram of the stomach, in layer 1, the bottom and first layer is where the first food eaten goes (the papaya). Layer 2 is where the 2nd food eaten goes (the tossed salad). Layer 3 is where the corn on the cob goes, etc. In this meal we are using 6 different foods, giving us 6 layers. ......
With this meal, after 30 min. the papaya will leave the stomach, and layer 2 - the tossed salad, will move down to layer one's place.
Layer 2 will shortly thereafter leave the stomach too.
Then the corn in layer 3 moves down and 15 min. later, it will leave the stomach ....

..... As each layer leaves, the stomach size gets smaller and feels more comfortable. Each layer digests separately, without mixing and without disturbing its adjacent layers.


BASIC RULE - WATERY FOODS FIRST
To simplify this concept of sequential or layered eating, the basic rule or principle can be stated as follows:
Eat the most watery food first .....


BAD COMBINATIONS TO AVOID
The following represents some examples of bad combinations to avoid
Mixing dried sweet fruit, honey, maple syrup or bananas with nuts or seeds

Mixing starch foods with fresh or acid foods or fruits

Mixing dried sweet fruits with acid fruits.

Never eat dried sweet fruits with or after concentrated proteins

Eating raw, fresh or dried fruits after any cooked food

Avoid drinking beverages or even water during or after meals


CHEW ALL FOOD CLOSE TO LIQUID
For best digestion - chew all food close to a liquid before swallowing.

Also in the 14th edition of Howell's Textbook of Physiology on p.777 is some very interesting research:
Abbe Spallanzani (1729 - 1799), one of the older observers on gastric digestion, found that cherries and grapes, when swallowed whole, even if entirely ripe, were usually passed unbroken in the stools. ....
We can assimilate only those foods which are most liquified. .....


EAT WITH ATTENTION
An excellent practice is to eat with 100% attention on the taste of the food. See Self-mastery through Attentive Eating .....


DIGESTION TIME OF VARIOUS FOODS
(approx. time spent in stomach before emptying). ........
Water
when stomach is empty, leaves immediately and goes into intestines,
Juices
Fruit vegetables, vegetable broth - 15 to 20 minutes.
Semi-liquid
(blended salad, vegetables or fruits) - 20 to 30 min.
Fruits
Watermelon - 20 min.digestion time.
Other melons - Canteloupe, Cranshaw, Honeydew etc. - 30 min.
Oranges, grapefruit, grapes - 30 min.
Apples, pears, peaches, cherries etc. - digest in 40 min.
Vegetables
Raw tossed salad vegetables - tomato, lettuces, cucumber, celery, red or green pepper, other succulent vegetables - 30 to 40 min. digestion. -
Steamed or cooked vegetables
Leafy vegetables - escarole, spinach, kale, collards etc. - 40 min. - Zucchini, broccoli, cauliflower, string beans, yellow squash, corn on cob - all 45 min. digestion time
Root vegetables - carrots, beets, parsnips, turnips etc. - 50 min.
Semi-Concentrated Carbohydrates - Starches
Jerusalem artichokes & leafy, acorn & butternut squashes, corn, potatoes, sweet potatoes, yam, chestnuts - all 60 min. digestion.
Concentrated Carbohydrates - Grains
Brown rice, millet, buckwheat, cornmeal, oats (first 3 vegetables best) - 90 min.
Legumes & Beans - (Concentrated Carbohydrate & Protein)
Lentils, limas, chick peas, peas, pigeon peas, kidney beans, etc. - 90 min. digestion time
soy beans -120 min. digestion time
Seeds & Nuts
Seeds - Sunflower, pumpkin, pepita, sesame - Digestive time approx. 2 hours.
Nuts - Almonds, filberts, peanuts (raw), cashews, brazil, walnuts, pecans etc. - 2 1/2 to 3 hours to digest.
Dairy
Skim milk, cottage or low fat pot cheese or ricotta - approx. 90 min. digestion time
whole milk cottage cheese - 120 min. digestion
whole milk hard cheese - 4 to 5 hours digestion time
Animal proteins
Egg yolk - 30 min. digestion time
Whole egg - 45 min.
Fish - cod, scrod, flounder, sole seafood - 30 min. digestion time
Fish - salmon, salmon trout, herring, (more fatty fish) - 45 min. to 60 digestion time
Chicken - 1½ to 2 hours digestion time (without skin)
Turkey - 2 to 2 ¼ hours digestion time (without skin)
Beef, lamb - 3 to 4 hours digestion time
Pork - 4½ to 5 hours digestion time

(Editor's notes
Note1: raw animal proteins have much faster digestion times than the above times for cooked/heated animal proteins.
Note2: The digestion times given are under an ideal situation of eating only one food, chewing well, and having efficient digestion, as is the case e.g. after a fast. They are digestion times for optimally healthy persons, with good eating habits. The digestion times are to a large part derived from Dr. Gian-Cursio's and Dr. Bass' practices.
Digestion times are much longer on a conventional diet, and for persons with non-optimized digestive systems, or persons lacking in energy, and for meals with many ingredients put together haphazardly = not in the optimum sequential order.)

EAT SMALLER AMOUNT - FEWER VARIETIES
The smaller the amount of a particular food eaten, the less is the digestive time for that food. The greater the amount of a food eaten, the more is the digestive time prolonged.

..... Remember the less you mix and the fewer the varieties you use, the easier it is to digest and the less you will be tempted to overeat. The greater the variety, the greater the tendency to overeat.


THE IMPORTANCE OF BLENDED SALADS
Due to the liquification of vegetables by blending:
1 - Absorption and assimilation of its vitamins, minerals proteins etc. is increased to approximately 5 times as compare to eating and chewing the salad.
2 - A blended salad will digest and leave the stomach in 15 to 20 min. compared to 30 to 60 minutes for a tossed salad eaten whole......
Etc.
Conservation at energy in the digestive process is the key to all healing. (Success in healing is measured in terms of energy available. This was known by the early masters of Natural Hygiene) .....


BASIC PURPOSE IS SAVING ENERGY
..... Energy is the most important factor needed for recovery of health and it must be conserved at all costs and not wasted in unnecessary digestion. Sequential eating will maximize the conservation of energy without fail.

[ciervo-chaman]

I can't believe (after reading SO many posts about "HOW TO" eat) that no one ever talked about this. i have been doing this "strata digestion" for many months before starting paleo, and its really real.

i had read a lot of posts regarding GCB user and his wife cancer and so on, and a lot of users posting but no one ever mentioned this.

Personally I think this is MORE important that how much meat are you eating or if you are eating organs or whatever.

last night i had like 250 grms of liver (grass fed with a little corn) i was really good, no problems, until after all the pressure from my friends on "drink beer, drink wine, drink this drink that" i got a glass of water (2 hours after the liver consumption) and just 2 minutes after the first gulp of water i started belching and feeling like my stomach was inflated. and then i started to fart O_O 

one of the rules of this "strata digestion" concept is , most watery foods first, then the less and less watery. and forget about consuming something in between meals.

i think its worth reading and taking it in consideration, at least for trying it, not just to "believe it" .

this is the actual link to Dr.bass webpage
http://drbass.com/sequential.html

[eveheart]

Without disputing the usefulness of sequential eating and food combining in a modern "eat everything" meal, how would this device be necessary in a truly paleolithic meal?

Paleolithic man, in the pre-cooking period, did not use pots, pans, bowls, or recipes. Even in the early cooking period, man was not putting his meat and potatoes in a kettle with tomato paste and water and letting the flavors blend at a slow simmer.

Matters might be confused nowadays because so many people want to use so-called paleo ingredients in their modern-day recipes and call it a paleolithic diet. I prefer to do my digestion a favor and eat my paleo ingredients in a paleo meal - some meat when I want meat, some fruit when I want fruit, some nuts when I want nuts. No calculations and separations are necessary if you follow  both the letter and the spirit of the raw paleolithic diet.

[ciervo-chaman]

so water is not paleo?

i had liver, then, 2 hours later, i had water. my stomach got bloated and i got some pain and farts and blenching.

i'm not talking about the blended salad thing.

just the "rule" about doing the most liquid foods first, and the rules about combining in general. if your digestion is ruined, so, are toxics formed on the digestion? or it is just delayed or something?

i can get the point on "being natural" and saying that you eat whatever you want cause its paleo and so on. but if you do some paleo mixes your digestion is ruined, i know. it has happened to me many times.

[ciervo-chaman]

so. I like to be called Pato.

i'm not a paleolitic man. i'm a right now man.

and i cant get why i have to have a diet of a paleo man that suposedly was on the wild and all the things? i'm behind a computer screen like 3 hours a day, working in my garden another 3 more, and working 4 hs in my parents shop. so.. i know this is "paleo" forums but i think that does not apply to me (the "paleo" lifestyle, running to catch animals)

[eveheart]

can get the point on "being natural" and saying that you eat whatever you want cause its paleo and so on. but if you do some paleo mixes your digestion is ruined, i know. it has happened to me many times.

What do you mean by "eat whatever you want" and paleo mixes? There are no paleo rules, really, except, of course, that foods were eaten as they were encountered. Nobody caught a fish and then looked for a lemon to squeeze on top. Cutting meat from an animal with stone tools was typical, but other food preparation, cooking, and seasoning was not yet invented. The mixing of food wasn't done yet. There were no ceramic bowls, no metal pots and pans.

In contrast, the modern diet in most places involves eating at set hours. A typical meal might be to start with a salad (vegetables, beans, bread croutons, milk products in the cheese or dressing), then a bowl of soup with various ingredients (let's say: meat, vegetables, pasta, and fruits), then a large plate of meat, vegetables, starch from grains and/or legumes), and finally a sweetened dessert (fruit, flour, refined sugar). For a person eating this way, food combining rules make sense because they lighten up the load on the stomach.

As far as healing past digestive problems, that is the puzzle you need to solve. Try to focus on what works for you, not what somebody else says should work. Give your body as much time as it needs to heal past damage.

[Iguana]

To what Eve wrote, I would add that a problem arises from the fact that we have a whole array of different foods available in our fridges and our various storages, which is contrary to what happens in nature. A wild animal or a pre-fire hominid would generally find one food at a time, so there is/was little opportunities for food combining.

It’s true that by eating too many different foods in a meal, the digestion is hampered and can even be blocked with some combinations. Yes, it’s better to drink (water or coconut water) before a meal, and as much as possible not immediately after a meal as it dilutes the digestive juice.

In general, a few different fruits can be eaten one after the other in a meal, and the same is valid for vegetables, but sweet fruits may not combine well with veggies, nor with meat or eggs. Combining different animal foods in a meal can lead to an overload and we’d better avoid it. I mean a combination of lamb with wildboar or eggs or fish in one meal, for example, should be avoided. But lamb muscle, lamb liver and lamb marrow can be eaten in the same meal without problem, as it would happen in natural conditions.

If we are still hungry after some meat or fish or eggs, some vegetable can be selected and perhaps one kind of nuts. If it’s for example hazelnuts, avoid other nuts and avocados in the same meal.

I will never eat again durian and avocados in the same meal, as it proved to produce a totally indigestible mixture — at least in my case. The same for avocados and almonds!

[JeuneKoq]

Pato, it's called the "Paleo Diet" because it is mainly inspired by the way humans and their ancestors ate, for the greatest part of our evolutionary history. It is admitted that we present-day humans are still better adapted to this type of eating, and that it is the most healthful for us...
Not because you're required to live in caves and hunt animals with spears

"Paleo Diet" is just a general term.
Your variant of it could be called "raw omnivorous smart-combining diet" instead.

[ciervo-chaman]

As far as healing past digestive problems, that is the puzzle you need to solve. Try to focus on what works for you, not what somebody else says should work. Give your body as much time as it needs to heal past damage.

thats what i'm talking about, doing what works for me, drinking water 2 hours after eating liver didnt work for me. i think its because this "strata digestion" concept, being the water more liquid, it got mixed with the liver chyme, if i had drinked it before the liver, even 5 minutes before, i would not had the problem. maybe thats not right, and i will test it tomorrow when i have my stomach empty again making sounds hehe.

What do you mean by "eat whatever you want" and paleo mixes?

i mean, you eat for instance meat, and before your digestion ended (it can take up to 6 hours in my case, right now, or more..) you are eating some other food (paleo) thats causes troubles on your digestion, e.g water, tomato. thats what i'm trying to refer by mix, not doing more than 1 food at the same time mixed in the same dish, sorry i'm not very good explaining myself in english.

If we are still hungry after some meat or fish or eggs, some vegetable can be selected and perhaps one kind of nuts. If it’s for example hazelnuts, avoid other nuts and avocados in the same meal.

I will never eat again durian and avocados in the same meal, as it proved to produce a totally indigestible mixture — at least in my case. The same for avocados and almonds!

so if you eat some vegetables right after  (lets say 20 minutes after) a meat meal, you are not getting digestive troubles?

i had really bad experiencies mixing avocados, but not eating them alone!
mono-eating is maybe the best to do.

what do you recommend to eating fruits (sweet ones), and not getting too much blood sugar rise (i was having this problem before, so now i'm almost not eating fruits, i dont want the depression again). i think a full banana is too much sugar to eat alone. apart from mixing it with some fat?

Pato, it's called the "Paleo Diet" because it is mainly inspired by the way humans and their ancestors ate, for the greatest part of our evolutionary history. It is admitted that we present-day humans are still better adapted to this type of eating, and that it is the most healthful for us...
Not because you're required to live in caves and hunt animals with spears

"Paleo Diet" is just a general term.
Your variant of it could be called "raw omnivorous smart-combining diet" instead.

yes i know why is it called paleo diet, i'm trying to "addapt" the diet to my lifestyle (is not paleo) paleo diet worked for paleo lifestyle great, but it must have some adaptation to me right now, i'm more sedentary, even I have to take in consideration food availability, so.. its not so easy.. i'm having bananas all year long on argentina, but here you can only grow bananas really small size and only after september till may. uf..


what is your aproach on the "healing" part of the body? and why?

i'm still a little bit puzzled between some concepts, but the concept of available energy for healing, and giving the body the right nutrients still feel like the most relevant. i'm having "sensations" in all parts of my body that i used to have problems before(left ear, left lower abdominal, right leg, gum), but now they are really short and not really painfull, just "feelingfull" ,since i started all raw with meat and eggs. i want to believe this is healing hehe... i hope so =)

thanks to all of you for answering and sharing i really apreciate it.

[eveheart]

...and i will test it tomorrow when i have my stomach empty again making sounds

Yes, keep testing things to see how you react. Also, try eating less of some food: maybe a few bites of liver will be finished in your stomach sooner. I am always surprised by how little food I eat now and never feel very hungry. I have used the instinctotherapie guidelines for learning when to stop with each food that I eat. The stop signal is very subtle, but it is reliable.

Noises in your intestines are often due to old junk being loosened and passed out. Many people mistake this for a bad reaction to a certain food. I think it means that a certain food is having a good effect on sick intestines. I may be wrong in your situation because only you can feel what is going on.

[ciervo-chaman]

i'm being more and more atracted to the instincto-thing (i'm having some voice in my head saying me "NO-NO" when i'm eating anything)

i will start obeing this voice.. it sounds like it wants to protect me hehe.. but when it comes, so then comes other voices saying "oh there is still more food and you are really thin eat more" "finish all the fruit you can let it at the half, you are wasting!" "finish al the meat you have put on the table whats the point on leting that small piece of meat?" etc etc..
i think all of them are excuses to overeat..

i was so thin on raw vegan/fruitarian hehe "i" must stop "me"..

now i remember being really inspired by Luigi Cornaro's book, have you read it? this man eating bread, soups, wine, meat, milk, eggs, and being free from illness and living to 102 years. but he was doing something like following always the "stop" , ALWAYS.
"Discourses on the Sober Life" http://soilandhealth.org/02/0201hyglibcat/020105cornaro.html

"and, as he [a man] draws near his end, he is brought so low as to be able to take but little nourishment, and at such times, the yolk of an egg, and a few spoonfuls of milk with bread, is quite sufficient during the twenty-four hours; a greater quantity would most likely cause pain, and shorten life"


oh, how i forgot about this? oh.. AV.. right.. haha.. (eat eat eat!)

thanks for making me remember this hehe, you people are very kind!

[eveheart]

i'm being more and more atracted to the instincto-thing (i'm having some voice in my head saying me "NO-NO" when i'm eating anything)

My "voice" tells me, "That was good!" when I have eaten enough, but more important, my sense of taste tells me, "The flavor is not delicious anymore, so I don't want another bite." Some people would say it's their sense of taste and smell, but I don't really notice the smell as much as the taste.

now i remember being really inspired by Luigi Cornaro's book, have you read it? this man eating bread, soups, wine, meat, milk, eggs, and being free from illness and living to 102 years. but he was doing something like following always the "stop" , ALWAYS.
"Discourses on the Sober Life" http://soilandhealth.org/02/0201hyglibcat/020105cornaro.html

That reminded me of hara hachi bu, a Confucian teaching that instructs people to eat until they are 80 percent full. The point is to stop before you are full, so that would be around 80 percent. In practice, it's really about paying attention to the quiet "stop" signal that comes before your belly says it is full, because that would mean that you are over-stuffed.