Dietary Recommendations for Building Health

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Part 1: Slow Water and Warm Bellies

The Wet and Warm Diet

Gary and Rain Klepper, D.C. July 2024

One of the most important lessons that I have learned from over 45 years of clinical practice is that lifestyle determines whether or not a person will stay healthy as they age. If sickness has developed, lifestyle also determines whether or not they will recover their health.

There are five major categories that make up your lifestyle:

Most important is being in supportive relationships with spouse, friends, and family.
A close second is to be engaged in interaction with other people (and critters) through work that is satisfying and contributes value, and that engages the mind and body with inspired creativity.
In terms of specifically taking care of the physical body: movement, exercise, and labor that condition the body to meet challenges and to remain strong and flexible with good posture and free breathing, without wearing out or damaging joints is so important for aging gracefully. In other words, train your body so that it operates efficiently and you are comfortable living in it.
At least as important is sleep. Regular, adequate sleep, especially being deeply asleep between the hours of 11:00 and 3:00 is needed for the body to regenerate and for the mind to be clear and free of anxiety.
Your food plan and approach to eating.

The focus of this article is diet, and specifically the use of diet to build resources.

General Dietary Principles

What you choose to eat and drink, as well as what you choose to avoid will have a huge impact on long term health.

I view diet through the lens of Classical Chinese Medicine. In this system, many of the same recommendations are made as in other nature-based methods.

Here are 6 of the major principles:

Eat a diet of real, unprocessed foods that are fresh and uncontaminated with chemicals from agriculture, production and/or storage of the food. The Mediterranean Diet is a good general guide for where to start.
Eat a large variety of foods that includes fruits and vegetables, animal and vegetable proteins, nuts, seeds, beans, grains, and healthy fats such as olive oil and butter.
Do not eat refined sugar, artificial sweeteners, or sugar alcohols like xylitol or sorbitol.
Avoid the vast majority of foods that come in a package.
Emphasize wet and warm foods and drinks, mostly cooked.
Avoid cold foods and drinks or large amounts of raw foods.

Generating Resources for Staying Healthy and Healing Illness Through Your Food Plan

How do I determine your best food plan?

Part of my toolkit for determining what treatment might be useful in a patient visit is feeling the pulse and the abdomen, and sometimes looking at the tongue.

I am looking at the overall state of health, and whether there is any accumulation of pathogenic factors.

These pathogenic factors can be broken down into 3 categories:

Environmental exposures including cold, dryness, wind, dampness and heat.
Toxic chemicals from agriculture, food processing, packaging and storage. In addition, even the most organic and fresh whole foods can generate toxins if your digestive system cannot efficiently handle them. For example, some people do not easily digest glutinous grains, dairy products, or nightshade vegetables.
Thoughts may be toxic factors, and often can be the strongest.

Any accumulation of these pathogenic factors will inhibit the vitality and obstruct the flow in the channels.

As well, I am evaluating the adequacy of resources that are needed for maintaining health, and for expelling any pathogenic factors that may be present.

The Resources

These resources, within the nature-based language of Classical Chinese Medicine are:

Jing, which is essence or constitution, which we are born with, and which carries our blueprint.
Yang qi, which is the moving and warming aspect of the vitality, and which fires all metabolic activity, including our digestion.
Blood, which nourishes all of the tissues of the body and carries emotions.
Thin fluids, which irrigate every cell in the body with moisture, and which bathe the membranes of the digestive and respiratory system and the eyes, as well as engender sweat.
Thick fluids, which bathe the linings of the body cavities, the fluid-filled sac around each joint, and from which cerebrospinal fluid and hormones are made.

When these resources are all abundant, and the mechanisms that regulate their use are unobstructed, we have health. Each of them is strongly affected by what you eat, how you eat it, and what you don’t eat.

Let’s look more deeply into the thin fluids, because that resource is almost universally deficient.

Thin fluids are essential for maintaining cellular hydration. Chronic cellular dehydration is one of the main root causes of most every condition that brings a person into my clinic for help. It doesn’t matter whether the condition is an injury that is slow to heal, allergies, distress in the digestive system, or any chronic illness. The almost universal pattern shown when I first see a patient is cellular dehydration, often along with an accumulation of stagnant, toxic fluids between the cells. To oversimplify, the cells are dried out and the sewer system is backed up. Not a great scenario for maintaining health.

It is interesting to note something that surprises most people: This condition cannot be solved by drinking more water. Drinking water is necessary for maintaining good hydration, but for many people, increasing the amount of water consumed just runs right through and induces a frequent need to urinate. This does not substantially rehydrate the cells. To rehydrate the cells, we need to consume Slow Water.

Slow Water is water that has been cooked into foods so that those foods are no longer “thirsty”. When we eat foods that are saturated with Slow Water, that water is easily converted by the stomach into the thin fluids that act as the irrigation system feeding moisture to the cells.

Avoid Cold Food and Drinks

A critically important point is that for the stomach to be able to create fluids from foods, it must be kept warm. Cold foods and drinks paralyze the stomach’s ability to create fluids from foods.

In fact, you can look at the digestive system as a compost heap. A compost heap that is fed a combination of concentrated nutrients along with lots of fiber, and kept warm and moist will create great soil in a short period of time. Similarly, a diet of wet and warm foods containing not only nutrient rich foods but also an abundance of dietary fiber, will allow the stomach to transform these foods into thin and thick fluids.

The stomach will also transform wet and warm foods, with the help of the spleen, into blood. This transformation process supports the creation of a diverse and healthy gut microbiome.

Pour a lot of ice water on a compost heap, and the transformation stops. Not much happens in a compost heap in the middle of the winter.

For this reason, it is important to protect the stomach from cold. Do not eat or drink anything colder than room temperature. I have seen many cases of chronic illness that only began to heal once the habit of drinking cold water was changed to drinking hot water or tea with meals.

Want a glass of white wine or a cold beer? Fine, but nurse it along slowly, and really taste and fully enjoy each sip. Like ice cream? Fine, but limit it to very occasional use, like when the moon is full.

Similarly, eating lots of raw foods chills the stomach. The digestion is run as if the stomach contains a fire. As we get older, sick, and/or are stressed, the stomach’s fire diminishes in intensity.

Use the fire of cooking to maintain the vital warmth of your digestion. Eating too much raw food will further deplete the stomach fire. If you like salads, eat them in small amounts, and use a strong vinaigrette dressing. The vinegar acts somewhat like cooking fire, preparing the raw vegetables for digestion. Give your salad a few minutes to marinate.

Eat raw fruits in season at room temperature only, and if your digestion is weak, cook them first.

Think of stewed fruits and compotes.

The worst thing for your stomach is frozen smoothies. If you insist on drinking smoothies, drink them warm, and actually taste and chew each mouthful as if you are eating soup.

Basic Guidelines for the Wet and Warm Diet

Enjoy everything that you eat and drink. Take the time to chew and taste every bite of food. Do not rush while eating. Do not eat while standing up. Do not eat while dealing with emails or doing business phone calls. Do not eat while watching scary things on TV, including disturbing news. Mealtime is your time to relax and enjoy your food with loved ones.
Avoid cold food and drinks. Let nothing pass your lips that is colder than room temperature. Eat raw foods in condiment amounts.
Start each day with a large mug of hot water, perhaps with a slice of lime or lemon added. Wait an hour before consuming tea or coffee.
Eat congee for breakfast every day. Grains are not only grounding, but they are the best way of providing Slow Water to rehydrate your cells. If you cook grains with enough water so that they will not soak up any more with further cooking, that is the definition of congee. The grains are no longer thirsty, and they will give their water to your cells.
Make one of your other meals each day a soup or stew, or at least begin the meals with a cup of soup.
Avoid dehydrating and drying foods. These include desiccated grains such as crackers and chips, deep fried foods, coffee, alcoholic beverages and chocolate.

A good way to transition from coffee consumption is to substitute pu erh tea. If you don’t know what that is, research online how to source shou pu erh tea and prepare it gong fu style.

How to Make Congee

Congee can be made with any grain, and it is best to rotate through a variety of grains. A typical amount of grain per person is about 1/6 cup.

Some people use an automatic rice cooker, which tends to have a congee or porridge setting, or in an Instant Pot. The ratio of grain to water in an automatic cooker varies with the device being used, but will generally be anywhere from 1:6 to 1:10.

It is important that the grain be given enough water so that when it is fully cooked, there is still liquid seen between the grains, and the grain cannot soak up any more water. In other words, the grain is no longer thirsty, and when eaten, the grain will give its water to your cells. This is Slow Water!

I like to cook the grain in a cast iron pan. I add an optional first step which is to toast the grain. I first add the grain along with salt to a dry pan and roast it until I can smell the nutty aroma of the grain.

If nuts or seeds are being added, include them in this initial pan roasting step. I often add walnuts, pecans, or pine nuts. This roasting step can be omitted, but is mandatory with raw buckwheat.

Once I smell the aroma from the grain, I add olive oil and let the grain cook for a few minutes before adding water.

For the steps that involve adding water, I keep a boiling kettle of water available. First, add just enough to cover the grains and stir until that water has been absorbed. Repeat the process of adding just enough water to cover the grains and stirring a few more times.

By this time, you should see some evidence of starches leaking into the water, meaning that the water begins to take on a milky appearance.

Usually I make congee savory, but if going for sweet congee, after the first or second water additions, it is time to add any fruit, fresh or dried. I like to use dried mulberries, blueberries, sliced figs, dates, or any available fresh fruit.

Before adding more water, stir into the grain any additional material that you wish to incorporate into the congee. I often use powdered mushrooms. Cordyceps is my go-to mushroom for congee, but other commonly used ones are lion’s mane, maitake or tremella.

If fresh mushrooms are being added, I generally cook these separately and add them at the end. Favorite fresh mushroom additions are oysters, shiitake, maitake, boletes, chanterelles, or anything else that is in season.

At this point, all the additional water needed to finish the congee can be added. The correct amount depends on the type and form of the grain, and will need some experience before you can eyeball the correct amount of water. But, more hot water can always be added.

When the grains are fully cooked and very soft, go ahead and add anything else to complete the dish. I will generally add any leftover vegetables and protein such as meat or fish that might be left over from a previous meal.

Pour these leftovers on top of the congee, reduce or shut off the heat and cover until the leftovers are heated through. If no leftovers are available, just poach a few eggs per person directly in the congee. If additional vegetables or mushrooms have been cooked in a separate pan, add those to the congee at the time of serving.

Last minute additions could be a bit of miso mixed with warm water and stirred in at the end, or perhaps thin strips of roasted nori, or chopped scallions. Topping with fermented vegetables is a delicious finish.

Making the congee fresh from scratch each time does take more time than cooking it in a machine, but results in a far superior product. Realistically, you will have to adopt a method that matches available time.

Even adding water and reheating leftover cooked grains is possible to save time if you’ve only got a few minutes to prepare your congee.

The variety of grains that can be used for congee is enormous.

Flaked grains, such as oatmeal, cook in the least amount of time, about 10–15 minutes.
Small softer grains, such as white rice, millet, quinoa and buckwheat, will require 20–45 minutes to simmer and soften adequately.
Harder grains, such as the brown rices, including black and red rices, may require 60–90 minutes to complete, so presoaking overnight may be necessary to cut down on morning preparation time.
Super hard grains, such as whole rye, ancient wheats, and whole barleys such as purple barley or black barley, or certain wild rices, are probably best soaked and pre-cooked in a rice cooker to reduce the morning preparation time to something that is humanly possible.

These grains that require a long cooking time or overnight soaking do require advance preparation, but the amount of incredible grounding qi and stamina that they give is well worth the time.

Conclusion

One of the best things that you can do for your overall health is to adopt a wet and warm diet that includes morning congee and frequent soups and stews. In fact, it is so important that I will claim that it is nearly impossible to move away from chronic illness and to become truly healthy without such a diet plan, regardless of what herbs or supplements you take or what treatments you receive.

For Further Reading

Many of the ideas in this article have been lifted from the books written by Andrew Sterman. I recommend his series called Welcoming Food, Vol 1-3. Volume 1 is theory. Volume 2 is recipes and practical matters. Volume 3, not yet released, is all about grains. They can be purchased by visiting AndrewStermanMusic.com.

Andrew’s wife, Ann Cecil-Sterman has written a small book from which some of the ideas contained in this article have been borrowed. Its title is Becoming Healthy, Staying Healthy.

The model of the digestion as a compost heap comes from the teachings of Ed Neal, M.D.