Anti-Stress Nutrition Programme to Improve Mood,
Health, Behaviour and Learning
By Brenda Sampson
SAFE, LOW-ALLERGEN FOODS
Fresh meat, fish and free range chicken and eggs.
Plenty of fresh vegetables, both raw and lightly cooked. Organic or home grown are better still.
Raw fruit in moderation, eat it whole not juiced.
Nuts, seeds and sprouted seeds
Home made baked goods using alternative flours available from health shops. Wheat is a common allergen; if it is tolerated use wholemeal flour, but use other flours as well. Avoid sugar in baking. Tasteless white flour requires sugar to flavour it, but whole grain flours have a nutty flavour of their own and do not need added sugar. Tolerated fruits, nuts, sweet vegetables or savoury herbs can be used for flavouring. Use baking soda and cream of tartar for raising, one teaspoon soda to two of cream of tartar.
Pure water to drink. If the tap water tastes unpleasant, it will usually be because of chlorine or because of copper from copper water pipes. Chlorine evaporates easily. Boil the water, or run it off into a jug and let it stand for a few hours, preferably over night. Do not drink or cook with water from a hot cylinder. It will contain excess copper. At night, fill a glass jar with water to drink first thing in the morning. Cold water lying all night in copper pipes will contain excess copper. Run tap for a while before using. In 1993, Petone had the purest water in New Zealand, artesian water without added chemicals. There is a big yellow building on the waterfront, the Early Settlers Museum, which has a public tap, (a gardening tap), on the western side facing the Hutt Road.
At the Gear Island pump station in Petone, there is another public tap supplying pure, untreated artesian water. Go east, almost to the end of Jackson Street. On the left is the Shandon golf course; on the right a little dirt road leading to the pumping station. These taps will still give pure water if Petone changes to fluoridated water.
