Vicki Edgson - Gut gastronomy : revolutionise your eating to create great health

First published in 2015 by

Jacqui Small LLP

An imprint of Aurum Press

7477 White Lion Street

London N1 9PF

Copyright 2015 Text by Grayshott Spa, Vicki Edgson and Adam Palmer

Grayshott Health Regime copyright 2015 Elaine Williams and Stephanie Moore

Photography, design and layout copyright 2015 Jacqui Small

The authors moral rights have been asserted. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.

Publisher: Jacqui Small

Senior Commissioning Editor: Fritha Saunders

Designer: Maggie Town

Editor: Heather Thomas

Photographer: Lisa Linder

Production: Maeve Healy

ISBN: 978 1 909342 83 5
eBook ISBN: 978 1 910254 25 7

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

2015 2014 2013

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eBook conversion by CPI Group

Key to recipe symbols:

Plan recipes

Post-Plan recipes

Since Grayshott Hall became a spa 50 years ago, the medical profession, pharmaceutical and food industries as well as people all over the world have become increasingly concerned about their health, as manifested in their diet, level of fitness and personal appearance. Governments and the private sector have devoted vast resources to telling us what to eat, how to exercise and the dire consequences of not taking advice from the experts and corporations that bombard us daily with publications and advertisements offering remedies and potions that, allegedly, will help us to achieve healthier, fitter and more beautiful bodies.

I have observed the exaggerated claims of nirvana from diets with more and more scepticism. In most cases, what is on offer cannot and does not deliver sustainable results, especially as increasingly bizarre combinations of exotic foods, meal programmes and impossible timetables are devised. These are pushed to an ever-expanding audience that is desperate for success but inevitably disappointed by the reality of what they are being sold as well as their own inability to sustain the prescribed utopian solutions.

I believe that a more transparent, no-nonsense world would produce an audience receptive to the fact that most solutions offered are simply a waste of time and money. However, there are effective solutions and these are the ones that are produced by people whose expertise can deliver results with integrity.

I decided to gather my team at Grayshott and research and assemble a health programme that would address some of the symptoms and consequences of modern living. We believe that repairing the gut is the key to restorative good health. As the godfather of medicine said: All diseases begin in the gut. Hippocrates (460 370 B.C.)

Through therapeutic treatments, herbal tinctures, a scientifically backed diet and specific eating practices, we believe that health must be tackled from the inside out, and the nutrition we recommend is based on a naturopathic approach to gut cleansing and rebalancing the digestive system. The crucial first step to vibrant health is often overlooked: understanding the delicate and complex processes of the digestive system.

At Grayshott we are fortunate to have a wonderful team who have come together to share their expertise, knowledge and experience. What is so exciting is that our programme has delivered results and, even more important, it is sustainable, which is the key to its success. Many readers may have visited clinics all over the world and emerged feeling wonderful only to relapse into their old routine, negating their efforts to achieve their goals because they could not maintain the prescribed diet or exercise regime.

Most of us want to feel healthy and good about ourselves. Although there is no universal panacea or cure for obesity, diabetes and the aches and pains of modern living, I believe that our approach not only works but is doable and sustainable. Providing you can take something from it, it will help you achieve your goals and deliver lasting results.

Nutrition has always been a cornerstone of our health philosophy at Grayshott Spa. Two years ago we pooled our collective 50 years of clinical research, experience and practice to develop a more structured programme for our guests and created The Grayshott Health Regime. One of the main factors influencing our approach was our concern about peoples often misguided notions of needing to detoxify and their desire for a spartan, punitive regime to achieve this. We felt this was mistaken as the demands of modern life, such as over-work, over-exercise, over-fatigue and continuous exposure to stress, were leaving people depleted and in need of nourishment rather than cleansing through deprivation. One of the main casualties of such a lifestyle is a compromised digestive system, and from this emerged the core of our Plan, which focuses on digestive health as the route to true health.

We not only wanted to show people how to regain good health and nourish their bodies through eating real food but also to make them understand that eating the appropriate foods would support and take care of detoxification. This enables us to confidently recommend eating delicious, healing and satisfying foods, such as good-quality, grass-fed red meats (including the fat), fish, eggs, fermented foods, butter, cream, nuts, avocado and a rainbow of wonderful, organic vegetables.

On the Plan, our guests have noticed improvements in their health in as little as one week. We knew that these principles worked over several weeks or months but never imagined the dramatic results that could be attained on such a focused programme. We have repeatedly recorded measureable improvement in such markers as blood glucose, serum cholesterol, triglycerides and gamma GT.

Whilst these objective health measurements have excited us and various members of the medical fraternity, our clients are more often thrilled with the unexpected weight loss aspect, especially as it is body fat that has been lost and not muscle. This reinforces our long-held conviction not to make weight loss the primary focus, as it will often take care of itself as the body heals. We regard being over or under weight as merely a sign of a deeper problem. Correct that and people generally achieve a healthy weight.