Healing with food begins with understanding the basics of nutrition. Contrary to the definition of Staff of Life (bread, potatoes and rice), our staff of life consists of nourishing our body each and every day with fruits, berries, vegetables, nuts, and herbs. Our health is closely linked with our intake of food and how healthy it makes us.

Nutritional Immunology (NI) was pioneered recently as a science. By studying nutrition and immunology it was noticed that eating nutritious foods led to a strong, immune response. It was found that a strong immune system, in turn can protect us from infections as most diseases are caused by inflammation in the body due to poor nutrition. When we are ill, we turn to eating nutrient rich foods to help recover faster. Unfortunately, when we are healthy, we ignore eating nutritiously and return to eating foods that often aggravate our health.

Our immune system is responsible for the healthy functioning of the body. It protects the body against outside invaders, it monitors the body to make sure it functions well, it cleans up toxins and debris and it repairs damage done in or on the body. When the immune system gets overwhelmed and cannot cope, we become sick and if nothing is done, the illness becomes chronic.

What we learn in Nutritional Immunology is that it is important to focus on overall health and wellbeing. By doing so, our body is able to take preventive action. It’s a fairly simple concept - if you prevent diseases, then curing them becomes obsolete. It's rather like an avalanche. If you are able to prevent it by creating a mini avalanche, then there is no damage to control.

We use food to help our bodies replace millions of cells daily. Through Nutritional Immunology, we discover which food combinations have the best potential disease-fighting nutrients in foods. We are taught that foods such as fruits and berries, high fibre vegetables such as broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower have an abundance of phytochemicals. We are taught that fruits like tomatoes and rose hips and the seeds of grapes have an abundance in antioxidants and that many types of mushrooms (ABM, ganoderma, maitake and other wild mushrooms) have an abundance of polysaccharides.

Good nutrition is one of the key elements for good health. Eating correctly, knowing the right foods to eat and the right combinations can make all the difference in our lives. Nutritional immunology teaches us how.