Chapter 1
The Ancient Wisdom of Food as Medicine: A Journey Through Traditional Nutrition
In a world obsessed with diet trends and nutritional science, Dr. Ronald F. Schmid's "Traditional Foods Are Your Best Medicine" offers something profoundly different: wisdom accumulated over thousands of generations. This groundbreaking work has influenced countless health practitioners since its first publication in the 1980s, with celebrities like Gwyneth Paltrow and functional medicine pioneer Dr. Mark Hyman citing it as foundational to their nutritional philosophies. What makes this book revolutionary isn't just its comprehensive analysis of traditional diets, but how it connects our modern epidemic of chronic diseases to our departure from ancestral eating patterns. As our society grapples with skyrocketing rates of heart disease, diabetes, and autoimmune conditions, Schmid's research provides a compelling roadmap back to health through foods that nourished humans for millennia before the industrial food revolution.
Chapter 2
The Pioneering Research of Dr. Weston Price
In the 1930s, while most Americans were embracing the convenience of newly available processed foods, dentist Weston Price embarked on a remarkable global odyssey. Troubled by the increasing dental problems he observed in his patients' children-problems their parents hadn't experienced-Price suspected modern diets were to blame. His timing was perfect: traditional cultures around the world remained intact, yet photography and global travel had become accessible enough to document them thoroughly.
What Price discovered was extraordinary. From isolated Swiss Alpine valleys to remote Pacific islands, from Arctic regions to African plains, he found that wherever people maintained their traditional diets, they enjoyed remarkable freedom from the degenerative diseases plaguing modern societies. These people displayed perfect dental formation without orthodontics, resistance to tuberculosis and other infectious diseases, and virtually no cancer, heart disease, or arthritis.
In the Loetschental Valley of Switzerland, Price found children eating traditional diets of raw dairy from pasture-fed animals, whole-rye bread, and occasional meat had just one decayed tooth per three children. The valley had no recorded cases of tuberculosis despite it being Switzerland's leading cause of death. Price's analysis of their dairy products revealed exceptionally high levels of fat-soluble vitamins, particularly what he called "activator X" (now believed to be vitamin K2).
On the isolated Scottish Isles of Lewis and Harris, people thrived on seafood, oats, and vegetables. Children showed less than one decayed tooth per hundred examined, with no tuberculosis, cancer, or arthritis. In stark contrast, children in shipping ports consuming modern foods (white bread, sugar, jams, canned goods) averaged 16-50 decayed teeth per hundred, with tuberculosis becoming devastating.
The primitive Eskimos displayed extraordinary physical prowess and character. Those living entirely on native foods had virtually no tooth decay or chronic disease, while those consuming refined foods suffered in direct proportion to their intake. Their traditional diet consisted of salmon (often preserved and dipped in seal oil), salmon eggs (prized for children and women of childbearing age), caribou organs, kelp, and sea mammal organs.
Perhaps most striking was Price's observation that when people abandoned their traditional diets for modern processed foods, their health rapidly deteriorated-often within a single generation. Children born to parents eating refined foods showed narrowed dental arches and crowded teeth-what Price called "intercepted heredity," where poor nutrition disrupted the natural hereditary pattern of perfect dental form.
Chapter 3
The Revolutionary Power of Raw Foods
While humans have used fire for at least 400,000 years, every native culture examined by anthropologists maintained customs dictating that certain foods be eaten raw-practices invariably related to preventing disease, ensuring fertility, or promoting optimal growth in children. These traditional practices, once dismissed as superstition, have found powerful scientific validation through the groundbreaking research of Dr. Francis Pottenger.
Pottenger's ten-year study involving over 900 cats, combined with detailed records from thousands of patients, established that raw foods contain unique nutrients vital to human health. His experiment began serendipitously when he noticed that cats fed raw meat scraps were significantly healthier than those fed cooked meat. This observation led to rigorous controlled experiments that met the highest scientific standards of his day.
The results were dramatic. Cats fed raw meat, bones, organs, raw milk and cod liver oil showed remarkable health across generations: uniform size and skeletal development, broad faces with wide dental arches, healthy fur, resistance to infections and parasites, good temperament, and successful reproduction. They typically died of old age with normal internal organs.
In stark contrast, cats fed identical diets except with cooked meat developed numerous health problems: varying sizes within litters, dental and facial abnormalities, bones becoming so soft they were "rubbery" by the third generation, vision problems, infections, arthritis, heart problems, and poor coordination. Autopsies revealed the calcium and phosphorous content in second and third-generation cooked-meat kittens was only one-third to one-half that of raw-meat kittens.
Behavioral changes were equally striking-females became irritable and aggressive while males became docile and sexually disinterested. The miscarriage rate reached 70% by the second generation, and no fourth-generation kittens were ever born in the decade-long study, as third-generation kittens all died before reaching six months of age.
Similar patterns emerged when comparing raw milk to pasteurized, evaporated, or condensed milk. Only the raw-milk, raw-meat diet produced healthy cats across generations. Even raw milk from cows fed dry feed rather than fresh greens produced inferior results, showing the critical importance of nutrients in fresh greens that are lost when dried.
The implications for human health are profound. Pottenger observed calcium metabolism problems in most of his patients, manifesting as poor tooth development, arthritis, back problems, gallstones, kidney stones, atherosclerosis, strokes, cataracts, and bursitis-all involving abnormal calcium deposition. His X-ray studies of 150 children showed that only those drinking raw certified milk consistently developed excellent skeletal structures with normal bone age.
Chapter 4
Our Ancient Dietary Heritage
The evolution of human diet reveals profound connections between food choices and health. While controversy exists about human origins, anthropologists generally agree on what our ancestors ate and the superior health of contemporary people following traditional diets. Modern humans, genetically equivalent to those from 400,000 years ago, remain adapted to pre-agricultural foods despite recent dietary shifts.
Our genetic makeup remains essentially unchanged from pre-agricultural times, making us best adapted to hunter-gatherer diets. While agriculture began 10-15,000 years ago, the most damaging dietary shifts occurred only in the last 200 years. Around 1900, new milling methods stripped vital nutrients from flour, and refined foods became dietary staples.
Native American cultures viewed meat as sacred food obtained through spiritual ceremony. The hunt itself was considered sacred, and the meat carried the healing power of plants the animal had consumed. In Aboriginal and other native cultures, the connection between food (especially mammals and fish) and well-being was profoundly spiritual.
The !Kung of the Kalahari Desert, studied extensively by medical teams, maintain hunter-gatherer traditions and show no signs of modern diseases. About 10% of their population is over sixty, similar to America. They hunt just 2-3 days weekly, with women gathering plant foods that constitute two-thirds of their diet. The sharing of meat forms powerful social bonds-a practice anthropologists believe distinguished early humans from extinct relatives.
Hunter-gatherer diets contain 46 grams of fiber (8-10 times modern diets), 1600mg calcium (twice modern intake), one-sixth the sodium, and twice the protein of modern diets. Wild game contains only 3.9% fat compared to 25-50% in modern beef, with significantly different fatty acid compositions beneficial to health.
While the agricultural revolution changed diets considerably, many hunter-gatherer dietary elements persisted until recently. Fresh meat from free-ranging animals retained qualities of wild game, as did raw milk and dairy products from such animals. Coastal people maintained fish as a staple, while rural communities everywhere consumed fresh vegetables, fruits, and whole grains.
Beyond physical nutrition, ancestral wisdom teaches that "feeding the soul is quite literally as important as feeding the body." The spiritual connection between earth and humans that ancestors placed at their core cannot be replaced solely by consuming organic vegetables, free-range meat, whole grains, and supplements.
Chapter 5
Secrets of the World's Longest-Lived Peoples
Three remote mountainous regions-Vilcabamba (Ecuador), Hunza (Pakistani Kashmir), and Georgian Russia-have generated numerous reports of extraordinary human longevity. Vilcabamba, a small Andean village, documented nine centenarians among 819 residents in 1971, with church baptismal records verifying several people over 120 years old. Georgia reported 1,844 centenarians (39 per 100,000 people compared to America's 3 per 100,000).
Despite controversy surrounding longevity claims, multiple verification methods provide compelling evidence for extraordinary lifespans, especially in Vilcabamba. Dr. David Davies from University College London conducted thorough investigations between 1971-1973, examining church baptismal records dating to 1655 that documented individuals living to 126 years and beyond. Death certificates confirmed four people who lived to 150 years in the 1920s-30s.
Most importantly, these centenarians remained lucid, agile and active, free from cancer, heart disease, diabetes, and hypertension-conditions common just fifty miles away where refined foods had been introduced. The healthiest centenarians typically lived on small mountainside farms outside villages.
Georgian centenarians maintained remarkable health through balanced diets and active lifestyles. Studies of 1,000 elderly Georgians revealed diets with 70% plant-based calories and 30% animal-derived-proportions matching both hunter-gatherer cultures and early agricultural societies. Their diet featured raw soured goat milk and low-fat cheeses at nearly every meal, supplemented with eggs, meat from their own livestock, homegrown vegetables, whole grains, and moderate amounts of homemade wine.
Most impressive was their dental health, with excellent teeth into extreme old age. Marriage was nearly universal among centenarians, with active sex lives continuing into their 90s. Multigenerational households provided social structure, with elders maintaining high status and continuing productive work throughout their lives.
Vilcabamba, a "sacred valley" nestled 5,000 feet above sea level in Ecuador, harbors remarkable centenarians despite certain nutritional challenges. The equatorial mountain climate remains a steady 68F year-round. Most centenarians live on small mountain farms rather than in the village, growing vegetables and raising animals. Their diets feature fresh eggs, homemade raw cottage cheese from goats or cows, occasional meat, homemade brown bread, beans, and abundant fresh produce.
Despite remarkable longevity, Vilcabambans faced two health challenges absent in Georgian centenarians: high infant mortality and universal tooth loss in old age-likely due to insufficient fat-soluble nutrients found in animal foods.
Chapter 6
The Protective Power of Traditional Foods
Native groups immune to dental and degenerative diseases shared common dietary characteristics despite geographic diversity. They consumed whole, unrefined, indigenous foods established through centuries of cultural use. Special foods were prescribed for specific life stages, particularly before conception to ensure healthy offspring.
Traditional diets contained abundant fat-soluble vitamins and essential fatty acids from three key sources: seafoods (especially fatty fish), animal and fish organs (particularly liver), and dairy products from animals feeding on fresh green pasture. These foods provided complete vitamin D complex-not just the D3 produced by sunlight on skin, but other crucial D vitamins only available through diet.
Weston Price documented how patients with active dental decay could halt the process without fillings simply by eliminating refined foods and consuming protective foods. His chemical analyses showed dairy products from pasture-fed animals contained significantly higher fat-soluble vitamin content, especially when grass was growing rapidly.
EPA (eicosapentaenoic acid), abundant in fish and wild game but nearly absent in grain-fed domestic beef, produces beneficial prostaglandins that maintain arterial health, prevent abnormal blood clotting, and enhance immune function-explaining why native fish-eating peoples rarely suffered heart disease.
While most modern diets lack adequate fiber (meat and refined flour products contain little; sugar, fats, oils and alcohol have none), traditional diets incorporated substantial fiber through whole grains, vegetables, and seaweed. Native peoples consumed high-fiber diets that prevented constipation and promoted digestive health.
Minerals originate in soil and sea, naturally cycling through ecosystems until modern agriculture broke this cycle. Price's analysis showed traditional diets contained at least four times the minimum daily requirement of all tested nutrients, with some minerals like magnesium, iron and iodine reaching up to fifty times recommended levels.
Raw foods contain enzymes-protein catalysts essential to life processes-that are destroyed when heated above 107-108 degrees. Contrary to conventional teaching that all dietary proteins are broken down to amino acids before absorption, recent research shows about half of ingested protein passes intact or in large fragments into the bloodstream, supporting traditional healers' emphasis on raw foods.
Chapter 7
The Healing Power of Fish and Marine Oils
Native fishing cultures demonstrated superior physical development and disease resistance. A twenty-year Dutch study published in the New England Journal of Medicine followed 852 middle-aged men and found an inverse relationship between fish consumption and coronary heart disease mortality. Men eating at least one ounce of fish daily had over 50% lower death rates from heart disease compared to those eating no fish.
This protective effect increased with greater fish consumption, regardless of whether the fish was lean or fatty, suggesting multiple beneficial nutrients beyond EPA. Even modest fish consumption of one or two portions weekly provided significant protection, though traditional Greenland Eskimos who consumed fourteen ounces daily had extremely low heart disease rates.
A study of twenty patients with hypertriglyceridemia compared three diets: low-fat/low-cholesterol, fish oil-rich, and vegetable oil-rich. The fish oil diet reduced triglycerides by 64-79% and cholesterol by 27-45% within four weeks. When patients switched to vegetable oils, blood fats increased dramatically, with some developing abdominal pain and liver tenderness.
Japanese researchers compared people from fishing and farming villages to investigate fish consumption's effect on blood clotting. Fishing villagers consumed nine ounces of fish daily (providing 2.5 grams EPA) while farmers averaged three ounces (0.9 grams EPA). Blood tests showed fishing villagers had significantly higher EPA levels and less platelet aggregation (tendency for blood to clot), suggesting optimal fish intake might be closer to nine ounces daily than three ounces for maximum cardiovascular protection.
Research shows EPA and DHA are essential for visual acuity and brain development. DHA is a normal constituent of retinal cells, with dietary levels directly affecting vision. Studies at Oregon Health Sciences University found deficiencies reduced retinal cell function. Similarly, these fatty acids concentrate in the human cerebral cortex, with deficiencies potentially impairing learning and reasoning.
Traditional cultures wisely emphasized EPA/DHA-rich foods for pregnant women and children, understanding what modern science now confirms: the human brain acquires half its fat composition before birth and most of the remainder during the first year.
Chapter 8
Creating Your Own Traditional Foods Diet
Creating an optimal nutritional program requires understanding that the body's needs constantly change, making an ideal diet dynamic rather than static. Physical signals serve as important guides for food selection: difficult bowel movements indicate need for more fiber and water-rich foods; respiratory congestion often signals poor reactions to dairy or wheat; persistent skin blemishes frequently result from consuming refined sugars and processed foods; and excessive gas indicates improper food combining or inadequate digestive enzymes. Paying attention to these signals helps fine-tune dietary choices.
The Chinese concept of yin and yang provides crucial insight into creating a dynamic, balanced diet. Foods have different energetic qualities that affect the body in distinct ways: animal-source foods are more yang (contractile/strengthening/warming), vegetables are more yin (expansive/cooling), grains are generally balanced, and sweets and alcohol are extremely yin (dispersive/weakening). Health problems commonly result from imbalances of these forces, such as excessive yang leading to inflammation or too much yin causing lethargy.
Foods divide into six fundamental categories, each serving specific nutritional purposes: (1) Animal-source foods including fish, meat, organs, dairy and eggs - providing complete proteins and fat-soluble vitamins; (2) Raw and lightly cooked green vegetables, sprouts, and sea vegetables - offering living enzymes and minerals; (3) Other vegetables, whole grains, beans, fruits, nuts and seeds - supplying fiber, complex carbohydrates and plant proteins; (4) Condiments and alcoholic beverages - used sparingly for flavor and celebration; (5) Vitamin, mineral and food supplements - addressing specific deficiencies; and (6) Refined and manufactured foods - generally avoided or minimized.
Foods from groups 1 and 2 are most essential for prevention and healing, forming the foundation of a traditional diet. A balanced regime typically includes one-third animal-source foods, one-third raw greens and sprouts, and one-third whole grains, other vegetables, and fruits, with seasonal variations based on climate and activity levels. Fat-soluble nutrients essential to mineral metabolism - including vitamins A, D, E and K2 - are found only in fish, grass-fed animal products, and dairy from grass-fed animals. These are precisely the foods Price found abundant in immune populations, who showed remarkable resistance to dental decay and infectious disease.
Weston Price's research revealed that cultures with little dental decay also showed almost no physical abnormalities in children, including proper facial development and straight teeth without crowding. This remarkable health stemmed primarily from special nutritional practices during pregnancy and conscious birth spacing of at least three years - a practice modern psychologists also consider ideal for emotional development and bonding between siblings.
For optimal pregnancy outcomes, nutrient-dense foods from fish/shellfish (especially small, fatty fish), liver/organs (particularly from grass-fed animals), or raw milk/cheese from pastured animals should be consumed starting at least six months before conception. These should be complemented with iodine-rich sea vegetables and raw greens rich in folate. This nutritional foundation enhances fertility, supports proper fetal development, and helps minimize birth defects. Traditional cultures often reserved special sacred foods for pregnant and nursing mothers, recognizing the critical importance of maternal nutrition for the next generation's health.
Chapter 9
Healing Specific Conditions Through Traditional Nutrition
Rather than prescribing specific diets for specific conditions, it's important to acknowledge that individuals with the same diagnosis often have different nutritional requirements. Detailed recommendations require individual assessment, with consideration for tastes and emotional states, as even the finest plan is useless if not followed.
Colds and flus resolve most rapidly when fasting begins at the first symptom-whether fatigue, headache, loss of appetite, or throat soreness. While symptoms typically worsen over a day or two as illness establishes, fasting at the earliest sign often reverses minor symptoms within 24 hours. The body naturally suppresses hunger during acute illness because food interferes with healing responses.
Allergies serve as early warning signs of food-created imbalances. Conventionally produced milk and cheese are typically the worst offenders-removing them often eliminates allergies. In children, allergies commonly manifest as coughs, colds and recurrent ear infections.
Chronic fatigue, often dismissed when lab tests appear normal, frequently indicates low thyroid function. Beyond fatigue, hypothyroidism may cause dry skin/hair, weight gain tendency, constipation, and cold sensitivity-though rarely all symptoms together. The most reliable indicator is low basal body temperature (below 97.8F) upon awakening.
Most Americans over fifty show arthritis symptoms, contrasting sharply with the vitality of elderly people in traditional societies. Conventional medicine offers no clear explanation for arthritis development, though calcium deposits in joints are recognized. These deposits stem from disturbed calcium metabolism caused by poor diet. Even with adequate dietary calcium, refined carbohydrates (especially sugar) disrupt calcium-phosphorous balance, aggravating symptoms.
Fatty cold-water fish like salmon should be eaten several times weekly by those with heart and circulatory problems. Raw shellfish and organ meats, despite conventional warnings about cholesterol, have helped patients recover from heart disease without raising blood cholesterol. Commercial dairy and meat should be minimized, though fats from grass-fed animals may be beneficial.
People with cancer often face tremendous tension and confusion from conflicting treatment advice. While conventional treatments like surgery, chemotherapy and radiation may temporarily alleviate symptoms by destroying cancer cells, they often leave underlying conditions unchanged. For those choosing natural approaches, nutrition-based therapies offer possibilities, though results vary based on cancer stage, individual condition, cancer type, and program adherence.
Chapter 10
The Future of Traditional Nutrition in Modern Life
The relationship between individuals, physicians, and health goals forms the foundation for utilizing nutritional knowledge. Self-assessment is crucial, asking whether one's body feels capable of lasting without disease. While aging is natural, disease is not.
Working with a physician who respects individual needs can help understand medical conditions, though most doctors focus more on disease than health. The ideal physician serves as teacher, explaining findings and treatment options beyond drugs and surgery. Since many physicians lack nutritional knowledge, patients must sometimes know more about nutritional approaches than their doctors.
Setting specific, challenging yet realistic health goals with timetables is essential for achievement. Unlike other aspects of life, we have complete freedom over what we eat, making health one result of wisely exercising that freedom. The process requires welcoming change, learning from setbacks, and overcoming apathy.
The epilogue draws connections between physical and spiritual health, comparing the parallel work of Weston Price and Carl Jung. While Price sought to understand biological laws determining physical development, Jung investigated forces in the human psyche that shape our individual being. Together, their work provides blueprints for achieving health in both body and spirit.
Native cultures developed accurate prescriptions for satisfying, healthy lives largely free from modern depression and personal turmoil. The author emphasizes that information must lead to action-developing one's philosophy of natural living requires commitment to principles and hard inner work. This search for understanding develops capacity for love and relatedness, what Jung called "individuation"-the integration of the unconscious into conscious personality, enabling one to become a "whole" being embracing one's unique nature.
As we face unprecedented rates of chronic disease in modern society, the wisdom of traditional foods offers not just a path to physical healing, but a reconnection to the deeper rhythms of nature and our own humanity. In the words of Weston Price: "Life in all its fullness is Mother Nature obeyed."
