![]() Fortunately, we can duplicate a traditional way of eating nearly anywhere. The width, breadth and depth of the traditional diet’s impact on the body are hard to overstate. Haitian culture being what it is, it is also very difficult to accept that the healthiest among us are healthiest because they embody something that most Haitians hope to move away from, both in education and location. Diet is not everything, of course. ![]() Compared to city dwellers or others who have access to packaged foods made mostly of sugar and flour, the differences move into sharper focus. Hygiene is the use of charcoal ash as cleaning agent every few days or so with minimal to no access to dentistry. The “peasant” when looked at through an eye free of cultural prejudice is strong with wide jaws, well formed muscles, and exemplary structure. It is not a matter of hygiene and access to dentists, either. It is not access to imported food stuffs that ensures health but rather the lack of access. The more removed from the capital and habits of the upper classes, the healthier in general they are. Strong, white and clear of stains, they flash as vibrant advertisements of health. Haitians, particularly that rather hardy and also denigrated class the “peasant” have beautiful teeth. Generations of those that came before ate in the ways that time and location had made possible. Great-grandma probably had no idea what those things were. When we eat traditionally, in touch with our great-grandmother’s culture, these things completely cease to matter. It is infinitely more than putting together a puzzle using the pieces of fat, protein and carbohydrates. What we eat is important…very, very, very important. The actual structure of the body lost its integrity. Body deformities were more frequent, with turned in feet, hunched shoulders and greater general fragility. Mental retardation or other illnesses became more numerous as the skull became less roomy for the brain. Their teeth started to crowd as the jaw narrowed, not allowing enough room for all of the teeth to grow in straight. The children of those who no longer ate traditionally exhibited changes in structure. Then, things became even more interesting. When people turned to eating the displacing foods, the teeth began to rot and weight was gained. In addition, there were no complaints of mental disturbances, either. Straight, strong backs, broad shoulders, well balanced muscles, and powerful feet. This robustness worked its way down the entire body. Their faces were broad, with wide noses and strong jaws with large palates and well formed skulls with plenty of room for their brains. Price discovered that when people were eating their traditional diets, their teeth were strong and healthy, with no need for extraction because of rotting or space. Bones serve many purposes in the body, one of which is as a storehouse for nutrients. When the body starts to become deficient in certain minerals or digestion is impaired, the mouth environment changes and the body will borrow minerals from the teeth to shuttle to other tissues where needed. The teeth are bones, after all and the mouth is the beginning of our alimentary tract. In actuality, our teeth are some of the best indicators of whole body health. We are trained that dental health is a question of hygiene: if we brush regularly, we will have healthy teeth. What do teeth and nutrition have to do with each other? This is not obvious to us in our modern paradigm. It can not be done today because there are so few peoples left that eat their traditional diets without heavy supplementation of what Price calls the “displacing foods of industry” (sugar, flour, vegetable oil, and other processed foods). His documentation of their journey and findings can be found in the book Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, and is one of the most valuable nutrition studies ever done. He encountered people from all races and all climates. Price, traveled the world to study and take pictures of teeth. In the 1930s, an American dentist and his wife, Mr. It is more than the building blocks of our tissues. It is more than an arrangement of tastes: sweet, sour, salty, bitter, spicy, tangy umami in different proportions. It is even more than a combination of nutrients.
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