Why The Concept of Principal And Complementary Foods Matters
What Are Principal and Complementary Foods?
The concept of principal and complementary foods is central to macrobiotics and Chinese medicine, a key component of the five common dietary patterns of successful cultures around the world that have been practiced for hundreds of years. I share why the concept of having principal and complementary foods matters in this article, a bonus Part 4 in my series, beginning with The Use of Yin and Yang in Chinese Medicine Versus Macrobiotics,(part 1), Yin and Yang According to Macrobiotics (part 2), and How To Use Yin and Yang for Self-Healing, (part 3).
You can read more about the five common dietary patterns observed in successful populations in my book, The Macrobiotic Action Plan, Your MAP to Greater Health & Happiness (or simply, The MAP), and in my article, Crafting a Healthy Balanced Diet Based On Universal Principles.
Why The Concept of Principal and Complementary Foods Matters
Knowing which foods are principal foods, and which foods complement the principal foods enables orderly (versus disordered) eating. Here are a few reasons why this matters:
Knowing which are the best staple foods for you based on your region and personal needs will help you cut through all the conflicting dietary styles and nutrition information (and misinformation) flooding social media. It's very freeing and empowering! Whenever I find myself getting swept up by a wave of positive anecdotes from people following popular diet trends, I 'unhook' whatever parts are feeling drawn in, and return to my center, my inner knowing of the principal foods which best nourish my entire being. It's like returning home, again and again. I learned the hard way! (You can read about my/our 'journey' from vegan to low-carb / hypercarnivore - and back to vegan - here.)
Another important reason why the concept of principal and complementary foods matters is because eating seasonal, local and regional foods boosts your immune system, and engenders a subtle sense of stability.
Knowing the most appropriate foods for your particular region also streamlines meal planning, shopping and meal prep.
Choosing foods grown locally, or regionally is less resource consumptive. As much as I may want to purchase some juicy grapes when they first appear at grocery stores in the early spring, I wait until much later in the season for California grapes. They are not quite local, but they are at least from our country, and come available when grapes are naturally in season.
Having a clear understanding of the concept of principal and complementary foods helps you make better decisions. For example, I personally love several tropical fruit, but tend to avoid purchasing fruit from other countries, for the most part, including bananas. Let's compare bananas (shipped in from other countries) to potatoes –– (grown locally and regionally).
- Bananas and potatoes are both very affordable sources of calories. One large 136g banana has about 120 calories. One medium, 138g baked potato with skin on has 128 calories.
- According to Cronometer.com, both contain about 31g carbohydrates, 38 mg of magnesium, and roughly the same amount of vitamin C and manganese, however, potatoes edge out with a little more protein, fiber. vitamins B5 & B6, and nearly double the amount of potassium. (Make sure to add some salt to your potatoes to get the right balance of potassium to sodium!)
- While I can't exactly grab a potato, pop off the skin and add peanut butter for a quick snack, according to Chinese medicine, bananas have a cool to cold thermal nature, which is contraindicated for someone who tends to run cold.
- Both could potentially be a principal food, depending on one's location, however, bananas especially come up a bit short compared to whole grains, as explained below.
Likewise, I love mangos and papaya, however, overall, I feel much better sticking to more local or at least regionally grown seasonal fruit. Tropical fruits like pineapple and kiwi tend to leave a tingly, prickly sensation in my mouth. Fruit grown in your local region have weathered the climatic conditions you live in, and they in turn pass on their innate resilience to seasonal fluctuations to you, helping you build a healthy immune system.
Now, if I were to return to Costa Rica, Mexico or Guatemala.... I'd be having big bowls of mango, papaya and pineapple for breakfast! There's no comparison to their superior flavor when consumed where they are grown!
Photos: Mise en Place (L) for making Red Beans & Rice, (R) - Note the principal & complementary trilogy of foods: whole grains, beans, and vegetables
Principal and Complementary Foods (A Review)
According to Rudolph Ballentine, M.D., author of Diet and Nutrition, Transition to Vegetarianism, An Evolutionary Step, and Radical Healing, Integrating the World's Great Therapeutic Traditions to Create a New Transformative Medicine, whole grains (and whole grain products) are the principal foods of most traditional diets.
Foods that boost the flavor and nutritional value of the principal foods, yet are not as concentrated a source of calories, or are consumed in lesser quantities are complementary. (Primarily pulses, land and sea vegetables, and seeds.) Fruits, nuts, and animal foods are generally consumed in smaller quantities, and provide different functions, filling in nutritional or regional food availability gaps.
Legumes and vegetables perfectly complement whole grains. Legumes provide the balance of essential amino acids, along with vitamins, minerals, and fiber; vegetables add flavor, texture, color and variety to dishes, and are also good sources of vitamins and minerals. Being more alkaline, they also help balance the acidity of grains. In some cultures, such as Middle Eastern diets, more animal foods are consumed, however, pita or bread still anchor the meal. (You can read more about the five common dietary practices outlined by Ballentine in my earlier post.)
Why Whole Grains?
Whole grains have been consumed by advanced civilizations, including the Romans, for thousands of years. As Don writes in his article, whole grains, legumes, fruits and vegetables are the best foods for strength and health.
Whole grains are the logical choice as principal foods because they are an excellent source of calories and nutrition, containing all the macronutrients, vitamins, minerals, amino acids, fatty acids, fiber and glucose for the brain.
Let's look at the nutrition of 1/2 cup of brown rice, and .6 cup (just over 1/2 cup) of whole wheat pasta (a form people are more likely to consume than whole wheat berries), each containing about 125 calories, similar to the above comparison of bananas and potatoes.
- 1/2 cup of brown rice contains 2.8g of protein, 24g of carbohydrates, 1g of fat, just shy of 2g of fiber, 39mg of magnesium, 16% of the RDI for vitamin B1, 18% for B3, and over half (55%) of your daily requirements for manganese.
- .6 cup of whole wheat pasta contains 5g of protein, 25g of carbohydrates, 1.4g of fat, 3.3g of fiber, 45g of magnesium, 19% RDI For vitamin B3, 12% of B1, 62% manganese, 55% of selenium, 14& of zinc, and .2g of vitamin E. (Vitamin E and selenium are important antioxidants.) I just consumed 3 oz. of Delallo Whole Wheat Pasta Shells for dinner, which contains 10.5g of protein, and 6g of fiber. I consumed 23-25g of protein from whole grain sources alone today, over two meals.
- Unless eating a lot of pork, Thiamine (B1) is often deficient in low-carb diets. Carnivore diets are also very low in vitamins C & E, and manganese.
It is clear that whole grains, especially higher protein grains like whole wheat which many now eschew are great sources of many vitamins and minerals. They grow abundantly, with year-round availability, are easy to prepare, and remain viable after long-term storage.
And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat. ~ Genesis 1:29, KJV - BibleGateway
Both macrobiotics and Chinese medicine recommend a diet centered around simple, mildly sweet foods such as whole grains, root vegetables and winter squashes, with mostly cooked versus raw vegetables. These foods provide calm, even energy and moods. The more we consume these foods, the less we crave unhealthy sweets, and the more balanced we feel throughout the day.
Leafy greens and other vegetables –– which can be Quick Boiled/Blanched, or made into pressed salads or fermented vegetables –– beans and legumes, seeds, seasonal and regional fruits, small amounts of nuts, and healthy condiments and seasonings round out the diet.
'What's for dinner?' - Western 'Principal' Foods & Disordered Eating
Westerners tend to consume –– or at least consider –– animal foods as their principal foods, believing that consumption of animal foods is necessary to get adequate nutrition. Potatoes, corn, or possibly white rice and / or salads or vegetables are common side dishes for many eating a standard American diet. These would be considered complementary food choices.
What's Wrong With Animal Foods?
According to Chinese medicine, animal foods are more building and congesting. Contrary to popular belief, they are not necessary for optimal health, and are very easy to over consume.
Cheese and processed meats (bacon, sausages, salami, pepperoni, etc.) are also high in fat and sodium, a hyper-palatable combination that often leads to cravings or addictions to these foods. Over consumption of foods that are building in nature leads to excess accumulations that eventually cause problems of one form or another.
Animal foods should be used more like condiments, or consumed in much smaller quantities –– if consumed at all –– similar to the common dietary patterns of successful cultures.
In Chinese food therapy, they are used therapeutically in modest amounts by those with true deficiencies. True nutrient deficiencies are more prevalent in impoverished areas. Most chronic diseases in Western nations are diseases of excess, not deficiency. Deficiencies accrue because of disordered eating, consuming too many (Yang) congesting foods, and too little (yin) nourishing and moistening foods.
It's no surprise that two of the most popular vegetables in American diets are ranked as 'extreme yin' in macrobiotics: potatoes and tomatoes. While both have their potential health benefits, they are especially balancing to extreme yang, animal-based diets popular in Western cultures.
Pictures: Homegrown tomatoes, top L; locally grown purple potatoes, top R; Blueberries, grapes & (imported) papaya (not ideal) with porridge, bottom L; local grown Honeycrisp apples, bottom R - all more Yin foods
Congesting Foods Leads to Cravings for Dispersing Foods & Beverages
Consider for a moment, why are caffeinated beverages, especially coffee – and alcohol – so popular?
Heavy, congesting diets leads to cravings for foods and beverages that are more dispersing, as people have an innate drive to seek balance. Think coffee and sweets, including fruits and juices, and alcohol. I definitely needed my morning coffee when I was eating a low-carb diet. Coffee has the apparent effect of breaking up stagnation from congesting diets. As a plant-based dieter, I naturally lose my craving for coffee –– without trying –– and enjoy lattes once or twice a week, if at all.
Many people gravitate toward alcohol for similar reasons. To 'unwind' from stress, congesting diets, imbalanced lifestyles, or as a means of avoidance, a topic for another day.
What about refined sweets?
The sweets people consume are almost always made with refined flours, sugars and fat. Another hyper-palatable food combination. As a life-long coffee house hanger outer, I have rarely found these establishments offering cookies, muffins, bagels, etc. made with whole grain flours. These days, they may be gluten-free (often made with white rice flour, tapioca flour, etc.), and high in coconut oil, but clearly people are not demanding whole grains.
Commercial white flour breads, baked goods, bagels, muffins, cookies, pastries, dry cereals, and donuts –– along with fried foods, pizza and other high sodium and fat fast foods, large, iced sodas or coffee drinks, and/or ice cream –– comprise a large part of many Westerner's diets. These foods are nutritionally inferior; they replace more nutritious whole, fresh plant foods, and lead to major health imbalances. (Yang becomes yin, meaning excessively congesting diets ultimately leads to imbalances with weakened immunity, and nutritional deficiencies.)
Disordered Eating
This disordered 'pattern' of eating is born more from convenience and habit as opposed to more conscious, thoughtful choices, such as the five common dietary patterns of successful cultures around the world. Unfortunately, current principal and complementary food choices in Western nations lack a proven track record of supporting a healthy population for ongoing generations, as witnessed by current rates of obesity, and poor health trends.
Don and I incorporated the concept of principal and complementary foods in our book, Meats and Sweets, A High Vitality Diet, no longer available. As we discovered, fruits (the sweets), and vegetables that are technically botanical fruits such as tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, and summer and winter squashes are a better complement to animal-heavy diets. As more and more people jump on board with 'The Sugar Diet' it appears as though Don and I were ahead of the curve!
Eating a high-carb, low-fat diet with more fruits and vegetables, along with some rice or other grains and starches and occasional lean meats is a huge improvement from standard American diets.
Whole-Foods, Plant-Based Diet Imbalances
Even though many whole-food, plant-based dieters consume healthy plant foods, their choices are often based on nutritional studies which lack nuance. As an example, it's ok to eat 'the daily dozen' foods every day, yet it is sort of a random array of foods found to have certain health benefits. At any given time, another food could be studied and found to have super special health benefits as well. Do we continually add to our daily dozen list? Is a diet centered around 'super foods' an example of orderly eating? Not if many of those foods are out-sourced from other regions, at least according to macrobiotics. It's not how humans ever used to eat before trade made it possible to consume foods from other regions. Imported foods were luxuries relegated to the wealthy class.
Making sure you eat from a check list of the top super foods seems restraining, and a bit stressful, at least to me. Imported produce picked before ripe will not contain the same nutritional quality as locally grown produce. Adherence to the concept of principal and complementary foods makes a big difference in our immune system and overall health.
Contrarily, avoiding foods such as gluten and gluten-containing grains, soy foods, rice and oats can make it more challenging to get certain nutrients in the diet.
Restricting sodium in plant-based diets which are high in potassium can tax the kidneys which release hormones to urinate excess potassium to maintain the right ratio of potassium to sodium in the body.
Restricting fat –– including polyunsaturated fats –– reduces absorption of carotenoids.
When you eat according to the concept of principal and complementary foods, it frees you from being hyper-focused on every morsel you eat so you can enjoy your diet, in the right balance. Because, in the end, it's all about balance, as the early macrobiotic pioneers understood.
It's All About Balance - Early Macrobiotic Pioneers
In my article, How Yin and Yang Are Used in Macrobiotics, I mentioned how George Ohsawa, considered the father of macrobiotics, and author of The Unique Principle and many other books, learned the importance of obtaining the right balance of potassium to sodium salts from Sagen Ishizuka. I highlight a few other earlier pioneers to modern macrobiotics in this article, and in my book, The Macrobiotic Action Plan, Your MAP to Greater Health & Happiness, one of which is Kaibara Ekiken, considered by some to be the 'grandfather of macrobiotics.'
Kaibara Ekiken (also spelled Ekken), (1630-1714), a neo-Confucian philosopher, botanist, travel writer and physician to the Samurai class, wrote Yojokun (The Way of Nurturing Life, or The Book of Life-Nourishing Principles), in 1713, translated and described by William Scott Wilson as the "culmination of over six decades of observation on how a human being may remain vigorous and healthy throughout life and live to old age in a satisfying and fulfilling manner."
Wilson further states, "The main thrust of this book, however, is not medicine and cures, but a lifestyle that prevents the onset of disease."
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| Kaibara Ekiken C.C. Wikipedia |
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| Yojukun By Hanabishi - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0 |
Our Body - A Gift From Heaven & Earth
Ekiken believed our body is a gift from Heaven and Earth –– and your mother and father –– that should be cared for to live its natural life span. To Ekiken, thoughtlessly damaging one's body was the highest ingratitude.
"Your body is the foundation of your fundamental health. If fortified by the nutritious grains, your fundamental health will continue on vigorously."
While Ishizuka and Ohsawa emphasized the importance of getting the right balance of acid and alkaline, and potassium and sodium in the diet, Kaibara believed foods should be freshly prepared with a balance of the five main flavors: sweet, sour, salty, bitter and pungent,
Ekiken supported the consumption of meats, however, he emphasized grains over meats:
"Moreover, the ancients said, "You should eat more grains than meats [thus letting the grains' effect on your digestion overcome the effect of meats], rather than the other way around."
In all cases, he stresses throughout his book that over indulgence of any activities, including excessive eating, and lack of restraint towards sensorial pleasures leads to destruction of health.
(Above quotes from Yojokun, by Kaibara Ekiken, translated by Williman Scott Wilson in Cultivating Ch'i, A Samurai Physician's Teachings on the Way of Health.)
In Summary
People eat what they crave. We are unwittingly programmed to crave hyper-palatable, high fat foods, whether in combination with salt, or sugar. (Just watch an evening of television programming, and you'll see several commercials of meat and dairy-laden, high-fat and sodium-rich pizzas, burgers, fried chicken and other 'crave-able' foods.) Salt and sugar are then vilified by health influencers, while fat gets a hall pass. However, if we put aside our emotional attachments and beliefs about what we consider healthful or not, we can see it's the diet –– and lifestyle –– as a whole that is the issue.
Too much or too little of almost every substance can be harmful.
As Ekiken stated,
"Food and drink are the nourishment of life. For this reason, the nourishment received from food and drink should be considered a special daily supplement to man's life and cannot be neglected for even half a day.
"However, even though food and drink supply man's essential nourishment, they are also the objects of great desire. They are what the mouth and stomach crave. By giving in completely to these cravings, man can easily go beyond his limits, damage his stomach and spleen, generate a myriad illnesses, and lose his life."
Educating the populous about basic dietary principles could help people make better choices, especially when they understand the bigger picture of how foods complement one another. Perhaps national health trends in America would improve by broadly implementing these five common dietary patterns, adjusted appropriately for individual needs, depending on location, budget and personal preferences.
Instead, people are confused about what is best, and tend to throw their hands up in the air and eat whatever, whenever. Foods consumed out of season, and without regard to one's condition generally leads to weakened immunity –– with a tendency to catch seasonal cold and flu bugs –– and ultimately chronic disease.
Read The Entire Series:
- The Origin of Yin and Yang in Chinese Medicine versus Macrobiotics, The Laws of Complementary Opposites, Part 1/3
- Yin and Yang According to Macrobiotics versus Chinese Medicine, Part 2/3
- How to Use Yin and Yang for Self-Healing
- The Brown Rice Diet
- Crafting a Healthy Balanced Diet - Universal Principles - Five Common Dietary Practices of Successful Cultures Worldwide
- Read more about The Macrobiotic Action Plan, Your MAP to Greater Health & Happiness
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