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Gut & Psychology Syndrome™
This book is a well-researched, science-based summary of the genetic-nutritional-biochemical factors that link Autism, ADD, ADHD, Dyspraxia, Dyslexia, Depression and Schizophrenia to digestive dysfunction. Dr. Campbell-McBride applied her training in neurology and nutrition to help her own autistic son. The GAPS diet brings together the best of the dietary aspects that are helpful for both gut dysfunction and mental or developmental issues. This brings together aspects of the SCD (Specific Carbohydrate diet), gluten and casein free approaches, restoring digestive balance, and clearing toxins. This approach is also effective for allergies, sensitivities, digestive dysfunction and many other physiological conditions. [GAPS™ and Gut and Psychology Syndrome™ are the trademark and copyright of Dr. Natasha Campbell-McBride. The right of Dr. Natasha Campbell-McBride to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Patent and Designs Act 1988.] Click here to watch Dr Natasha's presentation at Wise Traditions UK 2010 (88 mins) This resource page was compiled for people who have attended my presentations on GAPS™, but may also be helpful for anyone else doing (or thinking of doing) the protocol, especially if you're in New Zealand.
We will be holding regular GAPS seminars and fermented food workshops in Wellington, as required. The format is slightly different now than the first few series of workshops. I now recommend you either read the book or watch the DVDs on your own first. Then the two workshops cover: 1. Getting started on GAPs. You already know what GAPS is, and why you need to do it. This is a "How To" workshop covering a step by step approach to getting started. 2. Preparing for the Intro. Although Dr McBride recommends everybody do the Intro diet (a temporary elimination diet), other practitioners have found that it's not always necessary. Once you're settled into the full GAPS diet, if you decide to do the Intro, this covers how to approach it, and some trouble shooting tips. 3. Dealing with the emotional side. I also recommend using Emotional Freedom Techique (EFT) or tapping to deal with any stress involved. I run regular "Intro to EFT" sessions, which can be done before starting GAPS, or during it. Email me to put your name on the waiting list, if you are interested in either of these.
On this page: GAPS Health Conditions ~ Resources ~ Foods, Books and equipment ~ Supplements ~ The Stages of GAPS ~ Intro hints ~ Questions & answers ~ Recipes The GAPS protocol is based on the principles that to heal the illness the gut needs to be repaired and the gut flora rebalanced. It may be suitable for the following types of conditions, and more:
It is highly recommended that you thoroughly read as many of these as possible. Yahoo discussion group - for recipes, tips, support, sharing experiences with others doing the protocol, asking for help if you get stuck. Joining this group is crucial. GAPS website - details of the diet, how to do the Intro stage, and any new info. NEW - Dr McBride now has her own website - it has some good fermented food recipes The book is available in NZ through our Nature Foods website. Or you can get it from Amazon UK (but USA only has it through the Marketplace sellers). Baden's blog - Baden is the moderator of the Yahoo group, and author of theGAPS guide book, which are now also stocking through Nature Foods This GAPS blog may also be of interest.
We have some of the foods you might want on our Nature Foods website including:
We also have copies of Nourishing Traditions, by Sally Fallon. Some people have asked about where to buy an enema kit, if needed during the Intro. I haven't tried them, so can't vouch for them, but these sound reasonable. www.enemas.co.nz/ Although Dr Campbell-McBride prefers to get nutrients from foods, sometimes supplements are needed. These supplements are likely to be helpful for most people, others need to be prescribed on an individual basis. Probiotics Remember that the probiotic needs to be started slowly, and built up, to avoid die off. Die off is when the good bugs kill the bad bugs, which releases toxins into the system. Symptoms can include digestive upsets, brain fog, headaches, flu like symptoms and more. These symptoms can also be caused by withdrawal from allergies. This also applies to the fermented foods.
Protein Digestive Aid (HCL and pepsin)
Either is fine, whichever is easiest to find. the Solgar may be more helpful, as they are smaller, so easier to adjust your dose. 1. Pre Intro - Dr Campbell-McBride recommends starting with the Intro diet, but for some people this may be too difficult to go straight into. So we recommend a Pre-Intro stage where you:
2. The Intro diet:
3. The main GAPS diet:
4. Reintroducing other foods. Most GAPS unfriendly foods are not that good for general health anyway, so even when you can tolerate them, it is recommended that they are eaten infrequently. See the book or the GAPS website for more information on the foods that are suitable for each stage, and how to implement each .. from those already doing the GAPS Intro. Be well prepared when going into the Intro phase. Don't underestimate what is involved - emotionally or practically.
Q & A Here are some questions that have been asked at GAPS workshops or by email. This may be added to periodically. What is the starch test? Use this if you have doubts about whether a food has starch in it eg. fruit that may have been picked before it was ripe. Get some liquid iodine from the chemist. Place a drop of it on the food you're checking. If it stays the same colour - a golden brown - there is no starch. If it goes dark brown or black, it has starch in it and isn't GAPS friendly. Can you do GAPS if you are vegetarian? It depends what kind of vegetarian you are. If you were vegan, it would be impossible to do GAPS, as the bone broths are one of the most important foods. If you were comfortable eating fish stocks you could do GAPS. If you could also eat fish, eggs, cod liver oil and later on some dairy, you could do it fairly comfortably. Coconut oil would be an important fat for you. I have done a high protein diet before and I got extremely constipated, I think especially red meat and eggs. How will it be different on this diet? High protein diets are not good if they are not accompanied by adequate fat. This is meant to be a moderate protein diet with plenty of fat. Fat eases constipation. Also you can still have as many non-starchy veges as you like, which will give you lots of fibre. By gradually easing into GAPS and repairing the gut at the same time, you should be able to ease your body into having less fibre from grains. If you need extra help at the start, ground flaxseed and prunes are two things that will help. If you have constipation in the Intro phase, I have a list of trouble shooting ideas. Also when I was on this high protein diet I felt extremely weak. So what will give me the energy on the GAPs diet? Carbs aren’t restricted on GAPS, just starches. So you can have carbs in the form of fruit. Also, your body can use fat as fuel, and will switch over from burning carbs. But it will take a little while to learn how to do that, which is one of the reasons Lynn and I recommend building up to doing the Intro diet, not launching straight in. So would I start with the Intro diet? Where would I get the information to do that for a few days? Then is it straight to the GAPs main diet? We recommend easing into it with the steps on the handout. Introduce the broth and sauerkraut and gradually reduce the starches over the holiday period, then do the Intro later in Jan, or early Feb. Then you reintroduce the foods in a specific order. We will go over this in the 2nd evening, but the info is all there on the GAPS website. Most of the diet seems easy enough to follow, but the bone broths and sauerkraut, seem like they would be hard to make? Probably because I have never made them before. But the knocking of the bones – wouldn’t really know what I was doing! Is it all easy to do? These are the most important part of GAPS and what makes it different from other exclusion diets. These are the foods that will heal your gut, so you don’t have to be on GAPS forever. Yes, it is fairly easy to make. There are recipes below. When you take a cooked bone out of your stock, you will see the marrow in the middle of it, so you will be able to see when it’s been knocked out. I can't remember what she said re starting kids - was it 1/2 c broth and 1/4 c sauerkraut juice each meal? Yes, ½ cup broth. But for the probiotic foods start with just 1 tsp a day and work up. The probiotic I have is the inner health one, is that an extremely effective one? If not which one is? Also I started having one capsule a day and now I am having two a day. Should I just stay taking that? Also do you take a probiotic the whole time you are on the GAPs diet? The Inner Health one is fairly good strength, but it doesn't have the full range she recommends. So it is probably best to use one with a wider range, or rotate between brands. Yes, you will need to take them all through GAPS, and maybe forever. Humans used to eat a lot of probiotic foods and now we don’t. So it is important to keep replenishing the good bugs. She said digestive enzymes are a temporary crutch, would it be beneficial for me to start on those at the beginning, because I am prone to constipation? In the book, she explains (in much more detail) how taking the HCL breaks down proteins in the stomach and then triggers the release of pancreatic enzymes. She has found that taking digestive enzymes isn’t that helpful for most people, but the HCL helps a lot more. But if you want to try some, they won’t do any harm. Where would I get my omega 3, 6 and 9 from? Is flaxseed oil okay to have? Is that only omega 3? Flaxseed oil is ok, no more than a tsp per day. But cod liver oil is better for most people, as it also has Vitamins A & D. You will get plenty of 6 & 9 from the nuts and vegetables. And if you get one of the fermented cod liver oils we have, it also has 6 & 9. Cod liver oil? Have never taken one before, how will this be good for my conditions? That is your source of Omega 3. CLO is also the best natural source of Vit A & D which many people are deficient in these days. Vit A is vital for the children with autism, and among other things is vital for healthy skin and eyesight. Can you have raw milk on GAPs? Would I be able to start off having dairy, or have to introduce later? I am already having butter and have been for ages and doesn’t seem to have any side effects. Later in GAPS. The lactose and casein are hard to break down in the early stages, but once your gut has settled, you reintroduce dairy step by step. First ghee, then butter, then fermented foods and raw milk last of all. Pasteurised milk – never! The thing is, when you’re in the middle of it, you can’t always tell what is doing what. But once you’ve done the Intro and had a bit of a clean out, then you can really tell what each food does when you reintroduce it. But you’re fine to keep having butter during the pre-Intro, but start weaning off the raw milk a bit before you start the Intro. Can you buy tallow, lard, chicken or duck fat? I have seen duck fat in Moore Wilsons, but it is quite expensive. You can buy lard in the supermarket, but it is refined. The easiest and cheapest way to get them is to make roasts and save the fat. A duck will give you heaps of fat and last ages. NEW: Is the Rangitikei Chicken you can buy in Moore Wilson's OK, or do I need to buy full organic? One concern about non-organic chicken is whether antibiotics have been used. But they say: "No Antibiotics or growth hormones are used in our Rangitikei Chickens. In New Zealand no Growth Hormones can be used in poultry products. Further information regarding this can be found at www.pianz.org.nz" Where can you get sausages made the GAPs way? Some of the brands in Commonsense have no starches but you need to check each one. From memory, Harmony is ok, and I think a new one called Stonycroft Farm or something like that. What could be the one recipe book I could buy to make lots of GAPs food? There are lots of recipes on the websites listed above. But if that’s not enough, the best would be her book. But Breaking the Vicious Cycle, by Elaine Gottschall or any other any book that has recipes suitable for SCD (Specific Carbohydrate Diet) will also be helpful. There is a NZ book available in the library - The new IBS low-starch diet / Carol Sinclair. There is a lot of helpful info in it, but you need to remember she isn’t coming from a whole food perspective, she JUST eliminates the starch. So some of her recommendations made me cringe – though I can’t remember exactly what they were now. Would you be able to list what a typical day of the GAPs diet would be with a couple of different options to choose from? On the Intro, it is broth for every meal. But once you’ve eased onto the full diet: Start all meals with some broth and something fermented, then soem options are:
Again, there are lots of ideas on the other websites. Can you have raw cocoa? I know you can’t have cocoa, but raw cocoa hasn’t been heated? It’s not the heating that is the problem with cocoa, but the structure of it that is hard to digest. After a while of being on GAPS, when you are stabilised on the core foods, you could cautiously try it. Is agave allowed? No. Even though it's largely fructose, it isn't "legal". I'm also not convinced it is a better sweetener than other whole food sweeteners, even after GAPS. It seems to have become very popular as a healthy sweetener, but I prefer to avoid fructose as a sweetener. Why do you consider fructose worse than glucose? I thought fructose is good in so far that it does not get as fast into the bloodstream. This article talks about fructose www.westonaprice.org/modernfood/highfructose.html. It is specifically talking about high fructose corn syrup, and of course agave is not the same. But in general, I think it is better to restrict even natural sweeteners carefully, and avoid those high in fructose. Fructose in fruit and honey is different as you are having the whole food, but still only small amounts of honey are best. Are bananas and coconut allowed, as they are not local? Coconut isn't high in starch, so the local rule doesn't apply there. So coconut products are fine Technically they are on the GAPS-friendly list, as long as they are very ripe. But as they are not local, some people may find they need to avoid them - unless you are on holiday in the Islands! A friend who has been starch free for some years told us that he has found that even very ripe bananas don't work for him. What were the other foods he said were on the OK list, but he couldn't tolerate? Cashews, and cooked carrots. But raw carrots are fine. Remember that the GAPS-friendly food list is a guide. Everybody has to listen to their own body for individual foods. Do you know where you can get preservative free wines from? To add later... Just look in the supermarket. You probably won't find one that is completely free of sulphites, but it is preservative 220 that seems to cause poeple the most problems. A friend of mine reacts to 220, but can drink other wines with sulphites including these Chardonnays: Old Coach Road, Mud House, St Clair Vicars Choice, Mission, Boatshed Bed by Goldwater. NEW Jan 09: Natalie, the Auckland WAPF
chapter helper, tells me: My husband and I are importing a range
from the South of France. As far as we know they are the only sulphur
free wines in the country. The guy that makes them uses homeopathics
to treat the vines. He is not organically certified yet. But will
be in a few years. That is if he ever needs to bother. On the environmental
scale in my books he earns a 11 out of 10. His wines are outstanding.
No one knows how he does it without sulphur. He was featured on
a wine show that played here recently. His English web site is http://www.domaine-viret.com/cosmoculture-us.htm#
What about Kava? I am trying to have it about once every 3 nights, it really does help me relax and sleep a bit better, but is it harmful for my gut in any way? It isn’t specifically listed, so I don’t know for sure, but I suspect not. But keep using it in the buildup, eliminate it during the Intro, and reintroduce after a while and monitor how it affects you. Is Chlorella a good thing to have? It’s not allowed on GAPS, but may be helpful later on for detoxing. See the book, website or discussion board for more recipes. There are also a number of websites that have recipes suitable for the Specific Carbohydrate Diet (SCD), which GAPS was based on. The stages of the SCD are different from GAPS, so always check that the recipe is suitable for where YOU are at in GAPS. A couple of them are ~ Pecanbread.com ~ SCDRecipe.com ~ I've also started putting some GAPs recipes on a blog, which is updated rather sporadically - usually when there's some special occasion that I want to develop a recipe for. It currently has recipes and ideas for Easter, Xmas and travelling, plus some basic recipes like fermented foods, broth, starch free breads and cripsy nuts. Elana's GF Pantry also has some lovely recipes - most of her baking is based on ground almonds. Many of them can be easily converted to GAPS by replacing agave nectar with honey. Stocks Detailed recipes for bone broths are available on the Weston Price website, towards the bottom of the page. If you are going to turn your stock into vegetable soup, you can simplify these recipes by leaving the vegetables out of the initial stock.
The soup you tasted at the presentation included onions, garlic, pumpkin, zucchini, cauliflower and broccoli When you're doing the GAPS intro stage 1 - you need to use all the meat, fat and marrow in your soup, to give you enough sustenance. Make your stock as usual, but use meatier cuts. Cook till the meat or chicken is just cooked, then take the meat off the bones and put to one side. I like to have three bowls - one for meat; one for fat, skin, marrow, any gelatinous bits, etc; and one for the bones. The meat and fats go into the fridge. The bones go back into the pot with a splash of apple cider vinegar and cook for a few hours more. When you're ready to make your soup, pour into a clean pan through a colander, and throw the bones away. In a classic stock recipe, you would then skim the liquid fat off the top, but we need it in this soup. Chop up your veges and cook in the stock till tender. Then get your bowl of fatty bits out of the fridge and add it back to the soup. Take a wand blender and blend till everything is combined, and you have a thick creamy soup. Add salt to taste. Shred the meat and add it back to the soup. This will be your main food while on the early stages of GAPS Intro. Variations: I like this variation as it "hides" the fat and the veges, which some children (and adults for that matter) don't like. But you can leave your veges chunky, and have the fatty bits loose, if you prefer. Also on the Intro stage 1, you can eat the meat off the bones with some steamed veges, as long as you have plenty of stock with the meal. Sauerkraut Lynn uses the sauerkraut recipe in Nourishing Traditions, by Sally Fallon, but uses bay leaves instead of carroway. The following recipe is by a friend of mine, who is Russian and eats sauerkraut every day as part of a traditional diet.
Update Jan 09: Libby has noticed recently that some of the cabbages were too young and didn't give enough juice when pounded. Because of this they went rotten, instead of fermenting. So just be aware of this with spring cabbages. Libby is now making sauerkraut for people in Wellington who are too busy to make their own. We keep a stcok here, so email me if you want some. Sandor Katz, the author of WILD FERMENTATION has a clip on Youtube that shows how to make sauerkraut. It is well worth watching. I found the recipe for this on a NZ website Jacqueline Organics. If you are doing the Intro stage where you use sauerkraut juice only, this recipe is a lot easier than making the full sauerkraut recipe. It's also easier to sip this if you don't like eating sauerkraut. My experiences so far making it: Batch 1 - The cabbage I bought from Commonsense Organics was quite small, so it didn't make 3 blender loads - only 1 .5. As she said, it was very smelly, right from the start and did need to be fermented outside. It took about 6-7 days to be tangy enough, rather than 3. It wasn't that great tasting, but not too bad either. Since I bottled it, it has been left on the bench and not refrigerated, and it seems to be tasting better as it gets older. Or I'm getting more used to it. Either way, its all good. Batch 2 - as she says, I added some of the first batch to it, but since my cabbage was again small, I onyl added 1/4 cup. Funnily enough, it doesn't smell anywhere near as bad as the first batch and although you can smell it when you get within a couple of metres, I have been able to keep it inside. It's currently on Day 3 and tastes nearly ready. Later updates: I have found that you can also ferment red cabbage juice, and it doesn't smell so much. Though I think it's also not quite as effective a digestive tonic. So I have been doing a mixture of red and green cabbage, which is a nicer flavour and smell, but still helps digestion. Build up to 1/3 or 1/2 glass before each meal. Another variation is to add some chopped raw beetroot, and a small amount of salt and extra water to each batch, so you are also getting the benefits of beet kvass. Crispy nuts Soaked and dried at low heat, to make them more digestible.
Mix nuts with salt and filtered water, and leave in a warm place for at least 7 hours. Drain in a colander. Spread on a stainless steel baking tray and place in a warm oven (up to 150F /65C) for 12 to 24 hours, turning occasionally, until completely dry and crisp. Or use a dehydrator. Store in an airtight container.
STARCH FREE BREADS To get a starch
free bread, you need to use some kind of nut flour. A good quantity
of eggs are required to give it some lift, and some fat is also
helpful.
This is the bread I made for my Overfed 2 talk in May 09. It is based on a recipe in Breaking the Vicious Cycle but with grated zucchini instead of dry curd cottage cheese. It is also similar to the GAPS basic bread, though that doesn't have the zucchini or baking soda. It is suitable for the Pre-Intro stage of GAPS, and for later stages. But because it has baking soda, it's not 100% friendly, so no good for the Intro or early stages of the diet.
Preheat oven to 175C (350F). Line a loaf tin with baking paper (this step is vital). Beat the first 4 ingredients together. Mix the flour and zucchini into the wet ingredients. The mixture should be thick but not dry. Add a little more ground almonds if needed. Spoon into tin and smooth the top. Bake for about 45 minutes, till brown on top, and a skewer comes out clean. I used a combination of ground almonds and coconut flour for the bread we had at GAPS presentation 2. It was the pumpkin version. (You can get coconut flour through me, if you are in NZ, or there are recipes available for bread that just uses ground almonds.) This bread is my favourite, and is a cross between the SCD almond bread and Bruce Fife’s coconut bread. It has a good texture and will keep for a couple of weeks in the fridge without going mouldy (the pumpkin version may not keep as long). It’s a bit dry and hard by then, but still tastes good. It can be toasted, but carefully at a low setting, and makes great biscotti. It is suitable for the Pre-Intro stage of GAPS, and for later stages. But because it has baking soda, it's not 100% friendly, so no good for the Intro or early stages of the diet.
Preheat oven to 175C (350F). Line a loaf tin with baking paper (this step is vital). Beat the first 5 ingredients together. Mix the flours together and beat into the wet ingredients. The mixture should be thick but not dry. If you have used kefir or yoghurt, you might need a bit more ground almonds. If it’s bit dry, add a little extra cheese or pumpkin. Spoon into tin and smooth the top. Bake for about 45 minutes, till brown on top, and a skewer comes out clean. Biscotti To get some crunch, you may like to make bread into biscotti. Cut into thin slices, then cut them in half. Brush with some olive oil, or duck fat, or ghee, or just leave plain. Lay on a baking tray, lined with baking paper, and bake at 175C till lightly browned. Turn off the oven and leave them in till completely cool. Watch them carefully though - it's easy to burn them (which is what I did the day of the presentation!) This is also suitable for the Pre-Intro and later stages. This version has no added sweetener, but you could add some honey to it. Stir through up to 1/2 a cup after taking the boiled fruit mix off the heat. This is a beautiful dark cake, but because it's boiled, you don't need to mature it for a month. It will improve with maturing, but can be eaten the same day, and still be delicious. Take a large pan, and melt together:
Finely chop:
Add to the pan & simmer for 5-10 mins, stirring often, till the fruit has soaked up all the liquid (though some of the oil may not soak up, esp if using coconut oil). Leave to stand for 30 mins, while you prep the rest of the ingredients. The full recipe fills a 8” x 8” (20cm x 20cm) square tin, or make a half-mix & bake in a loaf tin. Line tin with a double layer of brown paper, which comes to about double the height of the tin. Then line with a double layer of baking paper. Sift together in a large bowl, and mix well:
Beat up:
When the fruit mix has cooled to lukewarm, stir through the beaten egg. Then stir through the dry ingredients. The mixture should be a thick batter and quite hard to stir. If it's too runny, add a little more rice flour or arrowroot. Spoon the mixture into the pan, and bake at 150C for 1.75 - 2 hours for the full recipe, or 1.5 - 1.75 for the half recipe. Use the usual skewer test, or listen - when it stops sizzling, it's ready. Cool completely before removing from tin. Wrap in some baking or greaseproof paper, then in a teatowel and store in the bottom of the fridge.
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