steak potatoes

Do you eat your meat and potatoes together at the same meal? If you’re a vegetarian that answer is obviously a resounding “no,” but for millions of people it’s something they’ve probably never even thought twice about.

“He’s a meat and potatoes kind of guy” is of course a common phrase and just one example of how eating these two favorite foods together has become ingrained in our DNA.

It’s a practice that hasn’t been questioned much, but the truth is that eating meat and starches like potatoes together could be doing serious harm to your body’s systems.

Should you really abandon your favorite Sunday meal of meat and potatoes? If you truly care about your health then the evidence is pretty clear.

The Problem With “Meat and Potatoes”

The science of food combining is not well known, but many naturopathic doctors have discovered some surprising patterns and rules for better health.

One of the biggest no-no’s is actually combining meat such as steak with high starch carbohydrates such as potatoes, or even buns with your hamburgers.

Dr. Wayne Pickering, a longtime friend of fitness legend Jack Lalanne, tells us why in this article.

“Starches require an alkaline digestive medium to digest,” he notes. But meat such as steaks require heavy acids to digest. “If you put your fist in your stomach while it’s digesting steaks and all that, chances are, you wouldn’t have a hand anymore. The acid is intense…”

When you mix meat and starches together in the same meal, Dr. Pickering says, your body chemistry does not allow them to mix at all.

“They neutralize…Then what happens? If the food is not digesting… it’s going through your body (undigested), throwing it into all kinds of turmoil.”

That type of turmoil can consist of: heartburn, discomforting gas, acid reflux, serious digestive issues and much more. To make matters worse, your body will be deprived of key nutrients from the food you just ate.

One Doctor’s Incredible Personal Story 

Cutting out the meat and potatoes (or just bread and meat) together is one highly effective way that Dr. William Howard Hay, founder of the Hay Diet, was able to recover his health, and lose a ton of weight for that matter.

Dr. William Hay

He had weighed 225 pounds and suffered from all sorts of medical conditions including a dilated heart, which he found out about while attempting to catch a fast-moving train.

Using the simple plan of not eating proteins such as meat with starches, he began to treat himself and lost 50 pounds in about three months while recovering from his life-threatening heart condition.

Dr. Hay then went on to create the Hay Diet (this book from Doris Grant has a good rundown) and the rest is history.

Suffice it to say if you’ve noticed any of the symptoms above or had any health problems similar to Dr. Hay’s, it may be time to stop eating your meat and potatoes together and see what kind of differences you notice.

Health is complex, but at the end of the day this one simple change really could save your health, not to mention your life.

by | July 9, 2015