A food system with "fruits, vegetables and starches" is essentially the Kand-Mool, Phal-Phool, Patti-Pani food system mentioned in ancient Indian texts like Ram Charit Manas. Dr Peter Rogers calls it "fruits, vegetables & starches". Such a food system goes several steps beyond popular Whole Food Plant-Based guidelines. But there is value in studying it step by step.

(1) Kand-Mool literally means root vegetables. "Kand" refers to starch rich veggies like sweet potatoes and yams. Many varieties of sweet potatoes and yams are native to India; potatoes were introduced only a few hundred years ago. We can eat sweet potatoes raw but a good first step is to adopt a cooked food system with steamed or baked or boiled sweet potatoes & yams. Mool refers to non-starchy root veggies like mooli (radish), beets, carrots, …

(2) Phal-Phool literally means fruits & edible flowers. It can also mean 'fruits & vegetables'. "The best fruits are berries" -- Dr Greger. We may recall 'Shabri Ke Ber' story from Ram Charit Manas - what does Shabri feed Lord Ram in a forest? Berries!

(3) Patti-Pani literally means leafy greens & water. "Leafy greens are the best veggies!" -- Dr Greger. We must eat leafy greens in copious amounts.

Some day, maybe I should write a book on how to assemble delectable food plates by adopting the Kand-Mool Phal-Phool Patti-Pani system. In pre-covid 2020, I had started making such meals and serving them to my friends — they were pleasantly surprised that they taste so good!

As of today, I don't have a book or a writeup; I'm developing a slide deck. But I can explain verbally how to construct such food plates. Please ping me if you'd like to know. We basically need four components: (1) starches (sweet potatoes, yams, plantains), (2) leafy greens (copious amounts), (3) fruits & berries, (4) rainbow colored misc veggies. In addition, we may introduce lemon (n lime n vinegar), herbs (fresh, dried) & spices for enhancing flavor.

Grains, beans, nuts & seeds: all of these are calorie dense, non-juicy and 'hard' plant foods. None of them is part of Kand-Mool, Phal-Phool, Patti-Pani! Such a food system deviates from food pyramids like Dr Greger's Daily Dozen in a big way. But is it plausible that a plant-based food system without grains, beans, nuts and seeds is sensible? Let's see:

(A) Whole grains may be replaced by sweet potatoes. Is this okay? Dr McDougall would argue that both are starch sources and there exist cultures with low disease rates who derived a surprisingly large %age of calories from potatoes or sweet potatoes alone. Both whole grains & starch-rich tubers (potatoes, sweet potatoes) are satiating too! In other words, we'll feel full after eating some sweet potatoes. For details, Potato Lectures by Dr McDougall and The Starch Solution (368 pages, 2013) by Dr McDougall.

(B) Are beans essential? Not really (and this may come as a surprise to many)! Whole Food Plant-Based food pyramids make beans centerstage due to protein & fiber considerations. Actually, we can get adequate amounts of protein & fiber from Kand-Mool Phal-Phool Patti-Pani food plates with enough sweet potatoes and copious amounts of leafy greens alone. We may verify this through Cronometer. Attending a lecture series or seminars by Drs Rick and Karin Dina would be helpful. I attended the Fruits & Vegetables Summit in 2022 — my personal notes.

(C) Finally, do we need nuts & seeds? Not exactly… but this is harder to understand — we have to go into nitty gritty details of EFA (Essential Fatty Acid) requirements and related metabolic pathways in our body. But let's say we do choose to introduce nuts & seeds into our food plates — what's the minimal amount we need? We may adopt Dr Esselstyn's strict WFPB guidelines: No Nuts! Only 1-2 tbsp ground flax or ground chia (both of which have more Omega-3's than Omega-6's) suffice for EFAs.

Dr Peter Rogers has several technical videos at his YouTube channel motivating us to adopt a low protein, low fat, high carbohydrate system that he calls "fruits, veggies & starches" at the top of the pyramid. His deep understanding of biochemistry & pathophysiology, along with toxicology leads him to argue why we should eat this way.

Interestingly, Dr Peter Rogers' video (Dietary Nirvana Pyramid) uses the word 'Nirvana' :) That's an Indian word which literally means 'salvation', the final goal of spiritual journeys. Coincidentally, ancient Indian texts classify foods into three broad categories: 'sattvic' (which promote positive mental qualities), 'rajasic' and 'tamasic' (which promote negative mental qualities). "Kand-Mool Phal-Phool Patti-Pani" would be the most sattvic food system I can think of.

What motivated ancient Indians (and even modern day people all over the world) to seek a 'sattvic food system'? Some spiritual texts will divide states of mind into 5 categories like 'ksiptam' (restless), 'mudham' (dull), 'viksiptam' (preoccupied), 'ekagram' (concentrated) and 'niruddham' (closed). Of these, 'ekagram' (also known as 'ekagrata' in Hindi or 'ekaggata' in Pali) is a cherished state of mind in which thoughts have ceased and we are able to focus our attention to a suitably chosen object of attention via a meditative technique.

For example, in the 10-day Vipassana retreat, we get to experience ekaggata through the first meditation technique, namely 'anapana' (breath meditation, in which we choose breath as the object of attention — this is said to be the hardest technique among the 40 techniques that Buddha taught but bears maximum fruit).

What kind of food helps us experience 'ekaggata' with minimal effort? 'Sattvic food eaten in moderate quantities', explains Ramana Maharshi in Question 12 in Who Am I? (he was mostly a silent saint; his disciples collected his teachings into a thin booklet with 28 questions and answers).

Those who have done the 10-day Vipassana retreat may recall a lecture in which 4 factors for 'sankharas' were enumerated: the physical environment, the food we eat, our past stock of sankharas & how we react to the ongoing sankhara. Why simplify our food? Just like we make our physical environment noise-free so that we can meditate, it helps to simplify our food plates so that we can avoid distractions due to food-related distractions and focus on the last two sources of sankharas.

A fine point which I have picked up (through lecture presentations by Drs Rick and Karin Dina) is that we can even avoid the Kand-Mool part and still construct nutritionally complete food plates! This may explain how Jain monks who stay away from root veggies (because that makes the plant die) would thrive. But this will make our food system quite challenging to follow because it removes a calorie dense and satiating food group: starch-rich tubers. It's best to adopt such a food system only after our mind has quietened down and we can live on less food.

Even if we don't adopt Kand-Mool Phal-Phool Patti-Pani (or "fruits, veggies & starches" as Dr Peter Rogers calls it) fully, we may derive some rules of thumb for making our food plates better!

1. "Patti Pani" reminds us that we must amplify leafy greens & drink enough water. "Leafy greens are the best veggies!" — Dr Greger.
2. "Phal-Phool" reminds us that we must eat fruits & veggies. Many of us eat lots of whole grains & beans (why? they are cheaper than fruits & vegetables; we can store them for much longer; cooking and eating grains and beans takes much less time than cleaning & chopping-dicing-mincing-grating fruits & veggies. But low intake of fruits and vegetables is one of the top risk factors for chronic lifestyle diseases (see Fruits & Veggies Intake In India. It would help to amplify fruits & veggies in our food plates, and attenuate whole grains & beans. We may also recall Shabri Ke Ber story reminds us that "Berries are the best fruits!" — Dr Greger.
3. "Kand-Mool" motivates us to eat sweet potatoes and yams — they are under-appreciated nutrition powerhouses! See Potato Lectures by Dr McDougall and The Starch Solution (368 pages, 2013) by Dr McDougall to understand why.

Like many Whole Food Plant-Based (WFPB) doctors, Dr Peter Rogers recommends a WFPB food system with zero animal products and zero processed foods. He also recommends no salt, no oil, no sugar, just like advocates of WFPB SOS-Free food system, where SOS stands for salt, oil and sugar. But he goes beyond these guidelines by saying that we must really strive to eat organic, and very low fat. He encourages zero nuts & seeds! What motivates him to recommend that? We can get an overview of his reasoning by watching his videos here: Lipotoxicity: Dr Peter Rogers, Lectures on Blood Flow by Dr Peter Rogers and Dr Peter Rogers On Cancer.

In addition to the videos below, check out videos on Dr Peter Rogers & Soy.