Specialist Diets

While nutrition is definitely a science, it’s far from a one size fits all! One of the biggest challenges in achieving optimal health is discovering what works best for you. At Pure Taste we’re all about creating dishes around the foods you can eat, rather than the foods you can’t! The pages in this accordian section below will lay out the basic templates of key specialist diets so you can better understand our menu and recipe notation.

Gluten Free

A gluten-free diet is a diet that excludes the protein gluten. Gluten is found in grains such as wheat, barley and rye as well as in ancient grains such as triticale, spelt and kamut. It is also commonly found in commercially produced oat products which are milled in the same factory as gluten containing grains.

Traditionally, a gluten-free diet is used to treat coeliac disease. This is a medical condition where gluten causes an inflammatory reaction that damages the small intestine of the sufferer. Coeliacs have to follow a gluten-free diet for life to avoid further symptoms and complications.

In addition to coeliacs, there are a growing number of people that have non-coeliac gluten sensitivity. This term is used to describe those individuals who experience adverse symptoms when they eat gluten, but who lack the immune reaction and intestinal damage seen in coeliacs.

To avoid cross contamination, which occurs when gluten-free foods come into contact with foods that contain gluten, we keep the kitchen at Pure Taste a completely gluten-free zone!

Dairy Free

For the purposes of our menu, we’ve kept things simple and the term dairy-free is used to indicate dishes that do not contain milk or any kind of milk product from cows, sheep and goats. All the recipes labelled dairy-free are therefore automatically lactose free too, but some of them do contain eggs. If you’re looking for dishes that exclude both dairy and eggs, look for those labelled as vegan or consult your server.

Below are a list of common dairy foods that we exclude from our dairy-free dishes, along with some of the healthy alternatives, we use instead.

Paleo

Paleolithic diets mimic the types and quantities of foods our hunter-gatherer ancestors ate: pastured and wild meat, seafood, nuts, seeds, eggs, plenty of fresh veggies and small seasonal amounts of fruit.

The basic premise of the paleo diet is that this way of eating suits our genetics, which have hardly changed in the last 10,000 years, much better than the grains, dairy, and processed foods that have arisen since the agricultural revolution.

At Pure Taste we believe that eating a paleo diet is ultimately about health rather than historical re-enactment. As a result we stay true to the main principles of the paleo diet but also include some natural sugars in our desserts and alcohol in some sauces.

What We Exclude:

• All processed foods
• Grains
• Dairy
• Legumes
• Refined sugar
• Artificial sweetners
• Refined vegetable and seed oils
• White potatoes

What We Include:

• Seasonal vegetables
• Pastured and wild meats
• Free-range poultry
• Fish and seafood
• Eggs
• Nuts and seeds (including nut and seeds butters and cold pressed nut and seed oils in small quantities)
• Natural fats such as coconut oil, duck fat, lard and tallow, and olive and avocado oils
• Root vegetables and sweet potatoes
• Natural, non-grain thickening agents such as arrowroot and tapioca starch are used in some sauces and desserts
• Wine and spirits are a component in some of our sauces and desserts
• We also use natural sugars in our desserts such as honey, agave, coconut sugar, fruit juice, dates and the natural sweetner xylitol

The Weston A Price Foundation Diet (WAP)

This diet is based around the research of Dr. Weston A Price and his work studying the diets of healthy traditional cultures. As with the paleo diets mentioned above, the diet eliminates all processed industrial foods and anything containing modern refined vegetable and seed oils and refined sugar.

Meals are based around vegetables, traditional fat sources and high quality proteins from pastured or wild animals. The diet also emphasises other dietary commonalities among traditional cultures such as the inclusion of raw and fermented dairy, bone broth, fermented foods, and organ meats so the diet is rich in natural fats and the fat soluble vitamins A, D, E, and K.

The key difference between this dietary model and the paleo diet is that grains can be included provided they’re traditionally prepared – soaked, sprouted, fermented. And, nuts, seeds, and legumes are all soaked or sprouted prior to eating, too. The aim of this is to reduce the amount of enzyme inhibitors in these foods, making them easier to digest.

A note about coconut: Coconut is generally much lower in phytic acid and enzyme inhibitors than other nuts. For this reason we don’t soak coconut and coconut flour prior to use in our WAP suitable recipes.

Advanced SCD/GAPS Diets

The Specific Carbohydrate Diet, or SCD, aims to eliminate foods that are hard to digest if you have a damaged intestine, for example, if you suffer from colitis.

The diet is based on the research of Elaine Gottschall. For more information, see Elaine’s book, Breaking the Vicious Cycle.

The SC diet has two parts, an introductory phase, and an advanced phase. Menu items labelled as suitable for Advanced SCD/GAPS diets are only suitable for followers of the advanced phase.

The Gut and Psychology Syndrome diet, or GAPS, is a modified version of the SCD diet developed by Dr Natasha Campbell-McBride. The aim of the GAPS diet is to heal the gut in order to help those with conditions such as autism, ADHD, and depression.

The major difference between GAPS and SCD is that GAPS focuses much more on nutrient-dense, healing foods like animal fats, homemade bone stocks and broths, naturally fermented foods, and organ meats. The GAPS diet also has a more involved introductory phase than SCD. As with SCD, this means the recipes in our restaurant are only suitable for followers of the second phase of the diet.

Typical foods we include in our SCD and GAPS friendly dishes:

• Unprocessed meat, poultry and fish
• All fruits and vegetable as allowed on the legal list in the ‘Breaking the Vicious Cycle’ book
• Fully fermented yogurt, fully matured cheeses, butter and ghee
• Nuts and seeds in small quantities, including nut butters and nut flours
• Dry wine
• Herbs and spices
• Honey

Typical foods we exclude from our SCD and GAPS friendly dishes:

• All grains
• Processed meat (due to the addition of sugar and other additives)
• Canned fruits and vegetables (due to the addition of sugar and other additives)
• Commercial yogurts, milk of any kind, processed and soft cheeses
• Starches/tubers including potatoes, yams, sweet potatoes, arrowroot, parsnip, corn starch, tapioca starch
• Spices with anti-caking agents added
• Chocolate and cocoa
• All other sugars and sweeteners

Vegetarians and Vegans

Vegetarian diets typically don’t include meat, poultry, fish or shellfish. Vegan diets don’t include any animal products at all, including honey.

There are many different varieties of a vegetarian diet:

• Lacto-ovo vegetarians – eat dairy foods and eggs but not meat, poultry or seafood
• Ovo-vegetarians – include eggs but avoid all other animal foods, including dairy
• Lacto-vegetarians – eat dairy foods but exclude eggs, meat, poultry and seafood
• Pescetarians eat fish and/or shellfish, but not meat or poultry

At Pure Taste the designation vegetarian denotes dishes suitable for a lacto-ovo vegetarian diet. These dishes may include dairy products or eggs. The term vegan on the other hand is used to denote recipes that contain no animal products at all.

Low FODMAP

The low FODMAP diet is a diet that aims to reduce Fermentable Oligosaccharides, Disaccharides, Monosaccharides and Polyols. The diet was developed by Dr Sue Shepherd in 1999 and is now accepted and recommended as one of the most effective dietary therapies for IBS.

Here are some of the typical foods that are high in FODMAPS, with examples of alternatives we use in our low FODMAP dishes.

The low FODMAP dishes at Pure Taste have been developed using the latest version the Monash University low FODMAP app which lists the most up to date information on the FODMAP content of food and acceptable portion sizes.

Low Carbohydrate

Low-carbohydrate diets are dietary programs that restrict carbohydrate consumption. They’re often chosen to assist weight loss, aid blood sugar management or for a specific medical reason. Foods high in easily digestible carbohydrates such as sugar, bread, pasta etc. are limited and replaced with foods containing a higher percentage of fats and protein e.g. meat, poultry, fish, shellfish, eggs, cheese, nuts, and seeds and non-starchy vegetables.

Typical foods we include in our low carbohydrate dishes include:

• Fresh meats
• Fish and shellfish
• Poultry
• Non-starchy vegetables
• Fresh eggs
• Cheese
• Nuts
• Seeds

Typical foods we exclude from our low carbohydrate dishes include:

• Sugar, honey and maple syrup
• Products made with grains
• Starchy vegetables

The amount of carbohydrate allowed on a low carb diet varies a lot on different low-carbohydrate diets. For the purposes of consistency at Pure Taste, recipes and dishes labelled low carb are those which contain less than 20g of net carbs per portion.

No Tree-Nut and Peanuts

Menu items labelled as NF do not contain the following types of nuts:

• Almonds
• Walnuts
• Hazelnuts
• Macadamia nuts
• Pecan nuts
• Brazil nuts
• Cashew nuts
• Peanuts
• Pinenuts

Please note however, that nuts are regularly used in our kitchens and therefore cannot guarantee that any of our dishes are completely free from nuts.

A note about coconuts.

For the purposes of our menu notation, coconuts are not classified as a nut. Coconut allergies are less common than tree-nut and peanut allergies however if you are sensitive to coconuts, there are alternative options just let your server know so we can best advise you on which dishes are suitable for you.