My copy of Fletcherism What It Is or How I became Young At Sixty (1913) by Horace Fletcher arrived today. Like many other people I had believed that Fletcherism which became known as “The Chew-Chew Diet” involved eating what I wanted three times a day and chewing each mouthful thirty-two times. This myth has not been dispelled by the recent series from Channel 4, The Diets That Time Forgot. Wrong. The principles of the Chew-Chew Diet are about taking responsibility for what you put in your mouth and therefore taking responsibility for your own health.
Fletcherism or The Chew-Chew Diet is not about excessive mastication.
“The very essence of the method of performing the personal responsibility is avoiding excess of anything; excessive or laboured chewing among the rest. There is little if any harm in keeping food in the mouth as long as possible, and I believe that it is impossible to have too much saliva mixed with it when it is swallowed, because when it is properly tasted and insalivated it is almost impossible to hold it back from the food gate in the back of the mouth. There is always suction there ready to draw welcome nourishment in when it is ready.” p52-53
Some of Fletcher’s ideas strike me as a little bizarre, for example his obsession with ‘digestive-ash’ as he calls faeces and his advocating of a very low protein intake. Whilst many of us in the western world of the 21st century consume far too much protein, the recommended level being about 15% of our daily calorific intake being made up of protein (for the average woman on 2000 kCals per day this is about 300 kCals or 75g of protein), Fletcher’s suggestion of 5-7g (20-28 kCals) strikes me as dangerously low.
However, Fletcher emphasises that this is of less importance than that food should be enjoyed and should the follower of Fletcherism wish to choose meat to eat, then the taste and flavour of the meat should be enjoyed and savoured, provided that the principles and rules of Fletcherism are followed.
So having read the book, I take what I understand to be the Rules and Principles of Fletcherism and I begin my journey Losing Weight the Chew-Chew Way.
