If you follow me, you know that one of the biggest keys to thriving fertility lies in nutrition that supports YOUR healthiest, strongest and balanced body. That's why I created the Egg Quality Diet. But with inflation increasing our grocery bills, I don't ever want you to feel like eating to support your healthiest body is a financial burden. In this video, I discuss how to follow the Egg Quality Diet on a budget!

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Disclaimer: Please keep in mind that I am not a medical doctor. I have been a practitioner of Traditional Chinese Medicine for over 17 years and I will be speaking from my clinical experience helping thousands of women conceive. The office of Aimee E. Raupp, M.S., L.Ac and Aimee Raupp Wellness & Fertility Centers and all personnel associated with the practice do not use social media to convey medical advice. This video will be posted to Aimee’s channels to educate and inspire others on the fertility journey.

SEE TRANSCRIPT BELOW OR CLICK ON THE IMAGE ABOVE FOR THE FULL VIDEO.

Aimee Raupp:

Hi, everyone. How are you? Hello. Hello. I am Aimee of aimeeraupp.com and get to come to you live a couple times a month to share some, I don't know, fun things about fertility and health and vitality and egg quality and hormones. And today, we're going to talk about doing The Egg Quality Diet, which is my latest book right up here, on a budget. I don't know about you, but I just spent almost $300 at Trader Joe's yesterday food shopping for a family of three and I was flabbergasted at how damn expensive … Normally my grocery bill at Trader Joe's is about 200, so it was almost 30 … Well, what is that? Yeah, 30% higher, 40% higher. “Love this topic,” well, thank you Hatch to Harvest, I'm excited too.

I have a list of … So just so you know, these are all from students in my Yes, You Can Get Pregnant e-course who have done The Egg Quality Diet, who are living the life and they gave me their feedback of how to do it on a budget. I always do try to budget, but I have a little bit of a mentality, I don't know, that probably started years ago that that's where I spend my money, is my food, which I don't think is always the best and I'm not bragging about it. Sometimes, I'm just like the product is more important to me than the price, but not always. Food is expensive.

And I'm trying to get my laptop to turn on, so I wanted to pull up the dirty dozen list for you, but either way, something's going on with my laptop, which is stressing me out a little bit. Anyway, we're going to ignore that right now and I'm not going to think about it because I'm with you guys. So either way, I wanted to pull up the dirty dozen list, but you guys can all do that on your own or someone can pull it up for me and post it. Oh, I have my Kindle. I can actually pull it up on my Kindle. So first things first, how many of you guys have tried The Egg Quality Diet? How many of you guys are thinking about trying The Egg Quality Diet, but it's overwhelming you?

I would love to hear any feedback right now about that. Have you done it? Are you overwhelmed by it? Is price part of the overwhelm? Because that helps me direct the information today. So if anybody wants to chime in and share their experience, I'd love to hear that. Oh, a little fire. I got a little fire. Do you like my dress? Is it my dress or is it the question? “Amazing results in The Egg Quality Diet,” well, that's exciting. Thank you so much. I love to hear that. What kind of results? Do you want to share your results, Casey? Casey Wino. Is that you? Casey Wino 74?

“Can you do Egg Quality Diet if we're already pregnant?” I would not recommend it. Listen, it's totally balanced for pregnancy. I would do more carbs in the pregnancy. So it's macronutrient balance to be about 40% fat, 25 … Is that right? 25-30% protein and then the rest carbs. Typically, in pregnancy, I think you need a little more carbs than that, so you need more like 30-35 carbs, so you balance in there, but I also think protein's super important in pregnancy. I always aim for over 80 grams of protein a day in pregnancy.

Okay, let's see. “I've tried it, but it's very expensive to get all the ingredients per week.” Okay, thank you for that feedback and that's why you're here and I hope I can help. “Starting Monday, I've done an elimination diet. Before, it's overwhelming at first.” It's completely overwhelming. Listen, I wrote the book. I'm currently doing the reboot with all of my students. I have 170 so students in the reboot this round. It's fucking overwhelming for me. This morning, I was like, “Ah, right, I can't have my paleo bread that I like. Okay. Mrrr, mrrr.” But it is what it is, right? I don't mean to downplay it. It's something I'm choosing to do, so I have to personally deal with that emotional piece, but it is overwhelming, I think.

So general tips, I think, to reduce overwhelm is planning and preparing. I cannot say that enough. That's why that Egg Quality Diet resources page that comes with the book, which I never shared that link publicly because I worked my ass off and my team worked their ass off and we put on thousands of dollars of resources on that page and so the least you could do is buy the book and then get the resources page. So that's why when people are like, “Can I have the link?” “No, mm-mm. Buy the book. The link is in the book.” And I don't do that to be a biatch, I do that because I'm worthy of you purchasing the book to get the resources, right? That's my fair share in the game.

But on that resources page, we give you The Egg Quality Diet hack sheet. We give you the shopping list. We give you recipes. We give you liver support soup hack sheet, right? So so many resources are created for you to make it simpler, but I think the number one thing for the overwhelm, and even myself, I went food shopping yesterday, because phase one of The Egg Quality Diet is fairly easy for me because I live in that. I live a phase four where I know what works for my body and what doesn't. So most of the stuff, I don't eat. I don't eat a lot of nightshades. I don't eat beans at all. They don't work for my tummy. I eat very few nuts, because same thing, they just don't work for my body. I don't eat gluten and I eat dairy sometimes.

So anyway, for me, not that hard, but either way, I did my food shop yesterday, really trying to plan and prep for when we head into phase two, which in my opinion, as the author of the book and as the woman who's been using The Egg Quality Diet in my clinical practice for a decade, phase two is the hardest in my humble opinion. It's the hardest. And so same thing, I stocked up on my broth, I bought some chickens to make my own broth. I'm just pulling up here. I want to pull up the dirty dozen lists, so we can talk about that. So that's how I start to do it, is I'll print out the meal plans for each week and then plan my meals.

Some of our favorite meals are things like the shepherd's pie and things of that nature, which we're really going to get into in phase three if you will, but there's some great … Let me get the book out. I just don't want to knock things over. Definitely, it's going to fall. So phase two, we're in phase one right now, but some things I still love in phase two, my coconut milk yogurt. So I'm buying that Cocojune, but you can also make your own yogurt. I have the recipe in there which would really save you some money, the yolkacado. I bought all my avocados yesterday from Trader Joe's. You don't need to buy organic avocados, so I buy the regular conventional avocados, which are a major price savings.

Liver support soup, I get all of my ingredients. I make that myself. I typically make a handful of batches of bone broth. I get whole chickens delivered to me from ButcherBox, which I've done the price comparison. It's actually much more cost conscious and I know that's only available in the US. So for those of you outside the US, then you are left to your own of finding where you can get. But typically buying the whole chicken is actually less expensive than buying chicken in the parts. And so I get the whole chickens delivered to me from ButcherBox and again I've done the price comparison. It is almost like $1 per pound cheaper than Whole Foods, which I am anal about animal protein and that it's pastured or wild caught, that it's organic, grassfed, those types of things. And I think we should all be really conscious about that.

I'll get my chicken feet delivered from, oh my God, it's on my website and I'm blanking on the name of it right now, but it's from, you guys know, US Wellness Meats. I'll also get liver, organ meat delivered to me from US Wellness Meats and I make my own liver pate. So those are ways that I really save. And so I have stocked up on broth and then I'll make my liver support soup and I'll make that in batches and that is another way. So this year, what I decided to do with my garden, and what a lot of my girls said on here too, is the number one general tips and tricks I'm reading from this sheet that we got from all my students growing a small garden with herbs. So I have cilantro, I have parsley. I also grew dandelion greens this year. I'm also growing spinach and kale.

And so I also get organic spinach by the bag from Trader Joe's and it's very inexpensive in comparison to Whole Foods for certain. So I have all the ingredients for liver support soup and what I'll do too, parsley and cilantro, you don't need … I like to add a bunch to my liver support soup just because I like the flavor, but you can freeze what you don't use. And so another really good tip and trick that a lot of the women say is buy frozen vegetables, organic frozen vegetables. Where is it? Pick your battle, right? Eat seasonally. Make your own broth up for … Yeah, stock up on organic frozen fruits and vegetables whenever you see them on sale.

And so organic frozen is still a really good option, and in places like Whole Foods or even Trader Joe's, again, I'm speaking mainly to Americans right here and I understand that and I apologize, but that's just what my norm is, but you guys I'm sure have something similar where you live or going to a local farmer's market or starting your own small herb garden. I got one of those beds on Amazon. It's, I don't know, 3 x 2 or something like that. And so I have tomatoes growing in there, which are not on The Egg Quality Diet until we reintroduce nightshades, but I just like to grow tomatoes because they're so pretty. I have spinach, I have kale, I have parsley, I have cilantro, I have dandelion greens. Oh, I have lettuces and arugula.

Those are all the things I'm growing, and honestly, I'm growing them from seed. Great easy, but you could also go to a local garden center and get those organic already started and it is so much cheaper. And what's nice is when you trim it down, then it grows back faster. So obviously, it depends on the time of year where you are right now. For us, it's perfect time to be growing when you are here in the northeast, but if not, if you can't do the herb garden, then think about organic frozen vegetables, which I think is really good. Then I always think about … Someone else said, “Buy kale in bulk. It freezes very well without prep. You can just take the leaves from the freezer and toss them in the pan.” I think that's a brilliant idea.

Freeze leftovers in plastic-free containers. I do that too. I just stocked up on Amazon, but also there was a Bed, Bath & Beyond that was going out of business near us and I stocked up on the glass food containers and I love those. That's all I use. And so I'll make the liver support soup. I also have the mason jars, the big ones, same thing. I found some at the local goodwill store where there was just a whole container. It was like a dollar and I got these huge ones because I use them for Aimee Raupp Beauty as well when I make in bulk. Everything gets stored in glass jars until we bottle it. And so I have dozens of those 24-ounce mason jars with the lids and so I'll make the liver support soup. I make my bone broth and I freeze it all in that too so that just I'm prepared because preparation is so important.

And then the plastic-free containers, like I said, you can find them cheap. You don't have to go and spend lots of money on these plastic-free containers. So bulk cook and prep and store things in freezer so that you always have Egg Quality Diet-friendly meals handy. That is so critical to me. I also really live by on-the-go snack list because I'm a snacky person and I need that. And phase two, obviously, we're not really snacky as much. We're snacking. Another thing I'll do, so I make in bulk my butternut squash soup I make in bulk bone broth, like I said. I always have the phase two smoothie and I always have bone broth. The Cocojune is the yogurt I'm using right now, and right now, I had to get that from Whole Foods because Trader Joe didn't have it, but they were on sale, so I just stocked up. And then what I'm going to do is I'm going to freeze the ones that aren't going to last me this week.

So just to think of things ahead of time. So don't buy pre-prepared produce. Prepare all produce yourself. I think that is such a game-changer for saving money. And someone else said, “Just shop on the outer aisles of the grocery store,” so you are just in the produce area and you're preparing your own produce. Again, really extra bonus points if you're growing some of your own produce. Frozen whole chickens tend to be cheaper than fresh chickens from the butcher. I agree on that. My chickens come frozen from ButcherBox. For those of you in the US, I would really look into ButcherBox. You could even share that monthly subscription with another family to save on money, but I love it because the meat already just comes every month.

Moink is another good one, M-O-I-N-K. And then there's also, I love the … What's it called? The pasture chicken one. I did a live with them at some point. I really love their company too. I'm blanking on the name, but I know it's on my website. Their chickens are amazing as well. And so I love that my protein just gets delivered to me. I'll get fish through … Oh my God, what's with me and words today? And I have it prepared here, but I'll get fish from Vital Choice and I'll buy in bulk there too, frozen. I get the salmon and the cod and I love it because they come in these individual packets, but same thing, yes, I spend 80 bucks when I get that salmon, but I get enough salmon for two months or whatever, at least a month if I'm feeding me and my husband.

And so to think about that too, that buying in bulk and buying frozen is a really good way to get ahead of it. When you are down to the wire and need to go to the closest store and then find that, a, it's stressful and, b, you might be paying a premium for it, right? Pick your battles when it comes to buying organic. I think that's a really big one. So really looking at that dirty dozen list. So that's what I was pulling up here on my Kindle. And let's just see 2023 dirty dozen, Clean 15. Some people have a problem with dirty dozen list and EWG and I know that and I'm aware of it, but anyway, I still use it. So spinach needs to be organic. Kale needs to be organic. Then there's a bunch of fruit in here. Peppers, which are not on our … We cut those out because they're a nightshade. Green beans, we're cutting out because they're a bean.

So otherwise, it's fruit, strawberries, peaches, pear, nectarine, apple, grapes, cherries, blueberries, all need to be organic. But on the vegetable side of thing, spinach, kale, that's it. That needs to be organic. Everything else, you can buy non-organic, okay? So that's a really good way to cut your costs. The clean 15, which does not need to be organic, avocados, I'm just reading through the things that are on The Egg Quality Diet, onions when you reintroduce those, asparagus, cabbage, mushrooms, sweet potatoes. Trader Joe's, again, for my US girls, I buy the bag of sweet potatoes. It is so inexpensive. Whereas if I get them from Whole Foods, I feel like they come out to be $2 a sweet potato. Carrots don't need to be organic.

So really go by that list and pick and choose your organics because that can be so expensive. And then even more, again I'm going back to you could even do a little herb farm in your kitchen, at the kitchen window, grow your cilantro in your parsley. The dandelion greens are super fun. I'll do a video on them later for you guys. So pick your battles when it comes to buying organic. Again this is from one of my students, “If all organic produce is expensive, prioritize going organic with the dirty dozen, then go from there. The 80/20 rule is a good baseline,” and I agree with that.

We're going to pick and choose, and to me, again the animal products, the protein is the most important when it comes. That's why I like these meal delivery or these food delivery services because I do trust the farmers, and because I'm in a subscription, it just works out to be so much less expensive. It really is a savings. My husband and I sat down and did it and we compared buying our meat at Whole Foods versus doing ButcherBox and it's almost like a $200 a month savings for us. So I strongly recommend it because we eat a lot of protein.

My eggs, I'm still buying and I'll get the ones from Trader Joe's, which I did a price comparison yesterday. The same eggs at Whole Foods were like 8 something a dozen, which is just obnoxious as all hell, but I paid 6 something at Trader Joe's instead. So right there, I saved myself a good amount of money. Make your own broth. Of course, we already said that. Eat seasonally and season organic produce is always cheaper. If you have a local farmer's market or you have a local farm, we have a great farmstand down the street, I'll go there and I'll get what I can from her because I'm also supporting someone local who's actually growing it and I'm not paying a premium for her to be in a storefront. She's actually right there at her farmstand.

So think of those things. Really pin that out. You can make it fun. I love going to a farmstand. It's also really good Instagram material. It's just so pretty. If you guys are into your Instagram material, make your own broth. I think I've already said that. Canned coconut milk, I buy either Native Forest, again I'm talking to my US girls, although I think you guys can get this abroad, or I'll buy the or 365 brand in the cans. Yes, I buy the cans. They're BPA-free cans. I don't stress about it. I buy the cans. I do coconut milk light because coconut milk full fat don't work for my tummy. It doesn't work for a lot of tummies. So I do the coconut milk light and that's how I go.

If you look at the Califia Coconut Almond Milk, which sometimes I get and I use it in my tea, right now I'm not doing it because we've cut out almonds or we're about to cut out nuts and seeds, I think we cut them out today or tomorrow or something. That container of milk I think is $6 or $8 or something crazy. A can of coconut milk is $2 to $3, right? So really, that's where you can save money. And then someone says, “The cans of coconut milk are much cheaper. You can store them in a mason jar once you open the can.” Totally agree. Again I get these in bulk.

Go to your local goodwill, your secondhand home stores. You will always, always, always find mason jars, but then you could also again on your Amazon, we all have Amazon everywhere in the world now, on your Amazon, you can buy a 12 pack of these and they come out to be, I don't know, cheap. They're the best storage containers, so you don't need anything fancy, okay? But also I love a goodwill, I'm a junkie for a secondhand. Just it's a thing of mine and I've always been that way. And so I go to goodwill regularly and I always peruse the glassware area. I get nice wine glasses at goodwill for $1 because that's just how I am because wine glasses break. But I always find food containers, always, always, always, always. So that's another good way to really save.

“Opt for Whole Food snacks such as fruit and veggies instead of prepackaged snacks.” Of course, that will save you a ton of money. I do love the EPIC Pork Rinds. Those were on sale today at Whole Foods as well. They were like $1.50 off a bag, so I bought a bunch and I'm just going to … We have some storage in the basement, so that's where I'll store my extras. Plantain chip, same thing. I wait until the Barnana ones are on sale and I stock up. Whole Foods, Amazon, you can buy them in bulk and I think at Costco as well. So Costco is another real good secret, again for those of you that have access to a Costco.

And I know a workaround too that you don't actually even need a membership. If you have the app Instacart, you can have the Instacart app. If you have a Costco in your area, you can actually order through Costco through Instacart and you don't need a membership. So that's another workaround. I also have a good friend who if I need to go to Costco, I just take her card. So that's another good workaround. I don't have a membership, I don't pay for it, but there's a lot of really good organic and even good quality meats there, which you can get at a major discount.

Stock up on frozen organic fruits and vegetables whenever you see that they're on sale. I think that's such a great piece of advice. During COVID, because we really stocked up on meat and all that stuff, my husband was very concerned about food shortages, we went and bought one of those big freezers for the basement and it wasn't inexpensive, maybe a couple hundred bucks, but probably the best thing we ever did because now I can just really stock. So with Vital Choice, I'll buy their big thing of salmon because it's the biggest savings, but now I have salmon or cod whenever I need it, right? So I just have to think of head about defrosting, but having those frozen and ready to go, it just really takes the guesswork out of it for us.

We also have scallops. I get scallops from ButcherBox. They're delicious. I buy tuna. I buy in the cans from … Oh my God. See, what's going on with me and brand names today? The Wild Planet, I'll buy their tuna, I buy their sardines, I buy canned salmon all from them. And same thing, I'll stock up when they're on sale in the can, their BPA-free cans. I also do the tuna from Wild Planet in the glass jars. It's in olive oil. Oh my God, I love it. It's my greatest snack. But phase two, we're not doing tuna and I try not to do tuna more than once a week. But the small, the skipjack tuna is actually not a mercury concern, just an FYI.

And if anybody's ever concerned about fish in their area and this speaks to everyone in the country, Monterey Bay Aquarium has something called Seafood Watch. It's seafoodwatch.com or dot-org and you can go and find the best seafood in your area and they break down local versus, well not local, farm raise versus wild caught and what you can get in your area. They make these really handy PDFs. For me, living in the northeast, I printed out, I have it available. So I know now when I go, say, to buy fish, maybe my cod doesn't need to be wild. Maybe it's fine to be farmed in my region and that's a lot cheaper. And so that's another really good workaround for you, but then you'll learn about things like sustainable tuna and skipjack isn't nearly as mercury worrisome as others.

Plan your meals out for the week before you go to the grocery store. This helps keep your grocery list focused, so you don't overbuy. I think that's brilliant and that's also why we made you shopping lists. Our shopping lists are specific down to the ounce of ingredients for each of the phases and the weeks because that's what's important to us. So if I look at phase two, day 14, coconut milk yogurt, so I'm doing the Cocojune. I did get that on sale. You could also make your own yog avocado. Again, you do not need to have organic avocados. Simple sauerkraut, you can make your own sauerkraut. You can buy that as well in bulk and you can find really good quality sauerkraut. Liver support soup, again we went over that. Butternut squash soup.

So same thing too, sometimes Trader Joe's has the organic butternut squashes, but the truth is they're not on the dirty dozen, they're not on the clean 15 either, but you don't need to buy organic butternut squash, so you can buy it already cubed up, which is more expensive. I love to roast a butternut squash. I love to slice it open. Olive oil, salt, pepper or coconut oil, salt, pepper or just salt, depending on where you're at in The Egg Quality Diet, scoop it out and then make my soup. It is so delicious and it's a major savings. I've done that, the comparison of buying the cubed-up butternut squash versus the whole ones. I mean dollars you're saving. And I make that in bulk. Ginger, turmeric, bone broth, I think fairly straightforward. I will buy the hunks of ginger and then I freeze them and the turmeric as well.

Phase two smoothie. You can also see when things go on sale for this too, but I do love the, whatchamacallit? All right, I have a version that doesn't have the phase two smoothie. Oh, here it is. It's not in alphabetical order. Isn't that funny? Coconut yogurt or coconut milk. So I use the coconut milk, a filtered water or regular water, I now have my water tested and our tap water is fine, avocado, bone broth protein. So I like the Ancient Nutrition brand. Again, I wait for that to go on sale and I'll buy one or two, so I have it. Collagen peptides, same thing. You can find a really good quality one.

These should just be grassfed, bone broth protein, grassfed collagen peptides, okay? Whatever brand you find, grassfed, super clean ingredients. Cinnamon, same thing. I'll buy like the organic cinnamon seasoning from the Whole Foods brand, the 365, or even Trader Joe's has one. Again though, not so certain cinnamon needs to be organic, so there's another thing to think about. Turmeric, ginger, spinach or kale and then sea salt. So phase two smoothie and then bone broth of your choice. So those are the really light protein days, but if we get into week three, morning smoothie, bone broth, egg drop soup, liver support soup, sweet potato toast.

So again, none of this needs to be organic, mashed avocado, bone broth, Golden Milk bone broth, grilled cod with zoodles. Same thing, your zucchini doesn't need to be organic and you get those little zoodle maker, you make your own zoodle, you'll save a lot of money. The nomato sauce with your beets. That's another thing too is I'll buy … I do like to buy the precooked beets because it just saves me a lot of time, but you can make your own beets and save money there, but Trader Joe's has a good box of precooked beets, which I think is like $3.50, plenty of beets to make your nomato sauce and your liver support soup for that week.

So same thing, a lot of my girls love the nomato sauce. They love the … Let me just find the tuna over kale. Oh my God, it's so good. Stir-fried greens, sunrise hash, those are some of my favorite things. Pomato Bolognese, simple sauerkraut. You can make your own sauerkraut with cabbage. It's pretty easy. The shepherd's pie is to die for. You can also get some cauliflower, again not on the dirty dozen, so you can skip that being organic. Get the cauliflower from Trader Joe's, really inexpensive. Then the beef broth you're making and ground lamb. You can also use ground pork. You can use ground beef. You can use ground chicken. You can use any of those things you want. You can make your own sausage patties.

But I was looking for the couple of the sauces that we have here, but I'm now being reminded of all these really delicious … Here's the nomato sauce. So ghee or coconut oil and it's the same thing too. Trader Joe's does have a ghee. You just really ideally want a ghee that's been tested and certified as dairy-free. And so same thing, what I'll do is on Amazon, I'll buy my ghee in bulk and I save and then I just store it because it's never going to go bad. You don't have to refrigerate it either. Beets, onion, carrots, so none of that needs to be organic. Celery, bone broth, basil, oregano, thyme, marjoram, bay leaves, but again you'll make … This recipe in the book yields eight and a half cups of sauce. That's going to get you through The Egg Quality Diet, isn't it?

And let's see, liver support soup, the smoothies. The fat bombs are another great thing that I'll make in advance and store in the freezer. You can make your own mayo. You can make your own hollandaise sauce, ghee, egg yolks, lemon juice, to die for. But again, so thinking about, “Okay,” and that's what I would shop around, “who has the cheapest eggs?” Look at that. A lot of the farmstands have really good eggs. Some of my neighbors have eggs. I just had a patient show up with eggs for me the other day in the clinic, right? And so if you know people that have eggs, sometimes they have too many eggs, let's go old school, work out a trade with them, “Hey, can I give you this? I make delicious nomato sauce. Can I trade you for a dozen eggs?” Literally, you can do that. So think about that.

Affordable grocery stores, I know I'm like getting sidetracked here. Costco, hands down. Best store foods, you need large amounts, veggies, egg protein powder, chicken, Trader Joe's, all these, which I'm not familiar with, but this is what some of the girls in my group. Misfits Market, it's a grocery delivery service that rescues produce that wasn't going to make it to the shelves. So you see if you have those in your area, Misfits Market. All produce is organic and sourced from small farms. They also have meat and dairy. All of the meat products are grassfed, free-range, antibiotic, cost is very low for the quality of the products. That's brilliant in my opinion. And then there's portable food warmers that keep your lunch warm. Amazon has those.

Let me see. There's some good questions in here. “Should I keep doing my best in The Egg Quality Diet when I'm on a low income?” Yeah, honey, you do the best you can do, right? “Do you think the pasture-raised eggs at Aldi are legit? Prices are so much better.” Yeah, I do. I think they're better than commercially farmed, right? So maybe even if they're like a B, but yeah. “Should we buy The Egg Quality Book? What book should we buy for the reboot?” Yes, The Egg Quality Diet Book. This is the one you need. It's right here. If you have a Kindle, that version is much cheaper.

“Reintroduction was hardest. How to not feel fearful of reintroduction and tips for this stage? Example, gluten never bothered my stomach, but caused headaches with continued use.” I think that's great to know, right? So you can have gluten once in a while. That's how I would look at it. The reintroductions are the hardest because most people at that point are just like, “Fuck it. I just want to eat everything and move on with my life,” but it's so important to know. So I think what I always tell when clients work one-on-one with me, here's what I do with them. When we're in phase three, I make them make a list of the top 10 things they miss the most.

And sometimes it's like, “Well I really miss those Canyon Potato Chips,” and I'll be like, “Okay, so that's avocado oil, which you've already reintroduced and white potatoes. So we have to try white potatoes before we can try the chips,” or if there's like … I have that [inaudible 00:32:12] bread, I think it has four ingredients, so I'd have to reintroduce each individual ingredient before I can have that bread, but yeah, make a list of what you miss the most. Most people realize they don't miss a lot and it's certain things and so then we just introduce those ingredients, but just keep trying again. Be easy on yourself, Julia, and thank you so much for showing up and trying again.

“How early should we stop eating nightshade vegetables? How soon before egg freezing?” Well, if you're in the reboot right now, we're following, I think we're on day seven or eight right now, right, guys? So we cut out nightshades on day seven and we also cut out alcohol on day seven. So that was today, I think. Today's day seven, right? So I will tell you too, I've been doing this a long time at this point, the most common things I see that people are reacted to that they have no idea are nightshades and beans, the most common things and then nuts in excess. And it's fascinating. Nightshades though are a huge trigger for so many people from an inflammatory response.

“In your reboot now and feeling great. Can you drink sparkling water?” Yeah, totally. I know the LaCroix sometimes have the … Again, I get my sparkling water at Trader Joe's. It's so much cheaper than the LaCroix. This is like 3.49 for a 12-pack. I think LaCroix is like 5.99 or something like that. So anyway, FYI, but yeah, I just drank this today and great question. Did I just cheat? Carbonated water, natural flavors, so I'll let it slide. Maybe phase two, we just do plain seltzer, but otherwise, yeah. Okay, let me just go through here, “Day 22 here. Love it. Not so bad. I don't feel hungry. Amazing. My chronology age is 48. My lab age is 36 after Egg Quality Diet. You're amazing. I'm over five months on the diet now and I'll never go back to the way I was eating before. It's so automated for me now. I love you. Thank you.”

“Day 63, stopped my thyroid med as my TSH-1 too low.” That's amazing. “How do best quality meats pasture on a budget?” Well, I think I talked about that a bit. I would shop around and I would look at those monthly subscription services too because I really think there is … I remember when I switched to ButcherBox and I was like, “Oh my God, we're saving so much money.” “It's difficult when other members of my family are not participating.” I know, I know. I hear you, so you make three different meals. I hear you. My husband's different. Well, I should just say my husband is my husband and your husband is your husband or your partner is your partner. Ken is really good about taking direction in the kitchen and honoring and respecting, but sometimes I'll just say, “Okay.” He loves this one seasoning, he puts it on meat and it has some kind of pepper in there that gives me gas, but I don't do well with certain nightshades.

And so we just had this conversation the other night. I was like, “You need to not use that,” and he was just like, “Oh, you got it, babe.” And then he made his steak his way and then he made my steak my way and it was fine. I know that I have to voice what I need. So I think you just say or you just keep it simple. That's what I'll do with the boys of they have white potatoes. If we make whatever, I'll do a roast chicken often, we love roast chicken, probably once a week we do it, I just don't eat those and I eat my Egg Quality Diet way. You know what I mean? So there are workarounds to it, but I also think communication is so important of just like, “Hey, I'm doing this. It's really important to me. What are the ways you think you could support me?” Maybe that would help.

“Amazing. I'm 46. Hey, man, you have to remind yourself this is a choice.” Oh, thank you. That is a really good point. “I often eat the same meals two days in a row to save time on food prep.” I totally agree, Hatch to Harvest. I am such a creature of habit. If I have a busy workday and I know I'm up here and I don't have time, I'll make double the phase two smoothie, and I don't have it with me here, but I have it in my big clean canteen and that's two of my snacks, right? Same thing, I'll make a bunch of sweet potatoes in one day and then I put them in my food containers in the fridge and then I'll heat them back up in the toaster oven basically, but that's another way to really save time.

Yeah, I'll do the sunrise hash. Same thing, I'll make a bunch of it or almost like a frittata and then I just put that in the fridge and then I could reheat that the next day, so 100%. I love making meatballs. That's one of my favorite things, especially in phase two. And so that's just really easy for me. I don't think about it. I'll do salmon cakes too, which I use mushrooms for the binder in those and egg yolk and so that's another good thing that I can prep in advance and then just heat one up or quick pan fry in the skillet. “Are the meals too dependent on animal proteins?” It is a carnivorous diet, but when you buy the book, you'll get access to the resources page and I have vegetarian options on there.

Okay, you guys, I think that's everything, but this was really helpful. “Walmart has organic pasture-raised eggs for 5.99.” Look at you. So see, you girls are coming in and supporting each other. I get my eggs from my local farm. I love you guys so much. This is so brilliant. “They're wild mackerel, low mercury.” Oh yeah, you're talking about Wild Planet, right? “Buy avocados in bulk and put them in the fridge once they've ripened to keep them from over ripening.” Brilliant. Thank you, guys. “What grass-fed sausages do you …” I like the Bilinski ones and then I think Applegate Farm, but I did a whole thing on … Something came up with sausages the other day in one of my posts and I shared this article on paleo, AIP sausages.

There's also a sausage patty recipe in here. Where is it? Sausage patties, ground pork, maple syrup. So this is like phase four. You could leave the syrup out though if you're in phase three. Dried sage, rosemary, cinnamon, fresh ginger coarse sea salt, bacon fat, make your own sausages. They're patties obviously. “You guys are so cute. How awesome.” Let's see, “I'm allergic to anything on a hoof, so I have to be extra careful. Nothing made with dairy, beef, pork or venison.” Okay, so obviously, I have a rule of thumb. I'm not telling you to eat anything you're allergic to. So you have to do you and avoid that. “Did you follow the diet exactly like it's outlined in the book?” A lot of people do to a tee. You're so cute.

That's why we did it 100 days honestly. This isn't really … I love myself. I'm not criticizing myself. It's not really a book. It's 100 days of diet. There's information as to why and there's recipes, but I realized people needed 100 days of a diet from me. If I just gave you tips, that's what I used to do, just give you rules, “Eat this way.” If people fell off, I'm like, “Oh, okay, I'm going to actually just make food plans for you,” it was a lot easy, easier for people. “Do you just do this for 30 days or is it sustainable long term?” It's sustainable long term. My goal is for all of you to get to phase four, you do your reintroductions and you learn what your diet is and then that's how you live. That's how you eat. And you don't have to go back and repeat.

Some people are like, “Oh, I really fell off the wagon. What do I do?” I'm like, “Okay, restart in phase three. Remove everything and then slowly do the reintroductions again.” “I miss ice cream.” But when you get to phase four, you can have coconut milk, ice cream. You could make your own ice cream with a little maple syrup and coconut milk. It's delicious, or if you reintroduce nuts and you're fine, there's tons of nut-based you ice creams too that you can do. There's that cashew one. My son has that. It's not forever, guys, and you get to reintroduce. Don't forget that part. I think everybody forgets that part and thinks that I'm saying you can never eat these things again. I never once said that, ever, ever, ever.

You get to see what your body does when you reintroduce and you get to decide. “Dairy, ice cream, yeah, crushes my stomach.” It might be fine for you though. You only know though when you remove and then you reintroduce. Most people don't do well in a lot of dairy. “Nitrates are a major trigger for me. Despite having huge rheumatoid arthritis flare, I love … I know this is doing my body good, loving the food and don't miss anything right now.” Yeah, well, I'm sorry you had a flare. I wonder what that was from. “I buy a bag of avocados from Trader Joe's. Put them in the fridge.” Yeah, that's what I do. “I've swapped white sweet potatoes in place of regular potatoes. My family didn't notice the same.” Totally. I'll do cauliflower mash. They have no idea. Zero. “My husband's doing the diet with me. I love it.” Oh, it's so good. I'm so proud of you, guys.

“On day nine, don't think plantains sit well with me or coconut yogurt. What's the best go-to [inaudible 00:41:35]?” You can repeat. Find ones that work like the sunrise hash or the smoothies. Just if things don't agree with you, just skip them. “Mass produce, roasted broccoli or cauliflower in your cast iron with ghee, so good leftover.” I agree with that. “Love the hashes.” “The destructed egg rolls, hands down.” The destructed egg rolls and the shepherd's pie are my family's favorite and I'll have people over for dinner and I'll make those deconstructed egg rolls and they're like, “What this?” or also the cauliflower fried rice. Oh my God, so good and I'll just pick whatever protein I want to do. It's like a paella dish. Oh my God, people love it. And I'm like, “Yeah, this is in my book.”

And my husband always jokes like, “Oh, is my egg quality going to get better?” “I get 30 organic eggs in bulk.” Yeah, that's great. “Moving to the Land of Nightshades, South Korea, [inaudible 00:42:27]. Here goes nothing.” Okay, guys, I'm going to hop because it's 1:00 and I have to prepare for the reboot call, which is happening in an hour and I got to figure out why my laptop isn't charging, so I can actually do my job today. Okay, I love you guys. “What's the best bone broth?” I have lists on my website, aimeeraupp.com/fertilityrecommendations. You can see my recommended bone broth there, but really rule of thumb, grassfed bone broth with minimal ingredients, okay?

Some of them like certain brands like Brodo adds tomato paste. No bueno if you're avoiding nightshades, right? So you really got to look at the ingredient list. Here I go again. aimeeraupp.com/bonebroth. Flavor Chef is the name. They make an AIP broth, which is the only mass-produced AIP broth that I know of. I'm sure there's others out there, but they make it without carrot, onion and celery because a lot of people react if they have a FODMAP issue. Did I say that, low FODMAP bone broth? That's the one I'll bulk buy. Yeah, Flavor Chef. Thank you, [inaudible 00:43:31]. Butternut squash soup, I'm obsessed with the butternut squash soup. It's my favorite people.

Some people don't love it. I add sweet potato to mine too, which makes it even more like juicier, creamier. I love it. But if you can't have butternut squash or you can't find butternut squash, any other squash will do, okay? We're also creating a list and it's going to go on the resources page of swaps because people are like, “I live in South Africa and I can't find plantains. What can I do?” or, “I can't get sweet potatoes,” you can try cassava or yucca if you can't get sweet potatoes, not the flours, the actual food and you roast it like you would a sweet potato. You could do other squashes instead of butternut squash, right? So squash is just a very simple food and most people are not reactive to it. That's why there's so much butternut squash soup in phase two. That's why.

And remember, I did my research on this. I based this on The Paleo Approach, which is Dr. Sarah Ballantyne's book, all about AIP and healing and then I also layered in Chinese medicine theory. So it's a combination of both. This isn't a diet I just made up. This is founded in science, an autoimmune protocol to really help people heal. But then if we layer in other digestive issues like SIBO or histamine issues, it gets complicated, but I do address that in the book. And so if people are doing the diet and they still don't feel good, there's a histamine issue or there's SIBO or there's like H. pylori going on and there's something else we have to fix first and then they can dive into the diet. Okay, that's enough. Love you, guys. Ciao.

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