lysia: wow, i will trade your sweet potato/barley/apple recipe for a few of my own...that sounds fantastic! I cook my cabbage very simply: in my pressure cooker (worth the expense, trust me. i use it every day) i slice it thickly with a few whole cloves of garlic and some other veggies of similar cook times: squash chunks, onions, string beans and with a dash of sea salt. When it's done, i toss it in a pan to brown, at the end adding some ume plum vinegar, lemon juice and black pepper. It tastes amazing and takes literally 15 minutes from chop to chomp...(hey that was kinda rhymy!)

Funny you should mention wanting only meat and yang, I too also usually crave chocolate and my weight in preserves (my first few months on macro were brutal, sometimes i caught myself eating jam straight from the jar with a spoon!) Since on diet #3 I too have only craved salt and my fav: fried agedashi tofu which is as yang as tofu gets. Odd, but i figure it's all progress as long as you're trying, and to err on the side of yang is a bit safer in macro, it's easier to tell the warning signs: headache, swelling, moodiness, thirst. But we should still be careful of course....

My new fav fermented foods are condiments like organic kim chee and garden kim chee (it has lots of veggies, not just cabbage like regular kim chee). These foods have a bit of red pepper which isn't very macro, but it's not overwhelming, and the natural cultures are wonderful! Also i'm a huge fan of tempeh, trying to bend myself towards natto, and of course miso is technically a fermented treat.

And yes, sperm is very alkaline, but it is in perfect balance with our own yin yonis, so there's no worry there. And sex is very balancing for any condition, it helps to balance emotions, horomones, stress and lymph flow.

oh...and yes, no nuts or nut butters. and as little oil as you can ( i cook with a little water or the spray oils) foods heavy in oil/fat/protein. the closest i get is sesame seeds but no pumpkin. Happy Halloween!!!