This is a full week of eating built only from foods on Dr. Sebi's approved list. No substitutions that quietly break the rules, no "close enough" ingredients. Every item below appears on the nutritional guide, and where a common version of a food is excluded — bananas, tomatoes, rice — the plan uses the approved version and says so.
Three things to sort out before Monday
Water. The guide asks for a gallon of spring water a day and excludes tap water by name. Whether you hit a full gallon matters less than not getting to day three dehydrated and blaming the food. Spread it across the day rather than catching up at night, and if a gallon leaves you uncomfortable, drink to thirst instead — forcing water down in large volumes over a short period is not something to push through.
Shopping. Four things are worth a specialist shop or an order: burro bananas, key limes, seeded grapes and an approved grain or two (fonio, tef, kamut). Everything else is ordinary supermarket produce. Seeded watermelon and seeded grapes are the two that are genuinely hard to find, because seedless dominates.
Prep. Cook a batch of quinoa and a batch of wild rice on Sunday. Roast a tray of squash, onions and bell peppers at the same time. Four of the seven dinners below start from those two moves, and the week gets much easier for it.
Day 1
Breakfast — amaranth porridge. Amaranth simmered in water until soft, with chopped dates, walnuts and a thread of date syrup.
Lunch — kale and chickpea salad. Kale massaged with olive oil and key lime until it softens, chickpeas, avocado, sea salt.
Dinner — wild rice with roasted squash. Wild rice, roasted butternut squash, onions and bell peppers, thyme and oregano, olive oil to finish.
Snack — apple slices with tahini.
Day 2
Breakfast — berry smoothie. Berries, burro banana, hemp seeds and the water from a soft jelly coconut. If you can't get burro bananas, leave the banana out rather than using a Cavendish — the guide lists burro and baby bananas only.
Lunch — spelt pasta. Spelt pasta with cherry tomatoes, olives, sweet basil and olive oil. Read the pasta label for yeast and for wheat flour blended in.
Dinner — chickpea and okra stew. Onions, okra, chickpeas, cherry tomatoes, bay leaf and a little cayenne, over quinoa.
Snack — brazil nuts and a pear.
Day 3
Breakfast — quinoa porridge with mango. Quinoa cooked soft, mango, sesame seeds, a little agave.
Lunch — the big green salad. Watercress, cucumber, tomatillo, avocado, hemp seeds, dressed with key lime, olive oil and sea salt.
Dinner — stuffed bell peppers. Peppers filled with wild rice, mushrooms and onions, oregano and thyme, baked until the peppers give.
Snack — figs and walnuts.
Day 4
Breakfast — tef porridge with peaches. Tef makes a finer, smoother porridge than amaranth. Peaches, a little date sugar.
Lunch — chickpea and dulse mash. Chickpeas roughly mashed with avocado oil, finely chopped onion and powdered dulse, which gives it the taste of the sea. On spelt or rye flatbread, or in lettuce leaves.
Dinner — zucchini, chayote and greens. Zucchini and chayote sauteed with onion and thyme, amaranth greens wilted in at the end, over fonio. Fonio cooks in about five minutes, which is its main argument.
Snack — seeded grapes and brazil nuts.
Day 5
Breakfast — papaya and sea moss smoothie. Papaya or soursop, burro banana, a spoon of sea moss gel, hemp seeds, spring water.
Lunch — wild rice bowl. Leftover wild rice and roasted squash, dandelion greens, walnuts, key lime. Dandelion greens are bitter; the key lime and the squash are what make them work.
Dinner — mushroom and onion kamut. Mushrooms and onions cooked down slowly with bay leaf, turnip greens folded through, over kamut. Any mushroom except shiitake — that's the one exclusion in the category.
Snack — dates with tahini.
Day 6
Breakfast — avocado on spelt flatbread. With cherry tomato, sea salt and cayenne.
Lunch — okra and cherry tomato stew. Leftovers from day 2 if you made extra; otherwise a fresh pot over quinoa.
Dinner — nopales with peppers. Nopales (cactus paddles) with onions, bell peppers and oregano, over wild rice. If you've never cooked nopales, they're sold trimmed in jars and need rinsing well.
Snack — cantaloupe.
Day 7
Breakfast — amaranth porridge with berries. As day 1, with berries and agave instead of dates.
Lunch — purslane and cucumber salad. Purslane, cucumber, chickpeas, olives, olive oil, key lime.
Dinner — squash and chickpea stew. Squash, chickpeas and onions cooked down with achiote, cayenne, onion powder and bay leaf, over fonio.
Snack — prunes and walnuts.
The grocery list
Produce: kale, watercress, dandelion greens, turnip greens, amaranth greens, purslane, lettuce (not iceberg), cucumber, zucchini, chayote, butternut squash, bell peppers, onions, okra, mushrooms (not shiitake), nopales, cherry or plum tomatoes, tomatillo, avocados.
Fruit: apples, pears, peaches, berries, mango, papaya, cantaloupe, seeded grapes, figs, dates, prunes, key limes, burro bananas, a soft jelly coconut.
Grains: quinoa, wild rice, amaranth, tef, fonio, kamut, spelt pasta, spelt or rye flatbread.
Store cupboard: chickpeas, walnuts, brazil nuts, hemp seeds, sesame seeds, tahini, olives, olive oil, avocado oil, sea salt, cayenne, oregano, thyme, sweet basil, bay leaf, achiote, onion powder, dulse, sea moss gel, date syrup or date sugar, agave.
To drink: spring water, and burdock, chamomile, elderberry, fennel, ginger, raspberry or tila tea. The full aisle-by-aisle version is in the alkaline grocery list.
How to cook the eight approved grains
This is the part that trips people up more than the food list does. Most of these aren't grains anyone grew up cooking, and a bad first pot of fonio puts people off for good. Ratios are grain to water by volume.
- Fonio — 1:2, about 5 minutes off the heat with a lid on. The fastest thing on the list, and the one to reach for on a weeknight.
- Quinoa — 1:2, about 15 minutes. Rinse first to wash off the saponin coating or it tastes soapy.
- Amaranth — 1:3, about 20 minutes. It stays slightly sticky; that's correct, and it's why it makes better porridge than a side dish.
- Tef — 1:3, about 15 minutes. The finest grain here, closest to a smooth breakfast cereal.
- Wild rice — 1:3, 45 to 55 minutes. Much longer than white rice. Done is when the grains split open.
- Kamut — 1:3, about 45 minutes, and better if soaked overnight first. Chewy, holds up in a bowl with dressing.
- Spelt (whole berries) — 1:3, about 50 minutes, also better soaked. Mostly you'll meet it as pasta or flatbread instead.
- Rye (whole berries) — 1:3, about an hour. The least convenient of the eight.
Wild rice, kamut, spelt and rye are the Sunday-batch grains. Fonio, quinoa, amaranth and tef are quick enough to cook the same evening. All eight are covered in full here, including which contain gluten and where to buy them.
Swaps if something isn't available
- No fonio — quinoa, same job, ten minutes longer.
- No kamut — wild rice.
- No nopales — zucchini and bell peppers with the same seasoning.
- No purslane — watercress, or any approved lettuce.
- No soursop or papaya — mango.
- No sea moss gel — leave it out. Nothing on the list is mandatory, sea moss included.
- No seeded grapes — berries, figs or cherries. On the guide, seeded is the form that counts, the same rule that applies to watermelon.
What makes this survivable
Most people don't come off this because the food is bad. They come off it in the gap between finishing work and eating, when nothing is ready and everything familiar is excluded.
So: cook the grains in batches. Roast more vegetables than you need. Keep dates, walnuts and an apple where you'd normally keep the thing you're avoiding. And pick one meal a day to be identical all week — breakfast is the obvious one — so you're only making two real decisions a day rather than three.
The coffee gap is the other one worth naming. Coffee isn't on the list, and ginger or burdock tea is not a like-for-like replacement. If you drink a lot of coffee, expect two or three rough days, and don't start this in a week that matters.
Where it fits
A few practical notes to get the most out of the seven days, and to decide what happens on day eight. If you want the stricter version of the same week, the Dr. Sebi 7-day detox is set out day by day here.
Portions. Plant food is bulkier and less dense than what most people are used to, so the plates here are bigger than they look on paper. A working dinner portion is roughly a cup of cooked grain, two good handfuls of greens or cooked vegetables, and a fat — half an avocado, a spoon of tahini, a scatter of olives. If you finish a meal still hungry, add grain and chickpeas rather than more salad; salad adds volume, not staying power.
Storage. Cooked quinoa, wild rice, kamut and fonio keep four days in the fridge and freeze well in portions. Roasted squash, onions and peppers keep about four days. Cut avocado and dressed salad do not keep at all, so dress only what you're eating. Sea moss gel keeps two to three weeks refrigerated; make it in small batches rather than large.
Nutrients worth tracking. A week of eating this way is short enough that gaps don't matter much, but if you continue it, B12 is the one to plan for — it isn't present in plant foods in a reliable form, and a supplement is the usual answer. Iron from plants absorbs better alongside the key lime you're already using. Calcium comes mainly from the greens, sesame and tahini here, and omega-3 from the walnuts and hemp seeds. Worth raising with your doctor if you take this past a month.
Eating out during the week. The workable orders are a plain leafy salad with oil and lime on the side, steamed or grilled vegetables, and plain grain where they have one. Ask for no dressing rather than dressing on the side, since vinegar is in almost all of them.
What a week is for. Seven days is enough to learn the shopping, the grains and which meals you'd actually cook again. That's the useful output. Most people who keep something from a week like this keep the breakfast, the Sunday batch and two dinners, and build from there. What to eat after a reset picks up at day eight — the reintroduction order, what to keep regardless, and the week-three slip nobody plans for.
This is food, not a treatment for any condition. If you have symptoms or a diagnosis, see your doctor — eating well sits alongside medical care, not instead of it.
Common questions
Can I drink coffee?
Not within the guide. Approved drinks are spring water and the seven approved herbal teas: burdock, chamomile, elderberry, fennel, ginger, raspberry and tila.
Where's the protein?
Chickpeas, quinoa, amaranth, hemp seeds, walnuts, brazil nuts and tahini all appear through the week. Quinoa and amaranth are the two approved grains highest in protein — which is also why quinoa is mildly acid-forming.
Can I use garlic?
No. Garlic is on no reproduction of the guide. Onion, onion powder and a bay leaf together do most of what garlic was doing in a pot.
What if I can't find burro bananas?
Leave bananas out. The ordinary Cavendish isn't on the list, and mango or papaya does the same job in a smoothie.
Can I fast alongside this?
Plenty of people pair a shorter eating window with it. We cover alkaline fasting here, including what Dr. Sebi taught about it and how to fit a window around the week above.
Is one week enough?
Enough to learn whether you can cook this way, which is the real question. Seven days is a starting point rather than a finishing line — the 30-day plan is the next step if the week went well.
I take medication — anything to watch?
Worth a word with your doctor or pharmacist before you start, particularly if you take a blood thinner, a diuretic, thyroid medication, lithium or a sedative, since a large change in greens, herbal teas or fluid intake can interact with those. Stop and get advice if you feel dizzy, get palpitations, or feel confused or unusually weak.
Next
- New to this? Start with the beginner's guide
- The complete approved food list
- The Dr. Sebi 7-day detox, day by day
- What to eat after a reset: day eight onward
- Alkaline fasting: how to fast on this diet
- Check any food with the Ackaline app
- Is broccoli alkaline, and why isn't it approved?
Not sure whether something in your basket is approved? The Ackaline app scans any food and tells you whether it's on the list and why. The full week-by-week system is in The Alkaline Healing Blueprint.
For education, not medical advice. This way of eating is not a treatment for any disease. Talk to your doctor before making significant changes to how you eat, particularly if you take medication or have a diagnosed condition.
