Tuesday, March 12, 2013
Short Hiatus
I'm taking a breather from the blog this week. Just a lot going on and I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed. Hoping to get some inspiration through the rest of the week and I plan on hopping back on the blog horse. So to my 3 readers out there, I'll be back soon!
Friday, March 8, 2013
Looking for new veggie members for my club...
My mom's in town this week and many times when I have an extra set of hands to help with the kids I use that time to experiment a bit in the kitchen. And this weekend is all about vegetables. I am need of variety, big time. I also am trying to decrease the amount of meat and grains I eat and in order to do this I need to start stacking my plate up with veggies. And not just lettuce and carrots, but real nutrient dense vegetables that can satisfy me.
For a person who prides herself on healthy eating, I am the first to admit that there are many foods out there that I have never tried, or given a real effort to cook myself. So I took out my Nourishing Traditions book and am tackling some new foods over the next few days:
Cabbage
Artichokes
Beets
Parsnips
Turnips
Rutabagas
The root vegetables (parsnips, turnips, rutabagas) are about to go out of season. They are fall and winter vegetables and the temperatures are starting to rise here in Charlotte (finally!) so I wanted to take advantage of them before spring officially arrived. I will just slow-roast them with some seasonings. I'll also probably add acorn squash and sweet potatoes to the mix to help with the bitterness associated with these foods. I have cooked them before, but I can count the number of times on one hand...more like two fingers.
Cabbage is available year round and it's in the grocery stores a lot with St. Patrick's Day right around the corner. I know cooked cabbage is a staple Irish meal, but I've never really eaten it. The odds are stacked against me since both my mom and the Hubs admitted they do not like cabbage when I announced during dinner last night that some new dishes would be coming their way. Let's hope Sally Fallon's "cabbage with oranges" dish helps their tastebuds choke it down tonight!
Beets are ridiculously good for you. Ever since I started down this path a few years ago I have seen the word "beets" and the phrase "regular part of your diet" pop up countless times. It is chock full of nutrients (in particular, magnesium, which is something I feel both myself and the Hubs are lacking). But I have yet to cook them. So I'll be oven-roasting the beets and wilting their greens tomorrow night.
Artichokes have always intimidated me. I know they are good for you, but I try to avoid canned foods due to the scary BPA lining and it seems they always popped up in the canned version in recipes. The most common place I see them are in a low-quality spinach artichoke dip at chain restaurants. I'm no stranger to these, the Hubs and I used to order this every single time we went out to eat before I started changing my diet. Even after I stopped getting it, he used to get it and eat the whole thing himself! But those days are gone. Hopefully his clear arteries and sharp mind will thank me when he's in his 70s. Anyway, back to artichokes. They just look difficult to cook (like I said before, I fall prey to the "cooking is so difficult!" mentality as well). And I have no idea what a freshly cooked artichoke even tastes like. I bought two at Whole Foods and I'm going to try this slow-cooker recipe I found. You stuff the artichoke with sausage, cauliflower, mushrooms and green onions. Not really avoiding meat by doing this, but I have a feeling I may need to transition to this taste slowly.
So that's what's on the table for this weekend. I chose Sally Fallon's book for most of these recipes because she really does believe in letting the food shine on its own. Just cook, season with spice, and add some fat (either in butter or coconut oil). I'll be thrilled if we can at least choke down three out of the four. My gut is telling me these may not go as planned. Vegetables can be a little tricky and it may take a few tries to get the seasonings and cook times correct.
For a person who prides herself on healthy eating, I am the first to admit that there are many foods out there that I have never tried, or given a real effort to cook myself. So I took out my Nourishing Traditions book and am tackling some new foods over the next few days:
Cabbage
Artichokes
Beets
Parsnips
Turnips
Rutabagas
The root vegetables (parsnips, turnips, rutabagas) are about to go out of season. They are fall and winter vegetables and the temperatures are starting to rise here in Charlotte (finally!) so I wanted to take advantage of them before spring officially arrived. I will just slow-roast them with some seasonings. I'll also probably add acorn squash and sweet potatoes to the mix to help with the bitterness associated with these foods. I have cooked them before, but I can count the number of times on one hand...more like two fingers.
Cabbage is available year round and it's in the grocery stores a lot with St. Patrick's Day right around the corner. I know cooked cabbage is a staple Irish meal, but I've never really eaten it. The odds are stacked against me since both my mom and the Hubs admitted they do not like cabbage when I announced during dinner last night that some new dishes would be coming their way. Let's hope Sally Fallon's "cabbage with oranges" dish helps their tastebuds choke it down tonight!
Beets are ridiculously good for you. Ever since I started down this path a few years ago I have seen the word "beets" and the phrase "regular part of your diet" pop up countless times. It is chock full of nutrients (in particular, magnesium, which is something I feel both myself and the Hubs are lacking). But I have yet to cook them. So I'll be oven-roasting the beets and wilting their greens tomorrow night.
Artichokes have always intimidated me. I know they are good for you, but I try to avoid canned foods due to the scary BPA lining and it seems they always popped up in the canned version in recipes. The most common place I see them are in a low-quality spinach artichoke dip at chain restaurants. I'm no stranger to these, the Hubs and I used to order this every single time we went out to eat before I started changing my diet. Even after I stopped getting it, he used to get it and eat the whole thing himself! But those days are gone. Hopefully his clear arteries and sharp mind will thank me when he's in his 70s. Anyway, back to artichokes. They just look difficult to cook (like I said before, I fall prey to the "cooking is so difficult!" mentality as well). And I have no idea what a freshly cooked artichoke even tastes like. I bought two at Whole Foods and I'm going to try this slow-cooker recipe I found. You stuff the artichoke with sausage, cauliflower, mushrooms and green onions. Not really avoiding meat by doing this, but I have a feeling I may need to transition to this taste slowly.
So that's what's on the table for this weekend. I chose Sally Fallon's book for most of these recipes because she really does believe in letting the food shine on its own. Just cook, season with spice, and add some fat (either in butter or coconut oil). I'll be thrilled if we can at least choke down three out of the four. My gut is telling me these may not go as planned. Vegetables can be a little tricky and it may take a few tries to get the seasonings and cook times correct.
Thursday, March 7, 2013
It IS easy being green!
I just saw The Muppets movie the other day so Kermit's on my mind. I absolutely loved the Muppets as a kid and really enjoyed the movie. Now the green I'm talking about isn't our favorite frog, it's the super-powered, medicinal, delicious green vegetables that we should all be eating every single day (if not meal)!
If you're trying to make some small changes to your diet, adding more vegetables will serve you well. I think we all know they are good for us, but our society doesn't seem to give veggies the proper attention they deserve. I plan on doing some veggie profiles with this blog (I seem to have a lot of plans...hopefully I can execute them eventually! But I won't beat myself up about it, this year is all about baby steps). For now I'll give you some tips to incorporate more of these nutritious building blocks into your diet. Vegetables can be intimidating for people new to a healthy way of eating, so this is a list of ways to "sneak" them into your meals.
I don't like to break food into meal categories. I feel like you can eat any type of food at anytime of the day, but I know most people look at me weird when I dish out my dinner for breakfast so I'll try to categorize these tips into the three meals we are accustomed to:
BREAKFAST:
1) Add them to your eggs in the morning. Eggs are such an awesome food. They are a fantastic base for a myriad of flavors, and their already mushy texture allows you to add all sorts of things that blend well as you're chewing. On any given morning I put onion, peppers, mushrooms, a dark leafy veggie (kale, spinach, chard, collards...), broccoli, and/or zucchini into my scrambled eggs. Or I fry up some eggs and serve them next to quinoa or rice that has been combined with the above veggies. If I have left-overs from the night before I throw them in. That's actually usually better because they are already cooked (saves time) and are already drenched in either butter, olive oil, or coconut oil, mixed with garlic, and seasoned with herbs and salt and pepper.
2) Add a heaping spoonful of cooked sweet potato or some sort of winter squash (acorn or butternut) to oatmeal in the morning. These root veggies pair well with cinnamon, nutmeg, butter, and apples. And those are usually what you'd put in your oatmeal anyway.
LUNCH:
1) Salad....duh! We all know salads can give us our vegetables, but few of us put anything in besides lettuce, tomatoes, carrots and cucumbers. Now lunch is a meal that I struggle with a lot. But something I have started doing to incorporate a little more variety to my diet is making grain-based salads. I use quinoa or millet and then add things like zucchini, broccoli, asparagus (usually cooked) and then use some sort of a vinaigrette for a punch of flavor.
2) Cut-up veggies with hummus or guacamole. This is something you can add as a side. Carrots, celery, peppers, broccoli, and cherry tomatoes are obvious choices.
3) Stuff your sandwiches with vegetables. Whether you like wraps or thick-cut bread make sure whatever you are eating has vegetables stuffed in. You can buy a lot of vegetables pre-cut or shredded and this makes it even easier. Shredded carrots, broccoli slaw (they have this at Trader Joe's), peppers, cucumbers and celery add a really nice crunch to a normally mushy sandwich.
DINNER:
1) Add dark, leafy greens to pasta sauces. And while you're add it, add broccoli, zucchini, carrots, peppers, whatever. This is a great way to introduce yourself to some vegetables you may not be too fond of or familiar with (kale, collards...). Pasta sauce masks the flavor a bit and food sticks to slippery pasta on its way down so you don't have to adjust too much to the textures. This is how I first started eating kale years ago.
2) Add to soups. If you ever make a soup like chicken noodle, or some sort of stew, just add greens to it. Again, the flavors of the soup will mask the bitter taste of the greens, and they will just slip down your throat with the broth.
As you get more comfortable with vegetables and get used to the bitter taste of greens you'll start to enjoy them on their own as well. And then some day you may even make yourself a kale, celery, cucumber and parsley green drink and enjoy it!! The ultimate right of passage to health nut : )
If you're trying to make some small changes to your diet, adding more vegetables will serve you well. I think we all know they are good for us, but our society doesn't seem to give veggies the proper attention they deserve. I plan on doing some veggie profiles with this blog (I seem to have a lot of plans...hopefully I can execute them eventually! But I won't beat myself up about it, this year is all about baby steps). For now I'll give you some tips to incorporate more of these nutritious building blocks into your diet. Vegetables can be intimidating for people new to a healthy way of eating, so this is a list of ways to "sneak" them into your meals.
I don't like to break food into meal categories. I feel like you can eat any type of food at anytime of the day, but I know most people look at me weird when I dish out my dinner for breakfast so I'll try to categorize these tips into the three meals we are accustomed to:
BREAKFAST:
1) Add them to your eggs in the morning. Eggs are such an awesome food. They are a fantastic base for a myriad of flavors, and their already mushy texture allows you to add all sorts of things that blend well as you're chewing. On any given morning I put onion, peppers, mushrooms, a dark leafy veggie (kale, spinach, chard, collards...), broccoli, and/or zucchini into my scrambled eggs. Or I fry up some eggs and serve them next to quinoa or rice that has been combined with the above veggies. If I have left-overs from the night before I throw them in. That's actually usually better because they are already cooked (saves time) and are already drenched in either butter, olive oil, or coconut oil, mixed with garlic, and seasoned with herbs and salt and pepper.
2) Add a heaping spoonful of cooked sweet potato or some sort of winter squash (acorn or butternut) to oatmeal in the morning. These root veggies pair well with cinnamon, nutmeg, butter, and apples. And those are usually what you'd put in your oatmeal anyway.
LUNCH:
1) Salad....duh! We all know salads can give us our vegetables, but few of us put anything in besides lettuce, tomatoes, carrots and cucumbers. Now lunch is a meal that I struggle with a lot. But something I have started doing to incorporate a little more variety to my diet is making grain-based salads. I use quinoa or millet and then add things like zucchini, broccoli, asparagus (usually cooked) and then use some sort of a vinaigrette for a punch of flavor.
2) Cut-up veggies with hummus or guacamole. This is something you can add as a side. Carrots, celery, peppers, broccoli, and cherry tomatoes are obvious choices.
3) Stuff your sandwiches with vegetables. Whether you like wraps or thick-cut bread make sure whatever you are eating has vegetables stuffed in. You can buy a lot of vegetables pre-cut or shredded and this makes it even easier. Shredded carrots, broccoli slaw (they have this at Trader Joe's), peppers, cucumbers and celery add a really nice crunch to a normally mushy sandwich.
DINNER:
1) Add dark, leafy greens to pasta sauces. And while you're add it, add broccoli, zucchini, carrots, peppers, whatever. This is a great way to introduce yourself to some vegetables you may not be too fond of or familiar with (kale, collards...). Pasta sauce masks the flavor a bit and food sticks to slippery pasta on its way down so you don't have to adjust too much to the textures. This is how I first started eating kale years ago.
2) Add to soups. If you ever make a soup like chicken noodle, or some sort of stew, just add greens to it. Again, the flavors of the soup will mask the bitter taste of the greens, and they will just slip down your throat with the broth.
As you get more comfortable with vegetables and get used to the bitter taste of greens you'll start to enjoy them on their own as well. And then some day you may even make yourself a kale, celery, cucumber and parsley green drink and enjoy it!! The ultimate right of passage to health nut : )
Tuesday, March 5, 2013
Prep-ahead Meal #3
Chicken nuggets!!
This post is definitely for the kids, but these babies are awesome for kids of all sizes. I'm not talking the Tyson chicken nuggets that came from chickens kept in decrepit conditions or are full of nasty oils and fillers and preservatives. I'm talking about quick, super simple, homemade nuggets. I got this recipe from my gal the Whole New Mom. I've made them three times and make double batches to freeze. Music Man, Little Peanut, and Mama LOVE them. The Hubs eats them and says they are "good" which I take as a positive sign from him. Here's the recipe:
Easy Baked Chicken Nuggets
They really are tasty. And they have the awesome fat coconut oil in them so they pack an extra boost of healthy goodness. I've paired them with rice and a green vegetable, or sweet potatoes and cut up avocado. These have turned into a dish that the Music Man will eat on his own without negotiations. Not always, but I've seen it happen!
This post is definitely for the kids, but these babies are awesome for kids of all sizes. I'm not talking the Tyson chicken nuggets that came from chickens kept in decrepit conditions or are full of nasty oils and fillers and preservatives. I'm talking about quick, super simple, homemade nuggets. I got this recipe from my gal the Whole New Mom. I've made them three times and make double batches to freeze. Music Man, Little Peanut, and Mama LOVE them. The Hubs eats them and says they are "good" which I take as a positive sign from him. Here's the recipe:
Easy Baked Chicken Nuggets
They really are tasty. And they have the awesome fat coconut oil in them so they pack an extra boost of healthy goodness. I've paired them with rice and a green vegetable, or sweet potatoes and cut up avocado. These have turned into a dish that the Music Man will eat on his own without negotiations. Not always, but I've seen it happen!
Monday, March 4, 2013
Reason #5 Why I Am Doing This: I like the company I'm in
I think sometimes you can judge someone by the company they keep. I also believe you are what you eat. So when you combine those two ideas, I like to think that what food I choose and who I buy it from says a lot about the person I am and the person I want to be.
Clearly I choose the food I eat because I think I will be a healthier person for it. And by healthy I don't mean skinny. There are plenty of people out there who are sick and skinny. I'm not referring to those with illnesses or diseases, but there are a lot of people who are skinny and malnourished, skinny and tired, skinny and eating foods that are destroying their insides. I want energy, a clear mind, and an overall "good" feeling in my own skin. I'm starting to find more of a correlation between not just the physical impact of food, but the mental and spiritual aspects as well.
Case in point: the book I am reading about animal ethics has me looking at my food sources with a much larger magnifying glass. My research over the past few years has shown me that factory meat is not in the same realm as my local farm's meat when it comes to nutrition. Eggs in a carton in the grocery store offer a fraction of the vitamins, protein and other essential nutrients that a farm fresh egg does. But now there's more to the story for me. Now when I look at a piece of commercial, factory produced chicken I think about the backstory of that bird. Of the suffering it went through, of the horrific conditions it lived in and the unethical treatment it may have received. It literally makes me gag and I don't want to eat it. I can take this to produce as well. I think about all of the chemicals put on those plants and then those chemicals going into my kids and suddenly the food doesn't seem appetizing.
In my dream world, where I have an abundance of time and money, I wouldn't buy anything from a grocery store. I would only shop at my farmer's markets, grow some of my own food, and make almost everything I could from scratch. There's something about having a truly personal connection to my food that feels good. I thoroughly enjoy going to my farmer's market and talking to the farmers about how they picked the vegetables that day or how the lack of rain is really hurting a particular crop. I like talking to my meat gal about what cuts she'll have in weeks to come, or why the ground beef selection is low this month. I'm not totally naive, I know that farmers are human and can lie and maybe some do to try and make a buck, but a lot of these people invite you to their farms to check out their methods. This level of transparency makes me feel better. Most factory-based meat plants do not let anyone in their doors. That alone makes me feel safer putting my "food faith" in the hands of my local farms.
I don't see my dream world coming true anytime soon so I do shop at grocery stores. I try to choose the ones that are the most in line with my food philosophy: eating food that is as close to its natural form as possible. For me in Charlotte, these stores are Whole Foods and Earthfare. There are numerous products in these stores that I don't think are particularly healthy or smart choices for people. But you can find some top notch companies who are doing their best to help people living in this modern society achieve their food and health goals based on a more traditional approach of eating. Many of the products in these stores are made from high quality ingredients and are minimally processed.
Quick update: I'm doing pretty well with my shakes. I've made a few and like having them to sip on throughout the day. I'm still struggling with my fruit intake and overall food consumption.I am actually researching magnesium supplements to see if they will help me with some of my health troubles. I try not to get too caught up in all the supplement advice out there (if you listen to everyone you would be taking 100 pills a day!), but magnesium has been on my mind for awhile now and it feels like the right time to take some action. I'm actually sitting at Earthfare now typing this while my sitter watches the kids and I'm going to head into the health section to investigate some options. Going to see if I can get the Hubs to take something as well. That will take some persuasion. I may have to sneak it in like I do the liver : )
Clearly I choose the food I eat because I think I will be a healthier person for it. And by healthy I don't mean skinny. There are plenty of people out there who are sick and skinny. I'm not referring to those with illnesses or diseases, but there are a lot of people who are skinny and malnourished, skinny and tired, skinny and eating foods that are destroying their insides. I want energy, a clear mind, and an overall "good" feeling in my own skin. I'm starting to find more of a correlation between not just the physical impact of food, but the mental and spiritual aspects as well.
Case in point: the book I am reading about animal ethics has me looking at my food sources with a much larger magnifying glass. My research over the past few years has shown me that factory meat is not in the same realm as my local farm's meat when it comes to nutrition. Eggs in a carton in the grocery store offer a fraction of the vitamins, protein and other essential nutrients that a farm fresh egg does. But now there's more to the story for me. Now when I look at a piece of commercial, factory produced chicken I think about the backstory of that bird. Of the suffering it went through, of the horrific conditions it lived in and the unethical treatment it may have received. It literally makes me gag and I don't want to eat it. I can take this to produce as well. I think about all of the chemicals put on those plants and then those chemicals going into my kids and suddenly the food doesn't seem appetizing.
In my dream world, where I have an abundance of time and money, I wouldn't buy anything from a grocery store. I would only shop at my farmer's markets, grow some of my own food, and make almost everything I could from scratch. There's something about having a truly personal connection to my food that feels good. I thoroughly enjoy going to my farmer's market and talking to the farmers about how they picked the vegetables that day or how the lack of rain is really hurting a particular crop. I like talking to my meat gal about what cuts she'll have in weeks to come, or why the ground beef selection is low this month. I'm not totally naive, I know that farmers are human and can lie and maybe some do to try and make a buck, but a lot of these people invite you to their farms to check out their methods. This level of transparency makes me feel better. Most factory-based meat plants do not let anyone in their doors. That alone makes me feel safer putting my "food faith" in the hands of my local farms.
I don't see my dream world coming true anytime soon so I do shop at grocery stores. I try to choose the ones that are the most in line with my food philosophy: eating food that is as close to its natural form as possible. For me in Charlotte, these stores are Whole Foods and Earthfare. There are numerous products in these stores that I don't think are particularly healthy or smart choices for people. But you can find some top notch companies who are doing their best to help people living in this modern society achieve their food and health goals based on a more traditional approach of eating. Many of the products in these stores are made from high quality ingredients and are minimally processed.
Quick update: I'm doing pretty well with my shakes. I've made a few and like having them to sip on throughout the day. I'm still struggling with my fruit intake and overall food consumption.I am actually researching magnesium supplements to see if they will help me with some of my health troubles. I try not to get too caught up in all the supplement advice out there (if you listen to everyone you would be taking 100 pills a day!), but magnesium has been on my mind for awhile now and it feels like the right time to take some action. I'm actually sitting at Earthfare now typing this while my sitter watches the kids and I'm going to head into the health section to investigate some options. Going to see if I can get the Hubs to take something as well. That will take some persuasion. I may have to sneak it in like I do the liver : )
Saturday, March 2, 2013
Smoothies
I've been struggling getting veggies into my diet lately. While I am cooking greens and eating sweet potatoes for dinner like a champ, I am struggling at lunch time. I do like salads but I'm not finding the motivation to prep them and eat them for lunch. I think I need warmer weather to get into that mode and this 2013 winter in Charlotte is actually quite rainy and chilly. I've been staring at my Vitamix for quite some time and decided today to put it to work.
I treated myself to a green juice at a local grocery store down here while my in-laws were helping me with the kids. I basically copied it this morning:
3/4 cucumber
4 pieces of celery (with leaves)
big handful of parsley
big handful of spinach
1 yellow apple
splash of water
Delicious. And the best part was, I had some leftover from breakfast and I sipped on that while I was feeding my kids their lunch. I think I've killed two birds with one stone here. I find that when my kids are eating I am picking at their meals. I'm sort of hungry for my own lunch but can't really sit down and enjoy a meal. So if I start making more smoothies in the morning I can sip on them with the kids. That will get me through to nap time where I can actually sit down and have my own lunch. So more vegetables and a possible solution to my overeating problem. There's also the emotional component but baby steps!
I did have to cook up a couple of eggs this morning because I was still a little hungry.But there are so many other smoothies with nut butters, avocados and/or milk that I'm sure I can find something that fills me up.
I'm feeling rather optimistic about this. See how it goes....
I treated myself to a green juice at a local grocery store down here while my in-laws were helping me with the kids. I basically copied it this morning:
3/4 cucumber
4 pieces of celery (with leaves)
big handful of parsley
big handful of spinach
1 yellow apple
splash of water
Delicious. And the best part was, I had some leftover from breakfast and I sipped on that while I was feeding my kids their lunch. I think I've killed two birds with one stone here. I find that when my kids are eating I am picking at their meals. I'm sort of hungry for my own lunch but can't really sit down and enjoy a meal. So if I start making more smoothies in the morning I can sip on them with the kids. That will get me through to nap time where I can actually sit down and have my own lunch. So more vegetables and a possible solution to my overeating problem. There's also the emotional component but baby steps!
I did have to cook up a couple of eggs this morning because I was still a little hungry.But there are so many other smoothies with nut butters, avocados and/or milk that I'm sure I can find something that fills me up.
I'm feeling rather optimistic about this. See how it goes....
Friday, March 1, 2013
Fat
It may seem that with a no-sugar, no-gluten diet that I adhere to the "all or nothing" mentality when it comes to a healthy lifestyle. This couldn't be further from the truth. My addiction problems and emotional attachment to food are the reasons that at this moment in time I have had to follow strict guidelines when it comes to my own choices. So when people ask me about what changes they can make to their diet I think they are surprised when I tell them to start small.
Just to be clear, I have wanted to live a healthier lifestyle for years, probably close to a decade. When I first moved into a house with the Hubs I had all these visions of cooking our meals and always making healthy choices. I knew in my long-term health would be better if I ate well but I didn't always make choices consistent with the vision. In fact, I'd say I pigged out on just as much greasy food and take-out as most people. I love desserts and often had treats, and at the holidays I joined the ranks of my fellow Americans and put on extra pounds as I gorged on chocolates, cookies and pies every day from Halloween through New Years.
And even when I saw Michael Pollan on the Oprah show in 2009 and was pregnant with my son I did not drop all the junk cold turkey and start blending up green drinks and snacking on carrots. It was a slow, slow journey over the past four years that have brought me to this point. Filled with highs and tons of bottom-of-the-ice-cream-container lows. I truly believe we fail because we set out goals that are impossible and also dive into excretions of self-improvement without knowing all the facts, or even knowing ourselves all too well. My goal this month is to share some beginning steps that I took and think are extremely beneficial to starting on the healthy track.
I'm going to start with fats.
Fats are perhaps the most misunderstood aspect of our diet. And with good reason. The information out there about fats is very conflicting and there are also so many different types of fats and fats are hidden in items and the focal point of zillions of studies.
I'm actually going to be referring a lot to a woman named Nina Planck in this series on fats. She wasn't one of my "they" in my previous post, but she's a product of the Weston Price/Sally Fallon philosophy. She has a wonderful book called Real Food: What To Eat And Why and also is an excellent source for any woman looking to have a baby. I referred to her book a lot while I was thinking about baby #2 and ate a lot of her foods while the Little Peanut was brewing inside my tummy.
Fats are extremely important. Without boring you too much with a lot of information, just go back to your old high school biology classes and recall that all of our cell walls are made of fat. And a large chunk of our brains are composed of fat. So if you're looking to make a change in your diet and want to pinpoint where you should really work to use quality ingredients, fats are an excellent place to start. Who wants their cells walls and brain made up of low-quality, inferior fats? Not me!
Here's a super quick lesson on the different fats. First off, all fats are made of hydrogen and carbon. The fatty acids can be saturated, monounsaturated, and polyunsaturated. All fats technically have all of these components, but they are classified by the predominant fatty acid.
Saturated: beef, chocolate and butter
Monounsaturated: olive oil
Polyunsaturated: corn oil
Another thing to know about fats is how they withstand to heat (this will come in handy later). Basically, the more saturated a fat, the more sturdy it is and the less likely it will be damaged by exposure to heat. Unsaturated fats spoil more easily when exposed to heat and become rancid. Rancid isn't good.
A trans fat (a term that I think most people are familiar with since the FDA required that boxes label trans fats on boxes back in 2006) is the byproduct of a process called hydrogenation. My first tip for anyone trying to live a healthier life is AVOID ALL HYDROGENATED VEGETABLE OILS.
A hydrogenated vegetable oil is what you get when you blast an unsaturated fatty acid with hydrogen in order to make it more saturated and stable. You essentially change a liquid fat into a solid one. This process destroys anything beneficial the unsaturated fat had and also forms what we call a trans fatty acid. Tons and tons of research (dating back to the 1950s) link trans-fatty acids to an increase of heart disease. Why did it take nearly 60 years for the government to mandate they be listed on our food? Well that's a by-product of food politics and big business and I'll hopefully explore that on this blog in the months to come. But for now, please know that trans fats are no bueno. Seriously, bad, bad, bad, bad! Here's a list of all the terrible things trans fats do to us from Nina Planck's book:
They lower your HDL (the good cholesterol)
Raise LDL (the bad cholesterol)
Raise L/(a) - promotes atherosclerosis and clotting
Reduces blood vessel function
Promotes diabetes, hypertension and obesity
Damage cell membranes
Create free radicals (and that is linked to cancer of all types)
Interferes with the conversion and use of DHA and EPA (the ridiculously important omega-3s)
Just to name a few….they are bad. Period. Avoid them.
So what are they in?? Well, luckily, trans fats have been taken out of a lot of processed foods but don't be fooled into thinking those packages with the big "NO TRANS FATS!!" exclamation are good for you. Technically speaking, a food company can still put "no trans fats" as long as there isn't more than 0.5 grams of trans fats in the product. And that is 0.5 per serving size. So you tell me the last time you actually ate a serving size of potato chips. Or a serving size of Oreo cookie. It's OK, no one's watching, you can be honest with yourself.
What do you look for on the label to let you know if there are nasty fats in there that you shouldn't be eating? Anything that has the word "hydrogenated" in it. And quite frankly, that is going to be a lot of your name brand snacks on the shelves of most grocery stores. Because one of the big reasons the food companies started using these hydrogenated oils is because a hydrogenated oil has a longer shelf life. You've made it more "stable" (forget the fact that you've made it into something bad for you, as long as it's stable that's all we care about). It's difficult to turn a profit on food that spoils quickly.
Which leads me back to my boy Michael Pollan. What was his eater's manifesto? Eat Food. Not Too Much. Mostly Plants. The "eat food" part is a HUGE step. Because I promise you, anything you are getting that's in a box or is cooked with hydrogenated or partially hydrogenated vegetable oils is not food. Food is supposed to rot. When you are eating food you are eating something that was once alive and thriving in mother nature. When you eat something that can sit on a shelf for months (or years) then you are not eating food. For the most part…we can talk about bulk grains and canned goods another time. But hopefully you get the picture.
So this first, small step towards eating better is actually quite a big one. If you do some more research on hydrogenated oils and trans fatty acids I promise you that you will not like what you find. And if you have children, you will definitely think twice about the groundwork you are laying down towards their overall health. I plan on adding a lot more information to this topic as the month goes on (there's a TON to sift through!) but google trans fats and hydrogenated oils and see what pops up.
This month I'll show you a list of ingredients to avoid if you wish to live without these nasty oils in your body. You can take this list and use it as a step towards better health!
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