Archived News of the Week

Food and Nutrition

I want to talk about organics a bit and address the Six Foundations of Healing, starting with nutrition. By nutrition, I don't necessarily mean your MultiVitamin or your Noni juice or your Latest Special Supplement du Jour - I mean the food you put in your mouth every day and this includes pure water plus air, sunlight and auditory and visual stimuli. Anything that comes in contact with one of your five sense, is "feeding" your body.

There is no ambient light at night here at my mountain cottage, so I sleep in the healthy pitch black. There are no car or neighbor noises and my 3+ acres surrounds me in a safe womb of good air, natural quiet and stress free living. I feel very lucky. Do this if you can. It just may add years to your life.

You may not be able to move to your little nirvana in the mountains right away, but you do have full control over what you put into your mouth. I realize how expensive it is to shop solely at Whole Foods, Wild Oats or Vitamin Cottage, but please, please budget for this. With the 100,000 or so chemicals we are constantly being bombarded with on a daily basis, it behooves us to try just a wee bit to consciously decrease our exposure when we can.

Here's a simple rule of thumb: Shop in the periphery of the grocery store which has the fresh produce, the fresh meats, the good dairy, etc. Fill your cart with bags full of fresh vegetables and fruits. Remember: Don't eat anything in a bag, box, can, jar or wrapper. All this bad stuff is shelved in the middle aisles. Oh, OK: You can buy chicken broth in a box and tomatoes in a can and even organic beans in a can if you are pressed for time.

What follows is a list of foods that you really should buy organic in order to avoid the very high pesticide residues in them: Apples, bell peppers, celery, cherries, imported grapes, nectarines, peaches, pears, potatoes, red raspberries, spinach and strawberries. Make some sort of mnemonic for these foods or memorize them alphabetically, so it's second nature when you shop.

Here are some foods which aren't so bad when purchased conventionally: Asparagus, avocados, bananas, broccoli, cauliflower, corn, kiwi, mangoes, onions, papaya, pineapples and sweet peas. These have very low pesticide residues so you can save your pennies here: Costco sells big bunches of asparagus, great, tasty avocados by the five-pak, bananas, broccoli, and all the rest for a very nominal fee.

For optimal dietary guidelines, you can start with this: Buy organics when necessary; feed yourself produce dominated meals - up to 50-75%. Consume moderate amounts of animal protein, fresh as possible and a wide variety of very colorful vegetables. Buy grass fed, organic, free range and wild protein sources, non glutenous grains like rice, quinoa, amaranth, millet and buckwheat, goat and sheep cheeses, milks and yogurts, fresh herbs, (start an indoor year-round herb garden in a south facing window) green teas, fruits esp. when in season and as low glycemic as possible. Cook with and use coconut oil and olive oil, avoiding sunflower, safflower and corn oils. Canola oil is not so great, but buy organic if you must use it.

To reiterate, buy organically raised meat, and grass fed beef if you can. Whole Foods is now offering grass fed hamburger meat. I think it tastes a bit different - grassy? - and it may take you (me) a while to get used to it, but grass fed beef is full of omega 3's and is pretty much like eating a nice piece of wild-caught salmon. By buying organic meat, you will be supporting a system that helps reduce antibiotic use. This is important because the more antibiotics in use, the more likely bacteria will become resistant to them and the more likely you are to contract a hard-to-treat infection.

(As an aside: MDR (multidrug resistant infection) is a serious problem right now: Currently, bacterial diseases are occurring [for example, TB] which are resistent to every known antibiotic, including the current top super bug killer, vancomycin. To protect yourself, do not take antibiotics unless you absolutely must (only for bacterial infections, not viral) and if and when you do, finish the whole prescription; don't stop when you start feeling better.)

The kind of water you drink is crucial. DO NOT drink tap water. Chlorine and fluoride are not your best friends. For example, why is there so much diabetes today? Why are kids coming down with diabetes? Might it be because the chlorine in the tap water they are drinking contains a toxin called allocin which kills the Islets of Langerhan in the pancreas which produces the insulin? (Plus all the sugar and fake foods kids eat today, too, but that's another sad topic.) Secondly, fluoride has been implicated in increased hip fracture in older women. I buy Eldorado Springs water and drink that at home and at the office. I really should get a reverse osmosis system for my whole house, but I haven't yet.

Use the summer bounty to get yourself on track. The Farmer's Markets have so much good food now - Make a special effort to go and buy up all the fresh, organic produce you need for the week. Not only the tried and true corn and tomatoes, but go outside the box a bit and try kale and turnip and beet greens. Get a large bag of salad greens, wash and store them properly and you have your daily salad for the week. I have recently discovered Annie's Organic Red wine & Olive Oil Vinaigrette. If you don't feel like making your own, try it.

Next time, I will continue with the other five foundations of healing which include detoxification, structure, genetics, thoughts and emotions and spiritual health.

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