Monday, January 19, 2009

Why Organic?

Back when I was a kid and changed my diet to be vegetarian the pop culture surrounding vegetarianism was heavily linked to finding organic produce and food. We used to have to go really out of our way to find organic food. Finding organic grass-fed meat was even more difficult. Then there was also a kind of attitude, like, what was so great about organic? I knew lots of people who didn't buy organic. I used to judge restaurants on their selection of organic meals and things like if their kitchen used good cookware especially nothing made from aluminum:very difficult as many small restaurants can't afford to use well made cookware.

Many times peopele would tell me, organic food is a fake-out. Very few people would even believe that it tasted better. I usually defended my choice by focusing on the problems of industrial agriculture. But organic food offers many other benefits.

Many grocery products are processed that we don't associate with processing. Like salt. Commercial table salt has a lot less flavour than sea salt. One of the reasons is because table salt is processed with fillers. Some of these fillers include sugar.

Last month I was very busy getting ready for guests and I forgot to pick up sugar. We don't use very much sugar...basically Stagg puts it in his coffee. I could have a pound of sugar in the house for a year. Or more. Anyways I forgot to buy sugar and I had to make holiday cookies. So we bought some commercial sugar from the local grocery store. I hummed and hawed...even Stagg was like, what does it matter?

I sometimes make an iced coffee and I will put a little sugar in that. So I made an iced coffee. I couldn't taste the sugar. I thought I must have blown out my taste buds. I added more sugar. Nothing. I put some sugar straight in my mouth. What a rip. Nothing! I made the cookies.

Very bland. Seriously...something was wrong with this sugar. It had been years and years since I bought regular refined sugar. I will probably never buy commercial refined sugar ever again.

Oh and by the way...any vegetarians out there? The filter used for refined sugar is often bones of animals. It's called "natural charcoal". The filtration process of this sugar is popular because so many people prefer their sugar and much of their wheat and other processed foods to be "white and clean". Chances are if you don't buy organic sugar you aren't actually a vegetarian.

Yes, wheat is a processed food. Get over it. If you eat wheat, you eat Frankenfoods.

The other night we made it to the health food store and I picked up some "Vegan Organic Cane Sugar". It's delicious!

People are struggling with obesity because they have no idea how consuming processed foods including sugar and the holy grail favorite food staple—wheat flour—creates weight gain.

Wheat was originally a wild grass—which has been hybrid into six different classes in the United States. Soft red winter wheat and soft white wheat are grown east of the Mississippi River. West of the Mississippi, the wheat grown includes hard red winter, hard red spring, durum, hard white, and soft white. Soft white wheat is grown in the Pacific Northwest while spring and durum wheat are grown in the Northern Plains.

Evidence exists that this wild grass first grew in Mesopotamia and in the Tigris and Euphrates River valleys in the Middle East nearly 10,000 years ago. As early as 6,700 B.C., Swiss lake dwellers used this wild grass to make flat cakes. It was the Egyptians who discovered how to make yeast-leavened breads between 2,000 and 3,000 B.C. Since this wild grass is the only product with sufficient gluten content to make a raised or leavened loaf of bread, this wild grass quickly became favored over other grains grown at the time, such as: oats, millet, rice, and barley. The workers who built the pyramids in Egypt were paid in bread.

This hybrid grass (wheat) does not digest. It ferments in the stomach spewing off toxic waste that causes acid reflux, bloating and inflames tissues and joints—thus creating swelling in both. If people stopped eating ‘wheat’ and initially use a highly effective acidity detox remedy, within a few days you will lose inches from every part of your body. Furthermore, once you stop consuming processed foods and instead eat whole foods such as fruits and vegetables, under normal conditions, with moderate exercise, the body will release its excess weight on its own.


Related Links:

-Michael Pollan
-The Worst Mistake In The History of the Human Race
-Gluten Intolerance?
-Do modern eating habits contribute to Depression?

6 comments:

pjazzypar said...

I actually have tried vegetarianism and I have cut back considerably on the meat. I am a fan of organic foods and I have organic sugar in my cupboard, although I do not really eat a lot of sugar. Interesting story about the wild grass in Mesopotamia, what I great historic fact.

Candy Minx said...

Well, it's great to "see" you! Hi Pjazzypar. Yeah, I eat meat, but not tons of it. I'm more interested in eating really wonderful ingredients. I've always been uber-sensitive against totalitarian agriculture and into subsistence food gathering. It's getting a lot easier than when I was a kid and so few stores or restaurants were interested in how food lived...

I like to eat food that had a good life before we consume it. Vegies included.

The "Fertile Crescent" as it used to be called is a fascinating subject...food and otherwise. Some anthropologists believe that the move to agriculture was an emergency move due to over population and dwindling resources.

Gardenia said...

This is all very interesting - see you were ahead of your time! One of the happiest times of my life was when I lived in Iowa and grew all our vegetables and could obtain our fruits for the most part for the picking. Could get fresh goat's milk, local honey - those were the days.

Now, we are eating poison if we are not very careful and very picky. I have been reading frightening reports on MSG - I knew it was bad - but now there is proof of brain damage.

Reading Suzanne Somers book "Breakthough." Lots of good stuff in it.

I have eaten very very little bread during this diet and digestive health has improved for it quite a bit -

hmm maybe wheat was made for animals, not humans?

Candy Minx said...

Well, Gardenia, it wasn't that Iw as ahead of my time...it was that I hooked up with a lot of people who looked back in history to tradition. I was studying Hinduism, I hung out with Indo-Canadians, Native Canadians and Seventh Day Adventists. These sub cultures in Canada have many things in common including looking to conservative traditional ways of food and eating. I was dumb as a post...raised on really bad food and had a paradigm shift when I got into Hinduism and Buddhism.

That's interesting you notice a change with avoiding wheat great news!

Yes, some animals can digest whaet. Most animals digest grass the best though...and grass-fed tastes better too!

Janet said...

And the thing is...so many folks just don't want to hear it. They scoff, etc.

Cherie said...

Thanks for this!

I've read Michael Pollan's Book In Defense of Food and it changed my eating habits immediately. I shared what I learned with my family and we haven't eaten fast food for one whole year - we don't even WANT to. We don't eat processed foods at all, we eat REAL food and we are all a bit thinner, more energetic, and more clear-headed.

I'm going to do some serious snooping on your blog here. Came over from Gardenia's place.

Again, thanks.

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