Project Real Food Goals

What does real food mean to me?

I had to figure out the answer to this over the last few days so that I could begin Project Real Food on Monday.  I've been studying food for three and a half years now.  It all began when my son, Benjamin, was born.  He was sick and allergic.  He had terrible eczema, spit-up a minimum of 40 times a day and had blood in his poop (nothing is TMI here!).  He slipped down the growth chart at warp speed.  I began seeking out answers to help him on my own when his doctors weren't able to help him.  As any new mom knows, it can be terrifying when our children are sick and we feel helpless.

Through my research, I discovered how detrimental processed foods can be on our systems.  It's sort of a given these days, but I was still rather young and had spent exactly zero time thinking about food up to that point in my life.  I drank Coke by the gallons and we ate processed foods for almost every single meal.  I don't lie.  Ask my husband and he'll tell you that our favorite meal (and one we ate several times a week) was Pizza Rolls with a side of boxed mac & cheese.  Yeesh.

I also began a shift toward natural cleaning products at this same time.  I learned a lot about how closely asthma can be tied to the chemicals/irritants in our environment.  Since I'm an asthmatic, this hit home for me and it was an easy switch, albeit a little pricier.

Over the weekend, I sat down, put pen to paper and jotted out the list of everything I want to have accomplished when this journey is over.  I don't know how long this will take me.  I am not going to rush or give myself a deadline.  I'm simply going to tackle task after task until I have accomplished all of the following (even if I decide throughout the process that I may not permanently adopt it all).  These are not in order of importance or how I will tackle it, since I haven't yet developed my "itinerary":

1.  Buying local and/or organic - Except in rare cases where it is not possible, I want to buy mostly local and/or organic food.  I say mostly because everyone deserves some slack here and there, right?

2.  No added sugar - I've known for awhile that I'm a sugar addict. And the evidence is convincing that sugar is incredibly addictive.  Between the books I Quit Sugar and Little Sugar Addicts, I need no more convincing of the detrimental effect of sugar, both on me and especially on my children.  My goal is to abstain from any added sugar with the exception of maple syrup and raw, local honey occasionally.

3.  No packaged/processed foods - We've been doing pretty well refraining from packaged foods lately, but I want to challenge myself more.  There are a few things that are inevitable, but I'm taking a cue from 100 Days of Real Food and limiting myself to packaged foods with no more than 5 ingredients and then, only rarely.  If I don't know what the ingredient is and understand the possible side effects, I don't want to eat it.

4.   Find a source for local eggs - I don't want to support the abuse of animals.  This is one of the reasons I went vegan for a stint.  In addition to ensuring that animals are treated well, eating local eggs gives us a big health boost (more on that later).

5.  Switch over to humanely raised meats - Just like eggs, I want to find a local source for all of our meat.  It is no longer enough for a package of meat to purport that it is free-range and organic.  Sadly, we're being duped.  Usually these animals are treated no better than the ones who produce conventional meat.  I also want to lower our meat consumption a little more.  Right now we eat meat 3-4 times a week and I'd like to make sure we don't eat meat more than 2-3 times a week.  Partially for financial reasons (meat is expensive, and humanely raised meat much more so) and partially because I just don't think we need or were ever meant to eat as much meat as the average American eats today.

6.  Only eat soaked/sprouted grains & drastically cut back - It's only been recently that I've become intrigued with the idea that we were never intended to eat grains and that they're damaging to our body.  This book rocked my world.  This article explains it well.  I am a self-proclaimed carb junkie, so this will be as tough if not tougher than giving up added sugar.  That's why my first goal is to only eat soaked/sprouted grains (which reduce much of the harmful effects of grains) and cut back.  Eventually, I may give it up all together, but I'm not ready to commit to that yet and the truth is, I'm not totally convinced that we should eat no grains.  Like I did with veganism, I think testing a diet out and seeing how it impacts you is one of the best ways to decide for yourself what food principles you want to adopt and that's my plan with grains.

I've recently learned about bio-individuality and I think it is so right-on.  It makes a lot of sense.  In summary, we are all unique individuals and food that works for one person may or may not work for another.  I don't really believe that anything is one size fits all, so I don't know why I've spent so much time thinking there is a "perfect" diet out there.  I don't think there is.  I think there's a perfect diet for each person that looks different than another person's perfect diet, and we'll learn our own perfect diet through trial and error.

7.  Find an alternative to coffee or just give it up completely.  I've never had a caffeine problem before, and now I do.  I must have it to function, and I'm drinking three cups a day some days.  Not cool as a breastfeeding mom.  Also not cool because for the first time in my life, I'm experiencing headaches if I go too long without caffeine.  Not to mention it helps deplete magnesium, which is something I believe most of us are dangerously low in anyway.  The plan is to try herbal coffee and chai tea and see if either of them are a good substitute.

8.  Learn about GMOs.  Honestly, I've given very, very little thought to this but I watched a movie trailer and read an article the other day that finally spoke to me enough that I want to look into this.

The following aren't food goals per se, but they're part of the package for me to achieve better health.

9.  Make all of our cleaning products and most of our beauty products.  I'm not down with homemade shampoo (tried it), can't wrap my mind around the idea of homemade deodorant (though apparently it really works) and I love my make-up, but the goal is to find a way to make most of it for a cleaner, greener house.

10.  Exercise.  Often.  Enough said?

11.  Sleep more.  Again - obvious enough, but my kids are up between 5:45 and 6:15 almost every morning but I seldom go to sleep before midnight.  There is so much research on the effects of lousy sleep and I just keep ignoring it.

12. Supplements.  We're sort of all over the place on this one.  Ideally, we'd get all the vitamins and minerals our body needs from the food we eat and the ground we step foot on, but with poor soil quality and poor food quality, we aren't getting the amounts of vitamins our bodies need.  I agree with some who say supplements are an inferior source of these vitamins, but after years of studying this and going 'round and 'round, I feel that supplementing in addition to a healthy diet is a better alternative than a healthy diet that still lacks vital nutrients.  I want to get a handle on exactly what supplements our family should be taking, because there is a plethora of options out there and it can be very overwhelming!

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These are my major goals.  I may break them down into even smaller goals as time goes on and I'm able to better analyze.

My objective is to slowly tackle the world of "real food" little by little in hopes that it all sticks.  While I believe it's important to stick to a life change like this, I also think fellowship and hospitality are even more important than food, and I feel pretty strongly that one should never turn down a meal with someone else in lieu of following strict food rules like this.  Moderation should always be key.

If you haven't already read it, I can't recommend Food Rules enough.  It is THE shortest read, makes total sense and doesn't leave you scratching your head (or ramming it into a wall in frustration) like so many other books can.  He sums the book up with this, "Eat Food.  Not too much.  Mostly plants."  Like Pollan says in this book, there's nothing wrong with eating badly on occasion.  It's when it becomes your every day diet that you're increasing your risk for all the diet-related diseases that are now running rampant in this country (serious diseases related to what we eat kill THREE OF EVERY FOUR AMERICANS EVERY YEAR - YIKES!!!!!!!!!).  I love how he stressed making your own junk food.  Because, after all, if you have to make a chocolate cake or potato chips, you're just not that likely to eat it often.  :)

For those who said they were going to follow along, I'd love to know what your food goals are!  I know they won't look exactly like mine and I think we could all learn from each other.