I have always loved the word "homecoming". I love the Fall season and the smell and sound of leaves crunching under my feet. Growing up in the extreme north, Fall is crisp and vibrant. The smell of apples and leaves transports me home. The memories of football games, floats and cider still make me giddy even after all these years.
This is a season that we, as humans ,begin our preparations for the winter. We crave hearty food and comfort. Some of us dread the coming winter and some of us love every second of the string of holidays that are underway.
This year is interesting for my family since Kurt is eating "raw" and our menus are so radically different than normal. We have always eaten very healthy food. I have come to realize that people crave and love the food that they eat the most. I see this is my children most of all. If kids have always eaten healthy, they love and want healthy food. The very same thing is true about us.
After cooking fish at lower temperatures and for less time, when I see the salmon I used to eat at my local deli, it looks awful to me. It appears shriveled and burned. My "norm" has been shifted. Many times over the years I have noticed this amazing phenomenon. We get to choose what our "normal" is. That is a pretty cool thing.
When I am teaching a lot (which over the years I have taught up to 5 classes a day), doing 3 spin classes a day is no big deal. Earlier this year when I was pregnant, I would remember my "younger years" of training and be shocked that I could ever have run 10 miles in a stretch and teach all those classes. Training at that level seemed impossible and I was sure that now, being 42, I could never do that.
Just a few months later (not being pregnant anymore), I am back to that amount of activity level. It was a slow increase and I hardly noticed until I thought about it. The more we do the more energy we have. I am amazed that at 43 I can run 10 miles no problem and teach 3 classes a day and not blink an eye. My "norm" was simply recalibrated.
When it comes to what we feed our bodies, we do the very same thing. After these last few months of experimentation and exploration, I have come to believe certain things about food. Having studied nutrition in college and having many of the "facts" I learned later proven to be false, I do not think we know very much about the food we eat. The idea of flavanoids, photochemicals and enzymes being present in food is just beginning to be discovered. Many people (doctors, nutritionist and holistic health practitioners) sound pretty out there with their philosophies on food science.
One of my best friends is a very talented and quite famous dietician. She helps people find practical ways to eat healthier. Her clients feel better and lose weight. She can take your take out menus and shopping lists and work wonders. Sharon knows about brands and products you don't even know existed that can help make your life easier and get you to your target weight with ease.
The average person knows very little about the science behind food. For those of us on the other side of "normal", we are a different beast completely. One of my students is so "food phobic" that she eats almost nothing. She could scare you off of eating almost anything with tales of chemicals, pesticides, mercury etc. There is actually a new "eating disorder" that is classified as being overly aware and obsessed with healthy eating.
Somewhere between the "average American" and the "health nut", there is a balance. I believe that we need to take more responsibility for our food. We have gotten very lazy and lost many skills that our grandparents had.
We can re-set our idea of "normal". Even the busiest person has time to feed themselves an their family well. It is not so hard to cook our own food. Once we get into the habit, it actually is no big deal. With a little creativity and a freezer, you can actually work LESS.
I am going to tell you what I believe to be true about food. This is a blog. My blog to be specific. Although I have done extensive reading, research and experimentation and truly believe these truths, I am not going to explain all the reasons behind them. It would simply take too long and I am not sure that anyone cares of would be able to follow the science without a background in food science:
1) Our bodies have a Ph. When that Ph balance is off, all kinds of problems arise including yeast, energy and health problems. When we eat more plant based foods in their natural/raw state and less meat products and processed food, we help keep a healthy Ph.
How do you do this? Here are some very easy ways:
a) Cook a huge pot of steel cut oats over the weekend. Freeze some and keep the rest in the fridge to be eaten for breakfast and even as a snack or dessert. Flavor it with nuts, stevia ,cinnamon, crushed flax seed etc.
b) Eat salads. Be brave and creative with what you can eat raw. Bok Choy, sprouts of every kind, grated purple cabbage, raw pumpkin and sunflower seeds, berries, pomogranite seeds. Almost any fruit or vegetable can find it's way into a salad and add really great texture and flavor.
c) Bring food with you. Don't get stuck starving with no options. Toss an apple in your bag. I have been making an AMAZINGLY yummy "trail mix" lately that is super easy to make:
1) Bare Fruit freeze dried cinnamon apples
2) raw almonds
3) raw unsweetened coconut flakes
This mixture is beyond yummy and has great texture and really satisfies you.
2) We crave sugar and salt the more sugar and salt we eat. This is what companies know and use to get us addicted to junk food. I tell my students and clients, if you can't "pick it or catch it" don't eat it. After a few days of real food, you will be amazed at just how salty that can of soup tastes and how grossly sweet that salad dressing is.
3) Eat when you are hungry. So many people are obsessed with WHEN they will eat certain foods. Our bodies are very wise. They will guide us very well if we start to listen. Children eat more one day, less the next based on their activity level. We get used to our portion sizes. If we start to be open to the fact that sometimes we are really hungry, sometimes we are not, we will eat what our bodies need. There is a lot of research that shows that our metabolisms respond well to a varied caloric load. It is a bit like interval training. I call it "interval eating". If you eat a diet of 1200 a day, your body will turn down it's metabolism to survive on that diet.
4) Get over your fear of fat. Plant/fish fat is really good for you. Fat keeps your brain and skin healthy. It keeps you full and makes the food you eat really satisfying.
5) Cooking at high temps and for long periods of time, chemically alters food. Food that is brown/carmalized is cancer causing, will age you and has lost a lot of what we are eating the food for. Cook your fish below 325 and take it out when it is just flaking. Keep your vegetables vibrant in color and still crunchy.
6) There are a lot of chemicals on our produce. I will spare you the scary numbers but will tell you that there can be up to 20 different chemicals sprayed on your food. The FDA studies each one separately but has never studied how they may interact with each other. That being said, organic food is expensive. When we buy organic, we "vote" that organic practices are important to us. We send the message to farmers that we want them to be more ethical in their treatment of animals (watch the documentary "Food Inc" and you will NEVER buy anything but organic again). I buy only organic dairy products. ESPECIALLY for my children. Girls are getting their periods so young these days and many experts believe it is from hormones and chemicals in our food. For food like broccoli that I don't peel and that has a a porous surface I buy only organic. I also buy organic pears and apples since we eat a LOT of them. The foods, I will buy that are not organic are foods that have a thick skin like melon, bananas, citrus, kiwis etc.
There is a lot more to share and I promise to be better about blogging. Please reach out to me and let me know your thoughts and questions.
Story von Holzhausen
