I'll take a full cream cappucino please!

Question: What is the best way to sell a product that isn't moving off shelves and isn't popular with the public?

Answer: Call it a health food and you will see that product flying off the shelves faster than they can manufacture them.

It's sad, but true. So many of us are being fooled by clever marketing and advertising. We are actually turning our noses up at real, wholesome food, and choosing to buy processed, genetically modified foods instead, because the adverts, and sadly sometimes health professionals, tell us to.

If you can, try and cast your mind back to the time that you FIRST heard that full cream dairy was bad for you, I bet you'd struggle to actually pinpoint it or remember who it was who told you? I know you'll probably say you've read it in many magazines and newspapers, or it's something you've seen on TV, or someone said something. Did you ever question it? Or did you just go along with it because the amount of places you heard it or read it or saw it, meant that it HAD to be right? I was SO brainwashed, I actually convinced myself that cream was just gross and that I hated the taste! (I actually LOVE the taste though...)

THAT is the power of propaganda. Even our health professionals have been duped. As an exercise scientist, I am told to advise my clients to stay away from saturated fat and full cream dairy. Discovery Vitalityfoods actually subtracts points if you buy full cream dairy. It's terrifying the far reaching effects good advertising can have. These days, the amount of people who actually know the truth about full cream dairy, and saturated fats, are few and far between. Tim Noakes (read this very interesting article about him and his diet) is probably the only well-known person to actually say it in recent years. But I am trying my hardest to change that!

Did you know that, before World War 2, no-one even knew what skim milk was? People bought milk based on how creamy it was. The thicker the layer of cream on top of the milk, the better the quality, the faster it sold. Milk wasn't homogenised in those days which meant that it still formed that thick layer of cream on the top (yum!) These days, all milk (unless it's bought raw at a farmer's market) is homogenised.

In case you aren't sure what homogenisation is, it's a process where milk is raised to high temperatures and agitated and filtrated to break down the naturally occurring fat molecules that would otherwise separate and rise to the top of the milk to form cream. The process of homogenisation stops the separation from taking place and gives store bought milk its smooth appearance which most people have come to prefer. It also gives the milk a longer shelf life making it easier for manufacturers to transport it over longer distances, and also for consumers to have longer-lasting milk, once it's opened.

One of the problems with this process is that it kills off all of the many healthy enzymes in milk. But a much bigger problem is that, according to Dr Kurt Oster, the process of breaking the fat globules into such small pieces is now a leading cause of arteriosclerosis and heart disease. It's been listed as one of the top three causes of heart disease, along with transfats and chlorinated water.

You might ask, well why do they do it then? We could also ask why they make things like margarine and genetically modified cereals and other processed foods... Because they CAN,  because it makes them loads of money and because WE continue to buy them thinking we're doing the right, healthy thing.

Back to skim milk though, how exactly DID it become a health food? Well, not long after World War 2, people started moving away from butter and full cream dairy, in fact, ALL saturated fats, because some studies had apparently shown that it was linked to a growing number of heart disease cases. What they didn't pay attention to was the fact that heart disease was virtually unknown before the mid 1920's when people still loaded their food with cream and butter. Logic dictates that saturated fat couldn't possibly be the culprit when it came to heart disease, or people would have been dying from it for centuries before. It had to be something new that had been added into people's diets more recently. It's no coincidence that partially hydrogenated fats were introduced around 1921. These fats are primarily responsible for the heart disease epidemic and yet people decided to blame saturated fats anyway.

People started cutting full cream dairy out of their diets due to its high saturated fat content and skim milk became the order of the day. People the world over, bought into the scam and skim milk became the new favourite health food to buy. The great irony is that heart disease is now the number one killer and people have not gotten thinner and healthier. They've gotten fatter and sicker despite the amount of skim milk being sold each year. What does that tell us?

I don't have kids yet, but BOTH of my sisters told me, at different times, that their kids had to eat full cream dairy until they were at least 2 and that it was a struggle to find full cream yoghurt for them. Apparently full cream was essential to their development. Low fat dairy actually posed a threat to their normal development and could only be consumed after they turned 2... I'm sorry, but the last time I checked, kids were humans too. They aren't some strange breed that magically turns human at the age of 2. What they need, ADULTS also need, and vice versa. And if it's bad for kids, you can bet your bottom dollar it isn't good for adults! Who on earth comes up with this nonsense?! Full cream dairy is as essential to adults as it is to kids and that's the bottom line.

So how DOES drinking skim milk make people fatter? Well, milk, without the fat, is really just milk sugar (lactose). That means, when you drink your "healthy" glass of skim milk, you are actually just drinking a sugary drink and we know what sugar does to us... it ultimately makes us fat. Another reason is that, when you reduce the saturated fat in a person’s diet, they start eating carbs (grains and sugars primarily) to fill the gap. It's these grains and sugars that actually make you fat, not saturated fat. I've mentioned it before on this blog; since I started eating saturated fat, I have LOST body fat. It is much easier to control my eating because I no longer have cravings for sugar. I feel satiated when I eat, thanks to eating saturated fat. I am not unique. The rule applies to all of us. If you drink skim milk, you will be missing out on the satiating, blood sugar and insulin steadying affects of saturated fat. That skim milk will actually make your body automatically crave sugar and carbs (grains) to make up for the lack of them. Why else do you crave sugar and carbs when you don't eat saturated fat? It's because the body is incredibly intelligent. It is able to MAKE saturated fat out of sugars. If it is low on saturated fat, it will make you crave sugar so that it can MAKE saturated fat. Unfortunately, eating more sugar also has the horrible side effect of making you fat, not to mention the threat of diabetes and other illnesses.

Here's another frightening reason to avoid skim powdered milk in this excerpt from “Dirty Secrets of the Food Processing Industry” from the Weston Price Foundation:

"A note on the production of skim milk powder: liquid milk is forced through a tiny hole at high pressure, and then blown out into the air. This causes a lot of nitrates to form and the cholesterol in the milk is oxidised. Those of you who are familiar with my work know that cholesterol is your best friend; you don’t have to worry about natural cholesterol in your food; however, you do not want to eat oxidised cholesterol. Oxidised cholesterol contributes to the buildup of plaque in the arteries, to atherosclerosis. So when you drink reduced-fat milk thinking that it will help you avoid heart disease, you are actually consuming oxidised cholesterol, which initiates the process of heart disease."

A last point to make you think: farmers feed skim milk to their pigs TO MAKE THEM FAT. Seems like a paradox, doesn't it? But a farmer actually said that, if she gives her pigs full cream dairy, they eat far less, but, if she gives them low fat dairy, they want to eat all the time! The same rule applies to all grain fed animals. They have so much sugar in their diets that they feel permanently hungry and keep needing to eat. It's not normal, and it's not healthy, not for the pigs, and certainly NOT for you.

Still going to order that skinny cappuccino? I dare you to try full cream for a couple of weeks and see the difference it makes. Lower the amount of starch and grains and increase the saturated fat in your diet. It must be from a healthy, grassfed animal though. Add some raw, full cream milk, and raw butter and some free range animal fat to your diet and see if you can feel the difference. I guarantee you will.

King of the fast foods

I was listening to Redi Tlhabi talking on 702 this morning about the opening of the first Burger King in South Africa. Apparently Burger King were giving away free whopper burgers to the first 1 000 customers. I have to say, I share her confusion over why people would start queuing at a fast food joint several hours before it was supposed to open, unless they were homeless and starving and that burger meant the difference between life and death.

Colour me stupid but what is so special about Burger King? I GET that burgers are tasty. I also GET that fast food is convenient at times if you aren't as fussy as me. (Personally, I'd rather push through the hunger until I find something better.) I just don't understand how a burger, made in a fast food joint like Burger King, could possibly be more appealing than a burger made in your own kitchen, thereby giving you power over the ingredients IN said burger. In fact, Burger King is SO appealing to people, that they actually woke up early to go and queue outside Burger King hours before it opened when they could have actually used that time to make themselves a lunch that would have saved them, not only petrol and time, but also a possible heart attack, or some dread disease, later in life.

Recently, Burger King had to come clean, during the horsemeat scandal, and admit that they used horsemeat in their burgers. They only came clean AFTER DNA evidence was found proving that they were using horsemeat, and they were forced to admit to it and apologise for denying it only hours before. Too late, she cried? Apparently not according to the thousands queuing outside of Burger King this morning! It's scary to think that fast food eaters have no CLUE what they are eating, nor do they seem to care.

Mmm, delicious...

There are two possibilities here: One is that Burger King knowingly lied about the horsemeat in order to protect their own profit margins regardless of the harm they might be causing OR the other possibility is that Burger King literally had NO idea that their food contained horsemeat and are innocent of the lies... BUT that makes them ignorant about their own food so I'm not actually sure which is worse.

There are any number of scarily, toxic chemicals in most fast foods and if Burger King, and its clientele, are clueless about the horsemeat in their own burgers, how can they say they have been honest when listing the nutritional value of their burgers on their website? How can any of their clients trust that the nutritional breakdown on their website, is accurate? And if Burger King actually ARE aware of the horsemeat, then the nutritional breakdown on their website is null and void because they haven't declared it there and that means they have lied. Of course, I think we can safely say that they haven't declared it because they KNOW that you won't want to eat burgers made of horsemeat and so they'd rather lie to you and not lose your money. Where are the ethics there?

Unfortunately, horsemeat is actually the least of your worries when it comes to fast food. Here is a list of some of the ingredients NOT listed in the nutritional breakdown on their websites:

• sodium phosphates
• bleached wheat flour
• modified food starch 
• dextrose (sugar)
• partially hydrogenated soybean oil and cottonseed oil with mono-and diglycerides, (read: trans fats)
• Prepared in vegetable oil (Canola oil, corn oil, soybean oil, hydrogenated soybean oil) (read: trans fats)
• TBHQ, tertiary butylhydroquinone, a petroleium derived product
• Dimethylpolysiloxane

You may have saved some money because you bought a cheap burger, but what price are you ultimately paying for having that burger? If you read my previous post you'll remember that everything that you eat, becomes a part of you. Your body sees it all as food and it becomes part of your cell makeup, it flows through your bloodstream and it contaminates everything it touches. Why do 1 in 3 people have cancer these days? The above bullet points are part of your answer, folks. If you still can't see it then I'm not sure who can help you there!

The ONLY things that most of us will recognise as "food" on that list, are the bleached wheat flour, the sugar and the vegetable oil. Bleached wheat flour has been sucked DRY of any nutrients that it might have had to start with. Can someone tell me WHY anyone would do that? You not only remove the nutrients, but you kill any flavour it might have had to start with and you might as well add talcum powder to the burger instead. There is also the issue that your body breaks down the white flour  into glucose extremely fast and so you tend to store more of it as fat.

As for sugar, we eat that all the time right? Surely it can't be THAT bad? Well, let's see how bad it can be:

• Bad bacteria LOVE to eat sugar, so sugar can depress your immune system by fueling the bad bacteria
• Sugar contributes to infertility
• Sugars raises blood glucose levels, which can deteriorate blood vessels and lead to heart disease
• Sugar can increase your risk of cancer. Some believe it can CAUSE cancer. Read this article to really blow your mind!
• Sugar contributes to candida, which MANY women suffer from, especially IBS sufferers.
• Sugar cravings are related to stress and the cravings are self-sustaining. (Meaning when you eat sugar because you’re stressed, you’re going to end up wanting more sugar when the stress returns.) Vicious cycle anyone?
• Sugar is addictive. Lisa Byrne says it best in her workbook, Break the Sugar Habit: “Refined, white sugar acts more like a drug than a food in our system…but it started as a whole plant. The sugar cane and beet plant in nature come complete with vitamins, minerals, fiber, and phytochemicals like any other plant. When glucose is part of the whole plant, it acts like a food in your body -- entering our system calmly, breaking down slowly and providing a range of nutrients in addition to energy. When glucose is isolated, sugar acts like a drug in your body. Too much refined sugar creates a cycle of intense highs and lows, keeping our blood sugar, hormones and neurotransmitters out of balance.

Ok, so sugar = not good! How about those vegetable oils? We've been told that they're good, right? Margarine is made out of vegetable oils and we are supposed to eat that instead of butter to lower cholesterol and prevent heart disease aren't we? 

That would be... WRONG!

One of the (many) problems with vegetable oils is that, unlike butter or coconut oil, vegetable oils can’t be extracted just by pressing or separating naturally. They have to be chemically removed, deodorised and altered. Vegetable oils are some of the most chemically altered foods in our diets and yet they get promoted as healthy. What's frightening is that they are found in pretty much EVERY processed food, from salad dressing to mayonnaise (and fast foods) and  even on the "healthy" nuts and seeds you buy (look at the ingredients).

The last few times I've been in Durban, lately, I've heard an advert punting Canola margarine as a healthy alternative. It's practically on repeat and I get so mad when I hear it I turn off the radio! Here is the scary thing about Canola oil:

• It was developed by making a hybrid version of the rapeseed, and it was given its name in the 1980s as part of a marketing effort organised by a conference on mono-saturates.
• Rapeseed oil contains high amounts of the toxic erucic acid, which is poisonous to the body. (it has been linked to the formation of fatty deposits in heart muscles in animals) Canola oil is an altered version, also called Low Erucic Acid Rapeseed and it is commonly genetically modified and treated with high levels of pesticides.
• Canola (modified rapeseed oil) is produced by heating the rapeseed and processing it with a petroleum solvent to extract the oil. Then another process of heat and an addition of acid is used to remove nasty solids (wax) that occur during the first processing.
• At this point, the newly created canola oil must be treated with yet MORE chemicals to improve the colour and separate the different parts of the oil. Finally, because the chemical process has created a horrible smelling oil, it must be chemically deodorised to be palatable!
• If the vegetable oil is going to be made into margarine, it undergoes an additional process called hydrogenation to make it solid at cold temperatures. Unlike saturated fats (butter, coconut oil, etc) vegetable oils are not naturally solid at these temperatures and must be hydrogenated to accomplish this. During this process of hydrogenation, those lovely transfats we’ve heard so much about, are created.

Still thinking about that Burger? Did I go through all the other stuff listed that we DIDN'T recognise?

• Sodium phosphates: According to web definitions: phosphate of sodium is used as a laxative to cleanse the bowels... 
• Food starch is usually modified via a chemical process and is used in most processed foods
• TBHQ or Tertiary Butylhydroquinone is found in many foods, ranging from crackers to crisps to fast foods. It is also found in certain brands of pet foods, as well as in cosmetic and baby skincare products, varnish, lacquers and resins and it is used in the stabilisation process of explosive compounds... and you want to eat it because... ?!
• Dimethylpolysiloxane is an antifoaming agent (a form of silicone used in cosmetics, and Silly Putty) It is also found in diet coke, sprite etc.

Some people will read this and say, "So what? Life is short and I want to enjoy it! My parents ate all this stuff and they're ok! But are they really? I challenge you to say you don't know a single person who has cancer or heart disease or diabetes or some other physical ailment. Ageing prematurely also counts. If it's no-one in your immediate circle, then there will be someone who you've met through someone close to you. Doctors will tell you that these diseases are genetic. I will agree that some people ARE genetically predisposed to some diseases. BUT I also believe that it is our lifestyle that will determine whether we get those diseases or not. You are not powerless unless you choose to be.

So, you have a choice here. To continue to live in ignorance, despite having the knowledge at your fingertips, or to begin to affect a change, not only in your life, but in the lives of those close to you. The choices you make will affect your children, and your children's children. Look what happened when food became a booming industry and people realised how much money could be made by deceiving the masses. Our parents were told that eating certain processed foods was much better than eating real food and THEY bought into it. So WE bought into it. That's the power of advertising. 

But I also believe in the power of the influence we have on those around us. So it's up to us whether we choose to continue that legacy, or to affect a change. We need to start a food revolution. That's what I'm doing here and I can see the change happening in people around me and it gives me a great amount of hope. By looking after ourselves, we are also looking after those close to us, AND a great side benefit is that we go easier on our planet too. It's a win-win situation:)

That's enough of that! Tomorrow is THE REAL FOOD FRIDAY FEAST and I'm finally going to share that banana bread recipe I've been talking so much about! I happened to spot a banana bread loaf in a grocery store yesterday and, out of interest, I peeked at the ingredients. All I can say is, it wasn't far removed from a fast food burger! Wouldn't it be nice to eat a banana bread that, you know, was actually good for you? Bet you always thought ANY cakes were cheat meals destined to land on your thighs and hips and you needed 3 gym sessions to work them off! Not this banana bread, I guarantee!

Can I get a YUM!?

Don't miss tomorrow's post;)

Go on, eat that fat!

Winter seems like the worst time ever to try and overhaul your entire lifestyle, right? I disagree! And over the course of this post, I'll tell you why;)

If you were going to be following a "diet" where a meal consisted of 3 lettuce leaves, half a can of tuna and 5 almonds  then, yes, I'd say winter is a bad time to do that. In my opinion, ANYTIME is a bad time to do that! Winter is a time when all we want to do is hibernate, and EAT! You want soups and curries and stews and lots of hot, baked goods and snacky things and hot, sweet drinks. Sounds like a lot of things you can't eat if you are organic and healthy, doesn't it? Well, it's time we blew THAT mindset right out of the water!

Looks pretty fattening, right? WRONG!

I don't believe in diets. I don't believe in weighing your food and counting calories and depriving yourself of all the good things in life, just to lose a bit of body fat that will more than likely return the minute you start to eat "normally" again. Going organic and eating real food is not a diet, or a fad, or a quick fix to your fat loss issues. It's an entire mindset and lifestyle change. It's FOR LIFE. The fact that it has a sideline benefit of losing body fat is an added bonus, but it shouldn't be the only motivation or you probably will fall off the fruit box eventually.

I made a decision to start eating real, organic food about a year ago and it was just as winter started so I can vouch for winter being a good time to start the process;) I'd always considered myself to be very healthy up until then. As I mentioned in my first post, nutrition and health has always fascinated me. But, no matter how healthy I thought I was, my weight fluctuated and my stomach gave me grief a lot of the time. I was constantly on a learning curve and I loved learning but it was frustrating at times, knowing I wasn't quite getting it right!

WTF?!

Just over a year ago, a friend started mentioning organic and paleo eating to me. I knew nothing about all of that and so I decided to start researching it, as I do! I was astounded at how much information I found. It took me a few months to work my way through it and figure it all out for myself, but I began to realise just how wrong I had been for so long. There I was, dutifully cutting all the fat out of my diet, eating low fat this and fat free that, eating only egg whites, skinless chicken breasts, eating next to nothing, counting all my calories and I couldn't figure out why I wasn't getting it right.

Despite doing everything the "experts" told me to do, I still had to watch what I ate to avoid my body weight fluctuating too much and my stomach was still giving me grief despite me avoiding all the known aggravants.  I was also still catching every bug that came my way as well. I felt tired and unhealthy and permanently grumpy!

Blegh...

So basically, we have ascertained that I was NOT achieving my aim. It was time for a complete overhaul; a change in mindset and a change in lifestyle.

I'm not saying it was a fast process. I had spent the last 35 years of my life learning what to do and what not to do. Suddenly I felt like a child again because I had to start learning almost from scratch. 

Perhaps the hardest thing to get my head around was that I could eat fat! Now, most of us know that we need to eat some fat, like nuts and avocados and olive oil. But did you know your body also needs animal fat?

Altogether now... WHAAAAT?!

For decades, saturated fat has been utterly vilified. It's supposed to be the cause of obesity, heart disease, high cholesterol, it's been linked to cancer, it's a death sentence for diabetics and it's even been blamed for diabetes. It's pretty much to blame for EVERYTHING that humans have ever been afflicted with in the last 100 years. What's really interesting is that, in the last few decades, since scientists decided to blame all of these diseases on our saturated fat consumption, and told all of us to cut it out of our lives, all of those diseases have escalated to epic proportions. Even more interesting is that, while they were telling us to cut saturated fat out of our lives, they were telling us to start eating more grains, starches and vegetable oils. People started drinking skim milk and buying margarine by the truckload, instead of butter and yet they were still getting sick and gaining weight. It's no coincidence that heart disease has now become the number one killer, with cancer and diabetes running close seconds.

I'm going to blow your mind a bit now...

Saturated fat is NOT bad for you. In fact, it's ESSENTIAL for you. If you don't believe me, there is a lot of science behind it and if you are interested in the science, here is a great video that will give you all the stats. It's long and very thorough.

There is a BUT...

Unless you eat free range or organic saturated fat, you are not going to benefit from eating it. In fact, if you choose not to eat free range, it CAN be harmful. The reason why is because, animals that AREN'T allowed to range free and eat their natural food, are, quite literally, sick. These days, cattle are being fed huge piles of genetically modified grains because it's cheaper and it makes them grow big and fat so that they make the companies more money. They are also being injected with hormones to make them grow faster, and, because they are getting sick due to a shockingly bad diet, they are being pumped full of antibiotics. All of that bad stuff doesn't miraculously leave the cattle when they are slaughtered. So you end up with really poor quality meat full of hormones, antibiotics and disease from eating grain. Which means, if you have a grain intolerance, meat will not agree with you. Do I even need to spell out what the hormones and antibiotics are doing to you?

If the quality of your meat doesn't really bother you, how about what the poor cows go through? It's bad enough that their lives are going to be cut short so that we can have food on our table. Shouldn't we show our gratitude for such an amazing gift, by allowing them a happy, dignified short life? The same thing applies to every other animal who is kind enough to feed us.

Which life would YOU prefer? This?

Or this?

It's tough to get your head around isn't it? Eating fat... Boy did I struggle!

For christmas last year, I decided to roast a free range duck from Woolies and, because it was my first time ever, I had to turn to google to find out how to go about it! I had NO IDEA that a duck was so full of fat! Every method involved roasting it for many, many hours, poking it with a knife every few hours, to get rid of all the fat. By the time I was done, I had at least 1 cup full of duck fat, and a VERY small, skinny, crunchy duck. It didn't go very far on christmas day, needless to say!

2 months later, the cup of duck fat was still in my fridge... I knew I COULD eat it, but my mind just refused to allow it. I was SO brainwashed into believing it was bad for me. One day I finally broke through and I made myself a pot of popcorn using duck fat instead of oil. OH... MY... GREATNESS... It was the most delicious popcorn I have ever eaten! After that it wasn't hard to start cooking with it;)

These days I make my popcorn with raw farm butter or duck fat or even coconut oil, I cook things using all three as well. I (gasp) have butter on my banana bread! I drink a glass of full cream goat's milk every night (because I am lactose intolerant and can't digest cow's milk) I eat full cream goat's milk cheese, and full cream goat's milk yoghurt, DAILY. I eat egg yolks now too;) I never thought I'd see the day! I went about 15 years without eating butter and drinking milk! I honestly feel like I've died and gone to heaven;) And the interesting thing is, I have actually LOST body fat. I wasn't trying. That was just a side benefit of  going organic and free range AND eating fat again. I feel so energetic and healthy too; another side benefit.

So, back to why winter is a great time for a lifestyle change...

What could be better than a warm chicken curry full of delicious, healthy chicken fat, on a bed of brown rice, followed by a hot mug of organic hot chocolate sweetened with raw honey. (I'm not talking about the kind you get in a tin. I'm talking about a mug of organic hot milk with a chunk of dark chocolate melted into it. Have I got your attention now? How about a slice of warm banana bread smothered in a thick layer of butter? Still think you can't do this now?

That, my friends, is what eating real food is all about. It's about using all the real things that we were meant to eat, instead of going for the man-made, processed, canned and bottled rubbish that you find lining the shelves of all major grocery stores. The beauty of a lot of organic stuff is that it's actually not that hard to make yourself. So when they tell you how expensive it is, and how it's just "not do-able", don't believe it. I make my own yoghurt. It's so easy a child could do it. I make my own stock which I use to add flavour and goodness to all my stews, curries and soups. I grow my own vegetables. I save a fortune because I don't buy pre-packaged goods loaded with rubbish and, aside from saving money, our health has benefited.

This blog is going to be full of info to help you on your organic way, and it's going to include a lot of recipes and suggestions to save you money and make you healthier in the process. I get so excited just thinking about how much this will change your life for the better.

But that's enough for now. I'm off to make myself a mug of hot chocolate and eat a slice of my delicious homemade banana bread;)