Monthly Archives: March 2009

Slaughtering in BC: Information You Need to Know

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A video Where is the Meat was forwarded to me from Big Bear Ranch. The video was produced by Wendy Aasen and Pamela Tudge. Pamela Tudge is doing a masters degree at UBC Okanagan at the Center for Social, Spatial and Economic Justice which is part of Community, Culture and Global Studies. If you would like to read Pamela Tudge’s blog go to: okanaganfood.blogspot.com.

New slaughtering rules in BC are a serious issue for anyone interested in local food produced in a traditional manner. The government has implemented these rules to make the food supply “safer”. Of course, if more rules made the food supply safer we would not have had 20 people die from Listeriosis last year from Maple Leaf Foods’ contaminated processed meats. If a big, heavily regulated corporation like Maple Leaf Foods can have such a big problem, more rules won’t make us safer. For an update on the Listeriosis outbreak read: Up to 10,000 Could File Claims.

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Eating Local Challenges: Part II

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Even though I’m crazy about local food, there are some exotic foods I do not want to give up. Eating local foods may be a great idea for most of our meals, but exotic foods and specialty ingredients add a wonderful foreign element to cooking. It would be a sad day to lose these foods forever. Enjoy local foods and supplement with exotic ingredients. Feel good about all the nutritious homemade meals you’re making for your family.

These are my favorite exotic foods I would not like to give up: lemons, limes, bananas, avocados, olives, spices, cocoa nibs, vanilla, quality sea/mineral salts, coconut oil, coconut cream, extra virgin olive oil, cod liver oil, butter oil, raw butter, wild fish, wild shellfish, wild mushrooms, green tea, coffee, dates, currents, dried coconut, almonds, and pecans.

These are exotic foods I enjoy occasionally: papayas, pineapples, oranges, mangos, grapes, coconuts, Brazil nuts, sesame seeds, specialty oils, specialty vinegars, exotic raw cheeses, and exotic liquors.

Many people are worried about their carbon footprint and want to reduce their personal weight on the environment. This is a noble cause. I believe it is important to save your health first and the planet will take care of itself. I don’t want people to try to live an ideal that ends up making them sick, unable to have healthy children, or go hungry because of inexperience with planning. Have fun and don’t be zealous.

Eating Local Challenges: Part I

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There are a number of eating local challenges. One is called the 100 Mile Thanksgiving which challenges people to eat a local Thanksgiving dinner. The 100 Mile Diet is a more permanent change towards local eating.

I have mixed feelings about this movement. On one side, eating local is a great idea. Challenging your family to local eating for a period of time can be a great learning experience for the modern industrial eater. It allows the family to learn how dependent we have become on imported foods from around the world. Eating local for a period of time helps the family to find all of the great local food sources. This can be a fun experience.

But in the hands of a zealous person, local eating can be expensive and unnecessarily restrictive. It could make people feel guilty if they cannot live up to some high artificial restriction. Some people might quit in frustration while others “cheat” on the program and feel “bad” about not living up to some ideal. At worst, it can turn human tragedy into some kind of game. It makes “fun” of the real poverty and starvation faced by a billion people on our planet that must eat locally or die trying.

If you like to watch this type of program, which dramatizes the human condition though the distorted lens of reality TV, I have a link for you. Here is a commercial for a show coming soon to a TV near you: 100 Mile Diet in Mission, BC.

If you decide to do your own local food challenge and want to avoid these common pit falls, a good “acid test” might be a simple question. Are you having fun and learning something about yourself or are you feeling pressured and frustrated? Don’t let our society’s distorted ideals of achievement destroy a good idea.

Update April 26, 2009: Path to Freedom has announced a new challenge called the 100 Foot Diet. The idea is to eat from your property. For more information and tips about growing your own food go to: 100 Foot Diet Challenge. I can dig it!
In our society, growing food yourself has become the most radical of acts. It is truly the only effective protest, one that can – and will – overturn the corporate powers that be. By the process of directly working in harmony with nature, we do the one thing most essential to change the would – we change ourselves.
Jules Dervaes

The Dirty Dozen: Strategies for Avoiding Pesticides

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I just received a very useful list from Big Bear Ranch. This list is to help the family shopper to avoid the vegetables and fruits with the most pesticide residues. This list is especially important for pregnant or breastfeeding woman and small children. This list is developed and updated by the Environmental Workers Group.

I heard this list called The Dirty Dozen. The idea is to avoid the “dirtiest” twelve foods at the bottom of the list. If it is in the budget, purchase organic or biodynamic foods to replace these contaminated foods. In this way, your family will avoid about 80 percent of pesticide residues. The list has the ironic name of Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides.

Weston A Price Foundation Shopping Guide for Canada

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The Toronto WAPF Chapter is working on the 2009 update for the WAPF Shopping Guide for Canada. The Shopping Guide has guidelines to help families make better quality food choices. The guide has a list of categories of common foods. Each food is sub-categorized as: best choices, good choices and avoid.

Each sub-category has a selection of producers which can ship throughout Canada. These producers are not listed below but will be in the 2009 Shopping Guide. This list is updated yearly. Feel free to comment or add a favourite producer to the list. Please submit to: Ann Denny at canadawapfguide(a)gmail.com or Patricia Meyer Watt at 416.653.7112.

Some of the healthiest foods are unavailable in stores. Clean raw milk from pastured cows is difficult to get in Canada. Your local farm may be the only source for humanely raised animal products, pastured poultry and eggs, and organic or biodynamic vegetables. For this reason, many people are joining together to support local farmers engaging in traditional methods of agriculture. This is known as Community Supported Agriculture (CSA).

Below is a selection of foods listed in the guide. Some of the healthiest foods on this list may be impossible to find in stores. In some cases it will be necessary to make these foods in your kitchen. As demand for these foods increase, local producers and processors will fill the need.

As you go through the list, you will see that the WAPF does not like industry processed foods. They prefer pastured animals because the fat and protein will be healthier than a confinement animal. They consider traditional food preparation methods to be healthiest. These methods include: fermenting, soaking, sprouting and souring of difficult to digest foods. They also want grain products to be made with freshly ground grains to avoid production of rancid end products. Finally, trans fatty acids, modern vegetable oils and new fangled fats are to be totally avoided. The full guide will be out soon. I will keep everyone posted.

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Supplements or Superfoods: A Personal Story

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Past:
I first started taking the standard synthetic multivitamins found in most drug and grocery stores. I took these standard preparations for most of my life. I felt that these vitamins were “insurance” against my less than ideal diet. As for my diet, I was a vegetarian for six years. But most of my life, I consumed the Standard American Diet (SAD) with a low fat focus.

In 2001, I fell sick after the birth of my first child. I tried all the normal medications recommended by the medical profession. These drugs helped with symptoms of my disorder but never seemed to treat the root cause. I started thinking about diet and nutrition. I upgraded my multivitamins to the kind found in health food stores.

In 2003, after the birth of my second child, I went on Weight Watchers. The diet is an eat anything you want but be low fat program. I lost over 40 pounds on Weight Watchers. I was still on all my medications. I frequently got sick and I was extremely tired all the time. I was taking a standard multivitamin found in health food stores.

In 2004, I decided to update my multivitamin supplements. I chose the “best supplements in the world” produced by Life Extension Foundation. They have an extensive program which focuses on longevity and using nutraceuticals for treatment of common chronic disorders. If you would like to see Life Extension’s program read: Top 10 Steps for Achieving Ultimate Health. I did most of this program which is not cheap. I was spending about $2500 a year or $6.85 a day on supplements. I used their program for about three years.

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Seedy Saturday Gardening Event

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Seedy Saturday is an event sponsored by Friends of the New Victory Garden and Master Gardeners. There will be a seed exchange and gardening workshops. Bring your saved seeds or leftover packaged seeds. If you do not have any seeds, don’t worry. There are plenty available for everyone!

Date: Saturday, March, 21, 2009
Where: Kamloops Heritage House, 100 Lorne St, Kamloops
Time: 11:30am to 4:00pm
Cost: free, but a donation to the Kamloops Food Bank is greatly appreciated
Contact: Fawn Knox: 250.579.5768

Specific Carbohydrate Diet: A Personal Story

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I became very sick after the birth of my first child. My childhood asthma and allergies came back with a vengeance. I developed chronic sinus infections. I did course after course of antibiotics only to become sick again with new infections. I was taking very high doses of corticosteriods daily without much improvement in my condition. All these new medications I added to my anti-convulsion medication for epilepsy. I started having problems with yeast infections. The doctors said this sometimes happens taking corticosteriods. So, I had to decide which was more important, breathing or itching. More drugs were needed.

My doctor told me that if I lost some weight my asthma would likely get better. I joined Weight Watchers and lost over 40 pounds. I did so well on the program, I became a leader, and worked for Weight Watchers for a year. Everyone thought I looked great. My doctor even gave me a big hug after losing all that weight. But I was still on all the medications, coughing all night long, tired all day long, and starting to wonder if I would be alive to see my children become adults.

We made the painful decision to leave Victoria, BC for a dryer climate. We sold our house and started looking for another place to live. During this time of desperation, I paid to see a doctor who specialized in peak performance. He talked to me for about three hours, ordered a ton of blood tests, and offered me a book to read. The book was Breaking the Vicious Cycle by Elaine Gottschall. I read the book that night. Something written in the book resonated with me on a very deep level. I started the diet, and within three days was feeling better. It was like a fog lifting from my mind. I didn’t even know my thinking was foggy before changing my diet.

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Kamloops 1st Annual 100 Mile Style Food Fair

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I just got an email from a member at the Kamloops Urban Hen Movement about an upcoming event in Kamloops. It is sponsored by the Aboriginal Agricultural Education Society of British Columbia. There will be a tradeshow and workshop. The tradeshow will feature local farmers, processors, and other local food groups. There will be a change to purchase some local grassfed beef for lunch.

Some highlights of the workshop are:
Dr John Church from Thompson Rivers University will speak on: Producing the Best Beef
Master Gardeners will speak on: How to Start your First Garden
Ellen Duncan, a dietitian from the Q’wentsin Health Society, will speak on: Healing our Food

Date: Thursday, March 26, 2009
Where: The Henry Grube Center
Time: 10:00am to 6:00pm
Cost: admission by donation

Supplements or Superfoods

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In our fast paced world, eating nutritious food can seem impossible. The medical profession will often recommend a daily vitamin and mineral supplement as “insurance” against poor eating habits. It seems so easy to just take a pill a day, and forget about the whole problem. When a person starts thinking like this, it’s not much of a leap to believe that taking extra supplements will protect against a really poor diet. But how well does this practice really work? If you would like to learn more about the Nutraceutical Industry read Dietary Supplements: What the Industry does not want you to Know by Dr. Ron Schmid.

The Weston A Price Foundation believes we should get all of our nutritional needs met by whole foods in a nutrient dense diet. Looking at the quality of our diet, and the quality of the food sources within our diet, should always be a first step.

The Weston A Price Foundation is not big on supplements unless you’re under the care of a health professional. But the use of food based supplements, known as super-foods, is supported.

If you are looking at supplementation, start with a high quality diet of unprocessed whole foods from a quality local source. Then, if you are looking for “insurance” consider a program of super-foods. Weston A Price Foundation has a standard supplement guideline for healthy people eating a nutrient dense diet:
1. fermented cod liver oil and/or fermented skate liver oil
2. high vitamin butter oil
3. variety of super-foods depending on personal needs (Here is Sally Fallon’s Guide to Superfoods.)

If you would like to read some essays on this simple program please read the following essays:
1. Cod Liver Oil
2. Guide to Superfoods
3. Vitamin A Knavery