Food. It’s Not What it Used to Be

Much has changed over the years. We’ve gone from horses to cars, typewriters
 to computers. Many people don’t realize that food has changed as well. Unlike typewriters and computers, which look different, our foods look very much the
same as they did decades and centuries ago. Even though food looks the same, its composition can be very different. For example, grass-fed beef has a different nutrient profile than corn-fed beef. How food is raised makes a difference in its nutritional value and changes the benefit to your body when you eat it.

We’ve changed how food is raised or grown

We have changed what livestock eat and inject them with hormones and antibiotics. When animals eat foods that are not natural to them, it changes the nutritional makeup of their tissues. For example, grass-fed beef has far more omega fatty acids than does corn-
fed beef. In addition, when animals are given growth hormones, there are residues that are present in the end product you are eating, whether it’s meat or milk. Then to make it worse, the animals get sick very easily when not eating a natural diet. They are injected with antibiotics so that they survive until they are ready for slaughter. Does this sound like a healthy animal you’d like to eat? Animals that are fed properly don’t need antibiotics and will have great nutritional value as they were designed to have.

We change food after it’s grown through processing

We also change food after it’s grown through various methods of food processing. Some food processing removes nutrients in order to increase shelf life. Typically, fatty acids
are removed because they become rancid quickly when exposed to air. This type of processing is typically done to grains which naturally contain omega fatty acids in the germ. Not only is nutrition removed, food is also bleached and deodorized. Does this sound like a healthy food you’d like to be eating?

We’ve changed the genetic makeup

Not only have we removed nutrition and changed food after it’s been grown and harvested, scientists have long been genetically modifying food (GMO) before it’s planted and grown. As if God didn’t design our food correctly in the first place, we think we can do it better. In the case of genetic modification, the changes are often for convenience in growing. For example, making crops immune to certain herbicides or pesticides so they won’t die when the chemical is applied. Some seeds are actually registered and classified as a pesticide with the FDA because they contain insect repellent chemicals within the seed itself. Do you really want to eat a food registered as a pesticide!

We’ve changed food, so what?

We’ve seen how food has been changed, now let’s look at how that affects our bodies. When nutrition isn’t present because of how an animal or plant is raised, or if nutrients have been processed out of the food, this limits the nutrition you are getting. Nutritional deficiency is the prime reason our bodies aren’t preventing and healing disease as they were meant to.

For example, one of the main nutrients we are not getting in the quantity we need is omega fatty acids. This nutrient is lacking in meat because of how it’s raised and it’s being processed out of grain based foods. When we don’t get the omega 6 and 3 fatty acids we need, our health can suffer in many ways. Omega fats are responsible for healthy cellular structure, brain health and vascular health. Just this one important nutrient missing from foods has changed the health of our country immensely. Consider the minerals and other nutrients we are missing and it’s no wonder we are in such poor health. The important thing to remember is that our food quality is not what it used to be, and we need to take a couple of steps to ensure we are properly nourishing our bodies.

Have you noticed how many people have developed food allergies just in the last two decades? In the 1970s and 1980s food allergies were few and far between. How could this
change so quickly? Allergies are simply inflammation from your body rejecting
a substance within. Would it make sense that your body would reject foreign proteins introduced from GMO foods or hormone and pesticide residues? Oftentimes, people with allergies can switch to organic foods not containing these substances and they are not allergic to the organic counterpart.

Dangers of food modification

Gluten allergies are a good example of what happens when we mess with food’s design. Wheat today has been modified to the point that it produces far more gluten than ever before. Many people can’t tolerate the gluten levels and have to avoid it all together. GMOs also introduce foreign proteins that many people are allergic to. Peanuts, corn and soy are examples.

Digestive diseases are another example of the danger of
modifying food. More and more foods are being pasteurized
to kill bacteria. Foods were created with bacteria for a
reason - our stomachs need it. We eat lots of dead food
today because processing kills the live cultures we need to have a healthy digestive system. Milk is a great example of this. The healthy bacteria in raw milk is killed through pasteurization, and we are left with a beverage that is much less nutritious.

Food quality is extremely important. Virtually all major diseases can be prevented, improved or eliminated if we put clean, whole foods into our bodies. Eating food as it was designed works with your body, not against it. Unfortunately, our food system is so broken it’s very difficult, inconvenient and expensive to eat a completely clean diet. Many people simply can’t afford it and, sadly, the ones who can often don’t want the inconvenience of finding and preparing good food. This is why Healthy for Life U exists. We offer simple and convenient strategies for you to get the nutrition you need!

How to determine good quality food

Now that we’ve established shortcomings in commonly available food, let’s look at how to find good quality food.

In general, you want to find foods that have not been changed by people (often called whole foods). These would be fruits, vegetables, meats, most dairy, eggs, nuts and unprocessed freshly-ground grains.

When it comes to animal protein, you want to find meats, poultry and fish that came from an environment that allowed them to eat what is natural to their diet and where they didn’t receive hormones or antibiotics. You’ve probably heard of terms like free range, grass-fed or organic. These are the terms used to describe such an environment. Grass-fed usually refers to beef. Free range or cage-free refers to poultry. These terms are sometimes used loosely, so use caution and read labels or ask the producer for more information. If a meat is certified organic that means it wasn’t raised with antibiotics or hormones, but it doesn’t mean it was grass-fed. This means it doesn’t have the bad stuff in it, but it isn’t going to be as nutritious as grass-fed meats are.

The majority of fruits and vegetables are grown with pesticide sprays, and many are also grown using herbicides as well. The easiest way to avoid this is to buy organic produce or buy from a local farmer who can tell you how the food is grown.

When you are determining what foods to eat, simply ask what has been added, removed or modified.

If the answer is nothing, the food should be good; the more that’s been changed, the worse the food.

Can you believe this?

The average American household used to spend an average of 15-17% of their household income on food and only 3-5% on healthcare. Currently the average American spends only 5-8% of their household income on food and 15-20% on healthcare. Creating processed “cheap” food has actually proved to be more costly when you consider the healthcare cost, not to mention the lower quality of life.

Benefits of whole food

Eating whole foods will make a huge difference in your health and how you feel. When your body begins to get the full spectrum of nutrients it needs, you will experience more energy, a stronger immune system (less sickness), stronger nails, softer hair and you will just plain feel better!

Is clean eating possible in the real world?

The short answer is yes. It is entirely possible to eat clean foods and provide your body with the nutrients it needs. In reality, most people won’t keep up with it long term. People are all about convenience and the additional effort and expense needed to obtain good quality foods and prepare them is often more than most people will keep up with long-term. What we recommend is a hybrid solution that is easy to do long-term. The hybrid solution is to buy organic for products that contain higher amounts of fat and conventional for products that contain low or no fat. The reason for this is that typically hormone residues or other toxins are stored in the fat cells of animals. Using organic products for foods that are higher in fat will assure you that the fat is clean and doesn’t contain the toxins you want to avoid. Examples of foods to buy organically are: milk, cheese, butter and non-lean meat such as rib-eye, bacon or 60-80% lean ground beef. Some of the conventional products you buy will be lacking in nutritional value, but much less expensive and easier to find. In order to make up for the missing nutrients, we also recommend supplementing the missing minerals and omega oils missing from foods.

Check out Healthy for Life omega 3-6-9 and Mineral Supplement if you are looking for a top quality nutrition program. http://www.healthyforlifeusa.com/products/packages/

Fish oil or Plant Oil?

We know that our bodies need fat, Fat is vital for healthy eyes, heart, liver, kidneys, cells, hormones, immune system and more. Fats can come from various meats, poultry, fish, nuts and seeds. Often in our diet we aren't getting the healthy fats we need. Specifically, we often aren't getting enough omega 3 and omega 6. The reason for this is pretty simple, it's due to the way our food is raised and processed. Animals are often given feed with grains rather than being allow to eat grass from a pasture. Processing damages the oils rendering them useless and sometimes damaging to your body.

This is why supplementing omega 3 and omega 6 is a good idea, to insure you are getting the fats that your body requires. So the next questions is what product to supplement? There are literally thousands of omega supplements on the market. Currently the focus is largely on omega 3, specifically EPA and DHA. These are the omega 3 derivatives that are found in fish oil. Much attention is given to these derivatives, mainly because the fish oil industry has spent tons of money commissioning research to be done on the benefits of these fats. It is true that we need these derivatives, however, the body doesn't need a lot of them. Studies show that we need 5% or less of the omegas in derivative form, and 95% in the parent form.

So what is the parent form? Parent omega 3 and parent omega 6 are technically Alpha Linoleic Acid (ALA) and Linoleic Acid (LA). These are the most basic forms of the omega series fats. Your body can take these fats and break them down into related substances, also called derivatives. It's important to note that your body can not use a derivative fat and create the parent fat. Since your body needs around 95% parent fats, it doesn't make sense to focus on supplementing a derivative oil, like EPA and DHA, as the primary supplement. It's ok if EPA and DHA are added to the supplement, but many of the fish oil supplements are primarily EPA and DHA. The way to tell is to simply read the ingredient list. If the main ingredients are fish oil, then the supplement is primarily derivatives.

Another reason to avoid fish oil is quality. The best fish aren't going to be ground up and pressed for supplement oil, they are sent to markets and restaurants to be sold for top dollar. Fish used for supplements are lower quality fish or farmed raised fish. Krill is also commonly used for supplement oil. When is the last time you can recall humans eating krill? The tiny little creatures are usually eaten by whales. When choosing supplements, remember to keep in mind step 4 in the Healthy for Life U
plan. That is to use common sense and compare it to the past before all of the processing and mass production. Why aren't we getting the nutrient today, and how would we have gotten it before? We already discussed why we aren't getting it, and where people used to get it would have been from meats or seeds. Now you might ask, what about people groups who live by the ocean and eat lots of fish. Eating fish is great, when you get the oil from the fish you are getting in it a good proportion. Fish oil supplements are mega-dosing on the derivatives, giving you much more than you would get even eating fish three times per day. Those people are also eating other foods to get the parent omegas.

Plant based omega supplements are the best option and contain parent oils. When offered as organic, they are the most pure, quality oils available. Flax oil is the primary plant oil containing omega 3. Evening primrose, sunflower, safflower (linoleic varieties), pumpkin and borage are the primary seeds that contain omega 6 fats. A few of these have omega 3 in them also, but it's minimal compared to the omega 6. The best supplements for omega oils will have between 2 to 1 and 3 to 1 for the ratio between omega 6 and 3. Your body needs much more omega 6 than three.

Some will say we get plenty of omega 6 from our diets, the fact of the matter is that it's mostly processed and adulterated, meaning our body can't use it. Also the American Heart Association encouraged the use of omega 6 in the article Omega-6 Fatty Acids and Risk for Cardiovascular Disease. They even warned against the use of omega 3 without omega 6. This, however, is off the topic for this post, we'll discuss that in another post, for today we'll just leave it at that :)

For a great organic omega product formulated in the correct ratio, visit http://www.healthyforlifeusa.com/products/omega/