Lifetime Wellness Chiropractic

FATS and OILS

What most people call “vegetable oils” are really highly-processed seed oils, and they are terrible for our health. These polyunsaturated, highly-processed, and inflammatory Omega-6 oils are the mainstay of the prepared/processed/fast food industry because they can be manipulated and hydrogenated in the food labs. They turn to trans-fats when heated. Saturated fats can never become trans fats, and do not damage your body.

 

 

 

 

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SUGARS and STARCHES

Remember that most of the sugars consumed are hidden in prepared/processed/fast foods. The main culprit is High Fructose Corn Syrup ...another mainstay of the processed food industry, and the sugar most responsible for the obesity epidemic. This is NOT like simple cane sugar, and if you take your health seriously, removing it from your diet should be a non-negotiable.

 

There’s been a lot of well-earned negative press about HFCS, so it’s important to know that the FDA has made it legal to hide it by renaming it, so here’s a list of what it can be called now, because that's the game they're playing:

 

high-fructose corn syrup         corn sweetener            corn syrup                   natural corn syrup

corn syrup solids                       sugar syrup                  isolated fructose         malt syrup

glucose/fructose syrup            maize syrup                  tapioca syrup

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And starches? Unmitigated starches like white wheat and rice are just one small step from being sugars, so drastically reduce or eliminate them - and products containing them - from your diet.

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MEATS

Eating meat or not eating meat can be a personal, ethical choice, and I respect that. But please understand that whether it was gazelle on the steppes of equatorial Africa or a wooly mammoth north of the Arctic Circle, humans have been eating grass-eating animals since we began to walk upright and make fire. So, contrary to what some believe, we are true omnivores and our digestive tract has evolved so that we can eat plants, meat, and fish.

 

Unfortunately, the mechanization of food production in our world has literally changed the quality of the meats we eat, so care should be taken as to what kind of meats and fish you eat. Avoid commercial-level corn fed meats and eggs, farmed fish, and deli meats.

 

                       My rules are simple - (ORGANIC always):

                       Grass-fed beef

                       True pastured eggs

                       Free-range chicken

                       Wild-caught fish

                       Natural, pasture-grazed pork and lamb

                       Wild game like bison, boar, elk

 

A big rule is to never consume cured meats that are made with added Sodium Nitrate or Sodium Nitrite  ...ever! I cannot stress this enough. Look for natural products that list celery and/or beet juice in the processing. 

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DAIRY

Commercial, pasteurized milk is not fit for human consumption. It’s a dead food, and I do not recommend it. Raw dairy - hard to find - is better. Butter, cheese, yogurt, kefir, and buttermilk are cultured dairy, and should be sourced from raw, grass-fed, non-GMO feed cows whenever possible. But even if it's pasteurized, the introduction of cultures in these products make them an acceptable food you can digest. And don't waste time with "low-fat/no-fat" versions. WE NEED THOSE FATS! Go red label on all your dairy. 

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RAW FOODS

About 1/3rd of your daily dietary intake should be raw foods. Raw food is living food ...and all the digestive enzymes are dying (literally) to meet up with your metabolic enzymes to have a health party inside you!! Plus, the fiber present in raw foods helps clean your digestive tract like a broom! My favorites are: 

 

NUTS: walnuts, almonds & pecans (not roasted and salted)

FRUITS: apples, bananas, pears, berries, grapes, citrus, seasonal stone fruits

VEGGIES: celery, carrots, radishes, avocados, onions, greens

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All those listed above are great between-meal snack foods.

And with fruits, they come in their own packaging ...their skin!

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Be aware that raw foods must be warmed up in your tummy to be digested, and that extra energy expenditure can make you drowsy. So if you're doing a salad at lunch, get it with some cooked side -- like whole-grain rice, some chicken, etc.

 

SOY'TAINLEY NOT

Soy is the food industry's lil' bitch. 

 

I'm not talking about edamame, soy sauce, or tofu. I'm talking about the hidden soy in processed foods put there just to boost their protein content so they'll sell better. But, in food terms, what the industry calls "soy" isn't a cute bean growing in a field ...it's the left-over protein solids that are removed in the process of producing oil from soybeans.

 

Using extreme heat and carcinogenic chemicals like hexane, they remove solids and bleach the oil, creating one that is odorless, colorless, and so devoid of any organic material that it will not spoil. This soy oil makes an excellent industrial lubricant, which is why it was produced in the first place. The separated solids were considered useless waste, and were thrown away.

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Sometime in the "natural food" explosion of the '70's, soy producers jumped on the now debunked, "all plant-based oils are healthy, but butter will kill you" train, and decided to sell their industrial-strength stuff as a food oil. Because it's cheap and it lasts forever, it quickly became the go-to oil for the processed food industry. 

 

Soon after, they started processing the solids for their proteins, particularly lecithin, a potent emulsifier (which means it can blend a water-based molecule with a fat-based one) which was the holy grail for the molecular food junk science nerds, so it ended up in everything! 

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But here's the problem: Soy oil processing was never meant to pass any consumer food safety tests, and never did.  And they still process it the same way, but now humans consume it. Add to that the fact that, even in it's natural state, soy is a bitch! It's so high in phytic acid - which demineralizes bone and leads to osteoporosis - that animals don't eat it in the wild.  

 

To add insult to injury, geneticists have confirmed that there in no more soy left that is not contaminated by GMO crops.  And it can weaken your hip joints to the point of fracture.  The Bottom Line: pass on soy. 

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IT’S NOT FOOD IF IT’S COOKED BY A CORPORATION 

There’s no need to memorize this list when all you need to do is to eliminate all the processed, packaged, pre-made, and fast foods in your diet ...you do that, and you’ll put a big dent in your intake of unnecessary sugars and starches, and tons of other crap, too.

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“Simply by starting to cook again, you declare your independence from the culture of fast food. As soon as you cook, you start thinking about ingredients. You start thinking about plants and animals and not the microwave. And you will find that your diet, just by that one simple act, is greatly improved.” - Michael Pollan