Are you Trapped by Treats?
Since I am not a big Super bowl fan (sorry about that for those who are) I went to the grocery store to pick up a few items and then to rent a movie.
I was BOMBARDED with processed food the moment I walked in to the store- Super Bowl cakes with multiple ingredients and colored frostings, packaged processed cookies and crackers at sale prices too good to pass up. Huge bags of popcorn and chips at the end of most aisles along with mega liter bottles of soda and cases of beer.
A few minutes later I was at Blockbuster trying to find a movie. You’d have to be blind not to run into the supersize boxes of candy, bags of caramel popcorn and multiple combinations to try and ?create? an enjoyable movie experience with snacks galore.
As I was walking out of each these stores I couldn’t help but think “why isn’t America more overweight than it is?” I feel like I’m expanding just by walking by all this “food.”
This past week Michael Pollen was a guest on Oprah and stated:
“The American diet is a catastrophe. We don’t have a health care crisis. We have a food crisis. 75% of our health care costs are spent on chronic disease linked to the diet and that is bankrupting us.”
How do you navigate the waters of packaged, processed fake foods with multiple ingredients and keep yourself healthy?
- Keep it simple:Â Â shop at farmer’s markets and purchase as much of your food as you can – fruits, veggies, eggs, pastured chicken and grass-fed meat
- Less than 5:Â if you buy a food in a package make sure it has less than 5 ingredients and doesn’t have anything you can’t recognize or pronounce.
- Ask your body:Â after eating a food does it make you feel satisfied, nourished and healthy? Or do you find yourself craving more food, sleepy, bloated and moody.
Our food supply is complicated and layered and figuring out how and what to consume is not easy. However, having some forethought before entering a store is a start. Buying more of your food at farmer’s markets is controlling your environment so you are NOT trapped by food treats. Treat your body to real whole food so you can enjoy the day after Super bowl Sunday and not become a statistic of the health care crisis. Just because something looks tasty at a great price is not always the smartest and best treat for you.
February 7, 2011 @ 2:40 pm
Susan,
When I give my presentations about the American food system, I use "my" Main Street as the example. Of course, my Main Street is the same as all American's Main Street.
So, the icing on the cake: Three CVS pharmacies within a mile of each other. When you walk in the CVS store it's difficult to determine if you have entered a candy store or a drug store.
Yep, we gots a problem.
Ken Leebow
http://www.HighSatiety.net