Connections to Health - In Defence of Food

THE ISHTA HOLISTIC HEALTH CENTRE

CONNECTIONS to HEALTH

Struggling to lose weight?

Have you been struggling to loose weight following the Christmas binge?

It might just be down to the fact that you are not eating 'real' food but are eating what would have been termed at the beginning of the 20th century a food substitute.

I have been reading the fascinating book 'In Defence of Food' by Michael Pollan.
In this book he explains the change in our diet from eating mainly leaves supplemented with grains, meat and fish to eating mainly grains, meat and foods that include a whole range of artificial chemicals and nutrients, and those derived from corn and soya beans.

In the book Michael is spending time looking at how and why we have got to the stage we are at, where what a lot of us eat isn't real food at all, but imitation food! He links the increase in weight in the American culture to the relabelling of this 'imitation' food in the 1960's; and I think the same applies here in the UK.

In 1938 in America the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act imposed rules requiring that the word "imitation" appear on any food product that was, well, an imitation.

The rationale behind the "imitation rule" seems to be one of common sense and states… "There are certain traditional foods that everyone knows, such as bread, milk and cheese and that when consumers buy these foods, they should get these foods they are expecting… (and) if a food resembles a standardized food but does not comply with the standard, that food must be labelled as an imitation."

For example margarine was labelled imitation butter.

This was great for the consumer because they were aware of when they were eating something that wasn't 'real'. However this was obviously bad for the food manufacturer as they had to come clean about a product having been tampered with.

The 1970's

Sadly, that's when things began to change for the worst. In 1973 again in America, the food industry succeeded in getting the "imitation rule" overturned. This was nectar for the food industry as they didn't have to admit to the adulteration of food and to the production of inferior food-like products.

But this has made a huge impact on the whole of society in the West.

This small change in the law, which went largely unnoticed by the public, has led to most of the population of the West eating little more than nutrient-rich science experiments!

I remember when bread used to be made from flour, yeast, sugar and water and a pinch of salt, but if you look at a packet of bread in the supermarket now it contains a whole range of ingredients and nutrients including, wheat gluten, corn syrup, soya bean flour, vitamins, vegetable oils, emulsifiers, and maybe a dough conditioner.

All these to make a loaf of bread!

All theses changes and additions just to make a loaf of bread cheaper with a longer shelf life.

What's gone wrong?

A lot of pre-packed food, sadly these days this is also including such staples as milk, are being nutritionised, made with inferior ingredients and made to last longer and having nutrients re-added to them. The problem with this is apart from the ingredients that are alien to our bodies (and a lot of these provide empty calories, such as sweeteners and fats from corn and soya beans) is the fact that nutrients do not act in isolation. For example, folic acid which is added to just about everything, doesn't have the same benefits in supplements or when used to enrich a food as it does when eating whole grains. This is because nutrients do not work in isolation they work in synergy with other nutrients.

A whole food is more than its nutrient make-up.

To conclude the book, and in keeping with our own feelings, Michael recommends going back to real food. That means food your grandmother or even your great-grandmother would have recognised. He suggests eating a lot more greens and fruit and have meat and carbohydrates in moderation and going back to old fashioned cooking, a bit like Jamie Oliver and other celebrity chefs.

People eat these imitation foods because they cost less and take less time to prepare and clean up afterwards. How often would you eat chips if you had to peel, clean and cook them yourselves- and then clean up the mess after?

Rise in obesity.

A group of Harvard economists trying to understand the huge increase in obesity have correlated a link between a decline in the 'time cost' of eating, which to you and me means how much time do you spend cooking and cleaning and so on when preparing a meal. They have concluded that this amount of time has reduced enormously with the increased availability of cheap convenience foods.

The simple answer is to cook more

Where is the time going to come from? Most of us spend time on the internet and for some that is up to a couple of hours per day, this also means spending money on internet services. Why not divert some of this time and money on an area of your life that will pay dividends in energy and health?

It's a question of where your priories lie.

Why are you not shifting that weight? Maybe you are eating these convenience foods containing these empty calories and ingredients that don't agree with you. You are letting a scientist some where dictate what nutrients you need, who probably doesn't appreciate the complexity of the body. Maybe you are not willing to spend the time preparing a simple delicious meal for yourself?

It's all a matter of priorities.

To gain a better understanding of why we are being offered these alternatives to real food and the history behind it read Michael Pollans' book.

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