“Friendly Correspondence” is a new, semi-regular feature on Making Love In The Kitchen. As you may know, we’re not afraid to ask questions of BIG food, pharma, and fundraising to get more basic details regarding ingredients, chemical levels, testing and where donations end up. Though I continually aim to have an open dialogue and invite interviews, they are becoming tougher for me to get. So I decided I would just start sharing the correspondence. If we can’t stand up for what we do, why are we doing it? I think it was over the summer of 2011 that Pop Chips made a splash in the “health” world, bathing themselves head to toe as healthy, when truth be told, if you looked at the ingredients they are a prime examples of healthwashing. Their marketing campaign was pretty freaking smart. So smart that they actually asked me to be a part of it, requesting my ambassadorship for the product. No dice, but there were MANY other nutritionist who sadly did take the bait. rocessed potato and pro-imflammatory, processed oils and salt. All those torula and yeast extracts are just other names for MSG- they have a super salty flavour so it allows food companies to claim a lower sodium value. And if I were to eat them, I would still loose my vision and my face would go numb for about an hour.
There is nothing wrong with popchips really. They’re a snack food. Junk food if you will. Just like baked lays, and cheddar popcorn. But they’re not healthy. Might I remind you that ‘healthier’ is not even close to being the same thing as ‘healthy’. A healthy snack is fruits and vegetables. Maybe some nuts. Perhaps a home-baked granola bar. When I think of a healthy snack- I think of something that actually offers health. Not something just isn’t as bad for me as something else. You know what I’m saying?
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Now this was an incredibly fun post to work on. I felt like I was going undercover. My guise was that of a cute, perky nutritionista, perhaps playing a little dumb. I came forth with the some harder hitting questions than Ms. Boyardee was expecting and her discomfort, even made me uncomfortable. This was my firsy venture into the exposing of HealthWashing from a straight forward approach. I truly believe brands and businesses need to do they’re work with integrity. There is simply none in trying to pass canned spaghetti with processed cheese and meat that gets zapped in a microwave. I haven’t been able to get anyone to agree to any interviews on film or recorded since this one- but not for a lack of trying. Wait till you see what I’m sharing about my correspondence with Pop Chips in the new year. Now that we’ve defined the dirtiness that is Healthwashing, it’s time we start addressing some of the viscous culprits. Back in May, I received a press release for a brand shiny new cook book by Anna Boiarde, granddaughter and niece to the brothers behind Chef Boyardee (they changed the spelling for phonetic reasons). I thought I should take the PR rep up on her offer and schedule an interview, that they agreed could be filmed. The PR rep claimed to love my website and all my recipes and when I arrived at the downtown hotel for the interview, she went to the trouble of lining up all these Chef Boyardee “foods” beside me.
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Sugar, my sweet coconut lovers, is a drug. A delicious one, but a drug all the same. We get hooked as kinder and we stay on the substance all the live long day- only until we grow old enough to add caffeine to the mix. Getting off processed or even natural sweeteners is one sweet challenge and those playing the Fab Uplift Detox are gonna win that game! With a little help of course.
Some argue that refined white sugar is the most addictive substance on this planet. You might even admit this yourself. You have a little, you want a little more and than you find yourself needing your daily fix, whether it be in your coffee or tea, soft drink, muffin, breakfast cereal, bread, pasta sauce, salad dressing, fruit juice or after dinner cookie. Sugar is in everything and we are consuming more than we think.
The average person now consumes roughly 135 pounds of sugar per year. Holy moly! A person’s weight in sugar? Hello obesity epidemic and hello cancer! Sugar is the number one fuel for those pesky cancer cells.
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Just when LA schools put a ban on flavoured milk, a Canadian chain of fitness centres, Goodlife Fitness has declared it their official recovery beverage.
Hey there Healthwashing, didn’t expect to see you here.
Their healthwashing claim is that that consumption of chocolate milk after physical exertion is excellent replenishment for muscles. What is needed for recovery is carbs and protein to boost muscle repair. Being high in water, they also state that chocolate milk provides hydration. Well so do a lot of things, um… like water? What one seems to be considering is the amount of sugar in chocolate milk. As soon as there is an insulin response in the body (caused by refined sugar intake) the body will switch into a fat storing mode.
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Posted in Disease Prevention, Happiness, Health, Holistic, Inspiration, Junk Food, Nutrition, Poison, Smart Choices, Wellness on Sep 28th, 2011
We all get them from time to time. They creep up on us and it’s all we can think about for the rest of the day. We get a bit cranky and feel like taking a snooze. We may even resort to digging deep in our pantries to see what we can come up with. I’m talking sugar cravings. We all know that when we get them they’re super beastly and relentless. We often find ourselves giving in just to stop that “need” we feel.
It’s okay to admit you give in. It’s not the end of the world, it just means we need to take a look at why they’re happening and what emotions we’re experiencing and nutrients we’re missing out on that are the driving factors. When we get down to it, stress is often the real culprit here. As Meghan has outlined this week, stress is a huge problem we face in our day-to-day lives. It seems to be especially prominent this time of year when our routines are changing, kids are off to school, and we have a million things on our to-do lists.
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When some people don’t want to consume hot dogs (and meat in general for that matter), they often turn to the vegetarian options. And what might these be? Veggie dogs! There are also veggie burgers, veggie deli meat, veggie turkey, veggie ground beef, veggie chicken pieces and the list goes on and on. From the looks of it, it seems that vegetarians have no problem replacing meat since there are so many options readily available for them. They can have some faux bacon for breakfast, followed by a mock salami sandwich for lunch, rounding things off with a chicken-less “chicken” stir fry for dinner. Oh, and don’t forget about soy pudding for dessert!
How easy was that? By consuming these fake meat items, vegans and vegetarians can pick up right where they left off with the real stuff. Can you tell yet that I’m joking?
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When some people don’t want to consume hot dogs (and meat in general for that matter), they often turn to the vegetarian options. And what might these be? Veggie dogs! There are also veggie burgers, veggie deli meat, veggie turkey, veggie ground beef, veggie chicken pieces and the list goes on and on. From the looks of it, it seems that vegetarians have no problem replacing meat since there are so many options readily available for them. They can have some faux bacon for breakfast, followed by a mock salami sandwich for lunch, rounding things off with a chicken-less “chicken” stir fry for dinner. Oh, and don’t forget about soy pudding for dessert!
How easy was that? By consuming these fake meat items, vegans and vegetarians can pick up right where they left off with the real stuff. Can you tell yet that I’m joking?
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With all the running around, vacationing, working, and other summer fun happening, many of us are finding it kind of tricky to plan our meals properly. Not having the typical routine set out for us, we often get home from our Summer frolicking h-u-n-g-r-y and not wanting to do much in the way of cooking.
The temptation to turn to foods of convenience may just lure us in. The ultimate in convenience foods- Ramen noodles.
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Now that we’ve defined the dirtiness that is Healthwashing, it’s time we start addressing some of the viscous culprits. Back in May, I received a press release for a brand shiny new cook book by Anna Boiarde, granddaughter and niece to the brothers behind Chef Boyardee (they changed the spelling for phonetic reasons). I thought I should take the PR rep up on her offer and schedule an interview, that they agreed could be filmed. The PR rep claimed to love my website and all my recipes and when I arrived at the downtown hotel for the interview, she went to the trouble of lining up all these Chef Boyardee “foods” beside me.
Anna’s book is truly beautiful and has some really delicious sounding, back to basics style Italian recipes. She claims to shop organic, feed her family well and from our interview, clearly has an appreciation for top quality ingredients.
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As a kid, I was a huge cereal lover. I ate it every morning before school and on most weekends. To make matters worse, while I was munching on my sugar nuggets, I would watch all those cute little cartoon commericals on TV advertising new varieites of these marshmallow-filled boxes of joy. Of course, I proceeded to do what any child high on ridiculous amounts of sugar would do – I ran around the house asking for the newest cereal concoction. My wish was always granted. The only catch was that I had to finish off the old box first. I never did though; the new box got opened up the morning after it was purchased. I was sneaky like that.
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Last week I discussed the mystery of the hot dog. We learned what it’s made from and realized that all it really amounts to is highly processed meat with a boat-load of preservatives. Not edible in the least! Today, we’re embarking on some new and equally frightening territory. Hold on tight.
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When I was growing up my parents made a deal: my mom prepared meals on weeknights and my dad was in charge of weekend dinners. Of course, this meant ordering take-out or going out to eat on Saturday nights, and grilling up hamburgers or hot dogs on Sunday nights. It was a routine my father could handle and every Sunday at around 5 pm or so, he would come find me and ask me if I wanted a “hut dog” or a hamburger. Yeah, that’s not a typo. For whatever reason he called them hut dogs and still does.
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Whoever said that food has no impact on disease (um… my gastroenterologist..) has clearly never fed popcorn to a person with digestive problems. Popcorn could put someone with IBD in the hospital and someone with IBS in the bathroom. Now, not only is popcorn chock full of fibre, but those sharp kernaly bits that rip apart your gums if you bight down funny, could also rip apart your insides if you are at all sensitive. The body actually lacks the enzyme necessary to fully digest that hard kernal bit. The best we can do is just chew really well.
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To celebrate Making Love In The Kitchen’s first birthday, the bestest posts of the last year are getting another turn in the spotlight. These were selected either because they had the most traffic or should have. While together we stroll down memory lane, I will be away on a farm with no computer! We’ll chat [...]
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Is it hard to travel and stay healthy? Yes. Yes it is. The best thing to do though is be prepared. I had this expectation that Ireland was going to be bread, beer and potatoes- so much so that I actually packed apples into my luggage. I didn’t need to have worried though. Healthy, fresh [...]
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