What’s in our food?!?!?…

This blog post might be a little controversial to some of you, my friends and family.  However, it’s a topic that is very important to me, so that’s why I’m writing about it today.  I bet everyone who reads this has known someone whose life has been affected by cancer.  I know my life has been.  Cancer took my Dad from me way too early.  

This is a picture of my Dad the day that Andrew and I got married in my parent's hallway so that he could be there.  He died on week later.  He was 55 yrs old.  


When Dad got sick, we heard of about five other families who were dealing with a loved one who either just recently died or were dying of cancer.  People would hear that my Dad was sick with it and relate their story about someone they knew who had it.  Cancer is on the rise.  I started looking at why.  I read on the internet about how pesticide use on vegetable crops is more prevalent in order to have larger crops that don’t have spots on them.  Preservatives in our food are common practice.  Pop consumption is huge.  Cola contains caramel that has been produced in a way that makes it cancer causing.  The animal product food that people eat, that is sold at grocery stores, is pumped full of antibiotics and growth hormones.  We are poisoning ourselves in the attempt to nourish our bodies.  Most people don’t even know what the preservatives or pesticides do to us.  Some people do, but because of their busy lifestyle, have accepted it as how it has to be as they purchase premade products. 
How many people do you know that make their own jam with handpicked fruit and berries anymore? Not many.  It’s very easy to do.  But the culture and knowledge of doing that for your family has been lost over the generations.  Do people can their own spaghetti sauce or salsa or make their own pickles?  I know more people who do that, but many of us just go to the grocery store and grab a bottle because they have made them in some cases more affordable than making your own.  I’m not worried about saving money.  I’m worried about something else.  My family’s lives. 
The old arts are dying.  We don’t make our own soap anymore… or lotion.  I was told the other day from a girl who sells products to salons that the most organic a lotion could be is 70%... They have to put some preservatives in it or it will rot.  WOW!!  Are you kidding me?  It’s advertised as organic.  I trust that there are no harmful preservatives in it.  And yet, there are.  Why bother?  So we have a lesser of two evils. 
Why has society gone this way?  When we go to the grocery store to spend our hard earned cash to feed our family, we look for the best.  We only grab the best.  The rest is left to either be thrown away (much to my dismay when I heard that about a large Canadian company) or sold at a discount. 
The dairy farmer pumps the cows with antibiotics and hormones to keep up with his/her quota.  The beef farmer gives his/her cattle growth hormone in the food…. Or they get corn to eat.   

This is what http://preventdisease.com/home/tips24.shtml has to say about the cattle industry of today….

“Biting into a juicy burger or slicing a filet mignon, few people realize that beef isn’t what it used to be. Before World War II, beef cattle were raised on grass. It could take four years to fatten a steer. But then the industry switched to corn, a sort of time machine for a steer. Today calves start out on milk and grass but then, when six months old, they’re sent to a feedlot. By the time they are about 14 months old, corn-fed steers weigh enough to be slaughtered. "Corn-fed" may sound wholesome, as normal as Kansas in August and blueberry pie, but in fact corn is not healthy for cattle.

Cattle are ruminants. Their digestive systems are designed for grass, not grain. Fed on corn, they fatten in a hurry—it’s similar to force-feeding a goose to make its liver fat. A corn diet makes cattle sick, sometimes fatally. The animals must have antibiotics to stave off illness and infection until they weigh enough to be slaughtered, as well as hormones to promote quick growth. All this saves money for the growers and keeps the price of beef low.

Corn is a problematic crop, too. It’s heavily subsidized by the government and thus overproduced. It demands vast doses of pesticides and fertilizers, requiring huge quantities of natural gas and oil to produce. Toxic runoff from feedlots has become an environmental hazard, polluting ground water and land.

In addition, corn-fed beef is not good for people, particularly the people who regularly eat fatty steaks and burgers. Corn-fed beef is tender, with the marbling consumers have come to expect—and thus is high in fat, especially saturated fat. A four-ounce serving of grass-fed beef typically has 7 to 10 grams of total fat, compared with 14 to 16 grams in the same cut of corn-fed beef. Grass-fed beef, besides being lower in saturated fat, also contains more of the beneficial unsaturated fatty acids called omega-3s (similar to those in fish), as well as more vitamin E. Grass-fed beef also supplies more conjugated linoleic acid (CLA), another type of fat that has potential health benefits.

Hormones and antibiotics

And then there’s the matter of the hormones in corn-fed cattle. By the time the meat gets to your plate, residues are very small—not enough to worry about from a health standpoint. What is worrying is not the effect on consumers, but on the environment. Hormones from cattle (and other sources) end up polluting water. And not all scientists are comfortable with the idea of residues in meat: the European Union has refused to import American beef raised with hormones.

Another problem is the antibiotics used in corn-fed animals to prevent or treat disease. Again, residues in meat are not likely to hurt people, but use of antibiotics leads to resistant strains of bacteria in animals and in the environment. (Thus, if you get sick from Salmonella, for example, the strain may be resistant to many antibiotics.) Meat from corn-fed cattle is also far more contaminated with E coli bacteria, partly because corn interferes with ruminant digestion, and partly because the animals are crowded together in filthy conditions. E. coli levels are much lower in grass-fed cattle.”

Why are people even promoting this industry?  Why do I hear throughout my day so much “I can never give up steak”?  Or “I looovvveee my beef.  I couldn’t do what you do.  Good for you for having such strength”?  Really?  I really do not miss meat.  I don’t miss eggs.  I don’t miss milk. 

I love the fact that I can nourish my body without harming any animals.  Do I judge you if you eat meat? NO.  I would rather not judge anyone for their choices.  The choices that you make in your life are based on the information and beliefs that you have.  Maybe one day, you’ll try and live off of a plant based diet.  It’s a lot of change.  You lived your life eating certain things believing that they are good for you. 

The days of the small farmer raising their own beef steer and chickens in the yard are over.  Unfortunately, our beliefs that a chicken breast is good for you have not changed.  There is change happening everywhere.  However, our unhealthy and cruel food system is left unchanged for the better.  It is controlled by major corporations.  They control what you eat and how healthy you can be.  Some people will argue that people getting sick and dying young is a way for the planet to prevent itself from being over populated.  Tell that to the family that has lost their loved one from a horrible painful disease that can be prevented. 

I know that my little blog wouldn’t change the world, but maybe, it might help someone to make a healthier choice.  It might be as simple as making your family a fresh batch of jam with local fruit or vowing to buy organic veggies.  But hey, good for you!! 

If you EVER want to talk to me about doing a seven day raw vegan challenge, I’d be happy to help you free of charge.  How about we help change the world by making one healthier choice at a time!!