real food

I have no tips but I looove Sourdough Bread. I stopped eating it for sometime because someone told me it is higher in carbs than other breads.

Are you making your own? I look forward to hear how it went. Hopefully you can post your recipe here!

Iza-

There is nothing healthful about meat, dairy and eggs. Not only are they unhealthy for us but even if they are raised humanely they are not slaughtered humanely. The only way to know that, is to raise the animals yourself and slaughter them yourself. I understand that you don't want to give up meat, eggs and dairy...it is the American diet...but not a healthful one. You can see animal cruelty if you google "meet your meat" and numerous other sites. I suggest as far as health goes, read "the china study" by t. colin campbell. It discusses the role of nutrition and cancer. Also, check out Physicians Council for Responsible Medicine. There is a lot of information that the meat and dairy industry don't want you to know.

There is no downside to giving up meat, eggs and dairy. It is good for your health, it is kind to animals and it is good for the environment. And you would be amazed how wonderful a whole grain plant based diet is.

Iza- I think your thread got hi-jacked!  Oh-well, I am trying the "what my grandma ate" thing, and am feeling well.  I get my eggs from the guy down the road and I know what the chickens eat, We get a steer every year from the rancher a couple miles a way, (grass fed only), and I am trying my hand at making homemade whole grain bread, (not as easy as you'd think!).  We also use real butter.  It all started for me when I talked to the local mortician and he told me that the stuff they use in margarine is in the stuff they use to embalm you.  I decided I didn't want to be embalmed before I was dead, hence I started down this road.  Good luck to you,   Tami

I think you can eat meat, eggs and dairy but the animals must eat grass and not so much grain or corn (sorry, I don´t know the right word) It has to be a balance between omega 3 and omega 6.

We eat to much omega 6 now. Wild animals and grass-feeded are better. My husband hunts so we eat meat from wild animals and birds but not so often. Butter is better, it tastes better too! We only eat organic sourdough bread, we have a local bakery where you can buy them. Iza, I´ve tried to make them myselves but sorry I can´t give you any advice ! I wish you good luck with the sourdough,

Anna

I have eaten meat for years but stopped when I learned of the hormones that are in the feed. I do think that meat can be healthy, I just choose not to eat it.  I am very interested in this thread inspite of that.  I love wholesome down home food. I eat eggs milk and other dairy but I am picky and get the organic. If anyne has not tried orgnic milk you should.  I was shocked at the imporved taste over regular milk.

Bread, yes I would like to find a good whole grain one that does not have soy flour in it.  Any suggestions?

By the way, I love the name of this thread LOL

The key to eating like our grand parents is not just diet that had zero preservatives, dyes and hormones, very little prepackaged foods, but they also did lot more exercises to do many daily task and a whole lot LESS stress in their lives compared too most people now days have in there lifes..  We all need to research their entire approach of life style not just one part. Also remember the condition of the air they breathed, the water they drank and many other issues we do not have control over.  Another thing to remember we are treating a body that has been or is sick.  Breast cancer was one in twenty than.. not one in five now. Something bigger happened along the way....

Flalady

Interesting thread - thanks for starting it! I can't say much about sourdough, but for anyone making small amounts of whole grain bread, I've found the answer for me is a breadmaking machine, just to make the dough with no fuss, and then I always bake it in the oven in a wonderful old breadpan my mother had, that I never wash. I've never found a bread recipe baked in the machine that has a decent crust. bread machines seem to have gone out of favour lately but I believe with this economy are making a comeback. yes, it is expensive, energy-wise, to bake one loaf, but if you, like me, live far away from a good bakery, it's the only way to get great bread.

For anyone trying to make whole grain bread that comes out TOO heavy - try adding some gluten flour.

Flalady - I definitely agree with your observations. My parents are in their mid to late 80's as well as numerous relatives in mid to late 70's. Yet I am the first female in all my relatives to be diagnosed with breast cancer.  I see elderly people who are still getting around and some still driving and wonder where did I get it. In the past, the breast cancer ratio was something like 1:30 back in the 60-70's I read somewhere. 

My soap box is that children of our generation (born 1950-60's) were adolescents when the 'Chemical Age' took off with pesticides. I hope not to offend anyone but the three largest chemical factories during WWII were in Germany - you know the history. You can do the research but at some point they were broken up and are the large world pharma companies of today who have their origins in these chemical companies.

So our generation got the exposure to the pesicides, fertilizers and then introduction to growth hormones in food. Studies show the direct link of DDT exposure to young girls during the 1960's who later developed premenopause hormone positive breast cancer. It appears the impact of early exposure during youth to these carcinogens increases our risks later in life to develop cancer. So IMO this is why some of us have elderly family members who ate healthy (more or less what they could afford during the Depression) and are still alive today. Some in fairly decent health if they continued to take care of themselves.

As usual I've rambled off topic but our parents and grandparents ate dairy, meat, eggs - - however, their foods were organic and NOT tampered with chemicals and hormones!!  Okay - I guess I finally got to my point!  So for me, I eat in moderation and try to eat as much organic as possible with healthy diet and exercise as top priorities.  Sorry about the hi-jack.....Great topic!

Linda - Great point about the Fast Food restaurants.  I remember when some those chains opened in our area and while in college eating fast foods because it was so cheap for us students!  Then on to the job rat race and commuting and not having enough time to eat properly. Years ago when I was a Med Tech working evening shifts at the local community hospital you would not believe all the hospital personnel who were chain smokers!!  No time to eat but to take a quick smoke and cup of coffe in the side lunge room.  This is life style and what our generation grew up on.

I am bumping this old thread because this idea of REAL FOOD has been very much on my mind lately.

I went through a phase in the past where I tried raw veganism (only uncooked vegetables, fruits, nuts, seeds). Needless to say, eating those foods is definitely great for your health. The problem with raw veganism, though, is that the human body needs nutrients that it can only obtain from animal products (B12 for instance). Because of this, humans crave "meaty" foods with substance and texture that you just can't get from eating a raw carrot.

So, raw vegans have developed these elaborate recipes for fake foods... fake cheese, fake bacon and eggs, even fake pizza and hamburgers... made of large quantities of ground nuts and other raw vegan foods.

At one point one day during this raw-vegan phase, it occurred to me: If a system of eating relies heavily on fake foods, or on one type of food (i.e. nuts), something is just innately WRONG. (I've thought the same about "cooked veganism"... all the fake sausage, fake lunch meat, fake cheese, made primarily of soy product.)

Anyway, it dawned on me that I don't want to eat FAKE foods, period. Not fake processed chemical-laden "food product" from the likes of Monsanto, and not fake foods that are supposed to look like meat or cheese.

If your body is craving meat or cheese, wouldn't it be better to eat a small amount of the REAL THING (organic/pasture-fed/etc. of course) than to concoct some unnatural recipe to try to imitate it?

I was shocked at myself when I first had this thought. It seems sacrilegious to think that any amount of animal products would be "okay." But after reading books like Anti-cancer, Nourishing Traditions, and The Maker's Diet, I'm amazed that I ever felt pressured to confine myself to a limiting and unhealthy diet.

It's freeing to realize that yes, there are nutritional benefits to consuming a certain amount of organic animal products. It's not "cheating"... it's the way we were born to eat. It's wonderful that if I am craving eggs one day, I can cook up a couple of free-range eggs in a bit of pastured butterand have all the omega 3's and other nutrients in a real egg, instead of having to concoct yet another pureed nut mixture to make a fake egg. (Most raw vegans eat a LOT, and I mean a LOT, of nuts... nuts are great for you, but are that many really that good??)

It's funny, raw vegans are all about "living foods," claiming that only fruits/vegetables/nuts/seeds are "living." But what is more alive than fermented foods... raw yogurt... cultured butter... wild sourdough... all of which have nutritional benefits that just can't be replicated in a strictly raw vegan diet??

Also, there was no such thing as plastic when our grandparents were growing up.  They stored their leftovers in glass.

Robin, that is a frequently circulated old wive's tale about different breads, sour dough or whole wheat having a better insulin response than plain white bread.

Dr. Richard Bernstein, the famed diabetologist, has actually tested this. White breads and sour dough wheats raise glucose exactly the same.

Thought you would want to know. This myth has been circulated for at least 30 years. Until someone actually tested it. My son is a diabetic so I follow the information--and the misinformation carefully.