We Didn't Choose the Real Food Life. The Real Food Life Chose Us!

So, because I know my blog is watched by certain people who know who they are, I thought it would be prudent to educate people on a couple of things.

Yes, we eat primarily fresh fruits and vegetables in this home…particularly during the week. We eat meat maybe once or twice each week. And it’s usually for dinner.
We are clearly not vegetarians, pescatarians, vegans, ovovarians, or any other variation of anything other than omnivores. Even if we were, it’s not against the law.

What we are is a family that adopted eating real food over the extremely processed bullshit you can buy from the shelves of the grocery store. We recently added fresh juicing to our routine, too. And, for my regular readers, I am NOT saying that anyone who buys easy to prepare, boxed meals is somehow bad or evil. I know what it’s like to be too tired to cook. I know what it’s like to have small children to contend with (during the summer, my home wasn’t just filled with my sons. I usually had a niece, a much younger cousin the same age as my sons, and various neighborhood children…and I worked. So, trust me, I get it.). When my older sons were younged, I was mom-shamed once for relying on boxed foods. I am not shaming (or attempting to shame) anyone. I am explaining how we eat because people are fucking stupid.

Why Real Food?

It takes me what feels like forever every day to make fresh food and juice for myself, my husband, and Baby Bull. I don’t do the food fight with the little one, either. He even eats frosted Poptarts for breakfast.

I’ve never been particularly pleased with the idea that there were all kinds of weird ingredients in boxed foods that I couldn’t recognize. Again, though, I bought them…I understood (and understand) the time crunch of life. I work from home now. I can arrange my schedule. Oh, and with a plan of some kind (and a well-stocked pantry), it’s not really all that time consuming.

Real food, as in fruits and vegetables from the produce section, have more nutrients than canned goods. Canned goods are great for fiber. They also have protein (yes, plants have protein – a vegetarian diet does not put one at risk for a protein deficiency). However, they’re often overcooked. The process results in oxidation and the fruits / vegetables lose a lot of their nutrients. They often have added salt, too.

Meat…we buy meat. We don’t buy grass fed beef (that shit is super expensive). We buy regular hamburger, lean trims of beef, and lots of boneless, skinless chicken. We buy nitrite / nitrate free bacon. We buy eggs. We buy some pork. We buy some breakfast sausage. We buy kielbasa. We just don’t include meat at every single fucking meal.

Fiber – Good for Your Body

Bull, Baby Bull, and I all get the recommended serving of fruits and vegetables every day between meals and the juicer (yay juicing!). Fiber is extremely important to your body. Most people do not get anywhere close to the daily recommendation for fiber. Why the fuck do you think Metamucil is a thing? And Fiber One? Fiber helps you poop. So, if you’re complaining about your kid’s bowel habits (or lack thereof) or your own, look at what they are (and aren’t eating). If you have a kid who likes vegetables and fruits (and we do – and he’s almost nine and weighs almost 100 pounds), feed them the good stuff.

Fiber is also heart healthy. It can help prevent heart disease, heart attacks, stroke, and high blood pressure.

And if you’re struggling with weight and worried you’ll go hungry if you “diet?” Fiber keeps you full longer. The right fruits and vegetables mean you get to eat more throughout the whole fucking day, too.

“Micronutrients”

Somewhere along the way, society adopted the term “micronutrients.” It’s a stupid fucking term. It means vitamins and minerals. Those are two things that most people in the US, again, do not get enough of from processed foods. Sure, there are some processed foods that now have “added” nutrients. Why go for added nutrients when you can just buy the real thing?

Bull and I both feel better overall. Baby Bull is much calmer since the switch.

TL:DR

We eat real food (with less meat) because there’s practically no risk of protein deficiency (see link above), we get all of the fiber we need in a day, and we get vitamins and minerals.

One More Thing

Also, remember when eating real food was just the norm? Now it seems to be a sign of wealth or people are made fun of for not adopting food that may be associated with various health problems. Anyway, I just wanted to clear this up since it has apparently become a point of contention with certain people who worry about things that they don’t really need to concern themselves with since they choose to make themselves scarce and create excuse after excuse about why they’re not around.

Our rules for choosing food are fairly simple (and we still eat out and eat processed food from time to time):

Theoretically, could we make it at home with the ingredients on the label? (You know, without purchasing a chemistry set!) As I write this, I have boneless, skinless chicken soaking in pickle juice to make a real food version of Chik Fil A nuggets.
Do we know how we feel after we eat it? Sometimes you know what foods make you feel like shit. Avoid those.

Easy, right? We also drink a lot of water, FYI. Baby Bull and I limit ourselves to one soda per day. The rest of the day it is water, tea (unsweet for me), or (fresh) juice.

We don’t live to eat (at least not everyday…but we love us some cake!). We eat to live. Read Inner Engineering by Sadhguru or pick up a book on “clean” food. Or just remember the days where practically everyone had to eat their vegetables. Eating should be enjoyed…and the best way to enjoy it is while you’re feeling healthier.