Whole foods!

There are a million, bazillion ideas out there about how to eat right. How to eat to lose weight, how to eat to clear acne, how to eat to better the planet. Everyone has their opinion and who knows whether they practice what they preach.

But ultimately, isn't the best and simplest way to chose how you'll eat is to focus on whole foods? With no emphasis on calories, food groups, serving sizes or micronutrients - just a tendency to reach for things that have been minimally processed. It's so easy.

Whole, or natural foods, come from the Earth. They were put here for us to enjoy. Their nutrients are in perfect combination, not altered like processed foods. They often come perfectly packaged (a banana in a peel), at the perfect temperature (mother's breastmilk for an infant) and perfectly filling (you'll have trouble eating a full bowl of higher-calorie ground beef, but try eating a bowl of low-calorie watermelon and you won't have much trouble!)

Eating this way is cost effective because you can purchase most whole foods at a farmers' market. I also recommend purchasing large orders of meat from a farmer so that you can become familiar with all the different cuts (Head to Tail Eating).

Whole foods are also great for the environment. They don't use the plastic packaging, factory production, and long transportation that, let's say, a Twinkie would.

If you want a fresh new look on whole foods with interesting facts about their history and biology, and with delicious tips about how to enjoy them, check out my Whole Foods series on Pinterest. I've been "borrowing" gorgeous photos, like the one above, for each whole food. Please stop by and leave a comment, or click the Ask link to post your question to me.

http://amyjoyharrison.tumblr.com/tagged/whole-foods

It's Burger Season... Veggie Burger Season?

Just around the time this unseasonably nice weather hit Ontario the "burger" section of the grocery store seemed to be strangely bare. My first thought was that everyone was firing up their BBQs at the same time and the purchaser didn't plan for that much demand, but no - Ontario was the victim of yet another beef recall. 

I can't say I'm a firm vegetarian. For me if meat is humanely-raised and -slaughtered and is fed proper foods, I am okay to eat it in moderation. That's why I have an order for a certified organic, grass-fed 1/2 cow coming in next week (hurray!) But for those backyard parties that you're not too sure about or if invites tell you to BYOM (bring your own meat), I'd recommend keeping a box of veggie burgers in the freezer.

Recently I tried Sol Cuisine's original vegetarian burger. The stats are jaw-dropping: gluten/wheat free, vegan, low fat, 12 grams of protein, only 100 calories, lots of fiber/calcium/iron, kosher, halal... the list goes in. In fact look at these ingredients:

Filtered Water, Soy Protein Concentrate, Sunflower Oil, Organic Lemon Juice Concentrate, Onion, Modified Cellulose, Tomato Powder, Sea Salt, Garlic, Spices, Caramel Colour.

Everything is verified to be non-GMO. Very impressive.

For the group of us that dug into the tasting (my semi-vegetarian sister, my strict-paleo/whole-foods sister, my meat-loving former-chef husband, and myself) we found with a little creative condiment-adding, the burger was pretty good. Perhaps not as juicy and "meaty" as real beef, but an honest substitute and easily the type of thing you can add ketchup or mayo to for your liking (or homemade tomato jam! or vegenaise!) I look forward to trying more of Sol Cuisine's products in the future.

As it continues to get hotter, I definitely recommend branching out and giving vegetarian burgers a try. Because - hey - you can't get mad cow disease from vegetables. ... can you?