Nourishing Traditions December 14, 2007

I just got an email from a friend of mine. She’s from Turkey, but living in America. She has a baby boy — I met her in my mother’s group.

She writes:

“I’ve been reading Nourishing Traditions and smiling all the time: This lady is telling almost everything I knew from my mom and grandma!! Except some recipes it is the healthy Turkish way of good eating, waoww !! Thank you for mentioning it, there is so much about it I would like to talk with you.

I was making my own yogurt, yogurt drinks, kefir and cream cheese for some time already but this week I got inspired and started to make BOZA, a fermented drink which I was craving for… I will also order Kombucha starter and also offer it to Adam, I hope he will like it. When my aunt was pregnant with my cousin she started to drink Kombucha every day and after her son was born when he was 8-9 months old we gave it to him too. I can’t wait!!”

Funny because I knew Ebru and I shared a lot of the same opinions about food and health. Whenever I saw her, she was always feeding her baby boy fresh vegetables and fruits. And of course he is so healthy.

It’s a shame that so many of our traditions have been lost. So many mothers are serving processed foods like Kraft Macaroni & Cheese.

I am now making bone broths and homemade cream cheese and whey and sauerkraut. And I’m about to start brewing my own kombucha too. I ordered the scoby from GEM Cultures and it is due to arrive after the holiday. Seth and I have been drinking kombucha for the past couple of months. We don’t miss Diet Coke at all!

King Corn December 14, 2007

Guess what came in my mailbox today? My very own DVD copy of “King Corn”. I ordered a copy from their website, since I missed it in the theater.

I’m watching it now.

It’s BRILLIANT! Horrifying. But brilliant.

They actually make high fructose corn syrup at home. Did you know that high fructose corn syrup is inedible industrial corn soaked in battery acid?

Let me repeat that:

high fructose corn syrup is inedible industrial corn soaked in battery acid

Why in the world are we eating this? It’s in lots and lots of processed foods, drinks, and fast foods.

There is only one reason we eat it. Because it makes money for the chemical companies.

Did you know that drinking ONE soda a day doubles your risk of type II diabetes?

Why are we feeding corn to cows? Cows that are meant to eat grass and hay? They are not meant to eat corn and they get very sick when we feed them corn. Which is why they are pumped with antibiotics.

What the hell has happened to our country? Our farmers don’t eat their own corn or the milk that comes from their cows. This shit is inedible. INEDIBLE.

And we are ruining the land. Monocropping destroys the land.

Why are large chemical corporations controlling our food supply?

How in the hell did that happen? And why are we letting this happen?

Everyone in America should watch this movie. People need to wake up before it is too late.

It’s time to wake up and do whatever we can to support local, independent farms who sell directly to the public.

Here’s the trailer:

Here’s the website where you can order your copy of the DVD:

http://www.kingcorn.net/

The Future of Food December 14, 2007

I just read my friend the latest post on my friend Louisa’s blog:

http://constantstateofflux.wordpress.com/2007/12/14/the-future-of-food-life-stuff-and-eveything-else/

After I read that, “coincidentally” (not), someone else on a newsgroup posted a link to this video about the history of genetically modified food:

This is just an intro; I want to buy the whole video.

The scary thing is that pretty much everything you buy in the grocery store is now manufactured by companies like Monsanto. Everything is sprayed with pesticides and most things are now genetically modified. Anything with soy oil or vegetable oil (which is mostly soy oil). Anything with industrial corn or soybeans. It’s hard to know what’s what because the way they label it, you can’t tell.

For example, did you know that when you buy a food product at the store and it lists “spices” as an ingredient, that can contain anything? It usually (almost always) contains MSG.

It’s disgusting that Monsanto is going out and suing small farmers for saving and reusing seeds. It’s disgusting that there are only FOUR varieties of potatoes grown today. It’s disgusting the way huge corporations have driven small farms out of business.

I’m not buying seeds from catalogs anymore. Why? Because it’s all seeds from Monsanto!

“Virtually every large mail-order garden company in the United States uses a seed broker to supply them with stock.”

“The American nursery trade is a 39.6 billion dollar a year industry. With the purchase of Seminis in January of 2005, Monsanto is now estimated to control between 85 and 90 percent of the U.S. nursery market. This includes the pesticide, herbicide and fertilizer markets. By merging with or buying up the competition, dominating genetic technology, and lobbying the government to make saving seeds illegal, this monolith has positioned itself as the largest player in the gardening game.”

“Monsanto holds over eleven thousand U.S. seed patents. When Americans buy garden seed and supplies, most of the time they are buying from Monsanto, regardless of who the retailer is.”

http://thedeliberateagrarian.blogspot.com/2006/02/garden-seed-monopoly.html

I’m going to step up what I’m doing to change the future of our food. I’m going to join a seed saver organization and start growing all my vegetables and herbs from seed.

http://www.seedsavers.org/membership.asp

Here’s another place to buy seeds:
http://www.rareseeds.com/

Of course everything I grow is organic. But I want truly organic non-Monsanto seeds in my garden. I’m going to rip out everything that’s in there — it all came from Home Depot. Which means it’s all from Monsanto. UGH! It makes me sick that even people who are growing their own food are still unknowingly buying seeds genetically modified by this evil corporation.

I don’t have a lot of land but I have some and we live in sunny southern California — I can grow food all year long.

This is my first New Year’s resolution! I’m excited to start planning my garden. It’s a small step to take, but if more of us do it, it will impact the planet.