How to Eat Issue Three: Quality of Food
In the last issue we talked about Environment and Company and the impact it has on us as we eat. It was jam packed, with many people telling me that it as super helpful. If you would like to check it out, head to here.
This week we are talking about the quality of food. And I get the feeling that many of you will already be on board with much of what I want to share today. So let’s get started.
First up, a quick story - a recap on a conversation I had with my friend’s 10-year-old daughter.
We were driving into the farm, the car loaded with giggling girls. The eldest said to me “Is that truck taking your food away?”.
I replied with a quick “yes” and she continued with a barrage of questions:
What was on there?
Where is it going?
How much was on there?
What is a pallet?
What is a wholesaler?
We talked about the food chain. The life of the produce after it leaves the farm. She said “wow, it takes a long time to get to us”. And I answered, “yeah, in some cases, your produce could be weeks old before you buy it”.
And that there is my first point. Yes, we sell our produce around the country, and if the food chain is quick and efficient, people in Melbourne could be eating out produce as little as 3 days from harvest.
That’s not so bad considering the 1,600km drive.
The point is however, we do not have control of our produce once it leaves the farm. Our babies leave the nest, and they go out into the big, wide world. And my point here is, the quality of food will start to diminish the moment it is pulled from its mother (the mother being the soil, the vine, the tree). The life of the produce matters, every moment up until it lands on your plate.
By far, the first and most important step you can take to increase the quality of your food is to choose organic and in season. Something that has been grown and harvested in your area. If not your area, at least your country. And if eating meat, choosing a producer who loves and cares for their animals. You will find all the local produce and the freshest produce at your local farmers market, you cannot beat it. Anfd you won't find first hand conenction to your meat source anywhere else (unless you've got an awesome local butcher).
If you cannot get to a farmer’s market, choose a retailer that has a high turnover. And if you are unable to do that, then we have the big chain supermarkets, which have exceptionally high standards and high turnover (however, the downside is, they use packaging, and their prices do not reflect what the farmer gets, meaning, you are paying for packaging, transport, storage, and high rents – the payoff I guess?). So without fail, the freshest, cheapest, highest-quality, local and in season produce is on the stall shelves at your local farmers market.
When we are talking about the quality of food, including fresh produce into your daily diet is by far the best thing you can do for yourself. I don’t think anyone argues about that (do they?).
Buuuuuut.
Sometimes the perfect world does not exist and all of a sudden the cupboards are bare, the fridge is empty, and to top it we have no time! I get it.
So what do we do then?
If you can, follow this order of preference:
Leftovers (something you cooked), and then
Frozen / packaged / or take-out – sometimes it’s hard to tell which is best out of these…
We choose leftovers first because we know exactly what went into the food (as we cooked it). Packaged foods have a bombardment of random ingredients, frozen food is almost-dead food, and restaurants food has potential additives like MSG and/ or have been cooked in old, crusty oils, with lots of added salts and sugars. Even the “healthy” ones are sneaky.
[Side note, not all packaged foods are bad, we are lucky to have many varieties of foods that come all packaged up, just be mindful of the ingredients on the back plus the very effective, dodgy marketing using words like “natural” or “no nasties” or “gluten free”…. Sometimes they are not what they seem.)
As I am writing I am thinking that you already know all of this, this issue is however, to encourage you to go back to basics and incorporate fresh produce as much as possible.
So how can we, with ease, incorporate more fresh food into our meals?
I always try to have these veggies in the fridge at all times, to quickly through on the plate: carrots, cucumbers, baby spinach, cherry tomatoes, sauerkraut, micro greens, snow peas – all these are an easy component to add to a meal. But as we head into winter, we will move from raw to cooked, so steamed broccoli, beans, spinach and snow peas are a quick go-to. Add some ghee or fermented garlic butter or some spices to “spice” it up.
In the case of no fresh food, and no leftovers, my go-to is mung bean soup or dahl either made from scratch with some Love My Earth spices, my favourite is Kerala. Or the Love My Earth dahl mixes - I just need to add coconut cream and some sweet potato (we always have that, only about 79000 ton of it) to cool the spice down.
So let’s end with three things:
Incorporate fresh (and preferably organic) while you’ve got it, then move to leftovers, then packaged.
Keep easy to prepare produce in the fridge for the rushed moments in time.
Shop at a farmers markets for the freshest, cheapest, most high-quality veggies.
Next time, as we journey through how to eat, we will be talking about preparation of food. This is my favourite topic and it has nothing to do with storage, cutting, sieving, nothing like that – no chef skills in this one. Just a sweet, dear-to-my-heart tip. Can’t wait to share it with you.