Living | Practicing Awareness When It Comes to What's In Our Food
If I wasn't creating ROSE & IVY, I would be doing something completely different. What is that you might ask? Well, I would take on the food industry. Let me tell you why...
The other day I got a craving for a turkey sandwich with mayonnaise. It was a strange craving, but recently I have stopped eating dairy due to an on-going health issue and just turkey on a baguette wouldn't do. I was going to make my own, versus purchasing store bought since I was pinched on time. I went to Trader Joe's and a 'gourmet' retailer by my house to see if I could find one with a few ingredients (something I personally swear by for feeling the best I can). I know what the ingredients are supposed to be in mayonnaise because I have made it before - eggs, canola oil, lemon juice, a dash of Dijon, salt and maybe pepper. I couldn't find any, any without preservatives, gums and the dreaded 'natural flavors' (which are ANYTHING but natural). I reverted to making my own, but this isn't the first time this has happened.
You see, I believe that the food we put in our bodies leads us to health or disease. What if the lawmakers started really regulating what companies put into our food? I believe this would eliminate so many diseases, since you are what you eat. I have to be honest though, up until a few years ago I ate things that I assumed were healthy. I have always eaten fairly healthy, but when I thought I was really being healthy, I still was not. I drank 'natural flavored' waters, I ate beans that I presumed were nutriscious but had gross additives like calcium chloride and sodium benzoate (Goya is a huge offender) to canned tuna fish. Have you looked at any labels recently and noticed that almost everything has 'natural flavors'? Even Shake Shack, the beloved burger chain that never adds antibiotics or hormones to their beef serve buns loaded with preservatives - something they don't advertise, but I emailed asking them.
Through research I have learned that there are companies out there that manufacture flavors. Meaning they add meat flavors to steak, potato flavors to fries and even yogurt - there are a few companies out that that use natural flavors despite claiming to be 'all natural'. Isn't that gross? If you have to add a steak flavoring to meat, don't you think this indicates a larger problem?
I understand that many Americans don't have the means or access to farmers markets (this is another huge problem I could go on for hours about, I mean shouldn't we all get access to fresh food?), but I would like to think that if all of that junk was regulated and removed from our food that we would be raising a country of super humans.
Thoughts?
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