FAT, SICK AND NEARLY DEAD
)

Eat plenty of fruits & vegetables! But...What does “plenty” mean?

More than most Americans consume. If you don’t count potatoes—which should be considered a starch rather than a vegetable—the average American gets a total of just three servings of fruits and vegetables a day. The latest dietary guidelines call for five to thirteen servings of fruits and vegetables a day (2½ to 6½ cups per day), depending on one’s caloric intake. For a person who needs 2,000 calories a day to maintain weight and health, this translates into nine servings, or 4½ cups per day (2 cups of fruit and 2½ cups of vegetables). Harvard School of Public Health

Our foods are so deficient that we are fortifying just about everything to try to make up for it. However, don't be so sure that that is a good thing!
ALLERGIES ~ Please share with family members and friends who suffer from allergy related problems. Many people have greatly improved when they stopped eating GMO's.
)

Evidence-Based Science: Video Shows Impact of Processed Foods on
Human Digestion

January 25, 2012 in Evidence-Based Science, Health News
This past weekend, I tuned into TEDx Manhattan 2012, “Changing the Way We Eat”, a day-long seminar with inspirational speakers from the food world. Needless to say, I was stoked! My “highlights” review will be featured in a guest post on the real food blog Hartke is Online. Until then, I thought to share a little snippet from the seminar. One of my favorite presentations was not a talk, but a recorded video that shows rather than tells how the human body digests processed food as opposed to real (whole) food. For all the doubters out there, this is hard-core evidence that the body was not meant to digest Cheetos, Gatorade, Cheerios, Ramen noodles, or any of the synthetic so-called “foods” out there. If you’re still not convinced that you need to abandon your junk food ways, I urge you to watch this video; it’ll speak for itself:

Stefani Bardin is the talented media maker behind this video. In collaboration with Dr. Braden Kuo who conducted the trial at Massachusetts General Hospital, she filmed the “M2A: The Fantastic Voyage”, a video that for the first time in human history actually brings us into the digestive tract while the food is being digested, and compares the difference between how the body processes synthetic food and real food. The M2A pill, which has a wireless camera, and the SmartPill which comes with sensors, both track how liquids and solids ingested are processed by the body.

We see how blue Gatorade stains the stomach lining because of the artificial color added (a petrochemical derivative!), and how Ramen noodles are not effectively broken down in the digestive tract (they containTBHQ which is related to butane) … ugh, gross! The “whole food meal”, while definitely more nutritious than the junk food alternative, is still not ideal, but  at least the body knows what to do with it! This goes to show you that even incremental changes in your diet can either heal or further complicate your digestion…

So, next time a medical doctor urges you to give your sick child a colorful Gatorade to “replenish his electrolytes” when he or she has a fever (advice that makes me recoil in horror every time), I urge you to email him or her this video … and then find yourself another doctor!