The Way We Eat

I thought I ought to make an explanatory post of the types of recipes you'll find here and why.

I grew up with a mother who was always very interested in nutrition (so much so that she owns a health food store), so naturally I thought it was all kind of crazy. But darn it, Mom was right. Fast forward some years...

My second child was an extremely picky eater who constantly was getting rashes, headaches and stomachaches, extreme mood swings among other symptoms. The allergist found no "allergies" but told us to try a rotation diet to see if we could narrow it down, as it was clear that food was causing her problems. Sure enough, we tracked symptoms being caused by 10-12 very common foods, and that was simply the ones we could figure out. She couldn't be allergic to everything, could she? We tried to avoid those foods that gave her the biggest problems, and she was feeling mostly ok for a while. But then came the summer when she was basically sick in bed feeling miserable with a headache, stomachache and she was covered from head to toe with hives for six weeks. With lots of prayer, we happened to hear about celiac disease and decided to get her tested. She didn't end up having celiac disease, but we did put her on a gluten free diet. What an amazing difference it has made in her life. After four years of being gluten free (she's now 12), she's healthy, no longer a picky eater and doesn't even remember what she used to feel like.

Through all this, I explored many different areas of nutrition. There are so many different ways of eating, that I finally just decided that the best way for us to try to eat would be to eat as much as we could that was not processed. So I had to learn to cook everything from scratch. We do still eat a few convenience foods, but we try hard to avoid additives as much as possible. Nourishing Traditions was an excellent eye-opener on preparing foods to be enzyme-enhanced to promote digestion, as was learning to eat more raw foods. The whole family (7.5 of us) does not eat gluten free, but we eat gluten free foods much more than we ever used to. And when we do eat gluten, we try to eat it soaked or sprouted, but with this many kids that doesn't always happen.

I recently came across a quote by Ezra Taft Benson where he said, "In general, the more food we eat in its natural state and the less it is refined without additives, the healthier it will be for us." (Ensign, Nov. 1974 "Do Not Despair") Pretty much confirms my eating beliefs!