What do you mean ‘real food?’

So what do I mean when I refer to ‘real food’? 

In my opinion, real food is achieved through the process of using your own hands and kitchen tools to convert raw ingredients into a final dish. 

In my opinion, fake food is pre-packaged or individually packaged foods at grocery stores that are filled with sodium, sugar and bluntly put, are not nutritionally valuable.

When our first child was born, I knew I did not want her being fed the baby food at grocery stores when I realized that expiration dates were literally years out… At that point I decided to make at least a majority of her baby food out of fresh or frozen vegetables, and I’m so glad that I did.  It was not the easier route, but it was without a doubt the more naturally nutritious choice for our daughter.

At first glance, marketing tells us that the fake food is somehow always spectacular at something… ‘Fortified in Vitamin D’ or ‘significant source of’ blah blah blah.  As a mother, I learned to put my thinking cap on and trust my instincts.  Why would I purchase the cheap, preservative-filled items at the store that had to have vitamins and minerals literally added to it because on its own there is so little nutritional value? Marketing tells me that these items are fortified and better, but experience and motherly intuition tell me that is not the case when I see young children everywhere with gut problems, diabetes, allergies and more.

I am convinced that humanity needs to ditch ‘convenience’ and embrace the more difficult option of ‘from scratch.’  While we’re at it, we need to include our kids in the process that they learn the values of it too.  With that said, we are absolutely not perfect and still eat ‘junk food’ on occasion. And that is okay!  Start small and work your way further. For our family, the 80/20 rule has been one to live by.

For example, I began making cream of mushroom soup from scratch instead of guiltily buying the sodium and preservative filled kind at the store.  When I got comfortable with that, I began making cream of chicken soup from scratch, too.  Then came chicken broth, ranch dressing, and so on…  (Ask me for the recipes, I’d love to share!)

We finally stopped long enough to think for ourselves and realized that people are so sick…  We are living in the most advanced times we are told, but I argue that human health has not advanced with the times. 

Pick one thing and go from there.  And remember, you CAN think for yourself about these things.  If something does not make sense, or the marketing isn’t adding up…  Question it and be open to each side of the narrative, but then use the brain God gave you to reason through what really makes sense.

Good Luck!

Mary