Nutrition

Diet    Nutrition    Food    Cooking    Detoxification

The single most important health factor one can control everyday and that has an affect on every aspect of your body, mind, and spirit is nutrition 

It's not hard to see how the importance of good cooking and food quality has diminished if we notice the nutritional products being delivered to hospitals, nursing homes, prisons, and schools.  In the eighties, ketchup was designated a vegetable as part of the school lunch program which for some children may have been they're only decent meal all day. 

The American work ethic, more appropriately titled, 'profit ethic', has been distorted. In this age of corporate power and control, the individual, the family and the community has become subservient to amassing wealth.

Healthy nutrition, mental health, self-awareness, individuality and joy need to be say guarded. The power and potential that corporate structure can achieve is startling and here to stay. So everyday people struggle to make themselves heard above the noise of the machine. We must find away to not let that overpower the qualities they make us unique. 

Genetically Modified Foods Affect People & Pets (This is a reprint from FreindsEat’s.com)

Recently, FriendsEat’s Shari Ilsen reported Germany’s Minister of Agriculture banned the cultivation and sale of Monsanto’s (MON 810 maize) genetically modified maize. In response, Monsanto has filed suit against the German government’s decision on Tuesday. A Monsanto spokesman said Germany’s action was an “arbitrary ban” that violated EU rules. “They are in conflict with EU rules.” Reuters reports the lawsuit, filed in the administrative court in Braunschweig in northern Germany, was first reported by the Handelsblatt newspaper.

As Shari pointed out, many scientists have cautioned of a possibility that the pollen from these GM plants crosses boundaries and destroys the native crops in other areas. Germany is the 6th country to ban GM corn — France, Austria, Hungary, Luxembourg, and Greece all preceded Germany’s ban. Monsanto claims EU member states can invoke a safeguard clause against an already approved plant but such a move required new scientific evidence and none existed to support the ban.

An article in the French Newspaper Le Monde reports that the Committee for Independent Research and Information on Genetic Engineering (Criigen, based in Caen), participated in a study published in the International Journal of Biological Sciences which demonstrates the toxicity in mammals of three genetically modified corn varieties from Monsanto.

Translated from French:

“We showed for the first time ever that GM was not healthy, nor sufficiently accurate to be marketed. [...] Each time the three GM, kidneys and liver, which are the main bodies reacting at a chemical food poisoning, have problems,” said Gilles-Eric Séralini, expert member of the Commission for the revaluation of Biotechnology, established in 2008 by the EU.

In other words, researchers concluded that these three GMOs are not safe enough to be distributed commercially because the kidneys and liver in rats displayed toxicity levels when exposed to all three GM corn varieties.

The researchers stressed that their conclusions are based solely on the three GM maize varieties that formed the basis of their investigation. “Effects were mostly concentrated in kidney and liver function, the two major diet detoxification organs, but in detail differed with each GM type. In addition, some effects on heart, adrenal, spleen and blood cells were also frequently noted.”

Their conclusion strongly suggests that these GM maize varieties induce a state of hepatorenal toxicity — toxicity related to kidneys.

Information on the study released by the International Journal of Biological Sciences, which looked at the effects of GMO Foods (genetically modified foods), researchers found that 3 varieties of GMO corn, specifically Mon 86, insecticide-producing Mon 810, and Roundup® herbicide-absorbing NK 603  is linked to organ damage in rats.

In defense of the study Monsanto conducted a 90-day study into the finding, even though the issues with these foods are usually found after 90 days.  They concluded that both their practices and the GMO corn was safe for consumption.

These GM corns can be found in products such as animal feed, sweetners and in thousands of products found in the grocery store.

The IJBS study, researchers wrote:

Effects were mostly concentrated in kidney and liver function, the two major diet detoxification organs, but in detail differed with each GM type. In addition, some effects on heart, adrenal, spleen and blood cells were also frequently noted. As there normally exists sex differences in liver and kidney metabolism, the highly statistically significant disturbances in the function of these organs, seen between male and female rats, cannot be dismissed as biologically insignificant as has been proposed by others. We therefore conclude that our data strongly suggests that these GM maize varieties induce a state of hepatorenal toxicity….These substances have never before been an integral part of the human or animal diet and therefore their health consequences for those who consume them, especially over long time periods are currently unknown.

Monsanto recent response to the study, stating that the research is “based on faulty analytical methods and reasoning and do not call into question the safety findings for these products.”

The IJBS study’s author Gilles-Eric Séralini responded to the Monsanto statement on the blog, Food Freedom, “Our study contradicts Monsanto conclusions because Monsanto systematically neglects significant health effects in mammals that are different in males and females eating GMOs, or not proportional to the dose. This is a very serious mistake, dramatic for public health. This is the major conclusion revealed by our work, the only careful reanalysis of Monsanto crude statistical data.” 

 How to ID GM Food Source: Marion Owen website.

Not many consumers realize that the FDA does not require food to be labeled. That’s because the FDA has decided that you, dear consumer, don’t care if the tomato you’re eating has been cross bred with frog genes to render the tomato more resistant to cold weather. Some consumers may not be concerned with eating Frankenfood, but for those who are, here’s how to determine if the fruits and vegetables you’re buying are (GM) genetically modified.

While unpacking groceries, you pull out the bag of apples and decide to eat one then and there. You take it over to the sink, wash it off and -- with some effort -- peel off the little sticker. Pausing to look more closely at the sticker you wonder, "What do those numbers mean?" As much as we may dislike them, the stickers or labels attached to fruit do more than speed up the scanning process at the checkout stand. The PLU code, or price lookup number printed on the sticker, tells you how the fruit was grown.

As reported by Maria Gallagher, in the June 26, 2002 issue of the Philadelphia Inquirer, by reading the PLU code, you can tell if the fruit was genetically modified, organically grown or produced with chemical fertilizers, fungicides, or herbicides.

Here's how it works:

For conventionally grown fruit, (grown with chemicals inputs), the PLU code on the sticker consists of four numbers. Organically grown fruit has a five-numeral PLU prefaced by the number 9. Genetically engineered (GM) fruit has a five-numeral PLU prefaced by the number 8. 

For example:

A conventionally grown banana would be: 4011

An organic banana would be: 94011

A genetically engineered (GE or GMO) banana would be: 84011

The numeric system was developed by the Produce Electronic Identification Board, an affiliate of the Produce Marketing Association, a Newark, Delaware-based trade group for the produce industry. As of October 2001, the board had assigned more than 1,200 PLUs for individual produce items.

Incidentally, the adhesive used to attach the stickers is considered food-grade, but the stickers themselves aren't edible.