Nourishing Traditions

For someone who was a born rule-follower (a trait that drives my husband crazy), I also have a bit of a rebel in my soul.  I like to think that it comes from a line of strong women on my mother's side of the family.  Well, the rebel side of me was stirred up after I got my hands on what I now consider to be the most important cookbook ever published - "Nourishing Traditions" by Sally Fallon.  If you haven't heard of Sally Fallon, I strongly urge you to look her up.  Her views on diet and nutrition, which are backed by sound science, turn our USDA food pyramid on its head.

"Nourishing Traditions" is so much more than a cookbook.  It is packed with information on what we should eat and why.  The introduction to the cookbook is a whopping 71 pages of detailed information on fats, proteins, carbohydrates, vitamins, minerals, enzymes, and more.  She walks you through choosing and preparing foods to optimize your health, and she explains why so many of the foods "they" tell us to eat are actually bad for us.

Do you want to know why heart disease, diabetes, cancer, allergies, obesity, and general poor health is on the rise?  Sure, all the toxins in our environment are contributing to the problem, but we are not nourishing our bodies properly so that we can fight off disease and eliminate the toxins from our bodies.  Faulty science and profit-driven big agriculture has steered us in the wrong direction.  Remember when we were told to eschew butter and use margarine, and then a couple decades later "they" (Sally calls them the "diet dictocrats") told us that the trans fats in margarine are killing us?  Well, like the recommendation to use margarine, there is a lot of faulty nutritional information out there.  Low-fat?...  The low-fat guidelines aren't scientifically sound nor are they healthy.  Cholesterol?...  It's not the devil it's made out to be - in fact, cholesterol is an important building block in our bodies that is needed to *repair* damage other substances create (which is why cholesterol is found in our arteries - it is repairing damage created by substances like homocysteine).  Whole grains?...  Unless grains are soaked or fermented, they are full of "anti-nutrients" that damage our health.

So if everything we have been taught is wrong, and fad diets are becoming more & more confusing, what SHOULD we eat?  It's simple - return to the nourishing traditions of our ancestors, before there were factories that created "food" or pseudo-scientists and nutritionists who invented different fad diets.  We need to eat whole natural foods that are prepared using old time-tested techniques.  Those sourdough pancakes made by the 49ers?... They are full of good nutrition, unlike the pancakes made from a boxed mix.  Think red meat is bad for you?...  If it comes from a steer raised in a feedlot on corn and soy and goodness-knows-what-else then it is definitely bad for you!  If it comes from a cow raised on lush green pasture then it's full of good fats and nutrients - a true health food!

"Nourishing Traditions" will fundamentally change how you think about food.  I urge you to find a copy today and become a rebel like me!