Whole foods / processed foods
Creamy vegan fettuccini
What is the difference between a WHOLE FOOD, and a PROCESSED FOOD?
Simply put, a processed food is a food originally grown in nature, that we, man, have taken, removed a lot (if not all) the nutrients, and replaced them often with chemicals for a longer shelf life, processed sugar, salt, and fats, to ensure we come back for more! Before packaging it for sale!
This is ALL for profit - no other reason!
Now this is NOT the case for all packaged foods, in fact more and more companies are coming on board with healthy products still with most of their original nutrients intact! When a processed foods ingredient list is all whole foods - this packaged food can be still classed as a whole food! This is where the education around what to look out for on our packaged foods is key!
We are going to delve deep into understanding both the difference between whole and processed foods, and how to shop confidently knowing you are making the best choices for both you and your family… We will look at why this matters so much for our health, and what happens within our bodies when we both eat whole-foods, and processed foods…
Sweet potato breaky stack
Whole foods – What are they and why are they so important for our health?
A whole food is a food that is still in its complete form from nature!
Our body recognises this food and knows exactly what to do with it! Whole foods from nature are full of essential nutrients, vitamins and minerals that ensure every organ, cell and system within us thrive! Everything that is grown in nature holds a purpose, whether medicinal, nutrient enriched, or both! Nature has provided us with everything we need for optimal balanced health.
If we are preserving a food with sugar or salt, these ingredients are both from nature (as long both the sugar and salt are raw and still in their natural form), then this preserved food is still a whole food.
Simply put our body will process a natural food optimally, and you will store far less fat when eating whole foods compared to processed options!
Processed foods – What are they and why are they harmful for our health?
A food becomes a processed food when it has had any of its nutrients replaced (refining) with sugar, salt, fats, preservatives, additives, colours etc etc etc. Or it has an ingredient that is not a whole food mixed with it, as that changes the entire way the body will now process the whole food!
The body does not recognise the unnatural chemicals our foods are processed with, and when these chemicals arrive within our body’s digestive system to be processed, the body does not know what to do with them!
This creates a HALT within our digestion while the body tries to rid itself of this chemical!
All other food within our system at this time, even whole natural foods, are set aside to deal with later so the body can focus on getting this chemical out! The body feels immense internal stress from the danger of the unknown chemical, this stress triggers a cortisol release - the fat storage hormone… this in an ancient ingrained mechanism that still lives strongly within us. As fat storage means safety, as soon as any danger is detected we go directly into fat storage mode! And unnatural processed foods put us directly into this mode!
So what happens to the whole foods that we may have consumed around the same time as this processed food?
It is mostly stored as fat!
Both the halt in digestion, and the stress hormone release, create the optimal chance for the body to grab all it can as body fat storage! Yes, even whole foods!
When eating this way most of your life, your digestion is consistently halted, resulting in a slow and sluggish digestive system, bloating, inflammation, a struggling immune system and hormonal imbalance - this rapidly creates anxiety and depression and is a precursor to illness and disease…
Read this section a few times! This knowledge needs to be deeply absorbed for us to understand how and why we can’t just look at calories in / calories out, and why we may struggle to lose weight when eating processed foods - even when low calorie!
The 90% rule applies here! Deeply nourish your body 90% of the time…
How to shop for healthy packaged foods…
So how can we differentiate between a healthy packaged food and a processed packaged food?
We must simply ignore any of the clever marketing on the front of the packet, turn the packet over and read the ingredient list!
By law a company can market their product how they like - to a degree! So although the product may be marketed on the front with words like ‘healthy’ ‘low in sugar’ ‘high in fibre’ ‘high in protein’… They must list all of the ingredients included within the product in quantity order, starting with the highest to the lowest. This list may just contradict the marketing on the front of the packet when you know what to look for!
So the ingredient list is the best tool we have to ensuring we can start to make better choices for ourselves and our families.
What to avoid on the ingredient list:
Numbers - any numbers usually means chemical or unnatural
Chemically sounding names that you do not recognise - this one is a given, if it isn’t a recognisable food, then it probably isn’t one
Sugar - you want to see the words, natural sugar, organic sugar, raw sugar. If it just says sugar, this will usually be the highly processed toxic white sugar
Salt - you want to see the words, natural sea salt, pink Himalayan salt, Celtic salt. If it just says salt this will likely be the highly processed toxic white table salt
Oils - You want to avoid canola oil, this is a GMO and not good for us. Avoid any of the words, hydrated oils, partially hydrated oils, vegetable oils. You want to look for oils like sunflower and extra virgin olive oil.
What you want to find on the ingredient list:
You want to see a list of foods that if they were all individually sitting on a plate, you would eat all of them!
You want to see lots of healthy fruits, vegetables, whole grains and spices listed!
You LOVE to see the words ORGANIC!!
You LOVE to see the words RAW and NATURAL!!
Our best advice is to choose one item each shop to switch over to a healthier alternative, you will find something like a can of tomatoes for instance - the difference in ingredients between two companies for around the same price is amazing! Once you become aware, you will start to get really good at picking better alternatives! You will find companies you trust, we trust the Ceres Organic products wholeheartedly, we almost do not need to read the ingredient list now - it is always organic whole food listed! Start to make this a new habit, read your ingredients and also TASTE and FEEL the difference!
