Soyagera journey into healthier living

I’ve ALWAYS hated Valentine’s Day. If you’re not in a relationship, it sucks. If you are in a relationship, there’s pressure. If you’ve been with someone for awhile, well, there’s still pressure. My hubby and I long ago decided that Valentine’s Day just wasn’t for us. It is the epitome of consumerist thinking: stores flooded with paper cards, mylar balloons, polyester stuffed animals and cheaply-produced candies, all marketed in a way to elicit a feeling of guilt in those who choose NOT to recognize who they love with these “special” gestures. Blah.

Of the millions of dollars spent on Valentine’s gifts, a large chunk of that goes toward chocolates. Now, I am not about to bash chocolate.  Chocolate is one of the finest foods produced and all the recent hype about its antioxidant properties is true if one buys the *right* kind of chocolate. So, what is the right kind of chocolate?

For this blogger, excellent chocolate has to meet the following criteria:

1. Fair Trade
Cocoa (along with coffee, cotton, and other crops) is one of the world’s most exploited products. Small farms and farmers have lost business and wages due to larger conglomerates taking over, growing in amounts that no single farmer could keep up with, and selling at amounts that no farmer could afford to match.  Just as the private farmer is disappearing in America,  such is the case in parts of the world where there is no other option for income than farming. It’s just good ethics to buy Fair Trade. Wouldn’t you rather consume something that was grown as someone’s livelihood, cared for, tended, and something that received positive energy versus a giant crop used only to support Big Business?

To learn more about Fair Trade cocoa specifically, click here.
To learn more about the Fair Trade Federation, click here.

2. Organic
Let’s just take a look at what one can find in any given Hershey’s chocolate (taken from Hershey’s allergen info). For the sake of brevity, I have taken the obvious ingredients (milk, butter, cocoa) off the list:

• Acid whey
• Anhydrous milk fat
• Butter oil
• Calcium caseinate
• Casein
• Reduced minerals whey
• Sodium caseinate
• Sweetened condensed whey
• Whey protein concentrate
• Defatted peanuts
• Hydrogenated peanut oil
• Partially defatted peanuts
• Peanut flavor
• Hydrogenated lecithin
• Soy protein
• Hydrogenated vegetable protein
• Soya
• Soya lecithin
• Soybean oil
• Hydrogenated vegetable
• Modified food starch
• Hydrogenated coconut oil
• Enriched flour
• Hydrogenated starch
• Wheat flour hydrolysate
• Malt
• Modified food starch
• Corn fiber
• Corn oil
• Corn syrup
• Corn syrup solids
• Cornstarch
• Dextrin
• Dextrose
• Flaked milled corn
• High fructose corn syrup
• High maltose corn syrup
• Hydrogenated glucose syrup
• Hydrogenated starch hydrolysate
• Maltodextrin
• Xanthan gum
• Modified cornstarch
• Foodstarch
• Hydrogenated vegetable oil
• Vegetable oil

Compare it to chocolate products from one of my favorite companies, Liz Lovely

Sandwich Cookie (Organic Unbleached Wheat Flour, Organic Sugar, Expeller Pressed Canola Oil, Organic Peanut Butter [Organic Roasted Peanuts, Organic Palm Oil, Salt], Partially Defatted Peanut Flour, Organic Palm Fruit Oil, Organic Cocoa, Cocoa [Processed with Alkali], Salt, Organic Unsweetened Chocolate, Natural Flavor, Organic Corn Starch, Baking Soda, Soy Lecithin), Organic Fair Trade Dark Chocolate (organic cocoa liquor, organic cane sugar, organic cocoa butter, organic cocoa powder, organic vanilla).
* Certified Organic

I’ll let you research all the above ingredients and decide for yourself whether you’ll choose organic chocolates next time!

3. Vegan
For me, this is big. It’s actually not as hard as you might think to find vegan chocolate. I was never a milk chocolate fan, so I don’t miss that (although great vegan “milk” chocolate is available), and high quality, dark chocolate is easily found in most grocery stores. My local store even sells fair-trade options. Vegan chocolate is just cocoa and cocoa butter, maybe some sugar. That’s it. It’s not adulterated by milk or milk by-products. The taste is pure, chocolatey goodness.

Some of my favorite chocolates, cookies, and other fantastic goodies come from Liz Lovely, which I mentioned above. All of their products are fair-trade, organic, and vegan. What could better for YOUR valentine?

Right now, you can get free shipping on orders over $29 (so easy to do; everything is so yummy!)by entering the code: TRUELOVE. And join the Fanclub! The Liz Lovely crew offers deals and fun contests (for free cookies, of course!) all of the time.

Hubs and I went bike riding on the first warm day of spring. Leaving our house at 11:30 with no food in tow, we knew we’d need some lunch by the time we got to our state park destination. We stopped at a local organic market to get some goodies. Now, we hadn’t been to this market in awhile, and their shelves were fully stocked with new items; we went a little crazy. What was supposed to be a quick stop for a bite on-the-go turned into:

-1 package of flatbread (4)
-1 package of Field Roast deli slices (yum!)
-2 avocados
-1 bag of Mary’s Gone Crackers! Twigs and Sticks
- 1 block of raw cheese (for Hubs–he can’t quit cheese)
- 2 bottles of Kombucha (so addicting!)

The total was around $30.00. Ouch!

I’m not complaining, because Hubs and I have made a deal that we will never feel bad about doing good things for our bodies, but we could have easily bought a loaf of white bread, a package of bologna, 2 avocados, 1 bag of pretzels, a package of cheese slices, and two bottles of soda for oh, I’d estimate, $12.00. 

Another example: a few weeks ago, Hubs and I were doing a “cleanse.” We fasted on a Friday night and then all day Saturday. We drank a fiber&scillium-rich drink mixture and juice. Hubs went to the store to buy two bottles of juice for our “meals.” As he waited in the check-out lane, the woman in front of him bought a Banquet frozen dinner, two frozen pizzas, and a two-liter of soda. Her total: $6.49. Hubs bought one bottle of organic apple juice and a bottle of organic grape. His total: $8.99!

We’re pretty good at figuring out how to make cheap and healthy, quick meals. However, a cheap AND healthy meal is ALWAYS more expensive than a cheap, NON-healthy meal.  Add in the fact that most people don’t know how to cook anymore, and there you have it, the disappearance of a healthy diet.

I’m hoping that as organic food becomes mainstreamed the prices on it will continue to drop. Until then, we’ll have to cut out those $30 unplanned lunches…

Try to ignore the fact that the fireman is nervous, but calm, and the factory-brand morning-show host is, ironically, rushing him through the segment (as they always do). THIS IS THE REAL DEAL. The fireman, Rip Esselstyn, and his fire company buddies got healthy by averting themselves from the Standard American Diet (or, SAD–coincidence?). So, I’m a little miffed that it takes a bunch of “manly” firefighters to have mainstream media take note of the concept of –gasp!– not eating meat nor dairy. But, if it gets the word out there, so be it. But don’t buy the book; spend your money on research from people who have been doing this longer and aren’t necessarily trying to make a buck. Unless you’re a manly-man who needs a fireman book to help you feel more secure in your manlihood when not eating meat…

First, let me dispel any commentary that may come from this post: I’m a skinny girl. I’m not bragging, I’m not trying to sound elitist. I just am. I have an incredible metabolism, I have disgustingly-great genes, and one trip to the gym produces muscles instantly. That’s the way it is. I’ve got other hang-ups, though, so calm down. (And for the record, growing up with hip bones that could slice through flesh, being called “bag of bones” by a teacher in front of my entire class, absorbing accusations of drug use–”crackhead” comes to mind, getting the side-eye when topics of eating disorders arise, and hearing “put some meat on your bones” every day of my life hasn’t been a joy. But I digress from the subject a bit….)

Ironically, “put some meat on your bones” is the last thing a vegan will do.

A vegan diet is great for cutting weight,  if done properly. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not trying to lose weight. But cutting dairy (saturated fat!) and other animal-derived fats keeps the pounds from accumulating, especially on someone who is admittedly lazy (uh, me).  Organic foods ensure that the food is fuel and the body is not trying to process anything it doesn’t need.  And so, I’m still a skinny girl.

And I still hear, “you’re so skinny!” all of the time. 

At Thanksgiving, Hubs grandmother:  ”You’ve lost some weight! Are you eating enough?”
When I walk out of the room, she quizzes Hubs on my eating habits and discusses it with family members. I’m touched that she’s concerned, but it would be easier if I could say, “it’s our diet,” without raised eyebrows.

At Christmas, Hubs maternal grandmother: “Now, you’ve lost some weight since we last saw ya. Are you eating enough?”

The humor in this is that these women lived during the Depression era, so they know skinny; one would think it wouldn’t faze them. Perhaps that’s why they’re concerned. You know:  recession, lack of funds, no food, skinny wives. You’ll note that my family’s comments aren’t mentioned here.  For one, they’ve seen me skinny since I was six years old (I was a FAT baby, though!). And two, they tend to talk behind my back. They’re Catholic. They’ll just confess for it later.

The point of all this, though, is that I’m not THAT skinny. I really believe that people are so used to seeing obesity that it has become the norm. A gal who’s a healthy size and weight looks emaciated. This thought  is proven when I buy clothing.  I am a thin person, but I have definitely developed since my high school years. I have hips now. I have chubby (in relation to the rest of my body) thighs.  But, mysteriously, I wear a SMALLER size in the same brands I wore in high school. This is not new information, but just try discussing it with women. They don’t like to admit that they might actually be bigger than the perceived number “8″ on their pants. It’s infuriating how people are aware that they’re being duped but care not so long as they can maintain their  lifestyle, though it may be destructive. This idea of “normal” is passed to younger generations, too.

Take a look at teenagers nowadays, or pre-teens, for that matter. These kids are BIG. If I see one more teenager-belly hanging over pants that are too tight, I *might* have to start handing out literature on the subject.  Since when are kids the fat ones? Youth used to be envied. Before I begin a diatribe on the obvious causes of youth obesity let me end by saying that skinny doesn’t mean sick. It is, in fact, more often the opposite. The movement in the ’90′s to combat anorexia and bulemia seems to have backfired. The idea of accepting one’s body for how it is never meant “eat more Entemann’s.” It has left health in the dust and “put some meat on your bones” the unspoken national anthem.