Big Brother in Your Shopping Basket

Wherever you have the opportunity, buy organically grown food from your Farmer’s Market.  This is where you’ve exchanged hearty handshakes with the people that grew it.  

That carrot might not have graduated from geometry class, but it’s unadulterated with questionable chemicals.

Shop locally and you’re throwing a lifeline to genuine, hardworking human beings rather than corporate conglomerates that sell pesticide-soaked veggies. 

And don’t forget that supermarket actuaries (those who found accountancy too exciting) then gather details of your shopping habits through credit/loyalty cards to create demographic profiles to target buyers with special offers they don’t need. 

Some people are genuinely uncomfortable with this level of data collection and the incentive to spend more money than they anticipated.

Loyalty cards are merely marketing methods to get you to revisit the same supermarket over and over again. What people really want is the freedom to choose where to shop.

Bear in mind that the farmer’s alarm clock went off at the crack of dawn and he/she toiled to grow that food. Buying from local farmers cuts out the middleman allowing the farmers a much-improved cash flow.  

By selling to supermarkets, farmers are left twiddling their thumbs, waiting for the supermarket to throw them a bone weeks or, heavens forbid, months later, all while taking home pocket change. It’s a real-life Food and the Furious, and our farmers deserve better.

I spoke with the owner of a popular dog food manufacturer in England. Several supermarkets had approached him but two clauses in their agreements put him off:

• ‘First, they wanted “positioning” payments to make sure his dog food had a ‘front-row seat’ on the shelves, right where everyone could see them. Otherwise, his goods would be relegated to higher/lower shelves and he’d be told sales were low.
• if the supermarket’s fork lift truck knocked any packs of dog food off the pallets, guess who’d be footing the bill? The supermarket would charge the dog food supplier for damaged items at full retail costs.

Talk about a costly game of fetch!

Food Should Be A Joy 

Instead of being fuel, the modern-day diet is destructive to the human body.  Period.  The best kept secret in medicine is that given the right conditions, the body heals itself.

Food. For centuries food has been bringing people together to a communal table, allowing them to talk a while sharing their stories, their emotions, their experiences and their lives.

There’s nothing better than enjoying food with friends. Food gives us an instant connection to our traditions and beliefs.  Most important it’s the way mothers in every country or tradition say “I love you”

An appetite for food is much like an appetite for life.  Food changes our mood and can induce contentment well beyond that of the digestive tract.

It’s the modern equivalent of sitting around the campfire and exploring memories. Having a sense of belonging; a place in the world.

For me a delivered pizza doesn’t tick any of these boxes.

The subject of diet is far too colossal to address comprehensively here.  That would require a book and there are already many to choose from, each with differing views.

Having written that, here are a few random food tips I find useful:  

• Eat grass-fed and grass-finished meats and organs. Ask the butcher if the farmer adds any grain to the food and if they do chose a different one. I also love bone broth.
• Spicy foods helps to stimulate salivary glands, ensuring you have sufficient saliva for when you eat.
• Onions are rich in sulphur compounds that keep the bacteria Streptococcus Mutans in check.  They are exceptionally powerful when eaten raw.
• Raw garlic inhibits fermentation of sugar and has many other health benefits.
• I love nuts! My favourite ones are Macadamia and Apricot kernels (ok apricot kernels are not nuts but I thought I still mention them for their high content of Vit B17). Chewing on nuts will help eliminate rogue bacteria. They are a heart-healthy source of zinc, magnesium, copper, phosphorus and manganese.
• Sugar in most forms is known to be a major cause of cancer but it doesn’t directly rot or stick to our teeth. Carbohydrates/Starches do. While sugar has always had a bad press, a more significant contributor to dental decay and gum disease is bread, cereals, buns, pretzels, pasta, crackers, chips, muffins, cookies, cakes, especially if you’re over 50.
• Eating sugar upsets our body’s calcium to phosphorous ratio.  This leaches calcium and other essential minerals from our teeth (and bones) thereby weakening them
• Let’s not forget the “apple a day” reminder we’ve heard since we were a kid. However, the nutritional value nowadays is probably overrated due to the depleted soils. Leaves us with its crunchiness cleansing power for our teeth).  

Whenever possible I opt for organic food.

Dr Elmar Jung