30 Days to a Food Revolution

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When I heard about Diane’s 30 Days to a Food Revolution I felt super buzzed about the idea and knew that I wanted to be involved. We had succeeded! The word was getting out and the show that I shed blood, sweat, tears and sprained my ankle on was finally going to make a difference in how we eat in this country. Kids would have better meals in schools, food manufacturers would have to be more open about where the food comes from and how it’s treated and labeled and food lobbyists would lose their hold over the Government! The sad truth is, it’s going to take more than 30 days of food bloggers’ coming together but this is where it all starts- we’re sewing the seeds of the Revolution.

It made sense to write about sugar in my submission to The W.H.O.L.E Gang but I also thought it was important to start voicing my opinions here too. So far all you’ve seen are recipes and with less sugar but very little in the way of telling you why and how to cut back. So here I go…..

Since returning to live America 3 ½ years ago I’ve witnessed a plethora of health trends take off in New York- lowering salt, a movement towards whole grains, heart healthy fats, eating less meat, eating grass-fed meat, eating local, organic, avoiding high fructose corn syrup….and that’s just to name a few. The one always seems to be avoided is the sugar issue.

Working in Huntington was about more than making a TV show to me and the rest of the crew. It had to be. Jamie has an infectious passion and drive to help people and you can’t work with him without absorbing it. His energy though….well, that’s something I could only dream of having! We stepped into peoples’ lives in Huntington taught them how to cook from scratch. I had a girl in one of my classes at Huntington’s Kitchen tell me that she had never eaten fresh spaghetti before, only ever from a can. Hearing that sort of thing was a reality check for me- I realized how lucky I am that I was bought up knowing how to cook and what to put in my body. Going to the sweetie shop was a Saturday treat if we had earned our pocket money and we were occasionally allowed half a glass of soda with mom’s made-from-scratch Sunday lunch. In Huntington we encouraged people to stop filling their bodies with E-numbers and preservatives and instead fill their tummies with real wholesome food, that cooking could be fun, quick and affordable.

I should make a point to say that I’m not a Nutritionalist. What I am is someone who has worked in food for six years and for the same number of years I’ve suffered from hypothyroidism. So, I’ve been forced to take an interest in what I’m willing to put into my body and I’ve had to make changes. My minor addiction to sugar has had to be tempered because a sluggish metabolism doesn’t do well living on empty calories. I knew sugar was a problem for a lot of people, I just didn’t realize how big the problem was and how little control we seem to have over it.

Walking around the supermarkets in Huntington, I actually took notice for the first time as to what people were filling their carts with. It was pretty clear to me that there was a problem as big as people ignoring the produce aisle or filling their carts with processed meals. Sugar. Even when we pass on dessert or say that we don’t eat sweets, if we’re eating packaged foods, we’re still probably getting more than our recommended serving per day. Did you know that whilst the government has stringent guidelines for calories, fats, and sodium in school meals they don’t seem to give a toss about how much sugar is going into our childrens’ bodies? If they did, they surely wouldn’t allow 30% of a school meal to be made up with it. I could go into detail about how this goes back to our Government subsidizing corn whose surplus is turned into such things as high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) and how it goes into just about everything on the supermarket shelves because it’s cheap, but I won’t. You only have to watch movies like King Corn and Food Inc if you want to get into all the gritty political details. And I suspect many of you have.

It seems that there a mass of on-going studies about the negative effects of high fructose corn syrup- weight gain, diabetes, lack of concentration, mood swings etc. but these can be linked to all varieties of sugar and sweeteners from the honey that we stir in our tea to the maple syrup on our pancakes. It doesn’t stop there and now that there has been public backlash against HFCS and even a Facebook movement, companies’ are finding alternative ways and names to put sugar into what we eat. Because sugary things are tasty, because sugar is cheap and because tasty cheap things encourage us to consume more.

Ever heard of Evaporated cane juice? If you read labels you will have seen it on the back of so-called health foods, in my opinion, the prime culprit of this labeling could well be Whole Foods. So what is Evaporated cane juice exactly? Sugar. Less refined and ironically more expensive than table sugar but sugar none the less. Will it make us fat if we eat too much? Yes. Could it rot our teeth? Most likely. Will it give our kids behavioral problems? I would wager yes.

So, HFCS isn’t the only enemy at the table.  We ought to cut back on sugar & sweeteners full stop. Which is hard to do if you buy food from the grocery store. It’s not just sodas, candy bars and flavored milk. If you buy salad dressing, chances are there’s sugar in it. And if you buy low-sugar products, diet sodas, or sugar-free yogurts to get your sweet fix then there are no doubt artificial sweeteners in most of them. What we need to do, is get over our sweet-tooth-addiction.

Just like the commercials produced by the Corn Board claim: “everything’s fine in moderation” in reference to HFSC. Except that moderation is irrelevant when it’s the food companies deciding whether or not they ought to put sugar in our cereal and milk before we’ve even had a chance to dip a spoon in the sugar bowl ourselves.
Of course it all leads back to clearing out the processed food from our kitchens. Consumer demand is our best bet in carrying forward the Food Revolution. A study led by the UK’s Guardian Newspaper recently showed that since Jamie’s overhaul of the school lunch program, grades have improved, truancy is down as are asthma attacks and illness. So it just goes to show, we really are what we eat.

Cutting back on sugar is easier to do than at first glance. Here are a few suggestions on how to go about it:
• Start reading the labels and stop buying products that don’t need to contain sugar or sweeteners in them, jars of sauces, salad dressings, yogurts, milk frozen meals, bread, granola….
• Don’t assume that because you bought it from a health food store that it’s good for you. Recent studies have shown that Agave nectar is just as bad for us as Corn Syrup and some claim even worse.
• If you have a sweet craving, make your sweet treats from home and start slowly cutting back on the sugar in your recipes You will be amazed at how quickly things begin to taste too sweet to you.
• Be wary of anything that says “low-sugar”. If it tastes sweet it has artificial sweeteners, which may be calorie-free but are best avoided.
• Start by giving up sugary drinks, which are the source of a huge number of unnecessary calories.
• Research alternative names for sugars and sweeteners- there are guides all over the internet including on my sugar page.

I feel honored to have taken part in Huntington’s Food Revolution, The W.H.O.L.E Gangs 30 Days to a Food Revolution and beyond. Keep the energy alive! We still need signatures on Jamie’s Petition so please continue to spread the word! Don’t stop now; the Revolution is just getting started!

Tagged as: 30 days to a food revolution, jamie oliver, sugar, the whole gang