The Grand Experiment

Food is a sensitive topic.

As someone interested in food, nutrition and the culinary arts, I've enjoyed researching all kinds of perspectives on food, and I've discovered the subsequent strong conviction with which people cling to those perspectives. In fact, you can put it right up there with religion and politics. Try criticizing a friend's eating habits, or even tell them you've decided to change your own. Watch as they become defensive, proud, agitated, excited or ashamed. Why is this?

As a culture, we've attached a sense of morality to food in broad sweeping generalizations. Vegetables are good, cake and ice-cream is bad. Bad food takes better, but good food is better for you. If you eat bad food, you're bad; if you eat good food, you're good. There are "guilty pleasures" and the ever-popular "diet", insinuating restriction and unpleasant "health food".

Moreover, what people eat has come to say or represent something about their deepest values, self-worth and humanity. An obese person feels ashamed to eat in front of others for fear of the judgement associated with a lack of self-control. That same person uses food to cope with unresolved problems, stresses and emotional frustrations. An underweight person feels the pressure from others to consumed more than her or she is comfortable with, as they use food restriction to cope with life's trials and hurts.

The health nut feels a sense of pride over pure eating practices, indicating superiority to others. The junk foodie neither cares about their health nor the opinions of others, a sense of pride in and of itself. The vegan uses food as a sense of promoting justice and peace as well as pointing out the animal killers and ignorant members of society. The epicurean seeks power and superiority through knowledge and critique of the preparation and complexity of food. The constant dieter seeks a better life through a rhythmic routine of restriction and bingeing, manipulating the purpose and consequences of consumption and giving food the power to provide both happiness and depression.

It's fascinating, isn't it? Food and its method of consumption tells as much about a person as a hobby, a job or a checkbook. Of course people get defensive.

Despite personal perspectives of food, however, I'm going to go a step further, out on a proverbial limb, and propose that there is a grander perspective on food, one that is marketed to and in some form or fashion accepted by all in our American culture, despite niches, subcultures and personal edits, and it is this:

Food must be fast, cheap, convenient and tasty.

Now, you may not agree with all of those adjectives, but chances are you embrace at least two. You're not the only one. It's an expectation we've developed as a country over the past 40 years. In recent research, I've discovered this statement is result of a movement started in the 70's with a change in farming practices (reducing the cost of food), continued with a cultural shift of two-working parents in the 80's (making the need for quick preparation necessary), included the integration of more preservatives (to increase the shelf life of convenient food) and has culminated in the science of taste manipulation (a higher taste profile moves sales).

The end result is a nation clinging to this concept that their food must be fast, cheap, convenient and tasty. To live this way, however, comes at a price to our health.

Without preaching the gospel of organic living, cheap and tasty foods that are created by companies for fast, convenient access are typically full of chemicals our body cannot process. Here's a creepy story - a friend of mine recently said a friend of hers worked in a funeral home, preparing bodies for burial. He said his job has been made easier by processed foods. Corpses are coming in so well preserved already, a result of the many pounds of preservative ingested by the newly deceased and stored in the fat of the human body.

Processed foods have also been linked to obesity, depression, thyroid problems, heart problems, digestive problems, headaches, dehydration etc, etc. If it was created in a lab, it's generally not something that will promote the health of your body.

That said, I have a confession to make: I, a person many of you would regard as a health nut, nutrition diva and green-eater, have not been doing so as of late. I know, I can hear your gasps. I have been subsisting primarily on processed foods since arriving in Sacramento. Yes, I have a salad every now and then, but I will no longer reach for an apple when I'm hungry. I'll avoid the carrots in lieu of the tortilla chips. I'll have stovetop popcorn instead of, well, anything else, and I've been consuming almost exclusively refined sugars, flours and packaged food in the last two weeks.

The end result? I feel miserable.

I feel depressed and sluggish. I have more headaches, anxiety and aimlessness than I have in years. I've gained weight, I've stopped exercising and my brain is constantly fuzzy. It's awful.

You would think with all of my nutritional inquiry and interest, a thing like this would never happen, but I'm very, very human. I have old default reactions to stress and change. Sacramento has been a doozy of a change and a challenge I wasn't prepared for. It's a change I didn't acknowledge for a long time. As a result, I've gone to my default of salty, sugary and fatty foods that don't support my body, and it's taking it's toll.

To that, I have had enough, but I've decided to use this situation as an academic experiment of sorts. Perfect for a nutritional education junky like myself.

The Grand Experiment, then, is this: To see if it is possible, profitable and beneficial to live a life with a process-free diet.

The Time-Frame: One Year
(Friday, June 18, 2010 to Saturday, June 18, 2011)


The basic Idea: To eat foods in their closest to natural form as possible, avoiding processed and refined foods, artificial sweeteners and chemical preservatives.

It's a broad definition for an experiment, I know. For the purposes of the experiment, here are some specific, measurable guidelines for what we are defining as processed:

   White sugar and white flour
   Artificial Sweeteners
   Trans-fats and foods fried in unhealthy oils
   Dairy Products, save homemade yogurt with probiotics
   Pesticides
   Chemical additives
   Most alcohols (occasional glass of red wine excepted)

A few qualifiers here - first, I understand there is some level of processing to most foods we eat. I don't live in the Caribbean, so I'm not going to be able to go out to my backyard, hack off a pole of sugar cane and squeeze it into my coffee in the morning. Shoot, my coffee has been picked, dried, washed, roasted, packaged, ground and shipped, along with several other steps I'm sure I'd be shocked to know about. Oils are all processed from something. However, there are cold-pressed oils, which is the least-processed and unaltered chemically. There is organic coffee, and a dozen all-natural sweeteners that won't leach nutrients from my body and send my blood sugar skyrocketing.

There are usually less-processed options. Instant oatmeal is a whole grain, but did you know it's already been rolled and steam-cooked, then cut into smaller pieces so the hot water you pour on it can finish the job? And that's before the sugar and dried milk is added for the flavored types. Even old-fashioned oatmeal has been through the same process, minus the last step. Steel-cut oats are the "purest", most unprocessed form of the grain.

Second, this doesn't mean I'll be saying goodbye to tums, advil, and basic medications. I'm applying the experiment primarily to my diet, and consider advil a modern marvel we should never be without.

Third, I will allow for a nibble or two of processed food in a situation where it would truly offend or matter. I will always put people before food, and I have been in situations where it really was an issue. It's rare, but it happens. For example, I now work at Starbucks (NOT me in the picture). As an employee, I have to taste certain beverages for promotional reasons and perform coffee tastings. I reserve the right to sip a new frappuchino rather than get fired. =)

The bottom line is this experiment is not about getting legalistic. It's more about being intentional, purposeful and intelligent about what I'm putting into my body and see if helps my mood, my mind, my weight, my outlook on life and my insides. It's approaching food with reverence and respect for my body rather than out of mere convenience. And, quite frankly, it's a challenge. Our culture has processed just about everything there is to consume, and created a few options in the lab to boot. Can I beat the system? Can I live process-free?

This does mean I will be saying goodbye to some good friends of mine for a year. I adore Tostito Hint of Lime Tortilla chips. I attack a bag of those like a raccoon at a garbage bin, and can polish it off far quicker. If you've ever seen me around cereal, you know the damage that can be done in a short amount of time. Twizzlers are a major problem. And I adore cinnamon sugar toast, made with big globs of butter to soak in the raw sugar granules.

However, I'm too sick, sluggish and blech to care right now. That's how bad it's gotten.

I know I will have days - oh, so many days - when I'll want something loaded with all the chemical preservatives you can find in a lab. There will be moments of weakness and moments of great triumph. Like any scientist, I will be charting my progress and journaling my findings. I'll keep you updated on particular moments of enlightenment or struggle.

I don't start this journey lightly. I've done similar things in the past and I know the weight of the commitment. One year, I cut out all chocolate, chips, candy, cookies, cakes,  and cream just to see if I could (I won't lie, the alliteration was a huge motivator). I made it six months, and I became aware of just how saturated social situations are with the "C's". They are all celebration foods (there's that "C" again) and darn near impossible to avoid.

Now I'm ready for another journey, one I intend to see through to completion despite any situations that may compromise the guidelines I've set forth. I'm ready to change my way of thinking and explore a new way of living. I'm excited to see what happens, what I find as a result of the experience, and what I learn from the experience.

Are you ready to see what happens when a process-filled body enters a process-free zone?

Me too.

Here's to a year of process-free eating - may I come to know the true meaning of "Au Naturel".