Entire generations have lost the ability to cook a good healthy meal from local ingredients, because production has been shifted to corporate industrial farming resulting in cheaper nutritionally deficient grains, which require supplementation to justify inclusion in government nutrition guidelines, unpronounceable preservatives to last on the shelf, and sugar (HFCS - high-fructose-corn syrup) to be palatable.

As well, factory farm produced, heavily fossil fuel fertilizer based, pesticide covered vegetables and fruits are equally nutritionally suspect.

In the 1980s a tear in the fabric of the family first appeared. The tradition of three meals a day, ending with a family dinner – disappeared. Families scramble to get out the door in the morning, consume Lunchable style, high calorie, low nutrition lunches and snacks and return home to packaged dinners cobbled together because social networking and TV eat into preparation time.

What We Should Know About Nutrition Today

·       Healthy dietary guidelines set a daily fat level not to exceed 7 percent of total calories – about 15.6 grams in a 2000 calorie per day diet. The average consumption today is about 12 percent, resulting in the exponentially growing epidemic of obesity and diabetes.

·       Using the standard 2000 calories per day, an average on which the packaged foods nutritional labelling are based, a person would need to consume no more than fifteen grams of saturated fat – about three scoops of ice-cream or two glasses of whole milk, to reach the maximum daily 7 percent level.

·       Red meat should be slashed to no more than two under three ounce servings of extra lean 5% fat per week. The average Canadian eats at least 4 times this amount in factory farm finished marbled steak with 10 to 15% fat content.

·       Read labels, maximize use of fresh foods and ward off an unhealthy dependence on processed food to drastically reduce calories - fat, sugar and salt.

·       To readily reverse common addiction to salt, stop eating all processed foods for two to three weeks.

·       Avoid all soda pops, ‘sport’ drinks and all junk foods simply by not having them in the house. Make assorted fruits and unsalted nuts as well as lightly flavoured air popped corn - the go to snack food for kids (and health conscious adults).

·       Remember - Families that pause to eat meals together are healthier.

·       Parents should demand that schools restrict which foods can be sold through vending machines.

·       As of 2014 a slight trends in the general public away from sugary drinks seem s to be underway.

Interestingly in all of this - top food executives avoid the very foods they oversee development and marketing of - this includes Kraft food’s John Ruff, Nestlé’s Luis Cantrell, Frito-Lay’s Bob Lin, and General Food / Dr. Pepper’s Howard Moskowitz who apparently all go out of their way to avoid their own products to stay fit and healthy.             RR

see - Consumed