"Class-Made" Guacamole: No Better Brand Around

One of the things I love about having quit my corporate job is being able to get more involved in my kids' schools. I'm not doing as much as I could, but it's a thousand percent more than I did last year.

I am co-chair of PS321's Green & Healthy Committee, and January is Green & Healthy month! So we had a big party last week for which I created and ran a Nutrition Booth that was wayyyyy more popular than expected given my competition: a dance party, yoga and dance classes, an obstacle course, etc., and... a gelato (made of, err, natural, wholesome ingredients) workshop!

The kids loved playing my "Guess How Much Sugar!" game where they matched cups of varying amounts of sugar with the right product. I also had them be food detectives by asking them to find the differences between two kinds of ketchup, applesauce, peanut butter and cereal. What fun it was to hear an 8-year-old saying, "Mom! NEVER buy this kind of applesauce again! It has high fructose corn syrup in it!" I also overheard a mom looking at my "Did You Know?" section saying to her kid, "Wow, look at that. Broccoli stalks have more calcium and vitamin D than the flowers! We'll have to start throwing them into our stir-fry's." With all that under my belt, I was pretty confident making guacamole with Frank and his 24 first-grader classmates yesterday was going to be a hit.

We all sat and chatted for a bit: What had they learned during Green & Healthy month? Had they tried any new fruits and vegetables? Did they notice how good it feels to be green and healthy? I told them we'd be making guacamole; most had tried it before. I told them I was proud of them as I'd not touched an avocado until my 20's (true story.) Most of them knew an avocado is technically a fruit. (Did you?) I talked to them about the other ingredients - we kept it simple with lime, cilantro and salt but we discussed additional options like red onions, jalepeno peppers and tomatoes, all of which they were happy to be leaving out! I showed them how to easily open an avocado and remove the pit. I showed them how to start the process of growing their very own avocado tree! See here for yourself. (Frank and I agreed to babysit for ours at home and share the progress with the class every couple of weeks.)

And then the madness began!

They broke out into tables, each with a bowl, a masher and a spoon. Each kid got a half an avocado whose flesh they were responsible for scooping out. Each got a quarter of a lime whose juice they were responsible for squeezing out. I went around and sprinkled salt and cilantro in each of the bowls. They mashed and stirred, mashed and stirred. Giggles all around. I handed out carrots and (organic whole grain :)) tortilla chips and they devoured everything.

Only two out of 25 didn't try it. One spooned left-overs into her lunch container. Another literally licked the bowl (unsanitary, but a compliment nonetheless!) Here's what they had to say:

"It's better than store-bought!"
"It's better than a restaurant's!"
"It's better because it costs less!"
"It's better because you know the ingredients!"
"It's CLASS-MADE GUACAMOLE!"


Class-Made Guacamole. There's no better brand around. Try it with your kid's class!

Class-Made Guacamole 
(serves 25 hungry first-graders)

Ingredients:
the flesh of 12 avocados
the juice of 6 limes
2 tablespoons chopped cilantro
salt, to taste

Directions:
1. Scoop out the flesh of each of the avocados into a bowl. MASH.
2. Squirt out the juice of 6 limes into the mashed avocado.
3. Sprinkle the cilantro on top. Mix with a spoon.
4. Add in a little salt at a time, stirring and tasting until desired.

Serve with carrots and whole grain tortilla chips and proudly watch them devour it all.

Another Food Labeling Mess. Disappointing, But Don't Lose Faith.

GMO labeling has taken center stage in health headlines recently, and while actual laws are slow to get traction, heightened consumer awareness is pushing companies to make positive changes they wouldn't have had good business reason to do otherwise. See article about General Mills' decision to remove GMO's from Cheerios' yellow box variety. Progress!

And if you spend any time looking at food packaging these days, you'll see proud call-outs like "now with no high fructose corn syrup," "now with no artificial colors, flavors, dyes," "no trans fats," etc. This is good stuff. Sure, it can breed laziness: we see those call-outs and assume a product is healthy rather than spending quality time with the actual nutrition facts and ingredient lists which may expose otherwise. However, let's be optimists rather than cynics. Progress!

We're seeing more "antibiotics-free," "hormone-free," "fed no animal by-products" meats. More "pastured" and "grass-fed" options in standard grocery stores instead of just the fancier Whole Foods and natural food stores. Wild fish and organic milk is everywhere. Smuckers makes peanut butter you can feel good about buying for your kids. This all means healthier stuff is becoming more accessible to the masses, which means awareness rates have to be growing. And the more informed we are, the healthier we are. Right?

Well? Here's a head-scratcher for you: despite all of the above, and despite my optimistic blog post from last spring, recent data shows obesity rates in 2013 (27.2%) were higher than they've ever been, this after two years of declines seen in 2011 and 2012. What gives?

Could it be.... FRADULENT OLIVE OIL?

If you haven't heard about all of the incredible benefits of especially extra-virgin olive oil recently, you've likely been living under a rock. Its high concentration of mono-unsaturated (good) fat helps lower LDL (bad) cholesterol and decreases blood pressure. It has stronger concentrations of phytonutrients which have great anti-inflammatory effects on the body. Why is that important? Chronic inflammation wreaks havoc and leads to all sorts of nasty stuff like heart disease and type 2 diabetes.

But what if that EVOO we've been pouring all over our salads, drizzling onto over our vitamin A-rich, toxins-removing baked sweet potatoes and brushing onto our deliciously simple grilled halibut isn't EVOO at all, but a mix of god-knows-what kinds of oils? Ones that could very well be genetically-engineered, produce LDL (bad) cholesterol and increase blood pressure?

No, I'm not suggesting that fake olive oil is the number one culprit increasing obesity rates (though I must admit I'm baffled and saddened by the 2013 data), but it's disconcerting to hear that what 70% of us think we're putting into our bodies is actually pretty much the opposite. This is far worse than brands not disclosing whether their products are made from GMO's, or ones who market themselves as "healthy" when their ingredient lists suggest otherwise. No, this olive oil thing (if true, because there's always that question) is a full-blown lie. Makes you wonder what other "good" things we're doing for ourselves that are actually bad.

Ah, screw it, let's just throw in the towel and reach for the Twinkies, right?

Nope, wrong answer. Health is a combination of factors, and just because a couple things we're doing may not be what we've intended or have been told, the (mostly?) good combo will always, always prevail. So read up on as much of this stuff as you can so you stay informed and adjust as you will based on what you conclude. But if you're on the beautiful, albeit sometimes bumpy road to health, DON'T LOSE FAITH.

Resolution Not Working? Try This Instead.

One of the most helpful concepts I learned in health coaching school was 'bio-individuality.' Sounds deeeeeeeeep. And complicated. But it's a simple premise that makes a whole lot of sense. And that's actually the case with a lot of stuff in the health and nutrition world - it's just that too many of the food companies, too much of the medical world and too many loosely termed "experts" have realized that in order to make a business out of health and nutrition, confusing consumers is job number one.

So what is bio-individuality anyway?

There’s no one-size-fits-all diet – each person is a unique individual with highly individualized nutritional requirements. Personal differences in anatomy, metabolism, body composition and cell structure all influence your overall health and the foods that make you feel your best. That’s why no single way of eating works for everyone. The food that is perfect for your unique body, age, and lifestyle may make another person gain weight and feel lethargic. 
- Joshua Rosenthal, Founder, Institute for Integrative Nutrition -

The health and nutrition world markets under the guise of simplicity: Just eat this one food and your belly fat will disappear! Follow these three simple tricks and you'll fit back into those jeans like that! Never eat another carb again and you'll shed those plus sizes forever! Okay, maybe those approaches worked for someone. But they won't work for the general public. 98% of all diets fail sooner or later. And since it's January, I'll throw this depressing statistic out at you as well: 90% of New Year Resolutions fail. So many of them health-related.

Are you having trouble sticking to your health-related resolution?  
A different approach may be in order.

I just finished leading 21 women (and one man!) on a 7-Day "Resolution Jumpstart" Purification. The Purification is not about juicing or deprivation, neither of which is a long-term viable proposition. It's about eating whole, real (delicious, mind you) foods, and eliminating foods that either definitely are or could be inhibiting health-related progress including gluten, dairy, added sugar, caffeine, alcohol, soda, diet soda, juice, artificial anything and preservatives.

YIKES!

Let me tell you: that shit ain't easy. It took us - ALL of us (myself included) - a lot of energy and determination to do this. The intention is not for anyone to try to live like this forever. Instead, we cut out all of this stuff at once in order to create a clean slate. From there, we add stuff back in slowly and check how we're feeling. This way we'll know if there are certain types of foods that just don't sit well, and may be at the core of our issues including bloating, acne, low energy, poor sleep, eczema, intense cravings or weight gain. Many of my purifiers are discovering a few kinds of foods were really tripping them up: gluten for one (the source of chronic bloating); dairy for another (the source of chronic eczema); added sugar for still another (the source of intense cravings.) And many have enjoyed as much as five pounds in weight loss after just seven days! Likely the combination of everything.

But none of those specifics matter much if everyone goes back to their old ways once the week is over. The most valuable lesson (even the most miserable of) my purifiers take away from this seven day journey is awareness. Many of us go through our days mindlessly eating or doing this or that. There are no fingers to point here, it's just a reality of our crazed worlds. But for these seven days, each of us was ultra-aware of what we were eating, how we were sleeping, what kind of time we were making for exercise, how much TV we were watching, etc. And, importantly, how each of those things was making us feel.

We'll each decide what to DO with what we learned moving forward, but the practice of being more aware itself is really hard to shake (in a good way!), the positive momentum we've all created for ourselves forms the buildings blocks required for long-term change, and each of us will have our bio-individualistic learnings to fall back on, well, forever.

From one Resolution Jumpstart Purifier:

Last Sunday morning I was shoveling food in my mouth standing up and screaming at my daughter to get dressed for her skating lesson. This week I had oatmeal, have a smoothie and am drinking my unfinished tea out of my thermos. Totally different scene just a week later!

So if you're finding your health-related resolution isn't going so well, the reason might be that it just wasn't the right resolution fit for you. Because it was someone else's diet program, someone else's exercise regime, or it was simply unrealistic. Take just a week instead and practice the art of awareness: it's a real shortcut to some long-term answers.