Raw milk delivered, a local butcher and your farmer around the corner, complete with freshly churned butter, garden-fresh produce, and the sweet nectar of honey. These are the staple ingredients for traditional cultures back in the early 1900s and long times past where disease was uncommon, children were happy, adults were under-stressed, and the food was abundant in season. Fast forward 100 years and we’re sicker than ever and stressed beyond our eyeballs, with more food than we need.
The modern world has graced us with conveniences to suit our everyday needs and beyond. What it hasn’t graced us with is abundant health through our food supply. According to Healthline, there are 11 reasons that show everything that is wrong with the modern diet. Of course, there are many factors involved in why this is so. Food, however, is one of those main variables that has dramatically changed at the turn of the 20th century.
The Problem
A traditional whole food: raw milk – which is illegal in some states to obtain for human consumption, yet, it was one of the most complete foods among traditional cultures. And farming is something you may think only big companies do, and in-season produce is whatever you want at your local grocery store – fresh, frozen, or canned; while whipped, artificial butter products promise heart-healthy results.
Our modern world has made so many advancements to provide worldwide shipment of foods, we’ve lost touch of what food is and what it’s supposed to do for you.
Food is meant to nourish, providing essential fats, carbohydrates, and proteins in addition to micronutrients like vitamins A, D, E, B complexes, and so on. However, our culture tends to lean towards eating for pleasure versus eating to live. Our “live to eat lifestyle” has eschewed the true purpose of food.
There’s more to it (and more power) than satisfying a craving or getting rid of hunger pains.
Dr. Weston A. Price was a dentist back in the early 1900’s. He noticed that his patients (children) were seeing him more often with dental caries (cavities) as well as the narrowing of the facial structure in the lower ½ of the face. He was perplexed because the parents had a remarkable wide jaw line with no cavities. After many years of dentistry, his newfound discovery was that this degeneration of teeth and facial structure was not inherited, rather the food that the new generation of the 1930’s were consuming was evidently clear – the very mouth that was consuming these “convenience foods” were beginning to feed disease.
Price took his research far and wide to discover that the degeneration of health and increased dental caries went far beyond American soil. After visiting, studying, and observing Aborigines, the Inuits, Polynesians, & several others, he found that dental health corresponded directly with the health of the individual.
Those on their traditional diets without any influence of modern food (shipments of canned foods, an increase of sugar distribution, etc.), were robust, strong, healthy, and had amazing bone structure and phenomenal teeth.
Today, we consume approximately 60% of our calories from processed foods. The result: 2/3rds of Americans are overweight, 1 in 4 will die of heart disease, 1 in 3 will get cancer, and 90% are nutrient deficient in the basic of basic daily nutrients.
Convenience may just be our biggest enemy.
Convenience strips out the vital nutrients that are meant to grow and properly nourish the human body. These nutrients are simply no longer viable or available in the mainstream food supply. Our modern world has found ways to expedite the process to grow and provide food for you and it’s not necessarily a good thing. Farmers no longer take the time to grow their animals or produce naturally, with some exceptions. Food, on a larger scale, is manufactured to mimic the real deal or to be completely different altogether, all for convenience.
These methods may fool our taste buds and fill the belly, but our bodies have not modernized to accept the poor quality the food has become, and thus, it’s evidently clear in our modern life with real modern health concerns among ourselves and children.
The following are the possible problems associated with physical degeneration in children and adults due to modern foods:
- Unexplained stomach, gut, intestinal problems
- Bloating
- Cramping
- Excessive menstrual discomfort
- Skin allergies (eczema, rashes, etc.)
- Food sensitivities (gluten intolerance, dairy intolerance, etc.)
- Difficulty sleeping
- Brain fog
- Low energy
- Headaches
- Joint pain
- Poor eyesight
- Weight gain
- Low libido
- Abnormal development (in-utero)
- Narrow facial structure
- Crooked teeth
- Cavities
- Infertility
- Poor bone density
- Uncontrollable blood sugar levels
- Heart problems
Bring Tradition Into Your Modern Home
It’s reversible. According to Price, when he provided soaked/fermented porridge (like oats), butter oil (aka Factor X and cod liver oil), he noted a complete reversal of not only symptoms (cavities) but also a reversal in disease that began to degenerate in his patients.
Reverting back to traditional foods is relatively easy to do. When in doubt, ask yourself if the item you plan to feed your children or yourself resembles what it looks like out in nature (or what you’d buy straight from the farmer after a humane harvesting and packaging).
Top traditional foods:
Raw dairy and butter
Porridge made from soaked/fermented whole grains (like oats)
*Animal organs and fats with meat
Broths made from the bones
In season organic produce with emphasis on root and leafy vegetables
In season fruits (minimal)
Tropical fats (coconut and red palm oils)
Honey (sparingly)
Factor X – Butter oil
Sally Fallon, the founder of the Weston A. Price Foundation has wrapped up this traditional lifestyle in our modern world in an easy to read book called Nourishing Traditions. Some of our local health foods stores are featuring these traditional foods in their most natural state – like freshly made bone stock, frozen versus processed and canned.
*Be sure to get your meats from pastured animals (raised on grass and hay only).
You can find whole foods, like raw milk from your state at rawmilk.com to find a farmer near you, inquire how they test their milk, and how it may be beneficial for your family.
“Busy” will only serve you for so long before the convenience of being busy really slows you down…for good. Slow down intentionally and purposefully to enjoy your food and eat real food abundantly with a real purpose, because there’s more to it than just a full belly.
Photo credits: AndiL.
