Processed Food

Anything with a long ingredients list or manufacturing process.

Processed food is manufactured to be cheap (sugar is used as a cheap filler). Chemicals are added so that it is portable and shelf-stable. It is manipulated for texture, mouthfeel, and taste. It also tends to be polluted with toxicants, such as pesticides.

- Refined carbohydrates and flour (chips, pretzels, crackers, cookies, pastries, muffins, buns, breads, pizza dough, cakes, doughnuts, energy bars, candy, fried foods, and any processed ‘low fat’ foods.

- Hydrogenated vegetable oils

- Preservatives

- Dyes

- Emulsifiers

- Taste enhancers

- Flavoured drinks and beverages like tea and coffee

Allergens

Foods identified by the research as allergenic. For a range of reasons – pesticides, processing, genetic modification, hybridization.

- Gluten

- Soy

- Corn

- Grains

- Dairy

As a start, avoid gluten-containing grains. Quinoa, buckwheat, white rice, and white potatoes may ultimately be fine; however, most people benefit from a temporary 30-day break to really heal first before adding them back in. Also included in the 30-day restriction is legumes, as the lectins they contain can have inflammatory effects.

- Beans

- Peas

- Lentils

- Peanuts (not a nut)

Sugar

Causes oxidative stress, inflammation and disruption to our metabolism, hormones, gut, immune system, and brain function. We just aren’t equipped to tolerate it in anywhere near the quantities we eat it in!

Also, cut out any sweeteners to help unhook from “bliss-point”.

- Evaporated can juice

- Corn syrup

- High-fructose corn syrup

- Crystalling fructose

- Fructose

- Sucrose

- Malt

- Maltose

- Maltodextrin

- Dextrose

- Beet sugar

- Turbinado sugar

- Invert sugar

The Clean 15

if you’re going to choose non-organic, you should look at “The Clean 15.” These fruits and vegetables might contain trace amounts of pesticides, but overall they’re not very harmful and worth buying non-organic

• Avocados
• Sweet Corn
• Pineapples
• Sweet Peas Frozen
• Onions
• Papayas
• Eggplants
• Asparagus
• Kiwifruit
• Cabbages
• Cauliflower
• Cantaloupes
• Broccoli
• Mushrooms
• Honeydew Melons

The Dirty Dozen

The Environmental Working Group releases a list each year of fruits and veggies you should always buy organic. Those are known as “The Dirty Dozen,” thanks to their high likelihood of exposure to and absorption of pesticides. 

• Strawberries
• apples
• Nectarines
• Peaches
• Celery
• Grapes
• Cherries
• Spinach
• Tomatoes
• Bell peppers
• Cherry tomatoes
• Cucumbers 

.

..

.

Fresh Fruits and Vegetables

• Root vegetables
• Pastured meats
• Wild fish
• Pastured eggs,
• Nuts, and seeds
• Traditional fats like olive oil, coconut oil, or grass-fed ghee
• Drink: filtered water and kombucha

The Environmental Working Group releases a list each year of fruits and veggies you should always buy organic. Those are known as “The Dirty Dozen,” thanks to their high likelihood of exposure to and absorption of pesticides. their high likelihood of exposure to and absorption of pesticides. 

CREATING YOUR OWN CONVENIENCE

I do this through cooking in bulk and freezing.

Having a stockpile of bulk-cooked meals makes a huge difference on those nights when you don’t feel up to cooking.

This can be as simple as just cooking a bit extra.

Or as hardcore as a massive stockpiling mission. I did this in the months leading up to my son’s birth.

I do this for convenience and to stay away from premade food.

Premade food is often highly processed and full of preservatives to lengthen out its shelf life. Making it from scratch and freezing it is often a much healthier option. This way you have food to grab when you’re in a rush but know it’s the sort of food that is good for your body. Creating healthy convenience when you need it.

Some of my top cook-in-bulk options are

Bolognese 

I love having some containers of meat and bolognese sauce sitting in my freezer. When I need a straightforward meal I heat it up and pour it over spaghetti squash and spinach. 

We have some organic cheese and a bit of milk kefir on top and it’s delicious.

Chicken thighs 

Precooked and then frozen. I sprinkle salt, pepper and garlic powder and bake them in the oven for 40-50 mins. It’s pretty easy to heat up some veggies or make a salad to go with it.

Beef and mushroom stew 

Or any slow-cooked meal really. 

Throw all the ingredients in a slow cooker and leave it all day. 

When you get home you have hot food and leftovers to freeze for lunches or a quick dinner on a busy day.

I even made paleo pizza bases I found online, covered them in toppings, and froze them. This was an awesome quick easy and yummy treat when I didn’t feel up to cooking.

Frozen treats can also be great. I have made paleo snickers bars, coconut oil chocolates, and zucchini chocolate chip muffins.

Talking about treats is an important area when it comes to sticking with a healthy diet. 

When making treats, I try to lean into healthier options. I try to use fresh fruit, raw honey, and real maple syrup for sweetness. 

I also like to include healthy fats like avocado, coconut oil, and organic butter.

Here are some of my favorite treats to make:

• Popcorn I pop myself in ghee, covered in organic butter and some mineral salt.

• Chocolate is made from cocoa powder, coconut oil, honey, and vanilla essence. With nuts and dried fruit.

• Zucchini chocolate muffins with the main ingredients being zucchini, banana, cashew butter, and cocoa powder.

• Chocolate mousse made using avocado for the creaminess. So crazy good with some fresh strawberries.

I find I come and go off my different treats. I think that’s ok and part of the process.

Now, some of my treats can be challenging to make or take up quite a bit of time to prepare. I find it’s a good idea to have treats that are less accessible. When the craving starts to dwindle, it gives me pause about whether I want to keep making that time-consuming treat or just grab a piece of fresh fruit. 

However healthy the individual ingredients of a treat might be, most often they are in a quantity that is not ideal. 

It’s best to have them infrequently.

So treat yourself on occasion, however, cheating is a whole different thing which I will now cover in my third tip

CHEATER'S CAVE - CREATING CRAVING-FREE CUPBOARD

Maybe you have come across the idea of having a cheat meal a week or maybe even an entire day of cheating. The idea is that for that meal or day you can eat whatever you like. People suggest this helps you to stick with a diet.

My opinion may not be popular, but I believe cheater’s cave.

Now don’t get me wrong, I definitely think you should treat yourself through healthy options that satisfy your cravings.

What I’m talking about is eating food you know to be unhealthy. Food that goes against your new healthy choices. Cheating doesn’t just compromise the diet. Cheating compromises your own health goal.

In almost all other areas, I feel we understand this. You want to have a healthy long-term relationship. Cheating one day a week is not the way to do it. You are trying to build a healthy relationship with your body through the food you’re eating. Cheating is not the way to do that. 

The other thing is, that even if you only have one cheat meal a week, I have noticed the obsession that can come with that one meal. Fantasizing about what you plan to consume on that day can spill over into the rest of your week and affect your supermarket shop.

You hopefully started eating this way by throwing out all the food you plan to never eat again as I suggested in our how to get started video.

So you don’t want to spoil those efforts by going and buying those exact same things and bringing them back into your house. Don’t cruise around the supermarket checking out all that food you said you wouldn’t eat anymore. Planning and purchasing what you might have for that meal where your new healthy principles don't apply.

I’ve found this just maintains the desire and taste for those foods. 

In contrast, if you can avoid them entirely you can recalibrate how you experience food.

We now find sweets pretty sickening and broccoli sweet. 

Instead of creating a new lifestyle that will become easier and more normal for you. Cheating it will stay just a diet and not a long-term change.

Ultimately, I see you cheating yourself out of a healthier life.

Now, it will really help to have supportive people around you. Helping you to stay faithful to your new way of eating.

So join or create a culinary community!

Find your people, people who eat the way you do, and support your healthy life changes.

If you want to change to a healthier way of living it can be hard when you feel alone in it and isolated by it. That’s why connecting with people who eat how you eat is so important I think. People whom you can have meals with and share recipes.

We have the person who got us onto this way of eating and it is so nice to hang out with her and eat the way we eat together. The feeling of comradery is great and it really motivates us to stick with it.

There are all sorts of online communities so there are no excuses if you don’t know anyone personally that eats like this.

As a bonus, we want to address how to stick to a healthy diet on the weekend.

Firstly I’d suggest you steer clear of using one of those days as a cheat day. This is not going to help you stick with it. Rather it may derail the rest of your week. 

Use the extra time you may have on the weekend to cook in bulk so you don’t have to cook as much during the week when you are busy with work or school.

Decide on a special treat meal that sticks to the diet guidelines. This might be a little more time-consuming to make or have slightly fancier ingredients to help you feel excited by the diet. Eating healthy can feel like luxury if you make an effort.

I hope these tips can help you stick to your diet. 

More importantly, I hope it changes a diet into a permanent healthy lifestyle. 

I see this as the real goal of these tips.