This is the second part of the article on food secrets that could save your life. You can read the first part here.
- Eat wild foods
Caveman enjoyed all his food from the wild, ranging from fruits, roots, berries and wild meat. He benefited from superhealth, lived long and he enjoyed absence of modern food related complaints such as obesity, heart diseases, and cancers.
Wild berries are known to be rich in anti-ageing and cancer fighting nutrients.
Wild salmon and other wild fish provide high quality omega-3 fatty acids and other nutrients for the brain and well being.
Free range chicken and cattle provide meat, milk and eggs richer in antioxidants, richer in nutrients, richer in ‘good fats’ and low in ‘bad fats’ than zero grazed cattle and caged chicken. Furthermore, they do not contain traces of added hormones, antibiotics or other drugs.
Free range eggs have less cholesterol, less saturated fats, more Vitamin A, 2 times omega-3 fatty acids, three times more vitamin E and five times Vitamin D compared to housed chicken.
Wild foods are safer and beneficial to health than farmed foods. To increase yield but the detriment of health, farmed foods are grown with fertilizers and sprayed with chemicals to kill pests and weeds while wild foods boast of unparallel purity.
The term organic food is the new fad which basically means wild foods i.e. crops grown and animals reared without use of chemicals or fertilizers.
- Avoid foods in ‘coffins’
Any packaged food is dying, half-dead or dead.
You are most likely to find processed food in ‘coffins’ such as a bag, can, jar, box or polythene bag. For food to be successfully packaged it has to undergo some form of processing such milling of maize, pasteurizing of milk and juices, cooking of meat and many others.
The processes of converting raw food into a suitable form for packaging is intended to kill unwanted germs however; it does more that by killing the beneficial nutrients. Destruction of the beneficial nutrients turns food from ‘medicine’ to non beneficial stomach filler. There extent of destruction of the beneficial nutrients depends on the severity of heat and length of treatment.
Packaged foods also swim in chemicals that are used as preservatives or syrups made of high sugar or salt concentration which are all known to be enemies to health.
Since the processing destroys most of the flavour and the vitamins of foods, artificial flavourings and vitamins are added to replace the killed ones.
Most of the foods, particularly fruits and vegetables in their fresh form are superbly nutritious and should be eaten in their natural form.
- Eat God-made not machine-made
God made oranges, pineapples, straw berries, cabbages carrots, brocolli, nutmeg, garlic.
Man spent sleepless nights in the laboratory and imitated God and made flavoured fruit squash, garlic flavoured powder, fizzy drinks, etc.
Man decided to domesticate and feed animals in an enclosure. He again entered the laboratory and came out with various chemicals in the name of animal feeds that baloon them for slaughter within months.
The consequences of all machine-made foods are clearly demonstrated by all manner of terminal diseases such as cancers.
Enjoy foods in their natural form where possible. Some foods such as milk have to be pasteurized to kill germs.
- Eat ‘live bacteria’.
Live bacteria have many healthy benefits to the body including control of intestinal infections, reduction of lactose intolerance, reduction of blood cholesterol levels, improvement of immune system, anti-carcinogenic properties and anti-diarrhea properties.
Live bacteria in food are referred to as probiotics which is a term used to refer to live bacteria that confer health benefits to the consumer. The most common bacteria that are classified as probiotics are lactic acid bacteria, bifidobacteria and some yeasts.
Although many consumers are not aware, lactic acid bacteria are prevalent in homes. They are the bacteria that cause milk to coagulate during fermentation. They coagulate milk by feeding on sugar in milk (lactose) breaking it down to lactic acid.
At the beginning of the 20th century, a Russian bacteriologist Eli Metchnikoff was the first to give a scientific explanation for the beneficial effects of lactic acid bacteria present in fermented milk.
He attributed the good health and longevity of the Bulgarians to their consumption of large amounts of fermented milk, called yahourth.
In 1908 Eli Metchnikoff postulated his ‘longevity-without-aging’ theory. The principle of his theory was that the lactic acid bacteria resulted in the displacement of toxin producing bacteria normally present in the intestine resulting in prolonged life.
Science has since recognised and embraced probiotics as beneficial to human health. Where can you find the probiotics? Traditionally, African communities consumed probiotics from fermented milk, fermented porridge (uji) and other fermented foods including vegetables.
Although the fermentation process was spontaneous, the live bacteria in these foods were effective. A particular case is that of the Maasai community of Kenya who consume high amounts of fermented milk that protect them from various heart related diseases.
Modern sources of probiotics are mainly fermented dairy products such as probiotic yoghurts, fermented sausages and cereal-based fermented foods.
“Let food be thy medicine & let thy medicine be food”.
Thanks for this very important information. I wished it would be made accessible to the majority who think ‘traditional/ natural is primitive!