OBC Food Rules-Day 40: Be the kind of person who takes supplements - then skip the supplements

We know that people who take supplements are generally healthier than the rest of us, and we also know that in controlled studies most of the supplements they take don't appear to be effective.  How can this be?  Supplement takers are healthy for reasons that have nothing to do with the pills.  They're typically more health conscious, better educated, and more affluent.  They're also more likely to exercise and eat whole grains.  So to the extent you can, be the kind of person who would take supplements, and then save your money.  (There are exceptions to this rule, for people who have a specific nutrient deficiency or are older than fifty.  As we age, our need for antioxidants increases while our body's ability to absorb them from the diet declines.  And if you don't eat much fish, it couldn't hurt to take a fish oil supplement too.)

OBC Food Rules-Day 38: Favor the Kinds of Oils and Grains that have Traditionally been Stone-Ground

When grindstones were the only way to refine flour and oil, four and oil were generally more nutritious.  In the case of grain, more fo the germ and fiber remains when its ground on a stone; you can't get white flour from a stone.  The nutritional benefits of whole grains are impressive:  fiber, the full range of B vitamins; and healthy oils, all of which are sacrificed when the grain is refined on modern roller mills (as mentioned, highly refined flours are little different from sugar).  And the newer oils that are extracted by modern chemical means tend to have less favorable fatty acid profiles and more additives than olive, sesame, palm fruit, and peanut oils that have been obtained the old-fashioned way.

OBC Food Rules-Day 37: "The Whiter the Bread, the Sooner You'll be Dead"

This rather blunt bit of cross-cultural grandmotherly advice (passed down from both Jewish and Italian grandmothers) suggests that the health risks of white flour have been popularly recognized for many years.  As far as the body is concerned, white flour is not that much different from sugar.  Unless supplemented, it offers none of the good things (fiber, B vitamins, healthy fats) in whole grains-it's a little more than a shot of glucose.  Large spikes of glucose are iflammatory and wreak havoc on our insulin metabolism.   Eat whole grains and minimize your consumption of white flour.  Recent research indicates that the grandmothers who lived by this rule were right:  People who eat lots of whole grains tend to be healthier and to live longer.

OBC Food Rules-Day 35: Eat Sweet Foods as you Would Find them in Nature

In nature, sugars are almost always packaged with fiber, which slows their absorption and gives you a sense of satiety before you've ingested to many calories.  That's why you're always better off eating the fruit rather than drinking it's juice.  (In general, calories taken in liquid form are more fattening because they do not make us feel full.  Humans are one of the very few mammals that obtain calories from liquids after weaning.)  So don't drink your sweets, and remember:  There is no such thing as a healthy soda.

OBC Food Rules-Day33: Eat Some Foods that have been Predigested by Bacteria or Fungi

Many traditional cultures swear by the health benefits of fermented foods-foods that have been transformed by live microorganisms, such as yogurt or sauerkraut, soy sauce, kimchi, and sourdough bread.  These foods can be a good source of vitamin B12, an essential nutrient you can't get from plants.  (B12 is produced by animals and bacteria.)  Many fermented foods also contain probiotics-beneficial bacteria that research suggests improve the function of the digestive and immune systems and, according to some studies, help reduce allergic reactions and inflammation.

OBC Food Rules-Day 32: Don't Overlook the Oily Little Fishes

Wild fish are among the healthiest things you can eat, yet many wild fish stocks are on the verge of collapse becuase of overfishing.  Avoid big fish fish at the top of the marine food chain-tuna, swordfish, shark-because they're endangered, and because they often contain high levels of mercury.  Fortunately, a few of the most nutritious wild fish species, including mackerel, sardines, and anchovies, are well managed, and in some cases are even abundant.  These oily little fish are particularly good choices.  According to a Dutch proverb, "A land with lots of herring can get along with few doctors."

OBC Food Rules-Day 31: Eat Wild Foods When You Can

Two of the most nutritious plants in the world-lamb's quarters and purslane-are weeds, and some of the healthiest diets, like the Mediterranean, make frequent use of wild greens.  The fields and forests are crowded with plants containing higher levels of various Phytochemicals than their domesticated cousins.  Why?  Bevause these plants have to defend themselves against pests  and disease without any help from us, and becuase historically we've tended to select and breed crops for sweetness; many of the defensive compounds plants produce are bitter.  We also breed for shelf life, and so have unwittingly selected for plants with low levels of omega-3 fatty acids, since these fats quickly oxidize-turn rancid.   Wild animals and fish too are worth adding to your diet when you have the opportunity.  Wild game generally has less saturated and more healthy fats than domesticated animals, becuase most of these animals themselves eat a diverse diet of plants rather than grain (see rule 27).

OBC Food Rules-Day 30: Eat Well-Grown Food from Healthy Soil

It would have been easier to say "eat organic" and it is true that food certified organic is usually all grown in relatively healthy soil-soil nourished by organic matter rather than chemical fertilizers.  (It also will contain  little or no residue from synthetic pesticides or pharmaceuticals.)  Yet there are always exceptional farmers and ranchers in America who for one reason or another are not certified organic, and the excellent food they grow should not be overlooked.  (And just because a food is labeled organic, does not mean it's good for you:  Organi soda is still soda-a large quantity of utterly empty calories.)

We now have a body of research supporting the hypothesis, first advanced by organic pioneers Sir Albert Howard and J.I. Rodale, that soils rich in organic matter produce more nutritious food:  that is food with higher leveles of antioxidants, flavanoids, vitamins, and minerals.  Of course, after a few days of rising cross-country in a truck, the nutritional quality of any kind of produce will deteriorate, so ideally you want to eat food that is both organic and local.

OBC Food Rules-Day 29: Eat like an Omnivore

Whether or not you eat any animal foods, it's a good idea to try to add some new species, and not just new foods, to your diet-that is, new kinds of plants, animals, and fungi.  The dazzling diversity of food products on offer in the supermarket is deceptive, because so many of them are made from the same small handful of plant species, and most of those-the corn and soy and wheat-are seeds rather than leaves.  The greater the diversity of species you eat, the more likely you are to cover all of your nutritional bases.

OBC Food Rules-Day 28: If you have the Space, Buy a Freezer

When you find a good source of pastured meat, you'll want to buy it in quantity.  Buying meat in bulk-a quarter of a steer, say, or a whole hog-is one way to eat well on a budget.  Dedicated freezers are surprisingly inexpensive to buy and operate, because they aren't opened nearly as often as the one in your refrigerator,  A freezer will also enable you to put up food from the farmers market, and encourage you to buy produce in bulk at the height of its season, when it will be most abundant-and therefore the cheapest.  And freezing does not significantly diminish the nutritional value of produce.

OBC Food Rules-Day 27: Eat Animals that have Themselves Eaten Well

The diet of the animals we eat strongly influences the nutritional quality, and healthfulness, of the food we get from them, whether it is meat or milk or eggs.  This should be self-evident, yet it is a truth routinely overlooked by the industrial food chain in its quest to produce vast quantities of cheap animal protein.  That quest has changed the diet of most of our food animals in ways that have often damaged their health and healthfulness.  We feed animals a high energy diet of grain to make them grow quickly, even in the case of rumminants that have evolved to eat grass.  But even food animals that can tolerate grain are much healthier when they have access to green plants-and so it turns out, are their meat and eggs.  The food from these animals will contain much healthier types of fat (more omega-3s, less omega-6s) as well as appreciably higher levels of vitamins and antioxidants.  (For the same reason, meat from wild animals is particularly nutritious; see rule 31).  It's worth looking for pastured animal foods in the market-and paying the premium prices they typically command if you can.

OBC Food Rules-Day 26: Drink the Spinach Water

Another bit of  traditinal wisdom with good science behind it:  the water in which vegetables are cooked is rich in vitamins and other healthful plant chemicals.  Save it for soup or add it to sauces.

OBC Food Rules-Day 24: Eating What Stands on One Leg (mushrooms and plant foods) is Better than Eating what Stands on Two Legs (fowl), Which is Better than Eating What Stands on Four Legs (cows, pigs and other mammals)

The Chinese proverb offers a good summary of traditional wisdom regarding the relative healthfulness of different kinds of food, though it inexplicably leaves out the very healthful and entirely legless fish.

OBC Food Rules-Day 22: Eat Mostly Plants, Especially Leaves

Scientists may disagree on what’s good about some plants-the antioxidants?  The fiber?  The omega-3 fatty acids?- but they do agree that they’re probably really good for you and certainly can’t hurt.  There are scores of studies demonstrating that a diet rich in vegetables and fruits reduces the risk of dying from all the Western diseases; in countries where people eat a pound or more of vegetables and fruits a day, the rate of cancer is half what it is in the United States.  Also, by eating a diet that is primarily plant based, you’ll be consuming far fewer calories, since plant foods-with the exception of seeds, including grains and nuts-are typically less “energy dense” than the other things youe at.  (And consuming fewer calories protects against many chronic diseases.)  Vegetarians are notably healthier than carnivores, and live longer.

OBC Food Rules - The First 21 Days!

The first 21 days have focused on what “food” is.  The next 22 days will focus on what “kind of food” is best to eat.  If you’ve followed the rules offered thus far you will be eating real, whole food most of the time – the simple key to a healthy diet.  Beyond that, you have a great many options.  One lesson that can be drawn from the striking diversity of traditional diets people have lived on around the world is that it si possible to nourish ourselves from an astonishing range of foods – so long as they are real foods.  There have been, and can be, healthy high-fat and healthy low-fat diest, but they have always been diest built around whole foods.  Yet there are some whole foods that are better for us than others, and some ways of producing them and then combining them in meals that can make a difference.  So the rules in this next  section propose a handful of personal policies regarding what to eat, above and beyond “food”.

Side note:  For your own copy of this great book of food rules, please visit your local book store, Whole Foods book section, or online.

OBC Food Rules-Day 19: If it Came From a Plant, Eat it; if it was Made in a Plant, Don’t.

OBC Food Rules-Day 18: Don’t Digest Foods Made in Places Where Everyone is Required to Wear a Surgical Cap

OBC Food Rules-Day 16: Buy Your Snacks at the Farmers Market

You’ll find yourself snacking on fresh or dried fruits and nuts-real food-rather than chips and sweets.