All posts tagged baby steps

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Let’s face it: we’re not perfect.  Some of us are just starting our real food journey.  Sometimes we need a break from the kitchen.  Sometimes we’re in a phase of life where we can’t do everything and some convenience is helpful.  Last week we talked about 10 things you shouldn’t buy at the store.  And while generally, buying packaged and pre-made foods is not the best plan, sometimes we just need a break.  Today we’re going to look at 10 items that are okay to buy from the store.

Keep in mind most of these are not excellent nutrition or perfect options.  I’m not recommending a steady diet of store-bought foods.  But when you just need something easy, these are some better options.

1) Cheese

Ultimately, you can’t go wrong with cheese (as long as it’s actual cheese — not “cheese food product”).  Although normal store-bought cheese won’t be grass-fed or raw, at least it’s a real food.  Plus you can serve it simply in slices or cubes, on crackers, or in sandwiches.  We rely on cheese a lot when I don’t want to cook or we’re out and about.  Look for hormone-free varieties, which can be found in most grocery stores.  Imported cheeses are often grass-fed and raw even if they don’t explicitly say so (I have found these at Costco).

2) Frozen fruit and vegetables

These are so helpful for a wide variety of meals.  Frozen veggies go into soups, as part of a stir-fry, or served as a side dish.  Frozen fruit can go into smoothies, be an “as is” snack (especially for teething babies), or even make a quick fruit salad.  I always have these on hand (choosing organic where the fruits/veggies are on the ‘dirty dozen’ list).  These are great any time, really, and are not much of a compromise (especially off season).

3) Pretzels

Okay, they aren’t nourishing.  But they usually have few ingredients and no preservatives.  I like to buy them every now and then if we’re having a rough time, and serve them with cheese and meat.  Perfect meal?  No.  But it gets the kids fed and makes them happy.  Just make sure to check the ingredients because a few brands have corn syrup or soy in them, but most don’t.

4) “Natural” Macaroni and Cheese

Any brand that has actual pasta and cheese in it is okay.  I found the Annie’s organic in a big box at Costco cheaply.  A 15-count box lasted us two months (and I’m a little sad that wasn’t longer, honestly).  Make it with real butter and whole milk (ignore the instructions; use 4 tbsp. butter and 2 – 4 tbsp. whole milk) and add some ground beef or cooked chicken and it’s not too bad.  Pair it with some steamed veggies and fruit slices and you’ve got a pretty healthy meal.

5) Sourdough bread

Sometimes we all just need a little bread!   Sourdough is the one type that’s usually safe, because it has minimal ingredients and it naturally lasts longer due to the soured grains.  Make grilled cheese or other sandwiches, serve bread and butter, or even hot sandwiches or stuffing!  It’s an easy meal component.

6) Yogurt (plain)

I like to buy either Trader Joe’s European style or Dannon plain, because both of these brands are only cultured milk.  They don’t have pectin or guar gum or any of those additives.  Dannon can be found at any store.  Just make sure it’s whole milk and plain.  This can be eaten plain (add a little fruit and honey if desired) or add to smoothies.  It’s nourishing and easy, and if you get brave, you can use either as a starter culture to make your own yogurt at home.

7) “Natural” lunch meat

Look for brands like Applegate farms — ones that are free of nitrites, nitrates, and other preservatives.  Use them to make sandwiches or just to eat plain.  My kids love uncured pepperoni and cheese slices.  Add a banana and you have lunch.

“Natural” hot dogs

These, too, are awesome.  Look for brands that are uncured and free of nitrites.  Serve on a slice of sourdough, mix into mac’n'cheese, or just serve plain.  You can even make pigs-in-blankets (and they can be made ahead of time and frozen) for an easy lunch on the go.

9) Crackers

Look for crackers with minimal ingredients, and no soy or canola.  Many health food stores have decent ones.  Serve with cheese and/or lunch meat for a quick meal.  If you can eat it, add some nut butters too (another item you can buy at the store — just make sure it only contains nuts.  You can add honey and sea salt at home if you like).

10) Brown rice pasta

If all else fails, have pasta for dinner.  Brown rice is low in phytates and phytic acid, so if it doesn’t get soaked, it’s not a tragedy (that’s why you should choose it).  Pair with meat and sauce, or have BLT pasta (I’ve been making that for lunch lately).  There are lots of ways to serve pasta with nourishing ingredients!  You can buy regular brown rice, too, and use that for stir-fry or Mexican Rice.

With these simple ingredients, you can make food very quickly and easily, that is not too bad!  It’s good to know there are options on days when you are busy or sick or just plain tired.

What do you buy at the store for busy days?

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I buy food in packages sometimes.

OKAY, I said it!  I do.  But, especially since Jacob is sensitive to corn and soy, I have pretty strict standards about what I will buy and what I won’t.  And the number of packaged items I buy has gone down over time.  If you took a look at my pantry, you’d find almost nothing that you could just grab and eat (frustrating, when everyone’s starving and no one wants to cook).  And if anything ready-to-eat is there, you can bet I’ve probably made it.  Like the macaroons I made for the kids yesterday morning…which are now gone (their friends were here and they shared).

Some foods are “iffy” — you might buy them if you don’t have a particular reason not to (like chocolate chips — they contain soy lecithin so I don’t buy them, but I used to sometimes before we discovered Jacob’s sensitivity).  Or maybe some are just special, rare treats.

But there are some things that, generally, you should never buy at a store, if you can help it, because there is just no redeeming value there.  Let’s dive in and take a look.

1) Beef (the one ” plain ingredient” on this list)

I can walk into some health food stores and find “grass-fed beef.”  It is potentially as low as 30% grass-fed (that’s what USDA organic standards require) and very likely not grass-finished.  And plain ground beef costs $6/lb. or more.  In any normal store, beef is corn-fed and probably has hormones and antibiotics in it.  I can’t even stand that stuff anymore; it stinks and I don’t feel well after eating it (yes, plain beef).  And that CAFO meat costs $2.50/lb. minimum, on up to $4/lb., depending on the store and “type” (fat content).  Or, I can go to my local farmer and buy 10o% grass-fed beef for $3.50/lb.  It’s a no-brainer.  Even if it’s not actually cheaper to buy the best in your area, it’s worth it for high quality meat.

2) Ice Cream

Who doesn’t love ice cream?  There have been weeks — yes, really — where we literally ate an entire batch, every single day.  This was usually, but not always, in the summer.  It was our bedtime snack.  However, it was never store-bought.  That stuff has anti-freeze in it, plus skim milk (in ice cream), corn syrup, guar gum, and a lot of other additives.  And that’s just for vanilla.  Forget about the junk in the interesting flavors.  Make your own ice cream at home and skip the junk.  Mixing raw cream, raw pastured egg yolks, raw local honey, real homemade vanilla…it’s practically a health food!

3) Bread

There’s one caveat to this: if you can find real sourdough bread (ingredients should read: flour, water, salt and maybe honey), that is fine to buy.  But if we’re talking the usual grocery-store-bakery-dinner-roll sort of bread, don’t buy it.  The ingredients list has about 30 things on it, including soy oil, powdered milk, high fructose corn syrup, dough conditioners, and other things that make you go “Is that food?”  It’s not.  Not to mention bread is usually made with all or mostly white flour (even “whole wheat” bread is at least half white flour in most cases), and it’s treated with some type of preservatives.  Real, homemade bread doesn’t stay soft and mold-free for weeks at a time.  It’ll be “less good’ the day after you bake, stale and dry by 2 or 3 days, and moldy by a week, supposing it’s wrapped up (if it’s sitting out, it’ll just dry out and be good for breadcrumbs, which are something else you should never buy).

4) Chicken Stock (or Beef, etc.)

You cannot buy healthy stock from the store, with very few exceptions.  I know some farms or small stores make their own stock in-house, but this usually is expensive, $3 – $4/quart.  Stock is so easy to make, and bones cost $1 – $2/lb., which ultimately means you’re paying under $10 for a couple gallons of stock.  Don’t buy the cartons of stock or cans or even worse, bouillion cubes.  They don’t have any of the gelatin or other goodness of stock, and they have MSG.  Ugh.  Skip it.  Make chicken stock or beef stock at home!

5) Salad Dressing/Marinades, Barbecue Sauce

I used to buy these all the time.  Until I looked at the ingredients and realized that even ones that weren’t sweet contained high fructose corn syrup.  They also usually have soybean oil, corn starch, and various thickeners, artificial colors and flavors.  No thanks.  It’s easy to make your own salad dressing (or this one), or chicken marinade or beef marinade, and even barbecue sauce isn’t hard.  Why waste money on unhealthy store-bought versions?

6) Frozen Pizza

Sometime last year, it was getting late and we wanted a fast dinner.  I headed to a health food store and bought a frozen pizza, rationalizing that it “wasn’t that bad” because, well, it was a health food store.  Umm…yuck?  Plus I didn’t feel well.  Even the “good” ones have white flour (or unsoaked whole wheat…but not much of it), dough conditioners, soy or canola oil, and so on.  Don’t even look at the ingredients on the bad ones.  Instead, do what we used to do (and need to do again): make up a triple batch of pizza dough, then make 20 or 30 personal-size pizzas and freeze them.  It’s simple: make the dough (you can use sprouted flour or adapt for soaking), spread it, pre-bake at 400 for 5 minutes, add sauce, cheese, and any toppings, and wrap it up to freeze.  I haven’t found a better solution than aluminum foil for this, sadly…though I suppose if you wrapped in parchment paper first then in foil, it wouldn’t matter since the aluminum wouldn’t touch your food.  Hmmm….  Anyway, then all you have to do is toss a homemade frozen pizza in the oven at 450 for 10 – 15 minutes.  So awesome.

7) Cream Soups

So many casseroles and other one-dish meals call for cream soups.  It’s almost annoyingly ubiquitous, like with a bag of frozen veggies, some chicken breasts, and a mixture of cream soups, you can make a “from-scratch” dinner, fast.  Not so much.  At least not the “scratch” part.  Have you read the ingredients?  More soybean oil, cornstarch (all GMO), artificial and “natural” flavors, thickeners, preservatives, an incredible amount of processed, refined sodium….  But of course if you enjoy that type of cooking, there’s no reason you should give it up.  Instead of using canned cream soups, make your own cream soups.  Then enjoy your rich, delicious, nutrient-dense meals!

Cake or Mixes, or Frosting

Cake isn’t health food.  Even if you make it at home.  But what’s a birthday party without a little cake?  I’m still enjoying my birthday cake (well, I finished it last night — and you’ll get the cake recipe next week and the real buttercream frosting, with no powdered sugar, the week after).  But the the store-bought cake, mixes, and frostings are absolutely awful.  They’re full of vegetable oils, refined white flour, GMO beet sugar or corn syrup, various preservatives and additives, food dye, and so on.  There’s no redeeming value to consuming those.  In contrast, if you make a cake and frosting at home, at least you’re getting rich cream and butter, pastured eggs, the chance to use sprouted or almond flour, and other nourishing ingredients.  There’s still sugar.  But there’s definite redeeming nutritional value there.  Try chocolate fudge cake, chocolate zucchini cake, spice cake, or even carrot cake!

9) Cookies or Brownies

Same deal here.  Not health food, but homemade at least doesn’t contain vegetable shortening, artificial flavors, and other complete junk.  There’s something delicious and sort of nutritious about a cookie loaded with real butter, eggs, homemade vanilla, and aromatic spices.  Try my grain-free brownies (I love these), or oatmeal chocolate chip cookies (must find a way to soak them), or even devil’s food cookies.

10) Fried Chicken or Fried Potatoes (or fried anything…)

Eek.  Have you looked at the ingredients on these things?  Fried foods aren’t the healthiest (because the cooking method, despite the type of oil, reacts with the starches and creates some yucky stuff — so still, keep it as a rare treat), but the ones from the store are made with vegetable shortening, white flour, various additives and preservatives…awful stuff.  Instead, bread your own chicken in sprouted flour, or soak organic potatoes in water (to reduce starch) and then fry them yourself in coconut oil, pastured lard, or another healthy oil.  I am really loving my pastured lard lately — it just makes things so delicious.  Try chicken nuggets, amazing fries, or even popcorn chicken (from my newest book!).

**This post been entered in Real Food Wednesdays at Kelly the Kitchen Kop!**

What foods from the grocery store make you hesitate or say “No way!”  Were you surprised by any on this list?