Did you know this about your food?

Lately, I've been feeling on overload a bit.  I've been reading so much about local eating, and the problems with our food system in this country.  Well, I have actually been studying this for about 5 years now and the more I learn, the more hopeless it becomes. 

We have so little control over the food that goes into our bodies.  When you want to live beyond the processed grocery store food, which the government in all its wisdom deems "safe" it is a very frustrating and daunting task to many.  The government has decided that the irratiated, chemical laiden cheeseburger from McDonald's or that nutritionally bankruptTwinkie are safe for you, but that raw milk from a cow with all it's beneficial enzymes intact is "dangerous"....well, that scares me.  A lot.

Let's think about this.  There have been many studies done of McDonald's hamburgers that will be put on a shelf for literally years, never touched, and they look exactly the way they did when they were bought.  Or a Twinkie, many, many years after manufacture, looks exactly the same as the day it was pressed into a mold and baked.  This food is dead food or it would break down.  What nourishes our bodies?  Why, here's something that some of you may not have thought about.  Living food does.  Our bodies need living food that will actually break down in order to remove the nutrients from it to nourish your physical form.  Dead food will not break down, and therefore does not feed the all important cells in our bodies.  If you don't feed your body living food (which most processed food is no longer living), then you are not providing your body with what it needs to not only survive, but thrive.  Your immune system depends on these living organisms to create resistance to food germs and fight many illnesses.  If you're only eating "sterilized food" then your body is unable to build up resistance to the germs and illnesses that are searching to seek and destroy. 

I could go on and on about this topic, I really could.  I read so many well researched books and found out how dysfunctional our government is that it's terrifying to me that they can control such a personal choice as what I put into my mouth to nourish my body.  The entire food system of our country is owned by big business, but mostly the one I fear the most is Monsanto.  They are in the forefront of genetically modified food and patenting seeds.  Seeds are life, how can you patent food and life?

 And for the love of God, please don't believe the commercials that show the white bread middle Americans walking through their placid little corn field  and tell you that "corn sugar (what the corn industry is calling high fructose corn syrup these days) is just as safe as sugar, why, your body can't tell the difference!"  I know your liver begs to differ with them! 

I think for me, I feel so aggravated some days by the misinformation and agendas from the big business and corporate greed that drive what happens to our food.  Did you know that the USDA is not allowed to force a recall on tainted food?  They can only recommend it, they aren't allowed to order it.  So if hamburger goes out to 10,000 retailers from some large factory farmed plant and it's tainted with ecoli, some of which very possibly could kill people (or hey, spinach that has used that "fertilizer" from that factory farm and spread that ecoli to spinach), the USDA is only allowed to say to the company, we recommend a recall.  Then, the company is allowed to do whatever it wants from there.  How many times have they ignored the recommendation because recalling thousands of pounds of tainted meat would be too costly?  Anyone seeing the problem here but me?  The stories I have seen and the research I have read would scare the hell out of the average American.  Or maybe it wouldn't, I don't know, but it sure scares the hell out of me.

I'm eternally thankful that I have fresh, local food available to me to feed my family.  I'm very grateful for the farms that raise that food and fight the fights they need to to keep that option alive for me.  However if the government and big business have their way, I will no longer be able to purchase that food.  In fact, believe it or not, I would not even be able to consume the food I've grown myself for my own consumption.  Oh, this is no joke, folks.  Legislation like this tries to sneak through at every turn.  And you can say what you will about NH, but this is one time I'm truly thankful for our motto, "Live Free or Die"...I just hope it doesn't actually come to that. 

Trying to find my way through the food industry minefield, ~Peacemom 

Yogurt!

This is my very first attempt at making home made yogurt. It brings back memories of my first cheese making project as they both start the same way, heating up the milk. In this case, I used raw milk from our fresh milk/egg/meat CSA. The best milk, so good!

It's really quite easy to make. Sterilizing everything you'll need to use first, like containers, thermometer, pan, spoons, etc. Heat 1/2 gallon milk to 190 degrees, remove from heat and let cool to 105 degrees. Take 4 oz already prepared plain yogurt (I used Stonyfield Organic Plain), put it in a bowl. Add 4 oz of 105 degree milk to it to temper the yogurt. Then, mix all back into the milk.

If you want fruit in your yogurt, use 8oz frozen or fresh fruit, add 1 T sugar or honey and heat on stovetop until reduced about half. Crush with potato masher when softened. Spoon about 1/4 c of fruit in the bottom of an 8oz container with a tight fitting lid (I used 1/2 pint mason jelly jars), fill with yogurt. Fill a small cooler with about 1/2 gallon water that is 105 degrees, place jars in cooler and close the lid. Place cooler in a warm place for 4-6 hours and presto, you've got yogurt! If you use raw whole milk, it will not taste like the yogurt you're accustomed to. No tang, no bite, it's smooth and silkie and quite delicious. Give it a go, it's really easy and so economical. I pay $7.00 a gallon for organic raw whole milk at the farm, I can get about 20 servings from a gallon. So, I pay about $.38 per container and that includes the fruit (I used strawberries I picked last summer). Stonyfield organic yogurt is $1.19 in the grocery store here, so that's a serious savings, and we eat a lot of yogurt in our house.

On my pursuit of local only food, it's a great item to make on my own. Even the Stonyfield that I use as the starter is local for me as their plant is in the next town and also their milk, though pooled, is organic and local to New England. I am not contributing any plastic containers to any recycling or worse yet garbage heap, the ingredients were all within biking distance of my house and it is totally yummy. I control the amount of sugar, preservatives (none!) and coloring (also none!) that go into it. I feel that much more self reliant knowing I can make this for my family. It's all good, folks. Give it a go, it's really easy, very low-tech and you won't be sorry you tried a new skill.

I also made my very first totally homemade tortillas last night for Lime Chicken Tacos. They were a little crispy for a first try, but the flavor was great and the chicken with lime filling was really yummy. I'll post that some time later as it was incredibly easy to make as well. I get chicken from my CSA which always comes in whole form. Though I could cut it up and cook it separately well, it's already thawed whole, so I just cook the whole thing. I usually get about 6 meals out of one chicken. They are big, yummy and free range, so tend to have a good muscle mass to them. I had some left over rib, leg and thigh meat, so I decided to give the tacos a whirl for Music Man and I and they came out quite good. Since he's been laid off again, I'm in total survival mode, gotta do more for myself and not buy anything prepackaged any more (I've yet to perfect the Cheez It though, Music Man's big weakness!) . Of course, there are so many health benefits to that since I know exactly what goes in to it and where it came from. Perhaps that will be one of those wonderful by products of a stressful situation, really making me walk the walk instead of it being partly talking the talk. It's a whole different story when you're really making it work for yourself and proving to yourself you can be much more self sufficient then you ever thought possible. Feels really good, honestly.

Yogurt adventures to you, ~Peacemom