Wise Traditions, Volume 8, Number 3

FEATURES

• Making It Practical
  • Healthy Eating Shouldn't Cost an Arm and a Leg, Anne Sergeant shows how you can save money eating a healthy traditional diet
  • Cooking for Sequoia Academy, Stephanie Rivers develops a healthy lunch program for a small private school
  • Building a Local Food-Buying Club, John Moody gives details on connecting with local farms and economies
  • Drink that Milk! Eat those Peas!, Tricks for getting children to enjoy traditional foods from super-mom Maureen Diaz

DEPARTMENTS

• President’s Message: Making It Practical
• Letters: Letters to the Editor of Wise Traditions
• Caustic Commentary: Sally Fallon Morell and Mary Enig take on the Diet Dictocrats
• Farm & Ranch: Joel Salatin testifies on the state of the conventional food system
• Homeopathy Journal: Joette Calabrese describes a homeopathic first aid kit
• Know Your Fats: Mary Enig replies to the National Association of Margarine Manufacturers
• All Thumbs Book Reviews
  • Thumbs Up: Put Your Heart in Your Mouth by Natasha Campbell-McBride
  • Thumbs Up: Politically Incorrect Nutrition by Michael Barbee
  • Thumbs Down: The Cholesterol Wars by Daniel Steinberg
  • Thumbs Down: Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease by Caldwell B. Esselstyn
• Tim’s DVD Reviews
  • Thumbs Up: Making Food Storage a Lifestyle by Russ Silver
  • Thumbs Up: The Raw Milk Controversy by Mark McAfee
  • Thumbs Down: Michael Pollan on What's Wrong with Environmentalism
  • Thumbs Down: Food Matters--You Are What You Eat by Permacology Productions
• Children's Health: Jen Allbritton responds to Frequently Asked Questions (Growing Wise Kids)
• Soy Alert: Kaayla Daniel describes the scandal of soy-based food aide programs
• NAIS Update: Judith McGeary demolishes the traceability myth
• A Campaign for Real Milk (on realmilk.com):
  
  • Raw Milk: What the Scientific Literature Really Says (1.1MB PDF), A Response to Bill Marler, JD, Prepared by the Weston A. Price Foundation
  • Response to Anti-Raw Milk Position Paper by Bill Marler, JD (274KB PDF), Summary Prepared by the Weston A. Price Foundation
• Healthy Baby Gallery: More healthy Wise Traditions babies!

President's Message: Making It Practical

by Sally Fallon Morell

“I can’t afford healthy food!” That’s what we often hear when presenting information on healthy traditional diets. Or, “I don’t have time,” or “It’s not practical.”

In this issue we address these concerns with several plans developed by individual members who have faced this common challenge. From buying clubs that connect consumers to grass-based farmers, to mothers crafting healthy meals their children will actually eat, much thought and wisdom has been applied to the challenge of providing healthy food in the modern world.

The big surprise is the revelation that with careful planning, you can actually save money by eating high-quality food—not just in medical and dental care but in the actual amount spent on food. As Anne Sergeant, author of our lead article on food costs, puts it, “We can’t afford not to eat healthy food!” If you total up the cost of everything eaten on a standard American diet, and add to it the additional burden of health care, missed days at work, reduced productivity, etc., etc., we come to the inevitable conclusion that cheap food is very expensive indeed.

What health-conscious consumers need to spend more time on is planning—actually thinking about what they will eat, where to obtain it, and when they will cook it—and then, of course, in the kitchen preparing nutritious meals. Sadly, for many people, eating is a completely unconscious activity. Most have only the vaguest perception of the cause-and-effect relationship of diet to health and so float through life consuming whatever fast and convenient food is available at the moment. . . and then bemoan their unjust fate when illness appears.

Fortunately, more and more people are making that connection, and we hope that they will find this issue useful as they learn to focus on healthy food, find local sources, and develop shopping and food preparation routines. Usually that task falls on the shoulders of moms, but as you will see in this issue, even guys with full-time jobs can, with careful planning, eat delicious and nutritious meals every day in their workplace.

The challenge of healthy eating may seem daunting at first, but as many of us can affirm, it soon becomes second nature. Fortunately, as healthy eating becomes a habit, we find that we actually develop an aversion to processed food. And once we grasp the cause-and-effect connection between bad food and poor health, we gain the motivation to make those initial efforts at dietary change.

We at WAPF are working busily on the upcoming conference, to ensure not only an excellent learning experience but also delicious and nutritious meals throughout. We look forward to seeing you there!

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