THE WHAT & WHY OF WHOLEFOODS?

 
What exactly are whole foods? Think unrefined, unprocessed, unbroken – for example:

• Wholemeal flour, ground fresh when you order - rather than refined white flour
• Un-sulphured dried fruit
• Fresh nuts, fresh flours - not rancid
• Cold pressed virgin oils - not chemically refined

Remember, nutritionally speaking, refined food is dead food!

 FACT: Did you know that most oils people buy are refined by:
• First cleaning and cooking the grains or seeds into a mush at 120⁰C for a couple of hours.
• Then solvents are extracted from the mush by using Heptanes under heat (Heptane is a component of gasoline and traces of these solvents can be found in refined oils).
• Then it’s degummed to remove minerals, chlorophyll, etc. – these components are then recaptured and resold as vitamin supplements!
• At this stage the oil still has a slight yellow tinge so it’s then bleached and finally deodorised at 270⁰C.

This illustrates just one of many other examples of the refining process in processed foods. Many foods like white flour and sugar go through other complex refining processes.

You don’t have to be a fanatic to be healthy - just be wise. People are getting sick and many are dying early from a lack of knowledge!

As a nation we’re getting sicker. Evidenced by the fact that in the recent budget the government cut back in many areas, but not the health sector! They budgeted an extra $1.5 billion for health care, three times what they added to education.

Penelope
www.happyandhealthy.co.nz