Real Food: Here is Everything You Need To Know About it
So, food has gotten confusing nowadays, and you’re just finding out that real food is the answer to a lot of life problems. But what exactly is real food, what are its benefits, where do I buy it, and where can I learn more about it? We know.
We offer trusted insights on real food and real living, focusing on time-tested practices to help you make informed choices based on proven knowledge. What better food data source is there than what has worked for people all around the world since the beginning?
REAL FOOD is all regular foods that would not disappear or change if electricity stopped tomorrow.
That’s just the beginning. We’re going to tell you how you can tell the difference between real food and non-real foods, the benefits of them and how to change to eating real food daily, sources where you can buy them, resources to learn more about them, comparisons of the different types of REAL FOOD and REAL FOOD products, and finally, the cost implications of eating REAL FOOD and how to budget for it.
What Exactly is REAL FOOD?
These foods are the ones that bodies (ours and animals) know and are made to process, the foods that people have been eating for centuries, and the foods that we all return to every time something goes wrong with our health.
Fruits and vegetables, meat, fish, poultry, dairy, grains, etc., are all real foods, as well as cakes, bread, donuts, juice, and different types of snacks, etc., are also REAL FOOD as long as they’re made with REAL ingredients.
After telling you the health benefits, we show you how easy it is to know if something someone calls food is REAL.
Health Benefits
Because our bodies know and are made to not run on anything except REAL FOOD, that’s the only energy supply that will give us maximum good health benefits. Anything other than this causes problems for our bodies and health, either now or in the long run.
Unfortunately, many of us don’t realize this until we start seeing changes outside our bodies that we can’t recognize, such as gaining or losing excessive weight, skin problems, hair and nail problems, etc. These food-related changes start from within us, and we may even have early internal signs that we pass off as being normal until they start to show.
Here are the benefits of eating REAL FOOD, which no other type of consumable item labeled food will give us:
Physical Benefits
Improved Digestion- The better you can digest food, the more you can get all the benefits out of the food, and the better your body can use it to make you feel good.
Enhanced Immune Function- A robust immune system protects you from illnesses now and ensures a healthier future as you age.
Better Heart Health- The primary key to peak heart performance lies in the exclusive nutrition provided by REAL FOOD.
Stable Blood Sugar Levels- If your blood sugar isn’t spiking up all the time, this protects you from inflammation, which is the starting point for most, if not all, illnesses.
Optimal Organ Function- REAL FOOD to your organs is like proper care to your car engine; the better the care, the better it works at its optimal limit.
Healthier Skin- Because our skin is alive and being young doesn’t last forever, maintaining its health, starting with REAL FOOD, is what will keep it going and strong.
Hair and Nails- They are dead but start off alive inside and, therefore, need the right nutrients for strength and proper upkeep.
Optimal Body Composition- We sometimes forget that what we eat gets broken down to the most minor level our bodies can use, which means every bit of ingredients we eat becomes our body’s ingredients; REAL FOOD makes sure your body is made up of the correct materials.
Mental Benefits
Better Cognitive Function- The proper supply of nutrients will help your brain work better, improving your memory and concentration.
Excellent Mood Regulation- Since our blood sugar will be stabilized, our mood swings and irritability will also stabilize.
Higher Energy Levels- When your body has the correct ingredients, it can reach the peak of its energy.
Reduced Risk Of Mental Disorders- When you’re body’s stable, your chances of having mental decline become very low.
Emotional Benefits
High Sleep Quality- Because your mood is better regulated, the quality of your sleep becomes higher.
Less Stress and Anxiety- The more you benefit from proper ingredients like magnesium and B vitamins, the better your stress and anxiety levels become.
Enhanced Emotional Resilience- When things in your body become stable, you become more balanced in your emotions, which helps you better handle your boss.
You might have noticed a trend with all these benefits. REAL FOOD keeps your body and mind working the way they are supposed to and the way you want them to.
REAL FOOD Vs. Non-Real Foods
So, REAL FOOD is all regular foods that would not disappear or change if electricity were stopped tomorrow. Our bodies know it and are made to process it.
This means if it takes someone more than a paragraph and with multiple different words you can’t understand to explain to you on a basic level what the food is and where it comes from, it’s not REAL.
How To Tell The Difference
The Examples:
Scenerio 1
You: “What’s this?”
The Person: “It’s a donut.”
You: “What’s it made out of ?“
The Person: “I made it with flour, salt, butter, eggs, baking powder, milk, and vanilla. Then I fryed it with olive oil or sometimes tallow.”
You: “Oh okay.”
Scenerio 2
You: “What’s this?”
The Person: “It’s the company Rocket Sad’s Classic Donut.”
You: “What’s it made of?”
The Person: “They make it with Enriched Wheat Flour (Wheat Flour, Niacin, Iron, Thiamine Mononitrate, Riboflavin, Folic Acid), Sugar, Water, Vegetable Oil (Soybean Oil, Palm Oil, Canola Oil), Eggs, Milk Solids, Yeast, Salt, Mono- and Diglycerides, Calcium Propionate (Preservative), Sorbic Acid (Preservative), Natural and Artificial Flavorings (Vanilla), Food Colorings (Yellow 5, Red 40), Calcium Sulfate, Ammonium Sulfate. Those were just the ingredients, I’ll get into how they make it.”
You: “Ahh…sorry, my cat’s calling! Gotta go…”
Same food name, one's a food, and one's a thing.
It’s not about the number of ingredients.
The difference between REAL FOOD and non-real food is the value you get from each.
REAL FOOD comes with the full punch of what your body needs and how it needs it. All the nutrients in REAL FOOD are carefully curated with each other so that you get just the right amount of each.
Each nutrient is paired with the best and correct partner, so once they're in the body, they help each other work at their maximum.
Non-real food producers try to imitate this but fail miserably. Their issue is that they have to make sure everything is as perfect as it should be, like REAL FOOD, but the product has to also look, feel, and taste as good and not cause you significant pain or death simultaneously.
Just imagine trying to recreate air and make it exactly like the air we breath in every way, shape, and form. There'll definitely be problems and a lot of it.
It's one thing to try something and fail, but it's another if that failure is only visible after someone gets seriously ill or flat-out dies.
Another difference between REAL and non-real food is that they're everywhere (you can find them almost anywhere), but only one pays back what you paid to get it.
Have you ever considered that our bodies need so many different nutrients to function and that if it were up to us to remember to take each one, so many of us would fall down and pass away on the streets because, oops, we forgot to take vitamin C this past month?
This is why all REAL FOOD has been made to have so many of the nutrients we need, so we don't have to keep too many tabs on our bodies. If you don't like oranges 🍊, but eat bell peppers 🫑 or pineapple 🍍, you still get vitamin C. If you don't want any of those, but for that lunch you had three hours ago, there was some lemon, you still get vitamin C.
REAL FOOD makes missing out on things your body needs to function and survive almost impossible.
Non-real food means you will definitely miss out on so many nutrients you need because, as we mentioned, it's almost impossible for it to imitate REAL FOOD while trying to look, feel, and taste good and not destroy your health at the same time.
So many of us don't realize something. At any given time, we each have a certain amount of resources (nutrients) in our bodies. We also have reserves (nutrients our bodies store as a backup just in case the resources are finished).
With anything we eat, our body's use energy from our resources to process the food. If the food doesn't bring in extra resources to replace and refill the resource, that food takes up our energy and leaves us with nothing. When this happens, you find that after just 2 hours, your body tells you you're hungry again because the resources were depleted and not replaced.
So you eat again, and the cycle continues. Suppose this keeps happening over a long period. In that case, those resources in your body will eventually finish, and that's when the body will tap into the reserves.
Once it's running on reserves, it no longer has excess energy to spend on unnecessary things like your hair and nails because those are dead and definitely are not as crucial as your organs for you to stay alive. This is when the person starts to see symptoms like hair loss, nail problems, etc.
If the person is under starvation and keeps going until the reserves are empty, they die since there is no more gas to keep things going.
They remain sick and weak if they keep eating foods that take up their energy but don't replace it.
The foods that take up your energy and barely replace what they're using up are non-real food. They have almost no nutrients for your body; they use your nutrients and leave you hungry within an hour to two hours because your brain will keep asking for food to replace the nutrients it used up. This is why it's a multi-trillion dollar business: it's set up in a way that keeps consumers coming no matter what.
REAL FOOD uses your resources, but then it replaces them and fills them up.
Ever wonder why a sick person is not recommended to eat non-real food and why a person, after surgery, is told to eat protein to help their muscles?
REAL FOOD is also set up so that the things you need at different times of the year grow and are available at those exact times. It's usually hot all over the world in the summer, so we have many fruits like watermelon 🍉 that are mostly water.
It's usually cold all around the world in the winter, so the available foods are root vegetables (carrots, potatoes, beets, etc.), which need to be cooked in something hot to be edible (therefore keeping us warm), and citrus fruits like oranges and lemons, which help us fight illnesses since it's usually because of the cold that a lot of people get sick.
This concept is the same in different countries. Places that are tropical and have many mosquitoes and other things that can cause illness have more citrusy, spicy, and antimicrobial food available to fight off those illnesses (think cloves, black pepper, etc.); that's why, in the past, they had to be transported from warm places like India to colder places like parts of Europe.
Non-real foods, on the other hand, are available almost everywhere around the world nowadays, even in villages; yet, the people eating them are sicker than ever before, not only because these foods don't contain the right amount and types of nutrients our bodies need, but also because while companies who make them try to achieve that goal of looking, feeling, and tasting just right, they put harmful additions which are detrimental to our health. This lack of correct nutrients and harmful additions have these immediate/long-term effects on your body:
Immediate
jitteriness and then fatigue afterward because of the blood sugar spike and fall
bloating, gas, and constipation in a lot of people
getting hungry very quickly after eating because your body never got the nutrients it was craving in the first place, so it has to make you feel hungry again to try and get them
mood swings of irritability and anxiety because of the quick rise and fall of blood sugar
palate fatigue, which means you get so used to the artificial and intense flavor additions that are not normal that when you eat REAL FOOD, you feel like it needs a bit of a kick
If you look closely, these effects are very similar to the effects of drugs when a person takes them for the first time.
Long-term
excessive weight gain and obesity
chronic diseases (diabetes, hypertension, heart disease, gut inflammation like IBS and Crohn's, body inflammation, etc.)
nutrient deficiencies
mental health problems because your brain doesn't get what it needs
cancer risk
addiction to non-REAL FOODS
dental problems
hormonal imbalances
If you notice, these long-term effects are also very similar to the long-term effects of addiction.
We're sure you now see why eating REAL FOOD matters to us. It's whether we like it or not since doing so gives us maximum bodily, mental, and emotional benefits, and not doing so makes us suffer pain and problems with all three.
Switching To REAL FOOD
The Change
One of the best ways you can switch over to start eating REAL FOOD is to not stop eating non-real food.
Hear me out.
When you eat non-real food while learning about what it does to your body, you will not only subconsciously develop disgust for it, but it will make it much easier for you to see and stop consuming it.
Just keep eating them while you learn about what they’re doing to you.
Once you put your body back onto REAL FOOD and give it what it needs, anytime you try to go back to non-real food, you will feel sick just like the 1st time you ate it before building tolerance to it.
This is the same thing that happens to a person who gets rehabilitated from substance use. When they go back to it, they have the same initial painful effects as though they never took it. Just like how a person who has quit smoking may feel nauseous or dizzy if they try to smoke a cigarette again.
A thing to remember is to not make food complicated.
Just eat REAL FOOD.
Suppose a particular food bothers you because of allergies or intolerance, makes you feel a certain way, or maybe you don’t like it, or you can’t have it religiously, don’t eat it.
Otherwise, putting unnecessary voluntary restrictions on yourself will cause you stress, make you relate food with a feeling of stress, and make you have a cycle of guilt where every time you give in and eat whatever REAL FOOD you were restricting yourself from, you feel guilty, beat yourself up about it, try again, and then do it all over again.
Ironically, no period in history has ever stressed more about food and weight. Yet, we suffer the most.
Meal Prep
REAL FOOD is available worldwide, even though non-real food makes it seem like it's not. This is because so much money is put into marketing and advertising non-real food that we can find it almost everywhere we turn.
In some places, non-real food might be more prevalent. However, REAL FOOD is still available, especially since it's naturally accessible for growing with methods like community gardening, etc.
When it comes to eating and making REAL FOOD, cooking your own food is the best option because you can alter the food the way you like and don't pay an extra service fee to get it done. However, the cost is almost the same, but slightly less than buying already-made food because you still have to pay for it with your time.
Yet, cooking is only for some. Some don't like it, and some don't have the time.
If you're one of the people who can't cook for one reason or another, there are many options of ready-made REAL FOOD for you to choose from:
pre-packaged meals and food at the grocery store (ready-made meals with REAL ingredients, foods like fruits, vegetables, canned fish, sliced meats, yogurts, etc.)
pre-made meal subscription services (like Factor, etc.)
dining out
hiring a cook
deligating someone in your family to be in charge of cooking
giving a trusted neighbor or your parents some extra money to shop and add you to their cooking, and you pick up the meal, or they drop it off for you
As you can see, when it comes to food, someone, somewhere, somehow has to make it. We have the choice to either take on the task ourselves or pay someone for their time to do it, whether it be the grocery store being the intermediary between us and where the food they sell comes from or hiring a person or subscription service to bring the food to our doorstep.
There is no way around it. It's the same with brushing our teeth every morning. We either do it ourselves or hire someone (if anyone besides the dentist would accept this 🤷 🤷♀️), but it has to be done.
We at M2oo love cooking. If you decide you want to go the cooking route, we made you some things to help you along the way.
Below is a FREE HOME COOKING STARTER GUIDE that tells you the essential pantry items you should have in your kitchen to be able to make meals on the fly, a start-off 2-week meal plan using only and exactly these same items with 6 different recipes to go along with it, tips on batch cooking and meal prepping, and the FREE SAMPLE OF THE FOOD BOOK which shows you how to choose fresh ingredients, store them correctly, and use top cooking tips as a beginner but like a pro so you can further simplify your home cooking.
GET THE FULL FOOD BOOK!
Want to choose fresh ingredients, store them correctly, and use top cooking tips as a beginner but like a pro? The Food Book is perfect for anyone looking to simplify their home cooking.
Poll
Buying REAL FOOD
Cost Comparison: REAL FOOD Vs. Non-real food
To many people, the cost of REAL FOOD is very high.
This is not the case. It seems this way because non-real food (with all the advertising everywhere we turn) is very prevalent in our lives and cheap. Just as years of eating its strong and intense artificial flavors make us feel REAL FOOD is lacking in taste, years of buying non-real food, which is usually very cheap, also make us start to feel REAL FOOD is pricey.
Why Does Non-real Food Seem So Cheap?
When you want to make and sell something, you want to cut your costs as much as possible. How low will you go to make non-real food? You:
Find the cheapest ingredients you can get on the market that would be decent enough to make the product.
Find a way to produce everything as quickly as possible at one time so you don't have to keep paying to run the machines or keep paying your workers.
Buy your ingredients in bulk (wholesale) so you get the discounts that come with that (with buying wholesale).
Don't have to make multiple rounds to get your products in stores because you make everything once, so you can send everything out once.
Doing all this helps you sell your product at a low price so people think it's cheaper and a better value than the competition, but high enough to make you a lot of money (especially since you barely spent money to make it compared to what you're getting).
This is how non-real food works.
Imagine your friend wants to make the same product, but they do the opposite of everything you've done. They:
Find the highest quality ingredients they can get on the market.
Take their time making the product so it gets done at the best time.
Buy ingredients wholesale but more frequently because they want to ensure that the product is fresh and of excellent quality.
Make multiple transportation rounds yearly so each product reaches stores at the right time and is as fresh as possible.
This is REAL FOOD.
The way you and your friend made the same product is why you have this 👇 :
Farm Fresh Eggs (YOUR FRIEND):
$6.00 per dozen
Regular eggs directly from a farm or local farmers' market, often organic or free-range.
Pre-Made Eggs (e.g., Liquid Egg Whites in a Bottle) (YOU):
$4.00 per 16-ounce bottle (~ 10 egg whites)
Bulk-made egg whites with lower-quality ingredients and preservatives to extend their shelf life in the store.
If you had your friend's produced eggs, this is what it does and gives your body:
Vitamin A, D, B12 and selenium
9 essential amino acids
Omega-3
Antioxidants
Rich flavor and great texture
If you had your produced eggs:
Protein (a maybe)
Preservatives
Stabilizers (such as xanthium gum)
Natural flavors (ingredients that started off natural but have possibly become unrecognizable, but saying natural flavor sounds nicer)
Added nutrients (like riboflavin and folic acid since so many nutrients were lost because of the excessive processing)
It should be clear which gives you what you paid for.
The reality of life is that if we pick the REAL one, we pay the price now and are done with it.
If we picked the non-real one, we would pay the upfront price now, and the rest would be in medical bills.
Still, with these money-saving tips, you can maximize the value of what you're paying for REAL FOOD.
Purchasing your groceries in bulk
Purchasing food only when they're in season (if they're out of season, extra effort was made to grow and get them to you, so you have to pay more)
Frozen fruits and vegetables can cost less because properly frozen produce lasts longer than non-frozen produce.
Choose store brands (this means the store themselves made the product and don't have the cost of a go-between, which is usually passed down to us to pay).
Look for sales, discounts, and coupons in weekly grocery store flyers.
Use cashback apps and loyalty programs that earn points and give you a little of the money you spent back.
Don't shop when you're hungry, and don't shop without a list (this way, you avoid impulse buying).
Farmers' markets might have some deals your usual grocery store won't (but make sure you're actually buying from legitimate farmers; scams happen at these places).
Buy food as it is (any extra work done to the food, such as cutting, bagging, seasoning, wrapping, etc., will mean you pay for that additional service; no one works for free) unless you want to pay for the convenience to save your own time.
Ethnic stores might have some fantastic deals on spices, grains, and some produce (these are stores that specialize in selling food from a specific country or culture).
Use price comparison apps that can help you find the best deals for what you're buying (or pay attention when you go to different stores so you price compare yourself as well).
If you were to sum up all these REAL FOOD saving tips, you would get this:
Food is made from somewhere by someone or some people. The closer you get to buying the food from the exact people and place (or season) it was made, the less you would pay.
The farther away you get from these people and places (or season), the more you have to pay for all the people and things it took to get the food to you.
In Beyond The Grocery Store: What are you 'really' paying for? we explain in more detail why the price of food is the way it is and the history behind it.
Click the highlighted link to download it.
Where To Buy REAL FOOD
Below is a list of places you can find in your area to buy REAL FOOD.
Places as close to the people who made them as possible:
Farmers’ Markets: Directly purchase fresh, seasonal produce, meats, and dairy from local farmers.
Community Supported Agriculture (CSA): Subscribe to receive regular boxes of fresh, local produce from nearby farms.
Food Co-operatives: Member-owned stores that source food directly from local farmers and producers.
Farm Stands: Small roadside markets where farmers sell their produce directly.
U-Pick Farms: Farms where you can pick your own fruits and vegetables, often at a lower cost.
Ethnic Markets: Specialty stores that often source ingredients directly from the region of origin.
Other places with almost all intermediary costs:
Supermarkets: Large retail stores offering a wide range of food products, often with several distribution layers.
Grocery Stores: Smaller than supermarkets, these stores also source food through various distributors.
Online Grocery Delivery Services: Services like Amazon Fresh, Instacart, and local online grocers.
Warehouse Clubs: Membership-based stores like Costco and Sam’s Club that offer bulk buying options.
Convenience Stores: Small stores with a limited selection of food items, usually at higher prices due to convenience.
Health Food Stores: Stores like Whole Foods specialize in organic and REAL products, often with added costs.
Meal Delivery Services: Companies like Blue Apron and HelloFresh deliver pre-portioned ingredients with recipes for you to cook, and companies like Factor deliver fully-cooked meals.
Labels and Quality
How To Read Food Labels and Tell If it’s REAL FOOD
If you’re buying something pre-made, you should know what you’re putting in your mouth. Other than that, apples and carrots 🥕 don’t come with ingredient lists, but they do come with certifications, which we’ll tell you next.
We mentioned before that if it takes the person telling you what’s in their food more than a paragraph and filled with words you can’t understand to tell you what’s in the food and how it’s made, it’s not REAL. Here are the other things to look out for:
The first ingredient listed on the ingredients list means that’s what the food/product is mainly made of.
If the word natural is used to describe the product, it means nothing because the word ‘natural’ in the food world isn’t regulated, and for some reason, every last detail of food needs to be regulated for us to get the truth.
If the expiry date on the food you’re looking at seems extremely long (meaning it was made to be able to sit on that shelf for years), it means something that shouldn’t be in your body is keeping it that way. Just as much as it makes that food sit there for a long time, it could potentially sit in your body for a long time (while also causing you harm).
Recognize Certificates and What They Tell You
The food you buy can be plastered with stickers saying it's certified for this and that. Here's what they're telling you:
Organic Certifications
USDA Organic (United States):
Indicates the product is made with at least 95% organic ingredients and free from synthetic pesticides, fertilizers, and GMOs. If it says 100% organic, then all the ingredients in it should be organic.
EU Organic (European Union):
Ensures that at least 95% of the product's ingredients are organic and meet specific farming and production regulations.
Canada Organic (Canada):
Indicates compliance with Canadian Organic Standards, meaning no synthetic chemicals or GMOs.
Australia Certified Organic (Australia):
Ensures organic production methods and no use of synthetic pesticides or GMOs.
Fair Trade Certifications
Fairtrade International (FLO):
Indicates fair wages, safe working conditions, and sustainable farming practices.
Fair Trade Certified (United States):
Assures that farmers and workers receive fair prices and wages and work in safe conditions.
Non-GMO Certifications
Non-GMO Project Verified (United States and Canada):
Certifies that a product contains no genetically modified organisms.
GMO-Free (European Union):
Indicates that the product is free from genetically modified ingredients.
Sustainability and Environmental Certifications
Rainforest Alliance Certified:
Ensures sustainable farming practices, biodiversity conservation, and fair treatment of workers.
Marine Stewardship Council (MSC):
Certifies sustainable fishing practices and responsible fishery management.
Forest Stewardship Council (FSC):
Indicates products from responsibly managed forests, ensuring sustainability.
Animal Welfare Certifications
Certified Humane (United States):
Ensures that animals are raised humanely with adequate space, shelter, and care.
Animal Welfare Approved (United States):
Highest standards for animal welfare and sustainability in farming practices.
Quality and Safety Certifications
ISO 22000 (International):
Sets standards for food safety management systems to ensure the safety of food supply chains.
BRC Global Standards (United Kingdom):
Provides a framework for managing product safety, integrity, legality, and quality, as well as the operational controls for these criteria.
Specialty Certifications
Gluten-Free Certification Organization (GFCO):
Certifies that products contain less than 10 parts per million (ppm) of gluten, ensuring safety for people with celiac disease.
Indicates that the product complies with Jewish dietary laws.
Ensures that the product meets Islamic dietary regulations.
Regional and National Certifications
AOC (Appellation d'Origine Contrôlée) (France):
Protects the designation of origin for products like cheese and other regional foods.
PDO (Protected Designation of Origin) (European Union):
Certifies that products are produced, processed, and prepared in a specific region using recognized know-how.
PGI (Protected Geographical Indication) (European Union):
Indicates that at least one stage of production, processing, or preparation takes place in the region indicated.
Because these certifications are supposed to provide added value and assurance that you're getting the strictest standards currently available and the ones that cause the least damage to the people involved in making the product and their environment, the price of products with these certifications is usually higher than the ones without.
It's a sad reality that for food to be properly and truthfully made and sold, we have to pay the cost of organizations certifying these foods so they can be made correctly and ethically; otherwise, they wouldn't be.
Would it not be best for that to be the standard and for food producers who don't align with it to be fined instead of us?
Click the button below to see the food certification labels' logos so you can recognize each the next time you see one.
Avoiding A Specific Ingredient
The food can be REAL, but you may have to avoid specific ingredients for health, religious, or personal reasons.
It’s important to know that some ingredients have different names. Depending on what you’re avoiding, you need to know about it thoroughly and the different forms and names it can take in your food.
Take sugar, for example. It could be listed as any of the following, all being sugar, but without it saying so:
Sucrose
High-fructose corn syrup
Glucose
Fructose
Maltose
Dextrose
Lactose
Cane sugar
Beet sugar
Agave nectar
Maple syrup
Maltodextrin (spikes your blood sugar more than table sugar)
If you notice, many of them end in -ose, which typically means it’s sugar. That’s why you have to learn the ways and different forms the ingredients you’re avoiding come in so you know what to look for on REAL FOOD packaging and ingredients lists.
We have a section on our site called ‘The Ingredients List’ that shows you different types of ingredients and everything you need to know about them, from producing to eating them.
Making Vs. Buying
For some foods, it's cheaper to make them than to buy them; for others, buying them is more inexpensive. We will have a series on our site called 'Buy or DIY,' we'll show you whether it's more affordable and better for you to buy or make each of the ingredients we discuss under 'The Ingredients List.'
For example, on 'The Ingredients List,' we tell you everything you need to know about bread, from production to eating it (the types of bread, how it's used, making it, storing it, etc.). Then, on 'Food and Finance' (under the 'Buy or DIY' tag), we'll show you the time, energy, and cost difference of making REAL bread vs. buying it (from all the different possible places you can buy it from).
We'll link it HERE for you to follow once it's started.
Maximizing Benefits of REAL FOOD
Proper Storage Techniques
Unlike non-real food, REAL FOOD must be packaged and stored correctly for its nutrients to remain the same throughout the time it's not used.
In "35 Fruits and Vegetables That Should Not Be Refrigerated" and "Fruits and Vegetables You Can Freeze | A Complete Guide," we thoroughly demonstrate this refrigerating and freezing method for fruits and vegetables.
Here are the guidelines you should go by when it comes to storing meat, seafood, and dairy.
Dairy
Refrigeration: Store dairy products at or below 40°F (4°C).
Packaging: Keep dairy in its original packaging or transfer to airtight containers.
Placement: Store dairy in the main body of the fridge, not in the door, to maintain a consistent temperature.
Shelf Life: Consume opened dairy products within their recommended time frame (e.g., milk within 7 days).
Freezing: Freeze dairy products like butter and hard cheese, but avoid freezing milk and soft cheeses for best quality.
Meat
Refrigeration: Store raw meat at or below 40°F (4°C).
Freezing: Freeze meat at 0°F (-18°C) if not used within a few days.
Packaging: Keep meat in its original packaging or wrap it tightly in plastic wrap or aluminum foil.
Placement: Store meat on the lowest shelf in the fridge to prevent drips onto other foods.
Thawing: Thaw frozen meat in the refrigerator, not on the counter.
Seafood
Refrigeration: Store fresh seafood at 32°F to 38°F (0°C to 3°C).
Freezing: Freeze seafood at 0°F (-18°C) if not used within two days.
Packaging: Keep seafood in airtight containers or tightly wrapped in plastic wrap.
Placement: Store seafood on ice or in a leak-proof container on the lowest shelf.
Thawing: Thaw frozen seafood in the refrigerator or under cold running water.
If you want to know how to individually store almost every type of dairy, meat, and seafood, you can get all of that at your fingertips within The Food Book. We have listed for you the A-Z of every food category (Fruits and vegetables, Meat, Seafood, Dairy, Spices, and Herbs, etc.), showing you how to know when it’s fresh, how to properly store each one, and pro cooking tips you can use even if you’re a beginner to maximize it when cooking.
Click the button below to download the FREE SAMPLE.
Food Waste
Wasting food is not just about what you’re doing being called “waste.” It’s also about the fact that you’re wasting your money.
Learn how to use leftovers (we show you this in 7 Tips To Help You Cut Your Grocery Bill Down By $100s).
You can use methods like freezing and pickling to save the food you’re not using now or the food you want to be able to use when it’s out of season (we’ll discuss this in ‘The Ingredients List’).
As we mentioned, don’t shop without a shopping list. This helps you stick to buying only what you need and the amount you need because to make a shopping list, you generally have to have meals you plan on making so you’re prepared.
This leads us to this last tip: Make a meal plan so you know what you’ll be making with what you’re buying. Meal planning isn’t and shouldn’t be complicated. It’s just a matter of deciding what you’re going to eat. We’ll include the steps to meal plan in the FREE HOME COOKING STARTER GUIDE here 👇.
FAQ
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The best way to know if the food you're buying is organic is to look for known certification labels, like the ones we showed you above, which say it's organic. If it just says organic, it means it's 95% organic. If it says 100% organic, all the ingredients should be organic. If the label differs from the ones we mentioned and you're unsure about it, your best bet is to look into the company online and see what you can find out.
Remember the misconception that 'everything organic is good for you.' Check out the 10 Common Food Myths Anyone Who Eats Should Know to know more about that.
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You should only be worried about eating only one type of food daily for months because too much of anything is good for nothing. Doing so will overload your system with specific nutrients, which could have side effects.
Check out our post on the 5 Bad Eating Habits You Should Stop This Year For Gut Ease, which discusses this.
Other than that, ensure that the food you're buying is not faked and made to pass off as what it's not. For example, foods like olive oil and cheese can come mixed with canola oil and wood pulp without you knowing.
There are many more, and we discuss them in The Fake Food List. Click the highlighted link to download it. 👆
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You get virtually every nutrient from REAL FOOD, but nutrients like selenium, zinc, and magnesium can be challenging.
This is because some farmers use farming techniques (such as growing the same crop repeatedly in the same soil (a.k.a. monocropping) and using chemical fertilizers) to maximize fast crop yields for profit.
These practices have reduced the mineral content in much of the world's soil today. Soil needs time and proper management, like crop rotation and organic matter addition, to restore its nutrients naturally.
Organic and regenerative farming methods aim to maintain soil health by using crop rotation, cover cropping, and natural fertilizers, which can help replenish and maintain soil nutrients.
Conventional, high-intensity farming practices are more associated with soil nutrient depletion.
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Take it step by step. We can all find it difficult to change. You want to educate them gently and spread out so they can digest the information without feeling pressured. Once in a while, point out the ingredients of the non-real food they're eating by reading it to them. This will slowly get them to start feeling an aversion to non-real food. You being an example is another significant way of helping them make the switch.
Use these tips combined with your knowledge of how your family receives information to tailor a great strategy you can use to help them make the change.
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Ask yourself: What would I eat along the way while traveling to (blank destination) if non-real food didn't exist?
It's simple: You would plan how and where to shop, cook, or dine by taking the necessary steps to help you do so effortlessly. You would also look up cafes, restaurants, etc., in the area you're going to and along the way to know the types of food they serve and whether it fits your needs. Finally, you will also ensure you're prepared in general for any emergencies that could arise where you might be without food or great options.
Conclusion
After everything we’ve discussed, you can see that eating REAL FOOD is the difference between why Linda and Lee, 95, aged gracefully throughout their lives with very few illnesses, medications, and pain and why Jordan and Jamie, down the road, who live with non-real food, have a line of medicines on their kitchen counter at 65 with the bodily pain that comes with their illnesses. Change your food, change your life.
Take the Next Step: Now that you know about REAL FOOD, go to our Food and Finance Section to find out how to get the most value out of the food you’re buying and how you can make money from these same foods.
Drop A Comment: What are you doing with REAL FOOD?
Stay Connected: To know more about how changing your food can change your life, sign up for the M2oo Newsletter, which delivers Real Food and Real Health information straight to your inbox.
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