food
10 tips for eating sustainably
Here are a few tips on how to reduce your impact on our planet 3-5 times a day just by stuffing your face with deliciousness.
1. Buy Organic. Organic food is higher in nutrients, free of neurotoxins, free of pesticides, hasn’t been gas ripened, supports biodiversity and generally just tastes better. If you can’t afford to do a full organic shop start with what you can afford and make sure to always wash non-organic food in a mixture of water and apple cider vinegar to remove the majority of the pesticides.
2. Buy Local. Reduce your food miles.Food miles refer to the number of miles between the farm your food came from and the place you bought it. For example if you bought a delicious mango from your local supermarket that has come from Mexico that’s roughly 5551 miles as the crow flies! Find your local farmers market and see what you can buy that is close to home.
3. Cut out processed and packaged foods. I’m not saying that you need to cut out all junk food and never have chocolate again – but think about all the unnecessary packaging that just goes to landfill every time you buy a multi pack bag of crisps from your local Tesco. Bake your own treats! Home cooked meals are generally healthier, encourage mindful eating and most importantly you know what you are putting in to your body.
4. Say no to tuna! I know what you’re thinking “but Jess – tuna is delicious and comes in very convenient easy open cans”. This may be true – however it’s also true that tuna is being hugely over fished which is devastating for the marine life. Also it’s full of heavy metals such as mercury – there is even a possibility of heavy metal poisoning from eating too much tuna. Also dolphins.
5. Learn to cook. I hinted at this one before. I have been really surprised to discover over the past few years that there are so many young adults who have no idea how to cook. Cooking connects us with our food. We appreciate it – we learn to love the process and want to know more about the food we are preparing.
6. Eat seasonally – your body best assimilates food that is seasonal and local to where you live. Get back to the ol’ farmers market and then get in the kitchen.
7. Grow yer own! Grow something. Anything. I live in a little flat with a little garden in London and I have five edible plants growing in my little temporary space. Five! It was lovely harvesting the elderflower a few weeks back – or making myself a nice fresh mint tea straight from the garden. Growing your own also helps attract bees to your garden and bees are our friends.
8. Be prepared. Cut out the convenience foods. It’s not often you’ll find me in a food free environment. I usually always have a piece of fruit on my person. I get hungry. I’d rather eat fruit that some highly processed food like substance.
9. Get involved with meat free Monday. The meat industry alone contributes one-fifth of man made greenhouse gas emissions. Reduce the amount of meat you eat – take a day off and enjoy the benefits of eating vegetarian for a day. You’ll find your tummy will thank you for it too. Don’t believe the lies about protein. It’s impossible to be vegetarian and be protein deficient without also being calorie deficient. #JustSaying
10. Forage – hooray for the free food movement. Look up local foraging groups or maps online and see what you can get for free from mother nature!
Vote with your food dollars! Every dollar you spend on local, organic food is one less dollar spent on the industrialised food system. We all have the power to change the way the world eats – one meal at a time!
Tweet or instagram me to let me know what you think!
JW x
If you’re interested in reading more about health and wellness my friends Matt and Tegan have written an incredible book called 365 Day’s of Wholeness – you can buy it here
Italy will probably make you fat
Hoorah! I have arrived in Italy – one day in and I already love this place to bits!
However – I’m pretty sure that I’m not going to look the same when I leave as I did on arrival. The food here is AMAZING and there’s just so much of it! I mean – all the best foods are Italian ; Pasta, pizza, gelato, canolli… the list goes on.
Sorry Mum and Dad – looks like i’mma be single for a little while longer.
tweet me @jessicaswander
follow my adventures on instagram @jessicaswanderlust x
Healthy “Snickers” Mousse
INGREDIENTS:
- 1 x frozen ripe banana
- 1 x ripe banana (not frozen)
- 1 heaped tablespoon of peanut butter (I use the organic peanut butter from my local market)
- 2 teaspoons of raw organic cacao
- 3 chopped dates with pips removed
- dash of coconut water
- Loving Earth caramelised buckinis
METHOD :
- place the bananas, peanut butter, cacao and dates in a high powered blender or food processor and pour a small amount of coconut water over the top,
- blend and add more coconut water until you get the desired consistency.
- Spoon the mousse into small glasses and top with buckinis.
- Enjoy!
TIP: using frozen bananas allows you to enjoy this tasty treat straight away. If you dont have any frozen bananas or you’re pre-preparing for later you can just use unfrozen ripe bananas and leave the mousse to chill in the fridge for a while. Make sure to only add the buckinis just before you serve them so they stay crunchy and delicious.
Lentil as Anything- a farewell dinner
And so the farewells begin! I spent this afternoon with some gorgeous friends of mine at Lentil as Anything at the Abbotsford convent. This is one of my favorite places to be when I’m in Melbourne. The gardens are gorgeous, the food is delicious and served buffet style, there is always music and it always feels magnificent…
St Andrews Market
St Andrews Market is one of my favourite places in the whole wide world. It’s definitely one of the things I’ll miss the most when I set off on my adventure. I love lazy late saturday mornings with friends drinking chai and taking in the beautiful energy of this wonderful place.
Delicious vegan friendly options for lunch and music everywhere. People are so happy to chat and it’s a great way to learn more about a variety of topics from bee keeping, sustainable living, superfoods, crystal healing, organic farming, and whatever else you can find. People are so open and happy to share their knowledge with everyone.
7 Princicals of Health
Video Posted on
Just passing on some knowledge nuggets from the incredible Don Tolman. The man is a genius! He’s the Indiana Jones of whole foods medicine…. get on it…
x
FIND DON TOLMAN HERE: http://www.dontolmaninternational.com/
Juice
Drinking Juice is a great way to get extra vitamins and minerals in to your body. However not all juice is created equal.
Juice that you buy from the supermarket is full of preservatives and added sugars etc. Fresh squeezed juice is the way to go!
Juicing helps you absorb all the nutrients from fruits and vegetables. This is really important because most of us have impaired digestion due to less than optimal food choices over many years. This limits your body’s ability to absorb nutrients from the food you eat. Juicing allows you to consume an optimal amount of fruit and vegetables easily enabling you to absorb all the mico-nutrients.
I use a regular juicer but for best results and to retain the optimal amount of enzymes and nutrient quality you can use a cold press juicer.
Here are some of my favourite recipes.
Refresher Juice
- 1/2 watermelon
- 2 limes
Detox Juice
- 1 apple
- 6 carrots
- 1 small beetroot (and beetroot greens if available)
- 1 small bunch of spinach
- 1 lemon
- 1 thumb of ginger
Orange and Mint Juice
- 4 oranges
- 1 bunch of mint
- 1 apple (or pear) for added sweetness.
Happy Juicing!
Jess.
Pesticides and Herbicides are gross…
Every day we ingest herbicides and pesticides in our bodies just from “fresh foods” unless you’re buying all organic food this will always be the case until something changes dramatically with our farming practices.
What we can do is wash our fresh fruit and vegetables in a mixture of water and raw apple cider vinegar. This removes 99% of the chemicals from the outside of the food.
All you need to do is fill up a bowl, or your sink with water and add just a few table spoons of the vinegar to the water. Wash your vegetables and you’re done! A great way to test this is with apples you buy from the supermarket. They are usually waxed to make them shiny. Washing them in this way will help to remove the wax from the apple so you can see firsthand what apple cider vinegar can do!
You can buy apple cider vinegar from the supermarket or a health food shop. My favourite is Paul Bragg’s raw apple cider vinegar.
If you have any questions please email me at yorhealth_jessica@hotmail.com. I’m also open to suggestions on topics you’d like to hear more about.
Have a great day!
Jess.
Jessica's Wanderlust 