Food issues

When I go shopping in a regular grocery store, I mainly focus on the outside. The produce, the meat, and the dairy. I do my best to avoid all the processed, packaged food, and bottles of flavored fizzy sugar that populate the middle.

 I happen to work in one of these places, but fortunately, don't have to leave my little bakery corner unless Im sprinkling baked goods throughout the store. However, since hurting my shoulder at the end of November, I have been on light duty, and can't do my normal work.

 So the other day, I had to walk the store, every aisle, and scan out of stock items. It took me forever, because I was amazed by the products I ran across. "Natural" and "healthy" products filled with unnatural and unhealthy ingredients. Sugar in fun shapes for your kid marketed as a healthy fruit snack. Oodles of noodle boxes with powdered chemical sauces., and umpteen other examples, across just as many food types, of confusing jargon and marketing loopholes.

 Now, I know this stuff exists. I just forget. I also do, on occasion, buy some packaged food. However, I am at a point where increasingly, I seek out and find a healthier, better, alternative. It almost always requires more work on my part, and often it is not as cheap, but the payoff is huge in that I get a superior, healthy product that I know is good for me and my family.

 When I was just starting my scan of out of stocks, a woman asked me "hey, you work here? Is this stuff any good?" waving a box of noodle side dish at me. I said that I hadn't tried it, but mentioned that I had tried the organic product on the shelf next to it and it was pretty good for box pasta. She rolled her eyes and said "Ugh, you're one of those" and walked off. Its true what they say about leading a horse to water.

Awhile back I watched a good documentary about food additives, artificial sweeteners, links between some additives and cravings, and deceptive strategies used by the food industry to schlep their stuff. Its called Hungry For Change and definitely worth a watch if you are at all interested on what is really going on with your food. You can watch it on netflix, or get it from their website here.