First I have to say that I have made a list of 6 items that I am not ready to give up yet. This is still an new endeavor for me, and I want to set myself up to succeed- and for me, that means that I can upheave all of my eating habits, but I will wean myself off my 6 no-nos slowly.
Choosy Mothers
So, having said that, you will understand why those items were even in my pantry in the first place. I grabbed the JIF peanut butter off the shelf and said to my kid, "Do you know why I am obsessed with this peanut butter? I have been told since I was a kid that this is the best peanut butter. "Choosy mothers choose JIF. They took our mothers hostage and made them think if they didn't get it, they were not choosy mothers. So then I pass my preference of peanut butter on to my kids. They start marketing to us as babies, with the whole knowledge that our emotional relationships to certain brands can stick to us for a lifetime."
Then I grabbed our container of Nestle Quik. "And see here, this freaking rabbit? This rabbit has been telling me to drink nestle Quik since I was knee high to a gnat. He was cute, he knew what I wanted- I wanted chocolate milk, and he wanted me to like Nestle brand, and I listened to him, here I am 35 years later, still listening!"
Finally I grabbed the Mother of all comfort food for latchkey kids in America- Kraft Mac and Cheese. "Now this, this is truly the best example of brand identification in American history, besides Coca Cola. This box of yummy, albeit crappy nothingness has been the staple food of kids, of moms to give to kids, of kids who are at home without mom, of college kids- its the comfort food of those kids who grew up...they cornered the market on comfort food."
She and I knew that the Kraft mac and cheese would be hard to give up. It will be, but I am not enforcing that one yet.
When I went to the Monsanto Rally and March on May 25, 2013 with a dear friend and a new friend, the new friend, Rebecca, turned to us and said, "The really disturbing thing is how much I am emotionally attached to certain brands. Not just the foods, but the brands themselves."
It is disturbing, especially when you consider that they had this plan all along. Those brander developers market to us young- the know we will get attached. they know we will feed it to our kids, turn to it for comfort- it will remind us of our childhoods- even the bloody jingles haunt us- "My bologna has a first name..its o-s-c-a-r." Who over the age of 35 doesn't know that one? Or the Libby commercial- "If it says Libby Libby Libby on the label label label you will like it like it like it on your table table table." These things embed into your consciousness. You don't even see it happening. Like sheep, they get the ring in our noses and then we belong to them for a lifetime. Unless we wake up and see that we have been programmed, like robots, and in that epiphany seek to be free agents.
And why wake up? Because these foods are filled with GMOs. GMOs are not to be trusted as safe for consumption, and these brands that we have been lulled into feeling safe and comforted by are delivering genetically modified organisms right into our trusting mouths and bodies, and that of our kids, and our grandkids. Kraft, Nestle- two of the biggest bad boys on the list of tainted foods.
Below is a list of brands to avoid. It isn't easy! Like I said, I am keeping my 6 things, for now. As mentioned above, mac and cheese, Jif peanut butter, Nestle Quik, Coca Cola is the 5th and Oreos is the 6th. Other than these, I will not shop at a major grocery store. I buy most of my family's needs at the local farmer's market and Trader Joe's. I am learning to prepare different foods for dinner, and you know what? It feels good. It feels....strangely sexy. I can't explain it- just try it and see.
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