Wednesday, March 30, 2011

The Path I've Chosen

The dietary path that I have chosen is to follow the dietary pattern of the Weston A. Price foundation by eating real, high-quality, traditional foods and by learning and connecting with my ancestral dietary heritage. Dr. Weston A. Price was a dentist that traveled around the world studying the diets of indigenous, non-industrialized peoples. What he found throughout the world is that people that subsisted on a traditional diet had low to no chronic diseases and nearly perfect teeth with well-formed dental arches. He found that each culture had a source of animal food in their diet, and even those that ate more plants would seek out insects or animal products such as milk, eggs, etc. Dr. Price tended to find the most incidence of dental caries (cavities) among those cultures that were most dependent on plants and the least amount of dental caries among those who were more dependent on meat such as the Masai of sub-Saharan Africa that subsist on meat, milk, and blood (which they have a technique for extracting without needing to kill or even seriously injure the animal).

My ancestors are most likely to be from West Africa as I am African-American and that is where the strong majority of the slave trade took place. As my ancestors in America on both sides of my family appear to have been share-croppers, my ancestry is highly likely to be connected the trans-Atlantic slave trade. My family on both sides also has a tradition of cooking and eating soul-food when we get together for family gatherings and holidays. Many of the foods considered soul food today can be connected with West-African cooking and dietary habits with some influences from Native American and European-American cultures. Some West-African foods that still survive today as a part of soul food include: greens (collard, mustard), gumbo (a seafood stew whose name is derived from the African word 'gombo' meaning okra), yams, okra, black-eyed peas, and the use of meat as seasoning in vegetable dishes and slow-cooked stews. West-Africa is also a coastal region with high access to seafood such as fish and shell fish that can also be found in soul food today.

I am currently learning all about our food system, researching soul food and West African foods, and learning about the benefits of traditional eating. I am learning about the importance of eating organically, avoiding the toxins, poisons, and unnecessary cruelty that are prevalent in our food system. I am learning about greedy, monopolistic companies like Monsanto that want to corrupt and control the world's seeds, as well as the supposed "philanthropic" entities that fund this unethical onslaught. I am learning the power of voting with my fork in order to support the best practices in our food system, of knowing my farmer, eating sustainably, going local when I can, buying fair-trade products that do not exploit the people that grow, harvest, and manufacture them.

The life that I want is a vibrant, healthy, energetic one, and eating the right things will power me to live that life. I live in the Central Valley of California that has been referred to as 'the bread-basket of the world' with all that it produces. It would make sense for me to investigate that, and partake of the local bounty of goods that is available to me in this area. California is like a self-sustaining system when it comes to what is produced here, and it would be good for me to learn more about what is produced here and how it plays a part in my journey in taking care of me.