Really new - question

[e&tsmom]

I hope someone can help me. We are not TF and we are not a veg family either. We eat saturated fats from dairly products, eat whole foods, eggs, nothing processed, I bake our bread products. I am intrigued by the TF philosophy, though truthfully I dont completely understand how to do it...even after reading stuff on Price and others. Not sure how to sprout grains, exatly. But, we also dont eat meat because I am not at all satisfied with how they are treated prior to slaughter, I dont trust the "organicness" of the food the animals consume, and sadly I realize that even ill animals raised on an organic farm are still slaughtered and distributed for sale.

So, i am not quite sure where I fall. I love the idea of the TF diet but cant get past the rest. It was really hard from me to drink milk for a time becasue I was afraid it was from sick cows who just had their babies taken away. Ugh. Of course, I give my children animal foods becasue they are still growing, so I guess I'd like to be more TF than I realize. I am not sure how to reconcile everything. We eat eggs from a local farm because I have been there and they are humanely treated and have lots of room to roam. Anyone else have this problem when they first started. Anyone else go from veggie to TF. I guess we're kinda lacto-ovo (DH and I) and the kids get a little more
meat. Can anyone suggest some small steps? And, tell me how it the world to sprout grains???

[Cristiaz]

I hear ya on the meat dilemma. I was a veggie for 14 years but after diagnosing myself with celiac and having the protien sources I was eating taken away (soy for one and other grains) I started craving meat. I ate wild caught fish first, salmon or halibut. I had my first steak this past March and my body needed it so badly that I felt like a new person after eating it. We get our steak from a local farm, 100% grass fed, outside, no transporting them (which I think is cruel due to the fact it is stressful for animals to be shipped like inanimate objects), they are killed on the farm, one at a time. We can visit the farm anytime we want too. Go too Eatwild.com and see what you can find near you. So far I'm just eating steak. No other animal products except eggs from pastured chickens from the same farm. I'd like to try buffalo but not sure how where I can get it....

As far as sprouting, I have a sprouting chart in one of my raw food cookbooks. If you have or get the book Nourishing Traditions by Sally Falon, she talks about it too. I bet you can find all that info online too.

I'm definitely not full on TF by any means but the woman on here are so smart that its a great starting point to learn about the traditional way of eating and just healthy eating in general. I've been doing whole foods for years now but am trying to incorporate more TF.

[mom61508]

You should get nourishing traditions for sure. I just started reading and wow what a great book to have!!! Also tons of recipes in it.
It was hard for me too to eat more meat but I feel SO much better eating :

You go to the farms where you get the meat and ask lots of questions also eatwild.com like mentioned above is a good place to look.

Sprout all you grains/legumes in water overnight with a litte acv in it....i think...Then you cook as normal. I'm kind of new to this too

[e&tsmom]

Thanks for the responses. I went to eatwild and found a bunch of great sounding, quality farms that meet eatwild's standards, but they are pretty far away. I am not sure that diving 1 1/2 hours to get eggs and meat is practical. I know DH wont like it very much. I also went to local harvest, wich I associated more iwth veggies (we grow our own) so I didnt ever go one it much. I found several farms much closer to me there that say they are certified organic, or in trasition to certified organic, pasture fed etc, but they are not on the eat wild website. Any thoughts? Which is more reliable? Do they have to pay to be on eatwild? I couldnt find that info.

I ordered the Nourishing traditions from the library. If I like it (which I hope I will since I have been reading many things on the internet and weston price found. forums and I am really intrigued) I'll gte my own copy. I would love to feed my family a healthy, balanced diet without negatively impacting the lives of the animals we will consume. I have been having a real battle in my soul about this, but my kiddos are gorwing and they need more meat than I have been comfy giving them and I feel completely drained. I know my body needs somehting so I am hoping to find a good balance with quality, well-cared-for meat. As DH says, I am all concerned about the treatment of animals, but I wont be helping any animal if I die. I don thope to find a happy medium.

[Carliegirl]

Nourishing Traditions is really wonderful, its packed full of information and is a great resource and that's where I started but, I also recommend Nina Planck's "Real Food" which is in my opinion a little more optimistic, concise and fun to read. They both are on the same wavelength. I really like Nina.

Sounds like you're well on your way to TF to me. We are all concerned about the safety of the meat we're eating and that the animals are treated well. That's one of the great things about buying from a local farmer...you can really know these kinds of things. Do check out eatwild.com and also look and see if your area has a farmer's market. We get our raw milk there. Once you find a farmer selling you can go visit their farm to check out their processes and stuff.

[e&tsmom]

Thanks carliegirl. I found a couple of farms I plan to visit this week, but what kinds of questions should I ask them. I have never before been concerned about meach, since we didnt really eat much. Any suggestions on that?

I'll check out the Real Food book. Thanks for the suggestion!

[laurelg]

How about you or your DH (or both!) take up hunting? You know exactly where the animal comes from, you demonstrate your respect for the animal by being willing to take its life yourself and you avoid the quandaries about unethical farm practices and whatnot.

I do eat meat from the store, mostly because we haven't gotten good enough at hunting to fill our freezer yet. : But, I really view it as hiring an assassin when I do - I feel a moral obligation to be willing to kill (i.e. do the dirty work) if I'm going to eat meat products.

[mbravebird]

I would suggest you go to your local farmer's markets to find local farmers who meet your standards. The standards being: animals are fully pastured and treated well. "Certified organic" is not a big standard for me, because it often doesn't mean much and the local farmers who are doing really good stuff can't afford to get certified, anyway.

We get our beef and chicken from farmers who used to be vegetarians. They treat the animals really, really well, care for them, and see the eating of them as part of the circle of life as long as it is done humanely and with respect. We get our milk, raw, from a family with a tiny farm -- when one of their cows died after giving birth, she died with her head in the lap of the farmer's daughter, her head being stroked. They allow the calves to nurse, working the calves' needs into their milking schedule.

You can find people doing this, but probably not by looking for certified organic. Go to your farmer's market and look for farms that say they're pastured and chemical-free, and that will likely lead you to folks who are doing things in the way I described above. With eggs, ask whether they're actually on fresh grass, or whether they just have a big run that has turned to dirt. With meat, ask whether they're truly grassfed or whether they're finished on grain.

If you're interested in better milk, go to realmilk.com and look for folks in your area -- I don't know what your state's laws are about it, but there will always be someone doing it in your area (even if they're not on realmilk.com), you just may have to make a few connections with folks first to find out about it. If it's not legal in your state, it will be in the form of a cowshare, so that you actually own part of a milk cow, and are allowed to have the cow's milk for that reason.

I would suggest you start with soaking and fermenting rather than sprouting. Look to Nourishing Traditions for help with that, and ask here if you need to clarify what you find there. Have fun!! (Go slow, too -- baby steps work well...)

[YummyYarnAddict]

I was a vegetarian then a vegan for years until I became pregnant with my daughter and then went back to being a vegetarian. I was told that I really needed to become an omnivore for health reasons because even though I was eating healthy and my cholesterol and some of my other labs were great, I felt miserable and have a lot of health issues (including osteoporosis before the age of 40, some infertility issues, fibromyalgia, and on and on). I had seen nutritionists and knew that my diet was healthy ... if you buy into the healthiness of a vegetarian or a vegan diet ... but, the reality was that it just wasn't working for my body. I saw a naprapath, an osteopath, an acupuncturist, and on and on and my acupuncturist told me to think of meat as medicine because my body needed it. She said that I didn't have to sit down and eat half a cow, but what I needed to do was to eat the best quality meat I could find, and eat the appropriate amount for my body in order to achieve health. Still, I persisted with the alternating vegetarian and vegan diet for a couple more years and my health continued to deteriorate. My daughter was vegetarian until she was two years old and had meat at a friend's house and she told me that she wanted and needed meat, so I figured that she knew what her body needed and I bought and prepared meat for her, but not myself.

Last year after getting the test results back showing profound vitamin and mineral deficiencies (but an awesome cholesterol level!), my doctor sent me to yet another nutritionist who said that there was nothing she could really do unless I became an omnivore. I listened to her spiel and I just couldn't do it HER way, but I wasn't going to write it off out of hand either. I started doing my research and came across the TF way of eating/lifestyle. I was 100% behind doing this for my children. So why not myself? I did a LOT of reading, made a lot of phone calls, asked questions, so next I visited farms and farmers and actually "met" the animals. We get our meat from farmers who grow the food they feed their animals and who are certified organic and grow their own hay that they feed the animals during winter. We get the bacteria count reports about the milk. We get updates and newsletters and can follow our farmers on Facebook. My kids play with their kids and I know that they won't feed their own kids anything I won't feed my own. So I came around and my health is improving because of it, which, in turn, benefits my kids.

It helps to see my kids talk to the children on the farm too. My kids come back from running around and show an understanding that they know that the animals are not pets, but are there to produce eggs, be raised for meat, etc. We know the animals are well taken care of and we know when they're sent for processing. We get emails from the farmer when they're cutting back on milk distribution because the cows are getting close to calving and they're letting them dry up a bit. I trust my farmer so that goes a long way. Our farmers also host Open Houses and they share their farms with us. When we do our milk pick up, for example, we can pretty much roam around the farm and my kids can "moo" at the cows or chase the chickens and I can go into the store to see what's in stock and add to my order and leave a note and a check for what I need if I forgot to send an email. These things help and go a long way.

Today we were in Whole Foods and I thought about buying some chicken for dinner since I hadn't taken one out of the freezer before we left for the day. I found myself staring at the chicken and reading the labels and all I could think was that I didn't KNOW the chickens or the farmer so I couldn't TRUST the food. I ended up not buying any. We get all of our meat, dairy, and eggs directly from the farmer. I have to trust my food and, for me, that's a critical part of being able to live TF.

[e&tsmom]

Thanks m. I am planning on going to some farms (maybe I'll even get to the Farmers Market Sunday morning before all the throngs...) this week and I'll definitely use the info you gave. I appreciate it a lot.

Yummy - I totally related to your post. Your story is pretty much mine, though I havent been veg as long. But, i do go the the doc and have extraordinary cholestrol levels, great lab work, though I am never rested. Even after 10 hours of sleep, no kids in the bed, I am still exhausted. I exercise daily and I had to cut back on that - though I am working back up to where I was. It is frustrating. Dh has always thought I needed to eat meat, but wouldn't push it. I am sort of seeing this light with the whole TF thing, but I still need more info - still waiting on my books from the library. I really appreciated your story - thanks. I think if I can make sure I find an awesome farm and am comfy with their practices, perhaps I'll get over this hump and truly be healthy. Not that anyone would look at me and think unhealthy, but you know what i mean. On a side note, it has always been funy because the thing my kids ask for most is meatballs. I have never kept them from eating meat, and they do have it when DH prepares it for them occasionally, but that seems to be their fav. The body knows...

laurelg - thanks for your response. I see the correlation between hunting and respecting the animal, but that just isnt in the cards for us.

Thanks again. I'm feeling more confident!

[WuWei]

Check Local Harvest for humane farms near you. http://www.localharvest.org/


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