My interview with Healing Wheel, the online magazine for spiritual seekers, was posted today. Read the full interview here. An excerpt is below…

Tell us about the concept of primary and secondary foods. It is an intriguing idea that we feed ourselves in ways other than through our mouths, like say, by way of how we choose to interact with others on an emotional or spiritual level.

The concept of Primary Food is not new, it is intuitive that a life that is fulfilling and close to our true nature will more truly nourish our soul. Joshua Rosenthal, founder of the Institute for Integrative Nutrition in NYC, coined the term “Primary Food”. I think it is a critical part to maintaining a sustainable lifestyle. So maybe when we eat “secondary food” (the stuff we put in our mouth) we are trying to satisfy a need for Primary Food.

What is your own personal experience with living via holistic food versus living via more prepared processed food?

I have lived both sides of the fence, and have hopped back and forth a few times. I grew up chubby, eating a nutritionally-ignorant diet. Not many vegetables, lots of beef, chicken and pork, potatoes of various kinds, frozen pizza, mac and cheese. When I was in my early twenties I discovered macrobiotics and spent much of my twenties living and promoting that way of life. When I was 32 I moved, changed careers and lost a bit of that youthful idealism as I dealt with the “realities” of making a living. While never being totally in the grip of the “Standard American Diet” (SAD) I was certainly having illicit affairs with it, as well as eating unconsciously.

I’ve made attempts over the years to rekindle my passion for a more holistic approach to food. What has really helped me recently is the work done by people such as Michael Pollan who have been exposing the connection of global sustainability to food. This clicked with me and gave me some new toeholds with which to reignite my interest. I have replaced the idealism of youth with a more experiential, comprehensive philosophy of connectedness.

And I found I needed to teach. So I am spending more time writing, consulting and demonstrating the concepts of sustainable holistic food practices.

Read the full interview…

Talk to most people about why they want to change their diet habits and they’ll tell you, “I want to lose weight.”

“Lost” and “losing” generally imply something negative. I lost my keys. I lost the game. I’m losing my mind. It refers to something we used to have, no longer have, and either want back or wish we could get back. So why do we use this same language to describe a desired change in body weight? Do you want to lose weight, but then find it again? Do you wish it would come back? Probably not.

But isn’t that what happens to many of us? We have been on various diet regimens and “lost” countless pounds. If you are like me, you have probably “found” most of them again.

Language is powerful. If we want to create a sustainable, healthy lifestyle for ourselves, we need to change the paradigm of what we have done in the past that has not been successful. It’s easy to chalk it up to some character flaws (I’m weak, I don’t love myself, I have no willpower, etc.). But to quote Einstein, “You can’t solve a problem with the same mind that created it.” We need to change our minds. Change our minds about how we view body weight.

These days, when people comment that I have “lost weight”, I tell them, “No, I sent it away. I don’t want it back.” Usually good for a laugh. But it is deeper, it is a change to the paradigm and the frame of language around weight management. A friend of mine speaks of “weight release”, to let go of something no longer needed. Kind of like a yard sale for body fat.

Changing body weight, reducing it for most people, is seen as the end result of a change in diet. Our society has a great deal of image and self worth wrapped up in body weight. But body weight is simply a barometer and consequence of our state of wellness. As such, changing body weight should be the barometer and consequence of living a healthier, more sustainable lifestyle. It is no doubt fun to watch numbers go down on the scale. But it is even more satisfying to have a body, mind and spirit that is well-nourished, feels great and is in harmony with its environment.

How does your language around body weight impact your success in maintaining a sustainable, healthy lifestyle?

This is a fun idea from TriplePundit…

Could McDonald’s Replace Beef Burgers With Seitan? Would Anyone Notice?

Marilee Crocker of the Cape Cod Times interviewed me last week about my whole food consulting work. It appeared in this past Sunday’s Cape Cod Times. You can read the article online here…

Heeding an Inner Call

The comment about “well-paid speaking gigs” was somewhat tongue-in-cheek on my part, though if you are looking for a speaker…

Here is a quick read from Darya Pino at the Huffington Post…

Top 10 Mistakes Made by Farmers Market Newbs

This week’s haul from the Orleans Farmers Market – strawberries, mixed salad greens, red leaf lettuce, asparagus, radishes, shiitake mushrooms, garlic scapes and rhubarb!

I also had a head of lettuce my sister-in-law brought from her Boston CSA basket. With all these different salad greens, I decided to make my own mix. So I broke up the two heads of lettuce in a large bowl, then mixed in the bag of mixed greens. Everything went (in two batches) into the Oxo salad spinner (see below). Filled the spinner with water, gently massaged the leaves, drained (did this three times, the two heads were obviously fresh picked and not washed), then spun (the fun part!).  The spinner gets most of the water out of the leaves.

Then bagged up the  mix into reusable produce bags, ready for the week!

This article from the New York Times tells the tale of Scott Jurek, an accomplished ultramarathoner, who has traded meat and potatoes for whole grains, fresh vegetables, tofu, nut butters and sea vegetables. Inspiring!

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/13/sports/13runner.html

Want to get started with a whole foods/natural foods lifestyle? Been reading Michael Pollan or watching him on TV? Feeling compelled to get yourself in better shape while also shaping up the planet? Here is a workshop to help you get started!

This two-hour session will be part presentation, part conversation. The group is limited to eight participants, so we can all exchange information and ideas. We’ll also talk about individual challenges to starting and maintaining a natural foods lifestyle, and suggest strategies for success.

We’ll cover:

• Basics of a whole foods diet: shopping tips, cooking tips
• Becoming aware of your social food habits
• Integrating realistic whole food options in typical life situations
• Developing a plan that is sustainable and works for you
• What is Primary Food?

Where:

Venture Hyannis Conference Room
540 Main Street
Hyannis, MA 02601
(behind Colombos Restaurant, next to Fitness 500)

When:

Thursday, June 10, 2010, 6–8PM

Presented by:

Bert Jackson
Vegetarian/natural foods chef
Co-founder and past president Macrobiotic Organization of St. Thomas
Coach and mentor for whole foods living

Sign Up:

Fee for the event is $35.
Sign up soon as space is limited to 8 participants!

Shifting your perspective about food choices can seem daunting, and it can seem like a life sentence. For some, this is enough to give up before starting. The thought of never enjoying a pizza or a glass of wine again conjures up the old joke— Doc: If you give up smoking, drinking, fatty foods and sex you’ll live to be 100 years old. Patient: Why would I want to?

So here is the challenge. Don’t make a lifetime commitment. Give yourself a week. Try some very simple recipes. Here is a primer.

Shopping list (organic whenever possible!)
Let’s assume that you have some basics. I’ve mentioned a few other ingredients in the recipes that aren’t included here. While many of these items are available at a typical supermarket, better quality ingredients are likely to be found at your local natural food store and veggie market.

Medium grain brown rice
Rolled oats
Aduki beans, canned (Eden or other organic brand)
Other canned beans (again, organic)
Sea salt
Tamari (I get the wheat free. If you are sodium conscious, get low sodium as well)
Extra virgin olive oil
Toasted sesame oil
Organic limes or lime juice
Leafy greens (collard greens, kale, bok choy, not spinach*)
Broccoli
Onions
Carrots
Acorn, Butternut or Buttercup squash

Recipes

Brown Rice
Put one cup of dry rice in a heavy pot. Rinse well at least three times, until the water doesn’t appear cloudy. Add two cups of water and a pinch of sea salt. Stir and let soak for several hours (I do it either overnight or in the AM to cook late afternoon/evening). After soaking, bring to a boil then simmer on low for 45 minutes to an hour. Don’t stir. When the top looks a bit dry and you can’t hear the water bubbling in the bottom of the pot, you are done. Let it sit a few minutes and then you are ready to go.

Squash
Preheat oven to 375°. Cut the squash in half, remove the seeds, then cut into serving sized chunks. Mix a bit of olive oil with some tamari and a dash of nutmeg if you want. Lay out the squash skin side down on a baking sheet or wide pan. Brush the olive oil/tamari mix lightly onto the fleshy part of each piece. Bake for about 35-45 minutes, until pieces are soft throughout when poked with a fork.

Both the squash and rice can be used throughout the week in a variety of ways.

Fast Stir-Fry
This is a quick meal, especially if you have the rice and squash on hand.

Chop a few leaves of leafy greens, a few florets of broccoli, and a quarter of a large onion. Use an organic canola oil spray in a skillet or wok (I use a high-quality non-stick skillet**) and heat on high. As the pan gets hot add in the vegetables along with a bit of water (2-3 tablespoons). When the greens get brighter add in 3/4 cup of cooked brown rice and 1/2 cup aduki beans. Stir together. Add a teaspoon of tamari (or a cap full) and a few drops of lime juice. Scoop the flesh out of one of the cooked pieces of squash, cut into cubes and add it in. Mix everything well for a few minutes until everything is hot. Serve it up and you’ll have a tasty, very satisfying meal.

Morning Oatmeal
Bring 2 cups of water and a pinch of salt to a boil. Add 1 cup of rolled oats, stir, and simmer very low for 15-20 minutes. Stir once in a while. Serve it with a little soy milk, some chopped nuts, fresh fruit or a small dollop of agave syrup or brown rice syrup.

Tasty Veggie-Bean Soup
Chop 1 onion plus other veggies of your choice (I use up the veggies that are starting to pass their prime in the fridge). In a large, heavy pot heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil. Add the veggies and saute until the onions start to become translucent. And two cans of beans (I usually mix the beans, like garbanzos and black beans) and enough water to cover everything by an inch or so. Bring to a boil and simmer for 45 minutes. Add a pinch of sea salt to taste and enjoy.  You can vary the veggies (though I always start with onions) and the beans.

Miso option: instead of adding salt to your soup, use miso, which is a ferment soy bean paste rich in nutrients and flora for your gut. But don’t add miso to the pot. Boiling miso kills the flora. For each soup serving, take a bit of the broth and mix it with 2 teaspoons of miso (I use a suribachi). Different varieties of miso have different flavors, the lighter versions being milder, the darker having a more robust flavor. My personal favorite is barley miso from South River Miso.

Some things to avoid during the week

Part of the benefit from a whole food/natural food diet is not from what you eat, but what you don’t! Now some of these may be difficult to live without, but remember, we’re just trying this for a week, right? Give your body a vacation from some of these extreme foods:

Refined sugar
Flour products, especially white flour
Coffee and caffeinated tea (it’s only one week, remember)
Alcohol
Dairy products (yes, I love cheese, too. Just try it for a week!)

Observe the results

Watch how your body and mind react during the week. Sometimes, a sense of well-being in present after the first meal! Observe your sleep and energy levels. Keep tabs on chronic symptoms such as heartburn, joint pain and digestive issues. Sense how you feel!

Note: Sometimes a switch to a plant-based diet can have some embarrassing gastrointestinal results. You may want to add some pickled foods to your meals, like organic sauerkraut. Chewing very well also aids the digestion process. Some people have reported success with Beano, a natural enzyme supplement.

How’s it Going?

So if you are embarking on this experiment, let me know how it goes! This obviously just a taste of the possibilities. If you would like to explore further, please contact me.

* Spinach, potatoes, tomatoes, peppers and eggplant are all part of the nightshade family and contain higher levels of oxalic acid. There are anecdotal reports that some people suffer more joint pain when consuming nightshades. This should be a personal decision. But for the purposes of our experimental week, won’t hurt you to skip them!

** Until recently I was not a fan on non-stick cookware. The surfaces were too easily damaged and the non-stick particles could be ingested (someone once joked this may help with constipation). Newer methods of creating non-stick surfaces bond much harder material to the pans more strongly. My personal favorite is Swiss Diamond.

You have no doubt heard that if you want something, visualize it. If you want to be rich, see yourself driving the Ferrari, if you want to lose weight, see yourself svelte and buff. I’ve tried this. Just doesn’t work for me. I’m neither rich nor svelte.

The problem with our desires is that they are snapshots along a journey. There I am in the Diamond Head beach house, look at me in that Speedo (OK, sorry for that visual). The desire to be there leaves out a critical component, the willingness to get there.

It’s all about the journey. Rather than visualize the Speedo, how about visualizing going to the farmer’s market and buying fresh foods, cooking nutritious, low-fat meals, visiting your favorite restaurant and coffee shop and making choices that support your journey to your fine-looking self (and fine-feeling healthier self!).

All journeys require choice, this path or that. But the more we can define that path the easier the ride. For example, I work mostly alone in a home office, so I really enjoy going into town to my fav coffee shop to have breakfast or lunch. Now they have great coffee (which at this point doesn’t need to be on my path) and a dizzying array of comfort foods. But what I realized is that what I get most from my visit are the interactions with other people. My friends come here. I know the staff. It is a big social part of my day.

So now I choose menu items that are on or are close to my path. Vegetarian chili (no cheese), green salads, herbal teas. I still get that all-important spiritual nutrition, human interaction, but without losing site of the path.

The success of this came from visualizing the process. I actually thought ahead of time about my behavior in this situation. That allowed me to come into it prepared and not have a knee-jerk reaction to the growl of the espresso machine or the Kona coconut muffin in the pastry case.

Visualization of the path, of the willingness to make choices, contributes the success of the journey. After all, once you have the Speedo snapshot, where do you go from there?