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With the recent explosion of Gluten free products on the market, a recent study has found that quinoa and buckwheat is a better alternative to the traditional gluten free options of corn, potato wheat, rice flour and xanthan.

The gluten-free food market is now worth a staggering $1.6bn with the annual growth at 28%, according to Packaged Facts.

Traditionally going gluten free was the only option available to sufferers of coeliac disease but with the growing body of information on the effects of wheat and gluten in the diet, many people are adopting the gluten free lifestyle.

Unfortunately there are some concerns that in a bid to find an alternative to flour based products, the current alternatives may lack the nutritional depth of conventional wheat based products.

Currently corn, potato wheat, rice flour and xanthan had lower levels of antioxidants and polyphenol than quinoa and buckwheat.

Most importantly the study found that using other grains such as quinoa and buckwheat improved the bodies absorption of protein, iron, calcium and fibre.

Source: Trends in Food Science & Technology (2010, Vol. 21, pp 106-113)

Farm fresh food is healthier and better than what we get from supermarkets.

Unfortunately there are some major trade offs in the process of getting fruit and vegetables to the massive supermarket distribution centers around the country.

Think about that juicy red tomato, sun rippened and ready to eat, well Mr/Ms juicy red tomato would be a squashed, unhealthy looking tomato at the end of it’s journey to the supermarket shelf.

All those kms of shipping and freight equal time, transportation considerations and shelf life. Fruit and vegetables are often kept in cool rooms and picked green and stored in an artificial/modified environment by manipulating the levels of oxygen and carbon dioxide to stop or slow down the rippening process.

Depending on the fruit or vegetable, they can be artificially rippened with sulphur dioxide or other nasty chemicals.

So getting back to Mr/Ms tomato, we end up with this rock hard, whitish red looking tomato that has very little taste.

It’s always better to get fresh fuit and vegeatbles, whether from the actual farm which isn’t always convenient or from the local green grocer where the food chain equals Grower>wholesale market>fruiterer>consumer. A much better option than from the supermarkets Grower>distribution centre>cool room storage>refrigerated semi trailer>supermarket>cool room>refrigerated vegetable display>consumer.

Well for $20 today I picked up a box of freshly picked, sun rippened vegetable. Th best part was the beautiful aroma of farm fresh vegetbles that filled the car.

While the pace of life increases, time constraints have made the supermarket an easy option but with some careful planning there are better options that not only deliver healthier, tastier food but are better for the environment.

When food is the closest to it’s natural state, ie not highly processed, then this forms the basic guidelines of what to eat.

Part of my daily diet includes eating a breakfast muesli called Kapai Puku that resembles bird seed with it’s natural mix of seeds & grains. Well this morning I was surprised to find that after lifting the strainer from the drain hole in the sink there was plant life. A seed left over from cleaning my muesli bowl had started to grow, pretty freaky stuff but a testament to how a product that isn’t processed can still nurture life.

Unprocessed foods, grows from sink

Quite often our foods are highly processed and undergo various processes of pasterisation, heating, extruding as well as chemicals being added for colour, taste, flavor enhancement, preservation, binding of ingredients, consistency, shelf life, transportation etc to create the end product. Well if a product can sprout a shoot after being in the most inhospitable environments, there mustn’t be much in the product other than all natural unadulterated ingredients.

This also applies to our fruit and vegetables that can also be submitted to a whole host of processes and chemicals to get them into your supermarket aisle all year around. A great example is garlic, I recently did an experiment whereby I compared organically locally grown organic verses the imported variety.

The results were as I expected, the imported version can last for months versus the local version that lasted about 4 days before sprouting shoots.

So when buying your produce or food, be careful of what you are really eating and avoid the highly processed varieties..