The Real Food Challenge
WHAT is the REAL FOOD Challenge?
Give up ultra-processed food products and reduce moderately processed foods for one to seven days, while increasing the amounts of natural, whole foods in your diet.
WHY should I take the REAL FOOD Challenge?
The proliferation of highly processed, food-like products in the Standard American Diet (SAD) is literally killing us. Chronic diseases are responsible for 7 out of 10 deaths in the U.S. and the majority of these conditions (e.g., heart disease, cancer, stroke, diabetes) are caused in part by what we put on our plates, so it’s safe to say we are enthusiastically digging our own graves with knives and forks.
By taking our REAL FOOD Challenge, it is our hope that you will:
- Raise your awareness on how little real food is actually in your diet and/or how much ultra-processed food-like products you are currently eating without even knowing it.
- Learn what to look for on nutrition labels and how to identify unnecessary and potentially harmful ingredients, added sugars, preservatives and chemical additives.
- Educate yourself on how to eat for optimal wellness and good health. It’s quite remarkable that humans are the only animals who seem to have lost this instinctive skill.
In short, we believe you should take our REAL FOOD Challenge to motivate yourself to add years to your life and life to your years!
WHEN should I do it? NOW.
The sad truth about chronic disease in this country (and around the world) is that most of what’s killing us can be prevented by diet and lifestyle changes. And the best time to change what you eat is not after the medical diagnosis —although that’s usually part of the prescription— but way before that. Actually, today would be a good choice. Because no one goes to bed perfectly healthy and wakes up with heart disease, cancer or T2 diabetes the next morning. Make no mistake, what you are eating TODAY is what’s fueling your future quality of life.
HOW long should I do it?
For the rest of your life! Just kidding, well, actually…
As long as you can, with the goal being at least one week. For some, 24 hrs may be a challenge. If you can make it past one day, we suggest you shoot for 3 days, and then 5, and at 7 days you will hopefully see how much better you feel when you have been nourishing your body with foods that can help prevent disease, instead of fueling it.
Being reasonable people, after this challenge is completed we don’t think that anyone can – or should – remove ALL highly-processed foods from their diets forever. The occasional treat, cheat day or vacation binge will not make a whole lot of difference toward the end game. Our goal is that the REAL FOOD Challenge will open your eyes to how insidious highly processed foods have become in our daily lives and that you will gradually strive to remove as many of them from your normal routine as you can. The key is remembering that the further we stray from REAL food, the sicker we become.
WHO is the challenge for?
Whether you eat three meals a day out of a bag, box, or plastic carton – or if you already consider yourself a “healthy” eater – we think it will be surprising to most just how many stabilizers, flavor enhancers, dyes, preservatives, fake sugars, humectants, emulsifiers and chemical processing aids the large food corporations are surreptitiously adding to the products we put into our bodies.
Individuals can do it on their own, challenge their friends or decide to conquer it together as a family. The more the merrier and it’s a great way to teach children what REAL FOOD actually is by cooking and preparing delicious meals and snacks together!
Now, let’s get started….
RULES: Eat only REAL food for one week. Keep a daily journal and record your food. Submit pics of your journal entries to [email protected] and we’ll add your name to the list of REAL FOOD CHAMPIONS on our website!
THERE ARE JUST 3 SIMPLE RULES:
EAT as many whole, plant-based foods without a label (a.k.a. fruits and veggies) as you’d like.
MINIMALLY processed foods which follow our RECIPE RULE* are also allowed.
SUGAR, or any of it’s 50+ aliases**, may NOT be in the first 3 ingredients.
NOTE: Any meal cooked at home – or eaten away from home – is totally OK, provided all the ingredients in your meal meet the first three criteria above.
*RECIPE RULE: If the ingredients list was a recipe, could you make it at home? This means all ingredients listed on the nutrition label must be already sitting in your cupboard or fridge, or easily bought at your local grocery store or market. For example, we don’t know many people who stock sodium nitrate, azodicarbonamide, succinic acid, or propylene glycol at home.
** ADDED SUGARS come in many forms. Since ingredients are listed on labels in the order of most to least, avoid any product which lists one of these types of sugars in the first 3 ingredients:
Basic Simple Sugars (monosaccharides and disaccharides): Dextrose, Fructose, Galactose, Glucose, Lactose, Maltose, Sucrose
Solid or Granulated Sugars: Beet sugar, Brown sugar, Cane juice crystals, Cane sugar, Castor sugar, Coconut sugar, Confectioner’s sugar (aka, powdered sugar), Corn syrup solids, Crystalline fructose, Date sugar, Demerara sugar, Dextrin, Diastatic malt, Ethyl maltol, Florida crystals, Golden sugar, Glucose syrup solids, Grape sugar, Icing sugar, Maltodextrin, Muscovado sugar, Panela sugar, Raw sugar, Sugar (granulated or table), Sucanat, Turbinado sugar, Yellow sugar
Liquid or Syrup Sugars: Agave Nectar/Syrup, Barley malt, Blackstrap molasses, Brown rice syrup, Buttered sugar/ buttercream, Caramel, Carob syrup, Corn syrup, Evaporated cane juice, Fruit juice, Fruit juice concentrate, Golden syrup, High-Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS), Honey, Invert sugar, Malt syrup, Maple syrup, Molasses, Rice syrup, Refiner’s syrup, Sorghum syrup, Treacle
BONUS:
Familiarize yourself with our RED ZONE food additives and avoid them whenever possible.
Since you’re reading labels anyway, note the added sugars and stay beneath the maximum threshold of 24 g. (6 tsp) for women and children over 2 yrs. and 36 g. (9 tsp) for men, as established by the AHA and WHO.
Now that we have you diligently scanning food labels for REAL food ingredients, here is a list of 50 common additives we think you should avoid, even though the FDA generally lists them as ‘safe’ and many are banned in other countries. Due to the growing concerns about the consequences of consuming them in large quantities, we recommend avoiding them whenever possible, because there really is no need to consume them in the first place.
The good news is that if you are eating minimally-processed, whole foods, and are following our Recipe Rule while reading the nutrition labels, you won’t find any of these ingredients listed. We provide them as an educational tool so that you can read labels with a better understanding of how these chemicals make it into bodies and why they can be harmful.
1. Sodium nitrate: Added to processed meats to stop bacterial growth. Linked to cancer in humans.
2. Sulfites: Used to keep prepared foods fresh. Can exacerbate breathing difficulties in those sensitive to the ingredient.
3. Azodicarbonamide: Used in bagels and buns. Causal links to asthma.
4. Potassium bromate: Added to breads to increase volume. Linked to cancer in humans.
5. Propyl gallate: Added to fat-containing products. Linked to cancer in humans
6. BHA/BHT: A fat preservative, used in foods to extend shelf life. Linked to cancerous tumor growth.
7. Propylene glycol: Better known as antifreeze. Thickens dairy products and salad dressing. Deemed ‘generally’ safe by FDA.
8. Butane: TBHQ (tertiary butylhydroquinone) a form of butane and a known carcinogen, is sprayed on chicken nuggets to “help preserve freshness”. Ingesting a single gram can cause nausea, vomiting, ringing in the ears, delirium, a sense of suffocation, and collapse. Ingesting five grams of TBHQ can kill.
9. Monosodium glutamate (MSG): Flavor enhancer that can trigger headaches. Linked in animal studies to nerve damage, heart problems and seizures.
10. Disodium inosinate: In snack foods. Contains MSG.
11. Disodium guanylate: Also used in snack foods, and contains MSG.
12. Recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone (rBGH): Genetically-engineered version of natural growth hormone in cows. Boosts milk production in cows. Contains high levels of IGF-1, which is linked to various types of cancer..
13. Sodium benzoate: Used as a preservative in salad dressing and carbonated beverages. A known carcinogen and potentially harmful to our DNA.
14. Brominated vegetable oil: Keeps flavor oils in soft drinks suspended. Bromate is a poison and can contribute to organ damage and birth defects. Not required to be listed on food labels.
15. Propyl gallate: Found in meats, popcorn, soup mixes and frozen dinners. Shown to cause cancer in rats. Banned in some countries. Deemed safe by FDA.
16. Olestra: Fat-like substance that is unabsorbed by the body. Used in place of natural fats in some snack foods. Can cause digestive problems, and also not healthy for the heart.
17. Carrageenan: Stabilizer and thickening agent used in many prepared foods. Causal links to ulcers and cancer. Irritates people who have Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS). There are numerous studies showing conclusively that carrageenan irritates your GI tract and can exacerbate Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD), Crohn’s Disease and ulcerative colitis.
18. Polysorbate 80: A thickener that is used in baked goods. Linked to cancer in laboratory animals and complications for those with IBS/IBD.
19. Camauba wax: Used in chewing gums and to glaze certain foods. Also linked to cancer and tumors.
20. Chlorine dioxide: Used in bleaching flour. Possible link to tumors and hyperactivity in children.
21. Paraben: Used to stop mold and yeast forming in foods. Can disrupt hormones in the body, and could also be linked to breast cancer.
22. Sodium carboxymethyl cellulose: Used as a thickener in salad dressings. Could cause cancer in high quantities.
23. Aluminum: A preservative in some packaged foods that can cause cancer.
Artificial Sweeteners to Avoid
Artificial sweeteners are regulated by FDA, just as food additives are, but this does not apply to products ‘generally
recognized as safe’.
27. Saccharin: Carcinogen found to cause bladder cancer in rats.
28. Aspartame: An excitotoxin and thought to be a carcinogen. Can cause dizziness, headaches, blurred vision and stomach problems.
29. High fructose corn syrup: Composed of fructose and glucose, it contributes to obesity, diabetes, heart problems, and arthritis. Increases rate of insulin resistance.
30. Acesulfame potassium: Used with other artificial sweeteners in diet sodas and ice cream. Linked to lung and breast tumors in rats.
31. Sucralose: Splenda. Potential swelling of liver and kidneys and a shrinkage of the thymus gland.
32. Bleached starch: Can be used in many dairy products. Thought to be related to asthma and skin irritations.
33. Tert butylhydroquinone: Used to preserve fish products. Could contribute to stomach tumors at high doses.
Artificial Food Colorings to Avoid
Food colorings are used to give foods a more attractive appearance, but some experts believe they can contribute to
serious health problems, including asthma and hyperactivity in children.
35. Red #40: Found in many foods to alter color. All modern food dyes are derived from petroleum. A carcinogen that is linked to cancer in some studies and also hyperactivity in children. Banned in some European countries.
36. Blue #1: Used in bakery products, candy and soft drinks. Can damage chromosomes and possibly lead to cancer.
37. Blue #2: Used in candy and pet food beverages. Causal association with brain tumors
38. Citrus red #1: Sprayed on oranges to make them look ripe. Can damage chromosomes and lead to cancer.
39. Citrus red #2: Used to color oranges. Possible cancer risk if you eat the peel.
40. Green #3: Used in candy and beverages. May cause bladder tumors.
41. Yellow #5: Used in desserts, candy and baked goods. Possible link to kidney tumors.
42. Yellow #6: A carcinogen used in sausage, beverages and baked goods. Linked to kidney tumors, according to some studies.
43. Red #2: A food coloring that may contribute to both asthma and cancer.
44. Red #3: A carcinogen. that is added to cherry pie filling, ice cream and baked goods. May cause nerve damage and thyroid cancer.
45. Caramel coloring: In soft drinks, sauces, pastries and breads. When made with ammonia, it can cause cancer in mice. Food companies are not required to disclose if this ingredient is made with ammonia.
46. Brown HT: Used in many packaged foods. Causal links to hyperactivity in children, asthma and cancer.
47. Orange B: A food dye that is used in hot dog and sausage casings. High doses are bad for the liver and bile duct.
48. Bixin: Food coloring linked to hyperactivity in children and asthma.
49. Norbixin: Food coloring linked to hyperactivity in children and asthma.
50. Annatto: Food coloring that can cause allergic reactions and skin hypersensitivity, respiratory and GI issues.
Coming Soon!
