My sister-in-law Jeni once told me that the best way to keep a New Year's resolution was to make it very specific. Years ago, instead of simply resolving to drink more water, she decided she would drink a glass of water every morning when she woke up. She still does it today.
I haven't had much luck in the past with New Year's resolutions. I usually can't even remember what they are. This year, I was thinking of trying to focus on eating healthier -- I spend much more time worrying about my kids' eating habits than my own. Keeping Jeni's advice in mind, I was trying to make my resolution more specific when I stumbled upon this Prevention article about seven foods that experts won't eat. I'm going to pick a handful of these and stick to them.
Canned tomatoes are definitely on my list. Experts avoid them because most can liners are made with the hormone-disrupting chemical BPA, which can leach into food. Acidic foods like tomatoes encourage this process. I try to buy tomatoes in Tetrapaks, or even better, glass jars.
Corn-fed beef is another food that I'll try to avoid from now on. For one thing, grass-fed beef contains more vitamins and minerals and is lower in saturated fat than corn-fed beef, according to a USDA-Clemson University study. Unlike conventional beef, certified grass-fed beef isn't loaded with unnecessary antibiotics that give rise to drug-resistant bacteria. And in light of the FDA's pre-Christmas decision to abandon its 35-year-old pledge to stop the use of certain antibiotics in animal feed, I'm protesting with my pocketbook against superbugs. Grass-fed beef is widely available in grocery stores, but because it's more expensive than conventional beef I plan to keep costs down by purchasing it on the bone.
Potatoes seem pretty innocuous, yet it turns out that these root vegetables not only soak up chemicals from the soil but are sprayed again after they're harvested. USDA testing in 2009 found residues of chlorpropham (used to inhibit sprout growth) on 80.1 percent of the 744 potatoes tested and imadcloprid (toxic to honeybees) on 25.4 percent. The chemical load is so high some potato growers won't eat their own potatoes, according to the chair of the National Organic Standards Board Jeffrey Moyer, as quoted in the Prevention article. Going organic for potatoes is a low-cost no-brainer.
Those are my resolutions for a less toxic 2012. What kind of resolutions will you be making this year?
Image: Monster Peter
