TO GMO or NOT TO GMO

TO AVOID GMOs in YOUR FOOD

If you are not sure why GMOs are bad for you, do some research on the web. Most likely, you won’t be comfortable with what you find out.

So what food should you avoid? Either do not eat these brands or do not buy these brands if the food contains corn, beets/beet sugar, oils (hydrogentated oil, soybean oil, canola oil, corn oil, any kind of oil!), soy/soy lecithin. Now if you start to check labels, you’ll find that most things made by large manufacturers have some sort of oil or soy or soy lecithin in them.

Do not eat packaged food made by big commercial manufacturers. That means any brand that is familiar to your ear. Be aware that some of the large manufacturers market some food under less well-known names and some smaller manufacturers are also using GMO as well. Basically, you have to buy most of your food at a health food store and even then you have to check brands and labels. Publix “Greenwise” products are non-GMO (I wish they would make more products!). All brands carried by Whole Foods are supposed to be non-GMO by end of July 2012. I’m not sure if you will still have to make sure that things like lunch meats, butter etc. at Whole Foods are 100% (not 75%) grass-fed (if only 75%, the animals have been fed on GMO grains for part of their lifetime and  therefore were genetically modified via their diet). As of July 25^th, Whole Food’s lunch meat is not 100% grass fed.

Almost all the bread in the US is made by Bimbo Bakeries (yes, we are bimbos for being taken in by these manufacturers), including Arnold, Thomas’, and probably every brand found on regular, chain-food store shelves.  The soy and oil used in making these breads is GMO.

I am sincerely hoping Whole Foods starts to be an “all non-GMO” store. That will make things a lot easier.

In some health food stores, you should already be seeing some products labeled "Non-GMO". I say YAY, “Take back the label!”

No General Mills

No Kelloggs

No Kraft  (Phillip Morris)

No Heinz

No Nestle

No Coke

No Pepsi

No Hershey

No Orville Redenbacker

No Wesson

No Cisco

No Quaker Oats (is Pepsi)

No Campbells Soup

No Hagen Daz (General Mills)

No Pillsbury

No Robin Hood

No Unilever

No Betty Crocker (is General Mills)

No Nabisco

No President’s Choice

No Old El Paso

No Pringles

No Safeway brand

No Campbell Soup

No Lipton food (Unilever)

No Unilever

No Hunts

 No Maple Leaf

No Ragu

No Primo

No Dare, McKain, or Flower brands

No Conagra

No Efeem = No Mars, No Uncle Bens, M+Ms, Snickers etc.

No Morningstar Farms

No Loma Linda

No Knorr

No Western Family Foods

No Gugles

No Hostess

No Jiffy Pop

No Humpty Dumpty

For Now:

No Gardenburger

No Second Nature

No Bella Good

"ALL-ONE-GOD-FAITH. ALL-ONE!” If you don’t know about Dr. Bronner products, you don’t know what you’re missing! These soaps are incredibly pure and can be used in so many different ways (“18-in-1” uses) such as laundry soap, hand soap, body soap, aroma therapy, massage and more. Completely biodegradable and vegetable-based, this is the #1 selling brand of natural soap in America. The ingredients are water, saponified organic coconut, organic palm, olive, hemp and jojoba oil, essential oils, citric acid, and vitamin E. These products are certified to rigorous USDA National Organic Program standards and also certified Fair Trade by the respected Swiss certifier IMO. No BS from this company! You will love their products and also enjoy reading their mystical and poetic product labels.

Shout out to Michael Hagey for reminding me about Dr. Bronner. I’m going back to this as my laundry detergent. Also, I haven’t tried their organic lotions, but the ingredients are superb and I intend to buy some.

www.drbronner.com & http://www.drbronner.com/dr_bronners_philosophy.html

PS: A lot of new “green” companies have come along and many refuse to divulge all their ingredients on the basis that they are not legally required to. Just more wool over the eyes. Dr. Bronner’s is a tried and true, no-nonsense, old-world-style product.

UPDATE onSunscreen

I just read today that citrus oils in sunscreen can photoreact and possibly repress the skin's antioxidant capabilities. If you were to photo-react to the grapeseed oil in Loving Naturals sunscreen, you might get a deeper burn than if you used some other product. I still think Loving Naturals is a very good choice. I am photosensitive and I am not having increased burning with use of this product. Also, photosensitivity happens most often with bergamot, lemon, lime, orange, and angelica oil.

Here is what Badger says about citrus oil in their product: “Many of you have asked us why our sunscreen has citrus oils in the formulation when citrus oils are known to be photosensitizing. The simple answer is that we use very small quantities of the citrus essential oils and the percentages are so low that the oils are not considered photosensitizing. In addition, Lime Essential Oil, which is of particular concern, is no longer photosensitizing when it is Steam Distilled. We only use Steam Distilled Lime Essential Oil. In the very low percentages that we use (>.032% each by weight), the citrus essential oils can safely be used to enhance the fragrance of the product without any photosensitivity concern.”

My apologies for any confusion. The sunscreen issue is so important but a very difficult  topic. In general, try to stick with Zinc Oxide-based ("blocking") formulas, i.e., not sunscreens that are absorbed into the skin and make sure the product is non-nano (the particle size is at least above 100nm. You can email the manufacturer and ask about particle size). I understand if you don't like the whiteness of the blocking formulas. Add something over it to color it up (although what you add could be photoreactive, so be careful).  Another potential solution is to use the "absorptive" sunscreens only for when you are out in public and wear a hat (although you should always wear a hat midday!).

Wrinkle Remover and Sunscreen

I've accidentally stumbled on to a fantastic wrinkle remover! Well, nothing “removes” wrinkles, but mine are really smoothed out by this product. Loving Naturals SPF 30 Sunscreen is one of the purest sunscreens you’ll find, made from grape seed oil, coconut oil, and other nut oils, everything non-GMO, with non-micronized zinc-oxide as the active ingredient (and they even increased their particle size recently). You don’t get much volume for your money with this product (purity is costly), so you’d want to use this only on your face. More details on sunscreens in a future post (I’ll only touch this with a very long pole), but generally (for starters) you do not want to use anything that ends in “zone," "zole," or that begins with Octo" or "Octyl" as those chemicals actually make you burn faster and are also absorbed in to your bloodstream. Best to avoid Vitamin A (retinyl palmitate) for now and do not use spray-on or powder sunscreens.

Loving Naturals may not be the greatest solution if you tend to break out, although I do and I’m not having any problems. Another sunscreen to try, this could be your basic pick for all-over coverage, is anything in the Badger line. Badger contains titanium dioxide (safe when non-nano) in addition to zinc oxide and the product uses micronized particles only (although it does have a considerably smaller particle size than Loving Naturals). The Whole Foods here in Franklin is very smart. They have done their research. Instead of giving you 5, 10 or 20 sunscreens to chose from, they only stock 4 or 5 from the Badger line.

Loving Naturals and Badger sunscreens are quite white on your skin because of the zinc-oxide base. Try waiting 5 minutes and rubbing it in. I add a little colored mineral powder over it so it doesn't look pasty.  Make sure the mineral powder has a micron size of 10 (coarse) or greater! Otherwise you are inhaling the particles into your lungs.

PS: Loving Naturals sunscreen can also double as a safe diaper rash ointment. Generally the diaper rash in the stores has nano-sized zinc oxide (undisclosed) and you don’t want to experiment with that on your baby!

Truth about Chemicals in Our Environment

Here’s a link to a lecture at Princeton on how synthetic chemicals get into bodies. Including how to reduce your "toxic load".

http://hulk03.princeton.edu:8080/WebMedia/flash/lectures/20111114_whatsgotten.shtml

Pure Life Soap Company - Non-GMO

The Pure Life Soap Company has informed me that they are absolutely non-GMO. They are "active members of the non-GMO program within their distribution channels."


I fully endorse this product!

GMOs in Lotions and Cosmetics

See NoBullBeauty.com and Cosmetics Info (www.cosmeticsinfo.org) regarding GMO oil (from soy, corn, lecithin) and proteins from GMO yeast making its way into lotions and cosmetics. “While their effects on humans are relatively unknown, the FDA and U.S. Department of Agriculture have approved more than 40 plants for genetic modification. (These) were introduced in 1996 and the oils from these foods may now be being used in your skin care products."  I have an email into The Pure Life Soap company to find out if the corn used in their lotion is GMO or not.