Not a Food Snob, Just Hoping for Health.

Hello World! Or One Single Person? Or Maybe I Will Be the Only One Reading This?

It may be fairly obvious, but I am a complete newbie to this whole blogging thing. As a millennial that has been working as a 6th grade teacher for years, all I hear about is blogging this and blogging that. I actually have always had some sort of hatred toward the words blogger or blogging. Honestly, I probably have literally cringed before when someone told me they were starting a blog. I cannot really put my finger on one primary reason as to why I felt that way, which is an entirely different post anyways, but I definitely never pictured myself as a blogger. However, I recently had an epiphany. Recently, I have begun to get this incredible urge to share my views on food and recipes online in hopes that it will possibly open people’s eyes, even if it is just one other person’s eyes, to how truly important {for our kids, ourselves, and our planet} it is to cook healthy meals that are made from honest ingredients and how easy it can be all while being a working mom.

Yep, that’s my little family pictured above. My daughter, Stevie, is coming up on her first birthday. I am not going to lie, it has been one hell of a year. As a new mom, I thought I was going to lose my mind more than a few times. We laughed, we cried, we cried some more, we loved a lot, and we survived! Ricky and I kept a tiny human alive for almost one year – go us! In the beginning months, you are completely engulfed by the child. When I look back on those first couple months, it all seems a bit blurry. I am giving it to you straight. I love my child more than words, but being that I was nursing the first three months, I had no life other than feeding, changing diaper, feeding, changing diaper, napping, feeding, and repeat. Notice the amount of sleep in that list. Simply stated, it was the hardest, most challenging thing I have ever done in my life. During that time, rightly so, the focus really was not on the parents’ needs. Whatever baby needed, baby got. Who cares if mom had not slept or showered in 5 days? All I was focused on was giving Stevie all of the love in the world so that she felt loved in this new world of hers. It was also during this time that cooking fell to the wayside, too. Well, I wouldn’t say it completely fell to the wayside, but it was nothing compared to the type of meals I used to cook. “It happens,”  I told myself.

Before we go any further, it is important to note that before I became a mom, I was a little crazy about my food. I was the type of person who would only eat organic food and definitely no GMOs mainly to stay away from the poisonous chemical glyphosate. I always made it a point to eat way more fruits and veggies than meat. For a while, I was barely eating meat, and if I did eat meat, I would try my hardest to get it from my local food co-op which only stocked meat from local farms whose animals were grass-fed. Clearly, I would NEVER eat any sort of processed foods. When eating dinner with other family members or friends, they all thought I was crazy. Even Ricky, my partner-in-crime, the father of my child, called me a food snob as many others had before him. That’s when the ranting always begun. It is important that people recognize that I am not eating organic produce or local, grass-fed meats because I am a food snob. I do this because I prefer to eat plain old food. I do not want toxic chemicals, additives, fillers, or legit medicines in my food. Is it so much to ask that when I am eating meat, I want to know that I am simply just eating meat and not antibiotics and growth hormones? Being that there is research linking the main chemical used in the most commonly used pesticides on all produce and vegetables, glyphosate, to cancer and autism amongst other conditions, am I crazy to ensure this is not in any food that I am eating by avoiding GMOs? Maybe I do not want ridiculous amounts of unnecessarily added, ridiculously harmful to your health sugar in my food. Is that nuts?  I could go on and on about the harmful effects of most of the “food” lining the shelves in grocery stores today, and I will later in this blog, but for now I think you get my point. Can you sense my anger?

This passion for eating organic, pure food, or just plain old food as it has been formerly called, carried over into motherhood. When Stevie finally reached the age of which she was able to eat solid foods, I was so excited! Here was this little lady who was starting from a clean slate. She had never been exposed to chemicals or disgusting processed foods, and as her mom, I had the opportunity to keep her in that healthiest, purest state for as long as possible, and I was going to take advantage of that. As a parent, some of your main jobs are to keep your child safe and to keep them healthy. What you feed your child affects their safety and their health which really go hand in hand. I have heard the argument numerous times: “I feed my child fast-food {or insert any food that I will not feed Stevie} all of the time, and they are perfectly healthy.” Yes, they may be perfectly healthy now, but aren’t you concerned about the long-term effects that could have on their health? Furthermore, your child is learning their eating habits from you. If you teach them that fast-foods or processed foods are acceptable in their regular diet at an early age, it will become a habit that follows them into their adulthood. Once again, aren’t you concerned about the long-term effects this could have on their health? Let me stop here, please do not think I am trying to downgrade or put down anyone for their parenting. I am not saying if you feed your child these foods you are a bad parent. I just wonder if people truly understand the effect that regularly eating these foods could have on their children down the line. My main goal is to open people’s eye to the harmful effects because it angers me that our country aims advertisements and brands towards children that literally have poisons in them for the sole purpose of money. The food industry in our country is just that, an industry. They do not care about the health of consumers. They care about doing whatever they have to do to make more money.  Some people may have already stopped reading this because they are thinking, once again, that I am being a food snob. I AM TALKING ABOUT THE HEALTH OF MY CHILD. I am not being a snob. I have acquired knowledge that has shed some light on the benefits of eating this way. Another huge argument is that eating clean food is much more expensive. I agree, it can be. However, I am a teacher in the lowest paying district in which my school district resides. I am not a millionaire over here, and I have found a way to avoid the evils of your typical food. Trader Joe’s is my lifesaver. It takes a little more effort, but it can be done! Either way, I made it a point to ensure Stevie did not eat any processed foods, added sugars, GMOs, etc. So far, I have succeeded! That is a huge mom win for me over here!

Here’s the thing though, this blog is not about making meals for your baby. It is about making meals for YOU. See, as Stevie became more and more of a tiny, fully functioning human, I was becoming more and more of myself again, too. The realization finally hit me that I can no longer compromise our meals, the parents, because our health was just as important as Stevie’s. A million thoughts started racing through my head. I thought how cooking for us adults should not be pushed to the wayside just because it is a little more challenging to do it while caring for a baby! We needed to be on this Earth as long as possible for our little lady. Four years ago, I lost my dad to his battle with cancer. It was life-altering, to say the least. All I can think now is that I never want Stevie to have to go through losing a parent .We do not have control over much in this world, but one thing I can control is what goes into my body. So, I will do what I can to be here for as long as I can for Stevie. With those thoughts, my passion for cooking was rekindled. I was determined to cook Ricky and I honest, clean, meals. Food, just food.

My goal is to share some of my raw thoughts and honest recipes with you. I may rant about my views on the food industry. I may talk honestly about mom life and rant about that as well. Most of all, I hope to show you how cooking clean does not have to be a fiasco or, more so, how you can still accomplish cooking real meals even if doing it while caring for a baby is quite the fiasco.  Also, please realize that if you are unable to buy all organic ingredients for these recipes, it is okay! These meals are still much healthier options without the organic twist. No worries. No judging! Please check back often to find newly uploaded recipes and/or this mom’s crazy thought vomit in blog form!

Peace, Love, and Honest Food,

Sasha