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21st March, 2010 |

When in Rome… Kraft Macaroni and Cheese Dinner lacks something. It lacks artificial food dyes (yellow 5 and yellow 6), or tartrazine. Kraft products shipped to Europe and Australia are altered. European Kraft macaroni and cheese doesn’t contain artificial colors or chemicals, like the U.S. version contains. Is it that European children prefer Earth tones over hyper colors? Maybe, but doubtful. Europe is just, well, in the know when it comes to ingesting chemicals. You could say they frown upon it.
A 1994 study in Australia found behavioral changes in irritability, restlessness, and sleep disturbance are associated with the ingestion of tartrazine in some children (1). Perhaps this is why Kraft can’t sell their Macaroni and Cheese dinner with yellow food dye in Australia either.
15th March, 2010 |
Following my wedding cake that I was too amped to eat, the eggplant parmesan of my dreams entered my life while honeymooning 2 1/2 years ago. It made its appearance at a cozy vegetarian restaurant in Madrid. It’s probably more romantic to say that we happened upon this veggie nook entirely by chance, while wandering the evening streets of Madrid. But alas, it was moreso targeted and hunted, after doing my homework to find this destination. Splitting a week between three cities meant some degree of pre-mooning research. Many a variety of eggplant parmesan has been dined on by yours truly, at and away from home, but I’m still oozing over this particular one. This made my top-five meals of all time list. more
8th March, 2010 |

It’s very hard to order restaurant-style sweet potato fries after having so many of these over the years. Baked, crispy, and oh so addictive, these sweet potato fries are made with olive oil, cinnamon and nutmeg. Nothing less, nothing more. They’re a perfect appetizer or side dish year-round. more
3rd March, 2010 |

Dearest FDA, Couldn’t our ingredient labels simply include: FOOD or NOT FOOD, following a list of partially-hydrogenated this or mono-diglycerides that?
Mother Nature and margarine just can’t relate to one another. Margarine is closer to plastic than it is to food or Mother Nature, since it’s ARTIFICIAL MATTER. No matter what the label says, margarine is definitely TRANS FAT. As I’m sure you’ve heard by now, trans fat isn’t something anyone should be eating. Ever. more
1st March, 2010 |

Our smoothie blender logs a lot of mileage between the three of us and our smoothie fixes. I’m surprised the little machine still runs, but I’m hoping it’s a lifer now. Smoothies around here include whatever we happen to have on hand when we’re feeling the power of the puree. This one happened to include an assortment of frozen berries, from our Minnesota winter stock pile, along with some yogurt, banana and protein powder, hemp protein in this one.
Summer and winter smoothies are extremely different at our house. We don’t go a day without each of us having one or more with fresh fruit and local greens in the summer, and have to put forth more effort to feast on the winterized (packaged) versions for a few months out of the year. Since it’s March 1st here, and the ground is covered in snow, this is a winter variety smoothie. All of the berries were purchased pre-frozen, too, since we ran out of our frozen stock of fresh farmer’s market and co-op fruit months ago already. I’m sad to say that at the moment of this one’s blending, there was not a single leaf of kale nor spinach to be found in our kitchen. None. This smoothie was not part of the Green Smoothie Revolution. Unless my hemp powder counts for something?
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Bottles have BPA, gum has aspartame, snacks and drinks have artificial color, and everything else contains MSG and trans fat, it seems. Where do you start? Cheers, my name is Niki Ahrens and I just want the best for my family, and for the rest of us too.
It's our choice, as parents, whether OUR kids eat real food and whether we use First-Do-No-Harm products on and around them. The decision is always ours. Here you’ll find favorite safe recipes, links to research and data, and alternatives that give us super powers instead of harm us.

How the Food Industry is Deceiving You
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