Sustainable Seafood & Trusted Sources Anywhere

“Look after the land and the land will look after you, destroy the land and the land will destroy you.” - Aboriginal Proverb

I grew up in Southern California. I was born and raised in Palm Springs. And before moving to Denver, I lived in Los Angeles for a decade. I very rarely thought much about seafood and where it came from since we were close to an ocean in less than 1-2 hours drive.

Nearly 10 years go, when I moved to Denver, Colorado, a landlocked state, naturally I was a bit weary about sushi and seafood. In 2015 when, I was in nutrition school in Boulder, they told us about this cool non-profit Seafood Watch by the Monterey Bay Aquarium. This is a great resource for finding susatinable and high quality seafood in any area of the US you are in. FYI, this is also the same guide you see in your Whole Foods Seafood section.

You might be surprised to know that not all farmed seafood is bad and not all wild-caught fish is good!

One study found that fishing boats are responsible for 4% of our total greenhouse gas emissions from the food industry! While farmed fish actually have a lower carbon footprint than livestock!

Yes, sustainable nutrition and seafood is about caring for Mother Earth - our climate, overfishing, pollution and preserving habitats. It's also about what's safest for us to eat too. Every 6-9 months they put out an updated guide on what's the best (safest and sustainable) seafood in your region. You can check them all out and download yours here. They also have a general monthly update thats fantastic to check as well. No matter what you are looking for or care about, the Seafood Watch peeps have you covered! If you ever have questions, check them out!

Seafood in general is a great source of vitamins A, Bs and D as well at those wonderful anti-inflammatory omega-3s! It's also full of minerals like calcium, phosphorus, iron, zinc, iodine, magnesium, selenium and potassium!

If you are in Denver, my favorite place to get my seafood I trust and tates great is Marczyks.

Do you have favorite places to get your seafoods? Or favorite recipes?! I'd love to hear!

The Truth About Organic Food

“To plant a garden is to believe in tomorrow.” - Audrey Hepburn

A few years ago I bought my first home. Aside from that excitement itself, I was most excited for my own garden. I love to plant tomatoes, peppers, zucchini's, herbs and so more com the springtime here in Devner.

All this planting and planning has gotten me thinking about organic foods. While growing your own food is ideal, it's not practical or even possible for all of us. I count myself lucky and have been waiting for this for some time now. 

I am often asked my clients, do you have to buy everything organic? 

The answer is no... and, maybe?

Like so much of nutrition, I could go on and on on this topic. While buying organic is great for so many reasons, here are the highlights:

• Organic means ethical, no use of antibiotics or growth hormones, no use of conventional pesticides, fertilizers with synthetic ingredients, bioeneneered (aka GMOs) and no ionized radiation!

• No matter who you talk to, organic not only helps save our soil and environment, but did you know our climate change is 25-33% due to our food industry.

• It's also proven to have more nutrients and taste better! Foods grown with chemicals have depleted trace minerals, are contaminated with metals and chemicals, contains poisons like glyphosate and inhibit certain biological pathways.

• The USDA "organic" certification was created by our US government, not just to regulate the industry standards, but also to make money. In 1995, organic food sales topped $2.8 billion. In 2020, jump a record high (over a 125 increase form the last year) to almost $66 billion! 

• Because farms have to be able to afford the UDSA certification it can be expensive for our farmers, especially those small local mom-and-pop ones. So, when you are at the farmers market, ask them the vendors what their practices are. Many of them are doing things all the same things and then some but just cant afford the verification. Many times this means they pass those saving onto you and you can still eat well!

The good news is that it's made organic foods more available to us all, and yes I am looking at you Costco gallon of organic gummy bears! But what I really want to talk about is your whole foods or produce. 

If you find buying all organic all the time is too much, our friends at the Environmental Working Group have you covered! Every year they have the Clean 15 and Dirty Dozen! The Clean 15 is the list of the cleanest foods out there you don't need to buy. The Dirty Dozen is the dirtiest 12 foods and heavily sprayed when conventional, so best to buy organic. Download the 2023 Dirty Dozen and Clean 15 here.

How to Make Stress Your Friend

“When you change your mind about stress, you can change your body reaction to stress.” - Kelly McGonigal

Stress and nutrition are a little bit like the chicken and the egg situation. Not sure which one comes first. However, we do know from science and research that they both contribute to one another and their affects on our body, health and wellness.

Stress, in an of itself, is not bad. In fact, quite the opposite, stress is our body's way of protecting itself and surviving. Stress is "the body’s way of responding to demands from a variety of sources, both physical & psychogenic, & both positive & negative, in order to bring it back to its normal state of balance." It's when the stress becomes chronic that we have run in to trouble.  

The quick and dirty of it is that our stress response is also known as the Sympathetic Nervous System, or the "fight or flight" response. This is a real physiological action our body takes under stress, whether it's a nasty email or a major car accident. One of the first things your body does in the sympathetic state is release cortisol, the stress hormone. Cortisol is naturally anti-inflammatory, but in chronic states it raises our blood sugar, breaks down muscle, suppresses the immune system, decreases serotonin, just to name a few.

Additionally, the body responds by directing the blood, oxygen and muscle functions away from the stomach and intestines towards other life saving areas and functions of the body. Your body is not trying to sabotage you. It's actually so smart. It knows there's no point in digesting food if you might not surviving a situation. So your digestion slows down and over time if this continues to happen your metabolism learns to slow down. So ultimately, even if you ate perfectly (whatever that really means), if you are chronically stressed you aren't getting much benefit from these nutritious foods, you might as well eat cake, cookies, donuts for all meals. 

The flip side to the sympathetic is our parasympathetic, also known as the "rest and digest". When we learn to move into our parasympathetic nervous system more often we can lessen the effects of stressors in our life. And like the name suggests, this is when we can best digest our food and absorb and use all those great nutrients, no matter what it is that's on your plate. 

While there are numerous things you can do to learn how to reduce your stress and it's response in your body, that's for a blog post another time. For now, as it relates to food, one of the biggest things you can do is practice a bit of mindful eating. This week try taking 2-3 big breaths into your belly and chest before you eat your food and/or every meal. By doing this and other mindful eating practices you can change the way your digest and the nutrient value of your food without even changing what's on your plate! 

From a functional nutritionist perspective, we put a lot of blame on stress as an ultimate root cause of health conditions.

And beyond this idea of stress as something that needs to be mitigated or avoided altogether, this TED talk by Kelly McGonigal flips the script and changed how I talk to clients and honestly, on my life!

I watched it in one of my grad school courses. I hope you enjoy it!

What are ou thoughts on stress?! Do you do any one thing that you think makes the biggest different on your stress levels and health?