The Health Effect

by Brittany Stowasser

Diet effects health. It’s an age-old concept. We all learn to eat our vegetables and whole grains first, even as babies. Our parents serve us certain foods so we can grow to be healthy.

Somewhere along the way we grow up, get busy and convenience begins to play a major role in the types of food we cook and serve to our families. Rightly so, we are busy! There is work, soccer practice, dance class, family obligations and oh yeah, lets not forget going to the gym somewhere amidst these hectic schedules.

Who has time to cook a dinner from scratch? So we  chose (insert from the following list)  Fast food/packaged frozen dishes/convenient, processed foods until one day, despite our busy schedules (or perhaps because of them) we start to get sick. We definitely don’t have time for that! How dare our bodies betray us! This is generally when we start to pay attention.

Maybe the processed food isn’t a great idea after all?

What’s next? A diet? horrors!!!!  Just the word can make us shudder!

What does “diet” even mean? Merriam-Webster dictionary defines diet as “habitual nourishment” or “the kind and amount of food prescribed for a person or animal for a special reason.”

Hoping to recover our health quickly we return to the basic concepts we once knew. Vegetables, fruit, whole grains, lean protein. Then after these concepts are in place we start to feel better.  Hmmm, you think it’s connected? (yup)

Maybe you become a Vegetarian cutting out all meat and see a huge difference in your Cholesterol levels or a Vegan excluding meat, dairy and eggs and see a difference in all of your levels. Maybe the Paleo diet of grass-fed meat, vegetables and some fruits aligned more with you and you see a reduction in inflammation in your body having cut out dairy and carbohydrates. Maybe just restricting portion size and not limiting yourself at all is the ticket.

Congratulations on finding what works for you! Once you have chosen what aligns best with your body to achieve better health the trip to the local grocer is in order! New health journey in mind and lists in hand, you begin shopping and start to wonder, where did these tomatoes come from? What was used to grow these cucumbers? Should I be able to buy watermelons in November? All fair questions.

Greens currently growing that will be in the Wild Ramp Market soon.

The Wild Ramp is the local solution to your fresh food questions. Not only do we provide food to the public from local farmers, we visit them to see how it’s grown! We ask where it comes and how it is grown so you don’t have to. Providing only the best quality, in-season foods so you can maintain the long, healthy, delicious lives you were intended.