• Home
  • Blog
  • Recipes
  • Shop
  • Free e-books!
  • Children’s Behavior
  • Women’s Health
  • About
    • Meet Jaclyn
    • Contact
Facebook Instagram Twitter Pinterest

October 31, 2018

Are GMO Dangers Really THAT Big Of A Deal?

Are GMO dangers a real threat? Or are GMOs in food something that we can trust? In this article, Danielle explains the impact that GMO food can have on health along with ways to make sure your family eats the safest foods possible.

Are GMO Dangers Really THAT Big Of A Deal? | The Family That Heals Together

What are GMOs?

GMOs stand for “genetically modified organisms.” These organisms contain DNA that has been modified by human hands, not to be confused with the popular method of “crossbreeding.”

Crossbreeding naturally mates two types of the same plant or organism to produce a more desirable organism – such as breeding a cabbage to have more red than green, or breeding a tomato to be a bit smaller or larger.

This is natural, normal, and has been going on since the beginning of time.

GMOs have not.

In a laboratory, scientists can now modify an entire genome by adding a gene from another organism or a gene that has been artificially made. Also known as “transgenic” breeding, a popular example is RoundUp Ready corn or soybeans.

These are crops that have been genetically modified to withstand RoundUp pesticide.

Since GMO seeds and pesticides go hand in hand, we have to consider the safety of both.

Are genetically modified foods safe?

This has been the big question for years.

In March 2015, the World Health Organization deemed glyphosate, one of the most popular pesticides used for GMO plants, as “probably carcinogenic to humans.” In the United States, we’ve seen thousands of lawsuits citing bodily harm from pesticides.

A California groundskeeper won a lawsuit which found that RoundUp likely was a key player in his cancer.

Those who rely on the science that non-GMO and GMO products both have the same macronutrients (carbohydrates, proteins, and fats) say that GMO dangers don’t exist.

But GMO status doesn’t tell us if modified foods have the same micronutrients, which are so important to our health. Or even if they have other factors that affect health.

In addition to this, studies used to back GMO safety span short periods of time. To fully understand GMO dangers, we need research that looks at the big picture and investigates the effects of long-term exposure.

The FDA and US government perform no safety analysis of GMO foods. Instead, the companies who manufacture GMO seeds and pesticides voluntarily submit studies – paid for and done by them.

It is no wonder that they deem GMOs in food as “safe” despite clear GMO dangers.

What are the dangers of GMO foods?

Independent scientists have seen tumors grow in mice fed GMO corn diets, and not in the non-GMO fed mice. These mice also experienced liver and kidney damage.

Another study found that even low levels of glyphosate – the herbicide used with Roundup Ready crops – can mimic estrogen in the body and produce breast cancer.

Other studies and countries reveal that GMO pesticides cause birth defects and malformations.

Furthermore, genetically modified foods have been sprayed with chemicals in the field, such as glyphosate.

Glyphosate is a cancer-causing herbicide that used with GMO crops. The use of noxious pesticides adds another layer of gut and nervous system damage to the already present dangers of GMO foods.

Some crops – like corn, cotton, and soybean – carry a modification known as the Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) toxin gene, making them resistant to pests. But when we consume the Bt toxin, we now know that it combines into our DNA.

The full effects of this have not been studied. This toxin may even cause antibiotic resistance in consumers.

In 2007, scientists began speculating that Bt crops caused colony collapse disorder – or a nationwide phenomenon of disappearing bees.

This tells us that independent scientists found the following GMO dangers:

  • Cancer
  • Antibiotic resistance
  • Birth defects
  • Liver and kidney damage
  • Gut damage

At this point, it doesn’t look good for the safe use of GMOs. We need more independent studies to determine the long-term effects of GMOs.

Are GMO Dangers Really THAT Big Of A Deal? | The Family That Heals Together

Beware of GMO dangers lurking in these foods

You’ll find GMOs in nearly all processed corn, soy, rapeseed (canola), and sugar beet products.

Click here to find a full list of possible GMOs.

Even if a product is not genetically modified, it may contain harmful pesticides or herbicides.

To avoid GMOs, shop locally for produce and meat. Visit your neighborhood farmer’s market. At natural grocery stores, look for “organic” or “NON-GMO” foods.

The organic label certifies that the product was organically grown, using only natural herbicides or pesticides. A non-GMO label specifies that a product is not genetically modified.

A focus on traditional, whole foods will naturally limit your GMO intake.

Regarding pesticides, shop organic when buying the “Dirty Dozen.” These are fruits and vegetables that have the most pesticides remaining when you purchase them.

Also, be on the lookout for GMO salmon in the United States. Already sold in Canada, in 2019 the US will see extra large Atlantic salmon that contains a growth hormone gene from the Chinook salmon.

Where are GMOs banned?

Since the dawn of time, farmers have reused seeds from last year’s crop to plant this year. Monsanto and other GMO seed producers not only ban the reuse of their seeds but litigate farmers who do so.

This is financially devastating to farmers.

Because of this and the health impact of GMOs, many countries have outright banned them. Twenty-six countries in the world have banned the cultivation of GMO foods in their country. This includes Germany, France, Greece, and Austria.

Russia has banned both the cultivation and sale of GMOs in their country.

Sixty-four countries of the world require GMOs to be labeled, such as Australia, the entire European Union, and Japan.

Clearly, this isn’t a questionable issue.

Why won’t the US ban GMOs in food? It has to do a lot with the government farm subsidies that mostly benefit GMO farmers and the monopoly that GMO seed producers – like Monsanto, DuPont, and Bayer – have on the US.

So what can we do? We can avoid GMO foods as best we can.

But, we also need to talk with our legislators and vote with our dollars. We need to encourage better GMO labeling and ultimately the ban of GMO seeds and foods sold in the US.

By: Danielle · Filed Under: Blog, health · Tagged: GE crops, genetically engineered, genetically modified food, GMO, organic, transgenic

August 2, 2018

Homemade Chocolate Bars: How to Make Your Own Chocolate

I recently discovered how easy it is to make your own chocolate, so now I’ve been experimenting with everything from chocolate chips to these homemade chocolate bars. I hope you have as much fun with them as I do!

Homemade Chocolate Bars: Make Your Own Chocolate | The Family That Heals Together

Funny story, as a child I didn’t like chocolate. I never wanted a Hershey’s bar or Kisses. I preferred brightly colored, sticky candies. Oh how times have changed.

After I had children and started learning about the dangers of ingredients like food dyes and high fructose corn syrup, I realized chocolate was really the lesser of the two evils. But I still wasn’t a huge fan.

It was only after I started trying to pinpoint the cause of my migraines that I developed a real appreciation for chocolate. That’s because at one point, I had made paleo chocolate chip cookies and soon after got a migraine.

A friend shared that chocolate could be a migraine trigger, so I deduced this must be the cause, and lamented the loss of everyone’s favorite food group (but mine).

I soon discovered, however, that I had developed an intolerance to almonds and other nuts and would get almost an immediate migraine after eating them (especially almond flour. Here’s why eating a ton of almond flour is a bad idea). Which was quite the disappointment when you’ve just cut all grains from your diet and replaced them with nuts (see: things not to do on a paleo diet).

I can now eat almond flour without any problems (thank goodness, because otherwise these fabulous GAPS-friendly chocolate chip cookies wouldn’t have happened!), but I only use it in moderation, not as a replacement for every grain-based goodie like I did in the beginning.

Which brings me back to me point: after discovering that chocolate was not a migraine trigger for me, I developed a whole new appreciation for it. I could eat chocolate again! And now I wanted all the chocolate.

Why you should make your own chocolate

After realizing chocolate was a safe food for me, I decided it was time to find good, healthy chocolate I could indulge in. After all, conventional chocolate is problematic for a number of reasons, mainly:

  • undesirable ingredients
  • unfair labor practices

Today, most conventional chocolate still contains ingredients like CAFO milk and soy as an emulsifier. Of course, loads of sugar is also involved, but most organic chocolate bars include sugar too, which is why I decided to make homemade chocolate bars, but I’ll get to that in a minute.

I can still remember about five years ago thinking chocolate was a fairly safe food, and then being shocked when I looked at the label of a basic chocolate bar. It was full of preservatives and other ingredients made up of indecipherable code names containing letters and numbers that could’ve been anything. (Thankfully, companies are listening and are making their chocolate a little cleaner and safer for those with food allergies. Hershey’s for instance, seems to have removed PGPR, a problematic emulsifier used in chocolate.)

There are tons of organic chocolate bars on the market today, the quality of which widely varies. You can find what is basically just an organic version of a conventional chocolate bar, which is still chock full of sugar and contains soy, but uses organic ingredients (which says very little about the quality of milk used in the milk chocolate or the labor practices by which the chocolate was derived).

There are higher-quality bars that use less sugar and more quality ingredients, as well as fair-trade labor. I like many of these, and though I don’t tolerate the sugar well, have indulged from time to time.

You can even buy paleo-friendly chocolate that uses coconut sugar or honey as a sweetener, and some of these are delightful! I especially like Hu Kitchen Cashew Butter chocolate bars (get those here or here), Pure 7 (I buy them here), and Honey Mamas, which I buy in the refrigerated section of my local health food store.

But homemade chocolate bars are my first choice because I can:

  • customize the chocolate
  • control the ingredients and quality
  • save lots of $$$
  • & eat FRESH chocolate!

Homemade Chocolate Bars: Make Your Own Chocolate | The Family That Heals Together

A note on Fair Trade

You will notice that most quality, organic chocolate bars these days have a small logo that says “fair trade certified.” This means that the people who harvested your chocolate did so on their free will and were paid appropriately for their time.

According to slavefreechocolate.org,

2.3 million children work in the cocoa fields of Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire.

These children are vulnerable to brutal labor practices, including trafficking and slavery.

Candy companies–including but not limited to Nestlé, Hershey, Cargill, ADM, and Barry Callebout–have admitted accountability and promised to remedy this situation. Sadly, 14 years has passed since this agreement and little has changed.

This is reason enough to never buy conventional chocolate again, to only purchase fair trade chocolate, or to make your own chocolate with fair trade ingredients.

Are homemade chocolate bars good?

Yes! In fact, my kids and I prefer them over store bought chocolate! I find my homemade chocolate tastes less bitter than store bought dark chocolate, but you can easily adjust the sweetener if you prefer a more dark chocolate.

The only disappointing thing about my homemade chocolate bars is that they disappear too quickly. While they are really fast and easy to whip up, it’s still disappointing to see them get gobbled up in a matter of minutes! (#fourkidproblems also: #boymomproblems #theyneverstopeating)

Homemade Chocolate Bars: Make Your Own Chocolate | The Family That Heals Together

How to make your own chocolate

It really is a quick and easy task to make your own chocolate at home. Now that I’ve learned how, I can’t stop making homemade chocolate bars and chocolate chips! Next up, I want to experiment with using a homemade chocolate recipe for s’mores, chocolate syrups, and whatever else I can dream up!

First, it’s pretty easy to find fair-trade ingredients for homemade chocolate.

Navitas cacao butter is fair trade certified. I’ve found it at my local health food store in the refrigerator section, or you can buy it on Amazon here and have it in two days.

I also like Terrasoul Superfoods, which is super affordable, and though it doesn’t contain the “fair trade” label, you can read about their labor practices here, which explains the fair trade model they adhere to. I buy Terrasoul Superfoods cacao butter here.

You’ll also need cacao or cocoa powder, which you can also find fair trade.

I like Now Foods brand cocoa powder for its affordability, and although it’s not fair trade certified, Now Foods states they “source our cocoa powder from several of the world’s largest and finest cocoa processors. All of our suppliers have shown their dedication to eliminating the use of forced child labor…” You can buy it here.

I also like Equal Exchange baking cocoa, which you can find here.

You’ll also need a sweetener. In my experience, you cannot use a granulated sweetener without an emulsifier, and since I was determined to make a GAPS-friendly chocolate, I wanted to use honey anyway. Raw honey is my sweetener of choice for these homemade chocolate bars. This one is my favorite.

For this particular chocolate bar, I have added a little nut butter for texture and flavor. I like this one or this one for quality and texture, as they’re a bit gritty but still smooth.

We’ll also add a splash of vanilla. That’s it.

By the way, the first time I made these homemade chocolate bars, I used a random rectangular object in my kitchen to make it into a nicely-shaped bar. It worked fine. I’ve since purchased chocolate molds into order to get nice, uniform bars that have pre-sectioned squares so it’s easy to break off a piece. Get those here.

Homemade Chocolate Bars: Make Your Own Chocolate | The Family That Heals Together
Print Recipe

Homemade Chocolate Bars

Prep Time10 minutes mins
Total Time40 minutes mins
Servings: 2 Bars
Author: Jaclyn

Ingredients

  • Heaping 1/2 cup raw cacao butter pieces like this
  • 1/4 cup cocoa powder like this
  • 2 Tbsp nut butter
  • 1-2 Tbsp raw honey
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Instructions

  • In a small saucepan, gently heat cacao butter over low heat. Remove when there are just a few chunks left melting and whisk until they're gone.
  • Add the remaining ingredients and whisk to combine.
  • Use a stick blender like this to finish blending the ingredients and ensure they become emulsified.
  • Pour into chocolate molds like this, then place in freezer for about half an hour to firm up.
  • Store in the refrigerator to protect texture and freshness.

Homemade Chocolate Bars: Make Your Own Chocolate | The Family That Heals Together

Are you convinced to make your own chocolate yet? It’s so easy, so much healthier, and more affordable than buying chocolate from the store!

By: Jaclyn · Filed Under: Recipes · Tagged: chocolate, chocolate chips, fair trade, homemade chocolate, homemade chocolate bars, kids health, make your own chocolate, organic, recipes, soy, treats

February 20, 2017

Grain-Free Sugar Cookie Fruit Pizza Recipe

Grain-Free Sugar Cookie Fruit Pizza Recipe | The Family That Heals Together

I’m not super big into going over the top for holidays. We don’t do gifts or baskets on Easter or Valentine’s Day. But I do love an excuse to whip up something special in the kitchen, so for Valentine’s Day last week, I transformed my cassava sugar cookies into this grain-free sugar cookie fruit pizza.

Let’s just say the crowd went wild.

We ate it for breakfast because it has fruit on it, which makes it healthy. 😉 I mean, the fruit was organic.

So… *sugar* cookie fruit pizza?

I really love the maple sugar in this recipe. Maple sugar is less refined than white sugar and offers some trace minerals. And it totally behaves like real sugar in recipes.

But honestly? It’s still sugar. I buy one small bag of it from time to time from Thrive Market and when it’s gone, it’s gone til I get around to ordering again, and I don’t order it every time.

What I do order every time? These maple bacon pork skin cracklings for Mr. Incredible. For the same reason I make this sugar cookie fruit pizza for my boys. I like to make their tummies happy.

If you want to make your kiddos’ tummies happy, I suggest you make this sugar cookie fruit pizza. It’s free from junkie ingredients and it’s gluten and grain-free.

Grab the recipe below, then make it next time your sweet angels deserve a really special treat… or the next time they’ve been insane and mama needs a treat. Either way is justification for this yummy goodness.

Print Recipe

Sugar Cookie Fruit Pizza

Prep Time35 minutes mins
Cook Time12 minutes mins
Total Time47 minutes mins
Servings: 2 6-8" Pizzas or 1 large pizza
Author: Jaclyn

Ingredients

  • Sugar Cookie Crust
  • 1 1/2 cups cassava flour
  • 3/4 cup maple sugar
  • 2/3 cup  room temerature ghee or butter
  • 1 egg
  • 1 tsp vanilla
  • 1/4 tsp baking soda
  • Frosting
  • 1/2 cup softened butter
  • 1/2 cup softened cream cheese
  • 1/4 cup raw honey
  • 1 tsp vanilla
  • Toppings
  • sliced fruit of your choice

Instructions

  • Preheat oven to 350*.
  • In a large bowl, beat the ghee on high with a hand mixer, until creamy.
  • Add the maple sugar and baking soda and beat once more until combined, scraping the sides to mix well.
  • Beat in the egg and vanilla.
  • Add the flour and mix with a rubber spatula until mostly combined, then finish mixing with the hand mixer.
  • Line 2 small or one large pizza pan with parchment paper (don't skip this part).
  • Either divide the dough into two parts and roll onto two pizza pans, or roll out the dough onto one large pizza pan, using a rolling pin, to about 1/4" thickness.
  • Bake for 10-12 minutes, until lightly golden, then remove and allow to cool.
  • Meanwhile, prepare your frosting: combine ingredients in a large bowl and mix on high with a hand mixer until smooth.
  • Slice your fruit and set aside.
  • Once cooled, frost your sugar cookie crust(s) and top with fruit slices.
  • Slice up like a pizza and enjoy!

Grain-Free Sugar Cookie Fruit Pizza Recipe | The Family That Heals Together

Getting to help decorate will be your kids’ favorite part!

Grain-Free Sugar Cookie Fruit Pizza Recipe | The Family That Heals Together

Think your kids will love this sugar cookie fruit pizza? Be sure to pin the recipe for later:

Grain-Free Sugar Cookie Fruit Pizza Recipe | The Family That Heals Together

By: Jaclyn · Filed Under: Recipes · Tagged: fruit, fruit pizza recipe, kid food, organic, recipes, sugar cookie fruit pizza, sugar cookies, thrive market

Recent Posts

  • Healthy Carrot Cake Recipe | Paleo / GAPS / Gluten-Free
  • The PANDAS Parent Starter Kit (Where to start after a PANDAS diagnosis- or if you suspect it)
  • Paleo Pumpkin Spice Sugar Cookies (Healthy Pumpkin Spice Cookies!)

Copyright © 2023 · Hello CEO by Hello You Designs

Copyright © 2023 · Hello CEO on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in