foods that make you dumb, stupid...or destroys your brainpower

HEALTH EFFECTS HIGH FRUCTOSE CORN SYRUP

The Common Food Ingredient That's Making You Stupid

Lab studies show high-fructose corn syrup can actually sabotage your smarts in just 6 weeks.

BY LEAH ZERBE

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Brain-harming high-fructose corn syrup hides out in unexpected places. Be sure to read the label.

Foods that appear to be nutritious could actually be destroying your brainpower. The culprit? A common ingredient slipped into many "healthy" foods, including baby food, applesauce, and oatmeal, a breakfast favorite. Researchers at UCLA found that ingesting foods and drinks containing theingredient high-fructose corn syrup for just six weeks caused troubling changes in brain function. "Our findings illustrate that what you eat affects how you think," says Fernando Gomez-Pinilla, PhD, a professor of neurosurgery and integrative biology and physiology at UCLA. "Eating a high-fructose diet over the long term alters your brain's ability to learn and remember information."

While high-fructose corn syrup is rampant in soda and candy products, it also hides out in some seemingly innocuous items like bread, juices, ketchup, and instant oatmeal. (Previous studies have found high-fructose corn syrup is sometimes contaminated with mercury.) Most often associated with obesity and diabetes, this latest study, appearing in the Journal of Physiology, shows this industrial food ingredient can harm the brain, too.

How to Avoid GMO/Monsanto from "Garden of Eatin"

How to Avoid GMO/Monsanto

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Learn why Monsanto and GMO is bad. See what companies have questionable seed-buy practices, and who sells safe seed.

What is GMO, and who is Monsanto?

A genetically modified organism (GMO) or genetically engineered organism (GEO) is an organism whose genetic material has been altered using genetic engineering techniques. These techniques, generally known as recombinant DNA technology, use DNA molecules from different sources, which are combined into one molecule to create a new set of genes. This DNA is then transferred into an organism, giving it modified or novel genes. (wiki)

The Monsanto Company is a U.S.-based multinational agricultural biotechnology corporation. It is the world’s leading producer of the herbicide glyphosate, marketed as “Roundup”. Monsanto is also the leading producer of genetically engineered (GE) seed; it sells 90% of the US’s GE seeds. (wiki) Seminis is also listed on this page often, they were bought out by Monsanto and cannot be considered a safe, no-GMO, company.

Why does it matter if seed has been genetically modified?

These books have excellent reviews at Amazon and go very in depth into the issues with Monsanto. Links open in a NEW window/tab so you can come back easily!

>> The Council for Responsible Genetics has an excellent FAQ page that will answer this pressing question. I invite you to visit this page on the CRG site and learn more.

Other links to read:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto#Environmental_and_health_record

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto#Legal_issues

Vanity Fair article

Center for Food Safety: Monsanto vs US Farmers Report

Mcspotlight article

Government slashes pesticide reporting laws

Organic Consumers

For more information, just Google Monsanto. Even search their own website – their own pledges about creating a healthy sustainable planet go against everything they manufacture and do. You can’t make Round Up then turn around and say you’re trying to save the enviroment.

Who sells “safe seed” (not genetically modified)

I get a lot of emails asking for help with folk’s research. I can’t do it all for everyone, but I did write up a post on how you can do the research. It can be difficult finding out if a company is supplied by Seminis/Monsanto, but this page helps make sense of it.

—> Visit the “More on Avoiding Monsanto” blog post
(link opens in a new tab/window so you can easily return here)

Use this information as a starting point for your research. Call the companies you are interested in purchasing from and learn about their seed buying practices.

>> Visit this page, from the Council for Responsible Genetics. These companies have signed their safe seed pledge.

The following may be companies that sell only safe seed but have not signed the safe seed pledge (see link above).

Abundant Life Seeds
Amishland Seeds
Annapolis Valley Heritage Seed Company (Nova Scotia, Canada)
Diane’s Flower Seeds
Garden City Seeds
Heirlooms Evermore Seeds
Heirloom Seeds
High Mowing Seeds
Horizon Herbs
Irish-Eyes
Lake Valley Seeds
Livingston Seeds
Local Harvest
Mountain Rose Herbs
Organica Seed
Pinetree
Sand Hill Preservation Center
Seeds of Change
Southern Exposure
Sustainable Seed Co (added on request of the company)
Tiny Seeds
Uprising Seeds
Virtual Farm Seed Co (added on the request of the company)
Wildseed Farms

Now, who to avoid?

These are companies currently, or at one time, known to sell seeds from Seminis and/or Monsanto. If you think a company doesn’t belong here, email with with information about the company’s seed practices. If they are supplied even in part by Seminis/Monsanto, they won’t be moved to the safe seed list.

Anderson’s Seed & Garden, Inc
Audubon Workshop
Ball Horticultural Company
Breck’s Bulbs
Bunton Seed
Burpee
Cook’s Garden
Corona Seeds
DeBruyn Seed Company, Inc.
Dege Garden Center
Earl May Seed
Early’s Farm & Garden Centre
E & R Seed Co
El Seed
Farmer Seed & Nursery
Flower of the Month Club
Ferry Morse – For more information on Ferry Morse (I’m getting a TON of emails because they are also listed on the CRG page, please see my note on facebook)
Fukuda Seed Store
Gardens Alive
Germania Seed Co
Garden Trends, Inc.d/b/a Harris Seeds
Germania Seed Company
Grimes Horticulture
H.F. Michell Company
HPS
Jungs
Lindenberg Seeds
McClure and Zimmerman Quality Bulb Brokers
Meyer Seed Co of Baltimore, Inc
Mountain Valley Seed
Ontario Seed
Ornamental Edibles
Osborne
Otis S. Twilley Seed Co., Inc.
Park Seed
Park Bulbs
Park’s Countryside Garden
P. L. Rohrer & Bro., Inc.
R.H. Shumway
Rocky Mountain Seed Co
Roots and Rhizomes
Rupp
Seeds for the World
Seminova
Seymour’s Selected Seeds
Snow
Southern States Cooperative, Incorporated
Stokes
Spring Hill Nurseries
Totally Tomato
T&T Seeds
Tomato Growers Supply
The Page Seed Company
The Vermont Bean Seed Company
Tomato Growers Supply Company
Vesey’s Seeds
Vis Seed Company, Inc.
Wayside Gardens
Willhite Seed Co.
William Dam Seeds

Seminis’ home garden dealer list:http://www.seminis.com/global/us/products/Pages/Home-Garden.aspx
Farm seed for Canada:http://www.seminis.com/global/us/products/Pages/Canada.aspx

Other helpful links:
Monsanto’s Seed Brands
Monsanto Vegetable Seeds

1. I assume no liability for content on this page. Use the information on this page as a starting point for your research.

Know your beef, and you cannot depend on the label either!

When you buy beef from the grocery store, you can usually tell that there's some kind of beef encased in all that plastic and styrofoam.  what those labels won't tell you is whether your meat contains residues of rBGH or rBST growth hormones or whether it contains trace amounts of the 30 million pounds of antibiotics used on livestock every year. They won't give you a good idea of where your meat came from or how the animals were treated prior to slaughter, nor will they tell you about an animal's diet, which can impact the health of the animal as well as whether it's meat is contaminated with E. coli. If you care about all those things—as well as the nutritional quality of your beef—it's best to avoid the supermarket and buy grass-fed beef directly from a farmer, or local natural-food store, such as a co-op, as they who knows how beef is produced, or know the farmer directly. Grass-fed beef has also been found to contain higher levels of omega-3 fatty acids and is typically leaner than it's corn-fattened counterpart behind the market's deli counter (those are some nutrition facts that won't appear on the new labels, either).

pumpkin seeds

Processed Pumpkin Seeds

The Joy-Killing Truth: Raw pumpkin seeds or those you roast yourselfare perfectly healthy. But those processed pellets in plastic packaging? Not so much. The food industry often coats seeds in a preservative called potassium bromate, which blocks iodine from being absorbed by the thyroid, says Graham. Without proper iodide levels, the thyroid—which is vital to maintaining good moods—can't function properly. In fact, the thyroid is one of the first thing psychiatrists check when evaluating a person with depression.

Healthy Switch: Stick with those raw or home-roasted seeds, and don't just roast pumpkin seeds. Seeds from any winter squash can be roasted and are loaded with the same trace minerals and natural antidepressant properties as pumpkin seeds.

Consumption of fast foods and baked goods doubles risk of depression

Researchers conducting the study found that risk of depression could be predicted in a dose-dependent manner. Lead study author, Dr. Almudena Sanchez-Villegas commented"the more fast food you consume, the greater the risk of depression."The study found that those participants eating the largest amount of fast food and commercially baked goods are more likely to be single, physically inactive and generally exhibit poor dietary habits. Typically these individuals consumed less fruit, nuts, fish, vegetables, and olive oil, and were more likely to smoke or work more than 45 hours per week.

High consumption of commercially baked goods or fried foods subjected to the oil degradation process known as hydrogenation results in trans-fats that have been shown to dramatically increase heart disease risk in past studies. This current research demonstrates that these misshapen and synthetically processed trans-fats interfere with the proper function of chemical neurotransmitters in the brain and alter normal electrical activity necessary for intercellular signaling.

Depression among children and adults is expanding at an alarming rate, with 121 million people diagnosed worldwide. Antidepressants prescribed to manage depression are largely ineffective and only work to mask the underlying cause of the illness. A wealth of scientific evidence now points to proper nutrition as an effective tool to halt and even reverse depressive episodes. The study team advised against a diet including baked or fried foods, and emphasized the need for whole, natural foods containing plenty of B vitamins, omega-3 fatty acids, and fresh pressed virgin olive oil to significantly lower risk of depression

Learn more:http://www.naturalnews.com/035772_fast_food_depression_nutrition.html#ixzz1u93HGrRx

Besides a nutrional diet, aging or Telomere length is affected by...

Two Additional Lifestyle Strategies that Affect Telomere Length

While a nutritious diet accounts for about 80 percent of the benefits derived from a healthy lifestyle, exercise cannot be ignored, and there's evidence suggesting that exercise protects against telomere shortening as well. Yet another lifestyle strategy that can have a beneficial impact is intermittent fasting.

• Exercise—One recent study on post-menopausal women suffering from chronic stress found that "vigorous physical activity appears to protect those experiencing high stress by buffering its relationship with telomere length (TL)." ^xv In fact, among the women who did not exercise, each unit increase in the Perceived Stress Scale was related to a 15-fold increase in the odds of having short telomeres. Those who did exercise regularly showed no correlation between telomere length and perceived stress!
  High-intensity exercise appears to be the most effective all-natural approach to slow down the aging process by reducing telomere shortening. In fact, research has shown there's a direct association between reduced telomere shortening in your later years and high-intensity-type exercises^xvi: Greta Blackburn's book The Immortality Edge: Realize the Secrets of Your Telomeres for a Longer, Healthier Life^xvii further details the importance of high-intensity exercise to prevent telomere shortening.
• Intermittent Fasting— Previous research has shown that you can extend your lifespan by reducing your caloric intake, and I've written about this technique in the past. The problem is that most people do not understand how to properly cut calories, because in order to remain healthy, you have to cut out the right kind of calories—namely carbohydrates. Research by Professor Cynthia Kenyon has shown that avoiding carbs will activate genes that govern youthfulness and longevity. www.fatbgone.org for nutritional cleansing!