This week I had the privilege and honour of meeting Camilla Banard of RudeHealth cereals and food products. We bonded over shared food feelings, that the world has gone crazy when it comes to food and that we have created a breeding ground for eating disorders from anorexia to obesity as people no longer eat and drink because they are hungry and stop when they are full. We now face over-choice of food options paralysing us into sticking to what we feel is safe and familiar, morality around food with good and bad foods and considerations of the ethical origins of food and over information on health (often disguised food marketing) shouting at us from everywhere on what to eat. We have completely overcomplicated things and taken the pleasure out of eating and as such we must now strip things back and keep things simple. The simple thing is, food is joy.
What do I mean when I say simple? I mean food where you recognise the ingredients, restaurants where they tell you what is in the food and don’t expect you to just accept what you are given but at the same time don’t overwhelm you with calories and allergens (unless requested for a specific allergy). I mean simple such as the recent traffic light system on food which gives you a simple indication of the sugar, salt and fat content of your food. I mean simple such as no thinly disguised artificial bullshit masquerading as heathy like “xanthan gum” and “xylitol” and “aspartame” food additives which are put into “natural” and “low fat” products, but are in no way healthy and have been seen in science to alter anxiety and depression levels and metabolism (sweeteners are sweeter than sugar so increase your desire for sugar, making you crave it and hungry-angry “hangry” from the sugar lows). I mean no exclusion of food groups or veganism to fit in with fashion. I mean simple “my granny would recognise these” ingredients. I mean eating when you are hungry, with others around a table sociably with people you like at breakfast, lunch and dinner time with a snack or two in the middle, stopping when you are full and I mean enjoying food. Food is simple. It feeds your brain and body. Too much sugar and processed food makes you unwell and too little and you feel deprived and crave and more likely to binge. There is no bad or good, just food, and all our overthinking has taken the fun out of it and robbed us of an essential part of food and eating: pleasure. Food JOY!
I have had an eating disorder and a pretty serious one at that which nearly killed me many times. It has taken incredible self-determination and resilience to fight my way out of it. I have had to fight myself every day for years. I have overthought food, stood in supermarkets for hours and been so overwhelmed by the choices that I haven’t bought anything. I lost myself for a moment, using control over food to control uncertainty and misunderstood feelings and in the process I lost my ability to know what food I like and dislike. In my “eat pray love” recovery, I have experimented with different flavours from all over the world. I have learnt to savour the flavours and the beauty of good food. I have saved and treated myself to Michelin star meals as I also had periods where I really struggled to pay for food, seeing it as unnecessary and myself undeserving and so only eating others leftovers. I have also been so angry about the ridiculous criminality of pointless food waste that I ate food I didn’t like to save it from feeding bins instead of humans. I have attended food fairs and road shows and, as I help people start-up businesses, I have been on the curve the wave of every food trend and watched others crash with the consequences of these. With people following others when it comes to veganism, undiagnosed milk allergies, gluten free, avocados and so on, all promoting fad diets in the name of health, food is no longer just food. It’s a status symbol. It’s a sign of moral superiority and “being cool” edginess. It puts people into tribes and the food you eat now defines you. Somewhere is all this craziness we lost ourselves. We overthought food so much we stopped thinking altogether. Food is just food and it nourishes our brains and bodies and affects or looks, energy levels and moods and food can make us happy.
As Camilla and I sat down in her Fulham London shop, and discussed what we feel is right and wrong about food I thought of all the wisdom I have learnt in my own recovery journey. My head is popping with so much advice from different people and organisations and with a biomedical background and studies into neuroscience myself, I know health and I know food. Yet sometimes even I lose myself in all the craziness of my environment. From eating junk food around my family who lovingly supported me through anorexia to please them in a “look I am well now” post-anorexia way to eating less with my friends on diets that make me feel fat and then overeating at home later. From eating “just what’s there” when I come home from work and am too tired to cook and eating free stuff I don’t like, just because it’s free. I know me now. I know what I like and dislike when it comes to food. I know when my body craves chocolate in the same way I know when I really need a carrot. Yet often I don’t listen to my body. I put my desires to please others, to look a certain way and get others approval, I put my financial needs or weight worries or inability to think when overtired or frazzled by overdoing it, ahead of my simple desires to feed my body what it needs. My food preferences vary based on whom I am with like so many others, and this has to stop. I must know myself like my good friend Gina said. I must listen to my own advice and know what food I want and need and must stop overcomplicating things and worrying so much about the surrounding story to food and groups and what everyone else is eating or wants me to eat. We all need to just slow down, to breathe and to go back to food basics.
Food is simple. Eat food. Not too much, not too little. Know what you like. Don’t be closed to food experimenting. Eat variety; don’t be afraid of anything but easy on the sugar and salt and processed foods. Foods is one of the greatest pleasures in life and so enjoy it. As the “Go Compare” website advert would say; simples.
The Food Anti Extremist 