Food Musings

I consider myself something of a kitchen mage... always have, even before I Awakened to being otherkin. I try to add energy and intent to the things I'm cooking, and charging food items with beneficial energies has often been a practice of mine. Even if just to try to enhance the flavor.

Recently, though, I've started paying a bit more attention to the energies of the foods I'm eating themselves. I'm finding some interesting correlations.

1) Processed foods seem to have uniformly less energy than the same foods made from scratch by hand would have. Still need to test this observation more, but it seems to bear out. I have a device for making pasta from eggs and flour that I really need to test out, I think they would have significantly more energy than their manufactured counterparts.

2) Foods with large quantities of preservatives and unpronounceable ingredients seem to have less energy than foods that are more organic/natural.

3) Foods cooked in a microwave generally have less energy than those cooked using more conventional means.

4) Energy and taste often seem to correlate. Potatoes baked in an oven are much more flavorful than potatoes baked in a microwave, and have much more energy as well. There is also a difference in texture that is more difficult to quantify, but certainly present.

I find this all very interesting, as one of the theories of Huna is that a certain degree of vital force is created in the body by the Low Self, from a combination of breath and digestion, similar to how blood-sugar in the body is burned. I am given to wonder if a conscious effort to avoid lower-energy/more artificial foods and to give up the quick prep time a microwave affords would increase the reserves of energy naturally present in my body, perhaps even increase my capacity to hold such energies. This might make me a more effective Reiki healer...

Not certain yet, but something I'm going to take into consideration and continue to test as opportunity presents itself.

It's also interesting to note that Huna theory describes symptoms such as psychosis and depression for those whose natural reserves of vital force fall too low, even if they are physically healthy. I wonder if this trend towards processed foods and microwave preparation is contributing to the mental unrest of modern society....

Food for thought, in any case. ;-)

Home-Made Ice-cream

In the spirit of providing alternatives to highly processed and preserved foods, I was reminded tonight of an experience when I was young of making home-made ice-cream. After a brief search, I've found several variations of the method I used, and have decided to share them here. I can say from childhood experience that the method involving coffee cans definitely works. I believe the method involving ziplock bags would also work, but have not yet tried that version.

It's interesting to note that this would allow one to make much more healthy ice-cream than modern ice-cream, without processing and with greater control over the ingredients. No more corn syrup unless you choose to add it. No soy lecithin. You get the idea. This could be especially helpful to those with allergies. (And Ri, your dad may possibly have the most empty coffee cans of anyone I know, so you'd be very set for doing this if you were so inclined. ;-))

( Instructions behind cut-tag for space )

Modern Foods

I have in front of me a container of Edy's Grand Ice Cream: Double Fudge Brownie: "All Natural Flavors"

Ingredients: Milk, Cream, Skim Milk, Fudge Swirl (sugar, skim milk, corn syrup, cream, water, cocoa processed with alkali, bitter chocolate, modified tapioca starch, sodium alginate, natural flavor, salt.), sugar, chocolate brownie pieces (sugar, wheat flower, soybean oil, eggs, cocoa processed wtih alkali, corn syrup, water, natural flavor, salt, soy lecithin, xanthan bum), corn syrup, cocoa processed with alkali, cellulose gum, mono and diglycerides, guar gum, carrageenan, dextrose.

Now, comparing the ingredients in here to the ingredients for making home made ice cream, I have to say.... what the FUCK?

The soy products are an easy first thing to focus on... I know someone very allergic to it, and I also am pretty familiar with what soy is. My main thought here is "Why is this even in my ice cream? It's not a diet ice cream, what purpose does the soy in this serve? How exactly does it affect my body, even though I am not allergic to it?"

Corn syrup is next. I know high fructose corn syrup has been linked to both obesity and Alzheimer's. This is just regular corn syrup, but again, is it really necessary? I don't remember using corn syrup when I've made brownies or fudge, and certainly it's not necessary to make regular ice cream. Why is it here?

Many of the other ingredients on here I'm not even familiar with off the top of my head. I know very little about them or the effects they have on a human body, much less my own body in particular. This seems normal, because I have grown up with such processed foods and artificial ingredients for most of my life, but when you get right down to it... is it?

It makes me really think about simpler days, when people didn't buy complete meals to reheat at home so much as the ingredients to make them "from scratch". I think we had more control back then over exactly what was going into our bodies. And I'm strongly considering that as an ideal model to return to in planning my own meals. Just buying the raw ingredients and preparing foods myself might take longer, but I'd have much more control over exactly what was going into my body, and I tend to think in the long run it would be healthier as well.