Food For Fort

How do you build a body that’s hard to kill?

It’s something I’ve pursued with my fitness and nutrition most of my life.

It was something that felt even more pressing when my daughter Emily died and my husband developed his heart condition.

It made me want to make myself and my family physically bombproof.

Food matters for our health.

That is something we all know and can accept.

What we put in our bodies has a profound effect on how well our bodies are.

Essentially, we are what we eat.

Your body literally uses the fuel you put into yourself to build new cells within you.

It affects your fitness, your energy levels, your hormonal balance, not to mention your mental health.

So the quality and quantity and source of that food matters a great deal.

But it’s still so hard to navigate all the conflicting advice that’s out there.

As someone who is qualified in nutrition, even I find it hard to always know for sure the right way to go.

What I do know is government guidelines are badly ill-informed.

I’ve followed them. Then been a vegetarian and then a pescatarian.

I’ve tried paleo and then full carnivore.

I’ve spent time saying sod it all and just eating whatever I can get my greedy hands on.

I’ve read every faddy new health kick book going, as well as some from people who seem really, genuinely to know their stuff.

And they all have something different to say, but there is one theme that runs through them all.

Easy to grab, ready-made, processed food is really bad for us.

It makes us want too much of it, it makes us ill and it makes us fat.

I also care deeply about environmental issues and how our food needs to be sustainably sourced and packaging light.

So here’s the solution I’ve adopted.

Here is the “LivWell Diet” (working title)…

• Eat meat (lots of it and especially organ meat) and eggs
• Make sure your meat is local and grass-fed so it’s high omega 3, low omega 6 (look it up)
• Eat fewer grains and fewer starchy carbs (but don’t be a nob about it)
• Eat food that is reared and grown within spitting distance of where you live and the season you’re in
• Eat full fat everything
• Avoid all vegetable oils (cook in butter and meat fats)
• Avoid refined sugar (for the most part, again see the bit about not being a nob)
• Avoid processed foods (this is key – there is basically no real food in any petrol stations or large portions of the supermarket)
• Make everything from the basic raw ingredients yourself
• Have periods of the day or week where you fast to give your body time to heal
• Don’t go hungry, but if you live like this, you will only need to eat once or twice a day and feel fully sated at all times  (I promise – I’m not someone who tolerates hunger well)

Now this might all sound expensive and a faff. But it isn’t.

You’re cutting your food preparation by a third (or two thirds if you only eat once a day).

You’re simplifying the recipes to a small number of basic ingredients.

You’re either quick cooking on a hob or barbecue or bunging in a pot to slow cook in a low oven.

And it’s dead cheap.

Ask for organ meat from your butcher and they’ll basically almost pay you to take it off them.

Even though it’s the most nourishing part of an animal and will turn you into a health superhero, it’s absolutely dirt cheap.

Take your tupperware boxes so you don’t have any plastic rubbish in the process.

Liver is the king of nutrition and you will feel your body sing with joy after eating it.

If you’re weirded out by offal, I suggest your entry level might be sweetbreads, which are kind of pancreas, kind of thymus.

But don’t worry yourself about these details – just know it’s kick ass for your health.

Tender, easy to cook, slightly chickeny, slightly scallopy.

After soaking it in water, try frying it with a bit of chorizo and onion and serving with pea mash.

Gourmet. And oh so cheap.

Local fruit and veg can also either be grown very cheaply or sourced very cheaply.

Or picked for free in the case of wild garlic…

When there’s not much of it about, your grass-fed ruminant meat will provide all the vitamins and minerals your body needs.

They’ve eaten your greens for you.

Who honestly doesn’t love liver pate?

Or a fatty, salty, ribeye steak?

Yes, steak is expensive, but not really if it’s the only thing you need to eat all day.

And that grass fed british cow will have had a great life, provided rich habitat for bugs and small animals in the fields it lived in and won’t have had anything whatsoever to do with clearing of rainforests to grow it.

I’m looking at you Soy.

For more information, I think one of the best books I’ve ever read on the whole topic is Why we eat too much by Dr Andrew Jenkinson.

Making these changes in my own life has made me feel like a rockstar.

I’m sharper in mind, focus, energy levels and I no longer have major carb rollercoaster ‘hanger’ crash moments.

Give it a go and let me know how you get on!