Lifestyle Changes Do Not Happen Overnight Series: How to do a Pantry Clean-Out, Healthy Foods, Healthy Life!

Last month I talked about lifestyle changes and how they do not happen overnight.  I covered hydration as the first part of my lifestyle change series.  This month I will go into more detail on one of the subjects I mentioned, pantry clean-outs.  Making sure that your pantry contains only foods that are healthy for you can stop issues from happening because you forgot that box of crackers had canola oil in them! (one example!)

It is expensive to replace each item that contains not so great ingredients, so I suggest that as you go through the pantry, you make 3 piles:
Pile #1 – This food is perfect and I can keep it
Pile #2 – This food is less than desirable, but I will find a replacement once I finish what I have.
Pile #3 – This food is also less than perfect, but I only use it once in a blue moon.

If you do decide to get rid of any unopened food, consider donating to a local food bank where someone who may not have a meal at all, would be grateful to eat what you are getting rid of!

**Please note, if you find yourself becoming emotionally upset doing this, stop.  You may have emotional attachments that would need professional help before you do this.

Pantry Clean out 3 Stages

Stage 0 – Use it or Lose It
If a food, fresh or packaged, has been lingering around the pantry or refrigerator for a while and is past its prime, it is time to clean up and “use it or lose it.” The question is black and white—is the food edible or is it spoiled? If it is edible, but close to the end of its life, use it. If it is off smelling, moldy, stale, or otherwise showing signs of age—let it go. This exercise helps get the “clean up” mentality in gear and makes it easier to step into the larger decisions that come in the next stages. It is also a great stage to extend to the spice rack as old spices are lacking in flavor, lower in nutrients, and poor reflections of their fresh counterparts.

Stage 1 – Examine Your Fats
One of the simplest changes you can make that has a tremendous impact on health from a cellular level is to replace your refined vegetable oils with a nourishing real food fat that your body knows how to digest and utilize properly.

There are two steps involved in this stage, replacing standalone fats and fats as ingredients in packaged goods.

Step 1: Clean out the vegetable oils from the pantry and the refrigerator!
Including canola, safflower, sunflower, cottonseed, soybean, corn, peanut, rice bran, margarine, and generic “vegetable” oil.

Replace with tallow, lard, ghee, bacon fat, duck fat, or coconut oil for higher heat cooking (depending on budget, availability, and sensitivities), and olive oil, avocado oil, and butter for finishing or low heat cooking.

All olive and avocado oils should be COLD PRESSED, NOT Expeller pressed or any other form of pressed.  The heat from those changes the biological make-up of the oils to forms our bodies are not made or able to use.

Pantry Clean Out Step 2: Check Packages. Look at packaged products in the pantry and refrigerator that have these same oils, plus look for anything that says “hydrogenated” or “partially hydrogenated” as these are trans fats, which cause free radical damage to our cells. If a product has trans fats, it is best to get rid of it immediately and find an alternative (preferably a whole, fresh food—but a similar packaged product that doesn’t have trans fats is a healthier step on the continuum and is still a good change.). If a product has one of the vegetable oils, we eliminated in step 1.  If you need to make big leaps and have ample resources, I encourage you to clean out as many of the products as you are ready to. However, if you need smaller steps or have limited resources, evaluate each item and consider how often you consume it, is there an alternative, and do you have the resources to make the switch now.

‣ The reason this conversation is important is that these vegetable oils will be abundant in condiments, chips, crackers, bars, and other packaged foods you are used to buying, and it can be intimidating and debilitating to be shown 20 different products to throw away in one day. Instead, you can clean out the top 3 to 5 items you use the most often and find an immediate replacement. Then, brainstorm a list of alternative items you can make or buy to replace subsequent pantry/refrigerator staples when you run out of what you currently have.

Stage2 – Ditch the Chemicals
Food dyes, artificial sweeteners, preservatives, MSG*, artificial flavorings, thickening agents, the list of manmade chemicals being added to our food today is staggering. These fake ingredients can cause direct damage to our endocrine, digestive, cardiovascular, immune, and neurological systems and offer no nutritional benefit—so they have no place in our homes or on our plates. You can refer to a food additives glossary such as https://www.ewg.org/consumer-guides/ewgs-dirty-dozen-guide-food-chemicals-top-12-avoid to help see the types of language and words we are looking for, but in general these items are going to be easy to spot because they simply are not food. If an ingredient is not recognizable or pronounceable, uses a number or acronym (red #5 or BHT for example), or has a process attached to it (hydrolyzed yeast extract), your body likely doesn’t know how to use it either. Again, determine if “everything goes” makes sense for your life, or, if starting with the top 3 to 5 most consumed items and making plans for future swaps is the best choice.

*MSG is often hidden in other label ingredients. If you are sensitive, it is important to pay attention to other ingredients that indicate MSG is likely present.  Using an online resource like https://www.truthinlabeling.org/hiddensources.html can help you stay abreast of these ingredients.

Pantry Clean Out Stage 3 – Search Out the Sugar
While most of us are not going to be totally derailed from our wellness journey by having a scoop of ice cream at a birthday celebration or enjoying a slice of pie during the holidays, processed cane sugar does not provide nourishment to our bodies as an everyday food, and it is wise to remove most of it from our homes as it is tempting, addictive, and very easy to consume mindlessly when it is readily available. This stage can be one of the more emotional parts of the process as we tend to have strong memories associated with sweet treats, and they can provide a source of comfort, stress relief, and feelings of joy to some degree. Because of this emotional connection, it is a stage where you should really focus on the importance of balance and the good-better-best continuum. For example, if you look in your pantry and you have an entire basket of fun-size candy bars that you turn to for energy, emotional release, celebrations, etc., you may not be ready to just toss that out cold turkey. Instead, you can begin by replacing the candy bars with a darker chocolate that is sweetened with organic cane sugar and has minimal added ingredients. There will be time later in your journey to move even further on the continuum to very dark chocolate that is sweetened with coconut sugar or a little honey.

Stage 4 – Replace Refined Grains
While not everyone is going to need to be on a grain-free diet, bleached white flour or wheat flour enriched with synthetic vitamins and minerals is not a whole, nourishing food and is not going to add value to your diet. If you tolerate grains, this stage can either involve swapping white flour-based products for homemade versions with sprouted flour (you can purchase pre-sprouted or make your own), learning to make foods with a sourdough process, or finding store-bought versions of the product made with traditional grains like einkorn, spelt, kamut, sorghum or pseudo-cereals like amaranth, quinoa, and buckwheat, depending on your time and budgetary constraints. If you suspect or are certain you do not tolerate grains, this stage can become an opportunity to move further on your good-better-best continuum to find more food options that do not use grains at all. Whether that involves learning to use alternative flours made from coconut, cassava, tigernut, arrowroot, tapioca, etc., buying premade products that use these specialty ingredients, or using other whole foods like fruit and vegetables in new ways (kale makes fantastic chips and sweet potatoes make phenomenal “buns” for burgers.), this stage can be an exciting way to exchange less nutrient-dense foods for more nutrient-rich options.

Again, with this stage can come a balance and a realistic evaluation of where you are on your unique continuum. If your family is going out to a new wood-fired pizza restaurant in town, and you know they use unsoaked, non-fermented white flour in the crust—but you do not have Celiac or gluten sensitivities—by all means, you should eat some pizza, as that will nourish the soul even if it isn’t a boon for the body. The very reason for getting refined grains out of the home is so that they are no longer a readily available staple that we consume on a regular basis, but instead can make those random appearances in the “less than optimal but goodness it’s delicious” segment of our diet that is part of living a rich, full, enjoyable life.

Stage 5 -Get More Active in the Kitchen
This stage is not one that everyone needs to complete to reach their health goals and hit their personal “best” on the continuum. For some people, swapping their old staple products that were full of additives, sugars, refined grains, and rancid fats with similar products that are made with whole-foods derived ingredients will be enough to transform their health and enable them to live the life they desire. But for others, eliminating packaged items by getting in the kitchen to make their own food is an empowering, fun, and motivating experience that will set them up for a
long-term wellness on a deeper level than just physical health. Taking raw ingredients and transforming them into wholesome snacks, homemade condiments, and nourishing components of a meal puts a person in connection with the seasons, engages them with the food itself using all the senses, and fills their heart with the immense joy that comes from having a hand in creating the delicious food on the table.

I encourage you, if you desire to participate in this stage to choose some of your favorite pantry items and attempt to recreate them from scratch, using locally sourced or lovingly grown ingredients whenever possible. A reminder that it is not necessary to make everything from scratch, especially when the resource of time is more limited than finances, but that as often as it brings you joy and is within your means, eating foods you prepare yourself will always nourish on more levels than something purchased off the shelf.

There are people who do not have the luxury of deciding to get rid of some foods and buy or make other ones because it better serves their wellness goals. So, every “good” choice you are able to make is a privilege to be grateful for—let alone the times when you are able to hit your mark for “better” or “best.” Every improvement should be celebrated, appreciated, and honored as an important step on your wellness journey.