Yay! This is the first day of 2011 where I will be starting to try and blog more about ways to eat healthy, organic, natural and real foods on a budget. I will also talk about changes that we have made with cleaners, shampoo, conditioner, face wash, deodorant etc. (Yes, I do make all of these items now.) It has taken me a couple of years to get to where I am now, and I want to share with you guys some of the changes that my family has made over the years to have a healthier lifestyle, but not break the bank.

I decided to start my posts with the first change that I personally made with my family. I knew where I wanted to be with changes to our lives eventually, but boy did it seem overwhelming at first. I decided that we could just continue on the way we were, or I could slowly make changes. My daughter’s asthma is what really made the decision for me. I really wanted her health to improve, and after reading numerous books, I thought that eliminating chemicals was one way that we could help her.

I have read Nourishing Traditions, The Makers Diet, The Gaps Diet, and done tons of research at the Weston A. Price Foundation. I have also read quite a few books about herbs and ways to heal with foods and herbs.

I realize that everyone’s ideas of how to eat healthy vary. Some people are vegetarians, some people eat all organic, some people eat all raw, and there are many other diets out there. For me, we just try to eat food as close to the way God made it as possible. I figure that God knew what he was doing when he made the food for us. We eat some raw food, cook much of our food and we eat meat. Since God told Noah that he could eat meat when he came off the ark, I figure that our family can too.

I know that this may or may not be something that all of you are interested in. Some of the tips and suggestions that I make might seem too difficult to you. I suggest that if you do want to start introducing a healthier lifetstyle, just take it one step at a time. You can follow along in the order that we made the changes, or make your own changes.

I know that some of you may not be interested in these posts, and that’s fine. Just do what is best for your family and skip these posts, but for the many of you that are interested, I hope that you really enjoy these posts!!!!  Now on to my post . . .

Whole Wheat Bread:

Bread seemed like the quickest and easiest change for me to make when I first decided to make healthier choices. Now before you get overwhelmed at the idea of making homemade bread, I just want to let you know, I spend about 5 minutes twice a week making bread. This was not a huge time investment for me, and I knew that I would be able to stick to this change.

If I am running low on time, we will often have sandwiches or cheese toast. Plus, my family really enjoys bread. I had been buying bread from the store, but decided that I would start making my own bread. I bought a bread machine for $5 from The Salvation Army, & I was ready to go.

I have been through many bread machines over the years since whole wheat flour can cause them to wear out, so I definitely suggest finding one at your local Good Will or Salvation Army. Ours seems to always have them available. Eventually, we saved up our Swagbucks and bought a really nice Zojirushi Bread Machine. It has two paddles instead or one, and is strong enough to handle whole wheat bread long term. My family has been using them for years and they still work great!

White Flour Vs. Whole Wheat Flour:

I try to cook as much as possible with whole wheat flour rather than white flour. Why? White flour is bleached and broken down. The germ, middlings and bran are removed and all that is left is the endosperm. Bleach is then added to flour to reduce the risk of spoiling. There is also unbleached enriched all purpose flour that is bleached by oxygen rather than chlorine. In both cases, the nutrients are removed, and some are artificially replaced.

Whole wheat is actually full of vitamins, minerals and even protein. It also has more fiber since the germ, middlings and bran are still attached, and everyone is always saying that we need more fiber in our diets. There are 44 minerals and vitamins that are found in whole wheat.  Whole wheat is a complex carbohydrate that does not usually effect the glycemic index.  You can read more from the Weston A Price foundation about why whole wheat is better for you than white flour. There are many studies that have shown the decline in health once people began eating white flour rather than freshly ground whole wheat.

I am sure that some people don’t know that wheat actually starts our as wheat berries. These wheat berries can be bought and stored for more than 20 years. Pretty neat, huh! Not that my wheat berries ever make it even a year, but it is still good to know. (-: These wheat berries have to be ground to make flour. Sounds kind of tough doesn’t it? Well, guess what, it’s not! It is really super easy to do.

It is best if you can grind your own wheat because the nutrients begin to diminish 3-6 days after it has been ground, plus the wheat germ oil will make the flour go rancid a few days after it is ground.  I grind my wheat a couple of times a week.  If I have any extra wheat, I just stick it in a bag in the freezer to use when I bake again.

When I first started grinding wheat I just used the grinding attachment on my Kitchen Aid mixer to grind the wheat. My husband bought me a Blendtec for Christmas which I love, and I now use it to grind my wheat. I am still looking for a great deal on Craigslist or a garage sale for a grain mill, but for now the Blendtec works great! These devices allow you to take dry wheat berries and grind them into flour. (I actually soak my wheat berries and sprout them, dehydrate them then grind them. This is an extra step that I will talk about later in the week that gets rid of phytic acid.)

If you don’t have something that you can grind the wheat in, but have a food processor, you will be able to grind your wheat as well after soaking your wheat berries. I will go through this method later this week with a recipe, so don’t worry if you don’t have a way to grind wheat berries dry, you still can once they have been soaked.

Now that I have told you what I am doing, and a little bit about how, tomorrow I will go over how to switch over to whole wheat on a budget. I always have to find the best prices I possibly can you know. (-:

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