Herbs to fight chronic inflammation

There are many of us who have conditions due to chronic inflammation. The drugs that are regularly prescribed have some dastardly side effects. I found this information on Dr. Andrew Weil’s web site. Dr. Weil established the field of integrative medicine which attempts to integrate alternative and conventional medicine. He is the founder and program director of the Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine

Has anyone out there tried any of these? If so, how long have you used them and what were the results? The information below is from Dr. Weil’s site.

• Turmeric (Curcuma longa):
Turmeric accounts for the yellow color of curry and American mustard and has a distinctive sharp flavor. I recommend turmeric for all inflammatory disorders, including arthritis, tendonitis, and auto immune conditions. Take 400 to 600 milligrams of turmeric extracts (available in tablets or capsules) three times per day or as directed on the product label. Whole turmeric is more effective than isolated curcumin, its major constituent. Look for products standardized for 95% curcuminoids. Be patient: the full benefit takes two months to develop. Don’t use turmeric if you have gallstones or bile duct dysfunction. Pregnant women shouldn’t use it without their doctors’ approval. In rare cases, extended use can cause stomach upset or heartburn.

• Ginger: 

Powdered dry ginger is an excellent anti-inflammatory. Take one to two capsules (500 to 1,000 mg) twice a day with food. As with turmeric, you won’t get the full effect for two months.

• Boswellin:

This is the extract of the herb Boswellia, used in Ayurvedic medicine and available in capsule form. It may be useful for generalized inflammatory conditions such as fibromyalgia. The dosage is two capsules twice a day unless the product label directs differently.

In addition to herbs, you can also take dietary steps to reduce inflammation. The specific fats in your diet affect the way the body makes prostaglandins, a group of hormones that regulate inflammation. Some prostaglandins intensify the inflammatory response while others reduce it. To help your body reduce inflammation eliminate polyunsaturated vegetable oils, margarine, vegetable shortening, all partially hydrogenated oils and all foods that contain trans-fatty acids (read food labels to check for the presence of these oils). Instead, use extra-virgin olive oil as your main fat and increase your intake of omega-3 fatty acids found in oily, cold-water fish, flaxseeds or oil, and walnuts.

The health effects of eating sugar

This is the most comprehensive explantion of the relationship between consuming sugar and the health effects that I have ever read.

http://www.lowcarbmonthly.com/general-health/the-relationship-between-sugar-and-inflammation.html

Joel Salatin at Rollins College April 18th 2012

This video archive blog was written and filmed by A Local Folkus’ founder, John Rife. 

On April 18th, Homegrown and Slow Food Orlando partnered with Rollins College to bring Salatin to Central Florida for a packed lecture on his new book, Folks This Ain’t Normal….and there is nothing normal about a packed lecture hall. The crowd speaks for itself–Orlando is concerned about our food and local farmers. Squished, standing in the back row, Salatin’s words were clearer than ever before…

• “The United States has destroyed more soil faster than any other civilization in the history of the world!”
• “It takes life to give life.”

• “When a government gets between my lips and my throat, I call that an invasion of privacy!”

• “We are completely and utterly dependent upon a community of beings–bacteria that’s in the soil at a rate of 2 trillion per healthy handful. In our insides at the rate of 3 trillion.”

If you couldn’t make it to the event, or if you were up in the nose bleed section, we invite you to pull up a chair and get up close and personal with Joel Salatin’s lecture below. Then, let us know what you took away from it all. Comment below or write on Homegrown Co-op’s Facebook page and A Local Folkus’ Facebook page!

Joel Salatin at Rollins College April 18th 2012 “Folks this ain’t normal” from John Rife on Vimeo.

The dirty dozen and clean 15 of produce

A new report issued by the President’s Cancer Panel recommends eating produce without pesticides to reduce your risk of getting cancer and other diseases. And according to the Environmental Working Group (an organization of scientists, researchers and policymakers), certain types of organic produce can reduce the amount of toxins you consume on a daily basis by as much as 80 percent.

The group put together two lists, “The Dirty Dozen” and “The Clean 15,” to help consumers know when they should buy organic and when it is unnecessary. These lists were compiled using data from the United States Department of Agriculture on the amount of pesticide residue found in non-organic fruits and vegetables after they had been washed.

The fruits and vegetables on “The Dirty Dozen” list, when conventionally grown, tested positive for at least 47 different chemicals, with some testing positive for as many as 67. For produce on the “dirty” list, you should definitely go organic — unless you relish the idea of consuming a chemical cocktail.

Click here to see the Dirty Dozen & Clean 15 of Produce…

MeetUp with Your Local Foodies

We think you’ll like this MeetUp coming up on May 17 at Dandelion Communitea Café. Maya Fiallos from Maya Papaya Organic Farm will speak about community shared agriculture (CSAs) and their farm in Oviedo. It looks fun and informative, and we hope to see you there!

Local is Lovely…and a Growing Choice

We found this interesting article we want to share with you about the growing popularity of farm markets and similar businesses. We are very lucky to have over fifty sustainable farms within a 50-mile radius of us, and we hope this number grows. When you shop with us, you help us grow and also help all these farm families and other producers stay working at what they love: sustainably healthy practices. Read on…right here!

Fresh Baked News

While you’ve enjoyed the breads and other baked items we’ve had for a while, now you can more easily see our offerings in our new bakery case. We hope you’ll come in and see what else we have that new. If you haven’t been in to the Farm Store in a while, it’s changed!

Yes, we listen to you when you tell us what you want and need, and we make wonderful improvements each day, from our store layout to additional items for purchase. Feel free to leave a comment about something you’d like to see in our Farm Store. Better yet, come in to the Farm Store and tell us; the pastries taste so much better in person!

A Feast for the Eyes and Ears

On a lighter note than our last entry, we couldn’t agree more when Rhiannon Giddens from the Carolina Chocolate Drops sings, “…the best kind of food is made by hand, the only place to get it is from the land.” in their brand new video called Country Girl. Check it out here!

That spread of delicious food on the dinner table has our mouths watering! Come on down to the Homegrown Co-op’s Farm Store today and get just the items you need to create your own amazing dinner spread this evening.

Humane and Sustainable Practices

The Humane Society of the United States recently reported that Tyson Foods buys pigs from a factory farm facility in Wyoming that practices unethical and unhealthy systems for its animals. A video, taken by an undercover investigator at Itoham Foods, Inc., (the facility under the proverbial gun) shows pregnant sows in containment stalls so small they cannot turn around. In addition to the limited movement, the video also shows adult and baby pigs being physically abused by employees, and being left either sick, injured or dead without treatment or removal from the facility. Not only is this cruel and unnecessary, it produces a risk to the food supply via harmful bacteria and other contaminates, not to mention the stress and fear endorphins surging through the animals’ systems, which are then concentrated in the tissue and consumed by humans, posing an additional risk to our health. Typically, these animals are regularly injected with antibiotics, which, with regular ingestion of these tissues, can affect the way antibiotics work in human systems. The list of negatives goes on and on.

Unfortunately, this is not a unique scenario in big agribusiness; we’ve all heard stories similar to this time after time, and this is just one small facet of how they’re causing problems that drift down the line and onto our plates at home. For instance, large, industrial farms dealing in livestock are the major source for pathogenic bacteria in the food supply, air pollution due to the excess fertilizers and other chemicals needed to maintain the enormous amount of crops they grow, and poor working conditions for the people who work on these farms.

How can we each do our part to help stop this and other horrible things from happening? The answer is easy…and not so easy. The easy part — the part you can do right now — is to buy your food from local, trusted sources: farmers whose daily practices are sustainable, humane and organic. These are the kind of farmers and culinary artisans we feature at Homegrown Co-op. In fact, that’s the only kind of people we work with. That makes it easy for you to know you’re supporting the kind of families who are making a difference for good.

The not-so-easy part of the big picture is that we must make our collective voices heard if we want change to happen. This can involve things as simple as writing or calling your representatives, or as complicated as starting and maintaining a movement. Nevertheless, you can start now with the simple act of choosing the organic, sustainably-run farms and producers over the large corporations and agricultural conglomerates who do the most damage.