Chapter 1: Why Food Matters

Not that long ago the act of providing food dominated people’s lives. Each community had to produce their own food. When they did well, their families ate well. When they did poorly, they died. Diets were seasonal. In the spring and summer months, the people ate lots of fresh organic fruits and vegetables. During the colder seasons, they ate meats, nuts, beans, roots, and porridge. Cooking dominated village life. There were no markets, no grocery stores. When a family needed food, they grew it, foraged for it, or hunted it.

Today we have a whole industry telling us what and where to eat. We think it’s normal to grab a meal at a drive-through and eat it on the go, and when we do shop, we fill our carts with premade products wrapped in glorified packaging proclaiming “All Natural” and “Healthy Choice” when most of the things we are selecting are not even classified as food but as “foodstuffs” that are loaded with sugar and chemicals and hold very little nutritional value.

Unhealthy diets and lack of access to nutritious food are two of the driving factors behind what a new report from the International Panel of Experts on Sustainable Food

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Systems describes as the “ballooning costs of health impacts in food systems.”1 Food has changed.

Fruits and vegetables grown decades ago were much richer in vitamins and minerals than the varieties most of us get today.2 Family farms around the world are disappearing as factory farm corporations are taking over food production.3 Most of today’s food has been processed, showered with pesticides, sprayed with Roundup, treated with chemical solvents, and stripped of most of its goodness.

But facts have not changed. You are still what you eat and as a society, we are paying the price with low energy, poor health, and weight problems. It is common to wake feeling tired and groggy, and most compensate by gulping down coffee and grabbing ready-to-eat meals on the go. And we snack and snack on empty calories made of salt and sugar and unpronounceable chemical ingredients. Unhealthy dietary patterns have become increasingly prevalent over recent decades—a trend that has been accompanied by increasing rates of overweight, obesity, and noncommunicable diseases worldwide.4

We need to return to our roots, filling our menus with produce from the local farmer’s market, garden grown vegetables, and organic supermarket choices. With just a bit of attention and effort, you can swap out the junk food for healthy, better-tasting fare and regain your health and vigor in the process. Make a choice to fill your pantry with empowering supplies. Sadly, today the buyer has to be aware and choosy to avoid the cheap, the fake, and the altered. When you are at the market, make it a habit to read each label before you put an item into your basket. Avoid the choices that contain a lot of additives. Put back the products that have been highly processed. Avoid the packages and choose real food whenever possible.

1. Olivier De Schutter, “Towards a Common Food Policy for the European Union,” IPES-Food panel, February 2019, http://www.ipes-food.org/_img/upload/files/CFP_FullReport.pdf. 2. Roddy Scheer and Doug Moss, “Dirt Poor: Have Fruits and Vegetables Become Less Nutritious?” Scientific

American, April 27, 2011, https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/soil-depletion-and-nutrition-loss/. 3. Chris McGreal, “How America’s Food Giants Swallowed the Family Farms,” The Guardian, March 9, 2019, https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/mar/09/american-food-giants-swallow-the-family -farms-iowa. 4. Cecilia Rocha, “Unraveling the Food–Health Nexus,” Global Alliance for the Future of Food and IPES-Food,

October 2017, http://www.ipes-food.org/_img/upload/files/Health_FullReport(1).pdf.

The Importance of Buying Organic

Many foods contain harmful chemicals that you won’t find in the ingredients list. More than 1.1 billion pounds of pesticides are applied annually to crops in the US alone.5 These applications are being done solely to increase crop yields, not to make your food better for you. This is big business at work. Poisons and herbicides are sprayed on food crops, and the produce is sent off to market with a blind eye to what harm it may cause to your health. And there is harm. In 2015 the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) published a report that the herbicide glyphosate and the insecticides malathion, diazinon, tetrachlorvinphos, and parathion are possibly “carcinogenic to humans.”6 The insecticide chlorpyrifos has been associated with developmental delays in infants.7 Studies have also suggested that pesticide residues—at levels commonly found in the urine of kids in the US—may contribute to ADHD prevalence and are linked to reduced sperm quality in men.8

Glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup, is the most widely used herbicide in the world. Its use has been linked to cancer, autism, severe food allergies, and autoimmune disease.9 Studies from the World Health Organization Specialized Cancer Agency have shown that long-term exposure to glyphosate has been linked to potential development of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and other serious health issues. In 2015, both the state of California and the World Health Organization declared glyphosate a probable carcinogen.10

5. Donald Atwood and Claire Paisley-Jones, “Pesticides Industry Sales and Usage: 2008-2012 Market Estimates,” Environmental Protection Agency, 2017, https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2017-01 /documents/pesticides-industry-sales-usage-2016_0.pdf. 6. International Agency for Research on Cancer, “IARC Monographs Volume 112: Evaluation of Five

Organophosphate Insecticides and Herbicides,” World Health Organization, March 20, 2015, https:// www.iarc.fr/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/MonographVolume112-1.pdf. 7. Michael Biesecker, “States Sue Over EPA Decision to Keep Dow Pesticide On the Market,” Associated

Press, July 06, 2017, https://fortune.com/2017/07/06/states-sue-epa-dow-pesticide/. 8. Alice Park, “Study: A Link Between Pesticides and ADHD,” Time, May 17, 2010, http://content.time.com /time/health/article/0,8599,1989564,00.html; Mandy Oaklander, “A Diet High in Pesticides Is Linked to a

Lower Sperm Count,” Time, March 30, 2015, https://time.com/3763648/pesticides-diet-fertility/. 9. Anthony Samsel and Stephanie Seneff, “Glyphosate, Pathways to Modern Diseases III: Manganese,

Neurological Diseases, and Associated Pathologies,” Surgical Neurology International 6, no. 45 (March 2015), https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4392553/. 10. International Agency for Research on Cancer, “IARC Monographs Volume 112: Evaluation of Five

Organophosphate Insecticides and Herbicides,” World Health Organization, March 20, 2015, https:// www.iarc.fr/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/MonographVolume112-1.pdf.

In 2017, California listed glyphosate in its Proposition 65 registry of chemicals known to cause cancer. Since then “more than 42,000 people have filed suit against Monsanto Company (now Bayer), alleging that exposure to Roundup herbicide caused them or their loved ones to develop non-Hodgkin lymphoma and that Monsanto covered up the risks.”11

Glyphosate exposure is not good for you, yet since 2012 it has been used in California to treat almond, peach, cantaloupe, onion, cherry, sweet corn, and citrus crops.12 Peas, sugar and beetroots, carrots, potatoes, and onions have been found to contain high levels of glyphosate, as do quinoa, tea, beer, and wine.13 Tests have found glyphosate on wheat, barley, oats, and bean crops that are not genetically engineered because it is becoming a more common farming practice to spray the crop just before harvest to desiccate the field, or kill the crop and dry it out so it can be harvested “sooner than if the plant were allowed to die naturally,” writes Ben Hewitt, which means glyphosate is in a lot of the things we eat. In fact it is this practice of preharvest desiccation that “accounts for over 50 percent of dietary exposure” to glyphosate.14

We are being exposed to harmful chemicals. They are in many of the products we are eating, and no one knows the damage this exposure is doing, though some are beginning to wonder. Corn is a big offender. Monsanto spliced Bt into corn genes. Bt is Bacillus thuringiensis, a naturally occurring bacterium found in the soil that breaks open insects’ stomachs when they eat it, causing them to die. Big Food claims GMOs are safe, that the Bt would never be absorbed into humans. However, a study by the physicians at Sherbrooke University Hospital in Quebec, Canada, discovered Bt toxin was present in 93 percent of

11. Stacy Malkan, “Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma: Glyphosate Fact Sheet: Cancer and Other Health Concerns,”

US Right to Know, last modified April 12, 2020, https://usrtk.org/pesticides/glyphosate-health-concerns/. 12. Elizabeth Grossman, “What Do We Really Know about Roundup Weed Killer?” National Geographic,

April 23, 2015, https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2015/04/150422 -glyphosate-roundup-herbicide-weeds/. 13. Jihad Aldasek, “Updated Screening Level Usage Analysis (SLUA) Report for Glyphosate,” United States

Environmental Protection Agency, October 22, 2015, https://paradigmchange.me/lc/wp-content /uploads/2019/03/GLYPHOSATE-use-EPA-HQ-OPP-2009-0361-0064.pdf; Kara Cook, “Glyphosate in

Beer and Wine,” CalPIRG Education Fund, February 2019, https://uspirg.org/sites/pirg/files/reports /WEB_CAP_Glyphosate-pesticide-beer-and-wine_REPORT_022619.pdf?_ga=2.33097086 .1581849178.1551185850-857148262.1551185850. 14. Ben Hewitt, “Why Farmers Are Using Glyphosate to Kill Their Crops—and What It Might Mean for You,”

Ensia, December 19, 2017, https://ensia.com/features/glyphosate-drying/.

the pregnant women they tested, and it was in 80 percent of umbilical cord blood of their babies.15

In 2018 a group of scientists from the Environmental Working Group purchased more than a dozen brands of oat-based breakfast cereal, instant oatmeal, and snack bars from grocery stores in the San Francisco Bay Area and Washington, DC, area to give Americans information about dietary exposures that government regulators are keeping secret. Glyphosate was present in every sample, and “all but two of the 28 samples had levels of glyphosate above EWG’s health benchmark of a daily exposure of no more than 160 parts per billion, or ppb.”16 The highest levels of glyphosate were found in Quaker products. Quaker Oatmeal Squares Honey Nut cereal had 2,837 ppb of glyphosate. Quaker Oatmeal Squares Brown Sugar was second with 2,746 ppb. General Mills came in fourth with 1,171 ppb of glyphosate in their Cheerios Oat Crunch Cinnamon cereal. Large amounts of glyphosate were also found in snack bars, with Quaker Breakfast Squares Soft Baked Bars Peanut Butter the highest at 1,014 ppb.17

Quaker’s response was reported by Fox KTVU, CBS News, the New York Times, and People: “Quaker does not add glyphosate during any part of the milling process. Glyphosate is commonly used by farmers across the industry who apply it pre-harvest. Once the oats are transported to us, we put them through our rigorous process that thoroughly cleanses

15. Aziz Aris and Samuel Leblanc, “Maternal and fetal exposure to pesticides associated to genetically modified foods in Eastern Townships of Quebec, Canada,” Reproductive Toxicology 31, no. 5 (May 2011): 528–33, https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21338670/. 16. Alex Formuzia, “Roundup for Breakfast, Part 2: In New Tests, Weed Killer Found in All Kids’ Cereals Sampled,” EWG, October 24, 2018, https://www.ewg.org/release/roundup-breakfast-part-2-new-tests-weed -killer-found-all-kids-cereals-sampled. 17. Alex Formuzia, “Roundup for Breakfast, Part 2: In New Tests, Weed Killer Found in All Kids’ Cereals Sampled,” EWG, October 24, 2018, https://www.ewg.org/release/roundup-breakfast-part-2-new-tests-weed -killer-found-all-kids-cereals-sampled.

them (de-hulled, cleaned, roasted and flaked).”18 So if your oatmeal, oat cereal, granola, or snack bar is not organic, then chances are it contains a hefty dose of glyphosate.

If you are choosing non-organic wheat or oat products, you are choosing products with hidden chemicals, and the truth is we know very little about the long-term effects of glyphosate or any other pesticide in our food. The harm may take ten to twenty years to become evident. We do know glyphosate is bad for the environment, and it persists in the soil and the groundwater.19 The National Resource Defense Council writes that it has caused a “steep decline” in monarch population, “over 80% in the last 20 years,” due to loss of milkweed.20 Glyphosate-based herbicides can “harm all facets of an ecosystem, including the soil biology and composition, water, and non-target plants, aquatic organisms, amphibians, reptiles, invertebrates, animals, and humans.”21 Its toxicological effects have been traced from lower invertebrates to higher vertebrates. A 2017 environmental study observed toxicological effects “in annelids (earthworms), arthropods (crustaceans and insects), mollusks, echinoderms, fish, reptiles, amphibians and birds. Toxicological effects like genotoxicity, cytotoxicity, nuclear aberration, hormonal disruption, chromo-

18. Leslie Dyste, “Study: Weed Killer Found in Oat Cereal and Granola Bars,” Fox KTVU, August 16, 2016, https://www.ktvu.com/news/study-weed-killer-found-in-oat-cereal-and-granola-bars; “Weed-Killing

Chemical Linked to Cancer Found in Some Children’s Breakfast Foods,” CBS News, August 15, 2018, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/glyphosate-roundup-chemical-found-in-childrens-breakfast -foods/; Mihir Zaveri, “Report Finds Traces of a Controversial Herbicide in Cheerios and Quaker Oats,”

New York Times, August 15, 2018, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/15/health/herbicide-glyphosate -cereal-oatmeal-children.html; Shay Spence, “General Mills Responds to Report of Cancer-Linked Chemical Found in Its Cereals,” People, August 16, 2018, https://people.com/food/general-mills-cheerios -weed-killer-chemical-glyphosate-quaker-oats-response/. 19. W. A. Battaglin, M. T. Meyer, K. M. Kuivila, and J. E. Dietze, “Glyphosate and Its Degradation Product

AMPA Occur Frequently and Widely in U.S. Soils, Surface Water, Groundwater, and Precipitation,” Journal of the American Water Resources Association 50, no. 2 (April 2014): 275–90, https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com /doi/10.1111/jawr.12159; Eva Sirinathsinghji, “Widespread Glyphosate Contamination in USA,” Institute of Science in Society, August 2014, http://www.i-sis.org.uk/Widespread_Glyphosate_Contamination _in_US.php. 20. Sylvia Fallon, “Report: Monarchs, Other Species Endangered by Pesticides,” Natural Resources Defense

Council, October 30, 2019, https://www.nrdc.org/experts/sylvia-fallon/report-monarchs-other -species-endangered-pesticides. 21. Sharon Rushton, Ann Spake, and Laura Chariton, “The Unintended Consequences of Using Glyphosate,”

Sierra Club, January 2016, https://content.sierraclub.org/grassrootsnetwork/sites/content.sierraclub.org .activistnetwork/files/teams/documents/The_Unintended_Consequences_of_Using_Glyphosate_Jan -2016.pdf.

somal aberrations and DNA damage have also been observed in higher vertebrates like humans.”22

You can avoid the exposure by feeding your family organics. Fruits, vegetables, and grains labeled organic are grown with the use of safe natural pesticides. They are treated with natural herbicides and, infrequently, with limited, highly regulated synthetic pesticides. Eating organic food eliminates daily doses of pesticides, toxins, and herbicides from conventionally farmed foods and keeps the food on your plate good for you. And recent studies have confirmed that organic foods often have more beneficial nutrients, such as antioxidants, than their conventionally-grown counterparts. The British Journal of Nutrition published a study that concluded that due to different soil management practices used in organic agriculture and non-organic agriculture, “organic crops and organic-crop-based foods contained higher concentrations of antioxidants on average than conventionally grown foods.”23 In a sixyear study published in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, researchers found that organic onions had about a 20 percent higher antioxidant content than conventionally grown onions.24 The bottom line is, sure, organic produce is more expensive, but forgoing a dose of poison makes it so worth it.

Magickal cooking applies the same principles as any magickal ritual. The energy of an object is greater the closer an object is to its natural state. In kitchen magick we choose the cleanest source of energy, avoiding unnatural pollutants, and align these natural energies with intent as we work the ingredients into a food to nourish the mind and body and set an intention in motion.

Kitchen magick is alchemy, for through heat or cold or with brute force by stirring, smashing, or kneading, we empower a substance with will and intent as we change its

22. Jatinder Pal Kaur Gill, Nidhi Sethi, Anand Mohan, Shivika Datta, and Madhuri Girdhar, “Glyphosate Toxicity for Animals,” Environmental Chemistry Letters 16 (December 2017): 401, https://www.researchgate.net /publication/321822115_Glyphosate_toxicity_for_animals. 23. Marcin Barański, Dominika Średnicka-Tober, Nikolaos Volakakis, et al., “Higher Antioxidant and Lower

Cadmium Concentrations and Lower Incidence of Pesticide Residues in Organically Grown Crops: a systematic literature review and meta-analyses,” British Journal of Nutrition 112, no. 5 (September 2014): 794, https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24968103/. 24. Feiyue Ren, Kim Reilly, Joseph P. Kerry, Michael Gaffney, Mohammad Hossain, and Dilip K. Rai, “Higher

Antioxidant Activity, Total Flavonols, and Specific Quercetin Glucosides in Two Different Onion (Allium cepa L.) Varieties Grown under Organic Production: Results from a 6-Year Field Study,” Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry 65, no. 52 (June 2017): 5,122–32, https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs .jafc.7b01352.

form. A stick of butter is mixed with sugar and flour and worked with love to become a delectable treat filled with nurturing energy and kind intent. A pan of broth is filled with vegetables to become a healing elixir. Spices are ground and herbs are crumbled to stir a lover’s passions.

Kitchen magick is green magick. When we mindfully prepare a meal, the kitchen becomes sacred space. Everyday actions become powerful when we turn a mindless routine into a mindful ceremony. When we cook, grounded in the moment, aware and vested, we are able to focus intent, direct energy, and make the mundane an act of magick!