News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
Eating well is critical to our well-being - and we all know it. However, we live in a fast-paced, hectic world where it's not always so easy to find time to craft lovingly made meals with all the right foods. It's all too easy to grab something fast and forget about "eating clean."
Fortunately, it's getting easier and easier to "eat clean" in Sisters Country - even when we're on the go.
What is clean eating, anyway?
In its most simple sense, it's "leaning away from all your processed foods," says Angeline Rhett, owner of Angeline's Bakery & Café. It means eating lots of whole grains, plenty of fresh fruits and vegetables, and drinking lots of water (most of us aren't properly hydrated). If you're a meat-eater, it means going for lean, grass-fed beef, avoiding hormones and antibiotics.
Eating locally grown produce is a great way to ensure that what you are consuming is fresh and full of nutrients - and tastes good, too.
"The soil is alive," says Carys Wilkins of Mahonia Gardens, a local farm. "What your vegetables are made of is what's in the soil."
When growers operate giant fields of a single crop, "it's really hard to keep living soil... We try to till as little as possible so we don't disturb the bacterial and microbial culture," Wilkins says.
Diversity in crops - diversity in diet. Both are keys to healthful eating habits. One way to tell if you're hitting the target is simply to shoot for lots of color in your diet.
"Having just that rainbow spectrum of diet is a good way to know what you're getting nutrients in your diet," Wilkins says.
Community Supported Agriculture memberships such as those offered through Mahonia Gardens makes getting a variety of vegetables highly convenient, since you get a basket provided to you each week.
That kind of convenience is critical to keeping up good eating habits.
Rhett is focusing on providing the components of healthful meals to her customers, so they can prepare good meals with ease. And she also emphasizes that clean eating can be fun. The bakery specializes in treats that are good for you.
"That's what we really want to be able to offer," she says. "It doesn't have to be austere or boring."
And Angeline has the answer for those who are really jammed for time: fresh juice.
"I think it's kind of the silver bullet for a busy day - or any day, really," she says.
Sarah Wilder of Healthy, Healed, You. http://www.healthyhealedyou.com consults with many people interested in improving their diet, both through her nutrition practice and in her job at Melvin's Fir Street Market. She emphasizes that a good diet is an individual matter that varies from person to person.
"It's a bio-individual thing; it varies from person to person. I don't personally subscribe to any one diet," she says.
She does encourage people to increase proteins and reduce carbs and get more fermented foods into their diet.
She also notes that "clean is about the food that you eat - but also about what you put on your body, as well. I make my own toothpaste and deodorant," she says.
Wilder understands the importance of convenience for busy folks in Sisters, and she is pleased that Melvin's offers so many quick and easy meals to go. She also offers a tip for folks to get ahead of the curve.
"On a day that I have some more time, I'll make a lot of food," she says. "Batch cooking. I'll make three or four meals and freeze it. That's your fast food."
Angeline notes that it is counterproductive to beat yourself up if you don't live up to your clean-eating ambitions all the time.
It's really just about "each day building on the good choices you've already made."
She also notes that, with more and more businesses - not to mention an active farmer's market - offering good, wholesome products across Sisters, it's getting easier and easier to build on those choices.
"Working together in our own small town is the best," she says. "We all have a passion for it, and that's why it's so fun to work together with all these people."
Jim Cornelius is editor in chief of The Nugget and author of “Warriors of the Wildlands: True Tales of the Frontier Partisans.” A history buff, he explores frontier history across three centuries and several continents on his podcast, The Frontier Partisans. For more information visit www.frontierpartisans.com.
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