Simple Food Rules for Summer Wellness

Warmer weather, longer daylight hours and the relaxed energy of summer make it a perfect time to focus on your wellness. For anyone that knows me, eating healthy (and delicious) is paramount!

There is a lot of confusion and conflicting health advice surrounding food, nutrition and wellness today. Most of us know what we need to do to be healthier but we don’t always act on that knowledge.

One of my favorite books, Food Rules by Michael Pollan offers sensible and simple principles to kick off your summer wellness program. There are 64 rules guaranteed to resonate and entice you to create a paradigm shift in the way you shop and eat.

Here are some on my favorites:

1. Eat food, not too much, mostly plants.
2. Don’t eat anything your grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food.
3. Don’t eat anything with more than five ingredients, or ingredients you can’t pronounce.
4. Don’t eat anything that won’t eventually rot.
5. Don’t buy food where you buy gasoline.
6. Avoid foods that are pretending to be something they are not.
7. Avoid food products that make health claims.
8. Avoid food products containing ingredients that a third-grader cannot pronounce.
9. Avoid food products containing ingredients that no ordinary human would keep in the pantry.
10. If it came from a plant, eat it; if it was made in a plant, don’t.

When you keep clean food in your house, you eat clean food. Kick off your summer of wellness by eating a lot of fresh raw, vegetables, fruits and berries, Go through your pantry and purge anything that doesn’t follow Food Rules.

Take an honest approach, choose real food, and by avoiding “industrial novelties”, you will reward yourself with a bountiful summer full of wellness.