How To Rebel Against Corporate Food (And Why You Should)

Please remember that rebellion doesn’t mean that you have to lead a protest against some Big Food company’s national headquarters or march through the fields of a nearby industrial farm, waving signs. You can rebel quietly and staunchly by refusing to purchase what they are selling. Growing your own, buying from small local farmers, avoiding processed food like the plague that it is, and cooking from scratch are powerful weapons against corporate food.

Cookbooks

Mason Jar Salads: One of the biggest reasons that healthy eating plans go awry is a lack of time. If food is not convenient when you’re hungry, you are far more likely to reach for something processed or go through drive-thru. I recently discovered the wonderful world of mason jar salads and life will never be the same.  (Obviously, as a canner, I have many jars just waiting to be filled with healthy ingredients.) If you like to prep your food ahead of time so that something good is always at hand, check out this awesome little book with 50 recipes for mason jar food prep. These are kid-friendly, too, since you can customize the ingredients to suit the tastes of picky eaters. Mason jar salads will stay good for 4-5 days, meaning that you can make an entire week’s worth of lunches in a Sunday afternoon. There is a little more to it than just slapping some ingredients into a jar, though, so pick up this book! (Note: as with all successful books, there are quite a few knock-offs, many of which aren’t very good. Ensure that you get the original book!)

The Fanny Farmer Cookbook: If you want to avoid processed food ingredients in your recipes, one of the best ways to do so is to use a cookbook that was written well before processed food was commonly available.

My very favorite old friend in the kitchen is my Fanny Farmer Cookbook that I picked out of a dusty box at a yard sale. When I was newly married, Fanny is the one who taught me to cook as I worked my way through the recipes.

It’s a little different than modern cookbooks since it came from an era during which nothing could be allowed to go to waste. This is a thorough, old-fashioned cookbook that deserves a place on your shelf.

The Seasonal Kitchen Companion: This is my own PDF book about eating what’s in-season and preserving some of it for later. It’s loaded with recipe ideas, preservation instructions, and loads of ways to eat locally.

The produce chosen for this book is the stuff that my family loves. There are a few veggies you won’t find in it because we just don’t eat them. This is like a personal glimpse into our dinner table throughout the growing season.

It doesn’t matter if you get your produce from your own back yard or from the farmer’s market. Just enjoy that wholesome, delicious, fat-burning foods.

How do you break free from corporate food?

It’s not as hard as you might think to free yourself from relying on the huge industrial farms and the food manufacturers. And if you can’t trust the FDA, the USDA, and the EPA to enforce reasonable rules upon the huge corporations responsible for most of the American diet, you can avoid them altogether. Here are 3 tips to help you break free:

1. Eat local. (Find a local farm or market HERE)
2. Grow your own. (Every little bit of food that you can grow yourself chips away at the foundation of corporate food. You can find some tips for small-space growing in this round-up.)
3. Cook from scratch. (Ditch the processed food with these kitchen shortcuts.)

Focus on ingredients instead of on items that are put together for you. Grab produce, meat, grains, and simple dairy products. Look for items with fewer than five ingredients and stick to things in season whenever possible.

Food Preservation

I love filling my spice cabinet with homegrown goodness. Chili powder is easy to make, and it’s intensely delicious. Here’s the DIY for that, and here is a link to seeds for poblano chilis, my favorite pepper for making my own chili powder.

Speaking of chili, canning your own is delicious, healthful, and easy. No longer do you need to worry about the questionable ingredients in storebought canned chili. Try canning your own for the most delicious “fast food” meal around. Here’s are recipes for canning two kinds of chili.

Grab some preservation books. You can get all of my own canning recipes in The Prepper’s Canning Guide and you can learn to dehydrate things you never even imagined dehydrating from The Prepper’s Dehydrator Handbook.

What to Eat This Week When You Rebel Against Corporate Food

Below, find two lists that focus on making your own instead of buying processed, and eating in-season.