Key to cooking healthy is sourcing your foods. Of course, quality ingredients are expensive. This is why I tend to buy in bulk whenever I can. Here are useful addresses and affiliate links that may help you source your food well, while trying to keep it as cheap as possible.
Real Foods!
Of course, depending on the budget you have, I’ll only ever recommend real food, as little processed as possible. That’s where you’ll get the most nutrient from, and zero toxic and/ or addictive additives!
AVOID CANS I avoid as much as possible because of the metal leeching and the lining of some cans with plastic. Only exception is sardines. I also buy glass jars of tomato sauce
Legumes
Black, kidney, white beans, garbanzo beans and lentils
Buy in bulk, soak overnight before cooking, it usually cooks within 6-7 minutes, OF COURSE in my steam cooker. Red and black beans, soaked overnight or over 24 hours, needs longer cooking times ( 25 for kidney beans, approximately 40 minutes for black beans) Their fibers are tough!
If you have trouble digesting beans, go slow !
Also be aware than using a steam cooker to cook them after soaking is easier on your digestive system. WHY? 1) soaking wakes the plant and activate chemicals of growth that eases digestion. DIrectly pressure cooking does not give the dormant plant the opportunity to wake up and therefore, these chemicals don’t get time to ge released. 2) starting the sprouting process also further eases digestion. 3) steaming is a gentler method of cooking, and penetrates foods more thoroughly. You have to do trial and error to cook them right, starting with longer cooking time and getting to shorter time until you find the sweet spot.
How long do legumes steam?
My cooking times as of today, after soaking overnight to 24 hours and rinsing morning and evening :
- kidney beans: 25 minutes,
- 7 minutes for garbanzo beans,
- 5 minutes to french lentils,
- 40 minutes for black beans
- Orange lentils soak an hour, do not need cooking at all!
Buy them in bulk
I love buying lentils and garbanzo beans in bulk because I can sprout them and use in salad ! With cans, you have only one option: heat them up. And think of it: buying lentils dry is seems more expensive, but once soaked, a little bit of lentils is weights much more… In the end, you get to cook it as you deem fit, you don’t get toxicity from the can, and you can sprout, and it never expires.
NOTE : do not sprout and eat kidney, white and black beans sprouted and raw, believe me I have a solid digestive system and I tried, IT is NOT a good idea. You can sprout and eats french and coral lentils and gazbanzo beans sprouted, but go very slow to test it.-
Whether your budgets only allows you to go to Aldi or Whole foods, you are always better off buying real, fresh or dry foods, mostly from the produce and non processed meat and fish and dairy aisle. I can show you how most of them only need very little processing to get them ready and keep their nutrient density!
Sourcing
To buy in bulk well sourced and organic dry ingredients and less expensively, consider Azure Standard !
You can surely find a drop in your area, and you’ll be supporting American farmers on top! Azure also sells bulk frozen meat, fish and dairy, as well as produce, cooking equipment, seeds and so on. For bulk meat and fish, local farmers are good options too, but that’s a local question to ask around.
This page is not meant to make you feel overwhelmed about eating healthy. Most healthy people start somewhere, all habits start small, take it at your own pace. I started my food journey in the USA 12 years ago, I didn’t know a thing of where to buy my foods, I still am learning the ropes!
Ancient Grains
For baking, I gave up on conventional wheat a long time ago. My body does not enjoy its gluten and I sometimes react with an eczema flare. So I bake using sourdough and one of the most ancient grains there is : Einkorn, as well as Kamut. I purchase it in bulk at Azure Standard I grind it with my Komo Classic grinder. I made the investment a few months ago after using the Kitchen Aid grinder attachment for years. It was truly the best investment I made in years!
For affiliate discounts and codes, just wait a little bit, I will post it shortly !
You can look into these affiliate links and explore these options. Remember, I only recommend products I use and trust!
Herbs and Spices
On that one I can only recommend FRONTIER COOP my favorite Tea, spices and herb brand, the only one I use and in BULK, whether through my Frontier coop mom group or at amazon. The quality is such it is well worth the price, and they keep fantastically! Anything you use a lot, don’t hesitate to buy a pound of. I give you my Amazon affiliate link, I am not an affiliate for Frontier, but if I could I would in a heartbeat!
Nutritious salt
I do own iodized salt and use it to salt meat before steaming it, it does help meat sweat out their toxines, but then the salt does not stay on the meat!
To mix ingredients in the sauté pan or skillet, I do use more nutritious salt, that has no added iodine – not that iodine in salt is bad, but because I prefer having the minerals coming with sea salt. For Iodine, I try to eat enough fish, sea food and sea vegetables. To salt food, I use grey French sea salt from Brittany. I buy it in bulk with the San Francisco Salt Company at Amazon.
