6. Smart Food Spending

Spending Your Food Money Wisely

Next, I’d like to go over what foods you should be spending more of your food money on and what foods are totally okay to spend less of your food money on. Not all food is created equal, even when we’re talking simple whole foods. Some things are really worth spending more and other things not so much.

There are a lot of different studies that come out at different times about whether organic food is actually any healthier, and it’s something that you can imagine I used to just say, “It doesn’t matter if it’s healthier, it’s better because it’s got less pesticides; always buy it no matter what”. Obviously, the average person can’t afford to do that, and I’ve learned in recent years that that’s definitely not the way to think because it’s just not true. There are very much foods that do matter what you spend on them, and there are very much foods that matter a whole lot less, if at all.

Animal Products

Animal products are typically what I encourage people to spend more money on. That’s because they are literally more nutritious when they are well sourced. Additionally, I believe a lot in the energy around everything we do, and I think that if you have the option and you can afford to eat somebody who had a better life over somebody who had a worse life, then that’s better energy that you’re consuming. And that’s purely personal, but when it comes to actual nutrients, there are—there are myriad ways that well-sourced animal products are more nutritive and dense than poorly sourced animal products.

One example of that is grass-fed meat. It has more omega-3, which your body needs, and less omega-6, which your body doesn’t need. There is one form of omega-6 that grasps that—there is one form of omega-6 that is very healthful and your body does need, and it is actually found in grass-fed meat more, and that’s conjugated linoleic acid. And it is something that is good for your body for fat burning. Animal products are the number one thing—so dairy, eggs, and meat—I very much encourage you to spend more money on.

Produce Priorities

Another one is greens. That’s really straightforward. It’s because greens require pesticides. They are thin; even if they’re thick like kale or chard, they’re still relatively thin as a food. They’re a flat thing, so it’s very easy for bugs to get to them and to eat them. So they tend to be very heavily pesticided and they have no protection. There’s nothing of—there’s no skin, there’s no shell, there’s nothing to protect them from pesticides. So a lot of pesticides are used and, in turn, there’s a lot of pesticide residue on them.

Organic food doesn’t mean that it contains no pesticides; it just means that it contains specific pesticides that have been deemed more healthy for your body and for the planet. They’re considered more ecologically sound and they’re also employed, put on the produce, in more ecologically sound ways than conventional foods—the pesticide process for those. So greens, I very much encourage you to purchase organic. I also encourage you to under buy versus overbuy because they don’t keep, no matter how you get them. Whether it’s a fresh head of lettuce or lettuce in a bag or lettuce in a plastic box, that lettuce is not going to last you terribly long. I really think it’s important for people to be realistic about what they’re going to eat because otherwise you’re just buying food for the trash, and food waste is a huge situation in this country. I believe it’s at least [a portion] of the food we buy that gets directly thrown in the trash.

Thin-Skinned vs. Thick-Skinned

Lastly, when it comes to foods you should spend more money on: fruit that has thin skin. And this is for the exact same reason as greens. Fruit is sugary and sweet smelling, so it naturally attracts pests and predators, and it tastes great because of that. It requires a lot of pesticides. If you have a fruit that has a very thin skin, such as an apple or a berry—which really has no skin at all—all of those pesticides are going to land on and stay in the fruit.

Strawberries alone, I believe, have an average of about 50 pounds of pesticides added per acre. That’s a lot. So you can just imagine, even if you’re getting a gram or two per strawberry, you don’t want that. Pesticides at large are endocrine disrupting, meaning they can give you a lot of health issues from your endocrine system, which is your hormonal system and specifically your thyroid, and they can cause an assortment of health problems including cancer.

Then there are the foods that really don’t matter that much, and some of these surprised me initially when I learned about them. Avocados for one. I worked with an avocado company; I had an endorsement deal with them for a while and I got to go to avocado groves and see the fruit being grown, and it was very fun. Avocados only receive pesticides, whether conventional or organic, once every seven years on average. Do you know what that means in terms of the likelihood that the avocado you’re eating containing pesticides? It’s so minimal. They don’t have much pests—they don’t have many pests—because they are very, very hard and they have a thick skin and they don’t give off much odor at all. So avocados that you buy conventional, they’re not certified organic because when pesticides are used, they’re conventional, not organic pesticides, and they’re put on in conventional, not organic methods. But the chances of that happening when you buy one? Very small. So avocados, there’s just no need to purchase them organic.

The remaining ones are of the next foods that it’s not necessary to spend more money on: onions, pineapple, and asparagus all have a very minimal amount of pesticide residue at all. Onions are the lowest. They don’t have many natural predators; they grow underground. It’s just not something that you need to be spending twice the price on. Same with pineapple; it’s very thick skinned. Other thick thin—other thick skinned fruit also falls under this label. Something like a grapefruit: even if it’s been pet—even if it’s had pesticides applied, that grapefruit skin is that thick, you’re not getting any of them. When they test actual grapefruit pulp, it does not tend to contain much if any pesticide residue at all.

Summary

So those are the foods that I encourage you to let loose a little bit. And if you’re wondering what else, as far as all the other foods go, research takes just a moment. All you have to google is, “Is this food necessary to buy organic?” and the internet will tell you very quickly. I really encourage you to just prioritize: start with meat and animal products and make sure that you spend the most on those, and then greens and thin sinks—and then greens and thin skinned fruit—and then just work your way down and spend less on things that matter less.