by Melissa Diane Smith

Good news for those of us who eat against the grain of the Standard American Diet: Trends we saw last year – locally sourced meat and seafood, locally grown produce, sustainable foods, healthful kids’ meals, and gluten-free cuisine – continue to be on the top ten list of restaurant trends for 2012. According to the National Restaurant Association’s “What’s Hot in 2012” survey of more than 1,800 professional chefs, the top ten menu trends this year include:

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Are you starting 2012 off not knowing the basics about genetically modified foods and the health risks associated with them? If so and if you live in Tucson, there’s an easy way to remedy that situation: Attend a couple of short movies.

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by Melissa Diane Smith

The gluten-free diet is one of the most talked-about and followed diets these days for good reason: It’s the nutritional answer for the growing number of people who learn they are gluten intolerant. However, few people realize it, but eating gluten free can harm health in other ways when we focus only on “gluten-free” and end up eating a gluten-free version of the Standard American Diet that leads to ill health. Many people are doing that, unknowingly making mistakes with their diet that lead to weight gain, elevated blood sugar, heart disease risk factors, new allergies, immune system problems, and more.

I will address these issues and the little-covered topic, “It’s Gluten Free but Is It Healthy?” at the Southern Arizona Celiac Support (SACS) general meeting on Saturday, January 14, 2012, at 10:00 a.m. In my presentation, I’ll explain the most common mistakes people make with the gluten-free diet that lead to health problems and cover key food concepts that promote better health. My presentation will take place at Pima Community College, 4905 E. Broadway Blvd., and will be immediately followed by book signings of Going Against the Grain and my follow-up book Gluten Free Throughout the Year.

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by Melissa Diane Smith

How to avoid genetically modified organisms when you also avoid gluten.

When Marcia Popp, a 50-year-old graphic artist, began a nutrition coaching program with me last year, she had numerous health problems, including multiple food and environmental allergies. She also had been diagnosed in 1990 with a systemic immune condition known as eosinophilia-myalgia syndrome (EMS), which she developed after taking tryptophan supplements that were later found to be tainted.

Marcia had already cut gluten out of her diet nine years earlier, so I advised some different dietary changes to cater to her other food intolerances. I knew that genetically modified organisms (GMOs) were implicated in allergies – and that the tryptophan that was linked to EMS had been produced using genetically modified bacteria – so I also recommended that she avoid the eight major genetically modified (GM) foods to see if it made a difference in her condition.

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by Melissa Diane Smith

Quiz yourself with these eleven True-False questions.

Many of us have heard the term, GMOs. But how much do you really know about them, their health risks, and how to avoid them? There’s no better time than now, National Non-GMO Month, to find out. Take our quiz and test your knowledge, then pass the test onto others to raise awareness about this timely topic.

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I am happy to announce that Tucson Meet Yourself Folklife Festival, which has a special Health and Wellness focus this year, has selected me to speak on two different but related topics. My first presentation will be about “Going Against the Grain to Combat Obesity and Diabetes” on Saturday, Oct. 15, 2011, at 3 p.m. The second one, “It’s Gluten Free, but Is It Healthy?” will be the next day, on Sunday, October 16, 2011, at 3 p.m. Both presentations will take place in the lower level of the Joel D. Valdez Main Library at 101 N. Stone Ave. in downtown Tucson and will be followed by book signings of both my books, Going Against the Grain and Gluten Free Throughout the Year, at the Southern Arizona Celiac Support (SACS) booth in the Jacome Plaza that is virtually next door to the library.

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Thursday, September 29th, 2011
12:30 -12:40 p.m.

KVOI 1030 AM

I was a guest on the Buckmaster radio show with well-known Tucson host Bill Buckmaster explaining how our food has changed with the introduction of GMOs (genetically modified organisms) and genetically modified foods, “The Future of Food” movie showing that the GMO Free Project of Tucson is holding that evening, and our online Eat GMO Free Challenge that starts October 1. Visit the Buckmaster Show website. After the show, listen to the podcast of the program and advance it to 29:11 to listen to the ten-minute interview with me.

To participate in the Eat GMO Free Challenge and learn practical tips on how to slowly but surely take GMOs out of your diet, visit the GMO Free Project of Tucson website every day during the month of October.

Copyright © 2011 Melissa Diane Smith

by Melissa Diane Smith

There have been some disappointing developments against the people’s movement that is opposing GMOs (genetically modified organisms found in foods such as corn and soy). Mainstream media tends to cover that news, but there’s rarely-covered positive news to report. More people are waking up and banding together, and good things in the battle for protecting our food supply that you probably don’t know about have been happening recently. The following are victories and positive, hopeful developments that just might indicate a tipping point of rejection against GMOs in our food supply.

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by Melissa Diane Smith

New to the topic of genetically modified organisms? Here’s a quick primer.

Imagine engineers manipulating common food crops and making them produce their own insectide or making them resistant to chemical herbicides that kill other plants. These sound like scenarios that you might see in a scary futuristic sci-fi movie, yet they have already happened and many of us are unknowingly eating foods that are genetically modified in one of these ways – or both of them – every day.

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by Melissa Diane Smith

The active ingredient in herbicides sprayed on genetically modified herbicide-resistant crops such as corn and soy is a mineral chelator, according to a new report by Jeffrey Smith of the Institute for Responsible Technology. In other words, the herbicide ingredient grabs vital nutrients and doesn’t let them go, depriving plants of essential minerals needed for healthy function and leaving them susceptible to disease.

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