What keeps our household on track, steadily removing overly processed foods from our kitchen, is how much better we feel as we make these gradual changes.

I just wish more grocery stores were aware of what shoppers want to eat… and what we want to avoid.

My husband and I drive 2 1/2 hours to shop at Whole Foods. We’ve done that regularly, even during icy New England winters, and even when gasoline was at $4+/gallon.

However, after making that drive, it’s frustrating to have to read labels, just as we do at our local grocery store. Though we find far fewer products with “problem” ingredients — including high fructose corn syrup mentioned in this article — we still have to read all labels carefully.

For us, it’s about eliminating high fructose corn syrup (HFCS). We are amazed at how much better we feel without it. We simply can’t go back to how we felt before.

We’re constantly astonished at what contains HFCS and what doesn’t. For example, the local upscale grocer’s (not Whole Foods) house brand of pizza contains HFCS; the cheapo grocery store that we generally avoid… their house brand of pizza has no HFCS and it’s surprisingly yummy when we want convenience food.

I’m trying to make more time for cooking from scratch, as it seems to be the best solution. The health benefits — nicely described in this article — make it well worth the effort.

I cheered when Seattle’s PCC grocers banned HFCS from the shelves. I’m hoping that Whole Foods will choose a similar path, as more mainstream consumers reject HFCS and more manufacturers choose healthier alternatives.

In the meantime, I’m grateful for how many non-HFCS alternatives are carried by Whole Foods. That makes it easier to phase into cooking “from scratch” while using ingredients that are more natural.

I will still shop in your store for some things, but this definitely gives me pause when it comes to grabbing a treat as I’m heading out. I don’t want to have to read the ingredient list to know that I’m getting something of high quality that does not contain GMOs.

Last night we gathered 3 boxes full of overly processed food and gave them to the neighbors. Then we went to Fresh Market store thinking to pick up lots of “safe” food. We were so disappointed. There were only 2 organic produce items: carrots and corn. The rest of the store carried mostly the normal brands you get a Wal-mart, but at much higher prices. sheesh.

Tomorrow we will be making the 1 hour drive to the Wild Oats/Whole Foods store in Memphis. We don’t know what to buy, or what to eat to replace the toxic mess that had been our food. We can’t even figure out what to call the type of food we are looking for. Is “whole foods” the right term? We just want food with no natural or artificial flavors or colors, no chemicals to “enhance” the taste, feel, or smell of the food, and no preservatives or pesticides. We don’t want beef or pork from the miserable animals in feedlots. We don’t want meat or poultry that has been processed in the toxic conditions in processing plants.

Is that type of food called “whole food?” Why? I know we are not going vegetarian, since we have no objection to eating meat, only to how it is raised, slaughtered, and processed.

It is a whole new world for us, and I feel like a visitor from Pluto.

You just have to do it; it’s that simple. Also, once you start eating whole foods, you will find an almost instant decrease in your appetite, and you will discover you no longer crave chips, candy, etc. It’s almost scary how addictive those processed foods are!