Weg naïviteit; de ongezonde e-nummers …

In 1997 I graduated from the Agricultural University in Wageningen, studying Food Technology. What a time that was. Summer 2020 they had to deal with the Corona Challenges there. The student associations had to fill in their intro time completely differently. No 200 people in the pub hall. No beer relays. No singing alout, no … But wait, wait.. I linger off the subject….

Back to food technology. Free orientation with marketing and logistics orientation. Marketing with the 4 Ps. Learned you can actually sell everything by adding a correct story. I thought it was ok. The EU rules are clear. EU rules do not allow products that are downright bad for health. So a nice story with some good work, that is allowed… Ok… Just be careful with sugar. Not too much. And yes. Some people cannot tolerate gluten. You sell them other products with a different story. Everyone happy, everyone healthy.

It went wrong when my sister showed me this e-numbers booklet. WWWHHHAAATTT? So there are e-numbers that are allowed within the EU regulation which are really unhealthy? Rats drop dead. Carcinogenic to humans. What is this? And they are allowed? You’re kidding, right? Why didn’t I know this about these e-numbers?

Do you know this booklet?

What do you think about this? Did it surprise you as much as I did? Did you also think .. wwwhhaaattt?

What did I do?

Absolutely, I started to read ingredients list of the labels. Anything with E261 did not enter the house. Hello white chips! Bye bye all those deliciously different chips. Bye, bye spice blends from the supermarket.

At that time I discovered the rule that everything with 9 ingredients or more has been in a factory for too long. Too many changes. To strange for the human body. The body cannot do anything with that. I liked those rules. Made my life easier.

And then?

Then I got to know Paleo. I don’t know exactly how anymore. Will also be through that sister . Do you know Paleo? Paleo diet or maybe better Paleo lifestyle. That we are descendants of the hunter and our diet can become more like the hunter’s diet with a lot more vegetables.

Before or during that time, the ready-to-go-with-unhealthy-e-numbers-herbs-mixes left the kitchen. Then a bag of free little pots were hanging on a fence of a neighbour and I took it home. The end result was a drawer with those jars filled with herbs. The Paleo recipes taught me to cook with the herbs and voila I never had to go back to the supermarket spice mixes again.

I start with onion and garlic for a dish. An oriental dish will get ginger. Italian basil, oregano. Meat gets thyme. Fish dill. And other herbs depending on the recipe. Salt and pepper go in at the end or I put it on the table.

Now you, what can you do now?

How does your herb drawer or rack look like? Spice mixes? Are you okay with it? Do you want it different? Which herbs do you prefer to cook with? Do you want more, different, better? And did you know that you can make many spice mixes really easily yourself? Below a few mixes that I like to use.

I also make spice mixes together with my daughter. We both get a jar. We open the drawer and make our own mixes. By smelling the different jars. Fun to do. Surprisingly nice results. 

Make spice mixes yourself