Hi all,
Hope everyone is settling into the new year nicely!
We’re four days in, and I can proudly say my diet-related resolutions are thus far still in tact, haha. So cheers to that! 🍾🥂
With diet in mind, I thought I’d start off 2023 by giving you some free-from food / meal delivery suggestions.
I find having some prepared or frozen meals on hand keeps me from eating things I shouldn’t be (or spending too much💲on DoorDash… awhoopsies!)
So let’s get into it…
WHAT'S COOKING LOS ANGELES?!
FREE-FROM FOOD & MEAL DELIVERY SERVICES I RECOMMEND (& WHY):
Food & Wine recently updated their list of gluten-free meal delivery options. I would generally agree with the options, but feel they could’ve put an asterisk next to Daily Harvest. Although I think their products are very tasty (and also plant-based), last year one Daily Harvest product sent over 100 people to the hospital. So you always have to be careful!
Another meal delivery service I’ve tried in the past is The Good Kitchen (TGK). TGK is very allergy-friendly and also includes AIP options. Any meat is responsibly sourced, and there’s a focus on quality ingredients. Their portions could be slightly bigger but the price point was better in comparison to other paleo options out there.
Lastly, although not prepared meals, I thought I’d mention a couple other delivery options. One, Thrive Market. This is where I order many of my non-perishable specialty items from. You can filter according to your exact dietary needs and/or allergies. And two, CSA, produce, and farm boxes! Get fresh produce from LA farms delivered right to your door & at a bargain. Not a bad deal, eh?
What Else is Simmering...
(restaurant news)- Your next date night in Santa Monica could be at Margo’s, the vegan joint with GF pizza crust🍕options available upon request!
(food news)- Fed up with the costly tickets they’re getting, LA street-vendors are suing the city for their right to sell in currently prohibited zones.
(product)- Gotham Greens has 4 new plant-based dips recreating favorites like spinach artichoke, tzatziki, & more. Looks like you can get them at Sprouts.
(product)- The dark & bitter baking chocolate🍫you’ve been waiting for from TCHO is here. With only one ingredient (organic cocoa beans), it’s 100% unsweetened with no added nothings!
(product)- MALK…🥛need I say more?😉(This is a new, organic, plant-based milk company but without the gums, fillers, oils, or anything artificial).
(product)- MUSH… need I say more? Just kidding! This one is a little less intuitive. Think flavored overnight oats🥣in plant-based milks (or I guess MALKSsss…).
WHAT ARE YOU REALLY EATING?!
UPCYCLED FOODS ARE WHERE IT’S AT:
Upcycling food is the process of converting food that would otherwise be tossed or wasted into a new food product. A lot of innovative companies are hopping on this win-win bandwagon. Take for example Capao Fruit. These chewy, bite-sized snacks are made with cacao fruit. Generally, cacao fruit is only harvested for its seeds to make chocolate, and 70% of the fruit gets discarded as waste. But Capao is using the fruit as a main ingredient in their product. Other start-ups like Nutri V are working on turning farmed vegetables that don’t meet supermarket specifications into powders for veggie snacks. Pretty cool stuff :)… More on upcycling below 👀⬇️
What Else Is There To Digest?
(article)- Your movie theater popcorn has ZERO real butter🍿in it. Yup, most movie theater popcorn is made up of flavacol (think sodium filled, yellow-dyed seasoning), butter flavored topping (think bad oils) and butter flavoring!
(report)- An incredible new report, “Merchants of Poison: How Monsanto Sold the World on a Toxic Pesticide”🪳reveals the pesticide industry’s harmful playbook of disinformation, science denial, and abuse of power.
(article)- FoodPrint predicts the biggest food and agriculture stories of 2023 including high but stabilizing food prices, declining ultra-processed meat alternatives, the bird flu, and more…)
(article)- Reports of heavy metals like lead and cadmium in dark chocolate🍫have been increasingly identified in many of these brand-name bars.
(guide)- Here are some rules you can follow if you’re looking to buy wild seafood sustainably🐟.
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT:
(article & images)- In the UK, this stunning glass greenhouse🏡 (kinetic nonetheless) opens up into a giant open-air terrarium.
(article)- Tainted/recalled spinach in Australia was causing people to hallucinate🥬(this is not a joke😅).
(video)- This man built and buried a 3000lb sarcophagus-time capsule for one bag of flaming hot Cheetos (for TikTok, course). [I sadly admit that this pretty well sums up our generation to the aliens who open it 10,000 years from now].
(article)- Pink Sauce, the low-key sketchy condiment that went viral this past summer is now being widely sold. But why is Pink Sauce now orange🔶?
(books)- A list of children’s books📚that emphasize love for food and community.
And to end on the same White Lotus note I started off on:
Closing Thoughts…
As always, feel free to hit reply and shoot me an email or DM on Twitter. I’d love to hear your feedback on how I can improve this newsletter to better suit our free-from community.
I’ll be in your inbox next month!
Hugs,
Noam
🙆🏻♀️ website: noamleead.carrd.co
📖 book editor: Happier Being by Dr. Tal Leead
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There is no thing as responsibly sourced animal flesh. They ALL die brutal and horrible deaths at the slaughterhouse.