Beware the Frankenfood Drinks

If your kids are in little league, watch out for the drug-pushers.  I’m not talking about illegal drug-pushers, though you should watch out for them too… I’m talking about the folks that are passing out free samples of synthetic food like this one (Muscle Milk).

The other day one of my coworkers who knows my affinity for natural foods brought me an interesting specimen...it was a bottle labeled "Muscle Milk" with the curious subtitle, "contains no milk." It was empty because his eight-year old son had consumed it all at softball practice. Where did he get it? Free sample bottles were given out to everyone at the practice. What's wrong with that, you may wonder? Muscle Milk is a protein drink designed to help weight trainers build muscle. Does anybody think it's a good idea for kids to gulp it down like chocolate milk? Apparently some folks do... for instance, the ones manufacturing it. Frankly, I question whether it's a good thing for weight-training adults to drink this stuff.

So what's in Muscle Milk anyway? 

"WATER, CALCIUM SODIUM CASEINATE AND/OR MILK PROTEIN ISOLATE, AND/OR MILK PROTEIN CONCENTRATE, BLEND OF VEGETABLE OILS (SUNFLOWER AND CANOLA OILS), ALKALIZED COCOA POWDER [for the chocolate stuff] MALTODEXTRIN, CRYSTALLINE FRUCTOSE, POTASSIUM CITRATE, WHEY PROTEIN CONCENTRATE, NATURAL AND ARTIFICIAL FLAVORS, CELLULOSE GUM AND GEL, SOY LECITHIN, MAGNESIUM PHOSPHATE, MEDIUM CHAIN TRIGLYCERIDES, MONOSODIUM PHOSPHATE, SODIUM HEXAMETAPHOSPHATE, POTASSIUM CHLORIDE, ACESULFAME POTASSIUM, CARRAGEENAN, TRICALCIUM PHOSPHATE, ASCORBIC ACID, SALT, FERRIC PYROPHOSPHATE, DICALCIUM PHOSPHATE, SUCRALOSE, VITAMIN E PALMITATE, PYRIDOXINE HYDROCHOLORIDE, THIAMINE MONONITRATE RIBOFLAVIN, CHROMIUM CHLORIDE, FOLIC ACID, BIOTIN, POTASSIUM IODIDE, CHOLECALCIFEROL, CYANOCOBOLAMIN."  

(Forgive any typos that may have occurred in this list...even my spell-checker doesn't recognize most of these words!)  In layman's terms, this drink consists of water, sugars, cocoa powder and synthesized protein, vitamins, and minerals. Pardon me for a moment, but WHERE IS THE FOOD?! 

Here's another example... A couple months ago, a man stopped into my workplace and left us with ten or twelve little two-ounce bottles of 5-Hour Energy drinks... to try absolutely free.  Drug-pushing?  I don't very often watch commercials, thanks to the wonderful technology of DVRs that let you fast-forward through them all.  But this one snuck up on me and caught my attention. "Do you know what 2:30 in the afternoon feels like?" it asks. Well, if you're eating the Standard American Diet, you're probably dead on your feet by 2:30, as the ad implies.

We've been conditioned by the media, the government, and the medical establishment to believe that low-fat, high carb diets are the most healthy. Our meals are top-heavy with processed foods and high-fructose drinks (which, sorry to say, includes fruit juices).  And most Americans eat an enormous amount of sugar. Such a diet leaves the body malnourished and tired.

In his book, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, Dr. Weston Price documented what it takes to be strong and healthy (and have good teeth, to boot)-- in a nutshell, foods rich in fat-soluble vitamins (like vitamins A, D, and E). Native populations eating traditional foods were found to consume at least ten times the levels of fat-soluble vitamins of those eating western processed foods (p. 247). Here's one of many examples he witnessed ( in the high-altitude region of the Andes mountains near Cuzco), "The Indians of this region are able to carry all day two hundred to three hundred pounds, and to do this day after day. At several of the ports, these mountain Indians have been brought down to the coast to load and unload coffee and freight from the ships. Their strength is phenomenal." 

Unfortunately, foods rich in fat-soluble vitamins don't come from a bottle or a can or a box labeled "heart-healthy." They come from nature-- vegetables raised in good mineral-rich soil free of chemicals; meats raised as God intended in fields and pastures, not crammed into a barn, fed corn and meat byproducts and injected with hormones and antibiotics; dairy products that haven't been pasteurized to death. These foods are not cheap and they're not convenient, but they deliver (and they taste a lot better, too!)

Frankenfoods like Muscle Milk and 5-Hour Energy Drinks are counterfeits. Be careful about drinking them, and be especially careful about feeding them to your children. They aren't food. At best, they are fake (synthetic) vitamins laced with mild drugs (caffeine).

And when the pushers come and offer you a free sample... just say No, thank you.