Gut Health on a Budget

Many of the health problems people are facing today, are often seen to be influenced by chronic gut inflammation, through a process where there is a breaking down of the gut lining, allowing more gut permeability, and this may allow unwanted substances to slip into circulation, and cause an immune reaction. This may lead to many health issues for example food intolerances, fatigue, autoimmune conditions, cognitive and skin issues.

A good starting point for improving health, would be to reduce pesticides exposure in the diet. Organic food is often seen as an expense in families, but cutting down on pesticide exposure, is easier than people think. The Clean 15 and Dirty Dozen is always a good point of reference, and highlights the worst offenders like the soft skinned fruit and vegetables (the dirty dozen) to the safer fruits and vegetables which are covered by a harder skin (the clean 15). The website www.pan-uk.org has updated information on pesticides used in the UK.

Washing your fruit and vegetables correctly is also a great way of cutting down on pesticide residue. You can do this by using a combination of 4 parts of water to 1 part vinegar, and soak for 20 minutes. You must rinse fruit and vegetables thoroughly after.

Buying food seasonally from farmers markets and supporting local farms, is not only good for the environment, but is also good for your health. Eating seasonally may reduce your pesticides exposure, and produce will be fresher, tastier foods with higher amounts of antioxidants present. Check out farma.org.uk, which locates farmers markets nearest to you.

So what other easy tips can we give to keep your gut healthy on a budget? We know a lot about probiotic foods such as (Kefir, Kombucha, Sauerkraut, Yogurt, Miso, Tempeh) but we also need to include the prebiotic foods, which effectively feed the probiotics. Fortunately these are foods we frequently find in our cupboards (that won’t break the bank) for example oats, legumes, bananas, garlic, artichokes, leeks, onions, honey and whole grains. We also highly recommend supplementing with Biomednutrition probiotic range.

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