A few days ago someone asked me what food had the biggest impact on my health. It was a fascinating question that I didn’t have an immediate answer to. Of all the dietary changes I’ve made over the years, which one was the best? That’s like asking what the most impactful exercise is or the best pair of minimalist shoes are! Not an easy question to answer because so many have had a big impact or have been progressions from another product which was impactful as well.

After a few minutes of thought I gave her my answer: Seafood, salad and eggs.

Seafood
This group of food had a huge impact on me because I never ate much anything from the sea when I was younger. Thanks to my wife I started eating it a bit more in the last 8-10 years and now I have a whole new world of food options that has since expanded into sushi, sardines, oysters and more. More nutrient dense and variable than chicken and turkey, seafood has taken the place of fowl, which is what I used to eat quite a bit of.

Salad
This was a big one for me for two reasons. First, since I wasn’t used to eating many vegetables, it doubled or tripled the amount of green stuff in my diet and secondly, for the first time, it got me eating something other than sandwiches for lunch. Two big steps for my health and (after some home experimentation) I found that if I had a dressing I liked I could eat any salad no matter how big or what was in it and shockingly enough, craved and enjoyed massive, veggie laden bowls of greens. Now salads are one of my favorite things to eat and they are almost a daily part of my diet.

Eggs
Eggs were very similar to salads in that I hadn’t eaten them too often before I started eating them for breakfast in place of cereal. This revolutionized things for me as I started to realize that I was feeling more full, satisfied and energetic than ever before and, most importantly, I wasn’t hungry two hours after eating breakfast. No longer fearing the fat or cholesterol in eggs, I had a new outlook on diet and could start my day with an omelette and veggies (or anything else I wanted) as I was now free from the breakfast cereal trap.

After some thought, I realized there were two other foods that radically shaped my health: bacon and butter.

Bacon & Butter
These two “forbidden” foods were off my plate for quite a while after conventional wisdom managed to convince me that they were likely to contribute to fattening up and killing me. Then a few years ago I started to investigate food, nutrition and culinary history and started to realize that my fear of these two simple and delicious items was unfounded and possibly backwards. Now, instead of indulging, cheating or making a health sacrifice, I eat these foods without hesitation and love every bite. This freedom opened up my eyes and I haven’t enjoyed eating more than in the last few years.

So there you have it. Five foods that changed my health. Seafood, salad, eggs, bacon and butter. Two foods I was supposed to be eating that I wasn’t and three foods that I was avoiding that I didn’t need to. All are delicious and full of nutrients and have in concert accomplished a few things:
– Added nutrient density to my meals.
– Replaced nutrient poor foods.
– Expanded my palate.
– Helped me eat more traditionally.

All in all, some pretty good things.

What foods have changed your health?

Thanks for reading, have a great day!