Superfood Giveaway from Sacha Vida

At last year’s NYC Veg Fest I met Carlos, the young and energetic founder of Sacha Vida. Sacha Vida is a new company that recently started bringing some of South America’s best superfoods up North to share with us. They pride themselves on their sustainability, and the very high quality of their products.  I have been impressed with Sacha Vida since first meeting Carlos and really loved the sample of Maca they recently sent me. To help build a little holiday excitement, Sacha Vida has agreed to do a giveaway of a bag of their maca as well as a bag of their delicious chocolate covered goldenberries! I know once you try it, you’ll be as convinced as I am about its health benefits and Sacha Vida’s quality.

First tell me a bit about who you are and the founding of Sacha Vida.

Sacha Vida comes to life from my desire to share the amazing super foods that are native to Peru.   After I graduated from college I started to work for an international shipping company and traveled all over the world.  During my travels I always ended up talking about maca and other super foods from Peru and people would always ask me where they could buy such products.  Eventually I started thinking about my own company and ended up leaving my job to work on Sacha Vida full time.  It has been an amazing journey and we are excited and grateful for the great support that our products have received in the U.S. 

I love your company’s mission statement about providing healthy plant-based foods while also preserving the environment they grow in: the Amazon. Can you talk a little about why the Amazon is so vital to protect?

I’ve travelled in the Amazon many times and am always impressed by its beauty and its rich biodiversity.  The Amazon rainforest provides most of the air that we breathe and it is also the best source of natural remedies that could probably cure most of today’s illnesses.   Many people don’t know that  a lot of medications are derived from plants that grow in the Amazon.   The Amazon is also home to many native tribes that have survived for thousands of years only to be kicked out and robbed of their land by industrial agriculture and deforestation.  We need to protect the Amazon in order to ensure that our planet fights back against global warming and to ensure that we protect the natural ecosystems that our planet needs to keep going.

When did you first learn about Maca?

I learned about maca when I was in college, during one of my travels to Peru one of my friends talked to me about this natural powder that he used before he played soccer (we are talking about playing soccer at approximately 10,000 feet above sea level).  I did a little bit of research and found out that the Chasquis, which were high distance runners in charge of delivering messages on behalf of the Incas used maca during their journeys.   I tried maca powder and felt more focused and energized and have been hooked on maca ever since.

Why do you think Maca is such a vital ingredient? How can it benefit us?

Scientists have proven that maca is an adaptogenic plant, that means that it has the capacity to adapt and benefit your body where it needs it most.   For example, a woman suffering from menopause symptoms will  take maca and feel relieved and another woman who is trying to conceive will take maca to produce healthier eggs.  Likewise, an athlete training for a big event will take maca before workouts and a scientist will take maca before going to work.   Maca is a rich source of vitamins, minerals and it also supplies your body with calcium, zinc, iron, magnesium, phosphorous and amino acids.  In addition, maca is known for its aphrodisiac powers and in Peru is known as “Peruvian Viagra.” I heard countless stories of people using maca to enrich their sex lives and to help them conceive.  I use maca for its energizing properties, nothing helps me focus and concentrate better than a spoon of maca in my morning smoothie and I have friends that swear that a maca smoothie before hitting the gym makes their workouts more intense.

What is the best way for us to incorporate Maca in our daily lives?

Best way is to add a tablespoon to your daily smoothie, juice or oatmeal in the morning.  It is best to start gradually and start with one tablespoon in the morning or before your workouts.  

There are generally two types, raw or gelatinized. What is the difference? Which, in your opinion, is better?

People familiar with maca will know that raw maca is a lot cheaper and harder to digest than gelatinized maca.   Besides the digestibility issue you can also tell the difference with the flavor, raw maca has a much stronger flavor that many people dislike or can not tolerate.   Raw maca is made by pulverizing the dry maca roots,  gelatinized maca undergoes an additional step where the natural starches of maca are removed in order to make the maca powder more digestible while concentrating its nutrients.  Some people’s digestive systems are more sensitive and have to work harder to digest starches and other compounds in raw maca, consequently they experience stomach pains or a feeling of discomfort during the digestive process and may not give maca a second chance.  Gelatinized maca powder does not cause those side effects as it goes straight to your system allowing your body to absorb all the nutrients and minerals found in maca immediately.   Sacha Vida currently carries gelatinized maca and so I am biased towards gelatinized maca which in my opinion is a better product than raw maca.  Now, on a related side note, in Peru maca is always consumed cooked and never raw, people who cultivate maca in the Peruvian highlands added it to their stews or toasted but don’t eat it raw.

I also want to highlight that we are the only company in the market that sells maca products that are Fair Choice Certified  which is a certification system based in the International Human Rights Declarations and Labor Conventions.   I support this certification process because it seeks to protect and assure the fair treatment to everyone involved within the control of the company that implements the certification system so it benefits the overall community of growers and producers.   This is the first fair-trade standard created in Latin America that takes into consideration local market and producing conditions and it also includes requirements on health, safety and environmental protection.

Do you have a relationship with the growers of your product? What are the conditions Maca is grown in?

I have a very strong and close relationship to the farmers that produce our maca products.  I visit the maca farms every time I travel to the highlands of Peru and have shared many meals and interesting conversations with our farmer partners.  They are invested in producing a high quality product and are very excited to see that their products are reaching the U.S. market. Maca is usually grown in high altitude lands, where  lots of sunshine during the day and freezing temperatures at night make it difficult for other plants to survive. Maca has adapted to this environment and thrives by absorbing all of the minerals and nutrients from the soil in order to grow and survive. 

Tell me about Sacha Inchi. There is a lot of buzz around the seed of this beautiful star shaped fruit.

I am very excited about sacha inchi finally getting the recognition it deserves.  Sacha inchi is a vine and grows in the Peruvian Amazon, it is a very sustainable crop because you can cultivate it many times a year.  The seed has one of the highest plant based concentrations of Omega 3 fatty acids along with protein and vitamins.  This seed has been consumed in the Amazon for thousands of years and the oil has been used by native women to protect their skin.  What distinguishes sacha inchi from other plant based sources of Omega 3 is that sacha inchi also has naturally occurring vitamin E which helps the oil preserve its properties without oxidizing quickly like flax seed oil for example.  In addition the oil is very light and is a great complement to salads, dips, smoothies and cold dishes.   I recommend that the oil do not be heated because the Omega 3 bonds will break with heat and the nutritional value of the oil is compromised.  Sacha inchi seeds are super healthy snacks, they are full of protein and Omega 3 and are a great additional to trail mixes or enjoyed on their own.  We are currently working on expanding our sacha  inchi line and will have new sacha inchi products available online soon.

Anything else you’d like the readers to know?

We are a family owned company competing with big companies, what makes us different is that our products are always organic and that we truly care about following fair trade practices with our partner farmers.  For example, our maca products are the only ones in the market that are Fair Choice Certified. In addition,  I pick our partner farmers carefully and usually spend weeks with them understanding their processes and learning about their motivations.  I believe that a great part of being a successful entrepreneur is associating yourself with partners who are as passionate if not more passionate than you are about producing and delivering a high quality product.    I grew up in Peru and unlike other entrepreneurs  I am vested in seeing our partner farmers grow and prosper.  Economic development of their communities along with access to education for their children are the first steps in the process.   We have exciting projects in the pipeline with these goals in mind and I hope to share them with you soon.

Besides online, where can we find your stuff? Also what is the best way to connect with you (Instagram, twitter, facebook?)

You can find our products in New York at the Live Live Organic store in the East Village, you can also find us in California at the Rainbow Grocery Coop in San Francisco and in Massachusetts at Cambridge Naturals.  We are always looking to add more stores and if you want to see our products sold in your local store I encourage you to speak to the food buyer at the store  and ask them to add our products to their store inventory. You can always connect with us through our Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest accounts, we love to hear from you!

Thanks for doing the interview Carlos! Now for the exciting part. We are doing a giveaway (call it a little holiday gift!) of a bag of Organic maca and chocolate covered goldenberries!

GIVEAWAY

Here are the rules. First, the winner needs to live in the United States (sorry international readers, no disrespect). The contest will end on December 30th at midnight. To enter, you must be a subscribed reader to BYOL. To increase your chances of winning leave a comment on this post or/and "like" "Sacha Vida" on facebook. You will also gain a point if you "like" Bring Your Own Lentils facebook page. 

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As always the information presented in this blog is for educational purposes only. It should not be considered as specific medical, nutritional, lifestyle, or other health-related advice.

Keep it Simple, Keep it Whole; Book Review and Giveaway

Alona Pulde, M.D. and Matthew Lederman, M.D., Keep it Simple, Keep it Whole: Your Guide to Optimum Health Exsalus California: Health & Wellness Center; 2010.

Dr. Alona Pulde and her husband Dr. Matthew Lederman, two of the stars from the documentary Forks Over Knives and recent partners of Whole Food Market's Global Medical Executives of Health and Wellness, wrote a phenomenal work simply titled Keep it Simple, Keep it Whole. I’ve been reading a lot of nutrition and sports physiology books lately; however, this little book blew me away both for it’s breadth of knowledge as well as for the elegance and simplicity of it’s message.

Their title pretty much expresses the main theme of the book. While other works make strong cases for a similar diet (oil-free whole food, plant based) few of them can achieve what Dr.’s Pulde and Lederman have done. In essence they’ve combined a powerful argument for a strict plant-based messaged with a practical, public health-style approach. The result is a mixture between the latest nutritional research and common sense application.

The work operates under the notion that health is not a definitive one-size fits all. Rather, it explains that health is a scale, and every step towards the healthier end of that scale is a success. The authors have also created a simple grading rubric classifying various food types. Unlike, Dr. Joel Furhman's ANDI System, this system uses food categories rather than individual foods making it simpler to understand and apply. Not surprisingly, meat and dairy received an F grade, and most processed foods received a D. As such, most Americans are consistently failing when it comes to eating for health.

At the other end of the scale are whole plant foods such as grains and pseudograins like rice and quinoa, root vegetables and dark leafy greens, all receiving an A+. Richer foods like avocados, nuts, seeds as well as slightly processed whole foods like whole grain breads receive a slightly lower grade (A). Foods like soy milk, white rice and no-oil dressings receive an A- indicating that those foods should be consumed in lower quantities. Not surprisingly, according to the authors, the goal is to try and live within the A range of foods. However, this is where the authors demonstrate their flexibility. Rather than telling their readers that they should only consume these foods, they instead tell the readers to aim to have an average of A foods, not to only have A foods. So if someone is really craving a few cookies (which earn, at best, a C-) they should then strive to balance that out by eating healthier A+ foods for much of the rest of the day. They say the more often one is able to do this, the further up on the health scale one will be.

The book also recognize that not everyone is ready to live exclusively off A foods. For those people who are looking at making changes incrementally, they suggest simply moving up the food scale as much and as often as possible.

They also stress not to eat exclusively from the A+ foods. While dark greens may be the healthiest; starches, legumes, and more rich foods are needed to ensure that one is getting enough calories. Otherwise, a person is in risk of both starving themselves and depriving themselves of having satisfying meals, which will lead to a burnout of will and typically results in bingeing on the least healthy foods. As such, Dr. Pulde and Dr. Lederman implore their readers to eat a wide variety of plant foods – not just salads. They've also created a simple three-course guide to healthy eating. The first course should be a large serving of raw or cooked vegetables. They call this the “multivitamin” course and stress that this should be the largest of the three courses for people looking to loose weight. The second course is the filling course. This course should be “heavier” foods like lentils or potatoes. The final course is the smallest and also optional. Think of this portion more like a side, as it will consists of slightly more processed foods such as oil-free chips and salsa, dairy-free pizza, or whole grain breads. As one becomes more confident in their progress on the health continuum scale, these three dishes can be simplified into one large course.

Consisting of fourteen relatively short and easy to read chapters, Dr. Pulde and Dr. Lederman cover everything you need to know before starting your journey towards health. From in-depth discussions about why supplementing DHA can be dangerous to the ever-persistent concerns surrounding protein. And best of all, they've included footnotes citing the studies that have helped influence their program so more reading is easily obtained on each topic.

The book also has a small section of recipes. Here they include all types of healthful foods from smoothies to Mac N “Cheese” to chocolate cupcakes with frosting. Most of the recipes are simple and they use easy-to-find ingredients.

Overall, I cannot recommend this book enough, especially for those of you who are plant-curious. That said, the book is not dumbed down, and offers something for even those with a more advanced understanding of nutrition. However because it’s from a very small publishing, it won’t be easily found in too many bookstores. So check out  Transition to Health, Barnes and Noble’s website, or enter below for your chance to win one of three copies that BYOL is giving away and begin your journey towards improved health. One thing is certain, by the time you are done reading this work, you’ll be wishing that Dr Pulde and Dr. Lederman were your primary care givers!

GIVEAWAY

Dr. Pulde and Dr. Lederman have agreed to give away three copies of Keep it Simple, Keep it Whole. Here are the rules. First, the winner needs to live in the United States (sorry international readers, no disrespect). The contest will end on September 20th at midnight. To enter, you must be a subscribed reader to BYOL. To increase your chances of winning leave a comment on this post or/and "like" BYOL on facebook.

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As always the information presented in this blog is for educational purposes only. It should not be considered as specific medical, nutritional, lifestyle, or other health-related advice.