Nourish With Intent

Good morning, Cadre. Happy Saturday. February 1st it is. We made it through a month of 2025, which feels crazy to say because feels like it flew by and also dragged on forever. So welcome to this nutrition live this morning. Today, I wanted to just talk about something a little more topical. Good morning, Luke. Good morning, Jules. Good morning, Mom. There's the sunshine. Love it. We don't have any here actually right now, so I appreciate it, Jules. Like I said, I wanted to talk about something that's a little bit more topical.

And Jules, red looks good on you. Thanks. I am a Chiefs fan. I want to preface with. I'm not trying to be political, but some of these things are kind of a result of just like the current climate. And so I want to prioritize, provide resources for you all to continue to be safe. The biggest one I think right now is there is the presence of the bird flu. So I want to talk a little bit on how that's impacting our food, our food supply, and maybe some tips on how to navigate that as that continues to be something that we are dealing with.

Bird flu is in many, many states right now. It is affecting a lot of flocks as well as some of our cattle herds as well. So if you've been to the store lately, you've seen egg prices near me, they're like eight to ten dollars for a dozen, which is wild. And I've never seen that before in my relatively short life buying my own groceries. But eggs are very expensive. Any sort of poultry has also been going up in price. And we're. We're starting to see a little bit of change in beef prices. Beef is also something that we import a decent amount of as well.

So I'm not sure what that will bring. But in terms of food safety for bird flu, Bird flu is fairly unstable as a virus when it's. Say that again, it's destroyed rather easily by cooking. So if you're going to be cooking eggs or poultry or beef or whatever it is, make sure that you are cooking it fully. So for chicken or other poultry, that's 165 degrees Fahrenheit. Good morning. Speak. Wonder. For me personally, I am cooking my eggs entirely. No runny yolks or anything like that. That's always a risk.

Any sort of foodborne illness. When you're eating raw eggs, I think we all are aware of that. And then beef as well. I'm cooking that fully. And if you are somebody who feels uncomfortable with buying eggs or poultry or beef, some additional options for you could be. Lentils as a substitute for beef are a really great option. It's not identical, but it is. They're a wonderful source of iron, which is something that we get a lot of in red meat. It is a good source of protein. You're going to be getting some of those similar nutrients.

It's not quite as high as beef protein is, but you're also getting a little bit of added fiber. And you've heard me talk about fiber on here once or twice, so that could be a good substitute for beef. A substitute for eggs. In baking specifically, you can sub with like a flax egg or even applesauce. I've seen some people use and say mashed banana as well. I've never tried that one personally myself. Ron. I'm currently substituting applesauce for eggs in my baking. Yes. So that's a really great swap in terms of like, oh, I like an egg sandwich or scrambled eggs.

In the morning, you can use tofu and make a scramble if you don't have any allergies or issues with soy. Another option, if you've ever seen those, like, it's like Egg Beaters, is the liquid egg that's actually egg. There's a vegan product called Just Egg that is made out of mung beans. And you can actually make that at home. Basically soak, blend, bake and cook it on a sheet pan. Make like sheet pan eggs with that. So that's another option if you're looking to substitute for eggs. Obviously, if you can get eggs at a reasonable price, like for that, I think just make sure you're cooking them.

If you're at all concerned about bird flu in terms of eating poultry. So if you're eating chicken, if chicken prices you're noticing are going up, tofu is a good sub. One tip for that is it comes in your little package and it's got water in it. If you freeze your tofu in the packaging and then thaw it, the water in there expands and it creates these little air pockets in the tofu that give it a texture that's a little bit more similar to chicken than just straight out of the tofu press. So it's my little tofu hack for you.

Another option is soy curls. Not that different than tofu, except you buy them and they're dried. You rehydrate them and cook them. They come in little pieces. So more like your diced chicken, if that's something that you prefer. And then seitan is another good swap. You can make that at home. Really Easily as well. It is wheat based. So if you are celiac gluten or wheat allergy, anything like that, this one would not be for you. But if you can tolerate wheat, you have access to flour. Seitan is essentially just flour and water.

You can season it, cook it. So those are my swaps for you for bird flu. In terms of if anyone is kind of aware or just wanting to be in the loop with food recalls, there is currently a pause on communication from the CDC and fda. However, that information is still on their website. They're just not allowed to send it out to us. But the usda, I don't know if it was on purpose or on accident, was not included in that. And so I am able to still get my daily USDA food recall emails sent to me. I just got one.

I don't know if it was this morning, early last night, but I've gotten about two or three this week for food recalls to my email and for more, if you are someone who is on social media at all, there's an allergist named Dr. Rubin who's essentially doing their job for us now and communicating a lot of the recalls and anything that we need to be aware of, including like spread of bird flu, severity of that kind of stuff. So we've got some resources there for you as well. There was something else that I had in my notes, now I can't remember.

Oh, other thing to take note of I think is just in terms of rising food costs and some tips to help kind of keep those down. And I say that because we import about 40 to 60% of our fresh fruits and vegetables. So in the midst of kind of climate of international relations right now, there's a lot up in the air. We don't exactly know what's going to happen. We have suspicions if food prices continue to increase, and they say continue because we've seen some increases over the last year, fresh fruits and vegetables are probably going to be the thing, or fruits and vegetables in general are going to be one of the things that we see that pretty significantly hit on.

So if you have room in your freezer now stocking up on fresh fruits and vegetable or frozen fruits and vegetables, even canned, if you have the ability to shop local. So if you have some sort of community garden, if you have neighbors with a garden, if you find a CSA that you can join, support your local farmers. Farmers will often get hit hard with specifically like, I'll say the word tariffs, if there's retaliatory tariffs from other countries on US Your farmers are probably going to be hit by that.

So if you can find ways to support your local farmers, and that could even be buying their, like, if they have chickens or beef cattle, buying those things from them as well to support them. And also then you get to know a little bit more about, like, do they have an active bird flu outbreak, things like that. So I know that's not always an option for everybody. That can be more expensive. And if it is an option for you and something that you feel is an important aspect for you, that could be one.

One way to do it. And then shopping or eating seasonally can be helpful in reducing costs as well. Some of the foods that are in season right now are citrus fruits, even things like asparagus, if you've ever seen asparagus grown, that can grow in the snow. So if you're up in my northern area, Minnesota, you know, a lot of are there, South Dakota, I can post, actually, I'll do that. I'll post a little graphic of, like, what's in season right now. It does obviously vary a little bit from state to state.

And a lot of times your local farmers market will have, if you go to their website, like a graph of, hey, it's the spring in Texas, here's what's in season, or the spring in Minnesota, because we're in different planting zones, those are going to be a little bit different. But I will share one that I find and hopefully that can be a little bit helpful. So those are my tips for you today. The reason this was the focus of my Live this morning is because these are conversations I'm having with my clients in real life.

These are things that I'm seeing when I go to the grocery store. Real concerns I'm having around avoiding foodborne illness. So I thought I would share some of those tips. Obviously, like I said, there's a lot of unknown. We don't really know how our food supply will be affected, and we're starting to see inklings here and there. And I just want to make sure you guys have options if you need them. Obviously, maybe this doesn't apply to you, and that's totally fine as well. But sometimes it can be good information to have in the back of your mind just in case.

Any questions for me in regards to any of the things that I said or other concerns that you have around access to food, food supply, foodborne illness? I might be able to answer them this very moment. Some. Some things might take a little more research on my end, but no. Okay. Thought I would ask. You're always very welcome. I it makes me happy to see everyone here and yes, always happy to share my expertise. It's all I know. So for now, here I am. Nutrition is the jam and will be for the time being.

And like I said, these are things that my clients in person, in real life are asking me about. And I want to make sure that I'm informed and can help them in whatever way I can because sometimes I feel like I can't. Like I said, I'll post the little like in season chart for I don't know, maybe I'll pick like the middle of the US As a fair meeting point for everyone because I know I have people in here right now who are all over. So if you have other questions related to food safety, food supply, getting access to some of that information that I shared.

If you're interested in the USDA updates, if you Google USDA Food recall, it'll take you to the page where the sign up is. It's just your email. Otherwise, I appreciate you all for being here. I hope you have a wonderful rest of your morning. I am about to go to a coffee shop for their monthly donut day and it's their last donut day and I'm very sad and they're getting rid of their in house bakery. So that's where I'm off to. Hope you guys all stay warm, stay safe and I'll see you right back here next week.

Bye.