So if the video introducing Michelle Bridge’s and Woolworth’s new range speaks the truth, we’ve learnt 2 things:

1. That growing your own food makes you a freak
2. That if you’re cooking your own food, it’s time you ‘got real’.

UPDATE: And, surprise surprise given it was an outlandish, bullying video, it’s been pulled already within hours… Basically the commercial showed Michelle talking about growing her own vegetables sarcastically and then eating the dirt, not the veggie and then saying ‘you don’t have to be a freak’…. cutting to a sparkly kitchen and a quick frozen packet pulled out of the freezer… Advertising agency gone seriously wrong! And I’d like to make it super clear this is not a personal attack on Michelle Bridges. There are many chiefs that would have to have approved such a commercial. Just because she’s the poster child for it, it makes her an easy target I’m sure, but this was much bigger than one person.

Here’s the mumbrella article with the video still in it (click on words)

I actually don’t take issue with a frozen meal. I often pull things out of my freezer on the busy days and defrost them, granted I’ve made them or they’re a single ingredient like peas or something to that effect, but yes, eating from the freezer is super practical for the busy days. I also don’t take issue with a frozen, additive free supermarket option (not sure if this range is yet as I’ve not seen it yet). Power to you if you want to create and sell that. If the commercial had simply pitched it as a step up from the average freezer meal from the super market it would have been great. Unfortunately, they didn’t.

I take issue with putting down and almost bullying of people who want to connect with their food and with people telling people again and again that they don’t have time for and that they are ‘above’ cooking. They / we aren’t freaks. Even if it was meant as tongue and cheek, the fact is she was in a veggie garden and then finished there saying you ‘don’t have to be a freak’ and it cut to a shiny kitchen and a frozen meal in a microwave. What on earth were they thinking?

We have a big culture problem as it is around fresh food being weird or elitist or uncool as it is. It doesn’t need inflaming from an aussie icon in the health industry. Fine, create your own meals Michelle, but also help people consider how to get cooking – cooking is power and cooking is a big piece of the health puzzle. Please, use your power to do your bit here. This marketing angle of laughing at people who feel they ‘have to’ grow their own produce is not helping. That’s no doubt why it got pulled down so quickly.

You a freak? No.

• Did you know that if you prepare your meal – even if it takes only minutes, your digestive enzymes activate and you process and absorb that food more effectively at meal time?
• Did you know that fresh food has more life force and – especially if you’ve grown it yourself, the highest amount of phytonutrients of any food? So actually, home growers and local sourcers are the clever ones.
• Did you know that most ‘free range’ animals are fed GMO grains in their grain mix – the highest sprayed crops in the world, with glyphosate having been declared a probable carcinogen earlier this year by the world health organisation? What you eat eats is important too.
• Did you know that applying heat to plastic creates a leaching effect and is a sure fire way to allow hormone disruptors into your food – whether it’s ‘recyclable’ or not.

When you lift the lid on ‘convenience’ for the first time, a flood of emotions often comes through – Guilt, anger, confusion, embarrassment, panic: How did I not know? How did I not wonder? What am I going to do without… ?

We don’t PART with convenience on this journey to truly “getting real”, we just redefine it. Slowly. If that ‘convenient’ thing is ugly once you do a little digging, it’s not so shiny and the convenience loses its appeal pretty quickly. Truth and peace of mind coupled with smart buying and smart ‘making’ become far more important over the course of this journey – to have that sense that through empowered choice, we know for FACT that we are now on the trajectory to be doing the best we can for both OUR health and the planet’s health, and that we’ve found a way to make it simple and uncomplicated… Well bingo, that’s our convenience born again – this time as a love child from hippy parents!

So moving on… here is my MOST convenient, quick to make dinner. Cut up or grate some zucchini and chuck it in for the last 30 minutes.

WINNER WINNER CHICKEN DINNER

5 minutes work tops. I promise. About $3 a serve, and goes down to $2 a serve if you use wings – ORGANIC ONES to boot! And then you’ve got bones to make stock with, which is technically then FREE FOOD.

Nothing freakish about growing and eating your own. Nothing wrong with ‘getting real’. Nothing wrong with keeping a few freezer options from cooking double ups or even store bought.

What is wrong? Attacking people, bullying people and feeding us the convenience message that takes people further away from thinking they can put a home cooked meal on the table, easily, economically and organically – At $8 bucks a serve I want a 2 course meal, thanks!

Go find Quirky Cooking, Mamabake, Lisa Corduff, Cut out the Crap and Natural New Age Mum to name a few who can show you how to achieve your real food goals, connect with food, create simple family meals and love it.

Let’s redefine convenience on OUR terms.

And let’s call for an end to real foodists being called freaks. This culture MUST stop. Bullying about kids with real food in their lunch boxes in the school yard is rife… we don’t need it coming from ‘the top’ with Aussie wellness icons bullying it too and feeding that idea!