The JOON Blog

I picked up the latest issue of Cooking Light while standing in the check out line at the grocery store.  The cover images always look so amazing and I feel compelled to buy the magazine with the thoughts that I, too, will make this delicious meal for my family.  (Unfortunately, the recipes for those cover images rarely appear in the 30 minute dinner section, which are the only recipes that I usually have time to make!)  When I got home, my daughter was napping and my son was in the pool with my husband, so I had a few minute to sit down and breathe and read, a rare treat!  I came across an article entitled “Good News:  You can ease up on superfoods – What’s hyped isn’t necessarily healthy, and the fuss about “super” nutrients is much ado about…not much” Really? Because for the past few years, all I’ve been hearing about and seeing are top 10 lists for the best superfoods.

Well, if you’re not eating superfoods (acai berries, green teas, etc) or you’ve simply missed the conversation, no need to worry.  As the article said, “the superfood concept suggests a magic way to get the nutrients you need”.  And, as we all know, there are no magic bullets in life.  There’s no magic diet pill, no magic success pill…we just have to do things the old fashioned way – hard work and careful planning.  I got caught up in all the marketing about superfoods.  Shame on me!

Here are a few highlights from the article that I feel are important to share: (verbatim from the article)

1.  The humble canned bean has loads of antioxidants – which are often the focus of superfood virtues – plus lots of fiber, vitamins, and minerals.  But I don’t see Great Northern beans edging out goji berries anytime soon.

2.  Antioxidants are the focus of a lot of superfood hype.  Substances that inhibit cell damage caused by oxidation are thought to play a role in the prevention of many diseases.  But, science has a hard time saying which of these substances help the body, and in which quantities, let alone isolating a single one for superpower.

3.  Less-hyped (but more fully researched) antioxidants, like vitamins A, C, and E, don’t receive as much love.  Think, grapes, cherries, blueberries, and wine.

4.  The FDA sent a warning letter to POM Wonderful for making disease-prevention claims – not on the labels of pomegranate juice, but on the POM web site.

So, let’s get back to basics.  Let’s stop buying into the hype and pull out our old food pyramids that show us that it’s about variety and nothing more or less.

I believe that there is a parallel here to body care, as well.  There are so many claims made and so many ingredients that are hyped and research just doesn’t bear out that we’re going to benefit from them.  When we formulated JOON, we went back to basics. We followed the ingredients guidelines set forth by the Natural Products Association to ensure that our products met their standards.  We used ingredients that would make our products work – our washes lather, our sparkle shine (naturally, of course) and our products smell good.  For little girls, it’s about the basics.  It’s about establishing good routines and knowing what to avoid – what’s actually bad for you.  Along our journey, many people gave us advice – a product with acai berry would sell like hot cakes because that’s all the rage.  But we’re not about being all the rage.  We know that what you put on your body works in concert with what you put in your body.