Real Food That Loves You Back

I want to talk to you about food today.
But not just food like calories or diets or macros.
I’m talking about real food.
Food that reminds your body you’re alive.
Food that doesn’t trick your taste buds while starving your soul.
Food that was made — not manufactured.

And I want to start with a story about my wife, Kacy.
This is something she’s told me a few times, and it always stays with me.

She was just a kid — maybe six or seven.
They were visiting one of her dad’s friends. The kind of visit where adults talk in the living room and kids wander off and explore.
Kacy walked into the kitchen. No one else was there.
And — the fridge door was open.

Now, in Kacy’s home, that fridge had always been more empty than full.
It wasn’t that they couldn’t afford groceries. Her family had money — they just didn’t value food.
Their cupboards had the bare minimum. The fridge might’ve had some condiments.
Food was just fuel to get you back to work. A penny saved was a penny earned — and that meant no extras. No colour. No joy.

But that day, in that stranger’s house — the fridge was glowing.
Bright red apples. Yellow bell peppers. A big bowl of grapes. Fresh greens in the crisper. Homemade leftovers packed neatly in glass containers.

And young Kacy stood there, frozen.
She thought to herself, “Why can’t our fridge look like this? Why does theirs feel like a garden, and ours feels like a ghost town?”
She didn’t have the words for it yet. But she felt it.
That fridge wasn’t just full of food — it was full of love.

Fast forward to today.
If you open our fridge, you’ll see it.
Colour. Life. Nourishment.
And every time she looks at it, she’s grateful.
Because it reminds her that what was missing then — she now gets to build.

That’s what this is about.

See, a few years ago, we thought we were doing everything right.
We went vegan overnight after watching a documentary called The Game Changers at the Toronto Film Festival.
We stood in line for hours. Sat in a packed theatre surrounded by people buzzing with conviction.
And when it ended, we looked at each other and said, “Okay. That’s it. We’re in.”
Next day — boom. Plant-based.

And it felt good at first.
It felt righteous. Clean. Progressive.
We told people, “Yeah, we’re vegan now.” And technically, it was true.

But slowly… it started unraveling.
We were tired. Craving junk. Too tired to cook, too busy to plan.
So we leaned on takeout. Vegan pizza with fake cheese. Beyond burgers with fries drowning in oil.
We told ourselves, “It’s fine. It’s vegan.”
But it wasn’t real.

One night, I opened the fridge and just stood there.
Every shelf was filled with logos, packages, barcodes.
And it hit me: “There’s nothing alive in here.”

We hadn’t upgraded our diet — we’d just rebranded our junk.
We went plant-based, but drifted farther from real food than ever before.

So we decided to try something.
Nothing huge. Just a month. One month of whole food.
No fake meat. No plastic-wrapped snacks. No boxes.
Just produce. Beans. Grains. Herbs. Real stuff. Things you’d recognize from a garden, not a factory.

We soaked beans overnight. We made fresh broth from veggie scraps. We cooked every meal from scratch.
And almost immediately — something shifted.
I felt lighter. Clearer. The bloat disappeared. I didn’t need constant snacks.
Kacy said, “I feel like my head’s clearer.”
We weren’t crashing. We weren’t foggy.
There was peace in our bodies again.

There’s one moment I’ll never forget.
Kacy was making a broth — just veggie scraps and ginger, simmering on the stove.
The whole place filled with this warm, earthy smell.
Kacy turned to me and said,
“This smells like how I want to feel.”

That hit me.
Because we weren’t just cooking.
We were coming home.

Not to a location — but to a way of being.
We were slowing down. Listening to what our bodies needed.
Honouring the materials the Lord gave us.

That’s what this is.
Receiving real food with real gratitude.
Letting it be sanctified — made holy — by prayer.
Letting it be more than just calories. Letting it nourish your life.

Because the truth is, most people today eat more processed food than real food.
Over 60% of the average North American diet is ultra-processed.
And studies show a 62% higher risk of death for those who consume more of it.

That’s not just a statistic.
That’s people.
That’s lives.
That’s futures cut short — not because of famine, but because of fake food pretending to be real.

So we kept going. We kept cooking. We kept learning.
And that one month? It became our new normal.

But it wasn’t just about food anymore.
It was about values.
About healing what was broken — in our past, in our plates, and in our priorities.

Now we dream of building something for others.
A homestead-style retreat.
A place where people can come and taste what nourishment is meant to feel like.
Where you harvest from the garden, cook with what’s fresh, and sit down at a shared table.
No diet plans. No apps. No influencers.
Just honest food, real conversation, and the kind of rest that doesn’t wear off.

And when guests leave — they won’t leave empty-handed.
They’ll take jars of soup made that morning. A fresh loaf of sourdough. Maybe even a handful of veggies they picked themselves.
And most of all — they’ll take the memory of how real food made them feel.

Because once your body remembers what it’s like to be fed by the land — to be loved by the very thing the Lord created —
you don’t forget that.
You start cooking more. Supporting local farms. Using less plastic. Needing fewer pills.
And maybe…
maybe even changing the world a little — one meal at a time.

So this isn’t about being trendy.
It’s not about labels.
It’s about the ancient way. The simple way.
The narrow path.

There is food that fills you — and food that fools you.
Food that robs — and food that revives.
And the Lord is calling us back to what is good.

Real food. Real rest. Real gratitude.
Because the King of Kings didn’t just feed people with fish and bread — He became the Bread of Life.

Taste real food and see that the Lord is good.
And let what you eat remind you of who made you. 

What if the fridge in your home became a daily altar — not to shame or restriction, but to gratitude and life?