Moldy food & aflotoxins

Everything that’s animal or vegetable can get moldy. While living things are alive, the mold attackers can be held at bay. As soon as they are dead, molding begins. First it molds; then bacterial action sets in. This is what makes things biodegradable. It is a precious phenomenon. It does away with filth-in an exquisite manner. Without mold and decay the streets of New York would still be full of horse manure from the days of the horse and buggy and our lakes too full of dead fish to swim in.

Every grain has its molds; every fruit has its molds; tea and coffee plants have their molds; as do all herbs, and vegetables. Nuts have their molds; nuts grown in the ground (peanuts) are especially moldy because the earth is so full of mold spores. But the wind carries these spores high up into trees, and even up to the stratosphere. Molds are not very choosy. They have their preference for certain plants and conditions. But the same molds can grow on many plants. This is why aflatoxin, for instance, is found not just in your cereal, bread and pasta but in nuts, maple syrup, orange juice, vinegar, wine, etc. Where is it not? It is not in dairy products or fresh fruit and vegetables, provided you wash the outside. It is not in meat, eggs, and fish. It is not in water.

Although I find aflatoxin in commercial bread, I do not find it in carefully screened wheat that has had its discolored, shriveled seeds removed before using it for making bread, cereals and noodles. It is not in baked goods bought at bakeries, left open to air. Evidently the system of wrapping baked goods in plastic keeps moisture trapped and starts the molding process. In spite of adding mold inhibitors, American bread-stuff is far inferior to Mexican baked goods in which I do not find aflatoxin!

Here is some good news for cooks: if you bake it yourself, adding a bit of vitamin C to the dough, your breads will be mold free for an extended period (and rise higher).

Aflatoxin

What is so important about molds? Some of them produce very, very toxic chemicals wherever they grow. They produce some of the most toxic chemicals known to exist. Aflatoxin is one of these. My tests show it is always present in cancer patients; in other words it has built up due to the body’s inability to detoxify it in a reasonable time. A great deal of research has been done on aflatoxin. Any library would have more information.

Aflatoxin reaches the liver and simply kills portions of it. After a hefty dose the liver is weakened for a long time- possibly years. Hepatitis and cirrhosis cases always reveal aflatoxin. The liver fights hard to detoxify aflatoxin and manage its own survival. It manages for 2 to 3 weeks; then a portion of it succumbs. So the toxic effects of a dose of aflatoxin aren’t even noticeable for several weeks! And without a taste or smell to guide you, how would you know to stop eating the moldy peanut butter or spaghetti? The answer is:

1. make and bake things for yourself
2. test the things you dearly love but can’t make
3. treat things that are treatable for molds
4. throw the rest out of your diet

Treatments mentioned in the industrial research journals are hydrogen peroxide, strong alkali such as lime-water, metabisulfite (a common reducing agent) and high heat. I have tried heat and vitamin C, which is also a reducing agent.

Just heating a food to the boiling point does not kill the molds. Boiling for many minutes at a higher temperature or baking does kill them (but not ergot, another mold) and also destroys aflatoxin they produced and left in the food. For foods you can’t heat that high, for example nuts that are already roasted, or vinegar, vitamin C comes to the rescue. I suppose it acts a lot like the bisulfite; chemically destroying the mold toxin molecules.
Eradicating Aflatoxin

Simply sprinkling vitamin C over roasted nuts is not effective because the molds have penetrated the surface. Rinse the nuts in water first (a lot of mold is removed in this simple way). Cover the nuts with water, add about ¼ tsp. vitamin C powder (for a pint of nuts) and mix. Let stand for 5 minutes. The water penetrates the nuts, taking the vitamin C with it and detoxifies them. Pour off the water and dry the nuts in the oven at low heat. (Don’t burn them or you will make benzopyrenes.)

Rice and pastas can be demolded partly by cooking and partly by adding vitamin C before or after cooking. There is no need to add so much it affects the flavor. Brown rice is especially moldy.

Vinegars can simply have vitamin C added and placed in the refrigerator.

Honey can be warmed and treated the same way (¼ tsp. per pint).

Bread cannot be salvaged. Switch to bakery breads or homemade. Use it up in a few days, left in its paper bag. Or slice and place in a plastic bag in the freezer.

Zearalenone

Zearalenone, an anabolic and uterotrophic metabolite, is frequently found in commercial cereal grains and in processed foods and feeds, and is often reported as causative agent of naturally occurring hyperestrogenism and infertility in swine, poultry and cattle.[18]

What this means is, in animals, “zear” looks likes extra estrogen to the body. Does it affect humans the same way? Are high estrogen levels a problem for us? I find nearly every breast cancer case shows a too-high estrogen level for years before the cancer is found! It starts females maturing too early, too. It could cause PMS, ovarian cysts and infertility. Not everybody gets all of these effects. And what is the effect on men and boys of eating an estrogen-like mycotoxin in their daily diet? This female hormone could have a drastic effect on the maturing process even in small amounts.

Zearalenone (“zear”) and aflatoxin both have immune lowering effects. Zearalenone can induce thymic atrophy and macrophage activation.[19] If you have low immunity (low T-cells, low white blood cell count, and so forth), immediately go off moldy food suspects.

“Zear” is the mycotoxin that prevents you from detoxifying benzene. Every AIDS sufferer I see has a crippled ability to detoxify benzene; they also have zear!

The main zear sources I have found so far are popcorn, corn chips, and brown rice. But it was absent in fresh corn, canned corn, corn tortillas, and white rice, making me wonder how it gets in our processed corn products.

Sterigmatocystin
Sterigmatocystin (“sterig”) is plentiful in pasta. Emphasize baked pasta dishes, not boiled. This raises the temperature much higher than boiling. Better yet, make your own pasta with a pasta maker. U.S. bread flour is quite free of mold; the mold in our pastas must come from using inferior quality flour. Always add vitamin C to pasta before or after cooking.

Ergot toxicity could explain “Jekyll and Hyde” behavior in children, commonly attributed to “allergies”. In fact, the mechanism, inability by the liver to keep up with detoxification, fits well into the “allergic” concept. If your child has undesirable behavior, try going off the moldy food suspects for three weeks (cold cereals, nuts and nut butters, store bought breads and baked goods, syrups). Substitute cooked cereals, bakery breads, potatoes, and honeys. Add vitamin C to honey, pasta and cooked cereals. Pancakes and waffles made from scratch would be O.K.

Combining alcohol with ergot is more toxic than either is alone. Alcohol seems to drive the toxin deeper into your tissues. I have found ergot and aflatoxin in beer and wine! Perhaps some of the bizarre behavior and speech of intoxication is really due to the mold-alcohol combination. By delaying alcohol detoxification, the mold could even be responsible for deaths “due to” alcoholism. It would be safer to brew your own alcoholic beverages. Start with pristine fruit. Or at least add vitamin C (1/8 tsp. per cup) to the store bought container you are consuming.

Older children and adults are quite susceptible to ergot too. If bizarre behavior shows up, such as saying mean and cruel things, expressing unusual, irrational thoughts, feeling emotionless or unreal, try the same diet changes, but put alcoholic beverages, soy sauces and other sauces, and other grain derived foods on the “off” list. Try this diet on yourself if you have a temper or crying spells or frequent colds! Ergot can make you super religious, hearing voices of command or threat. Ergot also causes seizures!

Kojic Acid
Kojic acid is a mycotoxin that appears to be responsible for wood alcohol build up. In other words, the toxic effect prevents you from detoxifying wood alcohol. This leads to pancreas damage, invites pancreatic fluke infestation, and typically results in diabetes. I find it in potatoes; don’t eat potato skins. If you are a potato lover fix your own so you can peel them and remove any gray parts. I have also found it in regular coffee.

T-2 Toxin

T-2 toxin is a mold I have found in all cases of high blood pressure and kidney disease. It is present on dried peas and beans but it can be detoxified in 5 minutes by adding vitamin C to the water they are soaked in. Remember to throw away imperfect ones, first.

Sorghum Molds
Sorghum and millet carry these. Don’t buy sorghum syrup. Rinse millet in vitamin C water before cooking, or add vitamin C to the cooking water.

These mold toxins cause hemorrhaging, appetite loss, and inability to swallow. Elderly people are more easily poisoned than others; their hemorrhages show up as strokes and purple blotches on the skin.

Patulin
is the major fruit mold toxin. It is present in most common fruits if they are bruised. It is particularly hazardous since the mold that produces it can actually grow in your intestine in patches. At these locations, bowel bacteria, E. coli and Shigella, can climb through the colon wall to invade you. These bacteria are then free to spread to regions of injury and tumors.

If you have cancer or bowel disease go off fresh fruit (bananas and lemons are OK) for a few weeks. Then choose your fruit meticulously. Peel everything so you can see and avoid every bruise. Also take a 2 tsp. dose of Black Walnut Hull Tincture Extra Strength. This kills these bowel fungi. But you can reinfect with a single soft grape.

Mold Avoidance

We should be much more critical of our food.

Crackers are notoriously moldy. Never let your child eat crackers. Make crisp things in the oven from left over bakery goods. Just sprinkle with cinnamon.

Dried fruits are very moldy. Soak them in vitamin C water. Rinse and bake to dry again. Then store in the refrigerator or freezer. When fresh fruit gets overripe, don’t quickly bake it or preserve it. It’s too late.

Peanut butter (store bought) and other nut butters can’t be detoxified by adding vitamin C due to the mixing problem, even if you stir it in thoroughly. Make your own. Making your own peanut butter is a great adventure (see Recipes). Mix it with home made preserves, honey, marmalade, not very homogeneously so the bright colors and individual flavors stand out in contrast. Having three or four such spreads in the refrigerator will give your children the right perspective on food- homemade is better. Store bought jams are sweeter and brighter in color but strangely low in flavor and often indistinguishable from each other. Let your children eat the polluted foods that friends and restaurants serve (but not rare-cooked meats) so they can experience the difference. Their livers are strong enough to detoxify occasional small amounts.

Tea is quite moldy if purchased in bags. Although I used to recommend single herb teas (tea mixtures have solvents), I can now only recommend single herb teas from fresh sources in bulk (see Sources). This also gets you away from the benzalkonium chloride and possibly other antiseptics in the bag itself. When you get them, store them in their original double plastic bag. These herbs are so fresh, you’ll only need half as much to make a cup of tea. Use a bamboo strainer (non metal). Bake the strainer occasionally or put through the dishwasher to keep it sterile.

Artificial maple flavor did not have benzene, propyl alcohol or wood alcohol, nor molds. Turbinado sugar had none of these contaminants either. Brown sugar had sorghum mold. White sugar had propyl alcohol pollution. You can make your own syrup, safely, with artificial flavor and turbinado sugar. Of course, you’ll be missing the taste and nutritional minerals provided by the natural maple product but in a contest between nutritional value and toxicity, always choose the safe product.

Anything that is put in the refrigerator or freezer and then taken out develops moisture inside. Store cereals in kitchen cupboards or the freezer.

No government agency can test for all of these mycotoxins in all of our foods. Production and storage methods must be better regulated so as to be fail-safe. Simply sending inspectors out to look into the bins at grain elevators is not sufficient. Crusts of mold, sometimes several feet thick, that form on top of grain bins can be simply shoveled away before the inspector arrives. The humidity and temperature of stored grain should be regulated, requiring automated controls. This would soon be cost effective, too, in terms of reduced spoilage losses and higher quality prices earned. I believe that zear, aflatoxin and ergot require special regulations. Products that are imported should be subjected to the same tests as ours. Test results should be on the label.

Getting Away From Grains

In view of the many molds that are grain-related, and because these cannot be seen or smelled in pastas, breads, cold cereals, it would be wise to steer away from grain consumption. Always choose potatoes, because it is a vegetable instead of a grain, if you have a choice. The potato appears on your plate the way it was harvested. Whereas grain was hulled, stored for quite a long time, perhaps degerminated (the bran and germ picks up mold the fastest). Then it was mixed with assorted chemicals (fumigation, anti oxidants), each polluted in its own way, packaged again and stored again. Grains have a more tortuous history than potatoes that simply get sprayed.

Potatoes have their molds but they are nicely visible. And washing and peeling does away with them. Old literature advises that potatoes should be harvested by moonlight so the green drug isn’t produced in the white varieties. With modern mechanized harvesting this should pose no problem. But perhaps this must await the age of robots.

Dogs don’t eat hay and cats don’t eat fruit. This is not simply due to their inability to digest them. Nor to training. Their body wisdom guides them. But we can trick them into eating corn and soybeans by adding the flavors they like and thereby defeat their wisdom the same way we defeat ours. A concoction is made for them that is called “complete nutrition” and we feed this meal after meal, day after day, a most unnatural situation. The liver is deluged with the same set of pollutants time after time and never gets a rest. Humans still obey their body wisdom about varying their meals. This gives the liver a chance to catch up with detoxifying one pollutant while the new one builds up. If the liver is absolutely unable to handle something, you are informed quite quickly with an allergic reaction to the food.

Cats and dogs with their monolithic diet get no opportunity to reject food (except by vomiting or starvation). It is not surprising they are getting cancer with increasing frequency, a situation where the liver can no longer detoxify isopropyl alcohol, a common pollutant in their food.

Should we go back to the old days and make their food for them? Yes, they deserve pure food, they deserve variety. Table scraps would be much less toxic for them than their commercial feed. But what if they like and prefer their monolithic “scientific”, “complete”, polluted diet? If our food was doused with sugar for breakfast, lunch and supper, we wouldn’t care much about what was under the sugar either. And we’d continue wanting sugar, sugar, sugar the way a pet might want its favorite food and nothing else. Such is the deception of flavorings.

All change should be brought about slowly and with kindness for animals and humans alike. Learn what makes a good pet diet. Cats and dogs are both meat eaters. Cook chicken in a pressure cooker to kill all parasites. Put portions in the freezer. Add table scraps, dressed with a little butter, cheese or lard. Don’t wash the pet dishes with your own-dishwashers that don’t reach the boiling point. Serve fresh water daily. Standing water picks up bacteria. Don’t let food get more than a day old in the dishes. It picks up molds. Don’t feed pets at the table, keep them outdoors during mealtime.

After your pets have stopped eating propyl alcohol polluted food and are not getting propyl alcohol in their shampoos, there is no way they can get cancer. Whatever cancer they have will clear up by this change in diet and by giving them the pet parasite program.

Now they are back to a natural state and do not host human flukes. What a relief it is not to worry about reinfection from your pets.