Eat Your Vitamins: Your Guide to Using Natural Foods to Get the Vitamins, Minerals, and Nutrients Your Body Needs

by Mascha Davis, MPH, RDN

Timeline Unknown

Los Angeles, CA

November has kicked in and I’ve been struggling to manage my time to read, a majority of our projects are being delivered during this month. But, it hasn’t felt hectic, rather full of energy that everything is finally happening, a sense that a revolution is emerging. I’ve never been a person to be taking vitamins or supplements, or a person that cared about healthy eating, it was all-natural to me. However, in September I began reading more into vitamins and supplements. I began taking Omega-3, then added a multivitamin, then started taking black seed oil, then Vitamin D3. When I get into something, I really get into it, I wanted to add more vitamins and supplements to my weekly pill organizer/box.

For many things in life, I usually ask my old friend Ahmad Al-Houti, for his opinion or advice. Houti was surprised by the number of vitamins I was taking and how I wanted to increase that number. I was treating my vitamin intake like an investment portfolio, and now I was looking to diversify and expand. Houti and I discussed different vitamins and how they’re found naturally in ingredients and are best when consumed in food.

I began looking for a book that would get into this idea more. It doesn’t get too deep or act as a dictionary/encyclopedia of vitamins like Dr. Harold Silverman’s The Pill Book for pills, nor does it go for the more exotic/less known vitamins like Ashwagandha or some other stuff that a Youtube personality is (promoting) swearing by that it changed their life. Instead, it sticks to the ones we need, can find, and usually lacks. After discussing each vitamin’s history, debunking the misconceptions associated with it, then providing a well-written description, pointing out its role in the body and its benefits, illustrating the side effects and signs of deficiency, mentioning how much one needs and the best way to consume it, and presting its natural food sources; the book surprisingly mentions interesting recipes that one can cook where the vitamin is highlighted in. Eat better.