Homemade Bone Broth for Blends
I get asked all the time about what I put into AJ’s blends. Usually the answer is simply “healthier versions of what we eat.” The one constant is that I almost always use homemade bone broth as the liquid in his blends.
Bone broth has a whole slew of reported health benefits – everything from improving gut function to building the immune system– and couldn’t be easier to make. I tend to make giant batches and freeze in smaller quantities to blend for his feeding tube. I’m planning to make a ton of turkey bone broth from our Thanksgiving dinner, here’s how:
– 2-5 lbs. of bones from a quality meat (organic chicken, grass-fed beef, etc.)
– 2 TBSP apple cider vinegar
– Water
Dump everything into a crockpot, fill to the top with water, and cook on low for a minimum of 24 hours. The longer the better. You can also choose to add various spices – parsley is a great one for digestion – or vegetables as well. You’ll strain it after cooking so throw in whatever you have on hand that’s easy.
After cooking, just strain and you’ve got a great liquid for blending.
Happy Thanksgiving everyone! Call dibs on the turkey bones now!
Julie
Best Tube Feeding Formula?
What’s The Best Tube Feeding Formula?
Ask any dietitian – “What should I be eating?” and they will tell you, “a wide variety of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, lean proteins, and healthy fats.” After all, that’s what the USDA Dietary Guidelines recommend for every American.
Why should that answer be any different for people with feeding tubes? If they have a working digestive system, it probably shouldn’t. That is why we created meals for people with feeding tubes, each with a lean protein, whole grain, healthy fat, and a full serving of fruits and vegetables. We didn’t set out to create the “best feeding tube formula” because we believe the best “formula” is not formula at all — what is best is a wide variety of healthy foods just like everyone else should eat.
There is no secret sauce or magical elixir in our meals. In fact, you can probably find the ingredients in your kitchen! Just like oral eaters don’t eat the same food for every meal, every day, we believe that those with feeding tubes deserve variety, too, and that’s why the idea of creating just one tube feeding formula didn’t make sense to us. We hope you love all six Real Food Blends meals – see what our customers have said about the difference real food has made in their lives!
Real Food Blends meals align with the Choose My Plate model, which focuses on a diet containing a variety of healthy foods.
Find out why so many people choose real food over formula in this two minute video.
The Best Tube Feeding Formula for You
If you are looking for the best tube feeding nutrition option for yourself or a loved one, talk to your doctor or dietitian about a blenderized diet. Real Food Blends meals are an easy way to start a blended diet, and a growing body of research supports the benefits of blended diets for people with feeding tubes of all ages. Once you try our meals, you might just find that the best tube feeding formula doesn’t exist – that what’s best is actually a diet rich in a variety of whole, real foods.
Have you or your loved one found that the best tube feeding formula is actually a blenderized diet? We’d love to hear your story – please leave a comment below or on our Facebook page.
Ready to try Real Food Blends? You can start by ordering a Trial Pack, which has one of each of our six meals. You can also check out our transition guide which includes a sample transition plan. However, always discuss any changes to your tube feeding diet with your medical.
Expanding Our Mission
I’m proud to announce that Randy Lewis, former SVP of Supply Chain & Logistics at Walgreens has joined the Advisory Board for Real Food Blends. You probably haven’t heard of him and maybe his title sounds beneficial from a business standpoint for Real Food Blends, but his value here extends so far beyond that.
Randy is a major believer – and implementer – of “disability inclusion” programs. When at Walgreens, he made disability inclusion a priority, resulting in Walgreens Distribution Centers employing up to 40% of their workforce as disabled employees.
So what’s this got to do with Real Food Blends? Well, part of my dream when I started this journey was to employ disabled people, especially those that may need or have needed feeding tubes. This isn’t “social entrepreneurship” or charity – this is personal. I don’t know what the future holds for my son AJ. My hope is that he is able to have a job one day and that there will be companies that see the value in employing people like him. And so…
Real Food Blends will be a company that makes disability inclusion a priority. We are already working with our local disabled workplace employer to employ disabled workers to pick, pack and ship your orders. As we grow, so will our commitment to disability inclusion.
Best,
Julie
Production Date is Set!
It’s official! The first Real Food Blends meals will be produced on January 13th, 2014! Although this date reflects a delay from what we expected when we first launched our IndieGoGo crowdfunding campaign, we are very excited to have a firm date set. As you may know if you’ve been reading along with our updates, getting to this point has not been easy, but I didn’t start Real Food Blends because I thought it was going to be easy! (Only worth it:)
After production is complete, the meals will go to a certified warehouse to be packed and shipped to our customers. Those of you that backed our crowdfunding campaign can expect your meals by the end of January. (International shipping will take an additional 1-2 weeks to arrive).
So where can I buy Real Food Blends meals?
We will begin pre-selling the meals here on RealFoodBlends.com in January. This first production is being done in limited quantities so we encourage you to order early!
We apologize for the delays. We thank you for your patience and support. Through the ups and downs, delays and victories, your support and encouragement has been amazing and is a big part of what helped us get to this point. Thank you! As always, stay tuned on Facebook or Twitter for more updates (NOTE: We have a special announcement coming this week!)
Julie Bombacino
Founder & CEO, Real Food Blends
Progress!
When I decided to start Real Food Blends, it was important to me to build a company that would not only improve the life of our son and Chief Inspiration Officer, AJ, but one that would help improve the lives of all people with a feeding tube, their families and caregivers. Years of business and life experience told me this wouldn’t be easy, and as it turns out some steps have taken and are taking longer than planned. I’m so appreciative of your early support and continued patience – you have my word that it will be worth it.
That being said, we continue to be overwhelmed by your positive response and support. Thank you. We also have a lot more to share with you about the progress of the meals and company. Here’s the latest:
– Right now, we are in a bit of a holding pattern as we wait on the last round of approvals. However, we will have an exact production date this week!! Prior to launching our crowdfunding campaign on IndieGoGo, we consulted some amazing food development experts and conducted months of testing and trial & error. The leap to making these three meals in a large scale, regulated manufacturing facility has been a challenge but I’m happy to report that this first production date will be set this week.
– The final nutrition facts and ingredients of the meals are now available on our Web site. Those of you that backed our IndieGoGo campaign may notice that some of the ingredients have changed from our original recipes. This is due to a variety of factors: Some ingredients didn’t ‘play nice’ with the processing needed to make the meals shelf-stable (we’re talking about you, chickpeas!) and it was simply impossible to buy some ingredients at this large scale level without additives or preservatives (the milk alternatives especially!). One thing that didn’t change: All of our meals are still just real food.
– Each pouch yields an 8 ounce serving size for about 40 calories per ounce. (The measurement on the front says “9.4 ounces” as this is a volume measurement, not fluid. These meals are purees after all!)
– You may notice that we “lost” the spout top that we originally planned to use. We are working on a Patent-Pending system that will feature this spout, but for now, we wanted to be able to deliver 100% real food, shelf-stable meals as quickly as possible. We are hopeful our next production will feature this spout top for easier use.
– All the necessary paperwork has been filed for the appropriate insurance billing codes for our meals. Stay tuned to our website for updates on insurance reimbursement. We are also working on the necessary paperwork for WIC programs and will keep you posted on this as well.
– Many of you have asked how you can buy / reserve meals now. We will soon begin to pre-sell the meals on our Web site. All of our IndieGoGo orders will be fulfilled first. These first meals will be available only in limited quantities, but we will continue to expand, adding more inventory and options as we learn what all of you want and like the most.
My apologies again on the delay. I want nothing more than to provide these meals to those of you that need and want them. However, we know that it’s more important to do this right, and thoroughly test along the way to make sure we deliver you the best possible blenderized meals – that is why I started Real Food Blends in the first place. If you have questions, please check out our FAQs section, send us an email or post to Facebook / Twitter. We’d love to hear from you!
Thanks!
Julie
