Carey Davis-Munro Talks Health & Nutrition – Food and Wellbeing Coach Carey Davis-Munro has over 25 years of experience in the field of health, fitness, and wellbeing. She has worked in the food industry creating multi-award-winning products, notably a first-to-market healthy and nutrient-dense chocolate truffle, the base recipe for which is included in her book, Eat Nourish Flourish.
Having run food workshops for years, Carey is also a motivational speaker on nutrition, telling her own story and examining the psychology behind healthy eating and how to bring a family along with you on the journey to optimum health.
Her key message is about urging people to prioritise their health and to do so through the single biggest influence on lifestyle diseases: food.
Women Talking speaks to Carey to find out more about her passion.
Have you always been interested in health and nutrition?
“Yes, I have. I played high-level competitive sports when younger which was my whole life, but it wasn’t until my body crashed in a number of ways that I became really interested in understanding how to optimally nourish and heal ourselves and delved deeply into the science around that. From changing everything including my pots and pans I went on a detox I have never really come off and now find joy in helping others do the same. Understanding the properties of food and realising our gut is largely responsible for our mental and physical health is fascinating and hands us back the power of proactively taking care of ourselves.
Have you always followed a healthy diet?
My mum cooked a lot when I was a child but not quite in the same way I do now. But I really didn’t listen to my body or eat as well as I should have through university and my 20’s which meant when I became ill with glandular fever repeatedly and then chronic fatigue, my body couldn’t fully recover. I was on and off the operating table several times. The turning point was a gift for me, to understand my nutritional needs and the way my gut could support my overall wellbeing, and really turned my health and my life around.
What are the simplest changes we can all make to our eating habits?
It is as much about what we get out as much as the good stuff that we get in. So, step 1 in my book is to take a huge black sack and rid your kitchen and home of anything that is detrimental to your health and takes you ‘backwards’. The junk, the poor-quality snacks laden with yeast, sugar and ‘salt’, the fizzy drinks, the chocolate etc. By doing this you turn your home into a ‘haven’ where only the good stuff is allowed over the threshold of the front door.
Alongside the simplest change, we can make is not about food at all – but to focus on getting our bodies hydrated, cleansed, and supported through consumption of 2-3 litres of water a day. This can be via infusions and teas too. We can do without food for a while…but every single bodily function requires water to work optimally.
How can you encourage people to stick to a healthier diet once they have made healthier choices?
As a food coach, this is about doing the deep work on the psychological. We need to get our head in the right space and place to make the habits stick. This is why less than 7% of new year resolutions last past the first week. I work with clients on their values, personal philosophy, and long-term goals in addition to their underlying motivations and outcomes. This puts ‘petrol in the engine’ when it comes to weak moments and making positive healthier choices becomes a no brainer. I don’t work with people on short term diets or changes.
This is about sustainable long term lifestyle decisions that will positively impact their longevity, relationships, health, work and much more.
Tell me more about your superfood chocolate truffles?
Cacao and chocolate per se are a superfood. It is only the rubbish we mix it with that makes this a poor choice of ‘treat’ often.
Raw organic cacao will give you a boost of serotonin (our happy chemical) and can be a positive part of our diet if we include it in the right way. Not in cheap chocolate bars combined with milk solids, refined sugars, glucose and much more that is detrimental to our wellbeing.
My truffles use raw organic ingredients mixing the cacao with almonds for a protein hit, coconut and dates. There is not an ingredient in them that I wouldn’t call a ‘forward food’ – taking you forward into the future in a positive way. They are fibre and omega-rich, and it goes without saying, totally delicious which any food should be!
You will find the recipe for the Chocolate Truffles in her book Eat Nourish Flourish here.
Poppy Watt