Fresh cooked food is the way to go!
I, as a toxicologist, consider the natural toxins to be the greater danger.
I have to add one point here: I am a resident of the EU. Here, several quite dangerous chemicals are forbidden that are still legal and used in the US. I believe you are US-based? In that case, artificial food contaminants like pesticides etc. might be a bigger problem for you than they are in Europe.
Still, mycotoxins are a problem in the US aswell, especially aflatoxins. Did you read the dedicated post on these toxins from 1,5 years ago? I'm still not sure if I'll extend it (in that case I would also re-post it in English) or just translate the existing article to german... but if you are interested you can just read it in the short version here.
As for nuts, I only eat them with lights on, and I look at every single one of them for dark-brown/black/strange-looking parts. The toxicologist's curse: Nut paranoia.
I live in Portugal @sco :) and I will surely follow the link you provided here. I am interested!
Not long after I read your post I needed to pop into the supermarket and I swear , as I was browsing the baked goods, the nuts, the veggies I thought of you and thought “oh Gosh, it must be a nightmare having all that knowledge about all the processed food, fungi, pesticides, natural toxins”. 😥
Either way, thank you for the info about nuts, I will certainly be more careful from now on! Your paranoia has just been passed on :/
Have a wonderful evening! :)
Ah, Portugal, very nice! I wasn't aware of this.
It is both a nightmare and a relief to be informed. ;-)
But @sco, you can't say this without elaborating it further ... please continue :D
because .... :P
Nightmare is obvious... see "nut paranoia".
Relief because at some point you see that almost everything contains something toxic, yet somehow mankind survived for thousands of years. --> it can't be too bad --> When it comes to my personal nutrition, I don't care much about most toxins and focus my attention on those that are either dangerous for real or easily avoided.
Ow ... sorry @sco, I completely misread that. I thought it was within the context of living in Portugal. But yep, it’s true. Being informed has its advantages and disadvantages :)