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Have a life means different things to different people, but in the end the point is the same. Make friends, do hobbies... things that make life actually enjoyab

Have a life means different things to different people, but in the end the point is the same. Make friends, do hobbies... things that make life actually enjoyable. Is cooking enjoyable? Sure, but spending so much time on it every single day can be a serious burden

alisonatwork 5y ago
You don't need to spend "so much time" cooking to eat low in sugar. Plenty of vegetables can be eaten raw, notably all the "standard" salad vegetables in the west like cucumber, carrot, tomato, avocado, celery, bell pepper and so on. You can eat them in a salad by themselves, or you can make some noodles (thin Asian noodles just require stirring for a few seconds in boiling water) and toss the raw veges in with some seasoning of your choice. Nuts and seeds are easy to add too, and don't require cooking. Tofu doesn't need cooking. If you don't mind eating bread, you can make a sandwich instead of a salad or a noodle bowl. If you are making a breakfast or don't mind oats for dinner, just buy quick oats and add some water, stir it up and eat. Frying an egg doesn't take long, or stir-frying some meat, if you eat those things. No need to put a pot on the stove or chuck something in the oven. Think about how people eat when they are camping, or how short order cooks make food in diners, or how street vendors cook stuff up for you on-the-spot. I would say most meals you should be able to make within 15 minutes of chopping/prep, plus 5 minutes if it needs to be fried. It's really not that big of an investment.
- surfpel 5y ago
  > Plenty of vegetables can be eaten raw And this is what I do, but it doesn't meet my caloric needs unfortunately. I really wish I could sustain myself off of just that. Same with some of your other suggestions. I know because I've tried for a while :) > Think about how people eat when they are camping People eat like that because they're camping > I would say most meals you should be able to make within 15 minutes of chopping/prep, plus 5 minutes if it needs to be fried Yeah that's just not true
  - alisonatwork 5y ago
    I'm not sure what you mean by your "caloric needs" being so high that you cannot possibly meet them with a meal made in 20 minutes. You could eat a stick of butter in 5 minutes. No sugar. Plenty of calories. In fact, that's exactly what some thru hikers do. If you really require a vast amount of calories, this is solved by eating fat, which you could get in oils, nuts, seeds, butter, cheese and processed meats - all of which require zero cooking time. If you don't like the taste of any vegetables, or noodles, or porridge/oatmeal, or bread, or fruit, or stir-fried meat, or anything that does not require being stewed or baked or smoked for several hours... then just say so. But then that's a personal preference for the type of food you choose to eat - it doesn't mean that it takes "so much time" to cook nutritional, varied and delicious food. It's fine if you only enjoy a very limited set of foods, but I suspect most people have a broader palate.
  - zepto 5y ago
    > And this is what I do, but it doesn't meet my caloric needs unfortunately. I really wish I could sustain myself off of just that. Same with some of your other suggestions. I know because I've tried for a while :) From the way you talk, it sounds like a diet full of sugar and quick to prepare processed foods is actually the optimal one for you because your body and mind simply can’t deal with anything else. If this is the case, then maybe it’s best to enjoy convenient foods, and enjoy ‘living’, and not worry about health consequences because that will only detract from your present enjoyment.
    - surfpel 5y ago
      Such a passive aggressive comment. I don’t understand why people feel the need to be so vitriolic in the face of an experience that doesn’t match their own on this site
      - zepto 5y ago
        You’re reading something into my comment that isn’t there, indeed it’s the opposite of what I wrote. The point is that people keep offering you suggestions because you seem to be saying there is a problem. You’re obviously wrong that the problem can’t be solved since lots of people have solved it. That isn’t a matter of your experience not matching others. What we are left with is that you are simply making a choice based on your own priorities and preferences. I genuinely think that if this is true, you would be better off simply being happy with your choice. That sentiment is about respecting what is true for you and wishing you well. I imagine there are a lot of people who have similar priorities to you and are just fine with that.
- seanmcdirmid 5y ago
  > I would say most meals you should be able to make within 15 minutes of chopping/prep, plus 5 minutes if it needs to be fried. It's really not that big of an investment. This is how I cook dinner when its my term, but that is usually just broccoli or cauliflower and pork (stir fried) over rice. My wife takes a lot long with her meal prep...and they taste better. Restaurants/cafeterias have scale and specialization working for them, you can't compare that to making individual or family meals on your own.
  - alisonatwork 5y ago
    I didn't talk about restaurants/cafeterias, I mentioned diners and street vendors for a reason. Specifically these places feature solo cooks who cook complete dishes to order within a few minutes by using a griddle or wok. The only significant amount of time required here is the chopping of the raw ingredients, which they do beforehand so the customers can get their orders in 5 minutes. At home that might take up to 20 minutes, depending how much you need to chop. There are plenty of different dishes you can cook like this. Of course there are also plenty of other dishes that require a longer time to cook, but that's beside the point. The original comment was complaining that it takes "7 hours a day" and causes burnout to prepare a variety of meals that aren't packed with sugar. This is an absurd statement that at best adds nothing to the conversation and at worst discourages people from attempting to develop simple, healthy eating habits.
    - seanmcdirmid 5y ago
      7 hours a day is definitely an exaggeration but it isn’t that far from some common extreme cases. My mother in law when we visit her will spend most of her time in the kitchen preparing each meal, but then she kills her own chickens also (this being a low tier Chinese city). She has just done cooking that way most of her life. Then again, when we lived in China eating in was a special case and eating out was cheaper/more time efficient and was pretty healthy if you chose the right stuff.
      - zepto 5y ago
        Sure - but the point is that the original commenter is using an extreme as though it was typical or necessary, when it is clearly not. I have a curry recipe that takes about 3 hours to execute, however it makes about 20 portions which can then be frozen, and reheated. That’s 9 minutes per portion, and reheating it along with some rice from a rice cooker takes 5-6 minutes of attention. I.e. 15 minutes per meal. My lunch today will be pan fried salmon with crispy skin, a baked potato, and lettuce. The potato takes at most 2 minutes to scrub and put into a toaster oven. It takes about 2 minutes to rinse and select a few lettuce leaves. The salmon takes about 10 minutes to pin-bone, season, and cook isolaterally. Again, around 15 minutes. I learned the salmon cooking technique from watching a 10 minute Gordon Ramsay YouTube video. This stuff isn’t rocket science. You don’t have to spend 7 hours a day cooking, but you do have to accumulate learned techniques steadily over time, just like with anything you want to do yourself.
zepto 5y ago
> Sure, but every spending so much time on it every single day can be a serious burden Yes, but that simply isn’t necessary.

alisonatwork 5y ago

You don't need to spend "so much time" cooking to eat low in sugar. Plenty of vegetables can be eaten raw, notably all the "standard" salad vegetables in the west like cucumber, carrot, tomato, avocado, celery, bell pepper and so on. You can eat them in a salad by themselves, or you can make some noodles (thin Asian noodles just require stirring for a few seconds in boiling water) and toss the raw veges in with some seasoning of your choice. Nuts and seeds are easy to add too, and don't require cooking. Tofu doesn't need cooking. If you don't mind eating bread, you can make a sandwich instead of a salad or a noodle bowl. If you are making a breakfast or don't mind oats for dinner, just buy quick oats and add some water, stir it up and eat. Frying an egg doesn't take long, or stir-frying some meat, if you eat those things. No need to put a pot on the stove or chuck something in the oven. Think about how people eat when they are camping, or how short order cooks make food in diners, or how street vendors cook stuff up for you on-the-spot. I would say most meals you should be able to make within 15 minutes of chopping/prep, plus 5 minutes if it needs to be fried. It's really not that big of an investment.

surfpel 5y ago
> Plenty of vegetables can be eaten raw And this is what I do, but it doesn't meet my caloric needs unfortunately. I really wish I could sustain myself off of just that. Same with some of your other suggestions. I know because I've tried for a while :) > Think about how people eat when they are camping People eat like that because they're camping > I would say most meals you should be able to make within 15 minutes of chopping/prep, plus 5 minutes if it needs to be fried Yeah that's just not true
- alisonatwork 5y ago
  I'm not sure what you mean by your "caloric needs" being so high that you cannot possibly meet them with a meal made in 20 minutes. You could eat a stick of butter in 5 minutes. No sugar. Plenty of calories. In fact, that's exactly what some thru hikers do. If you really require a vast amount of calories, this is solved by eating fat, which you could get in oils, nuts, seeds, butter, cheese and processed meats - all of which require zero cooking time. If you don't like the taste of any vegetables, or noodles, or porridge/oatmeal, or bread, or fruit, or stir-fried meat, or anything that does not require being stewed or baked or smoked for several hours... then just say so. But then that's a personal preference for the type of food you choose to eat - it doesn't mean that it takes "so much time" to cook nutritional, varied and delicious food. It's fine if you only enjoy a very limited set of foods, but I suspect most people have a broader palate.
- zepto 5y ago
  > And this is what I do, but it doesn't meet my caloric needs unfortunately. I really wish I could sustain myself off of just that. Same with some of your other suggestions. I know because I've tried for a while :) From the way you talk, it sounds like a diet full of sugar and quick to prepare processed foods is actually the optimal one for you because your body and mind simply can’t deal with anything else. If this is the case, then maybe it’s best to enjoy convenient foods, and enjoy ‘living’, and not worry about health consequences because that will only detract from your present enjoyment.
  - surfpel 5y ago
    Such a passive aggressive comment. I don’t understand why people feel the need to be so vitriolic in the face of an experience that doesn’t match their own on this site
    - zepto 5y ago
      You’re reading something into my comment that isn’t there, indeed it’s the opposite of what I wrote. The point is that people keep offering you suggestions because you seem to be saying there is a problem. You’re obviously wrong that the problem can’t be solved since lots of people have solved it. That isn’t a matter of your experience not matching others. What we are left with is that you are simply making a choice based on your own priorities and preferences. I genuinely think that if this is true, you would be better off simply being happy with your choice. That sentiment is about respecting what is true for you and wishing you well. I imagine there are a lot of people who have similar priorities to you and are just fine with that.
seanmcdirmid 5y ago
> I would say most meals you should be able to make within 15 minutes of chopping/prep, plus 5 minutes if it needs to be fried. It's really not that big of an investment. This is how I cook dinner when its my term, but that is usually just broccoli or cauliflower and pork (stir fried) over rice. My wife takes a lot long with her meal prep...and they taste better. Restaurants/cafeterias have scale and specialization working for them, you can't compare that to making individual or family meals on your own.
- alisonatwork 5y ago
  I didn't talk about restaurants/cafeterias, I mentioned diners and street vendors for a reason. Specifically these places feature solo cooks who cook complete dishes to order within a few minutes by using a griddle or wok. The only significant amount of time required here is the chopping of the raw ingredients, which they do beforehand so the customers can get their orders in 5 minutes. At home that might take up to 20 minutes, depending how much you need to chop. There are plenty of different dishes you can cook like this. Of course there are also plenty of other dishes that require a longer time to cook, but that's beside the point. The original comment was complaining that it takes "7 hours a day" and causes burnout to prepare a variety of meals that aren't packed with sugar. This is an absurd statement that at best adds nothing to the conversation and at worst discourages people from attempting to develop simple, healthy eating habits.
  - seanmcdirmid 5y ago
    7 hours a day is definitely an exaggeration but it isn’t that far from some common extreme cases. My mother in law when we visit her will spend most of her time in the kitchen preparing each meal, but then she kills her own chickens also (this being a low tier Chinese city). She has just done cooking that way most of her life. Then again, when we lived in China eating in was a special case and eating out was cheaper/more time efficient and was pretty healthy if you chose the right stuff.
    - zepto 5y ago
      Sure - but the point is that the original commenter is using an extreme as though it was typical or necessary, when it is clearly not. I have a curry recipe that takes about 3 hours to execute, however it makes about 20 portions which can then be frozen, and reheated. That’s 9 minutes per portion, and reheating it along with some rice from a rice cooker takes 5-6 minutes of attention. I.e. 15 minutes per meal. My lunch today will be pan fried salmon with crispy skin, a baked potato, and lettuce. The potato takes at most 2 minutes to scrub and put into a toaster oven. It takes about 2 minutes to rinse and select a few lettuce leaves. The salmon takes about 10 minutes to pin-bone, season, and cook isolaterally. Again, around 15 minutes. I learned the salmon cooking technique from watching a 10 minute Gordon Ramsay YouTube video. This stuff isn’t rocket science. You don’t have to spend 7 hours a day cooking, but you do have to accumulate learned techniques steadily over time, just like with anything you want to do yourself.

zepto 5y ago

> Sure, but every spending so much time on it every single day can be a serious burden Yes, but that simply isn’t necessary.