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Ancient/authentic wheat varieties taste amazing !!! I like millet, einkorn, wheat berry, rye berry, kamut, etc. I get them at the farmer's market. Totally wo

by chubot 4y ago

Ancient/authentic wheat varieties taste amazing !!! I like millet, einkorn, wheat berry, rye berry, kamut, etc. I get them at the farmer's market. Totally worth it This was a revelation in taste and health in my 40's :) I realized that all the no carb / low carb fads of the past few years could be replaced with eating what people were eating thousands of years ago, before economic optimization turned wheat into nutrient-free, calorie dense commodity. (Similar things happened with rice and corn -- the heirloom varieties are amazing; the commodity stuff is highly processed and has fewer nutrients) --- Remember there was that trend of people eating a McDonald's hamburger without the bun? Do people still do that? They were onto something (processed wheat makes you sick), but the sad thing is that the real solution isn't available because of economics. You could eat it with real bread from heirloom wheat, and it wouldn't cause the health problems. But you don't have that option. (Although obviously the meat leaves something to be desired too) --- Another random anecdote: the first episode of Chef's Table: Pizza on Netflix now tells the story of an Italian guy from NYC who discovered amazing wheat in Arizona and makes acclaimed pizza there :)

cma 4y ago
Commodity corn on the cob is highly processed? Was that a mistake?
- djur 4y ago
  I think there's a good point to be made here: selective breeding has resulted in fruits and vegetables that are nutritionally far different from their predecessors, and yet we usually consider those foods "natural" and "unprocessed". Corn is much sweeter than it was even a few decades ago.
  - colechristensen 4y ago
    The corn you eat off the cob is a very specific set of varieties which make up a tiny tiny tiny percentage of corn crops produced for other purposes. Bred to have sugars instead of starches at a specific development stage, and mostly to keep that for long enough to make it through the supply chain. Actual fresh properly ripe sweet corn is a kind of “loses its best characteristics in hours” situation, unfortunately. Sweet corn traits have little to do with the rest of the corn crop. Any corn (maize) is unrecognizable compared to its unmodified form and has been for hundreds or thousands of years.
    - cma 4y ago
      I've never heard "processed" refering to selecrive breeding or genetic engineering. I thought it meant mechanical processing, heating/drying, and/or sometimes shelf-stabilization with chemicals. I don't think corn on the cob is considered processed, other than the harvesting and possibly shucking process if shucked.
- chubot 4y ago
  I would think of "corn" as a very overloaded word It wouldn't make economic sense to use the same thing for corn on the cob vs. doritos / Frito Lay vs. high fructose corn syrup, and it likely isn't In the last case, it's mostly chemistry and it doesn't even matter what the original plant was ---- that said the corn at the farmer's market is way better than supermarket corn :) And just as cheap (when it's in season), unlike some other produce
EdwardDiego 4y ago
> processed wheat makes you sick Does it? How? Are we assuming a diet with no other sources of fibre or vitamins?
- bluGill 4y ago
  The average American eats McDonald's once a week (or so i've read, I don't know how to verify), I know a fair number of people who are well under that, so a lot of people must be eating more often. There are a number of other fast food joints. If you get a varied diet you can have fast food once in a while, but it isn't very healthy alone.
  - datavirtue 4y ago
    I used to work at a financial services company that served the unbanked. You could count on seeing a Wal-Mart trip followed by MacDonalds on every account--multiple times per week. Poor people eat garbage in the US.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - EdwardDiego 4y ago
      Walmart is a cheap place to shop yeah? And I'm guessing Maccas is cheaper in the US than in my country?
- chubot 4y ago
  It obviously varies ... Kids seem to love it / thrive on it -- look at a typical 2 year old with mac and cheese or Costco pizza :) I think as adults people tend to not be able to metabolize that kind of diet. In populations, it repeatably causes a typical set of chronic diseases ("Western diet disease", obesity, diabetes, etc.). And there is more processed wheat/corn/rice in 2020 than there was in 1980, due to economic optimization. It's just harder to avoid So there was a trend away from carbs and bread in the last decade or 2, and those people could have also just avoided processed wheat / soft white bread of the type talked about in the original article. Carbs can be GOOD if they come from a good source, which the original article is talking about
Mikeb85 4y ago
> millet Isn't wheat... It's an entirely different family of grasses (millet, teff, sorghum are all types of millets).
holoduke 4y ago
Bread in the past contained stones and sand. As a result most people in the past had very poor teeth. The diet people had in the past lacked a lot of ingredients. As a result most people developed poorly. Processed food is not necessary bad. Its probably better than its ancient alternatives.
- EdwardDiego 4y ago
  Anecdote from NZ history - in areas where aruhe (the rhizome of the bracken fern) or shellfish were a staple food, a leading cause of death in Māori was septicaemia - blood poisoning from tooth abscesses caused by a diet high in materials that were damaging to teeth - the tough fibres in the aruhe, and the sand in the shellfish.
- mandmandam 4y ago
  "The past" is a very long, very large place to be compared like this. Many ancient skeletons show people far healthier, with far better teeth, than those of the recent past or today. Most of our longevity comes down to antibiotics and better childbirth. A huge amount of today's food is basically bland, over-processed, mass produced, Round-up soaked, hormone-addled, preservative-laden, antibiotic and micro-plastic filled sludge that uses fat, salt, sugar and colorants to pass as edible. Claiming this as superior to the local, artisanal, organic produce filled diets with a variety of meats from wildlife that hadn't been exploited to extinction is a very, very, very hot take.
- chubot 4y ago
  I'd say there was high variance in the past, like there is today But the diet that Americans eat today is worse than that of the past, adjusted for income i.e. we are > 1000x wealthier now, but eat poorer quality food than somebody with the same wealth 1000, 2000, or even 10,000 years ago. This is because the entire food industry has "scaled" and become economically optimized It's mistake to think we can't regress, or haven't regressed and forgotten valuable knowledge -- architecture is another good example

by chubot 4y ago

cma 4y ago

Commodity corn on the cob is highly processed? Was that a mistake?

djur 4y ago
I think there's a good point to be made here: selective breeding has resulted in fruits and vegetables that are nutritionally far different from their predecessors, and yet we usually consider those foods "natural" and "unprocessed". Corn is much sweeter than it was even a few decades ago.
- colechristensen 4y ago
  The corn you eat off the cob is a very specific set of varieties which make up a tiny tiny tiny percentage of corn crops produced for other purposes. Bred to have sugars instead of starches at a specific development stage, and mostly to keep that for long enough to make it through the supply chain. Actual fresh properly ripe sweet corn is a kind of “loses its best characteristics in hours” situation, unfortunately. Sweet corn traits have little to do with the rest of the corn crop. Any corn (maize) is unrecognizable compared to its unmodified form and has been for hundreds or thousands of years.
  - cma 4y ago
    I've never heard "processed" refering to selecrive breeding or genetic engineering. I thought it meant mechanical processing, heating/drying, and/or sometimes shelf-stabilization with chemicals. I don't think corn on the cob is considered processed, other than the harvesting and possibly shucking process if shucked.
chubot 4y ago
I would think of "corn" as a very overloaded word It wouldn't make economic sense to use the same thing for corn on the cob vs. doritos / Frito Lay vs. high fructose corn syrup, and it likely isn't In the last case, it's mostly chemistry and it doesn't even matter what the original plant was ---- that said the corn at the farmer's market is way better than supermarket corn :) And just as cheap (when it's in season), unlike some other produce

EdwardDiego 4y ago

> processed wheat makes you sick Does it? How? Are we assuming a diet with no other sources of fibre or vitamins?

bluGill 4y ago
The average American eats McDonald's once a week (or so i've read, I don't know how to verify), I know a fair number of people who are well under that, so a lot of people must be eating more often. There are a number of other fast food joints. If you get a varied diet you can have fast food once in a while, but it isn't very healthy alone.
- datavirtue 4y ago
  I used to work at a financial services company that served the unbanked. You could count on seeing a Wal-Mart trip followed by MacDonalds on every account--multiple times per week. Poor people eat garbage in the US.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - EdwardDiego 4y ago
    Walmart is a cheap place to shop yeah? And I'm guessing Maccas is cheaper in the US than in my country?
chubot 4y ago
It obviously varies ... Kids seem to love it / thrive on it -- look at a typical 2 year old with mac and cheese or Costco pizza :) I think as adults people tend to not be able to metabolize that kind of diet. In populations, it repeatably causes a typical set of chronic diseases ("Western diet disease", obesity, diabetes, etc.). And there is more processed wheat/corn/rice in 2020 than there was in 1980, due to economic optimization. It's just harder to avoid So there was a trend away from carbs and bread in the last decade or 2, and those people could have also just avoided processed wheat / soft white bread of the type talked about in the original article. Carbs can be GOOD if they come from a good source, which the original article is talking about

Mikeb85 4y ago

> millet Isn't wheat... It's an entirely different family of grasses (millet, teff, sorghum are all types of millets).

holoduke 4y ago

Bread in the past contained stones and sand. As a result most people in the past had very poor teeth. The diet people had in the past lacked a lot of ingredients. As a result most people developed poorly. Processed food is not necessary bad. Its probably better than its ancient alternatives.

EdwardDiego 4y ago
Anecdote from NZ history - in areas where aruhe (the rhizome of the bracken fern) or shellfish were a staple food, a leading cause of death in Māori was septicaemia - blood poisoning from tooth abscesses caused by a diet high in materials that were damaging to teeth - the tough fibres in the aruhe, and the sand in the shellfish.
mandmandam 4y ago
"The past" is a very long, very large place to be compared like this. Many ancient skeletons show people far healthier, with far better teeth, than those of the recent past or today. Most of our longevity comes down to antibiotics and better childbirth. A huge amount of today's food is basically bland, over-processed, mass produced, Round-up soaked, hormone-addled, preservative-laden, antibiotic and micro-plastic filled sludge that uses fat, salt, sugar and colorants to pass as edible. Claiming this as superior to the local, artisanal, organic produce filled diets with a variety of meats from wildlife that hadn't been exploited to extinction is a very, very, very hot take.
chubot 4y ago
I'd say there was high variance in the past, like there is today But the diet that Americans eat today is worse than that of the past, adjusted for income i.e. we are > 1000x wealthier now, but eat poorer quality food than somebody with the same wealth 1000, 2000, or even 10,000 years ago. This is because the entire food industry has "scaled" and become economically optimized It's mistake to think we can't regress, or haven't regressed and forgotten valuable knowledge -- architecture is another good example