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I agree with you “Processed foods, excessive simple carbohydrates and sugars are the main evils in the kitchen, but there are a variety of reasons to eat less m
by mark_l_watson 4y ago
I agree with you “Processed foods, excessive simple carbohydrates and sugars are the main evils in the kitchen, but there are a variety of reasons to eat less meat too.”
I like to eat red meat two or three times a month: tasty and I think some red meat is healthy for me.
I avoid any packaged food except I am too lazy to always make homemade bread. +1 for shopping for fresh vegetables, fruits, berries, whole grains, beans,…
Really, the main center parts of grocery stores where everything is in plastic or boxes really needs to be avoided.
As a substitute for packaged deserts, making a pancake and berries is pretty good.
- autotune 4y agoMy breakfast these days is usually a few pieces of bacon and oatmeal. I am happy and still managing to burn off weight with that combo.
- s0rce 4y agoMaybe we have different definitions of bacon but isn't it heavily "processed"? Its cured with nitrates and salt/sugar and smoked.
- Taywee 4y agoDepends on the bacon. You can get uncured bacon without any added nitrates or flavorings at all.
- s0rce 4y agoIsn't that just sliced pork belly? Also, personally, I think if you cook it like bacon its not good, just grey and not flavorful, I just eat traditional bacon infrequently.
- bboylen 4y agoSorry to burst your bubble but "uncured" bacon is a sham They add celery powder instead of nitrates, so they can claim "nitrate free". However, the celery powder just decomposes into nitrates, achieving the same effect https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/food/the-uncured-bacon-illusion-its-actually-cured-and-its-not-better-for-you/2019/04/19/0c89630c-608c-11e9-9ff2-abc984dc9eec_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/food/the-uncured-ba...
- anxiously 4y agoThat's not true-- you can buy uncured bacon. It's simply "uncut pork belly" which many companies turn into bacon. We buy our pork belly direct from a farm and it hasn't been touched with anything.
- bboylen 4y agoOh yeah that of course exists, didn't mean to imply it didn't. Just the "uncured" but still processed bacon that is pretty much just regular bacon
- anxiously 4y agoThat's fair-- if it's in a package, looks, smells and tastes like bacon it's probably bacon :)
- Spooky23 4y ago“No added nitrates” usually means celery extract. (Ie nitrates)
- jnwatson 4y agoUncut pork belly isn’t bacon. Both are delicious, but definitely not the same thing.
- denton-scratch 4y agoIf it's not cured, then isn't it just raw pork?
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- Spooky23 4y agoThe point of bacon is that it’s cured. Otherwise it’s pork belly.
- 411111111111111 4y agoI just wish there was a way to buy meat from animals that hadn’t been systematically tortured for their short life until they were drowned in co2 for easy butchering… the only reason why I try to use as much vegetarian replacement products is because I have moral qualms eating meat from sentient creatures that have been so brutally abused… And even diary is hard to consume after seeing cows from a bio farm getting herded for milking. They’re in serious pain while getting continuously impregnated to maximise milk production… it’s really hard to stomach for me as I’m not morally opposed to milk/meat consumption… but the way these creatures are treated really make it hard.
- rdevsrex 4y agoYou can buy direct from farmer who treats the animals well, either individually or with a group of friends and family. You just have to have the freezer space.
- dahfizz 4y agoBuy from a smaller local farm. The meat is higher quality anyway
- atsuzaki 4y agoShop from local farms, if that's an option for you. All suffering won't be eliminated, of course, but if you want to consume animal products, it's way better IMO to support local farmers who are invested in ethical animal treatment and sustainable practices.
- eecc 4y agoWell, CO2 asphyxiation is so far the most humane approach to butchering. I remember a YouTube of a journalist looking for the most humane technique to administer capital punishment and it turned out that during co2 asphyxia the victim goes light-headed, even laughingly before passing out and away without even realizing. When told about this, Death Sentence advocates were disappointed that the victims wouldn't suffer while the sentence was carried out. (surprising eh!)
- 4y ago
- SantalBlush 4y agoPersonally speaking, the main setback of fresh fruits and vegetables isn't the taste or the inconvenience of cooking with them, it's the spoilage. They go bad so quickly that it's a chore to keep them around and make sure they get used in time.
- Cupertino95014 4y agoTrue. But some keep better than others. Cabbage, for instance, keeps longer than lettuce. Pluots keep, too, much better than peaches. Oranges, tangerines, and grapes keep well. Carrots keep pretty much forever.
- kevinventullo 4y agoFrozen vegetables have been a lifesaver for me. I’m not up on the latest research, but I remember reading at one point that frozen veggies actually retained more of their nutrients than fresh because they are often frozen immediately after being harvested.
- hunter2_ 4y agoDepends. Apples, carrots, citrus last a surprisingly long time in the fridge. Tomatoes prefer room temp. Extra bread always skips the fridge, right to the freezer. Freeze things rapidly, thaw them slowly. Plenty of tricks.
- rglullis 4y agoThat is a problem specific to North American/car-centric/suburban cultures, where people buy groceries once or twice a month. In places where the grocery shops are within walking distance and more integrated with your life, you just make groceries more frequently. Consequently, the food you buy is always fresher.
- dumpsterlid 4y agoI really really have a grudge against being born in a country that is so car-centric/surburban. It reduces my quality of life in soooooo many ways.
- 4y ago
- sgc 4y agoThe main reason people eat so unhealthily in the US is the price gouging in the vegetable aisle. My wife came home with a small bag of brussel sprouts and some "gourmet" Baklava that weighed a bit less, but not much. Virtually the same price. It is very common for (cardboard tasting) tomatoes, which come from a high-production plant, to cost as much or even more than meat, that comes from a plant-consuming animal and then butchered and constantly refrigerated. the vegetable/meat price ratio in the US means vegetables are comparatively 3-5x+ more expensive than any of the many other places I have lived. They are more like 10x less expensive than meat in in some places I have lived. The same goes for nuts to carbs, etc. And you will feel it immediately in lack of energy and hunger if you don't have protein and the sufficient number of daily calories, while lack of vegetables mainly leads to a more subtle lack of general health.
- bayofpigs 4y agoShopping yesterday and was shocked to see a single head of cauliflower for $7.99/each.
- Spooky23 4y agoBuyer beware. You need to shop. I can go to Whole Foods and pay $10 for a bag of mini-cucumbers. Or I can go to Aldi and pay $3 for the same product picked from the same field and delivered regionally on the same train. The answer people have to that is “I’m too busy and don’t have time to do that”. Grocery stores collect a lot of market intelligence and price to the audience. That’s why a tomato with a wholesale price of $0.50 costs more than a nice steak. Or why they sell pre-chopped carrots and onions to helpless people with money but without skill for $15/lb.
- dsfyu404ed 4y agoIf you shopped for vegetables like you did for meat (i.e. in the frozen food isle) most of that price difference would evaporate. Fresh vegetables have a lot of handling, refrigeration and shipping timeline requirements that add a lot to the cost.
- aaronax 4y agoIf you were to consider that in ye olden days the majority of things in the vegetable aisle would have been simply unavailable out of season, does it seem a bit less like price gouging? Transport is likely the most significant cost. I suppose our food production has generally centralized over time to the regions that can grow these vegetables all year, and almost no vegetables are grown locally. So we end up paying the transportation costs, even during the four weeks in the fall when we could be overwhelmed by cheap locally-grown vegetables. My ability to get broccoli in November in North Dakota is quite remarkable?
- personjerry 4y ago> Really, the main center parts of grocery stores where everything is in plastic or boxes really needs to be avoided. But that's where things are cheap and convenient! :(
- ClumsyPilot 4y agoIts not cheap at all, in most countries you have markets where you buy corn by weight for $1 a kilo or whatever. UK supermarkets sell one cob cut into two halves, wrapped in plastic for $2
- bcrosby95 4y agoI don't know how prices translate, but where I live in the US you usually get corn in the husk for $1 each. I prefer it in the husk because cooking with it on makes it taste better.
- bluGill 4y agoHere in Iowa we only buy corn in season. Picked the same day, on the husk for $6/dozen. I won't even touch the packaged stuff you sometimes see off season, and given how rarely I see if I don't think many others will either. In season the farmer delivers half her corn to the grocery store and sells the other half from the back of her (happens to be a girl where I live, other places it was a man) truck on the side of the road.
- OJFord 4y ago> I avoid any packaged food except I am too lazy to always make homemade bread. Ha, so do I, except if you started forcing me to give in to certain things bread would be one of the last I'd be willing to give up. (Unless I was allowed 'packaged' bread from an actual baker I suppose.) Pre-sliced supermarket bread has to be me the most miserable yet widespread thing in existence, can't stand the stuff any more.
- adrian_b 4y agoUntil this year I believed that if I would attempt to make bread at home every day I would waste too much time, because I was making bread in a traditional way. However, after some experimentation, I have discovered that it is possible to make bread in a simplified way, which does not need more than 10 minutes of effective work for one bread made of 500 g of wheat floor (including washing the vessels etc.). I bake the bread in a microwave oven, in a lid-covered glass vessel. The right baking time must be determined by experiments, in my oven it is 13 minutes @ 1000 W for the dough made of 500 g of floor. The advantage of the microwave oven is a short baking time and perfect reproducibility. After kneading the dough in a glass bowl for a few minutes, I can put it in the oven and go to do other activities. Now I make at home one bread every day after I wake up, for breakfast. When baked at microwaves, you can use a leavening agent for a more conventional bread, but even the unleavened bread grows enough for my taste. Previously I was tempted from time to time to buy some commercial bread or cakes, but now I no longer care about them, I like more my own bread.
- CadmiumYellow 4y agoWow, do you have a recipe for this? I would love to try it!
- adrian_b 4y agoThere is not much of a recipe, because the point is to be simple enough to be easy to make in less than a quarter of hour, every morning. The simplest bread can be made with nothing else than wheat floor and water, by using the same method as described by Cato the Elder, 2200 years ago (except for using microwaves instead of fire). With the wheat floor that I use (12.1% proteins), I add water that is 75% of the floor mass, e.g. 375 g water for 500 g floor. The dough is kneaded for a few minutes, until it becomes homogeneous and elastic. After kneading, it is possible to bake it immediately. However, in most days I prefer to make a bread with high protein content, in order to not exceed the daily intake of energy that would make me gain weight. For this option, the dough must be left to rest for 30 minutes, to become cohesive, than it can be washed for a few minutes, to remove a large part of the starch, enriching thus the dough in gluten, i.e. protein. I bake the dough in a glass vessel covered by a lid, 13 minutes @ 1000 W in a microwave oven. The exact time will depend on the oven, so it must be determined by experiments. When the baking time is too long, the bread will harden. Pure bread must be eaten immediately after cooling. Unlike the commercial bread with additives, it has poor shelf life. Starting from the simplest bread, there are many options. One is to add a leavening agent, for a softer bread. Now, I prefer the unleavened bread, because when baked in a microwave oven it still grows, maybe 30% of what it might grow with an leavening agent, but it remains more chewy than standard bread. Unless you have untreated teeth problems, this is a good thing, because it causes much more satiety than soft bread in the same quantity. Chewing also keeps your teeth or your dental implants healthy, by stressing the bones. Some people like to add salt to the bread, so that is another option (when that is done, one should take care that the recommended daily intake of salt is 4 to 5 g, so less salt should be added to other food). Various spices or seeds can also be added before baking. Another option is to make it sweet, by adding sugar or raisins. Instead of mixing the sugar uniformly in the dough, I prefer to deposit the sugar on the flat dough, before baking, and then roll the dough and bend the resulting cylinder into a torus when transferring into the baking vessel. This method allows the use of less sugar, while still producing an intense enough sweet sensation, due to the alternation of sweetened and unsweetened layers in the baked bread. In this way, I use 50 g sugar for dough made of 500 g floor, but that should be adjusted depending on the individual taste. On the sugar, before rolling, I deposit e.g. cocoa powder (e.g. 5 g for 50 g sugar), vanilla essence, ground cinnamon, ground cloves etc. The advantage of this kind of simplified cake vs. traditional cakes or commercial cakes, besides the very short time for preparation, which allows doing this before breakfast, every day, is that the chewy bread, optionally with high-protein content, can cause satiety after ingesting a much smaller amount than would be needed when eating traditional cakes.