5 ms·

Good piece, and makes sense, but some examples would be helpful -- there's a lot of talk about foods engineered to taste like protein but that have carbs. Anyo

• sp332 13y ago
  Chicken with just a little salt has good flavor. And beef is pretty good by itself.
• icegreentea 13y ago
  They mean that they've added umani (savouryness) to their product. Most famously/commonly done with MSG.
  • Turing_Machine 13y ago
    Also soy sauce and some other fermented sauces (Worcestershire sauce, e.g.) hydrolyzed vegetable protein, hydrolyzed yeast, soy extracts, and the ever popular "natural flavor".
• pyalot2 13y ago
  Simply put, bad is: Anything ready made, pasta, bread, and anything not visibly grown or sliced in one piece. Good is: Everything that's noticably not been processed in any way. And if you want to stay off carbs, stay away from potatoes, rice, corn, etc.
  • mhurron 13y ago
    > bad is: ... pasta, bread ... Yep, those French and Italians are dropping like flies. > stay away from ... rice Ah yes, Asia, the poster child of poor dietary health in the world.
    • Turing_Machine 13y ago
      Well, there's a reason why modern Japanese raised on a more Western diet average something like 6" taller than Japanese raised on a traditional diet. The same holds true for medieval Europeans and their all-natural diet. Go look at some old suits of armor some time -- those guys were tiny, and they were the biggest, strongest men of their time.
      • hyperpape 13y ago
        Europeans also used to be quite short. The whole world is getting taller.
        • eddiedunn 13y ago
          Actually, the world is getting to the height of how humans were pre-agriculture, at around 6 feet. As Asia and ancient Rome has proven, high carb low protein diets do not make for great height. There is also reason to believe that a height in great excess of 6 feet is not optimal, however. Our physiology - bones and joints - don't allow for it.
      • mhurron 13y ago
        I am not advocating traditional diets, I am pointing out the silliness of demonizing pasta, bread and rice when many groups of people that basically live on these things do not have the problems that staying away from these foods supposedly solves. > those guys were tiny Diet was hardly their only problem.
        • TillE 13y ago
          My general sense with keto and the carbs-are-evil philosophy is that it's a handy solution for relatively quick weight loss. It really does work for that. But it's not at all clear if shunning carbohydrates is a healthier option in the long term, compared with a more diverse diet with similar total calories. As you suggest, there's considerable evidence that grains are not evil.
        • 13y ago
• justincormack 13y ago
  If your chicken and beef taste bland try eating some less industrial food. Good beef tastes amazing, and chicken is pretty good.
• gamblor956 13y ago
  You need to buy better chicken and beef (usually meaning organic chicken and grass-fed beef), since both absolutely have flavor when properly raised.
  • mhurron 13y ago
    Grass fed beef is worth every penny you'll spend on it if you are somewhere where you can find it. When you have it for the first time though, prepare it some way with a minimum of seasonings, maybe like a simple burger patty. If you first prepare it in something beef is just a part of, say something like a chili, you won't necessarily taste why it is worth a little more. And that's not talking about any possible health benefits it just tastes great.
• DanBC 13y ago
  Engineered to taste like chicken means pretty much that - they try to reproduce some of the texture and mouthfeel. They make it a bit bland and chicken-like, then use it for something that would have chicken. Not sure about your first paragraph. I know tha. If you take a rel chicken and roast it, and serve it with vegetables, that you'll have a tasty nutritious meal. But if you take that same chicken you can take the breast meat off and sell that as fillets; same with the legs; the wings get sold too. You do that with all the bird. Eventually you have a carcass from which you mechanically recover as much meat and meat-like protien as possible. That gets sold off for low value meat style products. So, you take some meat and chop it and re-form it into small lumps. You cover those in a salty spicy coating (which will soak up fat) and you fry those. You serve them with a sweet sauce (ketchup; bbq; anything with sugar). Now you have a low value bit of meat that you can sell in high volume to many many people for incredible markup. It is really tasty - some people think there aee combinations of sugar / salt / fat that are hyper paletable - and really easy to eat. This kind of popcorn chicken will have less protien, but more salt and fat and carbs than a regular chicken.
  • canvia 13y ago
    "(ketchup; bbq; anything with sugar)" Sadly those don't even have sugar in them for the most part, it's all high fructose corn syrup these days. HFCS along with trans fats have been linked to inflammation and should be avoided.
    • DanBC 13y ago
      I'm in the UK. We use sugar, not HFSC. We also have obesity over here. Drinking 42 oz drinks is going to cause problems whether they're using HFCS or regular sugar.
      • threedaymonk 13y ago
        We do have HFCS in the UK, but we call it glucose-fructose syrup. I've noticed it in the ingredients of an increasing number of beverages.
  • 13y ago