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How we're scammed into eating phony food

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Re: How we're scammed into eating phony food

#371

Post by RussianCow »

stephenr wrote: post #315
leroy_masochist wrote: post #309

My family raises grass-fed beef and sadly, this article is spot-on when it comes to the lack of consistency with that product. We know of farmers who go to cattle auctions and buy the cheapest steers they can find -- often sick and/or emaciated ones coming from farms in financial distress -- then fatten them up on grain while giving them pasture to forage, and sell it as grass-fed at farmer's markets. Just install a…

> There has never been good enforcement of governmentally-sanctioned standards pertaining to high quality farm produce in the US. I'm not sure what your intended meaning was here, but don't make the common american mistake of assuming if ($americanThing === TERRIBLE) { $anywhereThing = TERRIBLE; }

I don't see where the OP extrapolated anything to outside of the US? Even the sentence you quoted ends with "in the US".

Re: How we're scammed into eating phony food

#372

Post by [deleted] »

uhtred wrote: post #276
Al-Khwarizmi wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, this is a huge worry for me. The quality of food in the US is atrocious. When I was there, almost nothing tasted as it should, everything tasted bland and mildly sweet. The only way I found to get decent meat was to buy ultra-posh organic stuff at ridiculous prices, and then it would be no more than on par with the cheapest meat I could buy in Spain. Even chocolate is affected! TTIP is one of the worst things th…

If you knew what happened to the animals your cheap meat comes from, or what their meat contains, or what the process of raising those animals does to the environment, you wouldn't consider organic meat to be ridiculously priced.

[deleted]

Re: How we're scammed into eating phony food

#373

Post by dopamean »

stephenr wrote: post #326
leroy_masochist wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure if English is your first language, but the meaning of the sentence you quoted is straightforward, so I'm not sure why you're extrapolating American chauvinism from what I wrote. The scope of my comments is explicitly limited to the US. FWIW, European enforcement is supposed to be much better but that's outside of my firsthand domain knowledge.

English is indeed my first language, but I don't know where you're from, and many claims along the lines of "X doesn't work" from an American view point, are in my experience, intended as "X doesn't work anywhere" - the scope of the author's experience/knowledge is irrelevant (see: health care, gun control, government in general, banking/finance regulation, etc)

I think you're seeing something you want to see rather than actually seeing what he wrote. None of that has anything to do with what he said.

Re: How we're scammed into eating phony food

#374

Post by jimbokun »

orf wrote: post #273
coldtea wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Pies of all kinds, fish 'n' chips, traditional sausages, good old roast dinners, chicken tikka masala Sort of makes my point. None of these have anybody (of statistically significant percentage) outside the UK salivating, or have ever created something like a "British restaurant" to be found abroad (like there are French or Italian restaurants everywhere). And even the best of this list was invented by taking from…

> None of these have anybody (of statistically significant percentage) outside the UK salivating Have you ever tried a traditional English pie? I'm a bit biased obviously, but as an anecdote my Italian co-worker who moved here recently absolutely loves them (and I can't help but say 'who ate all the pies, guido?' to him). They don't have that kind of pastry in their cuisine at all and he can't get enough of them. It'…

"You're right, cuisine isn't our major cultural export (I'd say that's TV)"

Probably cultural products more generally, including books and music.

Re: How we're scammed into eating phony food

#375

Post by goda90 »

CalRobert wrote: post #283
rahimnathwani wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm ethnically Indian, and grew up in London. So I'm used to having good Indian food both at home and in restaurants. I recently visited Dublin for the first time, and picked an Indian restaurant based on Yelp ratings/reviews. I've never eaten worse Indian food than I did that day. I don't believe that the restaurant operators are unable to make OK food. They were Indian themselves. Perhaps they had to change their f…

I think there is some adjustment happening, and I've never had great Indian food here. It's certainly not as large a part of the cuisine as it is in London. I find the same thing happening with Mexican food with regards to dulled flavours.

I recently moved from Utah to Wisconsin, and the drop in quality of Mexican food is astounding. Even the gringo-ified chains in the western United States are better.

Re: How we're scammed into eating phony food

#376

Post by soundwave106 »

m_mueller wrote: post #196
RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #130

This article is so over the top that it borders on parody. Start with the title: "Everything we love to eat is a scam". I can provide lots of counter examples to that statement. Other statements with my comments "After reading it you’ll want to be fed intravenously for the rest of your life." - Look up total intraparenteral nutrition and see if you would prefer that to eating. "Escolar is so toxic that it’s been bann…

> By toxic the author means causes diarrhea due to unabsorbed oils/waxes. Oh, I see. No problem then, move along. > Zero calorie seafood, I never knew? Reading favourably before going into a rant is an important skill to have. If you try it, you'll see that the article has a good point with fake seafood, past the somewhat ridiculous comparison. > In reality, we have never had such abundant, safe food in the history o…

Escolar is generally not a problem if you limit portion size, so calling the fish "toxic" is a little bit overblown. It is a very tasty fish, to be honest.

The problem here is that the labeling is poor. It's too often called "white tuna" in American sushi restaurants (as the article implies), for I guess marketing reasons. And there's no warning about potential gastrointestinal difficulties.

From what I can Google, sushi restaurants are incredibly bad about mislabeling fish. (We all know that "wasabi" is usually green dyed horseradish, too. :) )

Re: How we're scammed into eating phony food

#377

Post by ajnin »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #311
pbhjpbhj wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you think you should get to dictate to others what food they eat? It doesn't matter if you think how people choose their food is not sensible, what matters for GMO labeling is whether you think they should be allowed to choose. Don't know what you mean by DHMO in this context, are you trying to make a joke about water? FWIW we have labeling for food dosed with water, eg bacon, such labeling is perfectly proper.

The problem isn't with labels per se. Sure, informed choice is best and all. But people are asking for GMO labels not because of a need to exercise informed choice - the campaigning is done because of irrational fears of GMO. Call it asking for an OK-ish thing for very wrong reasons. And DHMO in this context means the GMO fear makes about as much sense as DHMO fear. People are afraid because it sounds "chemically".

You're assuming and generalizing what people think based on nothing but your own prejudice. Maybe GMOs pose no risk (even though the definition of 'GMO' is so vague that it is impossible to be so generally affirmative), but what if I want to eat traditional varieties, what if I don't want to support multinational companies which ruin the lives of small farmers around the world, don't I have a right to do so ? Should that right be taken away from me because you don't think personally it is something worthy of concern ?

Re: How we're scammed into eating phony food

#378

Post by jimbokun »

true_religion wrote: post #282
ricksplat wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here is a really good example of food differences between USA and Europe. Something as simple as eggs: http://www.thejournal.ie/refrigerate-eggs-usa-europe-1809120... TLDR: European regulations force more stringent regulations on producers of eggs; therefore eggs are cleaner and you can store them for weeks without refrigeration. IMHO they've also got a much nicer colour.

This is why eggs in Denmark (as of my last visit) cost approximately 1.5x to 2.0x as much as eggs in the USA. There is a cost to having free-range eggs. There's a cost to controlling egg-quality so they can remain unwashed, and unrefrigerated for days. Now in the US, you can choose if you want to pay that cost and thus shop at different supermarkets that cater to your tastes. In the EU countries, you must pay the cos…

"Now in the US, you can choose if you want to pay that cost and thus shop at different supermarkets that cater to your tastes."

The point of the article is US consumers can't really choose what they're buying, because we are constantly, systemically lied to about the contents of our food purchases.

Re: How we're scammed into eating phony food

#379

Post by pvaldes »

Fej wrote: post #304
pvaldes wrote: post #227

The article is filled with mistakes and misunderstandings or maybe this guy eats in really terrible places: Spanish people weren't buying "fake olive oil" when poisoned. This was canola oil, was advertised as canola oil, and everybody in Spain can spot the difference among the wine and cider or between the cheapest olive oil and other vegetable oils. All this paragraph is false, including the “No one is checking, Olm…

What's the deal with milk?

Each country is different, and some have still real milk, but the product was kidnapped many years ago by enterprises and EU regulations and is worse each year. The "whole milk" of today is equal as the advertised as "ultra-mega-skimmed milk" only a few years ago. Yes, people like it, because everybody likes water.

When I was child, we drank real milk, directly from the cow and just boiled. Is a totally different product, with lots of fat. Milk today has the same flavor as sucking a whitewashed wall.

Re: How we're scammed into eating phony food

#380

Post by burkaman »

stephenr wrote: post #326
leroy_masochist wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure if English is your first language, but the meaning of the sentence you quoted is straightforward, so I'm not sure why you're extrapolating American chauvinism from what I wrote. The scope of my comments is explicitly limited to the US. FWIW, European enforcement is supposed to be much better but that's outside of my firsthand domain knowledge.

English is indeed my first language, but I don't know where you're from, and many claims along the lines of "X doesn't work" from an American view point, are in my experience, intended as "X doesn't work anywhere" - the scope of the author's experience/knowledge is irrelevant (see: health care, gun control, government in general, banking/finance regulation, etc)

But the line you quoted includes "in the US". How is it possible to be any more clear? It doesn't even say the standards don't work, it says there aren't any standards in the US.
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