161–170 of 191 posts
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My personal rule of thumb with "processed" food is: Would I be happy to do the same process in my own kitchen if I had the time and equipment?
What's an example of a process done by the food industry that you would not be happy to do yourself if you could do it for free?
Pollan's famous "maxim" manages to be condescending, unhelpful and inaccurate - all at the same time. Eat food: duh Not too much: again, thanks? Mostly plants: Oh you mean like, sugars and starches - the most toxic constituents of the modern diet. Pollan is the prototypical Bay-Area insufferable foodie. His documentary was a cringe-fest of pseudo-spiritual fawning. Rene Girard talks about how food has become a new st…
Oh you mean like, sugars and starches - the most toxic constituents of the modern diet. You jump pretty readily to a conclusion that isn't in what's said. "Plants" covers a diverse group of foods, some of which are the most nutrient rich available to us. You can eat nothing but potatoes, which are filled with starch, but a diet filled with plants is much more likely to involve a rich variety of very healthy foods. So…
Yet the ones he recommends for us to eat -- grains -- are toxic and not suitable for human digestion.
He's perhaps the patron saint of plant-eating, slightly ascetic or vegan foodies.
Vegans are precisely the people who ascribe a lofty moral status to their dietary choices, in my observation.
He's certainly not the patron saint of the paleo or keto crowd, both of which are very vocal and often produce very obnoxious members of the "food as status symbol" group.
I don't share that experience; the discourse of paleo and keto, in my perception, is people seeking personal results in their health. Keto people may "brag" about the results they've gotten, but not their high moral status, like vegans, or how people who disagree with them are to blame for all the world's problems, like vegans.
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> While I'm sure there's some arguable benefits to these things, I think it's paranoid or stupid to dismiss something just for being "processed". What the heck does that mean anyway? It mostly means, "a whole industry of greedy scum that added all kinds of useless and often harmful crap to the food it sells to make it last longer -- and increase their margins--, be more addictive --and increase their margins--, be pr…
With regards to your first link, note that the resulting "truffle oil" is now dirt cheap. Those profits are not just taken by the producer but passed along to the consumer. And according to most of the article you linked, the taste works. If so I see nothing wrong with it as long as it's listed on the ingredients. A lot of things aren't made exactly the way their name may make you think. There's definitely some scumm…
I disagree. I think a label should accurately describe it's contents, plain and simple. I much prefer to decide for myself what is in my own best interest thank you very much.
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This is dangerous advice though. Loose weight just by counting calories will not take in consideration toxicity (see my other comment in this thread). Many people burn fat this way, which release toxins they can't process. Hence their body is thin but saturated with poison. From here 2 things happens: - the person gains weight again to protect him/herself. Happens very often. - the person manage to not gain weight at…
This post is unscientific and literally nonsense. There's no such thing as a "toxin" and reducing your adipose fat tissue does not poison your body. It's precisely this sort of magical thinking that the OP is trying to counter.
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With regards to your first link, note that the resulting "truffle oil" is now dirt cheap. Those profits are not just taken by the producer but passed along to the consumer. And according to most of the article you linked, the taste works. If so I see nothing wrong with it as long as it's listed on the ingredients. A lot of things aren't made exactly the way their name may make you think. There's definitely some scumm…
> There's definitely some scummy stuff going on in the food industry, but I don't think a little fakery that saves the consumer money and creates a good flavor is that bad of a sin. I disagree. I think a label should accurately describe it's contents, plain and simple. I much prefer to decide for myself what is in my own best interest thank you very much.
The title on many foods isn't an accurate description of their contents though - wasabi is dyed horse raddish, crab meat is often mashed up and cleverly rebuilt pollock, most fruit juices aren't what they list, but still get to use the name juice because they're mostly apple or pear juice, most bacon bits aren't bacon at all - they're vegan even.
If you want to get an accurate picture of what's in a product, you always have to read the ingredients. The title is mostly just a vague description of its taste.
His "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." mantra is about the easiest diet to follow in the real world.
Some of the conclusions seem a little quacky here to me - like "avoid ingredients you can't pronounce" and a lot of "avoid processed anything". While I'm sure there's some arguable benefits to these things, I think it's paranoid or stupid to dismiss something just for being "processed". What the heck does that mean anyway? All our food is processed in one form or another and nothing about something being more process…
I would definitely avoid dihydrogen monoxide.
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Yes I am inclined to agree. There are a few lines in what I read that shoot up red flags (I only read the first 25% and last 10%). However I agree with the overall advice. I read somewhere that its best to avoid any food that is sold in packaging. I try to stick to that within reason.
Pollen gave a fascinating interview on Democracy Now! talking about how food companies began cleverly gaming the metrics, marketing smaller numbers of ingredients and real sugar (yes, sugar!) as though they were health claims. His new advice? "Don’t buy any food you’ve ever seen advertised." https://www.democracynow.org/2009/5/14/omnivores_dilemma_aut...
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Not parent commenter but these are things I wouldn't want to do to my own food, even if I could. - peroxide bleaching of flour https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flour_bleaching_agent - acid-enzype process for HFCS: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_fructose_corn_syrup#Proce... - de-oxygenation of orange juice for long term storage: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orange_juice#Not_from_concentr... (I'm sure these are nomin…
I actually really like the deoxygenation of orange juice thing. The result tastes better than fresh squeezed, more of a sour taste that I prefer. Maybe it just amounts to dumping more citric acid in it or something, but it's delicious in any case.
"Once the juice is squeezed and stored in gigantic vats, they start removing oxygen. Why? Because removing oxygen from the juice allows the liquid to keep for up to a year without spoiling. But! Removing that oxygen also removes the natural flavors of oranges. Yeah, it's all backwards. So in order to have OJ actually taste like oranges, drink companies hire flavor and fragrance companies, the same ones that make perfumes for Dior, to create these "flavor packs" to make juice taste like, well, juice again."[1]
[1] - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/07/29/100-percent-orange-...
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> Yes it has. A calorie is always in a context. No, the context only applies to health. You will always lose weight if you eat less calories, period. > During this process, molecules that can harm the body can enter it, or be produced in it. Since using fat to wrap molecules is one of the ways the body cope with it, it has an impact on it. That's not what happens. There is no such procedure that uses fat to "cope wit…
Example of a context: - eat a little protein and lots of fructose from an apple from your garden; - eat the same amount of calories as proteins + fat in industrial meat. The second amount will create vastly more waste, such as urea, to be processed by the body. It will also require more energy to processed because the fructose is almost usable as-is. Because the second source of calories brings less minerals, it will…
You're being deliberately obtuse and omitting half of the facts to suit your narrative.