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Told to Eat Its Vegetables, America Orders Fries

nytimes.com

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Re: Told to Eat Its Vegetables, America Orders Fries

#31

Post by joe_the_user »

atomical wrote: post #22
points wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not a direct link though. I can stuff my face with nothing but donuts for weeks on end and never put on an ounce of weight. Which is probably as irritating as someone who can't lose weight.

It is a direct link because I am talking about calories. There is a myth that there are people who can eat whatever they want and not gain weight. Everyone has a base amount of calories to work from and if you go over that amount you gain weight.

"Who ya gonna believe, me or your own eyes?" (Groucho)

I eat as much as I can, often twice as much an average person - it typical for me to have two helpings in a meal where most people have one.

I have never gone over 145 pounds and I am 6' tall. I cannot gain weight, period. And I'm not alone as other posters mention.

Re: Told to Eat Its Vegetables, America Orders Fries

#32

Post by autarch »

Mz wrote: post #29

"Eating vegetables is a lot less fun than eating flavor-blasted Doritos," said Marcia Mogelonsly, a senior analyst for Mintel, a global marketing firm. "You will always have to fight that." Just offer flavor-blasted veggies: Outback Bloomin' Onion. Hashbrowns with onion and red pepper. Etc. I eat more veggies these days than I used to and that is part of my approach. Veggies don't have to be bland.

I'm pretty sure potatoes and other starches are not included in the definition. I don't think hash browns are the solution, though they make for a delicious problem.

Re: Told to Eat Its Vegetables, America Orders Fries

#33

Post by arethuza »

zephyrfalcon wrote: post #17
rubashov wrote: post #12

The presumption that people need to eat a lot of vegetables is perhaps flawed: http://www.second-opinions.co.uk/why-eat-5-portions-1.html Population studies haven't really shown a clear benefit from eating a lot of vegetables.

I also recall this blog post from 2009: http://t-a-w.blogspot.com/2009/11/myth-of-5-day-people-never...

Sorry I got to "British socialized medicine destroying UK" and gave up on that one.

Re: Told to Eat Its Vegetables, America Orders Fries

#34

Post by Mz »

autarch wrote: post #32
Mz wrote: post #29

"Eating vegetables is a lot less fun than eating flavor-blasted Doritos," said Marcia Mogelonsly, a senior analyst for Mintel, a global marketing firm. "You will always have to fight that." Just offer flavor-blasted veggies: Outback Bloomin' Onion. Hashbrowns with onion and red pepper. Etc. I eat more veggies these days than I used to and that is part of my approach. Veggies don't have to be bland.

I'm pretty sure potatoes and other starches are not included in the definition. I don't think hash browns are the solution, though they make for a delicious problem.

My understanding is potatoes are a vegetable and very nutritious in their own right, which is why they were a staple of the Irish diet until the potato famine (by staple, I mean you could practically raise a family primarily on potatoes and some poor families basically did just that). I do understand why french fries and potato chips are considered "junk food" but I don't think that changes the fact that potatoes are a vegetable.

Re: Told to Eat Its Vegetables, America Orders Fries

#35

Post by ramit »

atomical wrote: post #28
points wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I just said, I CANNOT gain weight. It is simply impossible. I am not alone. I have been 9 1/2 stone for the last 10 years.

There have been studies that found people who were skinny thought they were eating more calories than they really were and that obese people thought they were eating less. I don't want to get into your specific issues here but it would be impossible for the average sedentary person not to gain weight eating the Michael Phelps diet. Calories matter. EDIT: I guess the people that believe calories don't matter and weigh…

Hey Atomical, I've seen a similar study before, but can't find it. Could you point me to it?

For other interesting studies on health: http://delicious.com/ramitsethi/health

Re: Told to Eat Its Vegetables, America Orders Fries

#36

Post by zach »

twillerelator wrote: post #8

>People know that vegetables can improve health More like: we were cajoled and coerced into eating vegetables by our parents, who were in turn cajoled by their parents, etc. We then spend the rest of our lives rationalising this uncritical acceptance, which isn't the same thing as knowing something.

Not just our parents:

http://www.fruitsandveggiesmatter.gov/

This site is a production of the Produce for Better Health Foundation, founded and funded by the Produce Marketers Association.

Re: Told to Eat Its Vegetables, America Orders Fries

#37

Post by tomjen3 »

>Dr. Jennifer Foltz, a pediatrician who helped compile the report. She, like other public health officials dedicated to improving the American diet, concedes that perhaps simply telling people to eat more vegetables isn’t working.

Jesus, you didn't know this? Really?

I have been bombarded with "this is healthy", "this is not healthy", "you should eat so much of this, so much of that, only a little bit of this" ever since I was four, possibly earlier. Same goes for all the calls to exercise, the cute campaigns to "exercise 30 minutes a day", "take the stairs", etc, etc, et fucking cetera.

So why, after all this time have they still not realized that the reason I (and mostly everybody else) don't exercise isn't that we don't know we should, it is that exercising sucks, getting sweaty takes time and then you have to clean up again, getting back and forth to the gym, etc.

The same thing goes for eating healthy, although it is _slightly_ ofset by carrots, which are very tasty.

Re: Told to Eat Its Vegetables, America Orders Fries

#38

Post by itistoday »

atomical wrote: post #28
points wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I just said, I CANNOT gain weight. It is simply impossible. I am not alone. I have been 9 1/2 stone for the last 10 years.

There have been studies that found people who were skinny thought they were eating more calories than they really were and that obese people thought they were eating less. I don't want to get into your specific issues here but it would be impossible for the average sedentary person not to gain weight eating the Michael Phelps diet. Calories matter. EDIT: I guess the people that believe calories don't matter and weigh…

I guess the people that believe calories don't matter and weight gain/weight loss is genetic want to down vote this to hell. Oh well!

Calories do matter, but it is not nearly as simple as you're trying to make it out to be.

Genes play a huge role. For most people, playing the game of watching what you eat and counting calories makes sense, but for others, it's not so clear cut. For example, my dad (a molecular biologist) is studying the effects that certain genes have on the weight of mice. The details escape me (and aren't relevant here), but the takeaway is that your genetic makeup will predispose you to weighing a certain amount, and some mice/people will be fat even if they eat very well, and others will be skinny even if they eat very poorly.

Hence, for some people (but not everyone), managing their weight requires more than just counting calories.

Re: Told to Eat Its Vegetables, America Orders Fries

#39

Post by [deleted] »

joe_the_user wrote: post #31
atomical wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a direct link because I am talking about calories. There is a myth that there are people who can eat whatever they want and not gain weight. Everyone has a base amount of calories to work from and if you go over that amount you gain weight.

"Who ya gonna believe, me or your own eyes?" (Groucho) I eat as much as I can, often twice as much an average person - it typical for me to have two helpings in a meal where most people have one. I have never gone over 145 pounds and I am 6' tall. I cannot gain weight, period. And I'm not alone as other posters mention.

[deleted]

Re: Told to Eat Its Vegetables, America Orders Fries

#40

Post by atomical »

joe_the_user wrote: post #31
atomical wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a direct link because I am talking about calories. There is a myth that there are people who can eat whatever they want and not gain weight. Everyone has a base amount of calories to work from and if you go over that amount you gain weight.

"Who ya gonna believe, me or your own eyes?" (Groucho) I eat as much as I can, often twice as much an average person - it typical for me to have two helpings in a meal where most people have one. I have never gone over 145 pounds and I am 6' tall. I cannot gain weight, period. And I'm not alone as other posters mention.

Period? So you can eat 12,000 calories a day and not gain weight?
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