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Ramen May Lead to Chronic Illness Study Says

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Re: Ramen May Lead to Chronic Illness Study Says

#41

Post by bialecki »

patrickgzill wrote: post #39

Completely anecdotal (not data) point: guy I know from one forum, young guy in his 20s, lived on ramen noodles for 18 months to 2 years. Got colon cancer, which usually hits people who are older. (I am trying to learn enough good recipes to eat well at home instead of eating out, have bought a few decent cookbooks and surprisingly, have found it enjoyable though time consuming to cook from scratch.)

One more data point: My brother eats Ramen pretty much every day and has for the last 2-3 years (he's in college now). He hasn't been to the doctor in at least 5 years even for a physical. However, he eats the Ramen without cooking it and just putting the spices or flavoring on it and then crunching through it. To be honest, it makes me sick watching it, so maybe that counts?

Re: Ramen May Lead to Chronic Illness Study Says

#42

Post by zzleeper »

bialecki wrote: post #41
patrickgzill wrote: post #39

Completely anecdotal (not data) point: guy I know from one forum, young guy in his 20s, lived on ramen noodles for 18 months to 2 years. Got colon cancer, which usually hits people who are older. (I am trying to learn enough good recipes to eat well at home instead of eating out, have bought a few decent cookbooks and surprisingly, have found it enjoyable though time consuming to cook from scratch.)

One more data point: My brother eats Ramen pretty much every day and has for the last 2-3 years (he's in college now). He hasn't been to the doctor in at least 5 years even for a physical. However, he eats the Ramen without cooking it and just putting the spices or flavoring on it and then crunching through it. To be honest, it makes me sick watching it, so maybe that counts?

That's really disgusting. Does he at least eat some veggies?

Re: Ramen May Lead to Chronic Illness Study Says

#43

Post by GHFigs »

dekayed wrote: post #14
briandoll wrote: post #2

That anyone would be shocked that packaged crap like Ramen has health risks is sad. This is not food. Of course it's going to kill you. I always hope that when startups say "eating ramen" that they mean it symbolically, in that they are being frugal. Eating crap like this is just dumb.

A friend of mine has said that he thinks the biggest problem in the US is that food is cheap. It is really that food that is bad for you is cheap and food that is good for you is expensive. Cheap + full usually wins against expensive + hungry with most people.

Convenience is another factor. Unless you live adjacent to a grocery store, you are almost always nearer to a source of junk food in the form of a convenience store or fast food restaurant. Neither are likely to be cheaper than what one can make easily from generally healthful ingredients.

(Cheap comes into play e.g. with chain sit-down restaurants, who get around the problem of having mediocre food by serving it in comically huge portions slathered in some unhealthy flavorizing agent like butter or Ranch dressing. They can probably beat anything you can make at home in terms of price per calorie. The meal doesn't actually get cheaper, meanwhile the impact on your health is worse because you're buying a whole lot of calories you don't need.)

In poor communities I've seen it's sometimes the case that shopping at an actual grocery store can be a two or three hour round trip due to bus schedules while the corner store is a five minute walk.

Both also profit immensely from the wealthier car culture: fast food could not be what it is today without the drive-through window and people's eagerness to consume meals in their cars, and the typical convenience store is a convenient source of food because it also happens to sell gas, which every driver needs. Both allow the consumer to trade away money and health for immediate satiation.

Re: Ramen May Lead to Chronic Illness Study Says

#44

Post by stjohn »

The article's title is misleading. The study doesn't actually pinpoint ramen noodles as a cause of chronic illness, but rather nutritional deficits, which of course could result from eating nothing but ramen.

"Those who relied on instant noodles and other cheap food with little nutritional content were at greater risk of chronic diseases including cancer, diabetes and heart disease, the researchers found."

The article title could just as easily have been Spaghetti May Lead... or McDonalds May Lead... Of course, it should be Poor Nutrition May Lead..., but then no one would care.

Re: Ramen May Lead to Chronic Illness Study Says

#45

Post by zbanks »

zzleeper wrote: post #42
bialecki wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One more data point: My brother eats Ramen pretty much every day and has for the last 2-3 years (he's in college now). He hasn't been to the doctor in at least 5 years even for a physical. However, he eats the Ramen without cooking it and just putting the spices or flavoring on it and then crunching through it. To be honest, it makes me sick watching it, so maybe that counts?

That's really disgusting. Does he at least eat some veggies?

Does the teaspoon of dried ones in the cup count?

Re: Ramen May Lead to Chronic Illness Study Says

#46

Post by AgentConundrum »

bialecki wrote: post #41
patrickgzill wrote: post #39

Completely anecdotal (not data) point: guy I know from one forum, young guy in his 20s, lived on ramen noodles for 18 months to 2 years. Got colon cancer, which usually hits people who are older. (I am trying to learn enough good recipes to eat well at home instead of eating out, have bought a few decent cookbooks and surprisingly, have found it enjoyable though time consuming to cook from scratch.)

One more data point: My brother eats Ramen pretty much every day and has for the last 2-3 years (he's in college now). He hasn't been to the doctor in at least 5 years even for a physical. However, he eats the Ramen without cooking it and just putting the spices or flavoring on it and then crunching through it. To be honest, it makes me sick watching it, so maybe that counts?

I don't understand why this makes you sick. This post finally made me look up ramen on wikipedia to see what it actually is (Instant noodles.. here in Canada the major vendor of this is Mr. Noodles, so "ramen" was a bit unfamiliar to me).

Your brothers way of eating ramen is exactly how I, and many of my friends, ate it when we were in elementary school. Crunch the everloving shit out of it, open the packet, sprinkle the flavour packet into the ramen, close it up and shake.

It was good. I haven't done that in years, but I remember liking it. In fact, I've got some Mr. Noodles in the cupboard right now.. I'm slightly motivated to try it again.

Re: Ramen May Lead to Chronic Illness Study Says

#47

Post by eru »

btilly wrote: post #27
brunt wrote: post #13

Ramen Noodles (when eaten all the time instead of a variety of fruits and vegetables) may lead to chronic illness. The title is slightly misleading in that regard. It should be common knowledge now that too much of any one thing will kill you.

It should be common knowledge now that too much of any one thing will kill you Not potatoes. You can live on nothing but potatoes and water and you'll be healthy. You'll likely get very bored of the diet, but you won't be missing anything essential. This is true of very few foods. (This is something that I learned when my wife was studying for general physiology.)

Fresh (breast?) milk or eggs would probably also work at least as good?

Re: Ramen May Lead to Chronic Illness Study Says

#48

Post by endlessvoid94 »

Chris_Morrell wrote: post #9
dinkumthinkum wrote: post #4

Yeah, but it's cheap. It's also not bad with some crackers. :)

I have a friend who uses the noodles and chucks the flavoring packet. He then adds veggies, some protein and a soy sauce based stock. It's pretty delicious and I imagine still decently cheap.

When you say he adds protein, do you mean he adds meat of some kind? Or something dairy?

Re: Ramen May Lead to Chronic Illness Study Says

#49

Post by Das_Bruce »

noonespecial wrote: post #19

My boss, on my first job, whenever presented with any "study" of this nature would mumble: "If you feed a rat a boxcar of anything, it'll get cancer" . Too damn right.

I think the cancer bit was just in there for shock value, the main point is that there is zero nutritional value to these foods.

Re: Ramen May Lead to Chronic Illness Study Says

#50

Post by zzleeper »

zbanks wrote: post #45
zzleeper wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's really disgusting. Does he at least eat some veggies?

Does the teaspoon of dried ones in the cup count?

But really, there are many ways a diet like his may be harmful. Too much sodium (still high even w/out the spice package), lack of vitamins, protein, fiber, and the list goes on.

You won't feel the pain when you are young, but when you DO feel it (or your brother), the damage will be already done

=/

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