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Ultra-processed foods and the corporate capture of nutrition

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Re: Ultra-processed foods and the corporate capture of nutrition

#331
post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If this stuff has the same veracity as what was in Aghora, I have to wonder if Svoboda met any Ayurvedic experts at all

He has not just met experts, he has gone through the full 4 or 5 year Indian Ayurvedic degree, which includes some parts of MBBS degree, IIRC. I have not read his Aghora series. That could be esoterica or even a spoof, who knows. I have only read his Ayurveda book. Doubt that that book is wrong, since my family has some background in Ayurveda as users for two generations or more. Also read his bio on his site - says…

His Aghora book (the first one) includes the following assertions

that Sri Ramakrishna got throat cancer by wish of some female guru as punishment for wanting to learn Tantra out of turn

Abbottabad is hottest place in Asia (it’s Jacobabad near where my mom grew up)

Wajid Ali Shah died soon after he was sent to Calcutta by British

Confuses Shamse Tabrez and Shamsuddin Sabzawari (RA)

Re: Ultra-processed foods and the corporate capture of nutrition

#332

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Accountability goes a long way for some people. My way is to eat less items with extra sugar in it. Oh boy do they hide that stuff in about a dozen different ways. Especially HFCS and 'apple/pear juice'. Then I track what I eat and try to hit my numbers. Someone I know is hitting nearly 40 pounds in a year with that method. Plus the accountability helped them stick to it.

Don't foods have nutrition facts printed on them? In Europe every package has a standardized label indicating the grams of macros per 100 g and grams of all sugars per 100 g. (also salt etc)

Most products do. You have to scour them. They usually break the carbs down by sugar and other. It is also by g. Also under a particular amount per serving they are allowed to say '0'. For example a box of tic-tacs is almost nothing but sugar. But it says 0. So serving size maters. It is also another way they will play games is by fiddling the 'serving' size. When everyone really knows the serving size is 1 container. It may say 2 or 3 per container. Or they may measure it by '1 cup' which for something like chips is a small amount of chips. But they are high in carbs. So you have to know the games played there too. That varies by manufacture. You could say better if those games are played there.

The thing is until you look you do not realize how much sugar is in everything and how many different 'types' there are.

A good rule of thumb when shopping in an american store is stick to the edges. The middle is full of processed stuff that usually has sugar. Not all processed is bad. For example a nice salsa is processed but not terrible for you and a decent time saver and usually tastes nicer than anything I have come up with. Like you point out you have to watch the labels.

Re: Ultra-processed foods and the corporate capture of nutrition

#333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You missed the most significant issue outside of portion size changes, etc. Car dependency. The shift over the last 60-70 years to push everyone to drive more and more and walk, bike, etc less has had an absolutely massive impact on obesity and being unfit. Compare the obesity rates in any area in the US versus types of transport and you'll see a huge correlation when other factors are fixed. e.g. https://pubmed.ncbi…

When I was a kid growing up in the Pacific Northwest I would say adults biked less but kids walked/biked more than today. I think adult biking is massively more popular and accepted today than in the 80s.

Agreed on the biking.

I remember begging my parents to let me bike to school because all the "cook kids" rode their BMX bikes to school and the bike racks were overflowing with kids who were biking to school. I remember being made fun of in the summer for taking the bus instead of riding my bike.

I don't remember seeing bike racks at any of the schools my sisters kids attended.

Re: Ultra-processed foods and the corporate capture of nutrition

#334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ask your parents or grandparents. Or just combine some of: meat, fish, rice, potatoes, veggies and legumes. How hard can it be? Maybe it will taste bland. Get over it.

I basically cook myself fish or chicken every day but that's not my point. My point is that it's very hard for the average american to receive good dietary information.

How is it specific to diet? It seems very hard for them to get good history, climate, science etc info. There's a ton of lobbying and targeted marketing and political propaganda to keep the average person non-thinking. To all the above, including diet, it looks simple (just read a book, just Google this and this), but if you don't know what to trust because you're confused so much at the very foundation and you've been told so much distorted and selective truths and straight up lies, what can you do? People believe homeopathy, pyramid schemes, that it's patriotic to go invade the middle east again, that universal health care is communism and free tuition equals gulag, that workers rights are anti business and so anti American, that the Bible is literally true, that a televangelist deserves your money, that drugs are bad mkay, that sex ed is evil etc etc.

The food you are fed is just one small way you are exploited.

Re: Ultra-processed foods and the corporate capture of nutrition

#335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I bake various types of bread on a weekly basis, and have never seen a recipe that doesn't require sugar or honey. I'm pretty confident it's needed to fuel the yeast for the rising process vs the flour alone.

French bread is water, flour, yeast, and salt.

I make french bread almost weekly and all the recipes I've used require sugar.

Re: Ultra-processed foods and the corporate capture of nutrition

#336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I bake various types of bread on a weekly basis, and have never seen a recipe that doesn't require sugar or honey. I'm pretty confident it's needed to fuel the yeast for the rising process vs the flour alone.

It’s quite frightening that you’ve never heard of sourdough bread given your baking experience. And as the other replies allude to, it’s quite common historically and in other places. Are baking books edited to exclude that knowledge in America? It really brings to mind the possibility.

I've made sourdough a few times and all the recipes I tried require sugar.

Re: Ultra-processed foods and the corporate capture of nutrition

#337

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I basically cook myself fish or chicken every day but that's not my point. My point is that it's very hard for the average american to receive good dietary information.

How is it specific to diet? It seems very hard for them to get good history, climate, science etc info. There's a ton of lobbying and targeted marketing and political propaganda to keep the average person non-thinking. To all the above, including diet, it looks simple (just read a book, just Google this and this), but if you don't know what to trust because you're confused so much at the very foundation and you've be…

Very good points, never thought of it like that. I mostly agree.

Re: Ultra-processed foods and the corporate capture of nutrition

#338
post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Seriously, read that book. If you have a point to be made, you can make it here and now without the need of a hundred-page reference. I understand you put a lot of work into reading books about diets or whatever, but I also make my arguments based on the findings supported by a large body of research. I'm not going to ask you to read through all of the reference material I'm using to build up my arguments. At best,…

I'm offering the book as a resource because I think it might be helpful or interesting to you and other people with similar thoughts. It discusses many things you have mentioned. There's only so much depth one can put in a comment, but some of my favorite books are ones I found metioned in passing here. You can take it or leave it. I'm really not sure what the "mainsteam science of food" is. Studies linking food to h…

Learning psychology, and learning to trick yourself into accomplishing greater goals is probably one of the most effective life hacks I've ever used.

If you don't like it, that's fine. I'm just saying... it works. And it works very well. Predict your own behaviors, be honest with yourself, and then nudge yourself into improving yourself through greater reasoning.

If you know that X will make you overeat, then avoid X from the start. If you know that Y makes you feel full, then eat Y. Etc. etc. That reduces the amount of measuring you need to do when dieting, because you can start to trust the nerve-cells in your stomach and/or brain chemistry for when you feel full and/or hungry.

That's the problem with a lot of diets: they don't recognize the efficacy that a little bit of psychology and prediction can do. Everyone's psychology is slightly different: what works for one person doesn't work for everyone else. So you need to customize it to each person.

But once you figure out someone's psychology, you really can "manipulate them to better themselves". That includes yourself. And its a lot less stressful than trying to "willpower" your way throughout the hours, days, or weeks.

Re: Ultra-processed foods and the corporate capture of nutrition

#339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I wish we put more emphasis on educating young people about basic cooking and nutrition. More difficult than it sounds. Most people want to eat healthier but when they research it they'll get fad diets and pseudoscience. Just look at Keto, paleo, whole 30, etc.

Ask your parents or grandparents. Or just combine some of: meat, fish, rice, potatoes, veggies and legumes. How hard can it be? Maybe it will taste bland. Get over it.

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Re: Ultra-processed foods and the corporate capture of nutrition

#340

Just by comparing photos and videos from the 1980s to the situation in the streets now, it is painfully obvious that we (and by "we" I mean at least half of humanity) have a serious obesity and metabolic syndrome problem. It is breathtaking how civilized nations silently accept such an enormous slide in quality of life, when other, much smaller problems lead to civic unrest, political discussions and overhaul of old…

Furthermore, it's gotten much worse in the last year. Now the government forces gym closures and discourages people from going outside or to the grocery store, practically forcing people to live a sedentary lifestyle and encouraging fast-food eating _even more_.
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