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Actually eat healthily for £1 per day

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Re: Actually eat healthily for £1 per day

#81
post #65
post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From a book called Rework [1]: "When you want something bad enough, you make the time - regardless of your other obligations. The truth is most people just don't want it bad enough. Then they protect their ego with the excuse of time." I think virtually everyone in the UK has the means to eat healthy if they really want to. [1] http://www.amazon.com/Rework-Jason-Fried/dp/0307463745

The idea that everyone has time to do 'X' if they only wanted it bad enough is complete BS. For people that work two jobs, have a family to take care of, commute several hours, have a sick spouse and sleep there is no more time in the day. No matter how badly you want it. Unless you or the author of Rework know of a magical formula to make the day longer than 24 hours or how to operate on little to no sleep.

If surviving on that arrangement doesn't work, change the arrangement.

Move somewhere with a cheaper standard of living. Reduce expenses to where one spouse can stay home. Find another job closer. Unplug the TV already. Seriously.

Yes, if you want it badly enough you'll do it. I moved 1000 miles, changed jobs twice, worked 2 jobs at once for years, have a family to care for, cut the commute from 2 hours to 15 minutes, and operate on limited sleep. TV? about 4 hours a month. Every time I thought "I can't do this but I have to" I found a way. Now I work a dream job at a startup, support a family of 4, and live in a nice area.

Yes, we know of the "magical formula": use your brain and make it happen; you're the only one stopping you.

Re: Actually eat healthily for £1 per day

#82
post #52

> Around 50% of food energy from carbohydrate That's NOT healthy at all.

> That's NOT healthy at all

This statement assumes facts not in evidence.

There is a lot of argument about what the best distributions are, without any real resolution at this point. The author reasonable chose to target a standard without claiming it was the only way to go.

Re: Actually eat healthily for £1 per day

#83
post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From a book called Rework [1]: "When you want something bad enough, you make the time - regardless of your other obligations. The truth is most people just don't want it bad enough. Then they protect their ego with the excuse of time." I think virtually everyone in the UK has the means to eat healthy if they really want to. [1] http://www.amazon.com/Rework-Jason-Fried/dp/0307463745

That kind of comment can only be excused by lack of experience. Try "making time" when, for example, you've got a job where you can't bring your food with you (and would have nowhere to heat it up even if you were permitted to bring it), a long commute and a family to spend time with. And I'm talking about a middle-class example. Now add being poor on top of that.

What job is this that you can't bring your food with you? I've worked in some pretty remote places in some pretty shitty environments all the way to middle of a metropolis with a bunch of suits and I've been able to always plan ahead and bring something to eat if I can't go out.

If you can't heat your food up then don't pack something you need to heat up. If your food needs to be warm to eat and it doesn't go inside a Thermos then don't bring it or learn to eat it cold.

Life's hard. Deal with it.

Re: Actually eat healthily for £1 per day

#84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So these people have no free time whatsoever?

On weekdays? Long job, long commute, children, sleep - yes, it is easy to have pretty much no free time for most of the week.

Ridiculous. The average American watches hours of TV a day. Prepping a simple rice or potato based meal takes ten minutes; less time than the drive-thru. We have to stop pretending that the obesity epidemic is about something more than poor self control.

Re: Actually eat healthily for £1 per day

#85
post #64
post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From a book called Rework [1]: "When you want something bad enough, you make the time - regardless of your other obligations. The truth is most people just don't want it bad enough. Then they protect their ego with the excuse of time." I think virtually everyone in the UK has the means to eat healthy if they really want to. [1] http://www.amazon.com/Rework-Jason-Fried/dp/0307463745

king_jester was talking about the poor. I doubt telling poor people to want it more badly is going to have a huge positive effect.

Many poor are content with their condition, unwilling to take even basic steps to improve. Harsh as this sounds, and downvote-bait it seems, I've worked at helping the poor and found (to my dismay) most of them are in that condition because they refuse to choose to do better. Yes, they don't want it badly enough.

Re: Actually eat healthily for £1 per day

#86
post #79

If you want to save some money, save some time and eat healthy, try this: Go to the grocery store, buy these 3 items: 1 bag of frozen vegetables. 3 chicken breasts 1 bag of dried lentils. Sunday night: Cook lentils in water, don't add anything Slice chicken breasts down the side, add seasoning, no oil, just seasoning, don't bread it etc. Bake the chicken breasts Monday for lunch: Microwave a bunch of the vegetables,…

My tips: get split, hulled lentils. Soak them in water for at least 20 minutes, washing and draining till the water runs relatively clear. When cooking, place them in boiling water and scoop off the the froth that bubbles up. This will reduces the saponins that some say are associated with leaky gut syndrome. For bonus points use a pressure cooker to destroy the phytate and lectins that are considered anti-nutrients…

I'll try that trick of scooping off the froth.

I'm probably going to avoid buying a pressure cooker for a while since I'm in Boston though.

Re: Actually eat healthily for £1 per day

#87
post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The idea that everyone has time to do 'X' if they only wanted it bad enough is complete BS. For people that work two jobs, have a family to take care of, commute several hours, have a sick spouse and sleep there is no more time in the day. No matter how badly you want it. Unless you or the author of Rework know of a magical formula to make the day longer than 24 hours or how to operate on little to no sleep.

If surviving on that arrangement doesn't work, change the arrangement. Move somewhere with a cheaper standard of living. Reduce expenses to where one spouse can stay home. Find another job closer. Unplug the TV already. Seriously. Yes, if you want it badly enough you'll do it. I moved 1000 miles, changed jobs twice, worked 2 jobs at once for years, have a family to care for, cut the commute from 2 hours to 15 minutes…

I'm not sure if you are just naive or intentionally contrary.

Please, explain to me how a family that can barely afford rent and meals can move 1000 miles away and find work. It's not really that easy to find a new job in a town you've never been to.

Or a couple in which one is handicapped or seriously ill can 'change the arrangement'

You made your situation better. Congratulations. I mean that. But assuming everyone can do it because you did is borderline arrogant.

There is no silver bullet solution and saying that anyone can do it if they want to bad enough is just stupid and ignorant.

Re: Actually eat healthily for £1 per day

#88
post #77

Before we start talking about "eat healthily", please visit http://nusi.org/ , apply critical thinking - ask for references to published research papers. Be aware of the difference between observational and clinical studies and of course, always remember correlation does not imply causation. We, as in mankind, don't know very much about what really is healthy food.

It took me a little reading to figure out the agenda, but some key phrases like "obesity is a growth disorder" tipped me off. This is a Gary Taubes project. He is a writer of books in favor of low-carbohydrate diets, and he often badly misinterprets the scientific literature. He has a selection bias about which studies he thinks are worth talking about, so as to make it appear that low-carbohydrate diets are the answer to everything. No actual nutritional scientists think his "alternate hypothesis" is credible.

Re: Actually eat healthily for £1 per day

#89
post #51

I'm not criticising the article (I love seeing hackers/hacker like mentality applied to diet and cooking, check : http://www.fourmilab.ch/hackdiet/ ) but I hate when I read something as "healthy food". Of course there are foods that are good for you and others that aren't, but somehow this always leads to the conclusion that in order to eat "healtily" you have to eat only "healthy" foods and avoid like the plague "un…

> The diet illustrated in the article, it's indeed healthy, it's cheap, and it's absolutely depressing.

Of course it is, but try finding a diet that costs £1 a day that isn't absolutely depressing.

I think this overemphasis on £1 or $1 a day is way too low.

The real question is how much are people who "can't afford" or "don't have time" to eat healthily spending on food per day? I would guess at least £5.

With £5 a day you could actually make an enjoyable, healthy and varied diet.

Re: Actually eat healthily for £1 per day

#90
post #61

Whilst it is nice people try and point out cheap options they ignore the following: 1) cost of running a fridge and freezer 2) calorie intake and how people are all different 3) large supermarket nearby and only you hanging around the reduced counter With that I'm sure a very short small inactive person could live well on this amount and intake but we are not all small inactive people. A few years ago I was in hospit…

A few years ago I was in hospital, I eat breakfast, dinner, evening meal and late night snacks and had seconds on every occasion. I was not overly active and bordering on totaly inactive. I slept lots as well.

A few years ago I was in hospital, and they didn't let me eat at all for two weeks. No, not even [whatever gotcha you want to insert here]. Lost 10 pounds I didn't need anyway, and otherwise felt fine. Wasn't particularly hungry during that time. Did watch a ridiculous number of cooking shows though.

Sufficient calories are easy to come by. A 50 pound sack of rice or bread flour is $18, enough calories to keep a large male operating a normal schedule for over a month. Spend your limited money on nutrients.

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