How to eat healthily for £1 per day – version 0.2 • Hacker News Board

Re: How to eat healthily for £1 per day – version 0.2

#51

Post by [deleted] » Mon, May 27, 2013, 5:01 PM UTC

ars wrote: post #48

VLM wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It has a few issues. 1) Depends on what you're using it for. Personally I think it tastes foul in salad dressing type applications. Olive oil is the gold standard for homemade salad dressings. I would imagine if you're frying donuts or potatoes or something, you'd want the more neutral flavor of canola instead of olive. 2) Rancidity issues lead to three problems. First is massively excessive processing which turns th…

> I would imagine if you're frying donuts or potatoes or something, you'd want the more neutral flavor of canola instead of olive. Don't deep fry with canola - it smells nasty after a bit. It smells sort of like old fish. I like corn oil for deep frying.

[deleted]

Re: How to eat healthily for £1 per day – version 0.2

#52

Post by lotharbot » Mon, May 27, 2013, 5:20 PM UTC

columbo wrote: post #37

VLM wrote: post #6

Lets flag last time's discussion of v0.1 ahead of time, so we can move on and advance rather than rehash. 1) A little too much oil/fat to be politically correct, a bit too little to be nutritionally correct. Canola oil? I wouldn't put that in my car. Eat half as much olive oil if you have to, but don't eat that rot. 2) Carbs about right to be politically correct, WAY too much grains/carbs to be nutritionally correct.…

> 3) The guy from a culture where the average TV viewership per capita is 4 hours and 38 minutes per day (per Neilson 2012) could never have spare the five minutes to throw some beans in a slow cooker. Also all home cooked meals take 8 hours to prepare because he says so. Finally multitasking has not been invented (serious, HN?) so time spent stirring a pot must be spent 100% focused on the stirring never a single br…

> "low quality, and doesn't add to the discussion"

That was my reaction to your last paragraph, as well. Every time there's a thread about dealing with certain challenges of poverty, someone comes along and accuses the rest of us of having unrealistic expectations of poverty, and makes some snarky remark about hybrids or hookers or macbooks.

Instead of dragging the thread down, why don't we elevate the discourse?

I personally have plenty of real case studies to go from. There was the divorced mom of 3 whose ex hid his assets so he could duck child support, who my wife and I helped move between 3 different shelters. There was the mentally ill guy on disability who I took to the hospital on occasion, and who thanked me for teaching him to shop because for the first time in his adult life he had food at the end of the month. There's the single mom, recovering from mental illness, and her son who live with me right now. There are over a dozen homeless guys who come to my church on Sunday mornings for free hot breakfast, and over 6000 families who come to our food bank each year.

Would the information in the original post, or the comment you were criticizing, help all of those people? No, but it could help some of them.

Knowing which foods give the best bang-for-buck in terms of calories and nutrients, and having some basic idea of how to combine them to make some viable meals, is a big deal for some people. Gaining the basic confidence to attempt actual cooking, instead of feeling like you must rely on pre-packaged convenience foods, is a big deal for some people. Learning certain time management skills, such as planning ahead and taking a few minutes to start beans soaking in the morning, is a big deal for some people. Yeah, this thread as a whole is a pretty theoretical exercise, but it does have valuable practical implications even for those dealing with real poverty.

Re: How to eat healthily for £1 per day – version 0.2

#53

Post by columbo » Mon, May 27, 2013, 5:21 PM UTC

maratd wrote: post #50

columbo wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 3) The guy from a culture where the average TV viewership per capita is 4 hours and 38 minutes per day (per Neilson 2012) could never have spare the five minutes to throw some beans in a slow cooker. Also all home cooked meals take 8 hours to prepare because he says so. Finally multitasking has not been invented (serious, HN?) so time spent stirring a pot must be spent 100% focused on the stirring never a single br…

> Here's a real case study; a mother, two children under six years old, mid-twenties, high school dropout, only has a bus pass and foodstamps. This is just as disingenuous as the parent and isn't even close to representing the most common situation. The majority of people don't live next to a market that has proper fresh produce, but demand drives supply and there's a reason they don't. Most upper and middle class fa…

> This is just as disingenuous as the parent and isn't even close to representing the most common situation.

http://datacenter.kidscount.org/data/acrossstates/Rankings.a...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty_in_the_United_States#Po...

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/social-issues/poor-k...

> 47.6 percent The nation’s poorest kids primarily live in households headed by a single female (pdf). Nearly half of all children with a single mother — 47.6 percent — live in poverty. Indeed, the children of single mothers experience poverty at a rate that is more than four times higher than kids in married-couple families.

Re: How to eat healthily for £1 per day – version 0.2

#54

Post by ctdonath » Mon, May 27, 2013, 5:32 PM UTC

columbo wrote: post #37

VLM wrote: post #6

Lets flag last time's discussion of v0.1 ahead of time, so we can move on and advance rather than rehash. 1) A little too much oil/fat to be politically correct, a bit too little to be nutritionally correct. Canola oil? I wouldn't put that in my car. Eat half as much olive oil if you have to, but don't eat that rot. 2) Carbs about right to be politically correct, WAY too much grains/carbs to be nutritionally correct.…

> 3) The guy from a culture where the average TV viewership per capita is 4 hours and 38 minutes per day (per Neilson 2012) could never have spare the five minutes to throw some beans in a slow cooker. Also all home cooked meals take 8 hours to prepare because he says so. Finally multitasking has not been invented (serious, HN?) so time spent stirring a pot must be spent 100% focused on the stirring never a single br…

His point is valid, albeit sarcastic. It's amazing how many respond with variations on "it's too hard" because various luxuries aren't trivial to acquire. Most of humanity spent most of history surviving on a lot less acquired with a lot more work.

We can continue the quibbling over narrow cases and solutions, but it all comes down to a phrase in a memorable HN thread: your life depends on it, so fucking figure it out. Some of us are trying to and doing pretty good at it; naysayers add nothing.

Re: How to eat healthily for £1 per day – version 0.2

#55

Post by lenazegher » Mon, May 27, 2013, 5:35 PM UTC

frou_dh wrote: post #11

VLM wrote: post #6

Lets flag last time's discussion of v0.1 ahead of time, so we can move on and advance rather than rehash. 1) A little too much oil/fat to be politically correct, a bit too little to be nutritionally correct. Canola oil? I wouldn't put that in my car. Eat half as much olive oil if you have to, but don't eat that rot. 2) Carbs about right to be politically correct, WAY too much grains/carbs to be nutritionally correct.…

I'd rather flag the entire submission. Cooking cheap is one thing, but the "healthy" throughline continues to go nowhere. The meal plan should be christened "This Week In Starch". Just look at it!

> I'd rather flag the entire submission. Cooking cheap is one thing, but the "healthy" throughline continues to go nowhere.

Perhaps a better title would be "how to eat as healthily as possible for £1 per day", but I tried to find a balance between precision and clarity.

Yes, the primary energy source is starch, but this is simply a necessity on such a limited budget. Even if you were comfortable getting the majority of your calories from vegetable oil or lard, it would be extremely difficult to find a palatable diet that incorporated such large quantities without breaking the budget.

Re: How to eat healthily for £1 per day – version 0.2

#56

Post by ctdonath » Mon, May 27, 2013, 5:37 PM UTC

columbo wrote: post #53

maratd wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Here's a real case study; a mother, two children under six years old, mid-twenties, high school dropout, only has a bus pass and foodstamps. This is just as disingenuous as the parent and isn't even close to representing the most common situation. The majority of people don't live next to a market that has proper fresh produce, but demand drives supply and there's a reason they don't. Most upper and middle class fa…

> This is just as disingenuous as the parent and isn't even close to representing the most common situation. http://datacenter.kidscount.org/data/acrossstates/Rankings.a... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty_in_the_United_States#Po... http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/social-issues/poor-k... > 47.6 percent The nation’s poorest kids primarily live in households headed by a single female (pdf). Nearly half of a…

So why is it politically incorrect to advocate not procreating until in a viable & believably permanent relationship?

Re: How to eat healthily for £1 per day – version 0.2

#57

Post by takluyver » Mon, May 27, 2013, 5:38 PM UTC

lotharbot wrote: post #52

columbo wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 3) The guy from a culture where the average TV viewership per capita is 4 hours and 38 minutes per day (per Neilson 2012) could never have spare the five minutes to throw some beans in a slow cooker. Also all home cooked meals take 8 hours to prepare because he says so. Finally multitasking has not been invented (serious, HN?) so time spent stirring a pot must be spent 100% focused on the stirring never a single br…

> "low quality, and doesn't add to the discussion" That was my reaction to your last paragraph, as well. Every time there's a thread about dealing with certain challenges of poverty, someone comes along and accuses the rest of us of having unrealistic expectations of poverty, and makes some snarky remark about hybrids or hookers or macbooks. Instead of dragging the thread down, why don't we elevate the discourse? I p…

Well said. The post doesn't have to have an answer for everything to be interesting.

In the 0.1 post, she's quite clear about the limitations of the exercise: "I’m not trying to work out how easy or difficult it is for people or families who find themselves in this position — there are clearly a large number of concomitant challenges that I wouldn’t presume to be able to quantify or address."

Re: How to eat healthily for £1 per day – version 0.2

#58

Post by tracker1 » Mon, May 27, 2013, 5:40 PM UTC

AlexDanger wrote: post #47

VLM wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It has a few issues. 1) Depends on what you're using it for. Personally I think it tastes foul in salad dressing type applications. Olive oil is the gold standard for homemade salad dressings. I would imagine if you're frying donuts or potatoes or something, you'd want the more neutral flavor of canola instead of olive. 2) Rancidity issues lead to three problems. First is massively excessive processing which turns th…

I'm going to call bullshit on pretty much everything you've said here. As I understand, Canola oil is a cheap, neutral oil with decent nutritional properties and an excellent range of cooking temperatures. Its a great alternative to olive oil. Its better than olive oil if you're frying a steak or using high temperatures. Can you provide sources for what you've said? I'll start: http://www.snopes.com/medical/toxins/ca…

Yeah, now open the bottle, use about 1/8th of it a month for a couple months and see which goes bad faster. Also, Olive Oil isn't the only option here.

Personally in my kitchen I have coconut oil, olive oil, rice bran oil (about as processed as canola, but much better properties), walnut oil (used sparingly, great flavor) and regular butter. On occasion I'll use regular lard, which is actually pretty healthy.

I probably use more butter and rice bran oil than the others. Canola/vegetable oils are just not good for you, do some cursory searches. There are much better alternatives that aren't much more expensive over the course of a year.

Re: How to eat healthily for £1 per day – version 0.2

#59

Post by tracker1 » Mon, May 27, 2013, 5:49 PM UTC

Nrsolis wrote: post #31

DanBC wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> One of the things that worries me is the focus on cost as opposed to nutrition. Well, this is just an experiment to see if a nutritionally adequate diet can be made for £1 per day. I hope no-one is going to actually eat it. I think it could actually be useful if the author increased the amount of money available - say £2 per day. Or if the author did plans for 2 people.

I sure hope no one is going to eat it either. Cooked oatmeal for breakfast 7 days a week? The author seems to be stuck in the mindset that certain foods are "breakfast" foods. I've had chicken breast and broccoli for breakfast. I've had omelets for dinner. Nutritious food isn't time-specific. BY far the biggest improvement most people could see from a cost basis is learning to cook and then actually cooking. The wife…

For that matter, I'm a bit concerned about taking in nutrients on a per-day basis... I think having some thing to eat a few time a day is important, but that the nutrition can be averaged over a 3-4 day cycle.. you may get a bit more one thing one day, and another the next as long as it averages out.

Re: How to eat healthily for £1 per day – version 0.2

#60

Post by frou_dh » Mon, May 27, 2013, 5:58 PM UTC

lenazegher wrote: post #55

frou_dh wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd rather flag the entire submission. Cooking cheap is one thing, but the "healthy" throughline continues to go nowhere. The meal plan should be christened "This Week In Starch". Just look at it!

> I'd rather flag the entire submission. Cooking cheap is one thing, but the "healthy" throughline continues to go nowhere. Perhaps a better title would be "how to eat as healthily as possible for £1 per day", but I tried to find a balance between precision and clarity. Yes, the primary energy source is starch, but this is simply a necessity on such a limited budget. Even if you were comfortable getting the majority…

I don't see why it's necessary to overreach and make health claims at all. It could just be "Meals You Can Cook On £1/day".

Frankly, it's this wishy-washy "Food Pyramid" definition of healthy eating (load up on carbs by default, also, FaVs solve everything) that's put the general population in such a bad state.