“Bachelor Chow™ . . . now with flavor.” – Futurama
I heard that it was projected that the next Muslim country to have nukes is going to be France.
It’s no surprise to anyone that the biggest health problem in 2022 isn’t the ‘Rona, it’s people who are overweight. I’d imagine that most of you have seen the .gif that shows state after state with an increasing Body Mass Index (BMI) over time. I just checked my BMI, and according to the chart I have to grow at least five more inches.
Part of my question as I’ve seen this epidemic unfold has been, why? It’s not like the people in the United States suddenly lost willpower started consuming crap for no reason, though that would explain the popularity of Friends. Although I think there are several other significant causes I think one of the biggest has been the rise of ultraprocessed foods.
Most foods (for all of my life) have been processed to some degree. Ma Wilder didn’t feed us raw wheat – nope. She used white flour in cooking and baking bread since mass-produced flour was cheap and lasted in the cabinet forever. Ma Wilder told me that, since I was adopted, I would have to eat bread only from self-raising flour.
What’s the difference between Nic Cage and someone allergic to wheat? Nic would never turn down a roll.
Processing of flour from wheat changes not only the nutrient profile – it pulled out the parts of the wheat kernel that don’t store well as flour – but it also changed how it acts when eaten. An example: wheat flour is made into the familiar powder that we’re used to. This makes it easier to store and ship. It also makes it pretty tasty.
The final thing I want to mention about flour is that mashing wheat up into a powder changes how quickly I’ll get to use the nutrients of the flour when I eat it.
Let me explain:
If I ate just a plain wheat kernel, I’d be able to digest most of it, but it would take hours of time and energy. If I eat a piece of tasty, tasty bread, it’s available for use nearly immediately.
Especially the carbs. I’ll save insulin discussion for a later post, but ultraprocessed foods have an amazing impact on insulin production.
And the physical form of the food can also make people fatter. When rats were given (I assume) Rat Chow®, some bored grad student came up with the idea of feeding some rats plain Rat Chow©. The other rats, however, they smashed up the Rat Chow™ into a powder.
Like I said, bored grad students. Possibly drunk.
What’s the difference between rat poison and Diet Coke®? Diet Coke™ has better advertising.
What happened? The rats with the powdered food got fat and the rats that ate the “plain” food didn’t, even though both groups of rats were eating the same amount of calories. The change in form changed the way the food acted in the rats – it made the nutrients available more quickly, which (again, because of insulin) made the rats fat.
Heck, it’s not even just the flour and powdered rat food.
An even bigger bomb to the body is sugar. Sugar was once very uncommon as human food. Our ancestors got it from berries (not a lot, but some) and, when they could fight the bees back, from honey.
If I get diabetes, will that make me a sugar daddy?
Domestication and widespread production of sugar didn’t occur until the folks in India figured it out in the early Anno Domini centuries (note to Zoomers, this was before the Internet). They figured out how to take the juices from sugar cane (which can’t be stored or shipped well) and turned it into granulated sugar, which could be saved forever, and shipped across continents.
But for most of human history, sugar was wickedly expensive, and only the wealthy could afford to have it regularly. Now? I can buy granulated sugar for $0.50 per pound. Sugar prices are going up, sure, but I can buy a wholesale ton of sugar for less than $500.
The next category of foods that just weren’t available to humans were vegetable oils. I’m not talking about olive oil which is pressed and can be used just as it comes off the press – I’m talking about corn oils, canola oils, soybean oils. As produced in modern times, these are really chemical products that depend on chemical processes to make them usable.
Their history has been slippery. Transfats – or fats that were unsaturated after being subjected to chemical processing, were supposed to be healthier than butter. We were told so. Now it turns out that they increased the risk of heart attacks. Oops. Now, instead of being promoted by the government, they’re illegal to put in food. And butter is now good for you.
The main thing about these processed foods is that they are cheap to make. Some combination of flours oils, sugars, and . . . well, let’s take a look at the Totino’s® Pizza Roll ingredient list:
What’s the difference between a bag of pizza rolls and a musician? A bag of pizza rolls can feed a family.
It’s an amazing list of chemicals. I just really hesitate to call it food, however. It’s what the word ultraprocessed was made to describe. I was watching a video by Dr. Pradip Jamnadas (cardiologist, and I do recommend his YouTube® vidyas) and he had a word that was even more descriptive for foods like this: pre-digested.
A lot of the work that our wonderfully designed digestive system goes through to get energy out of food is simply not necessary with Totino’s© Human Chow Pizza Rolls. In large part the food is designed to hit the digestive system, and flood the body with calories, ringing the dopamine bell in the brain.
I really do think they’re tasty. I don’t plan on eating them except on very rare occasions, because when I look at the label now, I don’t see what looks like . . . food. It looks like Elon Musk’s shopping list for when he’s trying to create artificial life.
But the real purpose of this is to sell as many Totino’s® Pizza Rolls as possible and make the greatest profit. This leads to one question that illustrates an overlap between libertarianism and communism: “How much sawdust can I put in the food?”
On my diet I can have a libertarian salad: lettuce alone.
To a certain extent, these ultraprocessed foods have succeeded admirably. They’ve allowed cheap ingredients (often made from low-value byproducts) to feed millions of people at a reasonable cost. The problem, though, are the consequences that we see now: the calories taken in impact the human system in vastly different ways than the food that we were designed to consume.
So, my plan is to eat as close to real food as possible – meat, fish, eggs, and whole veggies.
And, yes, an occasional pizza roll, too.
Food fight, indeed. My mother’s side of the family had deep roots in agriculture (pun intended). Long out of the business, I engaged my uncle in the evolution of the food supply, particularly in the 50s through the 80’s. The rapid advancement of genetic modification of nearly every species for yields and shelf life, coupled with the frankenfried food offerings designed by corporation$ for addiction, has led to a broad spectrum of ailments. It’s no shocker that the advent of any number of health issues and social ills that were even unheard of 50 years ago and now shockingly common, run in parallel with the proliferation of GMOs and ultra processed foods. You’re very right: meats, fish, eggs and whole veggies. Hold the HotPockets.
And, a great excuse to eat a steak . . . .
…sugar and alcohol being bad for you
Well, Tito’s is “gluten free” and is for “dog people”. It’s succulent with an organic lime & Schweppes® club sode mixer. And a sublime Pauillac supplies resveratrol. So, agreed on sugar (and MSG™) but nonsense on the latter.
Didn’t say I didn’t still imbibe, but I do watch how much . . . (I think The Mrs. likes Tito’s)
John – – Please post a photo of yourself standing in the middle of your fifty acre plot of wheatstrawberries.
Then you’d be outstanding in your field.
Or so, “they” would say…….
Ha! No, it’s The Mrs. that grows the chow. She’s getting better at it . . . .
The coming deliberate famine will cure a lot of that. Billy Gatekeeper and CCP are on it.
Slidin’ A Biden is CCP owned as is the entire CPUSA crime syndicate and they are out for blood.
Diabetes can be cured but then you can’t see the smoking hot doctor in short skirt anymore.
(sad trombone)
Most worldlings are too weak soft and stupid for existence and soon they won’t have to worry about it anymore.
They will go quietly along the markings on the floor to the abattoir while prattling on about muh democracy or some COV-LARP horseshit.
Food is a weapon so clean your plate and put a boiler plate over your pantry for when the Hunger Games go live in the third world bankster banana republic turd Chiquitastan.
Yup, folks will fight over a Snickers while real food goes ignored . . . .
Pre-digested is the right term for it. The speed it hits your bloodstream and causes that euphoric reaction is akin to hard drugs.
I would quibble about the food being cheap. Sure it doesn’t cost much at the retail end but there is an enormous amount of “money” spent to make corn cheap, and most of that money comes from the taxpayers.
And the cost of the doctors . . . .
No discussion on this subject is complete without including HFCS:
https://clarkstreetpress.com/a-brief-history-of-high-fructose-corn-syrup/#:~:text=HFCS%20was%20first%20produced%20by,and%20made%20it%20into%20fructose.
https://earthsky.org/human-world/a-brief-history-of-high-fructose-corn-syrup/
https://www.motherjones.com/food/2019/07/the-secret-history-of-why-soda-companies-switched-from-sugar-to-high-fructose-corn-syrup/
The switch to HFCS was also politically mandated as part of a US embargo on Cuban sugar…
http://www.searchamelia.com/cubas-uneasy-sugar-cane-revenge
Ricky excellent info, the cuban embargo and other government controls have also been to protect the American sugar producers. Its damned near a monopoly for them but the campaign contributions keep coming in. I quit pop years ago except on a rare occasion just tap water all day long now it helps.
And Dr. Lustig talks so much about how differently your body treats it . . .
Actually, one needs to take some undergraduate bio courses, with basic chem. Or be an athlete. My major complaint about university curriculums, let alone secondary ed, is that the important stuff is neglected. We all should understand diet. There is not much to it. Proteins are the same no matter the source. Fats that are hydrogenated should be avoided, though we do need a certain amount for digestion and basic operation. The easiest way I related diet to high school players was to relate to a car. Protein is needed for maintenance, fats for operation and carbs as a fuel. The more complex the carb the better, though there is a magic 45 minutes after a workout in which all bets are off, as glucose is being directly replaced intracellularly. When you’re at the professional level (not American sports, as we don’t do sustained aerobics) in a sport such as cycling, we only eat when we are in training. Food is a fuel, and only used as such. Proteins are regulated by percentages, as are fats, but carbs are strictly a need to go part of the diet.
The trouble with the American diet is that people eat from pleasure rather than need. Taste is more important than substance. Advertising has done a great job of conditioning slob-like behaviors. And of course, the default food items are from a mechanized process that values profit over nutritional value. Bottom line is to eat complex carbs, regularly exercise in such a way that a min of 30 minutes is spent on aerobic activity and most importantly to treat carbs as a fuel that will be stored as fat is not used. Proteins will as well, eating excess cheetos is much easier than boiled chicken. And yes, fried food is death in a bucket.
Aitkens diet, don’t eat the whites.
John I have no excuse as I am overweight as well but I have long thought on many things these last few years. Family’s use to use lard, or rendered fat to cook with just ask my father in law how many times he mentioned it. I remember the crisco can on the kitchen counter when I was a kid.
As I contemplated statements about the nut oils and other things I read, and think about margarine and how it was promoted as healthy it hit me. The all mighty dollar and greedy corporations created all this. Think about it, they replaced all the what were probably healthy cooking items and food with manufactured/processed items. Ain’t advertising great. When a commercial would come on I would ask my kids what are they trying to do, they would reply get our money. I beat it into their heads hope it helps.
Yes there was more manual labor when my Dad and Grandad were growing up they were eating better to a degree of what was available at that time.
I look at all the old pictures my father accumulated and used in two books, there wasn’t a fat person in them.
I have eaten so little fast food and canned meals these last couple of years it has helped me not put on weight over time. Which is good but age and the extreme efficiency of our God created human body to not allow the loss of stored energy is truly amazing. Saw a scientific documentary on a PBS show about fat and the human body. In a sense it was depressing but very eye opening.
Keep doing what your doing and maybe run over to a border crossing and support the truckers. That jog should help you lose some weight.
Yup – there are other things that have changed, but the big one is . . . our food.
Data point: ‘Soylent Green’ was set in 2022. Make of that what you will.
Make room, make room . . . .
At least it’s Atkins friendly.
You can counteract the quick digestion of such dangerous foods as bread and potatoes. All it takes is a scoop of Universal Flavor Enhancer: bacon grease. Mix a teaspoon of UFE into a cup of cooked oatmeal to get your day off on the right foot. Peanut butter is another excellent source of fat.
One of The Great Lies of human history is that “Fat makes you fat, but sugar gives you quick energy.” In fact, eating fat lets you stop eating with satisfaction, while eating sugar makes you eat again … and more.
Did you ever notice that anyone with room to raise a pig (or knows someone who can) has ready access to excellent fat, but you MUST pay off Big Sugar to get the granulated sweet?
When jars of filtered animal fat (pig, chicken, and duck) showed up in my favorite organic foods store, someone pointed out to me that this means “The Vegans lost the healthy food war.”
(BTW: I’m 6’2″, and 160 lbs, about 10 lbs heavier than I was 40 years ago.)
Excellent results!
re — RAPE!
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The rape plant produces an acid known to destroy heart muscle.
After crushing the seed to extract the oil, the rape husk waste is fed to animals — such as cattle, sheep, and factory-farm fish — to increase their weight from retained water through massive amounts of inflammation.
These ‘feed-lot’ animals must be quickly processed before their hearts quit.
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Rape is also part of pet food.
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Monsanto owns the gene-modified version of rape, laboratory engineered to tolerate petroleum-based pesticides and fertilizers (‘Round-Up’).
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Rape is pollenized primarily through wind drift.
Monsanto sued Canada farmers to prevent them from marketing non-GMO rape weather-adulterated by nearby Monsanto GMO plants… as a ‘copyright infringement’.
The government judges issued ‘rulings’ supporting the Monsanto allegations.
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Rape makes up the majority of the non- petroleum part of bio-diesel fuel.
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Millions of tons of rape are consumed by humans as part of the cooking process, in deep-oil frying — french fries, fish sticks — and as part of the animal feed.
A cheap alternative to already-cheap grains, rape is added to processed packaged foods, partially to adulterate and partially to immeasurably extend ‘shelf-life’.
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After processing, rape oil has a ‘shelf-life’ measured in centuries.
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As a replacement for human milk (‘formula’), rape products “…are not generally believed to be harmful to infants…”.
This infant ‘formula’ contains corn syrup to mimic the flavor of human milk.
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After noting some initial consumer resistance to the name of the plant — related to ‘turnip’ on Latin — Canadian farmers changed the plant name to ‘canola’.
In patriarchal India, the place raped women and girls are routinely publicly whipped, the original name — RAPE — is proudly displayed…
Yup – the more I read about that seed, the less I like it . . . .
I used to have a WiFi engineer who worked for me on occasion. Former Spec Ops guy, smart nearly beyond belief. His rule? “Never eat anything you can’t pronounce.” Seems like a good rule. Now if I could just follow it.
Dr. Jamnadas said, if it has a label, don’t buy it.
John, the weight issue is the proverbial “third rail” of American health discussions: to touch it in anyway is to set off a firestorm of words like “body shaming” and “judgmental”.
I am sympathetic. This is a problem my larger family has struggled with. I struggle with it, although to be fair I also struggle with body image issues (even in my 50’s). The reality is that we know – that darn “follow the science” again – that being overweight creates a lot of health issues, ones that society has to bear (where have we heard “do it for society” lately?). The problem is that anything that remotely sounds like “and you need to do something about it” gets shut down.
The BMI does not help either, frankly – as any number of lifters will tell you (myself included) will tell, the BMI is not reflective of overall health or strength. It would be nice if we could move to a different standard.
I have also noted upon occasion that among Christian circles, gluttony is a sin which is almost never talked about or preached on. Yet oddly, most of the Church fathers had a great deal to say on regulating the diet (for ascetic reasons, but the underlying reason – denying one’s self instead of giving in) remains relevant).
When obesity is actually treated in the same vein as any of the other pandemic, then we will make progress. Until then, not so much.
Ken Denninger (market-ticker.org) has opinions on lots of different topics, and if you search the archives of his blog, you’ll see his testimonial to losing weight on a high-fat diet. There’s a search box. Enter “diet”, and you’ll get a list of possibly relevant articles to browse.
In my opinion, the main reason people are obese is because they’ve been lied to too many times about what a healthy diet REALLY is. There’s too much money involved, with all of the food-producers, processors, and retailers (including restaurants) to ever have an honest public education campaign. Food is fuel. Look for entertainment elsewhere.
Yup – and there’s no money in a doctor actually making you healthy with no pills or anything else to sell.
The simple rule of thumb is JERF – just eat real food. Then you can get into whether or not potatoes are real food. And that nonsense about “resistant starch.”
A common question is, “people have been eating wheat for thousands of years; why the big fuss about gluten now?” The answer is today’s wheat isn’t what they ate thousands of years ago. It was carefully bred for optimum production/acre. Grows about 2 feet tall, no tall “amber waves of grain” anymore. And chemically rather different.
On the one hand, it fed millions or billions in poverty around world and saved many, many lives. Norman Borlaug won the Nobel prize and a bunch of others for developing it and saving those lives. The drawback is the reactions so many millions have to the new proteins in that wheat.
Yes – in the last 2,000 years we’ve changed food in major ways, many of them in the last 100. And how long has the body had to adapt?