Concerned advice I was given

July24Lioness

... 2) No one cooks anymore. Everyone sticks to boxed dinners, microwave food, fast food restaurants.... You can't even buy some ingredients in the store. It's pathetic. We're so concerned with working and keeping up with the rat race that we don't bother to wonder how long we'll live if we keep going like that. We live in a "Hurry up and eat ANYTHING so you can get back to work" world. And it just isn't healthy.

I have to disagree with this part. I went vegetarian about 16 years ago. I had one cookbook and couldn't usually find the basic ingredients (even things like chick peas!) without going to a health food/natural food store. I have watched the access to
"exotic" ingredients grow and grow! Especially with places like Whole Foods being popular, all sorts of stuff- including so many organic ingredients- has now become common. I work a FT job + 1-2 PT jobs and still make time to cook (30 minute meal Rachel Ray style!) pretty much every night. I don't think cooking at home is that unusual or rare. I think I eat much more diverse foods than I ever did growing up (with parents who also cooked dinner every night for the family). Just my experience, though. It could be different where you live.

Oh, I generally mean the cheap stores, where you find the people that aren't really thinking about what they're putting in their body. Or, honestly, the stores that I can personally afford. While I am forced to make the occasional trip to Whole Foods to buy something I need for a recipe (literally could not find arborio rice for risotto anywhere else in town) I can't afford to do all my grocery shopping there.

I do also come from a very (pardon me) FAT region. I'm from South Louisiana. That might have something to do with the ingredient availability. We're not buying it, so they aren't stocking it? I dunno.

Oh, I definitely don't get to shop at WFs! I just go to my normal Publix or Super Target. I shopped at Walmart yesterday. Even there you can find organic and a variety of stuff! I'm a poor teacher! :laugh: However, I think bc WF is so popular, the regular stores are adding more good food to compete. At least here where I live!

Publix rocks for the produce! I come from the 2nd fattest state (tied with Alabama!) and I can totally see how the food access matters. I want to do the CSA or farmer's markets, but the scheduling is difficult or I have to drive 40miles one way to the good places. And mind you, I don't live in a hut. Not to mention, the pricing can be horrific. It's sad how backwards things are. The bad for you stuff should be the expensive stuff. The unprocessed veggie goodness should be the easy access things. However, there are some improvements over the past couple years as people have become more aware. Even WF is 40miles for me. Annoying! You have to really work to get what you want.

Oh and props to the person who listed the grains!

Our CSA share is delivered to us and left on either our carport, front porch or on the patio...........I love it!! It cuts down how much I have to run to the farmers market to pick up anything.

I am very, very blessed. The town where I live has 2 farmers market locations with organic veggies and fruits and I work right down the street from one of the old Farmers Markets in the United States. It is HUGE!! Also, right down the street from where I work in the opposite direction is a fresh meat market in which I can get grass fed beef, locally farm raised chickens, eggs and pork, so I have access to local and Fresh foods all the way around.

I also bought into a CSA and I share with my neighbors because my hubby and I are not able to eat everything in our share every week.

i am still scared of Egg Plant, LOL............i give it away every time because I am not sure of what it is going to taste like. I want to try it though. Anyone have ideas?

July24Lioness

Speaking of not believing everything you read on the internet... humans have been omnivores since they first walked the earth. We have always eaten meat. Our original ancestors were hunter/gathers who ate a lot of fruit, nuts and vegetables which was supplemented with occasional gorging on fresh meat that they killed (hence the hunter part of hunter gather) and had to eat up before it went bad.

It's grains and dairy products that didn't come into our diets until we started farming.

ETA the groceries at our Target suck too. It's almost all processed crap with very little fresh meat and produce.

Exactly!!!

leavinglasvegas

i am still scared of Egg Plant, LOL............i give it away every time because I am not sure of what it is going to taste like. I want to try it though. Anyone have ideas?

I don't have time to find it now. But I posted a recipe for a vegetarian no pasta lasagna from the south beach diet phase one. You use eggplant slices for noodles. It was better than my moms lasagna.

simona1972

i am still scared of Egg Plant, LOL............i give it away every time because I am not sure of what it is going to taste like. I want to try it though. Anyone have ideas?

My mom used to make a great stuffed eggplant dish. She would hollow out the eggplant, chop up what was hollowed out and mix it with a ground beef/pork/veal mixture and then either fry it or bake it - if you're baking it [which I would recommend], it helps to top it with tomato sauce. She'd then top it with parmesan cheese.

I LOVE eggplant. Grew up eating it weekly.