Our culture is set up for obesity.

anything BUT cooking appealing, nutritious and economic meals for the entire family (which by the way, takes A LOT of time usually).

If that takes "A LOT of time," it's being done wrong.

BS.

Even the simplest meals can take a significant amount of time...between taking out containers, peeling or preparing the fresh food, and cleaning up, putting dishes away, etc. Do remember I also assume you cook economically. For example I never buy chicken breasts because I want them organic and organic chicken breasts are expensive as H.
So I buy whole organic chickens that come out less expensive, and I butcher them myself.
I can assure you that takes a significant chunk of time - just to get the meat ready for cooking.

Haha and then you wonder why people don't want to do it?

Why would any women or man at that want to spend so much time in the kitchen when they could be playing with their children,at the gym or working their job.

No, cooking time can be kept to a minimum, especially with simple meals.

You don't have to...in a span of 6 hours on a Saturday I can have made at least a winters supply of homemade spagetti sauce from organic veggies grown in my own garden plus have the fresh pasta made and frozen to go with said sauce and fresh strawberry rhubarb pies x4 made and frozen as well never mind the homemad bread in the ver...that above all sounds like someone who can't organize their time well....

Exactly.

Plus, she's only talking prep time, not the actual time it takes to make a meal. If you choose to butcher your own chicken, sure, it will take longer. But there are other ways that don't.

I always thought it took hours and hours to bake from scratch before I actually learned to do it myself. I make the best apple pie (including crust) any of you will ever have and it takes me about 20 minutes to put it all together, then an hour in the oven. Now, it takes an hour and 20 minutes total, but only 20 minutes of that requires me to be actually working. I don't stand over the oven for 60 minutes.

Also, I can hand-wash an entire day's worth of dishes in 20 minutes.

Can I come over?

anything BUT cooking appealing, nutritious and economic meals for the entire family (which by the way, takes A LOT of time usually).

If that takes "A LOT of time," it's being done wrong.

BS.

Even the simplest meals can take a significant amount of time...between taking out containers, peeling or preparing the fresh food, and cleaning up, putting dishes away, etc. Do remember I also assume you cook economically. For example I never buy chicken breasts because I want them organic and organic chicken breasts are expensive as H.
So I buy whole organic chickens that come out less expensive, and I butcher them myself.
I can assure you that takes a significant chunk of time - just to get the meat ready for cooking.

Haha and then you wonder why people don't want to do it?

Why would any women or man at that want to spend so much time in the kitchen when they could be playing with their children,at the gym or working their job.

No, cooking time can be kept to a minimum, especially with simple meals.

You don't have to...in a span of 6 hours on a Saturday I can have made at least a winters supply of homemade spagetti sauce from organic veggies grown in my own garden plus have the fresh pasta made and frozen to go with said sauce and fresh strawberry rhubarb pies x4 made and frozen as well never mind the homemad bread in the ver...that above all sounds like someone who can't organize their time well....

Exactly.

Plus, she's only talking prep time, not the actual time it takes to make a meal. If you choose to butcher your own chicken, sure, it will take longer. But there are other ways that don't.

I always thought it took hours and hours to bake from scratch before I actually learned to do it myself. I make the best apple pie (including crust) any of you will ever have and it takes me about 20 minutes to put it all together, then an hour in the oven. Now, it takes an hour and 20 minutes total, but only 20 minutes of that requires me to be actually working. I don't stand over the oven for 60 minutes.

Also, I can hand-wash an entire day's worth of dishes in 20 minutes.

I want some apple pie! :happy:

I think we should make it the fashion to bring our own tupperware, cut our meal in 1/2 or into thirds and store a bunch away before starting to eat. It will eliminate toxic foam to go boxes from the landfills and make a statement. We should make this a "thing"

I have actually brought containers from home to restaurants because I knew I'd never be able to eat the whole meal. It prevents sauces from spilling in the car. Granted, it's gotten me some odd looks, but I get odd looks anyway

anything BUT cooking appealing, nutritious and economic meals for the entire family (which by the way, takes A LOT of time usually).

If that takes "A LOT of time," it's being done wrong.

BS.

Even the simplest meals can take a significant amount of time...between taking out containers, peeling or preparing the fresh food, and cleaning up, putting dishes away, etc. Do remember I also assume you cook economically. For example I never buy chicken breasts because I want them organic and organic chicken breasts are expensive as H.
So I buy whole organic chickens that come out less expensive, and I butcher them myself.
I can assure you that takes a significant chunk of time - just to get the meat ready for cooking.

Haha and then you wonder why people don't want to do it?

Why would any women or man at that want to spend so much time in the kitchen when they could be playing with their children,at the gym or working their job.

No, cooking time can be kept to a minimum, especially with simple meals.

You don't have to...in a span of 6 hours on a Saturday I can have made at least a winters supply of homemade spagetti sauce from organic veggies grown in my own garden plus have the fresh pasta made and frozen to go with said sauce and fresh strawberry rhubarb pies x4 made and frozen as well never mind the homemad bread in the ver...that above all sounds like someone who can't organize their time well....

You know I hate cooking and i have time management problems. I work hard to manage my time. Maybe just maybe consider that some people do have struggles that you don't have and that doesn't make them a lesser person.

I do figure over time I'll get to the place where I can organize huge batches of food on the weekend. I used to be at a place where planning a single meal took me way too much time. Thankfully in the course of the last 2 years now I am able to plan for a week and keep food prep down to a normal time. But that's doing the simplest meals I can think of. Still the point is in another 2 years maybe I'll make batch pasta and my own broth and prep and freeze veggies from the farmers market to last the whole year.

In the meantime, I'm doing well if I feed my husband every night for a week (without going out that is)

It is amazing how many people think that preferring an option to purchase a normal single meal when going out for dinner or lunch = wanting to police restaurants.

That an option of being required to purchase 2-3 dinners at that one seating (one fresh and 2 stale ones to take home) is a far more reasonable alternative to so many posters there than a normal portion size And that if this is not my preferred choice, than there is something wrong with me.

Not gonna lie, I wish more resturants offered the "light version" even at dinner.. I would still probably only eat 1/2-2/3 of that. But just because they don't, doesn't mean that I (or anyone) have to listen to the cultural influence to eat it all. People wanted bigger portions... if they didn't they wouldn't be paying the bucks for it.... food companies were able to make bigger portions for less and the people keep coming back for more and more and more... If the consumer is wanting smaller portions than it is the consumers that are going to have to push back... but I don't see that happening anytime in the near future. At this point in the game, if the food industry shrunk their portions there would be a major pushback to get those bigger portions back... it's not all the resturant industries fault here. So until then you are just going to have to do what you need to to eat right.

I'm totally baffled about why it's a great idea to take a doggie box of left over food home: do you go out for a meal, or for two, is it really the same pleasant foodie experience reheated at home the next day? I don't find it so with leftovers of our own cooking (and I cook good tasty dishes from fresh ingredients), nor does the rest of my family....guess who is most likely to have to eat that up, yup, it's mum :grumble:

I do think it's a cultural issue, and it is one which an awful lot of folks are in total denial about - but really and truly, food your body doesn't need is wasted whether you put it through your gut or leave it to one side, and those places offering such enormous portions are encouraging an obscene level of waste. Customer demand for "value" misses the point - more is not better value, it's just excess - and the it's the culture as a whole which thinks in these terms, so it's the culture as a whole which would need to change. From the tone of so many of the posts here, I can't see that happening any time soon - but the best way for the obesity problem to be solved is certainly for that mindset to shift from "I'm entitled to whatever I want" to, "I'd like to have what I need".

So many people in the rest of the world short of food, and competitions to see how much of this or that kind of high calorie grease-laden food one individual can stuff into their face against the clock, out west? Another example of where culture really has lost the plot...

anything BUT cooking appealing, nutritious and economic meals for the entire family (which by the way, takes A LOT of time usually).

If that takes "A LOT of time," it's being done wrong.

BS.

Even the simplest meals can take a significant amount of time...between taking out containers, peeling or preparing the fresh food, and cleaning up, putting dishes away, etc. Do remember I also assume you cook economically. For example I never buy chicken breasts because I want them organic and organic chicken breasts are expensive as H.
So I buy whole organic chickens that come out less expensive, and I butcher them myself.
I can assure you that takes a significant chunk of time - just to get the meat ready for cooking.

Haha and then you wonder why people don't want to do it?

Why would any women or man at that want to spend so much time in the kitchen when they could be playing with their children,at the gym or working their job.

No, cooking time can be kept to a minimum, especially with simple meals.

You don't have to...in a span of 6 hours on a Saturday I can have made at least a winters supply of homemade spagetti sauce from organic veggies grown in my own garden plus have the fresh pasta made and frozen to go with said sauce and fresh strawberry rhubarb pies x4 made and frozen as well never mind the homemad bread in the ver...that above all sounds like someone who can't organize their time well....

Exactly.

Plus, she's only talking prep time, not the actual time it takes to make a meal. If you choose to butcher your own chicken, sure, it will take longer. But there are other ways that don't.

I always thought it took hours and hours to bake from scratch before I actually learned to do it myself. I make the best apple pie (including crust) any of you will ever have and it takes me about 20 minutes to put it all together, then an hour in the oven. Now, it takes an hour and 20 minutes total, but only 20 minutes of that requires me to be actually working. I don't stand over the oven for 60 minutes.

Also, I can hand-wash an entire day's worth of dishes in 20 minutes.

I want some apple pie! :happy:

We could do a pot luck....

ps it's amazing what a good food processor, a nice cooktop and an old fashioned apple peeler, slicer, corer can do to speed this stuff up....;), and if it's just as easy to make 2 pies as it is one (maybe an extra 10mins) and freeze it for later....

I agree that our culture is set up for obesity, and its not just the restaurant portions! Like others have said, we are overworked and overscheduled, without enough time to cook or exercise, yet somehow, a cost effective, nutritious alternative to cooking has not evolved. Other than at a salad store (expensive!), I don't know anywhere where you can go and get a plate that is 1/2 healthy veggies, 1/4 starch, and 1/4 lean protein.

I cook for my family 5-6 nights per week, and I plan out balanced dinners. But go to any restaurant and you're getting lots of carbs, almost no veggies, and the meat... sometimes okay, but more often than not has some kind of sauce, or is cooked in a way that introduces a lot of fat.

I find it very frustrating that I have to choose between, say, working out, or eating healthy, because after work, doing homework with the kids and running to a soccer game, I simply do not have the time and energy to both cook and hit the gym. Needless to say, I usually end up cooking and skipping the gym, because who would want to work out with a belly full of pizza!

You will find plenty of people who will tell you that you're doing everything the wrong way, you have bad time management skills or something that will somehow manage to dump the load on your virtue-less head and not on the structure of the world within which you live your life.

And then of course, you will still have to make choices because the darn restaurant is not changing their way of serving foods, so it's on us.
Saying "no" to some projects at work, if possible... and if that doesn't involve losing the job; or to some children's activities (this is a fertile area for cutting back as most will hardly benefit kids in any significant way over the long term), etc can be a start.

But being aware of the range of choices you can or cannot make is important.

I completely understand what you mean, good luck to you!

Not sure where you go out to eat, but when I go it is 1-1.5 hours of time invested plus travel. This is plenty of time to make a meal.

We live 2 minutes drive away from tons of restaurants. But we rarely eat out anyway.
This is why restaurant portions are not that big of a deal for us, personally, but I do realize many Americans practice eating out a lot; so for them, portion size will make a difference.

Why would any women or man at that want to spend so much time in the kitchen when they could be playing with their children,at the gym or working their job.

No, cooking time can be kept to a minimum, especially with simple meals.

My children help me cook the meals. This way I can teach them how to cook healthy meals that will carry them through their entire lives.

I cook dinner every night, and have never had an issue getting a healthy meal on the table in 30 min to an hour max.

Just so this dosen't get lost in a quote...if this is a cultural issue in the US and Canada explain how it is?????

There are so many cultures in Canada alone which culture do we blame????

The East Indians? the Philipinoes? The Germans? The Irish? The Native americans? The Chinese? Pakistani? Iranian? Egyptian? Cuban? (trust me this is just those that work in the company I do that have immigrated in the last 10 years) Caucasions born here with god knows how many cultures in their blood????

Which culture influence is to blame?

I agree that our culture is set up for obesity, and its not just the restaurant portions! Like others have said, we are overworked and overscheduled, without enough time to cook or exercise, yet somehow, a cost effective, nutritious alternative to cooking has not evolved. Other than at a salad store (expensive!), I don't know anywhere where you can go and get a plate that is 1/2 healthy veggies, 1/4 starch, and 1/4 lean protein.

I cook for my family 5-6 nights per week, and I plan out balanced dinners. But go to any restaurant and you're getting lots of carbs, almost no veggies, and the meat... sometimes okay, but more often than not has some kind of sauce, or is cooked in a way that introduces a lot of fat.

I find it very frustrating that I have to choose between, say, working out, or eating healthy, because after work, doing homework with the kids and running to a soccer game, I simply do not have the time and energy to both cook and hit the gym. Needless to say, I usually end up cooking and skipping the gym, because who would want to work out with a belly full of pizza!

You will find plenty of people who will tell you that you're doing everything the wrong way, you have bad time management skills or something that will somehow manage to dump the load on your virtue-less head and not on the structure of the world within which you live your life.

And then of course, you will still have to make choices because the darn restaurant is not changing their way of serving foods, so it's on us.
Saying "no" to some projects at work, if possible... and if that doesn't involve losing the job; or to some children's activities (this is a fertile area for cutting back as most will hardly benefit kids in any significant way over the long term), etc can be a start.

But being aware of the range of choices you can or cannot make is important.

I completely understand what you mean, good luck to you!

Not sure where you go out to eat, but when I go it is 1-1.5 hours of time invested plus travel. This is plenty of time to make a meal.

Seriously! While we aren't far from many resturants, just getting seated can take 20 minutes a lot of the time and then get our food ordered another 15 and then another 20 or so for it get out to us.

Just so this dosen't get lost in a quote...if this is a cultural issue in the US and Canada explain how it is?????

There are so many cultures in Canada alone which culture do we blame????

The East Indians? the Philipinoes? The Germans? The Irish? The Native americans? The Chinese? Pakistani? Iranian? Egyptian? Cuban? (trust me this is just those that work in the company I do that have immigrated in the last 10 years) Caucasions born here with god knows how many cultures in their blood????

Which culture influence is to blame?

Did this sound like a good argument in your head before you wrote it out?

If I go to a restaurant and pay $20+ for an entree, there had better be plenty of food on that plate. If you don't want all of it, you CAN take some of it home with you. If you can't control your impulses at restaurants, don't eat out. But lay off on suggesting that our "culture" should be set up with the lowest common denominator in mind. How about just try harder?

I don't think anyone has suggested changing culture.

It has simply been pointed out what the culture is and how it is setting us up for obesity.

And that is true.

It's totally a cultural issue. I don't think any other country (well, Canada maybe) even lets you take leftovers home. I've never seen it in Europe at least... and portions were much smaller there.

I also don't know anybody where I am coming from who claims to be able to slap together "miracle recipes" in minutes flat (including prep, cleaning up, distributing leftovers in containers, etc) - which recipes are also tasty, healthy, fresh, all natural, etc. Definitely not for an entire family!

People there allocate significant amounts of time to cooking. As long as they did that, they were not fat.
Now that they are starting to live like Americans and no longer allocate that much time for cooking, they're starting to be fat.
How simple is that?

Good, tasty, nutritious food takes a certain amount of time to make.
Yes, that amount of time is worth it but that means other spheres of life will have to give.

The clever marketing strategies that sold the idea that "more is good" and led to the fat epidemic

Here is the history of bigger portion and the profits earned by big food. Great Entertainment.

The Men who Made us Fat Part 2:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RLNbwNMtXQ0

right..so marketing made people fat, not overeating...got ya...

I understand your mindset, but you might misunderstand and miscalculate the power of marketing. It is no secret that next to R&D, marketing is a corporations largest budget. Think about that. If it didnt work, they wouldn't do it. We're talking billions a year for some companies. It's not because they are stupid, it's because it is effective.

You would think people would realize that if a lot of money is invested in a certain strategy that means it is effective and it works.
It is so much easier though to blame an individual's "choices", overeating 'cause they want to overeat, time management skills, gluttony, not knowing the RIGHT recipes that cook themselves in 3 minutes flat, the works.

Apparently you've never seen government programs

And it's even easier to assign blame to some third party's evil doing vs taking responsibility

Who said you shouldn't take responsibility?
I take responsibility ALL WHILE pointing to the "evil doings".

Your either/or mentality is just plain fallacious.