Your food is no cleaner than mine

I don't get any comments about anything in my cart usually. I remember once a guy commented on the cupcakes i had in my basket. He said.. I don't eat sweets, not my thing. I just smiled and said. tat's probably a good thing. I don't comment on others basket either. Although I was in Sams club a few weeks ago and was astounded by one gentlemen's cart (2 actually) piled high with hostess and chip and soda.. Most likely he own a small store.. but the sheer quantity he had just caught my attention. I didn't say anything to him.

No one has ever commented on anything in my cart but a checker. Mostly positive--but extremely rarely some weird non-positive comment that just seems strange from a checker. For example, one time in Myrtle Beach years ago the checker decided to try and shame us for buying beer on a Sunday. The idea of commenting on what's in someone else's cart just seems bizarre to me.

I've had people in the store ask me where I found something or if I was buying a specific product and someone was wondering about it, the person will ask me questions. But no one has ever randomly criticized anything in my cart.

Was reading through the first page... I have to laugh at the idea that "processed food" is bad... Um, I'm pretty sure any cut up and/or cooked food has been processed...

Oh it's semantics? Then find a better phrase that "processed".

Was reading through the first page... I have to laugh at the idea that "processed food" is bad... Um, I'm pretty sure any cut up and/or cooked food has been processed...

Oh it's semantics? Then find a better phrase that "processed".

Nope.

Stop using extreme examples.

Don't worry. We get it. The problem is the label itself, not the food eaten.

I don't have a magic ingredient number. I just buy my foods whole and raw and turn them into something yummy myself. I avoid chemical additives on the few things i buy that i do not make myself. And I avoid added sugar (which really has nothing to do with clean eating, that's just my preference) The nitty gritty details are just like any other diet, Subject to the whims of the person who eats that diet.

Is it better for you personally *shrug* idk.. I don't know you or your needs. I know it's better for me and i can tell by the lack of headaches, the increase in energy, the amount of sleep I get and how I feel overall.

I don't get all the hate.. I don't agree with paleo at all and I don't really get it. It doesn't seem like a healthy diet to me, but I don't go ripping it apart or demanding explanation from people who follow it. It's like vegetarians.. or the plethora of branches they created because no one could agree on exactly what constitutes a vegetarian. Like I am a vegetarian but I eat fish, so they created a name for that. Makes no sense to me. But to each their own.

Don't worry. We get it. The problem is the label itself, not the food eaten.

Actually, I'd moved on from that issue--I think I expressed my views sufficiently--to my more substantive questions about the concept, vs the (incredibly self-congratulatory) label you use for what I call cooking. Okay, sorry, haven't entirely dropped it, I guess, but I just find it so mystifying that you don't see how off-putting the label is. But moving on...

I don't have a magic ingredient number. I just buy my foods whole and raw and turn them into something yummy myself. I avoid chemical additives on the few things i buy that i do not make myself. And I avoid added sugar (which really has nothing to do with clean eating, that's just my preference) The nitty gritty details are just like any other diet, Subject to the whims of the person who eats that diet.

But see, I also kind of think that I generally buy my foods whole and raw and turn them into something tasty myself. That's what cooking is, right? But "clean eating" is something beyond that--it's a claim that it's bad to ever eat processed food. To actually have a discussion about the merits of that, it's necessary to define what you are talking about and why those foods are distinguished such that they must be unhealthy (unclean, even!) even in moderation.

That's why I raised a few specific examples. All processed, but all either consistent with cooking with whole ingredients, using a small amount of an additive that makes the results of cooking tastier (like using packaged herbs and spices, salt and pepper), or something that is quite time consuming to make myself and probably no better tasting (although I haven't tried) or healthier. So if you are going to say that the key issue is processing tell me what I'm missing about my examples.

i can tell by the lack of headaches, the increase in energy, the amount of sleep I get and how I feel overall.

If you are telling me that frozen tuna and yogurt from a store give you these problems, I'd have no issue with you avoiding them, obviously. But when it's part of "clean eating," there's a broader assertion--that most people would be healthier without such items, that they are bad for us as a society, etc. So again my question.

I don't get all the hate.. I don't agree with paleo at all and I don't really get it. It doesn't seem like a healthy diet to me, but I don't go ripping it apart or demanding explanation from people who follow it. It's like vegetarians.. or the plethora of branches they created because no one could agree on exactly what constitutes a vegetarian. Like I am a vegetarian but I eat fish, so they created a name for that. Makes no sense to me. But to each their own.

I don't hate clean eaters. I think they probably eat like a lot of other people here but for whatever reason have an attachment to a label I find obnoxious. But if people are making a claim about all processed food being not just not to their taste--which again seems a weird claim to me, since there's a huge continuum and variety of processing, and it's kind of like saying that only locally grown food is good and all else bad or unnatural--but also unclean (i.e., bad and disgusting for everyone), then I think it's fair game to ask them (politely and as an interested inquiry, not to tell THEM they should eat any other way) on what basis they make that claim?

I think it kind of bugs me because it's such a broad and rather extreme assertion to say that ALL processed foods should be avoided always, that they are inherently worse for you than other foods, just for that reason, but when I actually hear about what sel-defined "clean eaters" eat, I don't see how what they are eating is so different, and plenty of people, not just clean eaters, like to cook a chicken or whatever. I don't call that clean eating, I call it cooking.

Lemurcat: eventually, you can't even eat the kale.

http://www.nwedible.com/2012/08/tragedy-healthy-eater.html

I can't recall ever referring to myself or my diet as "clean"... But I always defined the word in my head as just "anything that's not greasy fast food". :embarassed:

Greasy and fast food is an important part of my healthy diet.

So still, the main issue is people using the term clean eating. The secondary issue is defining clean eating. Which I'm not even going to attempt. It's been gone over a billion times. Just use the search function. You might find it obnoxious that I attach a label to how i eat. I find it obnoxious that people take issue with my chosen diet and whatever I chose to call it. So that makes us even I suppose.

Lemurcat: eventually, you can't even eat the kale.

http://www.nwedible.com/2012/08/tragedy-healthy-eater.html

:laugh: :drinker:

When anyone tells me about their clean eating or Paleo diet or Primal etc etc... I just wonder what fad they're going to try next.