How important is it to "eat clean"

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Replies

  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
    Except it's a known fact that these foods are created to manipulate our body and brain chemistry to find them most pleasurable.

    Most food is created in an effort to make it most pleasurable. That's what learning to cook teaches you how to do. That's every bit as true about traditional home-cooked meals as marketed stuff, and most people will agree with me that really good home-cooked or restaurant food, cooked to their taste using fresh, whole ingredients (and, sure, butter) is much tastier and harder to resist than packaged stuff or fast food, I expect, although obviously taste is subjective.

    It just sounds scarier if it's some big corporation doing that, vs. mom or Julia Child.

    If anything, a lot of the additives in packaged food and fast food is because they are trying to make them tasty on the cheap, and as indicated above they still generally don't taste as good. Compare a frozen pizza to a pizza cooked at a really good local pizza place or home-cooked by someone with the right equipment.

    If you are claiming that transfats or HFCS or whatever are as addictive as truly addictive drugs, provide the evidence. It's certainly not my experience.
  • kgeyser
    kgeyser Posts: 22,505 Member
    Give it time, I'd wager good $$ that a few demographic groups will have the trend reversed in a few years (in a more statistically significant manner), for a number of reasons, but one of the being technology (another one being the strong decline in rate of smoking among the same demographic groups).

    You do understand that since the 1980's smoking rates have decreased by 50% while the number of adults that are obese doubled right? And that there is no sign yet of any adult demographic decreasing right?

    So other than smoking and technology which have done nothing to curb obesity to date, what other significant societal changes do you think will reverse the trend of obesity?
    Very few gyms are that cheap. Most are a good bit more. Heck a Crossfit membership can run $200+ per month. They are every bit as expensive in time as they are in $$. And if you have kids.... the number of gyms that offer daycare is very small. The private for profit gym industry is a horrendous way to promote fitness for the general population. It is in fact hard to think of something that would actually be worse.

    But the point is that there are cheap gyms available. If you're low on money is asinine to pay $200 per month for a gym membership but that doesn't mean you say f*** it to the $10 per month ones you can afford. My YMCA membership is $60 per month for my family which includes 2 hours of daycare each day. I mean that's worth it just for the baby sitter time and is something most medium income families could afford.

    The YMCA where I live is $100 per month for a family. And there's no YMCA nearby, I'd be looking at a 30 min drive at least. The gym within walking distance of my home is over $100 for a family and you have to pay for childcare. No $10 gyms in my area with free childcare. Where you live has a huge impact on cost and accessibility.
  • likitisplit
    likitisplit Posts: 9,420 Member
    Except it's a known fact that these foods are created to manipulate our body and brain chemistry to find them most pleasurable.

    Most food is created in an effort to make it most pleasurable. That's what learning to cook teaches you how to do. That's every bit as true about traditional home-cooked meals as marketed stuff, and most people will agree with me that really good home-cooked or restaurant food, cooked to their taste using fresh, whole ingredients (and, sure, butter) is much tastier and harder to resist than packaged stuff or fast food, I expect, although obviously taste is subjective.

    It just sounds scarier if it's some big corporation doing that, vs. mom or Julia Child.

    If anything, a lot of the additives in packaged food and fast food is because they are trying to make them tasty on the cheap, and as indicated above they still generally don't taste as good. Compare a frozen pizza to a pizza cooked at a really good local pizza place or home-cooked by someone with the right equipment.

    If you are claiming that transfats or HFCS or whatever are as addictive as truly addictive drugs, provide the evidence. It's certainly not my experience.

    I dare anybody to stop eating my strawberry cake.
  • ValGogo
    ValGogo Posts: 2,168 Member
    samba-girl-double-fail-giftumblr.gif
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
    A couple of years ago, the food industry started using maltodextrin as an additive in potato chips. Do some research on maltodextrin then get back to me how it doesn't cause cravings and increase the desire to eat more in one sitting.

    I didn't find anything reputable, but will read a link if you have one. It seems like the argument is more that it has a high GI.

    Also, the idea that people are addicted to potato chips doesn't make much sense to me, however, given real world experience.
  • Just_Ceci
    Just_Ceci Posts: 5,926 Member
    [img]http://i1082.photobucket.com/albums/j370/Jezey/Fail Funny Gifs/samba-girl-double-fail-giftumblr.gif[/img]

    FIFY
  • MrTolerable
    MrTolerable Posts: 1,593 Member
    If you are putting hours and hours into your body at the gym and doing cardio then it just feels rewarding eating lean.

    and in my opinion 300 cal of crap vs 600 calories of broccoli and chicken - I think your body would appreciate the lean food more.

    I feel like if you are eating at a deficit especially is really important the small amount of food you do eat is food that is healthy for you.

    - if due to financial reasons you simply can't afford it I recommend taking a mulch-vitamin
  • waldo56
    waldo56 Posts: 1,861 Member
    Give it time, I'd wager good $$ that a few demographic groups will have the trend reversed in a few years (in a more statistically significant manner), for a number of reasons, but one of the being technology (another one being the strong decline in rate of smoking among the same demographic groups).

    You do understand that since the 1980's smoking rates have decreased by 50% while the number of adults that are obese doubled right? And that there is no sign yet of any adult demographic decreasing right?

    So other than smoking and technology which have done nothing to curb obesity to date, what other significant societal changes do you think will reverse the trend of obesity?

    It was the same with smoking. People knew it was bad for you for a long time; slowly but surely the ball started rolling and it just became flat out uncool to smoke. It took a couple generations, but people eventually figured out how to deal with that particular negative in society.

    We are only a generation or two removed from the start of the substantial rise in obesity. Modern computer-TV-video game lifestyle is really only about 30 years old. People will figure out how to deal with it. Once the ball starts rolling, it will go. Just like the rise, it will be impossible to pinpoint the reason for the decline, instead being a combination of factors.
    Very few gyms are that cheap. Most are a good bit more. Heck a Crossfit membership can run $200+ per month. They are every bit as expensive in time as they are in $$. And if you have kids.... the number of gyms that offer daycare is very small. The private for profit gym industry is a horrendous way to promote fitness for the general population. It is in fact hard to think of something that would actually be worse.

    But the point is that there are cheap gyms available. If you're low on money is asinine to pay $200 per month for a gym membership but that doesn't mean you say f*** it to the $10 per month ones you can afford. My YMCA membership is $60 per month for my family which includes 2 hours of daycare each day. I mean that's worth it just for the baby sitter time and is something most medium income families could afford.

    Time matters. You may be motivated to spend the money to go to the gym, but to expect this particular industry to have any impact on the health of the population is foolish at best.

    Heck the city I live in specifically does not do anything with its public $$ or park spaces that could remotely promote fitness in order not to step on the toes of the gym businesses in town. That is flat out idiotic, but that's how it works here in 'murica.
  • MrTolerable
    MrTolerable Posts: 1,593 Member
    Give it time, I'd wager good $$ that a few demographic groups will have the trend reversed in a few years (in a more statistically significant manner), for a number of reasons, but one of the being technology (another one being the strong decline in rate of smoking among the same demographic groups).

    You do understand that since the 1980's smoking rates have decreased by 50% while the number of adults that are obese doubled right? And that there is no sign yet of any adult demographic decreasing right?

    So other than smoking and technology which have done nothing to curb obesity to date, what other significant societal changes do you think will reverse the trend of obesity?
    Very few gyms are that cheap. Most are a good bit more. Heck a Crossfit membership can run $200+ per month. They are every bit as expensive in time as they are in $$. And if you have kids.... the number of gyms that offer daycare is very small. The private for profit gym industry is a horrendous way to promote fitness for the general population. It is in fact hard to think of something that would actually be worse.

    But the point is that there are cheap gyms available. If you're low on money is asinine to pay $200 per month for a gym membership but that doesn't mean you say f*** it to the $10 per month ones you can afford. My YMCA membership is $60 per month for my family which includes 2 hours of daycare each day. I mean that's worth it just for the baby sitter time and is something most medium income families could afford.

    The YMCA where I live is $100 per month for a family. And there's no YMCA nearby, I'd be looking at a 30 min drive at least. The gym within walking distance of my home is over $100 for a family and you have to pay for childcare. No $10 gyms in my area with free childcare. Where you live has a huge impact on cost and accessibility.

    I paid $100 for one year :)

    I was a senior in college and got the hook up.
  • Mr_Knight
    Mr_Knight Posts: 9,532 Member
    So other than smoking and technology which have done nothing to curb obesity to date, what other significant societal changes do you think will reverse the trend of obesity?

    More and more people are going to realize that being obese is costing them money, opportunity, prosperity. Throw in more and more kids realizing that cute girl (boy) with fat mom (dad) is a solid portend of the future...

    It'll happen.

    It always does.
  • Timshel_
    Timshel_ Posts: 22,834 Member
    Hi all,

    How important is it to eat "clean"?!

    The question should be how important do YOU think it is. You can lose weight eating dirty or clean. There are other supposed benefits that are personal preference.
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  • 43mmmgoody21
    43mmmgoody21 Posts: 146 Member
    I don't want any vegetables, thank you. I paid for the cow to eat them for me.
    Doug Coupland

    ;D

    I'm going to have to remember this one. And add it to one of may fav. quotes from the Simpson's :

    "You don't make friends with salad"
  • jmv7117
    jmv7117 Posts: 891 Member
    Except it's a known fact that these foods are created to manipulate our body and brain chemistry to find them most pleasurable.

    Most food is created in an effort to make it most pleasurable. That's what learning to cook teaches you how to do. That's every bit as true about traditional home-cooked meals as marketed stuff, and most people will agree with me that really good home-cooked or restaurant food, cooked to their taste using fresh, whole ingredients (and, sure, butter) is much tastier and harder to resist than packaged stuff or fast food, I expect, although obviously taste is subjective.

    It just sounds scarier if it's some big corporation doing that, vs. mom or Julia Child.

    If anything, a lot of the additives in packaged food and fast food is because they are trying to make them tasty on the cheap, and as indicated above they still generally don't taste as good. Compare a frozen pizza to a pizza cooked at a really good local pizza place or home-cooked by someone with the right equipment.

    If you are claiming that transfats or HFCS or whatever are as addictive as truly addictive drugs, provide the evidence. It's certainly not my experience.

    Ignorance is bliss. I'd go into more details but you obviously don't care so fine. You're absolutely right in every way.

    I like you!
  • nomorebingesgirl2014
    nomorebingesgirl2014 Posts: 378 Member
    Bump
  • jetlag
    jetlag Posts: 800 Member
    Except it's a known fact that these foods are created to manipulate our body and brain chemistry to find them most pleasurable.

    Most food is created in an effort to make it most pleasurable. That's what learning to cook teaches you how to do. That's every bit as true about traditional home-cooked meals as marketed stuff, and most people will agree with me that really good home-cooked or restaurant food, cooked to their taste using fresh, whole ingredients (and, sure, butter) is much tastier and harder to resist than packaged stuff or fast food, I expect, although obviously taste is subjective.

    It just sounds scarier if it's some big corporation doing that, vs. mom or Julia Child.

    If anything, a lot of the additives in packaged food and fast food is because they are trying to make them tasty on the cheap, and as indicated above they still generally don't taste as good. Compare a frozen pizza to a pizza cooked at a really good local pizza place or home-cooked by someone with the right equipment.

    If you are claiming that transfats or HFCS or whatever are as addictive as truly addictive drugs, provide the evidence. It's certainly not my experience.

    Ignorance is bliss. I'd go into more details but you obviously don't care so fine. You're absolutely right in every way.

    Ignorance definitely is bliss. Having survived an actual drug addiction, I can say, hand on heart, that anyone claiming food is as addictive as drugs is ignorant. Yes, they may be contrived to tick all the right pleasure boxes, but they are not addictive like drugs are. Ever seen anyone try and peel the skin off their own face because they can't get their hands on mars bar? No, me neither.
  • Meerataila
    Meerataila Posts: 1,885 Member
    Except it's a known fact that these foods are created to manipulate our body and brain chemistry to find them most pleasurable.

    Most food is created in an effort to make it most pleasurable. That's what learning to cook teaches you how to do. That's every bit as true about traditional home-cooked meals as marketed stuff, and most people will agree with me that really good home-cooked or restaurant food, cooked to their taste using fresh, whole ingredients (and, sure, butter) is much tastier and harder to resist than packaged stuff or fast food, I expect, although obviously taste is subjective.

    It just sounds scarier if it's some big corporation doing that, vs. mom or Julia Child.

    If anything, a lot of the additives in packaged food and fast food is because they are trying to make them tasty on the cheap, and as indicated above they still generally don't taste as good. Compare a frozen pizza to a pizza cooked at a really good local pizza place or home-cooked by someone with the right equipment.

    If you are claiming that transfats or HFCS or whatever are as addictive as truly addictive drugs, provide the evidence. It's certainly not my experience.

    Ignorance is bliss. I'd go into more details but you obviously don't care so fine. You're absolutely right in every way.

    Ignorance definitely is bliss. Having survived an actual drug addiction, I can say, hand on heart, that anyone claiming food is as addictive as drugs is ignorant. Yes, they may be contrived to tick all the right pleasure boxes, but they are not addictive like drugs are. Ever seen anyone try and peel the skin off their own face because they can't get their hands on mars bar? No, me neither.

    Nicotine is a drug, too, though, and I've never heard anyone claim it isn't addicting, yet some foods are definitely harder for some people to avoid than cigarettes.
  • jojokmack
    jojokmack Posts: 117
    I don't know about eating 'clean', though I am off to google to look it up after this!

    I do know that I have started eating foods closest to their natural state that I can do. I am not obsessive about it, for example I don't like brown/wild rice or pasta (wild pasta??? lol) so I eat white. I make all meals from the basic ingredients and never touch processed or pre-made meals.

    I have logged in to MFP for 40 days today and I have noticed that I feel better for it. My energy levels have increased and I feel healthier. I also find that it is a LOT easier this way. I can eat a lot more food and still lose weight.

    That said,.......one week we were out and I grabbed a Subway Turkey Sub and it didn't upset my system too much. I guess that as long as you meet your calorie goals you will be OK.....but you may not FEEL as full or as healthy. :)
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
    I don't know about eating 'clean', though I am off to google to look it up after this!

    I do know that I have started eating foods closest to their natural state that I can do. I am not obsessive about it, for example I don't like brown/wild rice or pasta (wild pasta??? lol) so I eat white. I make all meals from the basic ingredients and never touch processed or pre-made meals.

    I have logged in to MFP for 40 days today and I have noticed that I feel better for it. My energy levels have increased and I feel healthier. I also find that it is a LOT easier this way. I can eat a lot more food and still lose weight.

    That said,.......one week we were out and I grabbed a Subway Turkey Sub and it didn't upset my system too much. I guess that as long as you meet your calorie goals you will be OK.....but you may not FEEL as full or as healthy. :)

    Just to be clear, since this is a long discussion. I don't think anyone disagrees that what you eat affects health or how you feel or that focusing on whole foods and cooking (and vegetables, of course) can be a good way of cutting calories and making your diet more healthy if you weren't. What bothers me are (a) the term clean, which is so vague as to mean nothing and thus primarily working as a way to claim that your diet is superior to those of people who occasionally buy processed foods (like yogurt or baby carrots or, sure white rice and Subway--ugh, how unclean!--it's rude); and (b) the in accuracy of a claim that too much X is bad, so the only way to be healthy is to cut it out entirely and thus clean is the same as healthy. Why not ignore the clean thing and just focus on a healthy diet that meets your goals?

    Beyond that, if you actually try to be logical and consistent about cutting out processed foods, it's hard to justify for healthy reasons. I eat stuff like yogurt and frozen fish FOR health reasons. Cutting them out would be dumb. Similarly, if I have a lunch place that makes healthy foods from good ingredients, why is that worse than making lunch myself always? Especially if it saves me time so makes it easier for me to eat well? And finally, I hate the minimalist clean argument, that it's just about cutting out TV dinners or ding dongs or what not. It's entirely possible to be fat and not eat these things (many people get fat despite cooking from whole foods, etc), so the idea that it's a special diet to just not eat them also seems odd to me.

    Okay, summary of points made earlier over!
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  • yogicarl
    yogicarl Posts: 1,260 Member
    Personally, if I eat a 300 calorie meal of brocolli, carrots, peas and beans, - you get the idea - then I'm full for longer and I don't crave to eat again until the next meal is due.

    If I eat 300 calories of millionaire shortbread, then I'm craving to eat another 300 calories of millionaire shortbread in the next 20 minutes.

    Junk food contains high amounts of sugar and salt with fat which are all addictive and in combination even more so, whereas "clean" foods do not trigger such acute cravings.
  • J72FIT
    J72FIT Posts: 6,002 Member
    Hi all,

    How important is it to eat "clean"?!

    It is as important as you decide it is.
  • eric_sg61
    eric_sg61 Posts: 2,925 Member
    Personally, if I eat a 300 calorie meal of brocolli, carrots, peas and beans, - you get the idea - then I'm full for longer and I don't crave to eat again until the next meal is due.

    If I eat 300 calories of millionaire shortbread, then I'm craving to eat another 300 calories of millionaire shortbread in the next 20 minutes.

    Junk food contains high amounts of sugar and salt with fat which are all addictive and in combination even more so, whereas "clean" foods do not trigger such acute cravings.
    Are fruits clean? Cause they trigger my hunger more than any "junk" food ever could. I guess fruit is addictive.
  • yogicarl
    yogicarl Posts: 1,260 Member
    Personally, if I eat a 300 calorie meal of brocolli, carrots, peas and beans, - you get the idea - then I'm full for longer and I don't crave to eat again until the next meal is due.

    If I eat 300 calories of millionaire shortbread, then I'm craving to eat another 300 calories of millionaire shortbread in the next 20 minutes.

    Junk food contains high amounts of sugar and salt with fat which are all addictive and in combination even more so, whereas "clean" foods do not trigger such acute cravings.
    Are fruits clean? Cause they trigger my hunger more than any "junk" food ever could. I guess fruit is addictive.

    If you find it addictive then yes, I guess - for you - maybe.
  • KelGen02
    KelGen02 Posts: 668 Member
    Don't worry so much about what the "rules" are. Eat stuff, write it down, pay attention to how you feel immediately, a few hours later, the next day. Recognize patterns. Adjust.
    [/quote]



    ^^^^ this
  • nomorebingesgirl2014
    nomorebingesgirl2014 Posts: 378 Member
    Bump
  • Meerataila
    Meerataila Posts: 1,885 Member
    Personally, if I eat a 300 calorie meal of brocolli, carrots, peas and beans, - you get the idea - then I'm full for longer and I don't crave to eat again until the next meal is due.

    If I eat 300 calories of millionaire shortbread, then I'm craving to eat another 300 calories of millionaire shortbread in the next 20 minutes.

    Junk food contains high amounts of sugar and salt with fat which are all addictive and in combination even more so, whereas "clean" foods do not trigger such acute cravings.
    Are fruits clean? Cause they trigger my hunger more than any "junk" food ever could. I guess fruit is addictive.

    In your case, clean or not, they're probably a bad idea. But wait, is that your real picture? If so, I bet there are days a little extra hunger is good for you. To fuel whatever the heck you're doing to look like that!

    We need a new definition of food. Instead of clean or junk or whatever, we need a nice shiny word that means compatible with a particular person's health, calorie goals, and satiety signals. Someone invent a new term!

    Individually Optimal?

    Nah, sounds silly and too many syllables. Humans don't like too many syllables.
  • likitisplit
    likitisplit Posts: 9,420 Member
    Personally, if I eat a 300 calorie meal of brocolli, carrots, peas and beans, - you get the idea - then I'm full for longer and I don't crave to eat again until the next meal is due.

    If I eat 300 calories of millionaire shortbread, then I'm craving to eat another 300 calories of millionaire shortbread in the next 20 minutes.

    Junk food contains high amounts of sugar and salt with fat which are all addictive and in combination even more so, whereas "clean" foods do not trigger such acute cravings.
    Are fruits clean? Cause they trigger my hunger more than any "junk" food ever could. I guess fruit is addictive.

    In your case, clean or not, they're probably a bad idea. But wait, is that your real picture? If so, I bet there are days a little extra hunger is good for you. To fuel whatever the heck you're doing to look like that!

    We need a new definition of food. Instead of clean or junk or whatever, we need a nice shiny word that means compatible with a particular person's health, calorie goals, and satiety signals. Someone invent a new term!

    Individually Optimal?

    Nah, sounds silly.

    If it fits...something that describes or measures health/goals/satiety... Maybe?