Fascinating NYT Mag piece on junk food

The bagels I eat are 270 calories, with 10 grams of protein.

The Rice Krispies I eat are the bigger ones: From 250-360 calories, depending on the fixins, with lots of sugar and almost no protein.

 

It's an entire movement called "paleo" that is pretty much word for what what you are posting, plus the caveman guideline.

 

A college buddy of mine — who had been in the 300-pound range as long as I had known him, about 20 years — went on the paleo diet/a regular workout regimen about a year ago and has lost close to 100 pounds.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paleolithic_diet

 

It can be both correct and a fad.

 

Convenient and inexpensive is no way to go through life, son.

 

Ragu, in general, I think you've got this nailed. It's just that every time you mention great-grandparents, I think of shmaltz and start laughing.

 

Re: alcohol.

If I'm drinking at night, I'm also eating — mostly junk. And I feel like shit the next morning.

If I'm not drinking, I might have one small dessert-like thing after supper, but that's it — and I sleep better and wake up better.

I love beer, and I love my single-malt scotch. Moderation and I are rarely in conjunction. But I've been hitting the gym, and I haven't drank anything the last two nights — and I've lost about three pounds without even trying.

 

A vitamin is a vitamin, a nutrient is a nutrient, no matter what food or "food" it comes from. I'm not going to sweat whether I'm eating a food or a "food." The key in any event is to eat balanced and not too much and exercise, even if you're downing your meals out of a test tube. As for the complex sounding things, what anyone would have against preservatives, I sure don't know.

 

A few years back, I wrote a piece for ESPN.com on this topic, centered around ballpark food. It was more about the (crude) neuroscience of how sugar-salt-fat engineered food works via the dopamine-reward cycle, and also how advertising and other food cues feed into this. No pun intended.

Always felt it was one of the most interesting things I've ever written about, and always felt ESPN might not have been the optimal place for it. Still, I think anyone who enjoyed and/or found the NYT piece intriguing will get something out of it.

Anyway, here's a link: http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=hruby/091014

 

My wife read "The Wheat Belly" book and has taken the concepts of it to how she eats.

She really did not have weight to lose but is trying to give herself six pack abs for her fortieth birthday. The book has elements of the paleo diet which basically preaches that if it did not grow in nature, don't eat it (very broad generalization).

She feels way better and has a lot more energy.