Recent statistics on the rise of obesity and its handmaiden Type II diabetes, have got a lot of people doing headless chicken impressions. Part of the reason is that the tidal wave of death can be directly attributable to the evil colour beige.
Knee jerk reactions abound! New York has required any food outlet with more than 15 locations to post calorie information for their menu; as though the double meat, double cheeseburger, large fries and a diet coke crowd are actually capable of translating that information into anything meaningful, or even caring if they could. The evils of transfat, even in minute quantities are to be blamed also, although I still see margarine and homogenized products in profusion on the shelves.
The reluctance to blame beige is obvious, but so much of the food pyramid or the predominant tastes of the oblate spheroids who worship it, are focused on maintaining the dominant colour.
Now that green is starting to become fashionable and plants are becoming cool again, one would expect people’s eating habits to follow closely, but there is a substantial lag.
Watching ads for diet companies who send you the food, I see lots of desserts and beige main meals. They are deliberately setting the dieter up for relapse with the colour palette and the idea that every meal should have a dessert. Not only are they reinforcing the deep fried junkie mentality, but the chemicals and food coloring's in their products have been proven to cause mood swings, and withdrawal symptoms. Essentially if you stop eating their food you are going to feel like hell for a week and not be too happy about it.
Secondary tactics like labeling and pricing are subtler. You must be aware that most low fat foods have boosted sugar levels, and most low sugar foods have more fat and that all of the so-called diet foods have higher prices than the original for less nutritive value. The next step is for them to sell you over-priced pills of dubious provenance that are meant to fill in the nutrition gaps in your fake food intake; although they often fail to mention the effects of mega dosing with a particular vitamin or the tendency for some concentrations to block the absorption of other nutrients.
What is the solution? It is very simple, eat fresh vegetables, use olive oil, lard or real butter and flavour the food with herbs and spices instead of salt and sugar. I will admit that cutting down carbs will help, but complex carbs are better than refined carbs, just as complex sugars are better than refined sugars. However, carbs are not intrinsically bad for you, it is just important that you are aware of how to handle them and the importance of integrating them with your diet in a way that will minimize their effect.
The first priority is breakfast, the most neglected part of the daily intake. Sugar or simple carbs in the morning is the worst thing you can eat, but complex carbs with a bit of protein is the best.
“But, but, but, what about my healthy breakfast cereal or the All Natural bars? “
Well let us start with the breakfast bars; five to seven kinds of sugar, glued together with some grains, natural flavorings (which aren’t) and coloring's if you are lucky, plus chemical preservatives and lots of salts.
Bunches of (insert grain here) boxes yield their contents as sugar, and five relatives, most of which go straight into the bloodstream. Oops! Sorry, that is nine types of sugar including the horrific caramel colour, plus GMO corn and corn products.
In a plot twist contrary to the recent popular reversal of “eggs are bad for you”, most eggs may be bad for you, especially if they have terms like; omega 3, vegetarian, cage free, etc. as all these hide factory egg protein, that is then washed in bleach and waits up to six weeks for you to buy it. That there is little or no chain of evidence, oversight or responsibility if the egg delivery machine turns up a batch of poisonous product, is just a bonus for the chicken factory.
Bacon, don’t get me started on modern bacon, I could write an entire article about that alone.
Lardings, the bits left when you have rendered out the pig's fat.