It's hard, cutting my intake of salt and sugar is at times frustrating, I've gone through a few moments of sugar withdrawal which I find hilarious, a stupid addiction really if you think about it. I've always ate wholesome foods for the most part, but I've never paid much attention to the amount of sugar, salt, and carbohydrates I consume in a week. I started to realize about two months ago that no matter how hard I worked out I wasn't going to see any drastic results without a big change in my diet.
Looking at some of the statistics on caloric intake and calories burned throughout the course of a day it became apparent that I couldn't exercise enough each day to burn everything that I was eating. Essentially the average sedentary male (which I'm not) "should" consume 2400 calories a day, which I think is pretty damn high considering doing absolutely nothing burns around 65 to 85 calories per hour or on average 1800 per day, I guess the other 600 calories are for storage. Moreover if you weighed around 170 lbs. and ran your ass off at about 8 km/h for that whole hour you would burn about 600 calories, which is a lot more exercise than most moderately active people want to do everyday. These are also for reference stats from various sites I've browsed, by no means do they apply to everyone. There are a lot of mindless facts about calories to be found online but what made it clear for me was a statement that I heard on "Oprah's All-Stars" show, (don't judge, it's entertaining at times to watch pathetic people ask for common sense advice, common sense is soo uncommon). I think this person was bitching about how they exercise but can't lose weight... Dr. Oz essentially said, to burn the calories that the average person consumes each day you would have to work out as a full time job, period, forget the numbers.
That makes sense without a lot of misleading digits. It's frightening how easy it is to get really, really fat. If you eat out, most portions are way too big but we love the added value of more carbs for less money. Super markets are full of freezers loaded with ready made salt, sugar, and carb loaded icy delights... Worst of all we've created this food mess for ourselves unwittingly. We want more than necessary for next to nothing and we want it to taste great (which for many means sugary and salty because that's what they've trained their brains to believe is the be all and end all of delicious). On my gluten conscious crusade I've noticed that we love starches; I wonder if that's a hangover from the great wars; we have many mouths, how do we feed them all cheaply and easily..? Feed stock, like cattle and sheep.
I don't want to sound like a staple hater but I'm easily enraged by the eating habits of the general populace. Every time I hear someone poo poo salad or greens in favor of french fries or more turkey dressing I want to wait around in their life until that day in their 40's, 50's, or 60's when a doctor says the words cholesterol, blood pressure, or heart disease and say "I told you so fatty better listen now or you're dead" that's harsh but really I feel the same way about drunk driving and smoking. And again, the dead thing scares me immensely; Ben's rule # 238 anything that kills me sucks.
Thus my diet changes, goodbye starches and gluten, you fat assed delicious ingredients I'll see you on the weekends. Goodbye high fructose corn syrup, and all of your fake sugary friends, unless the sugar comes from fruit I'm not getting it even though I want it. So long salt laden processed food; I don't eat much of you anyway, I'll miss you least. To help me out a little I keep this guy as a glaring reminder of what I don't need, I think it helps...
The dilemma however is that I'm not going to write recipes about salad for lunch and hard boiled eggs throughout the day. You've heard enough about Quinoa and it's hippie appeal. I'm learning new simple recipes and I'm working at getting some things up here. Should have some material this weekend worth writing home about.
Never fear dear reader, more to come!
Had an outstanding baked sea bass last night done up with a Thai marinade and some delicious boiled Brussels sprouts on the side, yum. The bass reminded me how easy it is to cook whole fish but as we ate it, as my buddy called it "Chinese style" (chop sticks in and picking it apart without breaking apart the bone structure), we talked about how socially unacceptable it was to eat a fish like this. It's clean, easy, and there is next to no waste but... We North American's are so used to being fed fake shit that when we're faced with eating something with the face still attached we cringe. Besides, fish cheeks are the best part, and if there's no head there's no cheeks, lame.
Beastie Boys - Hot Sauce Committee Pt. 2 rocks by the way, give it a listen
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