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Healthy Eating

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Healthy Eating

Postby Stokey Sue » Sat Jul 04, 2020 4:45 pm

Editing this to make it an introduction and not a test post!

I have my own quite strong feelings about what counts as healthy eating - and even more about what doesn’t

Who looked surprised? :D

I’ll be interested to see what you all put here - requests for information, or suggestions on how to achieve healthy eating, discussions of the latest scares so we can assess how scary we really find them?

Over to you health fiends! Enjoy

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Re: Stokey Healthy Eating

Postby karadekoolaid » Sun Jul 05, 2020 2:03 pm

No fat, no sugar, no fun

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Re: Healthy Eating

Postby Gillthepainter » Wed Jul 22, 2020 8:11 am

My body is a temple :tongueout

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Re: Healthy Eating

Postby Uschi » Wed Jul 22, 2020 11:46 am

Sauerkraut with mash and Kasseler pork ribs for me, please.

The Kraut and the mash for my body and the pork for my soul. Magic1

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Re: Healthy Eating

Postby Binky » Wed Jul 22, 2020 1:03 pm

Gillthepainter wrote:My body is a temple :tongueout



Oi, have you seen those Greek temples? Old, broken down and seen better days......



:gonzo

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Re: Healthy Eating

Postby Sakkarin » Wed Jul 22, 2020 1:15 pm

Ouch!

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Re: Healthy Eating

Postby herbidacious » Wed Jul 22, 2020 2:03 pm

It's not always clear/often not clear what it is, is it. I hate the way how we eat has been turned into a virtue and vice affair (as have many other things. Even walking...) We would be better without this extra added layer of value.

Some people need advice, clearly, but most people are sensible enough to moderate what we eat. (I am in a dark mood... ;) )

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Re: Healthy Eating

Postby Gillthepainter » Wed Jul 22, 2020 2:41 pm

Old, broken down and seen better days


That'll be me.

No it's not always clear, Herbi.
I'm introducing as much soya (subs) as I can into my diet.
And was lectured by a kindly soul to make it coconut, not soya. Better for you and better for the planet.

But I don't want everything I eat to taste of coconut.

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Re: Healthy Eating

Postby Suffs » Wed Jul 22, 2020 2:45 pm

There’s our physical health ..... and then theres our emotional well-being ..... I try to plough a middle furrow ... :limbobanana :wino

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Re: Healthy Eating

Postby smitch » Wed Jul 22, 2020 3:13 pm

I don't like all the guilt that is added to food by a lot of the 'clean eating' people. Or the use of coconut oil in everything and using honey in place of sugar in a recipe and calling it 'no added sugar' or similar.

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Re: Healthy Eating

Postby Earthmaiden » Wed Jul 22, 2020 3:42 pm

I'm currently doing a course run by my favourite local exercise studio. I needed to get my head back into a healthier eating mode (because it's good at slipping out of one).

Healthy eating to me (and luckily what we have been discussing) is eating as little processed food and added sugar as possible and a good balance of everything else, eating little and often to avoid low blood sugar spikes and drinking plenty of water. 'Avoid the beige and things with umpteen ingredients on the packet'. That said, don't beat yourself up if you enjoy the odd beige or sweet treat, you're human and nothing should be totally off limits unless for genuine health reasons. I've always felt best when following those kind of guidelines and I am starting to again.

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Re: Healthy Eating

Postby karadekoolaid » Thu Jul 23, 2020 4:11 am

(I am in a dark mood... ;) )
Top


Then turn the light on!! :lol:
The healthy eating topic is so complicated that I wouldn´t know where to start!
There have been so many conflicting diets, recommendations, campaigns and so on over the past 20-odd years that I´d hesitate to open a can of worms, but I´ve always tried to cook "fresh" food. I cook from scratch: no frozen stuff ( or at least, very rarely), no "fresh frozen, no "ready meals" or TV dinners, no cans of prepared food (again, very rarely), no "instant what ever", no shop-made dips and stuff I can prepare at home. Plus I´m about 95% vegetarian ( I occasionally eat minced beef and will jump at the chance to eat fish/seafood when I go out - but I rarely do!)
Much of the above will be affected by the fact that frozen, ready-cooked or instant food is virtually unavailable in Venezuela. I wonder what I´d do in the UK.
I turn my nose up at "super-foods": quinoa, couscous, amaranth, turmeric. That doesn´t mean I don´t eat them, it simply means that I don´t go mad serving them with every meal because some guru says they´ll give you everlasting life.
I´m also blessed with a healthy metabolism. I´m the same weight as when I was 16, so I´m definitely not the one to ask about "diets".
I also believe that you should only eat until you are no longer hungry; ie, don´t stuff yourself because it´s still on the plate; eat regularly ( breakfast is very, very important, but I may not eat "lunch" until 3-4pm) and then might just have a snack in the evening. I try as hard as possible to balance my meals so that I get a protein, some green veg, some carbohydrates, and try to vary the cuisine on a daily basis - Italian, Greek, English, Indian, Middle-Eastern, Chinese, etc.
I also love a full English breakfast from time to time -all fried - and might just make some Heart-Attack Potatoes (spuds, bacon, cheese, cream, fried onions) for lunch tomorrow! A little bit of what you fancy does you good.
I find it almost upsetting to contemplate those unfortunate souls who are allergic to something, or diabetic, or need to be on a diet, or can´t eat certain items because it affects their digestion. My heart goes out to them all but I´m not the one to offer advice.

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Re: Healthy Eating

Postby Stokey Sue » Thu Jul 23, 2020 10:19 am

I think we probably need to focus more on specific topics rather than a general view of what constitutes healthy eating - to come back here when something crops up

Basic recommendations that are fairly well agreed are the U.K. 5 a day; internationally a minimum of 400g prepared fruit and veg a day with a good variety, which is why national recommendations vary to take account of cultural differences and to improve local diet

The amount of protein recommended varies a bit depending on who is recommending but is 0.5 - 0.7 g per kilogram body weight so 50g or so per day for many; remember that’s the actual protein not protein containing food but also remember everything counts, the toast as well as the beans and the pasta as well as the meatballs.

Then you need vitamins, minerals, fibre, some fat.... and a clear head to avoid the extreme diet folks

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Re: Healthy Eating

Postby scullion » Thu Jul 23, 2020 12:17 pm

karadekoolaid wrote: I´m the same weight as when I was 16, so I´m definitely not the one to ask about "diets".


that could mean that you were twenty stone when you were sixteen as much as meaning you were nine and a half stone!

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Re: Healthy Eating

Postby karadekoolaid » Fri Jul 24, 2020 2:21 am

that could mean that you were twenty stone when you were sixteen as much as meaning you were nine and a half stone!

But it doesn´t. 75 kgs.

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Re: Healthy Eating

Postby Sakkarin » Fri Jul 24, 2020 12:10 pm

Ha! I'm 75 kg!

Unfortunately 40 years ago I was 58.5 :-(

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Re: Healthy Eating

Postby dennispc » Fri Jul 24, 2020 1:28 pm

74.1 this morning, probably about 57 60 years ago.

Following on from Sue's post, I’m reading, Dr Daniel Levitin’s The Changing Mind: A neuroscientist’s Guide to Ageing Well.

He gives examples of the amount of protein in some foods;

1 cup of nonfat milk is 0.3 ounces of protein

2 tbs of peanut butter - 0.2 ozs

2 med eggs - 0.4 ozs

Half a pound of salmon - 1.7 ozs

The book does emphasise, and gives examples, of the pitfalls in focussing on only one dietary component at a time.

However, page 266, “Older adults absorb protein less effectively and require 0.54gms of protein per pound of body weight per day. …” is it possible that his figure is different from Sue's because he's writing for an American audience? I’ve no idea whether he’s right or not, but the book is heavily referenced - 74 pages of them!

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Re: Healthy Eating

Postby Stokey Sue » Fri Jul 24, 2020 5:03 pm

The range of recommended intakes I gave were taken from national recommendations for adults, which are usually a pretty good consensus of what's understood in the field. Individual experts may recommend different levels, and different levels may generally be recommended for specific groups according to age, underlying health conditions, or exercise regime - I'd bet Mike Tyson is currently on a very high protein diet as he attempts to rebuild muscles ahead of his boxing match.

I just looked up Dr Daniel Levitin as I'd never heard of him. He seems to be an expert on the relationship between musicality and cognition, not nutrition, physiology, or geriatrics, so without knowing his sources I feel slightly sceptical. Also no sub-editor should ever have allowed him to say 0.54gms of protein per pound of body weight per day - nobody actually familiar with this area in depth would mix metric and Imperial measure in that way, and anyone used to working with metric units would know that the SI unit of gram abbreviates to g not gm and as for gms - well, I feel a bit queasy. At some point there has been a number conversion, and I do wonder if it was done as carelessly as it was reported, it's not just a matter of style and in scientific writing it's sometimes a bit of a warning flag.

I have heard it said that people need more protein as they get older to reduce the risk of muscle wastage and to enable efficient repair of tissue damage, but I've also heard it said that older people don't need more protein as they are (generally) less active and need fewer calories. As it's not my field, I'm by no means sure, I'd really like to know what a dietitian with an interest in geriatric nutrition has to say on the subject. I might try to find out, but don't hold your breath

It's common in the UK and US to eat more protein than the minimum requirement

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Re: Healthy Eating

Postby karadekoolaid » Fri Jul 24, 2020 6:11 pm

Interesting that we probably need more protein, and yet often eat less. Does anyone else have that problem? I´m not a huge meat eater, but I used to be able to snaffle down a 1/2 lb burger with no trouble. These days, a 1/4 lb is quite enough. And when I was in Mexico over Christmas, we we served meat/chicken/eggs/shrimp/cheese/fish at almost every meal. After about a week I felt I was suffering from protein overdose, and spent two days eating fresh fruit and salads.

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Re: Healthy Eating

Postby Stokey Sue » Fri Jul 24, 2020 6:20 pm

karadekoolaid wrote:nteresting that we probably need more protein, and yet often eat less

Apart form your own experience, where does that come from?
I don't think on this thread we've seen any evidence that we need more protein as we get older - just on ebooks says so

everything interacts, diet alone isn't the issue, I know someone who is 71, has rheumatoid arthritis and an enviable figure, She has been ticked of by her consultant for maintaining the figure by diet more than exercise, so her muscle mass has declined more than it needed to - loss of muscle affects metabolism as well as mobility

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