Veganism, Human Health and Conspiracies.

[stoveliker]

What sauces do you use. Ingredient-wise. Premade contains a lot of stuff that's less healthy (sugar, salt, preservation agents etc.).
And self-made sauces require quite some time.

 

[woodgeek]

What sauces do you use. Ingredient-wise. Premade contains a lot of stuff that's less healthy (sugar, salt, preservation agents etc.).
And self-made sauces require quite some time.

I have a small palette of stuff, some quick and some slow.

Lazy faves:
-'Annies vegan mac' boxed mac n cheese. add 0.5-1 tbl of nooch to sauce, 1 tbl vegan butter and 2 'field roast' smoked vegan hot dogs, chopped. Makes 2 servings.
-mock egg salad: mashed chickpeas with vegan mayo and dijon mustard with onion/garlic powder. Secret ingredient: Kala Namak salt. On Toast.
E.g. https://www.kathysvegankitchen.com/chickpea-egg-salad/

Quick:
-white bean soup with garlic and olive oil (ready in 10 mins) with crusty bread.

Marcella Hazan's White Bean Soup with Garlic and Parsley Recipe on Food52

How to cook a soulful bean soup in 10 minutes? As Marcella Hazan used to tell her students, "What you leave out is just as important as what you put in." Adapted slightly from <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Essentials-Classic-Italian-Cooking-Marcella/dp/039458404X/?tag=food52-20"><strong>The...

food52.com

-tomato onion (vegan) butter sauce (takes about 30 mins to cook, but only 3 to put together) on pasta.

Tomato Sauce with Onion and Butter

This Tomato Sauce with Onion and Butter recipe by Marcella Hazan offers a simple technique of combining fresh or canned tomatoes, butter, and yellow onion with a low and slow cook method for an irresistible sauce with a pure sweet tomato taste.

www.foodandwine.com

(both from Marcela Hazan)

Intermediate:
-impossible meatballs (usual meatball recipe + zest of one lemon, flax egg instead of egg, cook in sauce) in jar tomato and basil sauce (I like Rao's), on spaghetti. w/ vegan parm.
(mod from my MIL)
-wild rice soup with great northern beans and vegan sausage (about 15 mins to assemble, an hour to cook), with crusty bread.
(mod from Isa Moscowitz, I use browned sausage medallions instead of seitan, I up the herbs by 50%)

Wild Rice Soup

40 minutes prep/cook time INGREDIENTS 1 tablespoon olive oil 1 medium yellow onion, thinly sliced 1/2 teaspoon salt, plus a pinch 4 cloves garlic, minced 1 cup peeled and thinly sliced carrots 2 ri…

mealgoodfeelgood.wordpress.com

Involved:
-veggie tikka masala with roasted cauliflower and smoked tofu, on white or brown rice or quinoa.
(mod from Sweet Potato Soul, drop sweet potato and tempeh, add asparagus and smoked tofu (resembles ham) I up the spices 50%)

Tempeh Tikka Masala

Instant Pot Vegan Tikka Masala: a rich Indian-inspired curry with spices, tempeh, roasted vegetables, and coconut milk. Easy and delicious!

sweetpotatosoul.com

-12 ingredient lentil bolognese on spaghetti
(mod from rainbowplantlife. I use green or black lentils, cook 2x longer. I also add minced carrot and (frozen) roasted mushrooms.

Lentil Bolognese

This vegan Lentil Bolognese is an easy, yet gourmet meal made with 10 pantry staple ingredients. It’s deceptively meaty and ultra-satisfying!

rainbowplantlife.com

The meatballs and bolognese blow (non-vegan) people away. The involved things I batch cook and get 4-5 meals out of. They are better as leftovers anyway. 😋

 

[lml999]

Fascinating thread...ran across it by accident via "summary of what you missed" email.

We shifted to a Mediterranean style diet a year ago. I cut out almost all meat, except for lamb chops once every couple of months (otherwise the dog would revolt). I eat fish as often as I can, mostly wild salmon.

My understanding is that inflammation is a cause of much disease, and both ultraprocessed food, and meat are sources of inflammation.

Also, as others have commented, exercise and social connection are critical to healthful longevity.

 

[crstrode]

Why do all vegans have to announce that everything they eat is vegan or everything they brought to a family dinner is made with vegan ingredients? Or is it just my two vegan sisters who do that?

It because Vegans view themselves as superior beings that have been bestowed with unfathomable secrets of the cosmos - secrets that cannot be understood by mere mortals, and as such, it is their personal mission to constantly announce and promulgate their own virtue, and to denigrate those not so blessed.

 

[woodgeek]

It because Vegans view themselves as superior beings that have been bestowed with unfathomable secrets of the cosmos - secrets that cannot be understood by mere mortals, and as such, it is their personal mission to constantly announce and promulgate their own virtue, and to denigrate those not so blessed.

I'm just trying to be healthier and live longer. And 'eating plant based' seems to agree with my system. YMMV.

Oh, and reduce my eco footprint at the same time. Any benefits to animal welfare are a bonus.

 

[joop]

if we didn't eat them they wouldn't exist.DON'T CUT THE CHRISTMAS TREE'S THAT WOULDN'T BE GROWN OTHERWISE hopefully we pull our heads out of our butts soon.if it works for you geek go for it

 

[Prometeo]

a point of view, a vegetable-only diet could lead to greater ingestion of sugars and therefore greater glycation which damages the cardiovascular system seem..

 

[woodgeek]

a point of view, a vegetable-only diet could lead to greater ingestion of sugars and therefore greater glycation which damages the cardiovascular system seem..

Its very trendy nowadays to attribute diabetes to excess sugar consumption or even the proportion of carbs in the diet.

The scientific evidence for this is scant.

Blood glucose is highly regulated by the insulin system, and high blood glucose is usually associated with insulin insensitivity, which has many physiological causes, notably high BMI.

Folks with high blood sugar often improve after extreme weight loss, which can be achieved by either high carb or low carb diets.

 

[Prometeo]

Its very trendy nowadays to attribute diabetes to excess sugar consumption or even the proportion of carbs in the diet.

The scientific evidence for this is scant.

Blood glucose is highly regulated by the insulin system, and high blood glucose is usually associated with insulin insensitivity, which has many physiological causes, notably high BMI.

Folks with high blood sugar often improve after extreme weight loss, which can be achieved by either high carb or low carb diets.

I am not referring to diabetes, but to many pathologies, basically sugars react and bind to proteins and fats, depositing themselves in arteries, and also slightly damaging organs, skin, however it also depends from person to person

Advanced glycation end-product - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

 

[woodgeek]

I am not referring to diabetes, but to many pathologies, basically sugars react and bind to proteins and fats, depositing themselves in arteries, and also slightly damaging organs, skin, however it also depends from person to person

Advanced glycation end-product - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

Huh. AGEs are the hypothesized carcinogens formed on grilled meats, when eaten.

AGEs also form at much lower levels in the body, and there is a (very old) hypothesis that they are part of aging. I haven't seen much about that in years.

And again, since blood glucose is regulated in healthy people its hard to see how eating more carbs would increase AGEs. Elevated AGEs are implicated in some side effect of diabetes.

 

[woodgeek]

Oh, and I did finally get a well visit, and saw how my vitals were doing.

My measured blood pressure was normal, just under 120/80 ( I knew this from home measurements)
(My blood pressure in 2018 was 140/95, stage II hypertension).

My current blood work was:
Total cholesterol: 176
Triglycerides: 92
HDL: 65
LDL: 93
HbA1C: 5.5
And a bunch of other stuff that was 'normal'.
The only thing out of range was HDL, which was elevated, but not a concern.

My previous lipid panel (10 years ago) was:
Total cholesterol: 203
Triglycerides: 68
HDL: 58
LDL: 131

Overall, my doctor was happy with me, as a 56 yo man not on any meds, and told me to keep doing what I was doing.

 

[begreen]

Excellent results. You are fortunate your body is responding well. Some of us have harder bodies to balance. I have genetic predisposition to high cholesterol levels from both parents. All family members have high levels without meds. Thankfully, with a good diet and only filtered coffee, I am able to keep mine in control with the lowest dosage statins.

 

[Poindexter]

You and I have been walking a similar path!

High protein vegan is where its at. For me.

Wow. I haven't stopped by in > 1 year. Sorry.

I am still on high protein diet with minimal meats. My goal for 2024 is minimizing/ eliminating animal meat from CAFOs, I think Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations. I still love grain finished well marbled ribeye grilled on charcoal, but I don't do that even every month anymore.

I can't think of a good reason for eating the flesh of a sick animal to be a route to wellness for me.

And there is some genetic components to consider here. The capital N Native Alaskans were a stone age hunter gather gene pool when the russians showed up with wheat in the mid 1700s. I go back to work at my local hospital tomorrow, I fully expect sometime this week I will see one or two Natives in better baseline health on a traditional diet than the other 15-30 Natives I will see on a western or SAD diet with multiple chronic health problems.

Whether a particular individual should pursue paleo or carnivore or vegan I cannot say, but I have observed that ditching processed food seems to benefit everyone that takes that one step.

I did find the 'blue zone' cookbook was a good thing for me to read while I was trying to fall asleep, but the 4 episodes on Netflix were quite engaging. If you only got one hour to spare, try the last (fourth) episode of 'blue zone' on netflix.

Not to derail, just looking for input with this question. Where is the line between whole and processed foods? I can get down on all fours in the front yard tomorrow morning and bite a leaf of lettuce off a plant in my wife's garden and that is not a processed food. What about an apple or a carrot? Is pulling a carrot out of the ground so I can eat the whole thing a form of processed food? Apples, I am too old to jump high enough in the air to bite an apple still on the tree. Is a picked apple a processed food? I am not kidding. This is the sort of thing that makes me itchy. I am kinda at there is reasonable processing like canning or freezing, and there is unreasonable processing like isolating HFCS from corn kernels; but I am not sure where to draw a line.

 

[Poindexter]

What sauces do you use. Ingredient-wise.

Asian sauces in general are easy as heck. There is a gal on youtube, channel name is "Hot Thai Kitchen", don't ask me to spell her first name. She has a bunch of vids like "which soy sauce I like" or "what coconut milk tastes best" and similar. If you got vinegar, soy, oyster, chili and fish sauces you can make about anything. Add coconut milk and some tamarind paste, sky is pretty much the limit. I haven't been able to get any mirin local for several months, but for sake and mirin rice wines in cooking, 8-10 bucks for a 750mL bottle is fine.

I do like the food blogger behind 'just one cookbook' for Japanese recipes. Everything I have ever made of hers has come out well. I will say beware Japanese 'festival food.' Japanese festival food is a competition to see how much fat, sugar and salt can be grilled on one stick.

In fairness, I haven't really gotten into Chinese or Maylay cuisine. For Japanese and Thai I am ready to go. Eastern Indian food, like Bombay not Antigua, uses a lot of whole seeds with a long shelf life that need to be dry roasted and ground for each recipe. Amazon is your friend here, you can likely find a kilo of say fenugreek seed on amazon for the same price as 1 ounce local. For cardamon pods, look on amazon for the 500 gram bag before you go to Kroger.

I only have one coffee bean grinder, some mornings my coffee has some eastern enchantment in it. It is fine. Life is an adventure.

 

[stoveliker]

So you use soy sauce but are itchy about canned veggies re: processing?! (Scratching my head...)

 

[begreen]

We tend to eat mostly Mediteranean cuisine, but love Vietnamese cooking in addition to Thai.

 

[Poindexter]

So you use soy sauce but are itchy about canned veggies re: processing?! (Scratching my head...)

I think I am picking up what you are putting down. I have a zero dark alarm coming up, I will try to be brief.

I am OK with picking and washing and peeling fruits and vegetables. If I could only eat onions by pulling them out of the ground with my teeth and eating the skin and dirt and roots along with the flesh, I would probably commit suicide.

I am OK with canning and freezing. There is measurable loss of nutritional value. But in return there is still nutritious stable product suitable for long term storage. Fresh produce not consumed or preserved in 7-14 days, tops, is compost.

I am OK with fermenting. Kimchi, beer, wine, sauerkraut. Sourdough bread. The Japanese use a fungus called koji. Besides sake, mirin and soy sauce fermented with koji, there is also natto. I have bought some natto, and I opened the package, but I have never tasted that stuff.

Traditional soy sauce is just soybeans, water, salt and koji. Compare to beer ingredients water, malted barley, hops and yeast. No problem here. The California committee in charge of certifying organic does allow a little bit of alcohol to be added to organic soy sauce as a preservative. Many many soy sauces add a grain like wheat or barley to the soybeans...

Carmel color, problem.

Or think about blue cheese dressing. I can make an epic blue cheese dressing with sour cream, heavy cream, blue cheese, a few herbs and a little salt. Go pick up (not buy, just read the label) a bottle of blue cheese dressing at a grocery store the first three ingredients are going to be water, soybean oil and high fructose corn syrup.

Besides USDA, Oregon Tilth and California, among the other players, which of the organic certifying agencies is a tool of the Chinese government to profit from people who can't or choose not to use the search engines on their smart phones? That they have with them in the grocery store?

Not trying to derail the thread, but one thing the paleos and vegans have in common is ditching "processed" food.

I am confident it is an individual choice with a bell curve, but I am currently trying to figure out where my needle rests between leaf lettuce grazed out of the garden on all fours and chemicals I cannot pronounce.

 

[stoveliker]

I don't think processed is only about chemicals.
Soy sauce is (at least) in group three of the degrees of processed food. See e.g. the mayo clinic.

 

[woodgeek]

Not to derail, just looking for input with this question. Where is the line between whole and processed foods? I can get down on all fours in the front yard tomorrow morning and bite a leaf of lettuce off a plant in my wife's garden and that is not a processed food. What about an apple or a carrot? Is pulling a carrot out of the ground so I can eat the whole thing a form of processed food? Apples, I am too old to jump high enough in the air to bite an apple still on the tree. Is a picked apple a processed food? I am not kidding. This is the sort of thing that makes me itchy. I am kinda at there is reasonable processing like canning or freezing, and there is unreasonable processing like isolating HFCS from corn kernels; but I am not sure where to draw a line.

This is a very important question, which I have been considering a bit lately. I am personally convinced that while the question gets at an important issue, it is not super useful as is.

I think the concept of 'processed' is so elastic as to be almost useless in 2024. If I make cashew cream in my kitchen using a vitamix blender, is that product now 'ultra processed', even though its basically just cashew nuts and water? That Cuisinart thing on my counter is literally called a 'food processor', is everything made automatically less healthy after it goes through there? What about chewing? Should I chew less and automagically make my diet healthier?

This line of reasoning suggests that steak is healthier than hamburger is healthier than whole wheat flour. Ugh.

And indeed I have seen carnivore influencers argue their diet is healthy bc it is unprocessed. So long as you don't consider cooking processing. Double Ugh.

I have also seen raw vegans argue that their diet is healthiest, bc there is not even any cooking! Triple Ugh.

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Where do I stand? I think ingredients matter most (macro and micronutrients), and how those ingredients are combined/mashed up matter less.

The processing that matters is 'refining' and 'separation'. Refined sugar is different than fruit. Butter is different than milk. Refined flour is different than whole wheat. But the big difference is because some things were left out, and some other things were made more concentrated. How fine those products are ground... meh. Might make some difference in an edge case, but while most people are eating crazy macros (and not even realizing it half the time), I don't want to waste any mental energy on that.

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One thing I think about is food scientists and hyperpalatability. Its been shown that foods over a certain percentage of fat (like 25%) and sodium (like 0.3% weight) are effectively addictive and people will eat a lot of them and keep coming back for more. Think Doritos in 2024 (hyperpalatable) vs Fritos in 1980 (not hyperpalatable). Some think the definition should include sugar too.

Hyperpalatable food - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

So, most of what were classically labeled as processed foods, are what your Mom called 'junk foods' like pizza, cookies, chips, pastries, desserts etc are now actually called hyperpalatable.

The 18 Most Addictive Foods

Here’s a list of the 18 most addictive and the 17 least addictive foods.

www.healthline.com

Fun fact.... chicken nuggets and Prime beef and cheese are all hyperpalatable (high fat and sodium). Most beef 20 years ago was NOT hyperpalatable. Only a few cuts were marbled enough to be rated 'prime' and those then cost a lot more. Cheap cuts (my Mom bought as a kid) were like shoe leather. Now cattle have been selectively bred to have high intramuscular fat, and most of the beef is now prime rated, and conversely, a lot of (i.e. fast food) beef is now super cheap and hyperpalatable.

So those dudes guzzling (prime) beef steaks (with a pinch of salt), and thinking 'I am getting protein in a delicious, natural and totally unprocessed (= healthy) way' are eating a hyperpalatable food (i.e. addictive) that is also a saturated fat bomb. When they think 'its gotta be OK, bc my parents and grandparents ate a lot of beef and they were healthy...' they were having a different food product years earlier. Maybe a pot roast without a lot of marbling, maybe a burger with less fat (after cooking), etc.

And no surprise, the per capita consumption of meats climbed as those 'unprocessed' foods were bioengineered to have higher fat content and be hyperpalatable.

But no worries, they're unprocessed.

 

[EatenByLimestone]

I think it’s safe to say food that you killed yourself (plant or animal) and eat within a time period short enough for it not to have lost nutritional value is unprocessed.

I think there’s levels of processing. Freezing destroys nutrients. Canning destroys nutrients. I’m sure dehydrating destroys some too. Less processing is better. But you’re going to need some processing, because I don’t think I’ve ever heard of a case of good botulism or salmonella.

 

[begreen]

Even unprocessed food can be tainted by herbicides these days. Soy, grains (wheat, oats, etc.), beets, berries, nuts, often are sprayed with herbicides and pesticides, sometimes right before harvest.

 

[Poindexter]

I will agree that 'cooking' is a form of processing I am OK with having done to most of my food.

I am pretty OK with steering away from separation (like the main ingredient in Pringles is 'potato starch'), refining like pure white crystals of cane sugar instead of honey, and hyper palatability.

There is no doubt in my mind that some/many foods are engineered to be hyper-palatable to the point of addiction. I am convinced for a lot of the 'bigs' in the food industry the business is not about providing nutrition to the customer, the business is instead about taking money from the customer. The loser is the customer's long term health.

Another zero dark alarm for me tomorrow, good night.