The actual advice from a nutritionist that was quoted was
> focusing less on meal replacements and more on whole fruits and vegetables from local farmers, in addition to occasional animal products from farms where those animals were “raised with sustainable practices.”
Which does strike me as advice for relatively affluent people (although "for the 1%" is a bit of a stretch....). It is indeed not that easy to buy fresh, locally grown fruits and veggies for many people. But I do take your point. I don't think money is really the barrier to people eating a nutritious diet of whole foods. The limiting factor is probably time and discipline. You need to shop for fresh foods every few days (real foods spoil!) and actually prepare meals, when the alternative of cheap, prepared foods that are mostly junk are readily available.
I fully agree with you: Fruit and vegetables from local farmers is a bit more expensive. Whether it's from local farmers is also not really relevant to the nutritional value. So the whole line of reasoning is just complete bogus. The whole article feels like a thinly-veiled advertisement without any informational value.
It's an exaggeration to say only high income people can afford fruits and vegetables, but it is true that affording them can be a problem for many lower income people.
Around 19 million people in the US live in "food deserts", which are low-income places with poor access to transportation and no supermarkets within a mile (for urban and suburban food deserts) or within 10 miles (for rural food deserts).
Their choices for affordable day to day food tend to be fast food places and convenience stores. When the closest you've got to a grocery store is 7-11 your fruit and vegetable options are limited.
I can’t find the link, but i read that food deserts are mostly there as a result of market effects, i.e. insufficient customers bought fresh fruits and vegetables from shops in that area, so they closed.
I think it's mostly an American thing, as I hear it a lot coming from there. Never heard anyone in Europe saying regular fresh fruit and vegetables is out of their budget. I've heard American tourists exclaim surprise when they visit normal supermarkets here, things like "Oh! It's like a Wholefoods, but cheap!".
Indeed. In reverse, when I (British living in Berlin) have visited the US, the fresh fruit and veg section of the cheaper American supermarkets is priced like fancy expensive organic supermarkets here.
Whole Foods (and the co-op in one of the towns I visited) is priced like Harrods, KaDeWe, or Galeries Lafayette:
I highly recommend getting a big freezer if you can, it saves so many shopping trips for fresh vegetables, and the frozen ones are basically just as good. Pre-cut onions, herbs, cooked rice etc - can be prepped well, and only need heating up for a quick meal. Greens (leaves) and raw potatoes don’t work though.
It's not ridiculous. Grocery stores tend to be few and far between in low-income areas. Those that do exist typically don't have fruits or vegetables because processed food is cheaper in volume. It's a well-documented issue. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_desert
One thing I often do is put canned legumes and frozen veggies in my instant pot‘s steaming basket and pressure cook for 2 minutes (takes ca 15 minutes including warmup time). This is then the base for a custom bowl, maybe adding things like millet and raw onions, or fresh greens. Making a bowl like this is not as convenient and cheap as Huel, but I wouldn’t call it a high income solution either.
Most components can be prepped for the whole week (millet in the fridge, onions and herbs in the freezer etc), so net cooking time (where I actively need to do anything) is maybe 5 minutes - 2 minutes loading and starting the instant pot, and 3 minutes assembly of the bowl ingredients.
The worst thing about is prep time and requirement to have a big freezer and potentially need to shop fresh vegetables (but that can be skipped, depending on the frozen veggie mix).
Is it though? Certain types of fruits/vegetables are of course somewhat pricey. But buying the same ingredients (legumes and stuff) Huel/etc. are made from would certainly be reasonable cheap and probably way cheaper than the hyper-processed powder..
In the US, I could believe that from what I've seen in the shops when visiting as a tourist.
In the UK (where I grew up) and Germany (where I live), you should be able to get the recommended 5-a-day for less than £/€ 2 per day if you need to keep costs down, and £/€ 8/day if you're being lazy and getting fairly fancy stuff.
Sure, the income here is lower than in the USA, but even at the higher end that's not so much as to make that "significant".
I used Huel for 6 months twice a day because I have ADHD and would simply not eat because I would forget or felt eating “interrupted” my flow, and I thought this would be cost effective and efficient; I could just leave Huel in containers at my desk with water nearby, ready to mix and consume without stopping what I was doing. Reality? I had diarrhea on most days and towards the end of that experiment, trying to consume one had the psychological impact of water boarding myself.
Meal prepping rice bowls with beans (bought dried and in bulk, cooked in an Instant Pot), tofu/seitan, veggies, and whatever sauce I felt like for the week is cheap, fast, easy, healthy, etc. and doesn’t make me feel suicidal. The latter point might be because I was taking time to enjoy being alive rather than hyperfocusing on being a good little cog in economic machine trying to spin as fast as I could.
> I do eat my Huel, by the way; I don’t drink it. I make it with less water so my Huel is the consistency of melted ice cream. Then I pour my Huel into a bowl and eat it with a spoon.
That just goes to show how mundane Huel is. Huel is mostly oats (well, depending on the version), so it's effectively the same as thin oatmeal, fortified with seeds, etc.
I replaced breakfast with a bottle of Huel six years ago, and I don't see a reason to stop. I still cook for lunch and dinner and I skip the Huel on occasion to brunch with friends. No need to be a zealot about these things.
I do keep some of the meal bags in the pantry for emergencies. I've also replaced lunch with them at times to count calories and lose weight. I think these are good tools to have in your kitchen. They have characteristics that no other food option has, and that makes them valuable.
Exactly the same for me. I started using soylent like 10 years ago just like 20 meals a month. And about 5 years ago I switched to Huel and have it for breakfast every day except vacations or friends.
I cannot even begin to imagine doing that. I cook all my meals and cooking process is like a meditation/flow experience for me (and my spouse if we are doing it together), then taking time to enjoy the meal, then a very rewarding „one-up“ after cleaning. Nothing will ever beat that. Yes, a lot of time, yes, you have to factor it in. But it is so much quality of life, this is irreplacable, imho.
I think you forget the fixed investment in time you have to make so that cooking becomes a pleasure. Really, I envy you.
On my end, having never really cooked, everything is an effort. I have no inspiration on what to buy, no inspiration on what to cook from what I bought, and whenever I actually do the cooking, everything has to be a mental focus. I can't just "bake" stuff, because I have to focus on checking it's baking okay, turning it, shaking it.
Now I have no doubt all of this can be much smoother and enjoyable, but only if you invest enough time that each step is no requiring you to spend hours checking recipes ideas, baking tutorials, etc.
Like others said, there are some basics. I don't know about baking, it does seem somewhat more involved than what I do. But one example of something simple, which allows for variations and is pretty hard to screw up: eggs.
Melt some butter in a skillet, whisk some eggs in a bowl, drop them in the melted butter, wait for them to become hard, throw some cheese, bacon / ham / mushrooms and onions on top, fold in two. Voilà: yummy omelet.
Plenty of variations to be had with eggs: scramble them, boil them, try different kinds of cheeses, maybe add some peppers.
There is some basics in cooking that is not too complicated to learn and master through practice (given we eat at least 7 to 21 times a week).
Like heat, seasoning (salt, pepper), fats etc
There really is the same notions at the base of every recipe. There is a lot of books and videos that cover those basics. In a month of time through observation you can start to develop a skill that will be useful literally for the rest of your life in a most direct and enjoyable way.
Given we are exactly what we eat, it can be so rewarding that it’s really worth the effort. The challenge of learning how all those chemical notions fit together is almost on par on the challenges of learning in IT in some way.
Please take the time to learn the roots, you will be able to cook without thinking really simple and amazing things in a small amount of time, you will never regret it.
The cooking part has never been the stress source for me. It's the cleaning and prep time. Those stress me out hilariously badly; and, even if I use the dish washer (which is wonderful and I do use), I'm only one person, cooking for one person. I don't have the discipline, focus, etc, to meal-prep; and, I don't make enough of a mess to run the dishwasher every day - .. though arguably it would *still* take less water than manually washing.
Do you want to change this? Honest question. If you do, it is changeable. Start small. Grilled cheese, or pasta with jarred sauce. Once a week. It gets easier. But no shade if you are happy how things are
I understand and it happens to many people including myself. Maybe set yourself to do a nice easy meal once a week just for the pleasure and see how it builds up from that.
This is how you never eat stew again. I’m a decent home cook, I do all the cooking for our household. About 10 years ago I made a delicious, but enormous daal. I ate it for 3 days, froze probably 10 portions if not more. Every time I opened the freezer, I saw daal. Every time I wanted a convenience meal for a month, daal. It felt like I ate nothing but daal for a month. I love daal. But I’ve not eaten it since
I dont, I factor this time as investment into my mental and physical well-being.
After a while I dont sweat over recipes anymore, my grocery list and route in the supermarket is highly stable, I can whip up anything from italian to indian to chineese at any time
Get meal kits delivered. You still do >80% of the cooking but it takes out all of the planning and shopping.
I was lucky(?) to grow up with a great cook and gardener for a mum, so I'm not even really sure how you exist without doing this at least. Pardon my naivety, but what do you eat...? Is everything unwrapped from plastic or from the local takeaway joint?
> Pardon my naivety, but what do you eat...? Is everything unwrapped from plastic or from the local takeaway joint?
As a student, money was always a struggle, so I would mainly eat stupid simple meals. [Pasta|potatoes puree|green beans] with [olive oil|tomato sauce|frozen steaks].
Once I started working, yes, a lot of pre-made meals. That eventually gave me some deficiencies and led to teeth issues.
I then increasingly had more income, so I switched to food delivery (deliveroo|foodpanda|uber eat), which is close to "eating at a restaurant every day". Not really healthy though since most restaurant food, at least in Europe, is tailored for occasional meals, not everyday meals, so it's often fatty and not well balanced.
I'm married since then, and luckily my partner took on her to do the cooking, while I do the prep/cleaning. I don't mind doing the grunt work, it's definitely not a pleasure, but at least it's not stressful, and the food is much healthier.
One of the really neat things about the meal kits is it teaches you the skills and takes some of the pressure off. Those skills are directly transferable - at some point you might decide to buy the ingredients for the recipe card yourself. Or that the steps for a chilli are almost the same as a ragu
It's pretty clear that the overwhelming majority of people do not share your opinion (from the existence of and numbers for restaurants, fast food, and delivery).
And I think this is a fuck up on out part. We treat nourishment as sort of low maintenance task, but billogically this is number one task and triggers all kinds of senses and responses, hence, very rewarding in all aspects.
Which is why meal replacement shakes are great options. Saying “just cook fresh meals” is advice most people don’t need to hear, they know ow but they don’t. However some of them may leverage healthier and cheaper meal replacement.
I stopped when they had issues getting it into Canada, then decided to drive across the border to get it instead. I stopped because of too much soy side effects.
I highly, highly recommend Huel or alternatives for anyone. I feel way better and have much more energy when I'm regularly consuming them. I think liquid food in general is really good for energy levels because the body has to expend way less energy breaking the food down to absorb it.
I especially recommend it for anyone who suffers from depression. The ability to just make a nutritionally complete meal that isn't full of complete shit in less than a minute is a godsend for maintaining your physical health on bad mental health days.
Another tip for healthy meals in under 5 minutes. Buy the following:
- A bag of mixed salad leaves
- A bag of pre-shredded coleslaw veg
- Microwave rice, cous cous or grain blend
- Cooked chicken breast (or get a whole chicken from the shop and strip it all)
- Some ready made sauce or dressing like peri-peri mayo, pesto mayo, honey-soy-garlic dressing etc
- A seed blend (optional)
- Some fried shallots/onions (optional)
- Wasabi peas (optional)
Put the salad and coleslaw veg in a bowl. Put the rice in the microwave for 90s, and the chicken in the microwave for 60s. Add the rice and chicken to bowl, add the optional toppings if desired and drizzle a bit of sauce (don't go overboard) on it.
You've now made an exceptionally healthy meal in under 5 minutes. For some reason the added carbs and the heat in the chicken and grains really makes the it way more palatable than a cold salad. Poke bowls for the win.
As someone with anxiety (diagnosed) and a strong bit of OCD (diagnosed) of the particular flavor that makes cooking *very stressful* I am grateful for Huel and use it for many of my meals. Relatively reasonably priced, good-enough tasting (better with added spices and such), low stress, low commitment, way healthier than eating out for every meal.
I second this recommendation.
edit: to be clear, I mean their "ready to eat" or "just microwave" meals. Their shakes are good too; but the microwavable meals are where they really shine, in my opinion.
Use a high quality blender (I have my old roommates vitamix) and add:
Frozen blueberries (for the antioxidants), frozen other fruits (to taste). One banana. Add enough oat milk to cover all the fruits. I like Oatly full fat. Blend thoroughly, adding a little more oat milk if needed. Then add a few heaping tablespoons of pea or soy protein and blend in thoroughly. I add it at the end as it is less likely to stick to the walls of my blender this way, but probably depends on your blender.
With the vitamix you can fill it about 2/3 or 3/4 full at most but it might overheat if it’s too full, needing to cool for 5 mins before you finish blending. I’ve done that too many times to count and the blender still works, tho I try to avoid it.
Pour it in to several mason jars with wide lids. I tend to end up with three jars. I drink one right away (in the morning after my oatmeal when I am getting ready for my day), put one in the fridge as an easy meal later, and take one with me wherever I am going. They keep all day, and if you don’t finish it you can put it in the fridge at night and it’s still good the next day. Vegan stuff keeps really well usually. And it’s super tasty!
I noticed today that I like the vanilla soy milk Jamba uses in their shakes, so I may try that some time for a little extra flavor, but honestly fruit blends have loads of flavor so maybe not.
Don’t skip the protein powder! It really gives it a satisfying body.
The Human body is designed to eat all available material. meat, vegs, fruits, leaves, nuts, shells, skin, bones, flowers, insects and much more We can digest almost everything and we should. Our stumic needs to work. Our chewing muscles need to work. We should not eat easy lazy food. We will turn into weak beings with allergies and zero resistance.
Eat healthy, but also a bit unhealthy.
Herbivores graze all day. Carnivores gorge themselves and then lie around saving energy.
I guess omnivores can do a bit of both depending on what they are eating
I don't know about animals but I know nutritionists recommend 4+ meals per day. From "The Renaissance Diet 2.0" by Mike Israetel:
> The best recommendation for timing with relation to hunger and fullness is to eat four to eight evenly spaced meals of similar calorie content per day and avoid extremes outside of those boundaries.
TLDR: while meal replacements were technically effective, they did come at a cost to her mental health. Shifting to a well balanced diet appeared more sustainable in the long run.
Unfortunately the taste can vary. I’ve been using it for 5 years and I report about a bag a year as bad because of the flavor being off. Often in a weird sweet way (like paint or gas).
Also keep in mind there are various flavors. Vanilla is common default but there is also “original” which is less sweet, and even “unsweetened”!
Am I totally out of touch with reality or is this a completely ridiculous remark? Only 1 procent of people is able to afford the most basic food?