Fast and Easy - WHY?
 

Hi Friends-
I have a mini-rant/question here.
I am wondering why it is that when it comes to food, most people seem to, from my observation, want fast and easy.
I realize this is a generalization, and that is all it is.
I am not saying people are lazy. Gawd, people do things that are far more labor-intensive than I would ever be willing to do. Such as raise children, for the number one spot on that list. They also do a **** of a lot of admirably ambitious things in their work and hobbies that I am very taken aback by. They knit their own scarfs, paint their own chairs, etc, etc.
So why is it that when it comes to food, people (again I know it is a generalization) don't want to roll their own dough, chop their own vegetables, make things that have more than 5 ingredients, etc.
Ads for recipes use the words "fast" and "easy" more than "delicious."
I wonder if this could be part of the "problem" in general that causes us to all be here on this "fat" chicks site?
If we treated food with the same respect as other aspects of life, and put care into its preparation, would that make a difference?
Why do people aspire to have their food be fast and easy? Why is this the one thing that gets left to that back-burner (not literally) while we are busy putting effort into other things?
I think food can be an art form. I think I might just roll out some dough for pierogi today. That doesn't mean I'll eat much pierogi. It freezes well.

Hey Spinymouse!

Yes, food can be an art form! But for most of us, that takes more time than we have.

It used to be a full-time job to do the cooking, keep house, etc. And frankly, it still is! Only most women now also have jobs as well. Making your own dough, cleaning and chopping your own vegetables, etc. takes a lot of time that people don't have so much now. I don't see anything wrong with wanting to save some steps. The problem arises when everything is always fast, fast, fast, picked up in a bucket or bag on the way home.

My grandmother made all her own foods from scratch--and later, she and my grandfather had a big garden--what people would call a "truck farm"--so she was involved in all aspects of their food production. Oh, and she was overweight later in life, although not severely. My mother made some foods from scratch when I was growing up, and she also did a lot of canning (of produce from our grandparents' truck farm). But she was so happy when frozen foods became available--they were much better, for one thing, than the canned versions of some vegetables.

I agree with you though, mouse--when food gets too easy and too cheap, overeating becomes something really easy to do. And the sad thing is, the less money a person has, the worse the foods are that they can afford. :( So it's a bad cycle.

Jay

I hear you! I avoid "5 ingredient" recipes because they taste like 5 ingredient recipes :lol: And Heaven help me if I ever decide to follow a recipe from Sandra Lee, the Semi-Homemade cook.

I love taking the time to build complex layers of flavor and texture, using all natural ingredients. Foods that take time to prepare will taste better and be of better quality. It's also about the quality of the ingredients, and the risk of consuming things I don't want in my body.

It's a very enjoyable process.

I love cooking. And baking. I love following recipes, putting my own twist on it, and playing around with spices and such. It's fun. It's enjoyable. It's rewarding. It's EXPENSIVE! That is the one and only thing that holds me back from doing it more often.

It IS an enjoyable process, and it is an art form, and i love it... but I really only have the energy/time/desire to do it on the weekends. I am exhausted during the week - and I don't have kids, exhausting hobbies, just work all day and don't want to come home and do anything.

I do take more help than I should from frozen foods, but I do try to find better frozen foods. Buffalo burgers instead of those hamburger patties in a stack, frozen vegetarian lasagna with whole wheat noodles and think crust low-calorie frozen pizzas. I know it's not home cooking, but it's healthier and I feel a little bit better about it.

I would prefer and do love to cook good home food, but like mentioned above... that is a full time job and I already have one of those. *LOL*

I have three kids that are in cheerleading, soccer, and football, an intense full time job, and the kids are in school, so there's homework too! We get home at 7:30 or 8 some nights. There just isn't the time in our lives for me to cook a three course meal every night. I'd rather spend the time making sure that my daughter is learning to read or playing Legos with my boys. I guess that it comes down to priorities. We can still make good choices that are faster and easier; we do it every day.

Hey Mom -
(that sounds funny!)
I never cook more than a one course meal, but it's a good one course!
Yes, it does come down to priorities - food is one of my big ones.
I don't have children - YIKES - that in itself requires so much more time than it used to.
I just think if I put time and care and deliberation into my cooking, it will be a more meaningful thing, and I won't be multi-tasking with it.
But as I write this, I am taking a quick peek at the computer while about 13 ingredients are in the pan on the stove!
Suzanne - if I ever make a Sandra Lee recipe, it is time for an "intervention."
:)

I can understand if someone is extremely busy and really doesn't have the time. I know what it's like to have to juggle a job and family. I used to live on quick and easy.

I guess I get confused when people have a choice and they choose the fast and easy route, assuming it's better in some way or because they just don't care. It seems that grabbing a mix is the first option, and too many people don't realize that it's not anywhere near as good as something made from scratch. Like Sandra Lee :lol: I watched an interview with her and she said something that totally threw me. She said she went to culinary school, and they were teaching her how to make things from scratch, such as making a baking mix to use in recipes. She thought that didn't make any sense, when she could go out and buy a box of Bisquick, and thought it was the same thing. So she dropped out of culinary school, and went to the supermarket and cooked from prepackaged mixes. I guess that's ok if you don't mind that everything tastes like Bisquick :shrug:

Speaking for myself, I get pretty rushed trying to balance having to take care of a 2.5yr old. Either I run home from work, make dinner in under 45min to pick up DD or I get her home and try to cook while keeping 1 eye on her. However, I really don't buy all that many 'convenience' items in general. Especially since I'm following a whole foods lifestyle now.

My biggest splurge is prepared veggies and not much anymore since I get CSA delivery. For salads, I find it too time consuming and wasteful to try and make say a garden salad rather than buy a pre-made jumbo bag for $1.99. Sometimes I like a little red cabbage, but I'll have 3/4 of a head left and I know myself well enough not to cook it :lol: Secondly, my hands are extremely chapped and painful so the less amount of time I spend washing and rinsing vegetables the better it is for my skin. And of course I find it so time consuming and I wind up with so many more dishes to do.

Okay...for me it is a matter of being lazy I guess, lol. I've been cooking for waaaaay too many years, since I was a teenager. And I guess I am just tired of cooking. In the beginning of being a new wife and mother I enjoyed cooking and cooked from scratch. Kids get bigger, there's more running around and less time. Now with them being even older and having been cooking so long I don't want to cook anymore. If it were just me I would hardly ever cook. About the only time I cook from fresh/scratch is when we are having company and that is rare so...I prefer the easy/fast way.

My husband's stepmother is not a natural in the kitchen. She can't cook except by basic (very basic) step by step recipes.

My husband grilled Salmon on their grill, letting her watch every step of the process. She loved it and wanted the "recipe." There wasn't a recipe, just what he showed her. Take fish, spray aluminum foil with cooking spray. Put down fish. Sprinkle with Lawrey's and pepper (he explained she could use any seasonings she liked - this was a very disconcerting concept for her). Lay slices of lemon on fish, wrap fish. Put on grill. Take off grill when fish is done (open and test if you're not sure).

While he explained the process, she took notes, and ended up using three pages of a legal pad.

The conversation went something like this:

MIL: Where do I get the salmon.
Hubby: Mentions grocery store, and says Wild salmon tastes better and has less mercury, but it's more expensive. Buy wild, if you can.
MIL: There's a difference? How can I tell?
Hubby: If it doesn't say on the card, ask the guy at the fish counter
MIL: Oh ok, how much should I buy?
Hubby: I buy about 1/2 lb per person, a little more if the fish has bones (the one we brought, did not).
MIL: Oh we won't eat that much.
Hubby: Neither do we, but I like leftovers the next day.
MIL: We don't eat leftovers
Hubby: Buy less fish then
MIL" How long do we cook it, 22 minutes, right (that's how long it took
on their grill).
Hubby: That's just an estimation. It will depend on how big your fish is.
MIL: Oh, like how much it weighs?
Hubby: Well, more like how thick it is.
MIL: Well, can I ask the butcher to cut it to the size you used (yes go ask the guy at the fish counter, to give you a piece of fish EXACTLY 4.3 inches wide, 12 inches long and 2.2 inches thick)
Hubby: No, you have to buy it by weight, or by the filet.
MIL: Well, how will I know how long to cook it
Hubby: Did you see how I started checking the fish at around 12 - 15 minutes after we started? That's what you do.
MIL (writing as she speaks): 12 - 15 minutes. Well should it be 12 or 15 minutes?
Hubby: Doesn't matter (this stumps her, apparently she wants to use a timer to tell her when the fish is done). Hubby explains how to tell when fish is cooked. By the way, she has been cooking pan fish that her husband has caught for the 15 some odd years they'be been married. So cooking walleye, northern, perch, crappie, sunfish, bass, catfish, and bullhead doesn't stump her, but apparently salmon does. Her husband usually fries them, but she has a baked fish recipe from a magazine she makes. It is good, I got the recipe -- a xerox of the magazine page with notes scribbled in all of the margins.

We bought her a "basics" cookbook by Alton Brown. (She's not mentally challenged by the way, she's well-educated and has a career in professional office management, but she thinks very literally and almost mathmatically).

We've told her "Buy a rotisserie chicken and stove top stuffing!!!"

Originally Posted by :
I guess I get confused when people have a choice and they choose the fast and easy route, assuming it's better in some way or because they just don't care.

Not everyone finds meaning or value in cooking the best food.

Sometimes it's just fuel. Sometimes good enough is good enough.

I think we need to be careful especially with other women when we start making value judgements about not being domestic enough (not cleaning enough, not cooking enough). There's a lot of baggage there.

My husband and I both LOVE to cook, but that in itself, can be a downfall for us. We are on disability so we have "time" to shop and cook, but there are also days when neither of us is feeling well enough to cook, or wanting to cook. There are also days when even we don't have the time, because of doctor's appointments or other obligations.

I suspect even in the past, but especially today there are huge differences in the amount of time, desire, and interest, in cooking and domestic skills anyone (not only the women) have. I think "fast and easy," should be just as valid and available as "the old fashioned way." In fact, more "fast, healthy, and easy," options are needed.

A little off-topic, but when I was still working, and indian coworker was expressing shock that food in america was so expensive, fattening, yet not satisfying. It reminded me of the american cliche of chinese food. He said, american food sat in his stomache like a rock, but twenty minutes later he was hungry again. He was gaining weight, but always hungry. Where he lived in India (a metropolitan, but not huge city), food was very inexpensive, and most homes don't even have ovens. He said even among the very poor, food was often bought from stalls already prepared, because it was cheaper than fuel for cooking. But vegetables, lentils, and occasionally lean meats are the staples. Low GI foods that do stick with you longer.

Seems to me fast and easy isn't the problem.

Originally Posted by MariaMaria:
Not everyone finds meaning or value in cooking the best food.

Sometimes it's just fuel. Sometimes good enough is good enough.

I think we need to be careful especially with other women when we start making value judgements about not being domestic enough (not cleaning enough, not cooking enough). There's a lot of baggage there.

Now this is something I should think about, because I don't think about cooking the same way as I think about cleaning ---(believe me, you do not want to see the mess in my place!)
I was thinking about eating (dare I say dining?) and the care that is or is not put into it.
For one thing, as an overweight person, I think: eating is something I have to do. It is not like I have so much money in the bank (as in food in the fat cells) that I can just cruise for a while. So.... since I have to do it, why not do it in a meaningful way? And that means cooking things with quality (not quantity or cheap or fast or pre-made) in mind.
Now, I hate domestic drudgery. Hate, hate, hate. I see cooking as art, and scrubbing out the bathtub and cleaning the floor as drudge. If someone can change my thinking about that drudge stuff I would be eternally grateful!
And I don't mean to make any value judgements about anyone here. I am wondering if putting care and effort into food preparation will be beneficial. Now as to value judgements about Sandra Lee -- OK -- I'M GUILTY!!!

Kaplods-
VERY interesting about your Indian coworker!

I have to admit...I was a bit offended by this post. It's not that I don't WANT to cook from scratch. i just don't have the time and/or energy. I have a disabled hubby to take care of after working my 40+hr job. So, if all I can muster is boiled spaghetti, jarred sauce, and salad from a bag...it's what we eat. I absolutely LOVE to bake from scratch. Cooking I need a recepie, but I like to do it. I make an absolutely to-die-for pot pie, but it takes ALL day. I ususally only make it once a year (well now I won't since I lost the recepie:().

I just want people to stop to think what others have going on in their lives before a judgement is made. Most of us aren't lazy, just too busy/too tired.

Kerri

newFannie -
I am sorry to have offended you. I know that people are very very busy -that brings me to another thought - with all our labor saving devices, are we really saving any labor???? People are still feeling stressed out and cramming as many things as they can in a day............
But........I am sorry to have offended you.
I posted a concept/question that occurred to me, but I did not want to judge anyone.

No real offense taken. I know the point you are trying to make is valid. Just makes us who want to do more feel badly about themselves.

I agree that half of the "time" saving devices don't save any time. All that swiffer wet jet stuff...ugh. Went back to a regular old mop and bucket and my floors were prettier than ever. And I didn't have to go over the same spot 2-3 times. Swiffer has it's place, but not as a whole floor cleaner. Great for quick spills. But the dry cloths...I could not live without those. I clean everything with them. They are especially great in the bathroom on the floor. I take one in my hand and rub it all over the floor to get all of the hair picked up before I mop. Works wonders. And the citrus ones smell great. I also feel the same about the pop-up wipes (clorox, lysol, etc). These are great for every day maintenance. I wouldn't have a house without these items. And no...I am not a neak freak....my DH would fall out of his chair laughing at that one.
PLus with all of the "time saving" devices, we feel like we should be able to get even MORE done in the day. It is just not possible. We need time for ourselves, ladies.

Kerri

Originally Posted by newFannie07:
No real offense taken. I know the point you are trying to make is valid. Just makes us who want to do more feel badly about themselves.

Maybe we don't need to do more. Maybe we just need to stop and put our feet up and look up at the sky or something.
Maybe that perceived need to do more is the reason we do fast food.
Trying to fit more things in every day.
I don't know how "they" evaluate such things but I remember hearing that the people who were "happiest" in the US were the Amish. Interesting....

Originally Posted by MariaMaria:
I think we need to be careful especially with other women when we start making value judgements about not being domestic enough (not cleaning enough, not cooking enough). There's a lot of baggage there.

:lol: Ok, I see your point. Though I don't think that's what this topic is about.

I don't think of cooking as being domestic, it hadn't occurred to me. I guess that's because I cook for myself, or cook for guests and not as an obligation to family structure and tradition in that respect. I choose to cook because it's enjoyable.

I guess we're looking at this from the perspective of a foodie, not a domestic goddess :lol:

missmess- CUTE dog!
yeeah I understand; if I could have my intention, coooking would be unnecessary. but then also eating would be unnecesary. We would just be photosynthetic, like plants. Or just plain not need anything! In an ideal world........

I've found I cook less during the summer. We don't have central air for one. Standing in a hot kitchen ain't my idea of a hobby...much less a fun one. LOL I eat out quite often sometimes because I'm always on the go, hardly home, and I reserve my energy for other projects than cooking. But I do FAST food VERY rarely. I prefer a sit-down restaurant. It's much more sane than driving home, cooking, eating, then heading back out to where I'd just been to finish up my shopping and other errands. Cause when I'm out, I usually plan many stops along a route, and once I do fix breakfast here, and we get out the door, it's well into dinner time before I get home, and we have to have lunch in there somewhere.

Now yesterday, it WAS Wendy's chicken nuggets and fries. But that's only because I bought a hose reel from Lowes and it was missing a wheel, back to Lowes (15 minute drive, wasted gas), get home with the new one, and the hose leaks. Grrrrrrrr So another wasted trip back. In the meantime, it's now after 1 p.m. and we gotta eat, and I still have other things to get done. So got a chicken nugget combo that we shared and ate on the way to Lowes. But then yesterday evening, it was Ruby Tuesday's salad bar while we were out again.

Maybe if I just installed a stove in my car.... At least I DO have A/C in there. LOL

Originally Posted by missmess:
She eats her food in 2.5 seconds....

People crack up at how fast she eats her dog food! HA HA!!!

Oh, that is funny -
That's like me with liquids.:)

Well, first off, I don't find cooking to be all that enjoyable. I don't like tweaking recipes or making stuff from scratch, or anything like that. I like to throw a few things together and eat it (a good amount of my diet is raw fruits and vegetables for this very reason), and when I do cook, I prepare enough to get several meals out of it (so it will be a while before I have to cook again).

Second, I only have a limited amount of time. If I have the choice between going out and getting in some physical activity or staying home and cooking up an elaborate meal from scratch, cooking is not going to win. I'd rather fix something easy and then go out and do something fun.

Honestly, I grew up in a family of fast food / low-ingredient foods...I don't know *how* to just whip up something from 20 things I just happen to have in my kitchen. The thought of trying to do so is anxiety-provoking.

I prefer simple meals....grilled chicken with rice and some veggies (five ingredients total if you include spice for the chicken and butter for rice or veggies)...pasta (yes, I can make my own sauce, but when I don't have an hour or two to prepare it, I'll do the bottled sauce...in that case, two ingredients).....soup and a sandwich, etc.

It's taken me a while to move from the staples of my parent's life (Kraft Macaroni and Cheese, frozen pizzas, fried everything because it's easy to cook that way) to somewhat cleaner, but still simple food.

I respect those who can make what I would consider "complicated" meals, but it does bother me a little bit to have someone look down on my simple "5-ingredient" meals that are healthy and simple just because they don't take a lot of time to make.

Ah well, to each their own. As long as we're working on improving whatever we're doing, it's all good. :)

Hey! Having read more of this discussion, I have to say I really belong with those who don't like to cook. I've never liked it a lot, although I can put together some really good dishes on occasion. Combine that with not having oodles of time, and there you have it.

Also, regarding the Amish being the "happiest"--anyone who wants to live the Amish lifestyle should try it for awhile before signing up! ;)

It's always tempting to think that things were better in the good old days when people supposedly lived "more simply," but one person's good old days could be another person's oppressive existence.

My grandmother did her cooking on a wood stove when my mom was a child, and that is a whole technology in itself. Plus you had to make your own bread--that's how you got bread! Imagine having to bake every single morning for your family of six children... I don't envy her one bit!

As for cleaning--I like things clean, but if it comes down to a choice between a clean floor and going to the gym, or getting my contract done, the floor is going to wait. LOVE Swiffer! Will NOT go back to a mop and bucket! :D

Jay

I think I like to cook. But knowing how many vegetables are still in my CSA bag today, I am starting to think about changing my mind!
But---- I think I am also not ready for the 3 - tap faucet yet. (Hot water, cold water, People Chow...)

I think folks have brought up a lot of valid and interesting reasons why fast and easy is the norm for many people.

I can think of some other reasons too. Many people don't learn how to cook, either at home or in home ec. Parents often don't teach their kids how to cook and kids may have few or no responsibilities in the home. I know that when my mom was a kid (she was born in 1932 and grew up on a farm in pretty extreme poverty) she and her sibs did real work. The family relied on the children do do real work and contribute to the running of the household. Since there was massive daily cooking and intermittent preservation, butchering etc., there was no way that their mother could have done it all. So now lots of people leave home and move into an adult world without a lot of skills like cooking, budgeting, and menu planning to see them through.

Another thing to remember is that people, both on the farm and in cities, often had cheap domestic help, even families that were just middle-class. The domestic help could do a lot of drudge work and prep work. It's pretty uncommon for people to have that kind of help now.

Judging from my mother, grandmother, and elderly relatives, it was far more common for home cooks to have a pretty limited repertoire of recipes that they made over the course of their lifetime. Lots of people cooked because they had to, whether they enjoyed it or not. Lots of people had about 10-20 main dishes that they made all the time. I have some old cookbooks (from the 30s through 50s) with sections of "foreign foods" that are maybe 20 pages with recipes like "Risotto milanaise--an Italian way of glorifying chicken leftovers."

Before the 50s, I don't think there was the kind of "foodiness" that exists now, with thousands of cookbooks and magazines published every year, plus constant food on TV, nor was there the variety of ethnic and exotic foods, nor year-round availability of fresh ingredients that we have now. I think this variety and high expectation of what cooking entails can be really overwhelming for cooks. I mean, just going to the grocery store can be overwhelming because there are so many choices. If you don't know that the best food is often the simplest and quickest to prepare, or if you think good food = snootiness + inaccessibility, you may not even know where to start.

Wow, mariposita - what a thought-provoking post. And also amusing about the way to glorify chicken leftovers!
Now I am going to think about this (the high-expectation foodie concept) and also combining this with the need to use CSA bag contents. Could be an interesting result.

I dont enjoy cooking, because I dont know how. That and I cant afford to cook. When it would cost me $10 for the ingredients for a salad, I could pick up a pack of ramen noodles for less than $1. I also have trouble cooking because I'm originally from the USA, but I've moved to the UK and the cultures are so very different. All of the food stuffs I was used to in the USA arent stocked/made here.

If I could find good easy recipes, I'd be keener to cook. Right now the only from scratch recipe I know (aside from baking) is Chicken Parmesan. I cant even get spaghetti to cook right most times!

I took home ec in high school in the USA, but that didnt prepare me for life in the home at all! We were made to work in groups and everyone had tasks to do. IE we made taco salad on a monday, and Mac and cheese on a thursday in a given week. I never got to do any of the "cooking" i just cleaned up after everyone else's mess. Classes like Home ec are on the downfall now, with people opting out of it in most high schools :(

If there were an easy and cheap way for me to learn to cook, I'd go for it. For now though, I cant stand doing dishes, so the less mess, the better. (no dish washer)

Ann - you are right about people having a limited repertoire. My MIL had a weekly menu that never varied except for special occasions. She grocery shopped without a list. She was on a very limited budget and she knew she could afford to make exactly these things every week and it never varied.

My mom did a little more variety, but we never ate out or did convenience foods and she never experimented. I would guess she fell well into that 20-30 dishes. Hers was more based on what was in season. We had a huge garden so what was ripe was what we ate plus a very simple meat. When my sister moved back in with her 2 kids and money got tight we ate spaghetti with homemade sauce 3 x a week. And EVERY week we had "leftover soup".

Cassandra - truthfully if you learn to cook you can cook cheaper than you can do convenience foods. But it is a learning process that can be tough and somewhat expensive.

Edit: Doh! I hadn't read through Mariposita's post. She says a lot of the same things!

Until recently it hadn't settled in my mind that there's a middle ground. There was microwaveable food and there was company food, time-consuming courses that took a lot of work to prepare.

Now I know there's a middle ground. I know that whole wheat pasta and jarred sauce with a bag of veggie burger crumbles mixed in is a quick, wholesome meal. This is a beginning. It can be further refined with some fresh grated parmesan on top (keeps in the fridge forever), and a bag salad for a side. It can be FURTHER refined by chopping a few vegetables and throwing them in the sauce too, or making your own sauce one Sunday afternoon and freezing it, and pulling out the frozen sauce later.

Good food doesn't have to be incredibly time-consuming. It's the little touches that make a dish sing: fresh quality parmesan on your pasta; pepper from a grinder, simple things like that can add enough depth to compensate for not having simmered something for hours on the stove.

When I was a kid, we had a healthy cooked meal every night for supper. It was some form of meat, vegetables from the freezer (cooking is a snap: about 3 minutes in a half inch or so of simmering water), and potatoes or noodles or rice or garlic bread or whatnot for the bread/starch. This meal was tasty, filling, healthy, and pretty darn quick.

While we remember our grandparents slaving over a hot stove for hours, what may be sticking in our minds is the times they put in that big effort. I bet their daily meals were much the same as I listed above: meat, veg, starch cooked in a quick and efficient manner.

Perhaps it's more about being mindful of what we are doing? The ingredients, fresh or frozen, store bought or from your garden... the preparation of them, chopping, peeling, nuking... thinking about what is going into your body, how it will fuel you, etc is more key?

I can think of plenty of quick healthy recipes that only have 5 ingredients - in fact the most satisfying meals I've had lately have been simple roasted vegetables from the farmers market & some grilled meat from the freezer.

I think if we somehow were able to put the thought, care, love into our cooking while maintaining a realistic time frame and attitude toward it we'd be better off. That's what we are trying to do in my house... a lot of nights it is a frozen veggie lasagna or a thin crust pizza, but we still try to eat mindfully and pay attention to quality ingredients.

As for everything else domestic-I've taken the flylady approach of "you can do anything for 15 minutes" and somehow my house never gets too bad.

Good point Lizziness. As some people don't already feel enough pressure about what they are eating, they also have to feel pressure about how they are making it :dizzy: Some people can spend 10 minutes making a really healthy meal and someone else can spend 1hr making fried chicken and buscuits from scratch.

It's also been proven that forzen and canned veggies retain much of the nutrients compared to their fresh counterparts. If fast and easy will help someone eat better, then I'm all for it :)

"Fast," doesn't mean unhealthy, and slow and homemade doesnt equate to healthy either. Fat, skinny, and everywhere in between, you will find all sorts of food interests, preferences, and skills.

There aren't many healthy fast food options in the US, that is true. At least not compared to much of the rest of the world. But you will find foodies and gourmets who are both thin and fat, and you will find the same range in people who think "I only cook (or even eat) because I have to."

My husband and I love watching the Food Channel. My husband loves Paula Deen, though we laugh at her use of butter and mayo. It's over the TOP.
I prefer Anthony Bordain (sp?) and Andrew Zimmer (Bizarre Food). Seeing what other people in the world eat, is very interesting, especially the fast food (Street food). We don't have much street food in the US anymore, except during fairs and festivals, and even much of that is deep fried.

Watching street vendors dish up grilled critters (from bugs to birds to beasts), stews and curries, fruits and veggies... just about anything that could be made in a home is made and served in the streets - you can see that "fast food," isn't a new concept. "Clone restaurants," really are. Even 30 years ago, the number of chain restaurants was minimal.

There are many reasons that fat is becoming a world-wide epidemic. It can probably be summarized best as "affluenza." Food is available and affordable to anyone in the world who has the money to buy it. In the most affluent societies, even the very poor have the money to buy it. That hasn't always been true.

Our bodies aren't any different than any other critter on the planet. Give an animal an opportunity to eat their meals without working for it, and they will. Laziness and hunger our built into our genes, because conserving energy and eating in times of abundance to carry us through famine is the rule not the exception in the wild. If food is too abundant, overpopulation changes that in a hurry.

We've stepped outside the natural order on so many levels. We don't eat when we're hungry, we eat according to the clock. We don't eat foods that resemble anything that exists in nature. We don't sleep when we're tired, and we don't sleep until we're rested. The work we do, is less and less frequently physical work, and less and less personally rewarding. We don't have a sense of accomplishment over creating something we can immediately see as useful. We rarely if ever have to chase down food, or run from enemies. If we do run or exercise, it often isn't for a reason, and often not even fun.

All of the things that keep wild critters slim, toned, and in top condition don't enter our lives, unless we recreate them in an un-natural setting. I don't think it's rocket science to see why our bodies aren't working as they're intended to.

[QUOTE=kaplods;1813194 Give an animal an opportunity to eat their meals without working for it, and they will. [/QUOTE]

True. And I imagine that most of us would also, if we could, choose to wear clean clothes without having to do laundry, get paychecks without having to go to a job, etc. With most of life it just doesn't work that way. I think that the realm of food is about as close as we (in modernized countries) come to being able to cheat the equation. Unless you figure in the indirect payments in energy and expenses, like gym memberships and treadmills. And whatever medical costs. And believe me I am NO ONE to point any fingers here at all. I have high blood pressure and weird feet with bones that bent in a way they weren't supposed to from having to support excess weight. I am not proud of it. So maybe there really isn't a pardon-the-expression "free lunch."

I think that really is the point, there are consequences to our actions. There always have been, it's just in a modern, industrialized society the consequences aren't always immediate or directly linked to the behavior. At the "natural" level consequences are pretty immediate and clear. Eat when you can or starve to death. Run to get dinner, or run to avoid being something else's dinner. Rest when you're tired, play not only for fun and stress relief, but to teach the youngin's and practice skills used in hunting prey or evading predator.

I'm not advocating a return to the stone age, but now we have to realize that our environment is working against us, rather than for us. We have to use our brains to outsmart our physiology. Our body and primitive brain is still trying to prepare us for a famine that isn't going to come.

Funny - I missed the first 2 pages of this thread the first time I posted.

I like to cook. Thats kind of my problem. I dont like making it if it isnt really good. But I dont often have the time to cook the way I want too. I try at least one weekend night to cook a good meal.

When my mom, sister, MIL come to visit they all want to do me a favor and cook dinner. They cant cook. Finally with my sister I said..."you know what I would really like - YOU take the kids to the park while I cook. I want to cook without 2 little ones screaming for attention. THAT is what would be helpful to me. " They did and it was sheer heaven.

Oh and for me....I love to cook. I hate to menu plan and shop. In my ideal world I would shop for one meal at a time because I would have all day to do nothing but cook dinner. Get up, have coffee, wander off to the farmers market and whole foods to see what looks good TODAY. How do I know what I want to eat tomorrow?

JayEll, the Swiffer IS great ain't it? I talked my mom into one as well. I have the carpet flick and the wetjet, love em both. Magic Eraser is just another of those wonderous inventions as well. ;)

You know my mother tried teaching me to cook, she learned from grandma. And most people in my family LOVE to cook. I just...well, I don't. Never have. Wasn't able to even learn. I've been shown the family secret for their wonderful buttermilk biscuit recipe many many times. Hubby and I have contemplated using them either as weapons or hockey pucks when I make them though. But they're rather dangerous to get hit by one. Ouch.

Mom even sent me some premade biscuit mix that a local place sells here...good old fashioned homeade WV biscuits. They were harder than the ones I tried from scratch. ::sigh:: I finally decided, biscuit making was not for me and I stay extremely far away from it.

Now I don't know if fast food actually has anything to do with it though. As I said, most of my family loves cooking...greasy fried potatoes, fried pork chops, candied yams, candied beets, biscuits, cornbread...see a theme? They eat a variety. But just about EVERYTHING they make, they feel like they have to add fat too. They grew up on lard and butter. I watched mom take a can of peas and add a half a stick of butter to them! ICK! And to think...I actually used to eat and love her cooking. Nowadays, they taste overdone. I'm so used to nuking the Steamfresh frozen veggies from Birdseye. The peas taste more fresh, not overcooked, like those from a can. And I add nothing to them. Sometimes I may put about 3 squirts of "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter" on them. So mom's, swimming in butter, overcooked, squishy canned peas just taste awful to me now. Right after the peas, I watched her pour half a bag of brown sugar and add the other half stick of butter to a can of candied yams. They weren't candied enough for her taste. Double ICK! No wonder I got fat. :(