Fitness Friday: Look to our elders they knew the way

[pc747]

​

Last week we posted an article about the Paleo Diet. Now we will continue to post articles about different diets and workout routines but I would like to pause real quick and just have a moment and refocus for a minute. Back in the day when our grandparents and great grand parents were around there were not 50 different diet plans or work out routines, memberships at the gym was limited and yet obesity was not as prevalent then as it is now. Here we are today with the latest information at our finger tips, 24 hour gyms, and diet plans for everyone, but the reality is we have to ask the question of whether we are just too busy or too lazy?

Back when our grands and great grands were around they grew and raised majority of their food with the only time they went to the market was for flour, beans, sugar, and coffee. Foods like cereal, cake, cookies, candy, and soda was a rarity and fast food even rarer than that. Breakfast consisted of eggs, meat, and a biscuit or 2. Point is that they prepared and cooked everything. They did not have 24 hour fitness centers but kids then did go outside and play and the parents worked in the fields or at the plant. But time has changed with more women in the work place to help make ends meet. Add to that kids are involved in extra curricular activities and parents working odd shifts, thanks to more business going to a 24 hour operation, and it is easy to see why we are where we are at. As a kid I remember one time wishing I could have cookies and pizza everyday and to finally see the day where schools/homes allow that is more of a curse than a blessing. As more processed ingredients are loaded with salt and sugar to help with packaging and taste while foods made fresh are a rarity, we have to find a way to bring back that old school style of preparing and eating. Because what we are doing now is obviously not working. We are not here looking to latch on any political agenda or bash any food organization. As I believe the issue is not so much the people making the cookies and the cereal but those of us who look at those quick fillers everyday to feed ourselves and our children.
Is it hard in today's time to take the time to prepare meals the way our parents used to, yes but we are going to have to stop depending on corporations to feed us quickly and cheaply while demanding it sound healthy and go back to more of us preparing our own foods from local farms. And if the obesity epidemic in our country is not enough for us to pull away from depending on processed food then I challenge you to look at the allowable percentage of bug parts, animal feces, and rodent particles are allowed in processed foods as it is regulated by the FDA. Oh and no disrespect meant to the FDA, but just with any government agency they can not police everyone, they announce when they are testing, and the large name companies have enough money to buy...ughh ask for a retest. Plus if you look at how food is made in large factories with miles of vats and conveyor belts so even companies with good intent are not going to be able to catch every fly and every rodent throughout the premises. I know a few times I noticed a dead fly in a sealed juice container so I know it happens. Point is all the health centers and specials diets are nice but if we do not get back to the ways of our generations before us where our diets consisted of 80-90% of whole foods (vs 65-85% of processed and fast foods) we are going to continue threading water. Because the amount of money we are spending on health care, counseling, weight loss books, and special diets are not making the situation better but worse.

To keep it simple if you can not find it on a farm, pronounce the name, or know what the chemical is then you should not be eating it.

 

[pc747]

Suggestions:


At one time a balanced breakfast was considered to be cereal, juice, toast, and milk. That is not a balanced breakfast as juice, cereal, and bread (which is probably loaded with butter and jelly) is loaded with sugars. Instead if you must have cereal go a cup of cereal, milk, whole fruit, and protein (ie eggs or bacon). Balanced meals should consist of whole fruit and veggies
Another easy start is to try and eliminate all forms of sweetened drinks from your diet including sodas, juice, and artificially sweetened drink and just go plain water. Get your fruit juice instead from whole fruits which are loaded in fiber to offset the sugar rush.

Opening the thread for recipe and meal suggestion made from whole foods found on farms.

 

[Dusty]

I see what you're saying. But we have access to foods that are far superior to what we had "back in the day" we just choose not to eat it. The average life expectancy in the first half of the 20th century was barely over 60 years old, that's even after you factor out WWI. If you think they we're eating foods filled with flakes of gold and rainbows in the olden days you should read Upton Sinclair's The Jungle. If you think finding the regular stray fly in your juice is bad... YIKES! The FDA was developed precisely to monitor that kind of thing. Before that, well, you know the saying, "...watch how sausage is made."? Read The Jungle to find out where the saying came from.

Even as recently as the 70's we were experimenting with insecticides and chemicals in and on foods that would make your head spin (just before melting due to instability at the cellular level). Back then corporations ran wilder than they do now. Take for instance, the death of lard (animal fat). Cottonseed oil was used to make candles and soap in the early 20th century, but the advent of the lightbulb eradicated the cottonseed oil industry overnight. Like any good company Proctor and Gamble didn't want to change how they made money and didn't give a damn how they did it. So, with the help of their marketing and PR team they waged an all out assault on lard and portrayed it as filthy, dirty, and unhealthy (an image which taints lard today). And they convinced a nation to deep fry or fill their food with an untested chemical made in a lab that was originally supposed to be made as a substitute for candle wax. That product was Crisco. As it turns out Crisco is FAR worse than lard and not until the late 90's did the image of lard begin to shift SLIGHTLY. By the way, if you find a restaurant that uses lard in the preparation of it's dishes EAT THERE. Like all things moderation is the key.

I think the thing that we have now is knowledge. Now we just need the good sense and willpower to use it. And don't wish for the "good old days"... They weren't all that good.

(Sorry if I rambled or lost track. I don't have time to edit, I'm scrambliing to get out of here to go to see the O's knock out KC!)

 

[Vepaot]

I'm with Dusty. Foods back then were terrible and obesity wasn't a problem because of shorter life expectancies, access to food that had less nutritional value overall so people kept off the weight, and simply because people had a much more active lifestyle back in the day. You didn't have kids sitting in front of the TV playing Xbox or adults working in office cubicles all day on their computers.

Also you're wrong Dusty, KC is gonna mollywhop Baltimore. ;D

 

[94lt1]

In the 60's & 70's alot of garbage was being thrown in food..to make foods "convenient, tasty and affordable".. Corporations started experimenting with lots of chemicals, that were never intended for human consumption, to add flavor and or texture to their products. It's the same now. And because it" falls within tolerable levels for the average human body", according to the FDA, it's OK.. Yet rules and regulations for what the FDA actually controls, oversees, or regulates has changed in many ways over the years.

Now, Pepsi and coke are way worse than the tobacco spiked watered down kerosene whiskey that was served in some bars back in the horse and buggy days... Sure that would peel paint, but coke will remove rust from a bumper or wheel or even eat corrosion off your battery posts on your car.

But I believe PC's referring to before that time.. Back when foods weren't filled with preservatives and chemicals that many people don't know about or that some can't even pronounce.

Yes there are some good changes in the food industry.. But there are a lot of bad changes too. Many corners are cut, in the name of the all mighty buck. Additives are used, even though they are shown to cause harm.. Or more so.. That they CAN cause harm.. But the response is.. Well it's a 20% chance.. And it saves us x amount of cash.. Let's do it...

The days when tomato soup was made with tomatoes and other ingredients.. Not msg and other chemicals and dye to add color and preserve freshness.. I'll take my chances with "sausage" from the 40's vs tomato soup from today.

Mostly.. The obesity epidemic is from people eating processed garbage, and having a very easy lifestyle. There are healthy foods, but the garbage foods are easier to come by and are more affordable... A dbl cheese burger and fries with a soda/pop is 3$ and up. A salad at most places(iceberg lettuce, no real nutrition) is 4$ and up. A 2 liter of pop is 1$ and water is 3$????

Margarine was originally (supposedly) created to fatten up turkeys and chickens... But it killed em. But too much money was invested.. So it was salted and sold to go on toast instead.. I've researched this.. And there's evidence if it being true and also evidence of it being bull... One thing I do know.. Take a tub of Margarine and set it outside.. Most if not all living creatures will avoid it.. No nutritional value.. Put butter out, and you'll find lots of bugs and other things, in and around it..

They started off with good intentions.. Make more food readily available to the world. Make it cheaper and easier to feed mankind.. Then it turned into, if I do this.. I can make more money.. And it shouldn't hurt many people.. Controlled and calculated risks are the norm for companies today.. And that risk is always at our expense...

The human body is designed to be in motion. We're "nomadic" by design and trait. Technology has given us the ability not to have to be anymore... And technology has given us a much easier lifestyle..

Lifespan has little to do with it.. I see 12 year old kids that are 100 lbs over weight. Sitting on our butts and having it easy.. That's our issue.. Our bodies aren't able to cope with the processed garbage and sugars of today's foods. I can tell you out of experience that a change in how you eat(going away from so much processed crap) alone, can make a huge difference in how you look and feel. Granted we can't ever get back to free range cattle of the 1800's and away from hormone injected animals... But many of us wish we could..

 

[pc747]

Well stated 94lt, thank you

 

[cr6]

Great post PC!
People who say they don't have time to cook or eat healthy are simply being lazy period. I cook dinner every night after work. It doesn't take hours to make a delicious healthy meal. Sure, we all have busy lives, but if you have time to watch tv or surf the net each night, you have 30 minutes to make dinner. It's simply a matter of incorporating it into your schedule and committing yourself to eating healthy.


tap'n on my S5

 

[94lt1]

Great post PC!
People who say they don't have time to cook or eat healthy are simply being lazy period. I cook dinner every night after work. It doesn't take hours to make a delicious healthy meal. Sure, we all have busy lives, but if you have time to watch tv or surf the net each night, you have 30 minutes to make dinner. It's simply a matter of incorporating it into your schedule and committing yourself to eating healthy.


tap'n on my S5

Definitely.. We're creatures of habit(both a good thing, and a bad) and if people got in the habit of doing things like cooking a decent meal, instead of getting some fast food processed crap, they'd be better off.

This doesn't mean you have to give up burgers and fries.. I use angus ground chuck or sirloin to make home made burger parties, all the time.. I use fresh lettuce and tomato and onion.. No buns though.. And I cut potatoes and make steak fries in the oven with nature seasoning over them..

I was the world's worst.. I loved to get deep fried fatty crap and pop and sugary garbage.. But when I developed my own gravitational pull.. And time slowed down around me due to my substantial mass... I had to make changes.. It would be awesome if I were in the "not typical" category.. But sadly... There are more people out there in the world that are like I was, than there are fit or healthy people.. And the thing that keeps them going down a bad path is lack of education and will power..

I'm off to the store.. Today's menu for dinner... Stuffed peppers... A rare treat.. Home made with brown rice, onions, fresh bell peppers, garlic, and ground angus sirloin.. Instead of the processed garbage.. You cut everything rotel style, add it to the rice and put the peppers in a bed of water and let it cook.. Yum..

 

[pc747]

As 94lt and Cr6 has stated, guys in a way you are right food today has come a long way. We have improved in many areas as far as regulation especially regarding things like pesticides. But the point I was trying to make was some of the mindsets of eating have changed dramatically over the years. No one here can honestly say to me that fast foods and processed foods are much better for you than food found on the farm. If so I bring before the court the obesity epidemic that not only effects many of our citizens but many of our kids. We are seeing more adults relying on high pressure and diabetic medicines. There are kids needing to take medicines once prescribed for adults in the later years as well as having weight loss surgery. To think that kids are at the point that weight loss surgeries are being prescribed is a tragedy. So for a time where food is "safer" why is obesity an epidemic?

The easy answer is that people is just over eating and being lazy. Eh I will say that yes we are not as active as we used to be but that alone would not lead to obesity on an epic level. Again look at our grands and great grands, they worked in factories and businesses and though technology makes it easier now many factory jobs consisted of installing a component or two and that is far from working in the fields that were done by the generations before them. When they came home they cooked, raised their kids, and rested the first chance they had so I am not ready to declare they were more physical. So that leads to what you see at the grocery stores. It is cheaper and easier to buy cereals and pre-made meals than cook from scratch. Where macaroni and cheese used to have been made from block cheese, milk, and macaroni we now turn to a box of powder full of coloring, artificial flavoring, and unknown chemicals (used to prevent it from spoiling). We really do not get a sense to how much processed food we consume as a nation until you are challenged to stop. And guys I am speaking from experience as I was challenged. Foods I pointed to as healthy ended up being worse than I thought. I would choose yogurt thinking that was "the healthy option". Then after really reading the chemicals and the labels I found that a serving of plain vanilla ice cream was healthier than yoplait yogurt.

I offer this challenge: For the next week evaluate what you and your family consume daily in your diet. Look at how much of it is processed food (hint: if it did not come from a farm or straight from nature than it is processed). Of the foods you eat that are processed look up the chemicals that are used to make it. Really take this time to evaluate what you are consuming.

I did this challenge and I have to admit that 80% (and at one time almost 100%) of my diet consisted of processed foods. I have gotten that number down a lot to where it is closer to 40% and I still have ways to go. I know ill probably never get down to 0% processed foods but I will get as close as possible with my goal being drop it to 10-20%. It is not easy as like many Americans I have gotten so use to eating foods straight off the shelves. I went low fat, gluten free, low carb etc. Wasn't until my eyes were opened when I realized I was working too hard and just needed to concentrate on keeping it as simple as going to a diet of simple ingredients .

Any way I am curious to see what you guys come up with during your evaluation.

 

[cr6]

Exactly.
Fortunately cooking was instilled in me at a very young age. My Mom would have my brothers and I take turns one night a week to make dinner for the family. We had to pick a recipe out of a cookbook and it had to be something different each time. Most people just want to relax after a 10 hour workday, picking the kids up from soccer practice, etc. For me, the process of cooking dinner each evening helps me to unwind and relax after a long stressful day. And being that we all love to eat, cooking can often be a great bonding experience if you do it with your kids or significant other. Coming from a large Italian family we always congregated in the kitchen or around the dining room table at the end of the day. It's simply a matter of introducing it into your lifestyle. If you rarely cook, make a habit of setting aside a day or two each week to cook dinner. I can assure you that your habits will begin to change over time. As with anything....baby steps are key. In our instant gratification type of world, this is one of the main reasons people give up on diet & exercise, because they don't see immediate results. Results WILL come with patience & determination. B, you say it all the time, "slow and steady wins the race" and that's exactly right.

You can do it!

tap'n on my S5

 

[94lt1]

Also.. What better way to dazzle a fitness orientated lady... Show her you can cook.. Lol.. It works.. Truuuust me. Lol

 

[Dusty]

In the 60's & 70's alot of garbage was being thrown in food..to make foods "convenient, tasty and affordable".. Corporations started experimenting with lots of chemicals, that were never intended for human consumption, to add flavor and or texture to their products. It's the same now. And because it" falls within tolerable levels for the average human body", according to the FDA, it's OK.. Yet rules and regulations for what the FDA actually controls, oversees, or regulates has changed in many ways over the years.

You're right. But companies adding additives to foods has always been an issue and was far worse before the FDA. In the early part of the 20th century canned foods were packed with formaldehyde to prevent spoilage. Foods were spiked with straight up amphetamines and labeled as "energy elixers". In the thirties a company simply added an analogue of the chemical that would become antifreeze into food marketed to children as a healthy "meal". How did they choose that chemical? They simply went to a chemical supplier and picked a chemical with an exotic name and *poof!* they added it and touted it as a "health envigorator". Kids were dying all across the country for YEARS before anyone noticed the link. Like most regulatory entities the FDA began with good intentions and saved us from ourselves just in time. But as time passed corporations began to induce sway on through various avenues. The bureaus that once protected the citizenry from wrong-doing are now following other interests. I just hope we get our heads straight and, one day, chemicals like high-fructose corn syrup will be removed like the elixers of the 20s.

Now, Pepsi and coke are way worse than the tobacco spiked watered down kerosene whiskey that was served in some bars back in the horse and buggy days... Sure that would peel paint, but coke will remove rust from a bumper or wheel or even eat corrosion off your battery posts on your car.

Coke originally contained a tenth of a gram of cocaine and a host of other questionable secret chemicals in its mystery formula when it was first made at the turn of the century. I'll take the current version. Cocaine and hallucinogens were sometimes mixed, bottled with flavored alcohol and sold a "good times elixers" before prohibition... I'm sure it was fun, but, YIKES! Alcohol was a dicey proposition back in the day. Much like today you simply couldn't trust what was prepared and packaged at one place and sold to you as a product.

But I believe PC's referring to before that time.. Back when foods weren't filled with preservatives and chemicals that many people don't know about or that some can't even pronounce.

I agree. You'd have to turn the clock back a long ways. Not just modern preservitives but pesticides have always been an issue. Early pesticides were simply light traces of sea/salt water but that damaged the soil rendering it useless. As we learned a little chemistry (but had no chemical industry) we quickly began to use pyrethrum, copper sulfate, slacked lime and other natural insecticides (not bad). Then as we learned even more about chemistry we began to experiment in exotic mixtures containing mercury and arsenic in increasing complexity through the 11th century until the industrial revolution when we got crafty. We started using coal byproducts and petrolium formulas. Then came the 40s-70s... We began to notice that suddenly there was no wildlife near farms... At all. Read Silent Spring for more info about that.

Prepackaged/processed food has always been a problem. Early canned foods may have lacked modern preservatives but they would put crazy chemicals in it to change its color and make it so it didnt smell odd. Food processing knowledge for the average person was arms length. Ingredients would leave your farm town to go to a factory in "the city" and return in a crate filled with cans and boxes to be put on the local store shelf. A family making its own food from the ground up was the vast minority. Here's an excerpt from The Jungle to describe what food processing was like in the 30s-40s. Remember this wasn't sensationalism it is how food processing was being done for decades at all levels before people knew anything at all. If you didn't personally work in a food processing plant or directly know someone in the industry you had NO IDEA what was in your food at all. No one checked on your behalf, inspected ANYTHING, and the label didn't tell you anything beyond the name of the product and some advertising Mumbo-Jumbo. As long as no one could directly link your failing health or death to a food product it was all fair game. Even if a product did kill you, your family would have to ask the store where they got it. Then you'd have to ask the warehouse where it shipped from. Then you might know where it came from. The world was very VERY different back then but it is the same exact problem we have today. The food they make behind the curtain is GARBAGE.


I'd say the the industrial revolution all the way through to the 50's has to be THE WORST time in human history for eating a meal. The combination of insane pesticides, terrible hygiene in preparation, and food additives... No Thanks.

Do you really want that "back in the day" sausage? (Stop giggling.)

From The Jungle by Upton Sinclair...
Chapter 14

“There was never the least attention paid to what was cut up for sausage; there would come all the way back from Europe old sausage that had been rejected, and that was moldy and white–it would be dosed with borax and glycerine, and dumped into the hoppers, and made over again for home consumption. There would be meat that had tumbled out on the floor, in the dirt and sawdust, where the workers had tramped and spit uncounted billions of consumption germs. There would be meat stored in great piles in rooms; and the water from leaky roofs would drip over it, and thousands of rats would race about on it. It was too dark in these storage places to see well, but a man could run his hand over these piles of meat and sweep off handfuls of the dried dung of rats. These rats were nuisances, and the packers would put poisoned bread out for them; they would die, and then rats, bread, and meat would go into the hoppers together. This is no fairy story and no joke; the meat would be shoveled into carts, and the man who did the shoveling would not trouble to lift out a rat even when he saw one– there were things that went into the sausage in comparison with which a poisoned rat was a tidbit. There was no place for the men to wash their hands before they ate their dinner, and so they made a practice of washing them in the water that was to be ladled into the sausage. There were the butt-ends of smoked meat, and the scraps of corned beef, and all the odds and ends of the waste of the plants, that would be dumped into old barrels in the cellar and left there. Under the system of rigid economy which the packers enforced, there were some jobs that it only paid to do once in a long time, and among these was the cleaning out of the waste barrels. Every spring they did it; and in the barrels would be dirt and rust and old nails and stale water–and cartload after cartload of it would be taken up and dumped into the hoppers with fresh meat, and sent out to the public’s breakfast. Some of it they would make into “smoked” sausage–but as the smoking took time, and was therefore expensive, they would call upon their chemistry department, and preserve it with borax and color it with gelatine to make it brown. All of their sausage came out of the same bowl, but when they came to wrap it they would stamp some of it “special,” and for this they would charge two cents more a pound.”

Mostly.. The obesity epidemic is from people eating processed garbage, and having a very easy lifestyle. There are healthy foods, but the garbage foods are easier to come by and are more affordable... A dbl cheese burger and fries with a soda/pop is 3$ and up. A salad at most places(iceberg lettuce, no real nutrition) is 4$ and up. A 2 liter of pop is 1$ and water is 3$????

Margarine was originally (supposedly) created to fatten up turkeys and chickens... But it killed em. But too much money was invested.. So it was salted and sold to go on toast instead.. I've researched this.. And there's evidence if it being true and also evidence of it being bull... One thing I do know.. Take a tub of Margarine and set it outside.. Most if not all living creatures will avoid it.. No nutritional value.. Put butter out, and you'll find lots of bugs and other things, in and around it..

They started off with good intentions.. Make more food readily available to the world. Make it cheaper and easier to feed mankind.. Then it turned into, if I do this.. I can make more money.. And it shouldn't hurt many people.. Controlled and calculated risks are the norm for companies today.. And that risk is always at our expense...

The human body is designed to be in motion. We're "nomadic" by design and trait. Technology has given us the ability not to have to be anymore... And technology has given us a much easier lifestyle..

Lifespan has little to do with it.. I see 12 year old kids that are 100 lbs over weight. Sitting on our butts and having it easy.. That's our issue.. Our bodies aren't able to cope with the processed garbage and sugars of today's foods. I can tell you out of experience that a change in how you eat(going away from so much processed crap) alone, can make a huge difference in how you look and feel. Granted we can't ever get back to free range cattle of the 1800's and away from hormone injected animals... But many of us wish we could..

I agree across the board on this one.... Smart choices, which unfortunately are very expensive choices, you can get healthy "natural" food. But it takes willpower, a monetary commitment, and an individual educational commitment that 90% of the population has no interest in pursuing. Look, I love crappy food. But I wish getting food that was bad for your body took the same commitment as buying the healthy alternatives. Just this year I found my own local butcher. It's crazy having a guy who hand picks who he buys his meat from and who can actually tell you what the food you're eating ate.