You and I Are Too Old to Not To Understand What Good Food Is

Too Old for This Sh*t: How to Take Your Life Back from an Ageist Society

Photo by Nathan Dumlao on Unsplash

Research shows that we don’t want to eat food that isn’t good for us, but we don’t have a clue what good food is…..

People argue - okay, certain middle-aged men I know have argued - that beer is a health food. Right?

You've got your grains, water, and the fermentation, which everybody knows is so good for the microbiome.

I've heard similar arguments for potato chips. They are, after all, a vegetable. Right? Deep-fried in seed oils, are really, really tasty and really, really bad for us.

Same argument as catsup, which folks laughingly refer to as a vegetable. Or fruit, whatever your persuasion. Which is far more sugar than it is tomatoes, but what the hell do I know, right? Here’s a bit more about that.

As much as there is information on the internet, vast quantities of questionable “data” masquerading as knowledge, especially when the writers are shills for the sugar industry (please read Gary Taubes and others for the sweet lowdown on the sugar industry) we remain completely and utterly confused.

Quite intentional. Any casual wander through Whole Foods and Natural Grocers will offer you a dizzying array of all kinds of heavily-processed foods which are really, really bad for you. Because of where they are sold, in comfy, healthy-sounding, grossly-overpriced stores with the Beach Boys in the background, it feels as though that bag of beet chips should be just fine.

Right?

WRONG.

You and I are WAY Too Old to continue to believe the false promises, lying labels and disingenuous information about things like this pure processed shite:

Not a damned thing Natural about Cheetos. You want natural? Go dig a potato out of the ground and bite into the damned thing.

We aren’t likely to do that. You and I are more likely, however, to buy a bag of the above or some other fake food because it’s easy, convenient and takes less time.

For a way to understand the power of the food scientist, whose high-paying job is to addict us to junk, please see this:

Understandable. However, real grownups take care of their bodies. If we’re going to live long enough to enjoy being real grownups, maybe it’s time to stop using convenience and taste as an excuse to keep damaging the vehicle we inhabit.

Note I didn’t say none of us can ever have a treat. I am saying that learning how to understand what is fobbed off on us as “food” isn’t. Food, that is.

Chemicals, mostly, and my uneducated guess, some of them hardy enough to withstand a nuclear winter. Imagine a dystopian future when all that survived were Ultra-Processed Foods, or UPFs. At least we won’t eat each other as long as there are Cheetos around.

That said, this is worth reading: Consumer Perceptions Unwrapped: Ultra Processed Foods, a Consumer Observatory Report.

From that article:

The primary motivations for eating UPF are their convenience, price, and taste. Convenience is comprised of ease of preparation (or no preparation at all) and time taken. Prices of UPF are often seen as lower than less processed foods. Finally, many consumers find UPF, such as junk food takeout (McDonalds, pizza etc). to be more tasty than home-made food. UPF are also seen as a treat and as a food that offers pleasure and comfort. This is primarily when it’s snack food: cookies, chocolates, crisps.

Works for the folks who could care less about our health, and only care about the wealth they earn from our bad habits.

The ten big food conglomerates who make up the great bulk of those who push really bad fake food on us (please see this article from Business Insider) are in the business of getting you in the business of only buying their stuff.

Oxfam created this graphic to help us understand just how little variety we actually have:

Courtesy OXFAM

The simple truth is that at this point, UPFs are so ingrained, so familiar (safe- seeming) that we don’t even question them. The other truth is that we really don’t know what makes up a processed food, and when folks find out….well, even after they hear about what’s happening to their brains and bodies and arteries,

they still don’t give a shite.

Pass the Frito-Lays, will ya?

Even when people find out, and they do, that the palm oil necessary to make all this crap means that species like the orangutan are being wiped out of existence- that’s a nice way to say that Pepsi local shills cut off the hands of the orangs and worse. No I didn’t make that up, I have been to Borneo and Indonesia and I saw those animals.

THEY STILL DON’T GIVE A SHITE. You’ll forgive me if I vomit at the level of selfishness of this, but there you have it.

It isn’t that we’re ruining our bodies, it’s that we are ruining the world so that we can ruin our bodies.

Many of us really do not know how to tell if a food is good or bad. The argument is a little silly really. There’s nothing wrong with a piece of sliced carrot. There’s plenty wrong with that piece of raw sliced carrot after it’s been processed into a chip.

That people don’t seem to understand this speaks to how effectively we’ve been befuddled into believing that poison masquerading as food should be allowed in our bodies.

It’s fair that we aren’t particularly fond of those doctors who were paid to shill cigarettes back in the 1930s. Today’s dangerous doctors are paid to tell us that sugar is just fine, that this or that can’t hurt us.

But like the Silicon Valley billionaire bros who won’t let their kids on social media, those doctors aren’t likely to be stuffing their mugwumps with Hostess Ho-Hos.

Fans of Dr. Robert Lustig, and I am among them, likely have read his profoundly important book Metabolical: The Lure and the Lies of Processed Food, Nutrition, and Modern Medicine.

If you haven’t, get it. Read it. Then go back through your larder, your cupboards, your freezer and fridge and see just how much shite has crept in there, even though you might consider yourself a “healthy eater.”

Another excellent book to help you understand not only what you’re ingesting but the science behind what makes up the bulk of the inside of your local Kroger’s so dangerous is this book by Chris Van Tulleken: Ultra-Processed People: The Science Behind Food That Isn't Food.

Among the choice quotes from that book:

“Removing industry from the table will require a cultural shift before any shift in legislation. It will gradually become shameful for activists to work with the UPF industry as the understanding spreads that the companies are as responsible for diet-related disease as the tobacco industry is for smoking-related disease.”
― Chris van Tulleken, Ultra-Processed People: The Science Behind Food That Isn't Food

I continue to find stuff that I buy thinking it’s well-made, like nut butters, then find out it’s full of seed oils, which I really don’t want. While there is a lot of disagreement on this, the debate alone tells you why we can’t figure out how to eat. We are largely clueless because we’ve been taught to trust the wrong sources.

These days good writers abound. One of my favorites is

Maria Cross

whose work I’ve read for several years now. She just wrote How to Feed Your Brain: Seven Evolutionary Steps to Transform your Mental Health.

There are plenty of good food writers and good food journalists. However the journey to eating well for YOUR body, YOUR age is unique to you. That makes it inconvenient. It’s also work because those requirements are constantly changing.

Ideally we’d all get to work with a nutritionist, but that’s beyond the means of most. However you can teach yourself with what’s online.

Grass-fed beef is also beyond the means of most, while you’re at it. I don’t know about you but I can’t afford ten bucks a pound for ground beef, so thank god for beans.

I have grave difficulty reading all the food advice offered to people which exhort us to buy organic (that’s another big-time scam for way too many corporations) when in too many cases, what we’re spending a premium for isn’t organic anyway.

That may irritate purists, and I don’t blame them. Instead of getting mad at me, do the research and get mad at the people who bamboozled the public into believing they were getting things like free-range eggs when they aren’t, and organic when it isn’t.

We want to believe that paying a higher price gives us what the labels promise.

Nope.

We’d be better off growing all our own food (won’t happen) or at least buying from local green grocers (tell that to folks living in a food desert) and a whole lot of other things that would help. Clean air and water, for example, which are increasingly difficult to come by.

But to that, just to make a point, those with money do have better air. Please see this article, the best air is NOT free, nor is the best water. Just saying.

That said, you and I can still eat well. What that looks like for you is very different from what it looks like for me. You and I are worth the effort it takes to find out what foods are best for our body at this age and at this activity level.

And while I absolutely acknowledge and understand that far too many of us do not have access to decent food or a nutritionist, for those of us who do, for heaven’s sake, let’s stop justifying junk.

You and I are WAY Too Old to say we didn’t know better.

Yeah, we do. So let’s DO better.

If you and I want our best lives into our last and best years, that means the best fuel for our bodies. I want you to have your best body and your best life for your best and last years.

Let’s play.

This is to all of us who are focusing on our resolutions, who fell off the wagon by February and who really truly want to do better this year. You can. If this helped you please consider

These articles take time, resources, research and a whole lotta love. They are how I pay the bills. If you are inspired, kindly consider

If you know others who can use a boost to help them eat better please also consider

Above all eat well, move lots, love hard. Thanks for reading.