To wonder who eats this food and why?

[BingoBonus]

https://groceries.asda.com/product/plant-based-meat-alternatives/plant-based-by-asda-chicken-style-fillets/1000383161908

Plant-based chicken-style breaded fillet. The main two ingredients are water and oil!

I don't understand the boom in plant-based ultra-processed foods...........do people actually buy these as a healthy option? And if you are vegetarian why would you want something that looked like meat?

I don’t eat carbs

I can guarantee you this is a false statement and you definitely eat carbohydrates within your diet, you cannot survive without carbs. Essential for many of the bodies functions.

I eat between 20 and 40 grams of carbs a day, usually from green veg. I don’t eat potatoes, rice, pasta, bread, fruit, etc which are high carb foods.

I’m dairy intolerant. I do use vegan protein powders when needed but try to avoid UPFs and non-fermented soy.

Believe me, I’ve looked into all of this. It’s quite tricky to eat within the rules set by my body and dietary research as it is. I travel 3 days a week for work (all over England) so tend to fast now because eating out is so difficult for me.

@GCWorkNightmare I’m gluten intolerant because of my thyroid issues so I do actually understand the extra challenges with food intolerances etc as I used to work in the nutrition field, that’s why Robert Cheeke is a helpful person to contact directly. I don’t personally think it’s necessary to only eat fermented soy, but unprocessed I understand as I can’t have that either at all.

I would worry about brain function with so few carbs personally.

Never been sharper. Carbs make me foggy/sleepy.

Long term I wouldn’t be confident, from all my study and experience low carb long term starts to affect memory, focus and motivation. But you do you 👍🏾 just wanted to mention Cheeke in case you wished to ask him for help, his books are great and he’s always helpful.

Thanks. I’ve low-carbed for the best part of 20 years. Done degree and masters study alongside parenting and a full on job. All blood test measures are good, so I’m okay with it.

But I’ll look up that recommendation.

🤯. That’s a tricky one.
I have sporty 20something sons.
They do themselves gluten free endeme based noodles, ( sons not gluten free, noodles are )
Youd need 340g, sounds a lot but better than 1.6kg of lentils 🤣🤯

A lot of these foods contain pea protein which is become much more common as an allergen

Another common allergen is dairy. Should we ban all dairy produce?

Out of interest, what do you eat?

no meat
no wheat/gluten
no dairy
no carbs

what’s left?

I once survived almost entirely on peanut butter eaten with a teaspoon for a couple of weeks and it was fine…

@GCWorkNightmare can’t have peanut butter though, peanuts contains carbs…

Eggs, fair amount of fish, loads of veg, stirfries, salads. Curries with cauliflower rice and poppadoms. Bit of hummus. Nuts and nut butters. Small amounts of dairy (mainly when working away). Seed crackers are good. The odd vegan protein shake or bar.

I do have almond butter when the need arises.

I’ve clarified the carb point above.

A certain amount of PB can be part of a low carb diet (though a PB-only diet would be a little higher in the daily carb grammes than the PP sticks to). When people say they "don't eat carbs", they generally mean that they don't eat starchy foods whose main macronutrient component is carbohydrate — the "carb" component of a meal — and limit other sources. Like if somebody asked what carb someone's having with their chicken breast and asparagus, you wouldn't say "Aha, asparagus itself contains carbohydrates and the steak sauce has flour in it!", you'd say rice or chips or something. Nobody thinks they mean that they literally don't let a carbohydrate molecule pass their lips, surely 😅

Nobody thinks they mean that they literally don't let a carbohydrate molecule pass their lips, surely

I don’t because I know it’s not possible but I think people should stop talking about food in macronutrients. We don’t eat macronutrients, we eat food. Saying, I avoid heavily processed food and most starch is simple enough and more accurate.

I mean, yes, but that's not the language which allows you to find other people who are trying to do the same thing.

I'm vegetarian because I don't want to eat animals but I love fake meat. I know it's not healthy and avoid giving it to the kids (who are not vegetarian). I eat plenty of other unhealthy food too. This is just one of them.

@JarByTheDoor fair enough. I do think that no carbs seems to mean different things for different people though so maybe being more specific would be better. I once had someone tell me they don’t eat carbs while they were eating a bag of sweets 😂

🤣 Oh dear…

Yeah, the meaning varies by context to some extent, though I think sweets is kinda stretching it… Reminds me of that thread the other day about whether people would want to eat again after a big roast dinner at lunchtime, and some were essentially responding that no, they wouldn't want to eat again, so they'd just have a snack in the evening like poached eggs on toast or cheese and crackers — with "eat" to them presumably meaning "sit down for a full cooked meat and two veg dinner" 😁

@JarByTheDoor 😂 oh that’s funny. Yes it is always open to interpretation. I used to work with people to lose weight and other nutritional help and honestly it was hard, people would say ‘ I don’t drink any alcohol’ and then their food dairies would show alcohol and they’d explain it’s only two or three days a week so didn’t think it mattered. The worst habit for most was massively under eating with almost no carbohydrate rich whole foods, and then having to binge the next day and eat a whole cheesecake.

Also problems the other way round — if I'm asked my alcohol intake, I say I mostly don't drink but do have the occasional one or two. Then I end up feeling the need to to get super-specific about "occasionally" meaning something like a half-pint of cider in a beer garden last June, a double bourbon and Coke at a birthday a month ago, and a glass of champagne at New Year — otherwise I just know they'll have me down as a self-deluded two-bottle a week wine drinker 😅

I don’t drink at all and I am sure no one believes me

@JarByTheDoor yes absolutely. I don’t drink… but I’ll have a half glass of wine at Xmas. Whenever a doctor has asked, I say exactly that so they’re sure. Although sometimes you get multi choice questions on it, and they usually say ‘very rarely’ as an option. I’m shocked at how regular most people are, it’s so hard to lose weight if you drink regularly.