Observation on Eating

It’s coming up to two years now that I’ve stopped eating meat and fish.

I consider myself not that strict a vegetarian as I would eat at normal places and just ask them to leave out the meat and fish in foods they cook. I don’t go so far as not to eat food that has been cooked with sauces that have a little meat or fish in it. If I do, it’s close to impossible to eat with friends.

Being vegetarian has made me really conscious with what i put into my body as I need to ensure I’ve got a really good variety of vegetables, mushrooms, diary products, tofu, beans, nuts and fruits.

This greater attention has led me to what I think are some rather troubling observations:

Meat Meat Meat
The amount of meat most people consume at each meal is amazing. In fact, meat makes up the majority of the non-starch items in most dishes. What i find worrying is the quality of meat that is sometimes served. Some places save on costs by including lots of fatty skin and bones which means even less protein for consumption.

Starch Starch Starch
How did starch end up as 80% of most meals? I look at breakfast norms or chee-cheong-fun or kaya toast or roti-prata or nasi lemak and realise it’s just all flour with really sweat or watery sauces piled on for taste. Most times you really get just a sliver of protein to make up for the fish or meat that used to be there in more generous quantities. How much nutritional value do these give our bodies?

Processed Processed Processed
If we really pay attention to what’s written in fine print on labels, a large part of the “meats” we eat are processed. This processing of food is creeping into vegetarian cooking too with gluten, tofu mixes and meat replacements. What scares me is what goes into the processed foods. Some are really low quality parts along with artificial colouring of questionable origin.

Where Are The Greens?
Most times, the greens in each meal are garnishes in the cursory form of one or two slices of cucumber or tomatoes. Other times it’s just a sprinkle of parsley or spring onions. I wonder how the body copes with such low levels of dietary fibre intake.

When ordering, vegetable dishes are usually the last to be thought of. I notice my friends tend to order a lot more vegetable dishes when I’m around and these are usually the first to be polished off so I do know that people actually like eating greens if they just made a habit of including more of it in each meal.

—
Watching The Biggest Loser, the U.S. and the Asian versions, I tell myself it really is important to watch what kinds of and quality of foods that go into my body. Most of us will live to a ripe old age and a good quality of life in our later years where our health is good is something that makes these years more enjoyable & enriching. I’m thinking it’s a little too late to change our ways when our bodies have been worn down through years of not paying attention to what we fuel it with. The cost of health care is really getting too ridiculous and being a health burden to myself and my friends is not a place I want to find myself in.

So here’s me sharing these thoughts on my blog in hopes that it will go a little way to help others to be more careful and thoughtful with what they feed themselves with.

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Tagged as: eating, Lifestyle Choices, quality of food, unhealthy eating habits, vegetarian