My friend who frequents this site from time to time had a cholesterol problem for a while...his motto was "if it tastes good, spit it out!"
CanOz
So one of life's greatest pleasures should be avoided. Sounds really silly to me. Plenty of very healthy, nutritious food tastes wonderful, viz fresh fruits and vegetables.
I travel overseas extensively and all I can say is that the average Australian Take Away is just crap.
Well, sensible people just don't do take away but prepare their own food.
Agree that anyone including other than very occasional take away rubbish is doing themselves a disservice.
I think a lot of that has to do with portion sizes. Thai food itself isn't always that healthy (a lot of their noodle dishes have plenty of oil + carbs) it's just that they eat smaller portions. Your average size pad sie yew or pad thai has about 1,000 to 1,200 calories/serving in Australia but in Thailand the serving size is half.
Much of Europe is the same, a French family of four will eat a steak that is equivalent size to what a single Australian would. They have a diet high in butter and cheese and oil, yet they have a low level of obesity. It's all portion control.
Agree entirely.
A few more things,
Never use vegetable oil, it's actually palm oil, very bad for you , always use olive oil.
That's just not true. There is palm oil and there are various different vegetable oils which have no relationship to palm oil.
Use butter, not margarine.
Agree here, but the food police will disagree.
And low fat foods are usually stuffed with sugar , avoid them.
What? All your fruits and vegetables are low in fat with the exception of eg avocados where the naturally occurring fat is very healthy.
I bet their sugar consumtion is low, sugar or more particularly fructos upsets the hypothalamus, that part of the brain that controls appetite, once you eliminate sugar the hypothalamus starts working again and you aren't as hungry.
It sounds as though you've been sucked in by the spinmasters on sugar. If you can point me to a double blind, randomised, controlled trial which demonstrates that fructose disturbs the hypothalamus, I'd like to read it.
There is no particular food which, if avoided, will guarantee the maintenance of a healthy weight.
Imo far too many people eat far too much carbohydrate. The obesity epidemic began around the time nutritionists came out in force saying all carbs are good - eat as much as you like - you won't gain weight.
Absolute rubbish. The greedy, undisciplined masses jumped on the opportunity to chomp down massive bowls of pasta, eight slices of bread per day, potatoes every which way etc., and then wondered why they got fat.
Focus on fresh, unprocessed foods, simply cooked, avoid too much carbohydrate, and have moderate levels of healthy fat, and a bit of animal fat such as butter and cream to provide great texture and flavour, along with small amounts of protein daily.