(GASPS)
When I started learning about nutrition -
about which, by the way, much less is known than you might think -
I learned that what mattered most about one's health
was not necessarily the nutrients,
good or bad, that you were consuming or staying away from,
or even the calorie count.
What predicted a healthy diet more than anything else
is the fact that it was being cooked by a human being,
not a corporation.
Corporations cook very differently than people do.
They use vast amounts of salt, fat and sugar.
Much more than you would ever use in your own cooking.
The reason they do that is those are three incredibly attractive
and incredibly cheap ingredients.
And when they're layered properly,
as in a chip or pastries and forms of junk food,
they're incredibly addictive, they really press our buttons.
They activate our dopamine network, our cravings.
In fact, they don't talk about "addiction" in the food industry,
even though they traffic in addiction.
They talk about "cravability". It's the same thing.
"Snackability" is another term they use. It's a lovely word(!)
The last point about corporate cooking
that's important to understand
is they cook different stuff than you do at home.
In general, they don't cook that well,
but things like chips they cook incredibly well.
Here's a classic food that if you make it yourself...
If you've ever made French fries, you have to wash the potatoes,
you have to peel the potatoes, slice the potatoes,
fry them in a LOT of oil.
You have to spatter your entire stove top.
You have to clean up and then you have a pot of oil to get rid of.
It's really difficult and it's a pain.
They're wonderful, but it's a pain.
If you make them yourself, you'll only eat them every six weeks,
two months, cos it's too much work.
But when you let corporations cook for you,
it's so simple and so inexpensive and they're really good,
that you'll have them twice a day, as many people in America do.
The kinds of foods you end up with
are labor-intensive foods and desserts.
These special-occasion foods become everyday foods
when we let industry cook for us.
Eat anything you want, just cook it yourself.