What the Hell is With People and Conveniece Foods? page 6

[JoanieL]

Chicken laden with sodium is already available. The sodium puffs the chicken up with water retention (osmoregulation) to puff up the price. The first time in a lot of years that I had chicken w/out the sodium solution added, I thought it tasted gamey. It was just chicken. Without sodium added. What a strange concept.

Right now, in the US, it is illegal to grow chickens or pigs with hormones. But the feed is still up for grabs.

[Noctiluca]

For me it's been this stuff. I just don't really like doing it. But I realized after giving it more thought that mostly I don't like following recipes.

Yes! Having to try to collect a specific list of ingredients and fuss around measuring things and so on, not to mention finding a good recipe in the first place, takes longer then just cooking some food! I think most nights I spend between 10-20 minutes cooking dinner (assuming I'm not just re-heating leftovers). I open the fridge, pull out everything that looks good and put it together in a pan. Cook till done. It really is that simple!

[Jena]

A lot of people I know keep all sorts of snacks around. Like granola bars, cereal bars, fruit roll ups, 100 calorie packs of cookies, etc... like they will starve without these convenient little packages. I just eat primally and don't need the extra convenience because I don't feel the need to eat every 3 hours. Much more "convenient" in my opinion

[Primal123]

To be fair, those times are the best for socializing with the rest of the team. Maybe do a compromise and let them have lunch with their mates sometimes?

So I guess I am really extreme but I would bring our own lunch and let my daughter socialize with her friends but eat real food. But then again my husband accuses me of being a hippie on a regular basis.

[dragonmamma]

Kitchens these days are small and crappy. It wasn't until I bought a butcher block table and had a nice surface for preparing my foods that I enjoyed my food prep time.

[teach2183]

I consider myself very blessed to stay home with my kids. They get a hot breakfast every day and I cook dinner 5 nights a week. 1 night is leftovers, 1 night DH is responsible for dinner. Last night I made a pork roast. Lined the pan with potatoes and carrots. Took me 15 minutes to prepare, 70min to cook. My kids (2 and 4) entertain themselves while I cook. TV is a treat and as their imaginations grow I find they ask to watch it less. I work 15-20hrs/week from home to ensure time to give my kids what they need.

We need to slow down as a society and stop focusing on acquiring more stuff while sacrificing health and relationships.

[magnolia1973]

Honestly, throw meat on grill. Saute veggies. Perhaps bake a potato or sweet potato. You can make meals with less than 10 minutes of active time.

I think people have become addicted to the taste of convenience food and find the above bland/boring.

And I hate the sodium chicken.

[labbygail]

I'm a working mom (only 35 hours a week, however some of those are weekend and evening hours) and I have to say that it's not in our culture to make the commitment it takes to plan and execute home-cooked meals.
Sometimes by the time I'm done putting my son to bed it's 9:00 at night, and then I groan about having to go make lunches. My husband does other chores that I'd rather not do, like laundry, so I'm not complaining. However, some nights I do bemoan my lack of "me-time" (which I think was perhaps a foreign concept to generations past). Sometimes I legitimately need some time off my feet--I teach afternoon and evening school--or maybe some plain old unstructured time, but usually it's just cultural conditioning, the idea that adults are entitled to some time in which they can do whatever they feel like doing instead of entertaining a preschooler, working, and doing chores. I don't mean that I should be a martyr but rather that I'm not entitled to sit and read a book when there are lunches that need to be made. But that's not a commitment everyone is willing to make. People have different priorities.

I have to say that even though lunches are hard, dinner is actually easy. On my long days, my best friend is the crockpot. Coming home to hot dinner is like a present to myself. But that also takes commitment, because to put it up in the morning requires that I don't stay up late watching TV or going out with friends. I wouldn't call it a sacrifice...just priorities.

[Mud Flinger]

Love this thread because it is all so true. I also am lucky to be a SAHM, so I do have the time to grow much of our food and cook almost all of it from scratch. My son's preschool is doing a food drive so I thought it would be a good time to empty my canned food pantry and start again. I keep a few canned things around for emergencies but have rarely used any of it (discovered much of it was past it's use by date). Funny how many cans of coconut milk I have now though! Time to make some curry!

I am amazed at how few people I know cook from scratch with real food. Even pumpkin which is plentiful this time of year - I am the only one I know who carves their jack-o-lanterns the day of or before Halloween so that it is still fresh enough to cook down and enjoy. The few friends I have that actually do make their own pumpkin pie use canned pumpkin. It's like people don't even connect raw food sources with the finished product anymore!

[Owly]

With a full-time job, grad school, and a number of volunteer commitments, I hope that I can be forgiven for using canned organic pumpkin (pure pumpkin, not pie filling) and a can of organic tomatoes now and then, especially when things like fresh tomatoes cost a fortune here in winter. I believe in cooking real food from scratch as much as possible, but I'm not going to feel guilty about buying pureed pumpkin when doing that lets me do things like walk my dog, spend time with my spouse, and serve my community. And no, I don't watch television.