The Food Industry wants your money at any expense.

I'm going to keep this entry short and sweet and direct you to this cover story of the NY Times Magazine this week. This blog was rebooted and repurposed a little less than a year ago with the belief that the Food Industry is on the verge of undergoing the same transformation undergone by Big Tobacco a few years ago:

• both industries have a product that is massively profitable
• both industries have a product that is greatly ingrained in American culture and habit
• both industries have a product that is killing us at epidemic proportions

One industry has undergone a great deal of legislation, regulation, fines and a more honest discussion of how dishonest they were in manipulating the American public to simply make a buck. The other is just starting to realize they may be on the less fortunate path if they don't do something fast.

The piece is an excerpt from what promises to be a muck-raking book about what Big Food doesn't want you to know, Salt Sugar Fat: How the Food Giants Hooked Us by Michael Moss, and it starts off with a meeting of the top executives from many of the major food companies at Pillsbury HQ. One, Kraft Vice President Michael Mudd gave a PowerPoint presentation...

Mudd then did the unthinkable. He drew a connection to the last thing in the world the C.E.O.’s wanted linked to their products: cigarettes. First came a quote from a Yale University professor of psychology and public health, Kelly Brownell, who was an especially vocal proponent of the view that the processed-food industry should be seen as a public health menace: “As a culture, we’ve become upset by the tobacco companies advertising to children, but we sit idly by while the food companies do the very same thing. And we could make a claim that the toll taken on the public health by a poor diet rivals that taken by tobacco.”

The piece only gets uglier from there, looking at secret documents of experiments and lab reports designed to make foods addictive. Not ha-ha I got the fever for the flavor of a Pringle, but literally addictive.

Warning: May be fever inducing. Symptoms include upon a single pop, not being able to stop.

From scientifically designing the flavor of a soda pop to reach a "bliss point", to refining carbohydrates that are absorbed so quickly they impose the opposite reaction of feeling satiated, to creating prepacked lunch kits with super-processed sugar-dosed meat and cheese and super-sweet yogurt products packed in tubes to give children the idea that they are in command while tricking parents into thinking they are giving them something healthy, this excerpt is a pretty chilling reminder of what capitalist hunger for profit looks like when decoupled from any responsibility: personal, corporate, moral, ethical or otherwise.
-----

WEEKLY AVERAGE: 2242
Another week comfortably in my budget of 2200-2350. Friday evening had dinner with an old friend I hadn't seen since last winter, she was beside herself with compliments, saying she didn't recognize me from a distance because of my slimmer shape, that my skin was healthy, blah blah blah. After last month's dramatic 10 lb loss in part due the double whammy of the flu and preparing for a colonoscopy, let's see what the scale says next week, huuurg....
-----

MONDAY COUNT: 1910
Definitely felt a calorie hang over from the weekend, so it was easy to stay below budget. Stomach was weirdly unhappy in the morning, full but empty, so I kicked off the eating day with fresh juice instead of something solid. I think this may become part of my breakfast rotation.

AM SNACK: 8:15am, iced green tea, 0 cal

BREAKFAST: 11:30am, apple/beet/kale juice, 115 cal

PM SNACK: 1:45pm, momma salad, 100 cal

LUNCH: 2:30pm, chicken sausage, bengal lentils, steamed string beans, 7oz diet coke, 545 cal

PM SNACK: 4:30pm, beef jerky, 160 cal

DINNER: 8:45pm, shrimp, brown teff, health salad, poppa salad, 7oz diet sprite 690 cal
Teff is a weird grain. This is the second time I made it. The package says use 3x the water to grain, but last time I tried, it came out as a thick paste. This time I did 4x the water, and it was good but soupy. I was able to throw the shrimp in to make the dish, but it was a bit bland and watery. Still, for a grain, relatively low calorie....

EVENING SNACK: 10pm, Frito's, 300 cal
-----

TUESDAY COUNT: 2355
Surprisingly not sore at all from the pull-up drops yesterday, which makes me think I need to hit it harder ASAP. Came in low on the budget, thought briefly I could get away with a low-cal day, but within 45 minutes of my first evening snack, I found myself with sugar cravings -- thinking how dark chocolate chips and peanuts is actually relatively low glycemically, and if I just eat 300 cal worth, it'll be in budget. My mind was trying to justify eating sugar even though I made a promise not to eat sugar during the week.  So I double-downed on another snickity snack, which still kept me in budget and while it wasn't satisfying, it definitely took the edge off and allowed me to get to sleep at a normal time.

AM SNACK: 8am, iced green tea, 0 cal

BREAKFAST: 10am, Fage whole yogurt with agave, almonds and vanilla, 415 cal

PM SNACK: 1pm, beef jerky, 160 cal

LUNCH: 3:15pm, almond butter & jelly on whole wheat, momma salad, 7oz diet coke, 630 cal

PM SNACK: 7pm, poppa salad, 150 cal

DINNER: 8:30pm, sauteed beef tenderloin, broccoli, butternut squash soup, 7oz diet sprite, 400 cal
Didn't mean to go so low-cal, only realized it after doing the math after I've eaten. Weird, such a large piece of beef, a big mound of broc and a proper bowl of soup would add up to so little.

EVENING SNACK: 9:30pm, Fritos, 300 cal

EVENING SNACK: 10:15pm. cheesy poofs, 300 cal
-----

WEDNESDAY COUNT: 2305
Had some relatives I don't see often over for dinner, so I did a full-court press. Mac n' cheese, roasted brussels, butternut squash soup, chicken for their son and I, ice cream I also made over the weekend. I spent a part of the day making chocolate babka, which is a multi-hour ordeal. However, I somehow skipped dessert, despite all the effort, despite my family and relatives all eating it together, complimenting me on it, etc. It was both hard and easy to resist -- telling myself come Saturday morning, I'm gonna murder a large piece of babka kinda made it easier.

AM SNACK: 8am, iced green tea, 0 cal

BREAKFAST: 10:15am, steel cut oatmeal, 375 cal

LUNCH: 1:30pm, hake fish, steamed string beans, mushroom takatak, momma salad, 7oz diet coke, 660 cal
Another precooked micro-pack of Indian food, was meh. Gonna stick with lentils, more protein anyway.

PM SNACK: 4pm, apple/carrot/kale/beet/ginger juice, 160 cal

DINNER: 6:30pm, sauteed chicken breast, roasted brussel sprouts, mac n' cheese, half glass of wine,  +/- 800 cal
In addition to skipping dessert, I included some mac n' cheese in this meal just so we were all eating the same thing. However, I needed to keep it to 100 cal: 100 cal of homemade mac n' cheese is not a lot of food. Two ounces is a piece about 1" x 1" x 2", about 1/6 of a seemingly moderate portion. Still, I enjoyed the hell out of it's richness and it was enough.

EVENING SNACK: 8:45pm, poppa salad, 150 cal

EVENING SNACK: 9:30pm, Frito's, 7oz diet sprite, 160 cal

Bad sugar cravings. Could the half glass of wine or mac n' cheese set it off? Serving a decadent dessert to everyone after dinner? And damn, only had enough budget for half my usual Frito's, which happened to be the "suggested serving size". One measly ounce of Frito's, who the hell thinks this is a suggested serving?

-----

THURSDAY COUNT: 2255
Did laundry last night and woke up early to lift weights before B split for work, as didn't want to sacrifice this because Edie is out of school this week.

AM SNACK: 7:15am, iced green tea, 0 cal

BREAKFAST: 9:30am, steel cut oatmeal, 375 cal

LUNCH: 12:30pm, 4 small slices fancy pizza, small green salad with creamy dressing, water, +/- 700 cal
Out with the kids in Brooklyn visiting C and her family. We needed something close by and convenient and her local pizza shop was, for some unknown reason, a French pizzeria. The 16" pie had unusually thin, cracker-like crust, the sauce was delicate, the moz was offset with something like Gruyere. Very good, very not filling, he he. I ate half the pie and estimate the caloric load as less then 2 normal slices of streetza.

PM SNACK: 2:30pm, momma salad, 100 cal

PM SNACK: 4pm, beef jerky, 160 cal

PM SNACK: 5:15pm, poppa salad, 150 cal

DINNER: 8:30pm, chicken meatballs with shirataki noodles and homemade tomato sauce and Parmesan, 7oz dier sprite, 590 cal

EVENING SNACK: 8:45pm, Fritos, 180 cal 
-----

FRIDAY COUNT: 2385
Despite having a night out with friends, still pretty much kept on track. Feeling slightly hungry when I got into bed confirmed it.

AM SNACK: 8:15am, iced green tea, 0 cal

BREAKFAST: 9am, Fage whole yogurt with agave, vanilla and almonds, 415 cal

LUNCH: 11:45am, almond butter and grape jelly on whole wheat, momma salad, 7oz diet coke, 500 cal

PM SNACK: 2:45pm, apple/carrot/beet/kale/ginger juice, 130 cal

DINNER: 6pm, hijiki tofu patty, spinach salad, french onion soup, water, +/- 700 cal

EVENING SNORT: 8:15pm, whiskey, +/- 100 cal

EVENING SNACK: 9pm, potato chips, 240 cal

EVENING SNACK: 11:30pm, slice of streetza, +/- 300 cal