One of the things we spend more money on is buying convenience foods, being this fast-food or microwave food. Surely is faster, but it's also unhealthier and more expensive. Do we have the time to cook, save money and improve our health or are we really doomed to buying and eating convenience foods?
I prefer the first one mate. It is always advisable and recommended to cook and eat home food as it is far healthier than the one we buy outside. Outdoor food ruins our health gradually even though tastier than the one cooked at home. Having outside food occasionally or once in a week don't make anything negative but is even more enjoyable. Keeping the time factor in mind these days people have less time to cook but I feel making time to cook food is the wise and economic option.
I really think that convenience food is simply winning out, because more people don't have or are running out of time to prepare home cooked meals that take a lot of time to make in the first place. Home cooked meals are what everyone should be preparing for health reasons, even if the preservatives and the fast food is so much more easily accessible and simple to put together, but home cooked meals just takes lots of time. Maybe if it didn't take up plenty time, more people would make their meals at home. I'm one of the ones that prefer home cooked meals, though.
Well, I agree that's what most people think. In fact we are time consumed, but I think it would be fairly easy to introduce in our habits buying fresh food and cooking it, in one hour per day or less we could prepare meals. I speak for myself, sometimes I am just too lazy to do it.
Time is not money. Time is freedom and health. I don't know where this whole idea comes from that one doesn't have time any more to prepare and eat a healthy meal either at home or in a restaurant. I mean, make the time to put something nutritious in your body. Get away from your computers, social commitments and whatever other self-imposed duties, and just take half an hour two or three times a day to treat yourself and your body to something really rewarding in the long run.
I actually hate spending the extra money on convenience food. The quality is often worse, and the food is overpriced. I used to like those Jimmy Dean D'Lights breakfast sandwiches, but they would charge me like $6.50 for a box of four of them. I could pick up a pack of English Muffins and a half carton of eggs and make even more of them home made for less than half the cost of those. Plus they would taste better too. In the time it takes to microwave a frozen dinner, you could just as easily sear off some flank steak or chicken and make steak/chicken tacos with fresh toppings. In the mood for some homemade mac and cheese? Just microwave the pasta in a bowl with some water. Then drain it and microwave some heavy cream and butter until it's hot and add it to some shredded cheese to make the sauce, along with a little mustard powder and season to taste. The heat from the butter/cream should be just enough to melt the cheese into it without causing it to separate.
It's how the world is right now. Most people are so busy working off to earn money that they just don't have the time for a proper meal. It's the common believe of the young people now, they think they are healthy now so they neglect what is good for their body. People often think that we should earn as much money now while we still can and worry about health later in life but fail to realize that it may be too late then.
It is not easy to avoid the fast foods. I think you just have to develop a habit of making sure that you minimize the amount of times that you eat fast foods. I think people should just develop the habit of cooking a good dinner that will make them enjoy a family meal. I always take my time to cook my food and eat healthy.
When I was working, I got tired of having sandwiches for lunch. Peanut butter, bologna, cheese sandwich etc...Eventually, I started going with my friends to the fast food places for onion rings and a hamburger. I have paid the price. I am not fatter than I have ever been. I got used to greasy food on some level. What I mean is that sometimes I like French Fries and other times it seems greasy to me. I don't know why.
I buy a lot of the bad food just because I am a terrible cook and I hate cooking. Yesterday I attempted to make homemade cinnamon rolls, I spend a lot of time working the dough and letting it rise, making a mess and they finally came out of the oven smelling wonderful and tasting terrible. It would have worth the $2.50 to buy the Pillsbury ones and just through them in the oven.
I used to buy fast food quite often. McDonald's is very near my school, so my friend would go there once or twice a week. However, I am undergoing a healthy living program and I saw the effects of fast food to your body. It is extremely harmful and these restaurants should truly be avoided on a day-to-day basis. I really suggest finding time to make your own meals and do your own grocery shopping. You'll save up on medical bills in the future, because fast food can really mess up your health.
If you don't mind me asking, how do you saw the effects of fast food on your body? I wish those healthy living programs were something that existed worldwide and mandatory, we really should be putting our time where it's really important.
I don't think you can make something like "eating healthy" mandatory. That's infringing upon a lot of rights. As for Time vs. Money, sometimes you just need to get on with what you're doing and don't have time to prepare a meal for yourself, even a simple one. Sometimes you're on your way home and McDonalds is the only conceivable option that'll keep you fed as you move on to whatever needs to be accomplished at home, be it housework, homework, or just plain work. It varies on an individual level. Not everyone will agree and many people would rather find time for making food than pay for convenience. I respect that, but can't say that I have that luxury.
No no, that's not what I meant. What I meant was that it should be mandatory that we learn in depth (at school while we're kids or teenagers) about health and nutrition, practical information that could lead us to a more healthy life. As for paying for convenience, we just buy what we can afford...
Ahhhh, I understand. Yes, I can agree with that. I also believe culturally that America puts a very strong emphasis on glorifying the importance of meat to a meal when in reality most of the world cannot afford to eat in the way we do, and in a few years we probably won't either. Steak is expensive and environmentally reckless to produce. The unprecedented abundance we enjoy is unfortunately temporary; our diets will probably alter in a couple decades to be more rice and bean-oriented than they are currently. Nutrition may just come naturally as a result of the unhealthy food being overpriced.
No microwaved food for me. I can't stand the taste of microwaved food. Call me crazy but I feel that microwave heated food gets a certain taste from all that heat. If I don't have time to cook I just make some sandwiches or a fresh salad because let's face it, it only takes a minute or so to prepare. When I'm cooking I prefer soups since I can just throw the ingredients there and let them boil then come back, add spices and DONE, fresh food. There are a lot of recipes that don't take a lot of time or recipes that don't require you to sit there and watch the water boil. Why not cook them? You save a lot of money, eat healthy and can do other stuff while the food is cooking.
I don't think that meat is really that important to a meal and let's face it, what kind of meat are we talking about? I don't think that those chickens produced the way they are can still be considered meat, they are something almost lab made... @pretty, I don't own a microwave either and I am proud of that, sometimes saving time hurts our health.
