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| Food cravings engineered by industry | |
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| Topic Started: May 9 2013, 02:22 AM (210 Views) | |
| Darcie | May 9 2013, 02:22 AM Post #1 |
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Skeptic
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Standing in her kitchen in downtown Toronto chopping vegetables for dinner, Pat Guillet is aware she has entered the battleground. "Whenever you go grocery shopping, or into your kitchen, you're in a war zone. You have to really be prepared before you go in," she said. She decides, in advance, exactly what she's going to eat, and she forces herself to stick to the plan. Because she knows she is just one sweet mouthful away from a descent back into hell. Pat Guillet is a food addict. "I ate to the point it hurt to move. And I would just lie in my bed and wish I was dead," she said. She has finally wrestled her addiction under control and now she counsels other food addicts to avoid processed food. "Yeah, just the sight of the packages will trigger cravings," she said. Craving. It doesn't just happen to food addicts. Most people have experienced the impulse to seek out and consume a favourite packaged snack food. On one billboard, recently put up in Toronto, the intention to make you reach for another one is prominently declared, in large letters that tower over the city street. It's a picture of a box of crackers, and the promise "You'll be back for more. They know you will be back, because they've done the research necessary to make it happen. "These companies rely on deep science and pure science to understand how we're attracted to food and how they can make their foods attractive to us," Michael Moss said. The New York Times investigative reporter spent four years prying open the secrets of the food industry’s scientists. "This was like a detective story for me, getting inside the companies with thousands of pages of inside documents and getting their scientists and executives to reveal to me the secrets of how they go at this," he said. What he found became the title of his new book, Salt, Sugar Fat: How the food giants hooked us. "I was totally surprised," he said. "I spent time with the top scientists at the largest companies in this country and it's amazing how much math and science and regression analysis and energy they put into finding the very perfect amount of salt, sugar and fat in their products that will send us over the moon, and will send their products flying off the shelves and have us buy more, eat more and …make more money for them." It's not surprising to Bruce Bradley. He's a former food industry executive who spent 15 years working at General Mills, Pillsbury and Nabisco, and ran some common food brands including Honey Nut Cheerios and Hamburger Helper. But one day he discovered he couldn't do it anymore. "There were certainly times that I felt uncomfortable or troubled by what I was doing," he said. "I think that’s ultimately one of the reasons why I left the industry. As you start to get glimpses of products and you understand better how consumers are using them, and then you see trends like obesity and health issues that are increasing, mainly driven by the food we eat, it was hard for me not to just take a more thorough assessment of what I was doing." Now he writes a blog, critical of the food industry. http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/story/2013/03/05/f-vp-crowe-food-addiction.html One of the most important articles you can read about what food corporations are doing to you with food. Their primary aim is to increase their bottom line at the expense of your health. Why do we buy this? Maybe because we don't have all the information? |
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| margrace | May 9 2013, 03:22 AM Post #2 |
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Gold Star Member
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I think it was Linus Pauling back in the early 50"s who recognized what the food industry was doing. He tried to stop them and was sued. I will have to look up the history. It was on the Veria programs several weeks ago. |
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| Trotsky | May 10 2013, 03:06 AM Post #3 |
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Big City Boy
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I guess I am immune. I look at the ads, and among the GOOD sales items (not the ones made to LOOK like bargains) I choose my menus. On my fridge I have a list of things I need with a magnetized pencil to write the new things. I go to the store and buy precisely what I had planned. Until they start having impulse-buy items being held up by naked bodybuilders with erections, I am not interested in their gimmicks. Ahhh, Entenmann's is $2.50 (regular $6.79)...good. First I loook for carrot cake, if none I look for cheesecake. Rarely I have to go farther than that and I may choose lemon cake or a devil's food or walk away. Edited by Trotsky, May 10 2013, 03:10 AM.
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| margrace | May 10 2013, 03:09 AM Post #4 |
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Gold Star Member
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Yes that is what we do too Trotsky, we are on that magnamonius pension that Harper wants to cut even more so cannot afford the centre ille foods |
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| Alli | May 10 2013, 04:01 AM Post #5 |
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Mistress, House of Cats
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You mean they have center aisles in grocery stores? oooh 02 I went to the store last Friday list in hand and didn't buy several items. Cheese $9.99? That's insane I bought a lot of vegetables but I will not pay some of the outrageous prices Beets (sliced) used to sell for $2.29 a jar last week they were listed as a sale item for $2.49 Shopping is depressing.. I end up with a headache leaving the store |
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| haili | May 11 2013, 12:09 AM Post #6 |
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Gold Star Member
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Just don't walk down the junk food aisles. This is the most expensive time of the year to shop, with June being the most expensive month since our produce is mostly imported. It gets cheaper in summer so that's a good time to freeze things. |
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| Trotsky | May 11 2013, 12:14 AM Post #7 |
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Big City Boy
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I saw Filet Mignon for $44.99 a pound...it took my breath away. I would think that an appropriate price only for UNICORN MEAT. Edited by Trotsky, May 11 2013, 12:15 AM.
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