Eating more and liking it less

An article appeared today in several newspaper food sections discussing a new Pew Research Center surveywhich finds that we're eating more but enjoying it less. 39% of us "greatly" enjoy food, down from 48% 17 years ago, whereas the reported enjoyment of food has decreased, especially among the overweight- 56% to 42%. According to the article:

And the reason we're eating more but enjoying it less? In a word: guilt, says Thomas Wadden, director of the Weight and Eating Disorders Program at the University of Pennsylvania's School of Medicine.
"People are feeling guilty" about what they eat, says Wadden. "Two-thirds of women report they're dieting. One-third of men say they want to lose weight. They're forever checking their conscience before digging into that ice cream sundae."

While guilt may be a contributing factor, I beg to differ with the director. I think the main reason our enjoyment of food has dropped while our consumption has increased is that the majority of food we're eating is cheap and crappy.

I look at my kids' school lunch menu to see it. When I was a kid, we had hot turkey sandwiches (on white bread, yes I know,) with salad, hoagies, spaghetti- actual meals on our lunch menus at school. There was no "snack" menu available nor vending machines. Now, my school system offers chicken nuggets, pizza, bagels, and a snack line where the kids can buy all sorts of ice cream, soft drinks and cookies when they're done lunch. If they ate any of the lunch, anyway. Sorry folks, but we aren't building healthy brains and bodies out of soda and chips. But instead of addressing the problem, we just buy XL car seats and go on our merry way.

Or go out for dinner. There are so many more dining-out choices now than when I was a kid, but much of them aren't good- healthwise or tastewise. You can order a pasta dinner and you'll get, in that one serving, the amount I'd cook at home for a family of four. Or, enough french fries with your sandwich to contain a whole day's calorie requirements and two day's worth of fat. Only 39 cents to supersize it! They may taste good- thanks, IFF and Firmenich for that- but they're nutritionally bankrupt.

Ironically, given the decline in eating enjoyment, Americans report they're enjoying cooking more, with the biggest increase among men who cook.
In 1989, 25 percent of men told the Gallup poll that they enjoy cooking; in the Pew survey, that number had jumped to 32 percent. Among women, however, enjoyment of cooking has decreased from 39 percent in 1989 to 35 percent today.

Thanks, Food Network, for making cooking glamourous again. But with our busy schedules we probably cook less often then we ever have, and what we cook isn't the same. The nice thing is we can get presliced veggies, pre-trimmed meats, and the like; but what are we mostly cooking when we cook at home? Prepared foods, often frozen or boxed and reconstituted. No wonder our enjoyment has gone up- most of the work is already done. With the loss, however, we've lost control over what we and our kids put into their bodies. How much salt was in that frozen dinner, anyway?

Sometimes, I think the "healthy" or "lite" prepared foods are worse. Remember SnackWells, the low-fat cookies that had more sugar and just as many calories as regular cookies? The frozen yogurt that has just as much fat and sugar as ice cream? The lowered-fat microwave popcorn that takes twice as long, has twice as much trans-fat and costs five times as much as if you'd used an air popper and added a little real butter? Even things such as baked chips screw us up. These types of foods pretend they're healthier and therefore OK to eat, and we invariably eat too much.

We're also having problems with portion control, the survey revealed. Nearly 60 percent of Americans say they find themselves eating more than they should either often or sometimes, and 55 percent say they eat more junk food than they should.
The biggest reason Americans say they eat so much junk food is not because they like it (44 percent found that reason enough), or because it's cheap (24 percent), or even because it's heavily advertised (37 percent), but because it's convenient (73 percent).

It's convenient. We're eating ourselves into early graves for convenience.

Food is sacred. It's part of the rituals of most religions (or, the absence of it, in fasting) and it is life itself. What holiday, what event in our lives doesn't have a meal associated with it? Now that we have a superabundance of food, it has ceased to have some of that special meaning. From the article:

It's also a matter of having food available all the time, he adds. "People are eating continuously now. Food has become a recreational pastime. It's lost its ability to mark a special occasion."

And that's a damn shame. Food deserves our respect and our care. We should be eating mostly whole, fresh foods and instead we're cramming our mouths with cheap, crappy garbage that we readily admit we just aren't enjoying very much. Why??


Rant-related reading:
Fast-Food Nation, by Eric Schlosser (HIGHLY recommend- everyone should read)
Fat Land: How Americans Became the Fattest People in the World, by Greg Crister
Food Politics, by Marion Nestle