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| Kevin Cowherd - The worst thing since sliced bread |
| 2004-07-02 |
| EFL SINCE THERE are only about six of us left in the entire country who still eat bread, I probably shouldn’t have been surprised about what happened when my wife and I went to a local restaurant the other night. After we were seated, our server appeared with a basket of dinner rolls. "I don’t know whether you still eat this stuff," she said, putting the basket on the table. Then she looked down at it the way you’d look at medical waste. Apparently, she figured us for two of the millions of diet zombies who have joined the low-carb cult. Or - even worse - for two who should join the low-carb cult. This so bummed us out that we told her: Sure, hon, leave the basket. Then we proceeded to wipe out its contents like we were Michael and Mrs. Moore coming off a two-day fast. Look, I knew things were bad for the bread industry with this low-carb madness seeping into every segment of our society. According to a recent survey by the National Bread Leadership Council - yes, there really is such a thing - 40 percent of those questioned said they were eating less bread than a year ago. But I didn’t think things were so bad that restaurant servers were joining the low-carb cult and giving you the evil eye if you reached for the rolls. Then the next day, I picked up the newspaper and saw that not only were the health nuts going after bread in general, they were really going after white bread. Specifically, the article said that white bread "is under attack" by nutritionists for the U.S. Department of Agriculture. It said the USDA is thinking of recommending that people cut back dramatically on their consumption of fortified grains. And white bread, according to the story, is the home office for fortified grains. Well. Never mind that white bread holds an exalted place in the American diet. Never mind that generations of Americans have happily scarfed down thousands of slices of white bread since they were toddlers. No, none of that mattered. The decree was about to come down: White bread was evil. OK, all bread was evil. But white bread was even more evil. Even as I read this story and envisioned the coming PR rumble between the USDA and the bread industry - they may need to call in Kofi Annan to mediate this baby - I thought back over my own history of white-bread consumption. As a child, nearly every meal I ate contained white bread. Wonder bread was my mother’s brand of choice. On the TV, they were always screaming the famous Wonder slogan: "Helps build strong bodies 12 ways!" And my mother believed it. She believed it with every fiber of her being. She didn’t see it as hype, or the same soulless Madison Avenue propaganda that barked at you about not squeezing the Charmin and urged you to prepare your face daily for the glorious pleasure of a Gillette razor. No, my mother truly thought you were doing something good for yourself if you began the day with a breakfast of toast made from Wonder bread topped with gobs of butter the size of 50-cent pieces. An ideal lunch, she felt, was a peanut butter-and-jelly sandwich made with Wonder bread. And was there any dinner, no matter how mundane or exotic, that couldn’t be enhanced with a slice or two of Wonder bread and more butter? Now that the USDA is bad-mouthing white bread, what am I to think of my upbringing? Am I to look back on all those peanut butter-and-jelly sandwiches made lovingly by my mother’s hand and think: Why, that monster! She was trying to kill me!? Of course not. In fact, to this day I remain a bread guy. I may not eat as much white bread as I used to - older bread guys tend to favor whole-wheat or rye or even pumpernickel. But no one has convinced me that bread, eaten in moderation, can hurt you. So don’t ask me to give up bread just because there’s some new diet craze that’ll flame out in a few months, like they all do. That’s what I should have told that server the other night. You want my dinner rolls, you’ll have to pry ’em from my cold, dead fingers. Although he likes bread, the writer has a surname perfect for an Atkins menu. |
| Posted by:Super Hose |
| #9 Well, dunno about any alternative lifestyle, but he's married. She accompanied him to all the latest shindigs from Cannes to his movie opening. No strong stomach for this topic, so I'll leave it at that. |
| Posted by: .com 2004-07-03 12:52:38 AM |
| #8 Relax, OS. If I recall correctly, Mr. Tubby recently revealed his alternative lifestyle. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2004-07-03 12:45:00 AM |
| #7 WAIT A SECOND! "we proceeded to wipe out its contents like we were Michael and Mrs. Moore coming off a two-day fast" There's a "MRS MOORE" ?!?!?! The poor creature, you'd think shed been flattened to death by now. |
| Posted by: OldSpook 2004-07-02 11:23:59 PM |
| #6 If you only need to drop 20 pounds and have an otherwise normal metabolism, then Atkins is probably just going to mess you up. Body For Life works better for that sort of thing. Atkins worked for me - I was overweight, pre-Type2-diabetic, with insulin resistance forming, and elevated liver enzyme counts and high cholesterol (300+!), and almost all my excess body fat was located in my abdomen. Lookup "Syndrome X" on google - I was a classic case. I tried "low fat" diet and exercise, it barely made a dent. (Clue: Low Fat usually means they increase sweetners to make up for the lack of fat to carry the flavor). I then cut out processed sugars and flowers - that helped a bit with the weight loss, but the cholesterol, libver enzymes and insulin actually got a bit worse. But when I went on atkins, the weight melted, and within 6 weeks my liver enzymes were headed toward their proper range, BP was still high but had dropped 10 and 5, and I had much higher energy than before - and I had lost a large chunk of fat right around the abdomen. After 6 solid months, my BP is in the normal range (still a bit high), liver enzymes are normal, Cholesterol is below 200, and my waist size is back to where it was 15 years ago. Plus my energy is *UP* to where it used to be, and the Doc says I am no longer at any risk for diabetes: the tests show normal insulin performance and sugar uptake both fasting and post prandial. Its straight out of the book and studies the Atkins published. Atkins is not a *diet* as much as it is a treatment procedure for specific types of obesity related medical conditions. People who do not see a doctor, get the bloodwork and monitoring done, adhere strickly to the limits (and eat the recommended vegetables like Cauliflower and Broccoli!) and do not get the proper the intake of water or fail to exercise are not doing the treatment right. So Atkins in not for "nitwits" Raj - it works: you go into ketosis, which means instead of burning carbs for energy, you body metabolizes body fat - so your 200 miles is not as impossible as you think - try getting the facts instead of repeating prejudged garbage. But most importantly, like any other medical treatment you have to be sure its the right treatment for what ails you. |
| Posted by: OldSpook 2004-07-02 10:36:49 PM |
| #5 Maybe if Ulrich wins he'll endorse Wunder Brot. ;> |
| Posted by: Shipman 2004-07-02 7:50:08 PM |
| #4 Atkins, etc. - fuckin' fad diets, all. Try riding 200 miles in a week without carbs / on Atkins, no freakin' way. A nice 12 / 20 pack and a bowl of pasta after 40+ will replace all the carbs and the 2,000 calories burnt. What flavor fad diet will we see next year? Nitwits... |
| Posted by: Raj 2004-07-02 1:17:21 PM |
| #3 The entire white bread hysteria is just that, mindless pseudo-nutrition psycho-babble. Anyone who is really curious about the subject should read the incredible tome, "On Food and Cooking" by Harold McGee. While white bread contains less fiber, its finer milled flour also releases more nutrition. In reality, since bread is no longer a major dietary contributor of nutrition, it's a complete wash. As always with food, eat whatever you enjoy most in moderation. Like Jaques Pepin says; "Diet and starve yourself all your life for what, so you can die skinny?" |
| Posted by: Zenster 2004-07-02 11:23:40 AM |
| #2 Haven't eaten white bread since before boot camp, back in '90. The DIs would lose their frickin' minds if they found white bread on your tray. I always wondered why they even bothered buying and placing it in the mess line. |
| Posted by: BH 2004-07-02 11:01:12 AM |
| #1 Whole wheat,here,occasionally like a pattymelt on light rye.With lottsa cheese. |
| Posted by: Raptor 2004-07-02 7:39:41 AM |