I Challenge You!

[chefness]

* I'm not exactly sure where to put this so please feel free to move it*

Here it is in plain english, a challenge - a dare -

I ask you simply to think of your three most favorite things to eat on a daily/weekly basis. This could include pizza, chips, crackers, cereal, breads, soda, drinks, pre-packs meals, pastas, sliced meat, cheese, milk, yogurt - ANYTHING EDIBLE that you simply cannot live without.
*(I originally posted this wirh omnis, carnis and vegges in mind - the same applies to substitutes)


Now, look at the ingredients list on each of these three things. If you cannot pronounce all of the items listed - I challenge you to find out what those ingredients are . Perhaps they are things that you truely don't wish to be putting into your body, but had little to no idea of their presence in your day-to-day living.

This is not to scare you from eating these items - just simply to educate yourself on what nourishment (or lack there of) you are fueling your body with.

Once you have completed this task - if you are strong of soul - I dare you (triple-dog-dare, infact) to a) go without said item for 3 days and see if you truely do need it or b) seek out an alternative with ingredients that you can pronounce and which you know from whence they came.

At the same time, try local - try fresh and try organic. I do so challenge you to live with what was given to us, not created to destroy us.

[RubyDuby]

I would think most vegans already read the ingredients. lol

[missbettie]

i don't. :D

[helen105281]

BB not Helen




Agree with RubyDuby. Read everything on them. If I don't know what they are I don't buy them.

[RubyDuby]

i don't. :D
orly? then missb, how do you know you're not eating animals? :p

[missbettie]

well duh i'm psychic. sheesh! :p

JUUUUSSST kidding...although there are sometimes when I buy stuff and assume its vegan and forget to read the ingrediants... i've been unlucky a few times and have had to take the stuff back! d'OH!

[Festered]

What kind of a response did you get from omnis?
I rarely eat anything I haven't made myself lol
exceptions include plain popadums (lentil flour, dab of oil) and stock cubes! (salt, vegetables, spices/pepper etc)
Make my own soup which I eat quite often.

[buttons]

i don't. :D
I only recently started checking the funny little numbers (additives). Turns out the crackers I had just bought contained fish derivatives! I then switched to stuff with simple, letter-filled ingredients lists.

[pat sommer]

I picked olive oil, garlic and marmite before I finished reading.... now I feel left out!

[chefness]

I had alot of friends tell me that they canot live without pizza, but never realized that ingredients list was quite terrifying. The dough alone was bleached white flour with a whole list of additives...and then there was the pepperoni slices which almost compare exactly to the "Yyves" fakkeronni you can buy...Scary :S

But most of my friends were actually quite concerned. Though I got the same response all over the board of "There's no time to make your own".

[harpy]

Fake meats tend to have weird ingredients don't they? I wouldn't say they were in my top three foods though :p

[Pob]

I'm not convinced that there is a strong correlation between the difficulty of pronouncing an ingredient and it's effect on health. Many ingredients have a variety of names, some simple, some complex. Many natural ingredients can be harmful. :dizzy:

You should be aware of ingredients, what they are and where they come from. But I would suggest a more scientific approach. :cool:

[leedsveg]

I'm sure I've seen some of the ingredients of my non-dairy creamer, used in fireworks.

leedsveg

[baby_vicuña]

^ Scary :eek:

I already do this when I read labels. If I don't know what it is, I don't buy it. But I like this challenge idea. I'm curious to hear how others have reacted to it.

[mwb]

Back when I used to eat pre-packaged prepared foods (the vegan ones), I went with the rule if the ingredient list was bigger than my thumb I wouldn't eat it.

[Tishy]

^^^ I like that! I find the less ingredients the better! I don't buy many prepared foods. Once you get into the habit of cooking, you get so much quicker at it, when I make pizza, it takes less then 30 minutes! And everything is fresh :)

People just want more more more convenience instead of actually just putting in the effort themselves!

I'm quite bad with reading labels as I forget what most things are anyway, and if I make a list of what everything is...I lose it!

[twinkle]

Well, my top three are bread (which I make myself), some form of cooked potato, and chocolate (cocoa bean products and sugar, with maybe some vanilla).

Hooray! I'm going to live forever! :D ;)

[PlantsPlease]

I already do this :D

I love having a smart phone so I can look up ingredients in the store. I try to stay away from long lists of ingredients and artificial ingredients in general, but there are exceptions.

[patientia]

Do you guys know how much dihydrogen monoxide you consume each day? Dihydrogen monoxide is present in many food items, but rarely listed as an ingredient:
http://www.dhmo.org/

Ban DHMO!!!!1!

[Risker]

^ Quite. I saw a news article recently about a cash award being offered for anyone that could name an ingredient that wasn't a chemical because of the amount of people that say they don't want chemicals in their food.

[Sarah_]

Right. Has anyone ever noticed that the unhealthy, chemical-laden food is always the stuff that tastes the best? Taste-wise, I always prefer the store-bought stuff as opposed to homemade. Dunno why. Canned tom soup always tastes better than homemade, etc. etc.

[RubyDuby]

maybe bc that's what you're used to? Your taste buds are trained to prefer them.

[fiamma]

^ Agreed!!! :) :thumbsup:

[patientia]

Why do caramelised/browned parts of food taste so good? Why? Why does fried food taste so good?

[Soesja]

it isn't all that hard. we should make more items ourselves from scratch. I know I do.
I cannot believe people saying storebought tastes better.
Go learn to cook! Teach your tastebuds a lesson ;)