made a delicious white pizza with sauteed potatoes, leeks and garlic with a little aleppo pepper
just thought i'd throw that out there
just thought i'd throw that out there
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Why does unhealthy food taste good and healthy food taste like shit?
- Thread starter Kieli
- Start date
I think it has to do with salt and sugar. These 2 thing are loaded in fast food. Your body enjoys it and it makes you crave for more.
Because humans like any animal are evolved to like food that gives energy, the problem is that our modern society has far too much food energy and the modern healthy food is the kind that's low on energy. Look at beauty ideals, nowadays slim and tanned are in because they show that you can eat low energy foods and spend your time in the sun while in past centuries fat and pale was the trend because only the rich could afford enough food to get fat and avoid working in the sun.
I make chocolate chip cookies at home that I know have pretty much exactly 100 calories per cookie. I know what's in them, I know how they're made, they're basically a complete known. I even get most of the ingredients locally if I can.
If I had to choose between that one small cookie and a heaping plate of steamed greens which has fewer calories and is much bigger, I'd pick the cookie any day and I say that as someone who loves steamed greens. Such is the curse of humanity.
If I had to choose between that one small cookie and a heaping plate of steamed greens which has fewer calories and is much bigger, I'd pick the cookie any day and I say that as someone who loves steamed greens. Such is the curse of humanity.
Don't be too sad, it's one of the reasons that you and our species is alive today.
It is possible to limit yourself by being mindful of what you're eating and how much fat and sugar the food contains.
Fun fact as an extra tidbit, especially for parents: not only is processed food bad for you and your children, but so is an over-abundance of cooked and soft food. Our diets, especially during growth and developmental stages, need more resistive and woody crunch. Otherwise, our teeth don't have enough jawbone development to properly straighten them.
Salt, sugar and fat can make things taste amazing.
Healthy food can taste fantastic too though so as and where possible you should venture into trying to cook it. Gives a great sense of satisfaction turning these raw things from the ground into a great meal. It can be creative as well as you get a sense for spices and ingredients. Perfect something for the lockdown blues.
Healthy food can taste fantastic too though so as and where possible you should venture into trying to cook it. Gives a great sense of satisfaction turning these raw things from the ground into a great meal. It can be creative as well as you get a sense for spices and ingredients. Perfect something for the lockdown blues.
But now you're comically missing the point just for the sake of being condescending. The original point of this topic, as has been mentioned multiple times now, was not "why does processed junk food and fast food taste good", it's "why does 'unhealthy' food taste good."
Yes, proportions and over diet matter, but no one is going to tell me that Baby Back Ribs are healthy enough to eat everyday in reasonable servings.
Also, while "tasty-ness" is subjective -- I know this first hand -- there are certain things which do fall into human norms for concrete reasons. For example, people don't normally eat dirt or feces off the ground. There's a range of human taste normal to people outside of disorders. Within that range 'tasty' can vary, but all because there's some relativity does not mean there aren't general things one can say about what does and doesn't taste good.
Also, a lot of people in this topic are ignoring what you are saying and are insisting that "no, what I like is legitimately good."
EDIT:
That actually sounds fairly unhealthy. You've got what is basically white-bread with fried potatoes on top.
Some food is good for the body, and some food is good for the mind/soul. Sometimes they can be both, but neither is necessarily worse than the other. If eating too many salads gets you bummed out nothing wrong with a slice of pizza. Idk what your level or skill is with cooking, but there are plenty of recipes that are easy to start out with, and you might find the process making them quite enjoyable :)
Not only tastes better, but also cheaper.
Ive been "eating better" for over a month now and the best healthy stuff I've had is some fish from Applebee's.
Ive been "eating better" for over a month now and the best healthy stuff I've had is some fish from Applebee's.
What is and isn't delicious is pretty subjective and your culture and upbringing is going to likely have a strong determination in what you deem "delicious."
Here in America, our cultural palette of what's "delicious" is generally also not very healthy.
That said, there are healthy foods that can be prepared in a way to mimic or even straight-up replicate the taste of "delicious," unhealthy foods. I admit in my area it's not widely available but there's a few local spots that are quite good at doing it (it does sacrifice SOME of the health factors on some of the recipes, but it's still leagues better than the regular alternative)... It's also not terribly accessible to me on price, which means I can't do it 100% of the time. I do have the option of learning to prepare and cook those kinds of recipes myself but as much as I respect and almost even revere the act of cooking, I kind of don't like to actually perform the task myself.
It will vary depending on your income and your location in the states, but in my income level and my area, eating out healthier is usually like a 50% increase in cost. Preparing and cooking it myself is generally around 10-15% price increase. I can easily afford the latter but the former (eating out) is often a luxury cost for me.
Here in America, our cultural palette of what's "delicious" is generally also not very healthy.
That said, there are healthy foods that can be prepared in a way to mimic or even straight-up replicate the taste of "delicious," unhealthy foods. I admit in my area it's not widely available but there's a few local spots that are quite good at doing it (it does sacrifice SOME of the health factors on some of the recipes, but it's still leagues better than the regular alternative)... It's also not terribly accessible to me on price, which means I can't do it 100% of the time. I do have the option of learning to prepare and cook those kinds of recipes myself but as much as I respect and almost even revere the act of cooking, I kind of don't like to actually perform the task myself.
It will vary depending on your income and your location in the states, but in my income level and my area, eating out healthier is usually like a 50% increase in cost. Preparing and cooking it myself is generally around 10-15% price increase. I can easily afford the latter but the former (eating out) is often a luxury cost for me.
Healthy food tastes like shit?
That is news to me.
Unhealthy food tastes good because they drown it in salt, butter and/or sugar.
The real advantage of unhealthy food is generally that it is convenient. Its honestly hard to fuck up cooking something better than a fast food meal. And even if you do fuck it up you will figure out the next time.
That is news to me.
Unhealthy food tastes good because they drown it in salt, butter and/or sugar.
The real advantage of unhealthy food is generally that it is convenient. Its honestly hard to fuck up cooking something better than a fast food meal. And even if you do fuck it up you will figure out the next time.
Only in threads like these do you see people magically forget entire cultures worth of healthy and delicious foods.
Didn't think it needed to be said but yes, you're missing out on a huge range of flavors and extremey good food when you define pizza and hamburgers as the apex of culinary achievement.
Generally speaking cooking -anything- at home, even unhealthy dishes, is healthier than eating out where restaurants wont hesitate to make the food as salty and oily as possible to get you overstimulated. Home cooking just isnt taught, isnt respected, and thats not touching people in food deserts. Just being able to cook at home if you can is a huge privelege. And yeah, there are good, healthy dishes created before the advent of the cheeseburger you can find online. I reccomnd butter chicken or channa masala for starters. Or go to budgetbytes.com
Didn't think it needed to be said but yes, you're missing out on a huge range of flavors and extremey good food when you define pizza and hamburgers as the apex of culinary achievement.
Generally speaking cooking -anything- at home, even unhealthy dishes, is healthier than eating out where restaurants wont hesitate to make the food as salty and oily as possible to get you overstimulated. Home cooking just isnt taught, isnt respected, and thats not touching people in food deserts. Just being able to cook at home if you can is a huge privelege. And yeah, there are good, healthy dishes created before the advent of the cheeseburger you can find online. I reccomnd butter chicken or channa masala for starters. Or go to budgetbytes.com
Honestly, with your whole response taken into account, I've decided you people are from some twilight universe.
No one wants a glass of water and quinoa. No one.
This thread is INCREDIBLY pretentious lmfao
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It's taken me years of small, consistent changes but it's possible to develop a preference for healthy food over unhealthy food, taste-wise. YMMV of course.
My partner and I almost completely stopped adding any salt to our food, for example. Now food from elsewhere tastes way too salty and I'd rather cook at home.
I'm fortunate enough to have the space and resources for a small collection of potted herbs, and that helps a lot too. Being able to add fresh basil, sage, thyme, rosemary, etc makes for some very flavorful meals, and over time has changed my perception of what "flavorful" entails.
I think quinoa is a GOAT staple. The breakfast quinoa I make is delicious AF, blows oatmeal and sugary cereals out of the water IMO. I'd absolutely rather have a bowl of quinoa with soy milk, honey, cinnamon, and fruit, than have a bowl of Fruity Pebbles or Lucky Charms or Cookie Crisp.
Also American food culture just sucks and makes the pursuit of well-being so much more of an uphill battle than it needs to be. As others here have mentioned, there are plenty of cultures in the world that boast delicious, varied cuisines that won't clog up your arteries or summon cancers of the colon or pummel your pancreas until it says "fuck it, I'm done, get your shitty insulin elsewhere."
My partner and I almost completely stopped adding any salt to our food, for example. Now food from elsewhere tastes way too salty and I'd rather cook at home.
I'm fortunate enough to have the space and resources for a small collection of potted herbs, and that helps a lot too. Being able to add fresh basil, sage, thyme, rosemary, etc makes for some very flavorful meals, and over time has changed my perception of what "flavorful" entails.
I think quinoa is a GOAT staple. The breakfast quinoa I make is delicious AF, blows oatmeal and sugary cereals out of the water IMO. I'd absolutely rather have a bowl of quinoa with soy milk, honey, cinnamon, and fruit, than have a bowl of Fruity Pebbles or Lucky Charms or Cookie Crisp.
Also American food culture just sucks and makes the pursuit of well-being so much more of an uphill battle than it needs to be. As others here have mentioned, there are plenty of cultures in the world that boast delicious, varied cuisines that won't clog up your arteries or summon cancers of the colon or pummel your pancreas until it says "fuck it, I'm done, get your shitty insulin elsewhere."
I really wish I could trick myself into believing this like some people. None of those things taste remotely as good as say a bacon cheeseburger or a deep dish pizza. You are absolutely lying to your self if you say otherwise.
i like healthy food , am quite thin and come from a country with a strong culinary tradition (France, though a good amount of our stuff is not necessarily healthy) and I want to slap half of the people in this thread. The question of the OP obviously has relevance given every country has a tendency towards obesity - it does mean people gravitate more easily around unhealthy food.
and even more lol at the 'if you widened your horizons you'd discover lots of delicious healthy ethnic food'. Tons of delicious ethnic food ain't that healthy, mates.I mean sure teriyaki is better for you than fried chicken but it's hardly a health good either.
This is why I love having the best of both worlds. Also every time a thread like this gets made Era always jumps down the Op's throat and laments them for not cooking the right way or the presumption that they can't cook at all. It's absolutely hilarious, it plays out the same way every time.
The great thing about home cooking is that you can choose your ingredients and their amounts. I'm sure "no salt" is working well for you and your partner. I've found that a very small amount of salt can transform a dish from mediocre-bad to great, and it's not deleterious in any way.
it may not be super healthy but one of my favorite meals to make is prepackaged Vindaloo over jasmine rice with a small slice of garlic naan.
nothing about it is overindulgent, but it is a better choice than fast food and it is fucking delicious.
nothing about it is overindulgent, but it is a better choice than fast food and it is fucking delicious.
It can't be stated enough: You have to learn how to cook and you have to cook what you enjoy. There's a time investment and there's trial and error involved and cleaning dishes can fucking suck and whatnot and it means you don't just indiscriminately choke down "vegetables"(no, I'm not going to just eat a bunch of pre-bagged lettuce with shitty dressing). But the limiting factor to eating "healthy" isn't taste. I could become a supermassive fat fuck just fine on fibrous fruits, zucchini, potatoes, carrots, asparagus, beans and lean meats.
The final boss at that point literally just becomes portion control, which ironically becomes harder when your eating options become so much bigger, even if that stretches out to conventionally healthy foods.
The final boss at that point literally just becomes portion control, which ironically becomes harder when your eating options become so much bigger, even if that stretches out to conventionally healthy foods.
some bougie folk in this thread
can y'all lemme hold one of them organic flaxseed smoothies you got from whole foods?
can y'all lemme hold one of them organic flaxseed smoothies you got from whole foods?
This comes down to habit as well.
I would not swap a filled eggplant for a BigMac. Most fast food makes me sick and I dislike greasy stuff.
There is a world full of great food. But you have to revamp your tastebuds after years of salt, sugar and sh*t.
And it`s not black and white, like Sanka said The dose makes the poison .
Lean meats, veggies, herbs & spices can create great meals.
I would not swap a filled eggplant for a BigMac. Most fast food makes me sick and I dislike greasy stuff.
There is a world full of great food. But you have to revamp your tastebuds after years of salt, sugar and sh*t.
And it`s not black and white, like Sanka said The dose makes the poison .
Lean meats, veggies, herbs & spices can create great meals.
I don't intend to be condescending at all and I'm sorry if you read it that way.
I'm just saying that you are not gonna get instantly fat or malnutritioned by eating ribs some times in moderation if you don't eat like that all the time. Fat, salt, sugar and various additives can make food taste great, but they aren't exactly the best things for your body in larger amounts.
Eating dirt or literal shit is in no way healthy even if a select amount of people might find it tasty due to some disorder they might be suffering from, this entire discussion is if taste and health benefits is connected. The availability of new foods and our cultural habits absolutely has a ton to say about our eating habits, many people in the same geographical area will usually enjoy much of the same type of foods because that's what they are used to, healthy or not.
It's not shocking that tons of people in the US and around the world get accustomed to eating fast food when you have literal 1$ menus that makes it easy for busy parents to feed their kids with, these kids will just grow up eating the same food with the impression that it's how food is supposed to taste, unhealthy food options just becomes normalized as food.
Our openness to accepting new tastes is definitely a product of how we grew up and how varied we are used to eating, it's easy to dismiss something new because it's different than what you normally eat and you don't associate it with anything you experienced previously. Tasty foods can be unhealthy and healthy foods can be tasty, nothing is mutually exclusive and it really depends on the individual.
This plus OP evidently doesn't know how to season their healthy food.
I am no one
It's not too late to change
Every word of this. It's an attitude that seems to ignore A) tons of cultures & B) how difficult it can be to be exposed to these healthy foods in the first place
I'm disabled by severe mental illness, so I know all too well how hard it is to summon the energy and resolve to perform even simple tasks. Thanks to rampant capitalism, legit healthy choices are relatively hard to come by, and those of us who could really use the aid of a paid cook (as many middle class folks had in the old days) are not even close to being able to afford the luxury. I'm personally extremely, extremely lucky to live with a master chef whom is happy to do all the cooking in the household.
There really needs to be a massive sea change in the social safety so that the disabled are able to receive the help we need.
These posts above do a pretty good job of summing everything up. First of all, our palate gets used to the foods we normally eat. For example, I used to be picky with fresh tomatoes, but I started to eat them regularly and now a good local farmer tomato salad (just tomato and spring onion, add white tuna and green olives if you're feeling fancy) is one of my favourite dishes for the summer. Secondly, eating healthy does not mean you can never eat a burger or pizza; it means you should try to eat as varied as possible and portion control. I'm not American, but it seems to me one of your main issues regarding food comes from the ridiculous servings you have (IIRC, a small American McD drink was a medium in Europe) that equate quantity to value and make people end up eating more than they really need to.
Apart from that, I guess there are countries that have a healthier cuisine, mostly because it is more varied and because of the base ingredients they use. I'd say any Mediterranean cooking should do the trick: Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Greek...
Lmaoo
I'm a cold-brew tea drinker like 3-5x daily. Water if not.
And I swear, I love quinoa! Seasoned nicely of course, or just use David Lynch's recipe on YouTube lol
I just want to say that at one point, I ate really healthy for a few months and by the end of that period, good fruit tasted amazing. Sometimes you just gotta reboot your taste buds.
To go along with that, when I lived in Taiwan, I noticed that their cakes & pastries were drastically less sugary than similar American cakes. And they liked them, because they didn't have the same inundation with sugar that Americans have.
To go along with that, when I lived in Taiwan, I noticed that their cakes & pastries were drastically less sugary than similar American cakes. And they liked them, because they didn't have the same inundation with sugar that Americans have.
Junk food companies put a lot of research into making their food addictive and make you want to crave it. It's really not anyone's fault except the food companies.
The unhealthy shit is literally designed probably down to the molecular level to taste as good to the human palate as possible.