Food and cycling « CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum

CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Debate!

Food and cycling

(15 posts)

Started 11 years ago by chdot
Latest reply from PS

No tags yet.

chdot
Admin

OK not about 'cycling cafes' or nutrition for Audaxes.

It's Joanna Blythman piece commenting on Jamie Oliver's comments on 'the poor' and what they eat.

"
Nowadays, more people feel cash-poor and worry about their weight, but there is little sign that the majority of us are cooking more. Despite the daily diet of supposedly enabling cookery programmes on TV, reliance on ready meals and other convenience foods has become a national disease - if you're poor, you'll buy them in budget stores, if you're rich, you'll get them from upmarket ones.

"

http://www.heraldscotland.com/mobile/comment/columnists/oliver-twit.22009417

If 'the food industry' - with Government help (or at least limited hindrance) is responsible, presumably the same is true for the 'motor industry/driving lobby' and cycling(?)

'Food' is much more high profile as a 'leisure activity' - not just on telly.

What chance of getting more people cycling?

The 'poor' can't 'afford' to, the rich(er) prefer their cars.

Posted 11 years ago #
gembo
Member

Good article by Blythman

Liked quote from hunger poverty expert "when I was living off a tenner a week for food, I didn't need a hug, I needed a fiver"

I was given two fivers from the cash machine the other day at tescos Lochrin basin. Crisp new, quite nice. But last time this happened was in Liverpool in 1995, just one fiver then.

Blythman does link to Orwell and the poor not wanting to live healthily and cheaply on brown bread and raw carrots the way the middle classes might choose to do. However, must reread Wigan Pier as I thought he was quite critical of the poor loving beer and chips

Posted 11 years ago #
wee folding bike
Member

Pint of wallop features in 1984 I think. I haven't read it for years.

Posted 11 years ago #
SRD
Moderator

I had quite a row with someone on FB over this: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2013/07/how-junk-food-can-end-obesity/309396/

This is along similar lines:

https://theconversation.com/sugar-hysteria-wont-solve-the-obesity-puzzle-17384

Posted 11 years ago #
gembo
Member

The article in the Atlantic is pointing out that you can go into health food shops and find unhealthy products. also that if you fry things it is not the healthiest way to cook them. also salt doesn't make you fat it increases your blood pressure so you should watch that too. These blinding insights took six pages and they took themselves very seriously. the second link is saying obesity is caused by eating too much and exercising too little. Another blinder but shorter and suggested lord Byron like vinegar on his potatoes.

The first vegan I knew survived on tomato sauce flavoured crisps and chips with tomato sauce.

When I was vegan my diet was a little better and low in fat, no dairy (cheese, yoghurt, milk, cream, butter). Soya alternatives now are tastier. Low in fat but still quite sugary.

I did still eat chips as I am from the west of Scotland I am genetically prone to chips.

various mainstream products are vegan without advertising as such - jammy dodgers, jus-rol puff pastry, Heinz Beans, Birdseye potato waffles, Vitalite margarine, fry's chocolate, ruffle bars (except if they resort to cochineal for the pink bit). All fairly low fat and high sugar (except the Vitalite and the waffles)

If you have a low fat higher sugar diet but exercise sufficiently you will stay thin. I put on weight when I went back to being a vegetarian and ate lots of yoghurt, butter and gradually tried cheese. I put on more weight when I stopped exercising around the time my children were younger.

I felt guilty about exercising after work instead of looking after the children. But then I started commuting to work by bicycle and nearly got back down to a 32 inch waist but not quite.

You know it makes sense.

Posted 11 years ago #
Bruce
Member

Sugar is not a great way to moderate blood levels and energy.

I admit we hear different things every day about what we should be eating but the people I know who are close to me I see what they eat and how that makes them feel and look.

http://www.dietitiancassie.com/dietitian-cassies-television-segment-the-big-fat-lie/

Posted 11 years ago #
Charterhall
Member

"What chance of getting more people cycling?The 'poor' can't 'afford' to, the rich(er) prefer their cars."

I don't believe that people chose cars over bikes because of affordability, it's about the amount of effort they would have to expend.

Posted 11 years ago #
chdot
Admin

"I don't believe that people chose cars over bikes because of affordability, it's about the amount of effort they would have to expend."

That's undoubtedly true for some/many/most(?)

But it has to be assumed that some of the people who say they want to cycle are telling the truth.

I'm just saying that in the same way that (some) people believe that government inability to deal with obesity is related to the products and influence of the food manufacturing industry, how much is it the same for cycling and the motor industry/organisations?

There is undoubtedly the assumption by (many) politicians that 'drivers = voters".

Is this because that's what they assume (maybe from direct experience) or because that's what voters really/say they want or, more, influence/climate created by vehicle manufacturers, road builders or other vested interests - who obviously influence 'voters' as well as politicians?

Posted 11 years ago #
cc
Member

Great article. I recommend her books.

Posted 11 years ago #
chdot
Admin

So that's the book for the 'worried well' who cares enough to read about things. I suppose Richard's Bicycle Book may have had even more influence.

How does everyone else get info/influenced on food and travel choices?

There have been gallons of ink applied to paper about 'diets', but words don't seem to work.

Would fruit and veg stalls on every street corner (with affordable produce) make any difference?

How much effect would MUCH better cycle infrastructure have?

Will we ever know?

Posted 11 years ago #
amir
Member

Random comment, mildly associated with the like:

If you ever want to feel a little miserable on a bike on a Sunday morning in the middle of the countryside, why not try cycling in the area of East Fortune. There you can experience city-like traffic levels as people flock from miles around to the Sunday market, ironically to pick up cheap food and the like.

Are people really getting the economics of shopping right?

Posted 11 years ago #
chdot
Admin

"Are people really getting the economics of shopping right?"

It's unlikely. (By people I mean all but the most penny-analysing extremist.)

Once upon a time the Lyceum held FREE preview nights - which were a bit popular.

One night when the house was full (insert stereotype) a Morningside lady said 'you've got to let me in, I paid for a taxi to get here'...

Posted 11 years ago #
chdot
Admin

"
Spokes CycleCampaign (@SpokesLothian)
02/09/2013 09:44
@CyclingEdin @JoannaBlythman See our 2006 competition winners for 'Cycling Recipes' http://www.spokes.org.uk/wordpress/documents/odds-and-ends-may-be-exciting/competitions [slightly off-topic admittedly!]

"

Posted 11 years ago #
Cyclingmollie
Member

amir: "There you can experience city-like traffic levels as people flock from miles around to the Sunday market, ironically to pick up cheap food and the like."

“Feeding the Five Million: what would it take for everyone in Scotland to eat well and sustainably?”
Nourish Scotland 2013 Conference, 3rd and 4th September, Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh.
"It’s easy to make sweeping statements about what needs to happen globally, but harder to work out the details. So, this conference is to talk and think about Scotland – a small, wealthy, well-governed country blessed with some productive soils and plenty of water, with skilled farmers and fishers, world-leading science and a strong social fabric.
And food banks. And a population which dies on average four years younger than the European average, with huge inequalities across Scotland."
I'm going to the evening debate and dinner. There might still be tickets left.

Posted 11 years ago #
PS
Member

It's a good article. I read Bad Food Britain years ago but didn't really get on with it (agreed with the message, but it summarised a lot of what I knew already and was written like an extended magazine article), but that's by-the-by.

Britain's screwed-up approach to food is a cultural issue. Too many people are too distant from food and have been for too many generations - and it's not just "the poor", I knew loads of middle class kids at university 20 years ago who didn't know one end of a pan from the other. Some of them must have done home economics at school (I had) but hadn't been paying attention; but home ec on its own can't solve it - like a lot of education it needs to be reinforced in the home, but if the parents can't/won't cook then what do you do?

It's irritating when you know that the food is one of the principal pleasure in life and the prospect of a tasty meal can give people something to look forward to that really adds to quality of life (for my book, way more than watching the telly). It's also frustrating that the basics of cooking aren't hard to learn and, once you've got them, the possibilities are (almost) endless.

As for the obesity/health issue, it needs to approached holistically. It's not just food-centric (although banning sliced white Chorleywood bread and soft drinks would be a start) so it isn't solved by dietary products and articles. It's a whole lifestyle thing, one part of the equation being food, another transport, another how we work, another how we play...

I can't say I'm optimistic of it being solved because people and companies are extremely defensive (and questions like "how dare you criticise someone else's lifestyle choice?" keep issues entrenched just as much as the protection of "Big Food"'s right to make money and, the argument goes, make really cheap food that some people wouldn't otherwise be able to afford).

Posted 11 years ago #

RSS feed for this topic

Reply

You must log in to post.

// CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum

About This Forum

CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Debate!

Food and cycling

Reply

RSS Feeds

Links