<![CDATA[Out to Lunch

<![CDATA[Out to Lunch - Food]]>Sat, 22 Jul 2023 02:26:37 -0700Weebly<![CDATA[Red, White, Blue & You]]>Mon, 07 Nov 2016 19:42:54 GMThttp://www.outtolunch.co/food/red-white-blue-youMUSINGS ON WHY YOU'RE THE OBSTACLE, NOT THE POTUS

***Author's Note*** I, much like many of you, am not a certified any of the following: philosopher, behavioral economist, regular-ole economist, political theorist, sociologist, psychologist, or any other 'gist' of note. Despite these limitations, I'm hopeful the rant below helps someone (including myself) be more proactive, more thoughtful, more driven, regardless of tomorrow's election outcome.

The 2016 Presidential Election season has made me a lot of things, the least of which is proud. It hasn't made me proud of my country; it hasn't made me proud of my fellow citizens; most importantly, and I'll argue here that is should also be most important to you as well, it hasn't made me proud of myself.

Why? Why would the misgivings of an election year - a time often wrought with political discourse, disagreement, and disses - make me feel badly about myself? Well I, much like many of you, have been disappointed in both candidates during this election year. My time here won't be spent discussing the laundry list of transgressions from Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump. These actions have cast a cloud so immense that it needs no further breathe from these lips to shroud the American conscious.

What, then, will I spend the time on instead: I, we, can and should strive to do better regardless of tomorrow's outcome. Will the election of either Donald or Hillary be the reason you don't open the bakery of your dreams? Will it be the reason you don't move toward exercising more regularly? Start learning a foreign language? Begin taking free online courses to better yourself? Lend a helping hand in your community? Will the (extremely marginal for 99.9995% of us) higher or lower taxes you might see in twelve months - yes, that's how long it will be before we actually start to feel the affects of either president elect's desires - be the reason that you decide against getting your real estate license? Or, as it is in my particular case, will it be the reason you don't write more despite having knowledge, skills, eagerness and necessary tools to do so?

For the past 6 months, it feels as though we've been locked inside a time capsule heading to Mars*. Everyone claims to hate the ride, but step into the world of social media and all I can see is people talking about is, well, how much they hate the ride. No one - no one that Facebook's prioritization algorithm gives credence to at least - seems to be talking about how they are, can or should be doing something better for themselves. Regardless of your political affiliation, I'm convinced that we (you+me = we) can be working toward doing things better in our own little slice of the world, election results be damned. Though I do believe that our societal fabric is woven, over the course of time, from the results of such elections, I refuse to buy the narrative that the invisible, omnipotent hand of tomorrow's election is guiding the hands writing this note to you all today.

*One of Elon Musk's companies, SpaceX, is actually figuring out ways to make Mars a tourist destination. He is in the 0.0005% who should actually change their behavior solely based on tomorrow's election.

So here's a rallying cry to the movers, shakers, makers, and bakers out there in my ever-so-small audience. This post, at least in a certain way, is my way of heeding this much needed advice. Despite that audience being "too small" or my blog being "too uncool", the fact is that this is something I love to do, can do, and starting now, will return to doing more often, election 2016 be damned.

]]><![CDATA[Losing Yourself in Germany]]>Tue, 19 May 2015 21:48:59 GMThttp://www.outtolunch.co/food/losing-yourself-in-germany

In the film 8 Mile, a semi-documentary following the struggle of Marshall Mathers, aka, Eminem, there is a recurring scene which plays an important role. The rapper is painstakingly penning the words to what will ultimately become “Lose Yourself”, a few lines of which you’ve read above. Each of these scenes shows Marshall riding one form of rickety public transport or another through downtrodden locales in Detroit. The first time this recurrent clip plays in the film, we see his notebook, pages empty, with only a faint backtrack pulsing through the speakers. He is struggling to find himself, struggling to find the perfect lyrics to lay over the music, and even struggling to keep the pen steady, perhaps a mixture of nerves and the very real physical challenge associated with writing legibly while riding a bus. This is the recap of my ten month bus riding, song writing, soul searching journey in Germany.

Now I have to admit something before diving too deep on this one: The last thing I expected when moving to Germany was my life having any parallels to that of a platinum haired man who shares his name with popular candy treats. That isn’t to say I was aiming low in my expectations for this first work rotation. (So maybe I wasn’t aiming to earn a Grammy or have a date with Britney Spears, but I most certainly intended to do some other cool things during these ten months.) I was prepared for surprises. I was ready to be challenged at work. I was even anxious to be pushed in my personal life. But following in the likeness of a rap superstar just didn’t make it onto my to-do list.

The first time I noticed this peculiar parallel was, you guessed it, on a bus ride. Myself and a former participant of my work rotation program, who is also not from Germany, began discussing the topic of personal identity while returning from Chemiepark Marl. Having only been working in Germany for a month or so at this time, the advice he offered to be open to change was timely. He described how his work rotations in Germany, and his now full-time role in Germany, had really tested his “non-Germanness”. We spoke specifically of watching the people on the bus that day, as it seemed like a very tangible example of what he was saying. “Just watch the people,” he said somewhat withdrawn, “it only takes a few minutes to know that you’re not in Kansas anymore. You just have to want to see it.”

The talk we shared that day was relatively short, but when I stepped off the bus, I suddenly understood something that would stick with me for the rest of my time in Deutschland: I’m Eminem…and this is my recurring film sequence. In the physical sense, I knew that this would only be one of the hundreds of such bus, train and metro rides I would take. But in the more spiritual sense, I think something about that moment, arriving in a town I couldn’t properly pronounce, seeing signs that looked more like word jigsaw puzzles than sentences, watching the subtle ways that Germans are, well, not Americans, I knew a great opportunity had been given to me. The time would affect – not completely change, but perhaps enhance – personality characteristics I’d developed in another world. The question was no longer if the chance to change would present itself, but whether I would be willing to accept it.

Over the course of the following ten months, consisting of one new language, two flats in the Ruhrgebiet, three landlords, four challenging work projects, nine European country visits and a small hard drives worth of photos, the lyrics and rhythm of my song, both on and off the public transit system of Germany, began to take shape. What began as a crass, incomprehensible pelting of shouting tones, a linguistic jumble of exceptions, slowly evolved into a language I not only dealt with, but, by the end of my time, thoroughly enjoyed speaking; what began as trips filled with nerves to the grocery store, bakery or gym, eventually became an opportunity for me to learn a new vocabulary word or make someone laugh (usually when at the meat counter…and almost always at me); and what began as estranged, distant contact with work colleagues and shop patrons, ultimately blossomed into a few lasting friendships.

My core was still the same: still Zachary Woods, still from a rural, peach infested town in South Carolina, still a fan of patterned socks, still incessantly goofy, still curious. But when I looked into the internal mirror, the one that reveals much more than if your shirt is stained (it was) or if you’ve gained a few pounds (I had), the person looking back knew something that his former shadow did not – including a newly amassed, clearly important collection of vocabulary words like Eichhörnchen (squirrel), Heizpilz (outdoor standing heater), gegoogled, downgeloaded and my personal favorite, Sturmfrei (when your parents leave for the weekend without you, and the house is free for you to throw a party). And they say the Germans have a tendency to overcomplicate things.

In the process of working, collaborating, eating, laughing and living with the Germans, this reflection had learned about a totally new set of values, about a truly different way of life. I was spending more time enjoying meals, being (slightly) more quite in the work environment, considering to buy full-scale life insurance and listening (a lot) more before speaking. But these were merely the results of a bigger transformation that had taken place: I had developed a willingness to lose myself. Eminem would be so proud.

The Germans, at least for the most part, are not like me. And I, in less ways now as compared to ten months ago, am not like them. Traditionally, this imbalance would have sent me into adaption mode, a condition characterized by adjusting to the surrounding differences just long enough for them to no longer be influential. I am very protective of that core person previously mentioned, and that protectionism has served for quite some time as the proverbial anchor of my personality. This time of sharing with the Germans taught me to see this protectionism in a different light.

I had previously seen this anchor as a way to keep me safe, to keep me being “the person I wanted to be”. This security kept me from deviating too far when a stray wind or strong tide came too close. What I realized was that this anchor had indeed kept me steady, yet it had also kept me from truly embracing the new waters that were just outside the comforts of safe harbor. When a ship sets down anchor, it does indeed protect itself from potentially hazardous weather fluctuations. Yet the other side of that coin is that, by setting the anchor too deep, it also prevents any forward movement. And while there are invariably times it is not only appropriate but wise to set anchor in order to avoid hazardous squalls, with the right amount of guidance and reliance on your sense of internal navigation, there are just as many times when it would be unwise to waste the perfect wind and water conditions that would allow for further personal exploration and advancement.

And now the toughest question of them all: how does one know when to set anchor as opposed to riding the ever-present winds of change? The best thing I can say, using my time in Germany as a guiding reference of course, is to take a cue from the Germans from time to time: listen before speaking, respect their differences of opinion (even if you are totally convinced that they are wrong), eat a pork product that is utterly unrecognizable, etc. Try to understand more about where they’re coming from, why they might have the opinion they do, why they tend to present that opinion in the way they do, and how you, by adjusting yourself – let’s call it “adjusting your sail” for the purpose of continuing the metaphor – might be able to help bridge the gap between these differences. At the end of the day, we are here because of our differences, as well as because of our similarities. Only by sharing your differences with the Germans, and in turn them sharing their differences with you, will there be an overall net gain of intercultural awareness, business effectiveness and personal satisfaction.

]]><![CDATA[Shoeshine and Grind]]>Sat, 14 Feb 2015 14:31:18 GMThttp://www.outtolunch.co/food/shoeshine-and-grindEVEN IF THE SHOE FITS, SOMETIMES IT NEEDS SOME SHINE

As this post has nothing to do with food, I won't hop onto the traditional soapbox of eating well, eating (at least somewhat) naturally and treating your body like you give a damn. You should still do all of those things despite my not venting about them. Don't worry though, folks, I'll bring the steam back into the broccoli soon.

What I will talk about instead is this: people notice if you have a slack shoe game. People will also notice if you have a slack slack game, but let's stay in line with the video from above for the moment. You think that you're escaping the judgmental glances of your peers as you roam the office hallways, your shoes looking as though you spent the last six months punting dirty footballs. They are watching you though. Despite all your efforts to duck and dodge, they see those grizzly creatures gnawing at your heels.

Thankfully there is a solution to this troublesome conundrum: improve your shoe / shoelace / sock game. It sounds simple. That's because it is simple. If you're tired of meeting the office execs in those dusty pavement pounders, the first step is to realize that you have an issue. This phase is sort of like a drug addict checking themselves into treatment. They probably won't know to get help in the first place if they are unable to admit they're a drug addict. The good news is that changing your shoe / sock game is way easier than becoming unaddicted to meth. Moral of the story: get some fly shoes...and don't become a drug addict.

::Dead Giveaways of a Slack Shoe Game::

Always walking to the toilet extra fast. Yep, the shoe game is wack.
Pant leg openings are wider than a river. Classic side effect of a poor shoe game.
Feet are perpetually under the table during meetings. This chap's hiding something.
Frequent in-office luncher. Either a fan of this blog, or they have bad shoes.
More than an inch of rubber connecting your shoe to the floor. Just no.

Wearing some ish like this is also a sign that you're shoe / sock game may not be dying - it might be dead already. Do not let me catch you out a.) wearing these sandals...period, b.) wearing socks with sandals...ever, or c.) wearing socks with little curls at the top. This just isn't cool.

While I'm happy to poke fun at such a serious issue, I'm even more excited to say that there are some very simple...wait for it...steps that one can take toward changing their feet's fate. Let's all let out a joyous battle cry: THEY DON'T HAVE TO SUFFER ANY LONGER! I also choose to stay on the cheery side of things here, i.e., showing pictures of good looking shoe / sock combos, as opposed to blasting you with more examples of how not to assemble your ensemble. There's already enough bad shoe juju in the world without my adding to it.

::Potential Remedies to a Flawed Shoe Game::

Ask three fashion-forward friends if you need help. Awareness comes first.
Learn and be able to define the terms full, half and quarter brogue. Knowledge is key.
Polish your shoes. You don't need new shoes, just make them not look old.
Buy awesome socks. Trust me, you'll pay more attention to the shoes by default.
Buy some awesome laces. No one wraps Dollar General gifts with gilded ribbon.

::Signs That You're #killingthegame::

No brogue, no problem. Royal blue socks with black loafers are an office winner.

Half brogue, great color contrast, swag. You can ditch the cuffed pants though if you like.

Full brogue shoes basically say, "Look bro, I don't even need the socks." And they're right.

Those boots aren't just for the snow. Pair with patterned socks and they launch into office official.

So don't wear these to the office, but do wear these when you want people to know you're a badass.

You now have a nice platform from which to elevate your shoe game from office slob to BLOB - street speak for really awesome. Before I set you free to begin your own restoration journey, here are a few of my favorite brands, and places to find those brands, that make the transformation possible at fairly reasonable price. Now get out there and stop running to the potty to avoid office ridicule.

Shoe Brands

To Boot New York
Cole Haan
Mercanti Fiorentini

Sock Connections

Psycho Bunny
Happy Socks
The Joy of Socks

Locales

DSM, aka, Heaven
T.J. Maxx / Marshalls
Cole Haan Outlet

Just a reminder of the before and after.

]]><![CDATA[Christmas in Germany]]>Tue, 23 Dec 2014 17:54:22 GMThttp://www.outtolunch.co/food/christmas-in-germanyAN AMERICAN'S GUIDE TO GERMAN CHRISTMAS MARKETS

The differences between Americans and Germans are bountiful. From when and how often to talk in public, to offering compliments and even the proper way to hold your fork and knife during dinner, the amount of variance between the cultures are as strong as the accent. One similarity that I’ve taken particular note of during these past weeks, however, is how alike Germans and Americans view the holiday season. This time is special for both cultures. It is a time for physical things: friends, family, food, gifts and hugs. The season is also a time which ushers in a heightened sense of emotions: love, remembrance, joy, excitement and harmony. But the Germans have one special way of celebrating the Christmas season which I would like to petition for Americans to adopt.

Enter Germany’s Christmas Markets.

The. Germans. Love. These. Markets. They really, really love them. Raining? Doesn’t matter. Feeling a little sick? Stop being a pansy. Anarchical government takeover? We can deal with that tomorrow. In fact, I’ve actually had to push myself to create a few scenarios where a German would knowingly skip out on a Christmas market session:

The German National Team soccer match is only being televised indoors. They would only go to bars near the Christmas market though.

The Market is out of all of the following items: beer, Glühwein, cheese, sausages, soaps, owls (don’t ask), cookies, candied nuts and oxygen. In summary, it isn’t likely.

Someone stole their car, popped their bike tires and hijacked all the Deutsche Bahn trains. Come to think of it, there would probably need to be some amputation involved to keep them from walking there.

There is a new law (or any other sort of rule) stating they can’t go. They would, however, immediately try to change this dubious piece of legislation.

Glühwein

What? I’ll answer that question with another question: what do you get when you mix the slow warmth of hot chocolate and subtle bite of brandy with the spices of an apple pie and the feeling of six friends giving you consecutive high fives? Glühwein. That’s what. By warming a standard red wine with star anise, sliced oranges, cinnamon and cloves, the Germans have figured out a way to morph even the most

average person into a Marvel superhero. After three cups of this stuff, you’ll be able to throw exploding playing cards like Gambit, lift cars like Iron Man and tear your shirt off like Hulk Hogan. You will also find yourself saying “Oh yea brother” and doing the occasional leg drop on an unsuspecting victim just like the Hulkster. I’m still unsure if these last activities are the direct results of Glühwein consumption or just a dovetailed effect from some other Christmas Market novelty.

When? Not as much as the damn Germans. I know that sounds like a pretty crappy explanation for when you should drink this stuff. There is simply no other way to tell you. It isn’t that they drink it at any inappropriate time, as there is NO inappropriate time to drink it, but you just can’t time your drinking with that of any other German. Seriously, don’t listen to the peer pressure, don’t think you’re being a punk and don’t, whatever you do, get the bright idea that you’ll somehow outsmart the Germans at their own game of spiced liquid consumption. You will be the one that dances through the market aisles in a reindeer costume…not them. That’s not cool.

Where? There is only requirement for a regular moment to turn into a Glühwein drinking moment: a friend must be standing by your side prepared for the obligatory cheers, or “Prost” as the Germans call it.

Warning: When you cheers, which you will do joyfully and often, please, for the love of all things holy, look the other cup clanking party directly in the eyes at the moment of contact. This sounds like a pretty minute detail, and I guess it is by many measures, but all of the aforementioned embarrassment that comes along with drinking too much Glühwein will be exasperated when you’re forced to reconcile the ‘insincere cheer’ by purchasing another cup in order to get it right.

Reibekuchen

What? Think of this as the wicked love child produced from a hot, steamy night between the respective hash brown version from Waffle House and McDonald’s. The potato is first soft boiled, drained of moisture, lightly spiced and then fried on an oil lathered flattop. It is not drained of the moisture, i.e., grease, after that step. Welcome to awesome, people. Served with a dipping

sauce of Apfelmus, the German version of Apple Sauce, this bad boy will make you rethink the way you feel about food comas.

When? There are two distinct strategies here, both of which are viable depending on your intentions for the evening. Option 1: Eat upon arrival. If you plan to drink a lot of Glühwein and/or spiced beer during the evening’s market gathering, then I highly suggest laying the so-called base layer to prepare for the deluge. Option 2: Eat before exit. If you are going to take tonight’s visit to the market easy, keeping in mind that the German version of ‘easy’ is 3 to 5 drinks, don’t eat this until you’re ready for sleepy time.

Warning Option 1: If you don’t plan to drink, don’t do this. I mean it. You might think that you can do it, and the warm wafts of fatty goodness will be tempting, but you will PTFO mid-market stroll, leaving the rest of your company to fight the fight without you. Not cool in the German’s book or anyone else’s book for that matter.

Warning Option 2: Look at yourself in the mirror and be honest about your intentions before going out and choosing this option. Do not think for one second that forgoing the obligatory pre-Glühwein food will be rectified by late night consumption. The wine will kill you. The potatoes will no longer be able to help. If you know that you won’t be able to stay away from the wine, just go with option 1 and stop kidding yourself.

Where? Find a corner where the judgment for plunging your greasy paws into your mouth is kept to a bare minimum. The counter attendant will legitimately throw you a death glare if you ask for a fork.

Wurst and Kӓse

What? Germany is the uncontested sausage capital of the world. There cheese is pretty incredible, too. Whether your palette’s preference for spicy, salty or sweet guides your purchases, or your sausage selections are more often guided by the length, width or wrinkled nature of the link, the on-site butchers have a combination that will most assuredly suit your fancy. The cheese assortment tends to vary more

on the spicing of one particular variety with each respective farmer, e.g., a base Gruyere concocted with certain spice combinations such as garlic and thyme, rosemary and wine, basic and pine nuts, and so on; don’t worry though, you can find your fix for other cheese varieties, most notably Butterkäse, Cambozola and Hinterkäse, and with the array of cheese heads present on the scene.

Warning: German cheese is alive. Check this out if you’d like to learn more about how this is a good thing…and why Americans are pretty damn silly for pasteurizing everything under the sun.

When? I tended to observe the crowd for instruction on when to partake in these particular indulgences. That left me scratching my head to piece together a pattern more often than not. After approximately ten trips to Christmas markets during the month of December, ranging from Köln and Essen to Recklinghausen and even Hamburg, I was completely at a loss for any sort of cohesive explanation for the best timing to eat this. Then, conveniently enough after an Option 1 Reibekuchen sort of night, it dawned on me: THIS IS THE FOOD VERSION OF GLÜHWEIN! It would seem that just as with Glühwein, there really is no bad time to grab a handful of savory sausages nuggets and cheese slices. Sometimes we humans can make even the most obvious truths way overcomplicated.

Where? It is highly acceptable to stroll and chomp with these two items, making Wurst and Käse the most mobile of the Christmas market indulgences.

p.s. The month of no shave ended a few weeks ago. To all of those that followed the fiasco, I thank you. To all of those that didn't, here is a picture that will give you the entire story in about six seconds.

]]><![CDATA[Touch Down in London Town]]>Thu, 13 Nov 2014 14:18:25 GMThttp://www.outtolunch.co/food/touch-down-in-london-townREFLECTIONS OF A TRIP TO "OLD SMOKE"

This past weekend I spent three glorious days roaming the streets of London. I was able to visit some cool places during the time, including Camden Town, Borough Market, Big Ben, the London Eye, some pubs/restaurants (duh), and London Bridge, which thankfully did not fall down - click here for photographic evidence of the journey. It was also my great pleasure to have attended an NFL football match between the Jaguars and Cowboys at Wembley Stadium – no, I never thought I would type those words. Not only was this the only American football I have seen all year due to my locale in Germany, it was also the first time I’ve ever heard football-esque vocabulary spoken with a British twang. There were many instances of this, and almost all were hilarious, but here is a small sample of my personal favorites: touchdown – “tuts-don”, first down – “fist don”, and running back – “ruin-nin buck”.

Yet the best memory of this trip is something more reverent than fun. Stationed on the NW end of the famed Tower Bridge stands the Tower of London, which, as I was informed by a fellow onlooker from London, is often considered a favorite landmark of the locals. The tower itself was constructed by the order of Duke William of Normandy after his invasion of England in 1066, and is one of the oldest landmarks in the city. But what drew thousands upon thousands of onlookers on this particular day wasn't simply the tower, but rather a memorial to commemorate the centenary of England and her colony's entrance into the First World War in 1914.

As you can see from the pictures above, the 888,246 poppies surrounding the Tower created a compelling visual for onlookers. When a friend mentioned the memorial earlier that day I thought it sounded interesting…you know…a cool chance to see more of London. But when I stood looking out over the scene, it was impossible to fight the feelings of guilt and sadness and fear welling inside. The last thing I expected when looking out over a field of poppies was to feel such sadness and longing and regret. Perhaps I hadn't given enough credit to the idea, or perhaps I was in such a ‘tourist mode’ that I wouldn't let myself slip into the depressing thoughts associated with such a memorial. I would consider this an all too common feeling – an all too common lack of remembrance from the common citizen, such as myself, who has not spent time in nor suffered any direct tragedy as the result of war.

On my journey back to Germany from England, a trip that seemed far too much of a parallel with a time 100 years gone by, I decided to follow through on my video commitment for the month of November: write more. There were so many thoughts pumping through my head, and I am almost remiss to say that my natural inclination was to let them slip right by into my ever-growing “I’ll get around to it later pile”. Then I remembered the wise words of Samuel Johnson, who put my dilemma into a perfect phrasing:

“The chains of habit are too weak to be felt until they are too strong to be broken.”

I immediately picked up my pen and tried to filter the wave as best as I could. The piece below is what found its way onto the paper.

Planes Used to Fly

Not so long ago planes touched these puffs for a different reason. These massive wings carry me to and fro for friends, laughs, drinks, fun and a safe return home. Smaller wings once brought much larger change to this land, warping so starkly the atmosphere in which I now live, which is an atmosphere I admittedly take for granted. Realizing that those poppies are red for a hot reason hits me like 1/1000 of a bullet. Then I force into mind that nearly 900,000 soldiers are represented by these blooms, each one signaling where a life once stood, and it is likely that most felt at least 1000/1000 of a bullet.

That one was a father, this one a brother…there, a cousin…here, the would-be grandfather of a great actress. Or was she going to be a poet? Or perhaps she would have been an astronaut? It would seem as if we will never know. But as I stare out at this sea of beautiful suffering I can’t help but to feel how moved I am by the great characters she portrayed…or was it the wonderful images her words painted that shakes me? Thoughts of her untaken steps across the dimpled, weightless surface of the moon send a gravity throughout my being. That same gravity helps pull a tear from my eye and down my wind-blushed cheek.

What a wonderful thought to have. Some will gasp at that line. Please, allow me to explain. Clearly the cause for these blooming buds is tragedy, sadness and death. People perished in agony, you say, asking how I can be happy. As strange as it may sound, I am happy to have felt this sadness; I am thankful for the suffering they endured in the name of freedom and in the name of ending hatred (or at least slowing it for a time). Just as one doesn’t appreciate syrup until they’ve sipped vinegar, I’m standing here, full of smiles and joy, and now I feel a gratitude that I’m able to think in such positive, light ways.

When I push my mental form as close to those bunkers and fields and cockpits as I dare – which is admittedly nowhere near close enough to smell their pain – my mind’s lips are pursed from the sour contrast of my physical state. This reality is too sad to ever comprehend, but I feel indebted that this reality is in fact not my own. No, the reality in which I’m currently enveloped was paid for with the warm crimson now symbolized by this battlefield of blooms. I will walk away from this view a changed man, not necessarily a better man, perhaps a slightly more reality-filled man, but a changed man. And those brave souls will not have been taken in vein, nor will I have attended this great display in it.

p.s. Not to switch gears too fast, but as this is No-Shave November, and seeing as how I have officially started off No-Slack November in the right way, it seems appropriate to provide an update on my current beard situation. The truth is that I'm totally shocked to see how much growth has happened in two weeks.

Some of you BIG T gurus might not be so impressed. Whatever, the point of No-Shave November - or at least the point I have to harp on since I can't actually grow a legit beard - is to increase the awareness of men's health issues around the world. So to that I say make sure that you're using your God-given gift of BIG T for increasing awareness, and not just for ruffing up your girlfriend's kiss attempts.

]]><![CDATA[No-Slack November]]>Mon, 03 Nov 2014 15:26:19 GMThttp://www.outtolunch.co/food/no-slack-novemberA BLOGGER'S RESPONSE TO SLOW BEARD GROWTH

First things first, I have to give mad credit to those men that can grow intense facial hair. It is, at least according to Wikipedia, a secondary sex characteristic known for distinguishing the legitimacy of sexual partners to females of the same species. Well damn. First I have to wake up, again, to a non-scruffy face, and now Wikipedia informs me that my lack of beard is essentially the same as a lion with no mane or a peacock with shorter than average feathers. Why don’t you just add the line “Zack is a girl” to your post next time?

In addition to learning a bit more about beards, mustaches and mutton chops this morning, I’ve also done some research into the concept growing a beard in the month of November. It seemed foreign to me, but luckily the internet has a funny way of making once foreign concepts the topic of your next dinner party blab. As my bounce back to blogdom for the month of November, it seems only right that I give some love to the worthy cause known as No-Shave November.

The idea of No-Shave November or Movember or Noshember is credited to a group of 80 Australia bros (they actually call themselves Mo Bros) that decided on a faithful day in 1999 to “change the face of men’s health.” The basic idea is that men undergoing treatment for cancer, one of the pillar diseases the organization focuses on, almost always lose their hair, including the glorified facial variety. So by rocking some form of really sweet man scruff, the Mo Bros are showing a sign of their vigilance for their brothers undergoing treatment. This is easily the most justifiable reason I could have ever imagined for a man rocking a creepy moustache.

So here’s a big cheers to all the guys (and potentially women?) that are joining the fur frenzy for good reason this November. Be sure to remain conscience in the effort as the month progresses. There will surely be times when your best friend, mother, girlfriend or perhaps even a kind stranger insists that you shave the squirrel off of your face. Take the opportunity to turn their criticism of your grill into a speaking platform about an all too preventable illness. And while we're at it, let's hope that all women on the face of planet earth share the same sentiment as Minnie Pearl.

"Kissing a man with a beard is a lot like going to a picnic. You don't mind going through a little bush to get there!"

Minnie Pearl

]]><![CDATA[You Blew It]]>Mon, 04 Aug 2014 20:31:56 GMThttp://www.outtolunch.co/food/you-blew-itNOW LET'S BE CREATIVE

You read twenty-two BuzzFeed articles about eating healthy, and then, despite all better instincts, you broke down and ordered the cheesy chalupa with rice from Monterrey’s. Was it the right move? Probably not. Is it the end of the world? You’ll be surprised to hear me reply with an emphatic NO.

Everyone falls short of the glory of Jean Claude Van Damme’s abs from time to time (check out my photo tab if you’d like some visuals of my own shortcomings). The hard part isn’t veering from the straight and narrow path; the hard part is, however, taking the necessary strides to counter the mistakes we make along the way. This post will assume that each of us went Quesadilla Loco* for lunch and will offer a few in-office solutions to battle back against the burrito bulge.

*Quesadilla Loco can be substituted for any of the following luncheon landmines: Zaxby’s Zalad Grease Ballad, Artichoke Dip Artery Stint or my personal arch nemesis, the Turkey Club Flub

It sounds totally rudimentary, but some of us completely forget that simply moving around with even the slightest regularity offers a tremendous boost to our metabolism. And since we’ve already established that this particular day will be an excess of post-lunch goopity gunk kind of day, a boost in metabolic activity is in high demand. Science offers us a really complicated title for this phenomenon: non-exercise activity thermogenesis or NEAT for those that don’t already have enough acronyms for the day. NEAT ranges from the energy expended walking to work or typing to the calories burned performing yard work, gardening and/or fidgeting. The good news is that even trivial physical activities, such as the ones highlighted below, increase your metabolic rate substantially and join together with other bodily processes to culminate in a daily NEAT value – yes, this is in fact very neat.

Realistic For All:

Move…around…in…your…office/cubicle/lab space.

* Raise the roof – we’ve all heard the song…and now it is time to do the dance. Bust out 20 of these bad boys while you’re between emails. Not only will you up your NEAT levels, you’ll make your boss think that you’re thrilled about being at work. #doublewin #employeeofthemonth

* Water break – this is self-explanatory, but just in case you don’t know I will help you out. Your body and metabolism need water anyway, so go drink some so your kidneys stop hating you. Turn this into a regular task to help boost your NEAT in several ways, e.g., increased walking / increased hydration, and it will make you go pee more often, resulting in even more walking. That’s work synergy.

* Paragraph giraffe – did you just finish an awesome paragraph in the annual budget report? Well stand up and stretch out for a few minutes – imagine cleaning dusty ceiling fan blades without the aid of a ladder to maximize the burn. Your computer chair will appreciate the break from your ass.

Realistic For Most:

Start to venture away from the norm.

* Take your calls while standing – the average person burns 40-50 more calories an hour by standing instead of sitting. If you speak on the phone for two hours a day, which isn’t an exaggeration for anyone in customer service or internal sales, this amounts to roughly 200 extra calories you’ve burned by using your God-given right as a biped.

* Walking meetings – so if you’re trying to show someone your newly designed INDEX MATCH function this is not only impractical, it is dangerous. Walking while Exceling is a big no-go. But if you’re like 85% of “meeters” in the corporate world, the bullshit you’re talking about around a table can just as easily be bullshat about walking up or down the hall. The difference between sitting for an hour versus walking = 190 calories.

Ambitious:

You’re a total badass.

* Take a gym break – I told you it was ambitious. Before you flip your keyboard in anger just hear me out. Your office is probably no more than seven minutes from a gym. You can drive there, do thirty minutes of whatever the hell you want except for sit, shower and drive back to the labor lair in under an hour. Your employer might be so confused by your alien forms of recreation that they commend you.

* Enjoy your job – this is the most abstract one of all, and I saved it for last for two reasons: 1.) If you’ve stuck around this long you will probably hear me out, and 2.) this is easily the hardest of them all to do. If you actually enjoy your job then you will do what’s necessary to maintain or improve your skills for doing that job. There are more studies than I have hairs in support of the fact that even semi-regular physical activity increases blood flow, brain activity, ideation and creativity. Enjoying your gig will serve as a motivator in and of itself to help will you to fight back, either mentally or physically, against the dreaded metabolic shutdown caused by your lunch.

Just in case you needed one more demo:

]]><![CDATA[Supermarket Makeover]]>Fri, 09 May 2014 13:30:17 GMThttp://www.outtolunch.co/food/supermarket-makeoverTHAT TIME I WENT SUPERMARKET SWEEP ON 'EM

Our typical workday consists of norms: wake up, eat breakfast, shower (for most), arrive at work, nap at work, so on and so forth. Generally speaking, our after-work hours are filled with the same sort of habits: wake up from work nap, leave work, gym and/or bicep curls with grocery bags, dinner, TV and bed. My own weekends often consist of many of these midweek behaviors as well. Although I rarely do actual work on the weekends (sure, you can call me a Gen Y’er), I’d say roughly 95% of my M-F activities are present on my days off as well. Now although most of these habits are fine to be repeated, sometimes a little change can go a long way for your mental clarity and health. Well, as fate would have it, the food blogging angel pictured below must have known that my day-to-day was in need of a jolt. I doubt he intended said jolt to have such an effect on me, but I’m appreciative all the same.

Truly the master of mega food disaster and the man of the hour, Mr. Ed Southern, General Manager of the Carytown Kroger in Richmond, VA.

During my typical Sunday Kroger run a couple weeks ago, I came face to face – literally – with one of these system shakeups. I knew something was different from the moment I walked through the door and into the produce section. Aside from being my first and most frequented section, this area holds the distinction of amping me the hell up for what’s sure to be an hour of grocery shopping. If they have fresh kale and slightly green bananas, you might as well color me pleased. Anyway, that’s not what this is about, so I’ll stop blabbing and get to the point. On this particular day the aisles weren’t just filled with a wide variety of fruits and veggies; they were filled with a wide variety of fruits, veggies AND people. And not just any people, like the dads rocking sweatpants while picking up the evening’s dinner. No, these people were selling stuff. And not just random things that nobody at a grocery store wants, like flip-phone chargers or their overeaten and underfed bodies (although that would be hilarious); they were selling foods that they had made.

As I kept winding my cart through the store, I happened upon supplier after supplier of locally made, locally sourced foods being sold by the people that sprouted, cared for, packaged, canned and transported them. I could have sworn that all food was flown in by Anikan Skywalker on a Back to the Future hover board or that Tony the Tiger delivered everyone’s cereal on his way to the jungle. But here they were, the spoilers of my futuristic food fantasies, asking me if I’d like to sample their coffee, kale chips, freshly baked breads and homemade pickles. It turns out that real people make our food. Holy kale chips…who would have known?

A short intro to my latest post about grocery store adventures.

At this point, I have to come clean with the facts before going into much more detail. It wasn’t on my first pass through the store that I realized how golden this opportunity really was. In fact, I actually completed my shopping, passing many of the aforementioned vendors in doing so, paid for my items, and drove to the edge of the store’s parking lot before realizing that I was an idiot. I had just witnessed something for the first time in my entire buggy-pushing life. Never before in the history of frozen pizza and talking juice boxes have I walked into a grocery store where I met a collection of people that made my food. Never. Was I seriously going to pass up the opportunity to talk to these alien lifeforms of food creation just to get back to my ho-hum Sunday afternoon? With that epiphany in mind, I turned my car around – which, mind you, is full of groceries since I just left the damn store – parked, and waltzed my happy ass back into Kroger. This time I had my camera in hand instead of a shopping cart. Think about it for a second - how many times in recent memory or, for that matter, your most distant memory, can you recall a similar occurrence? If you’re like me, then no recollection rises to the surface. Isn’t that odd? Food comes from oxygen-breathing, blood-pumping, occasionally strange-smelling people, right? Yet, in an average trip to a store, you’d be hard-pressed to find a single purveyor of those foods. Furthermore, doesn’t it strike you as odd/a little depressing that the grocery store, the place where nearly all of us shop for our sustenance, maintains this moat of mystery between the consumer and the people that are supposed to be sourcing that sustenance? The reality is that most grocery stores (aka, 99.95% of them) are pumping that moat larger and larger for one reason and one reason alone: dolla dolla bills, y’all. But take special note that it isn’t just the grocery stores alone that deserve blame; it is also very much the end result of a gigantic push from the mega food suppliers that stock their shelves.

If you're in a pickle...or just want to taste a really delicious one, check out Chef Chaz Robinson from Sweet Sour Salty. He is 100% my pickle guy.

Some pretty lady (forgive me, I missed her name) and the Billy from Billy Bread pose with a crowd of happy bread and cookie lovers.

Foods from Stouffer’s, Nestlé, Breyer’s, Oscar Meyer, General Mills, etc. all have something in common that local food purveyors cannot, and most likely do not want to, compete with. That cohesive factor is predictability. To these aforementioned food giants, predictability translates into effective price modeling tools, more accurate forecasting, and ultimately bigger numbers on their financial statements – yes, a very valuable quality for a publicly traded company that cares A LOT about profits. This predictability enables them the control to keep their product suppliers (namely huge agro complexes, distribution networks and major grocery stores) under the iron thumb of supply and demand. When push comes to shove and one of these major players sees a dip in sales, they intentionally insulate themselves from these cold periods by passing on pricing pressure to those same suppliers and distributors. How ironic, considering a lot of their food can be found in the frozen foods section.

APPROXIMATE CALCULATION OF LIFETIME GROCERY STORE VISITS

0.8 times per week (I’m always hungry) * 52 weeks in a year * 26 years in my life = 1081.6 visits

NUMBER OF TIMES THIS HAS HAPPENED

1 time…ever

PROBABILITY OF THIS HAPPENING AGAIN

1/1081.6 = .09245% repeating of course

Doug Gammon and son from Sun Seasoned Raw Foods had the whole party screaming our favorite shopping day cheer: KALE YEA!

I didn't really need the caffeine since I was stoked beyond belief during this particular trip to Kroger. However, were the need for midday (natural) speed to have struck, Stephen from Blanchard's Coffee had my back.

From the small food business owner’s point of view, this predictability is something that they simply cannot compete with. Aside from being held subject to the previously described price pressures, nearly all of these small businesses hold true to the value of high quality – a trait replaced long ago with greed by the big boys. Don’t mistake what I’m saying: large corporations also have very high quality standards by which they operate. The million (gazillion?) pound difference is that smaller mom-and-pop shops tend to emphasize the quality of nourishment that their foods provide to the eater, not simply the visual integrity and/or lack of insects onboard the initial supply they receive. There are many reasons for this. One of the most powerful reasons also happens to be the single biggest advantage of buying from the little guy: better health for the consumer. Building upon the first, an additional reason is the level of transparency/vulnerability that’s present when vendor X sells to patron Y with no middle man present.

I looked into the eyes of each of these people as they passed their artisanal breads, spiced coffees, sage and garlic sausages, AWESOME cakes and barrage of pickled goods from their hands to mine. There exists an inexplicable level of connection and symbiosis with such a trade. Primitively stated, there is a little something called trust that is silent partner to such an exchange. I know it sounds nostalgic, but I think the fact that we brush this intimacy off as though it never existed is a sign of our numbness to the woes of our current food system. In days past, a store owner knew the names of those people that shopped in his store, shook their hands, kept their tabs on a burlap sack, watched the children of their customers grow into healthy, happy adults, and eventually become loyal customers themselves. In the modern system that way is no more. There is no accountability between the corporations that sell you the food that you purchase. I think that’s the biggest takeaway from my recent Kroger trip. Having a real-life encounter with someone who had labored to create, package and deliver the food that I was eating felt totally foreign, and that, in turn, felt totally wrong.

I'm just glad it wasn't my wiener. But really, Brad from Sausage Craft is piecing together some ridiculous concoctions inside a pork casing. Strangely enough, they ALL taste awesome.

This unknown guy and gal pair from Bold Rock Cider were dishing out some seriously yummy, extremely low calorie/low sugar cocktails. Talk about the perfect ending to the perfect shopping trip.

]]><![CDATA[So What Now?]]>Thu, 20 Mar 2014 15:45:23 GMThttp://www.outtolunch.co/food/so-what-nowPRACTICAL STEPS FOR FIGHTING THE RIGHT DIET FIGHT

We get it. People are unhealthy and the primary reason is that we eat terribly — too much of the wrong stuff and too little of the right.

Bashing the current food system does a lot of things: it brings awareness to the issue, it empowers people to have a say in the matter, it’s pretty funny if you do it right, and it makes me feel better for having taken a stand against something I feel is harmful. But I’m not blind to one of the largest issues that threaten the success of this blog and the health of its readers: too many people depend on the Megatron that is the industrialized food system to simply kick poor eating habits cold turkey. In addition to offering my insight into the wrongs of the way you’re currently being fed/feeding yourself, I also want to offer relatable, reliable advice on how to begin the transformation from a feeble Shia LaBeouf of planet Clueless to the badass Optimus Prime of WholeFoodsium. But just as a hobbled athlete should carefully follow the instructions of their physical therapist for rehabilitating a broken leg, so should you treat your nutritional malady. Wheelchair to full sprint won’t work for LeBron James, and it won’t work for you.

It has been proven time and again that skipping the proper rehab in this healing scenario is a recipe for failure. By subtracting just a few unhealthy food options or habits and replacing them with more beneficial alternatives, the road to health will seem less like a distant planet than ever before. There are a lot of reasons for this. To keep it short and sweet – for lack of a better phrase – I’ve offered up just a few of these reasons below:

1.) Keep your brain away from freak out mode:

Eliminating small amounts of those guilt foods at a time allows your brain to avoid freak out mode. Really. This isn’t a joke. Our brains are wired for rewards, and the perfectly balanced combo of sugar/salt/fat in your average Little Debbie Cake* puts your brain in the same mode as sexual pleasure [1]. Here, you can clearly see why you aren’t just fighting a craving when that itch to chow down on junk food strikes; you’re fighting physiology. I know what you’re thinking: damn, these scientists are doing it right!

*Ok, so it's like having an orgasm, and it's like an instant antidepressant. So, that's pretty much exactly how I looked at them to begin with and I'll probably continue to eat them impulsively for those very reasons. I’m still human.

2.) Help kickstart your metabolism:

Your body’s engine didn’t get to its current stagnant state in one day. It won’t turn that around in one day either. Going gung-ho from the start gun will most likely lead to the following scenario: you eat kale/basil salads with pine tar dressing for two weeks straight, you’re totally miserable because of the situation described in point #1 above and, despite all your effort, you’ve gained weight. That’s right, GAINED WEIGHT! What? How could this be? Well, for one, there is a far deeper mind/body connection going on than most people realize. When your mind is depressed because you haven’t been doping up on Little Debbie, your body responds by working less efficiently, which affects your dietary efforts because of decreased metabolism. This is a complicated matter to be sure, but I bet many of you previous diet adventurers have firsthand knowledge of this phenomenon. Now you know why it happens.

3.) Slow and steady wins the race, and not just when you’re racing a hare:

We’ve seen from 1.) and 2.) that a few replacements at a time is most likely the right prescription for your diet dilemma. Number 3.) is less about science and more about balance. Taking on any monumental change can seem a lot like...well, a lot like knocking down a damn mountain. Chipping away one or two pick swings at a time is the only way to go. I know the metaphor seems like a stretch, but it is so true. Treating this positive lifestyle change like a sprint will leave you exhausted on the trail before you’re fully prepared. Marathoners train for months to run 26.2 miles, composers craft their art for years before The Metropolitan Opera House calls, and you should treat this transformation with the same diligence and patience. You’re painting a masterpiece, not a hopscotch board in sidewalk chalk.

Now with these three simple strategies in mind, let’s have a look at a few diet swaps you can pull off to get the healthy party started.

● Kale yea! Eat this rough SOB instead of iceberg, romaine, or spinach for your next salad. Yes, this means you have to eat salad.

As a general rule of thumb, the darker the green of your vegetable, the more nutritious – see beta carotene content if you want to get real food boner going [2]. This means that by using nothing more than your eyes at the grocery store, a sense that marketers have abused for many years in the packaged sections, you can actually see the healthiest items in the produce section.

● Sweet, yes, SWEET Potatoes. Eat this gnarly tuber instead of white or red potatoes the next time you’re throwing down a mash or veggie roast.

Fooled ya, sucka. They aren’t actually all that sweet as compared to the aforementioned snack cakes we adore. They are healthy, though. Sweet potatoes have the highest % content of the powerful antioxidant beta carotene versus any other food. Additionally, the glycemic index (GI) of sweet potatoes - which in laymen’s terms is a measure of how foods affect your blood sugar - is about half that of the white alternative.

● 100% whole grain wheat bread. I almost don’t know where to start.

WE. EAT. WAY. TOO. MUCH. BREAD. That is a fact. Another fact is that we eat way too much stuff that wants to be bread but is more of a toy soldier hiding in your cupboard than an Army Ranger on the battlefield. If you've checked out the ingredient list on your average loaf of Nature’s Own or Wonder Bread lately, you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about. Here is a recipe for bread that I've used myself and know tastes great [3]: 1 1/2 cups water, 4 cups flour, 1 1/2 tsp of salt and 2 1/2 tsp dry yeast. That is all. So if that is all that it takes to make your own bread, then you might be asking yourself why in the hell your bread has so much other shit in there? Great question. It has so much ‘other shit’ in there because those chemicals are necessary for large food manufacturers to process, store, leaven, package, maintain, and price model the bread that you consume. These scientific formulas allow for more predictable outcomes. And for those financiers out there reading this, you guessed it right, more predictable outcomes lead to higher profits. Long story short: eat less bread no matter what, and make sure that you’re actually eating bread instead of a chemistry set the next time you do choose to indulge.

Sources:

[1] http://www.theguardian.com/news/2013/oct/17/guardian-short-ebook-extract-addicted-to-food

[2] http://www.healthaliciousness.com/articles/natural-food-sources-of-beta-carotene.php

[3] http://www.foodie.com/recipes/basic-machine-french-bread

]]><![CDATA[Prehistoric Bodies, Drive-Thru Lifestyles]]>Thu, 13 Feb 2014 22:25:39 GMThttp://www.outtolunch.co/food/prehistoric-bodies-drive-thru-lifestylesBODIES BUILT FOR 1355 LIVING LIKE ITS 2150

Coffee pot talk is a staple of my morning routine. Sometimes I drink coffee. Other times I don’t drink coffee. But whether I choose to indulge in the caffeine dream or not, I rarely miss that ten minute block beginning around 8:15 each morning. Why?

a.) It is a great way to log a few precious moments of social interaction before going all Jedi mind trick with my computer screen.

b.) It is a goldmine for writing topics for this blog. Seriously.

I’m generally hard-pressed to pass minute four before the “What’s for lunch?” chatter begins. If that starts at minute four, my head is unconsciously shaking by minute seven. By minute ten, my body’s in full-blown Harlem Shake mode, which for some reason is the default ‘get me the F out of here; I can’t listen to this crap any more’ setting. Staring contests with a LED screen have to be better – and less frustrating – than listening to people plot the atomic bomb mission they are about to call in on their metabolisms.

Our bodies are essentially the same now as they were more than 40,000 years ago, showing very little changes since the time when we overrode the Neanderthals. What has changed is our diets. Think plugging your Prius’ battery charger up to a Model T, or cramming the latest Xbox One disc into your Uncle Robert’s Atari console. Even the least technologically advanced among us would think either of these scenarios to be silly, right? Well, judging by the quantity, quality, and variety of foods we’re putting into our bodies, the answer is no. In addition to eating more, we work out less and spend much more time sedentary – sitting at computers, playing video games and prowling YouTube for the next Justin Bieber. We also cook for ourselves less than ever before. All of these factors combined are causing a national health crisis of epidemic proportions.

Let me hit you with a few stats: 72% of adults and 32% of adolescents and children in our country are overweight or obese, nearly 10% of Americans suffer from diabetes, cancer is both more prevalent and increasing at a faster rate than ever before, and 1 in 4 deaths in the US are related to heart disease [1]. Now let me hit you with a fact: EACH AND EVERY ONE OF THESE ISSUES ARE DIRECTLY RELATED TO YOUR DIET AND LIFESTYLE. I’m going to do my best to avoid being super scientific when writing these posts. I just think that when making sweeping statements such as the one above, there needs to be at least some research-based support behind them. Otherwise, my claims are about as valid as Tony the Tiger telling you that Frosted Flakes are great. They aren’t.

In the October 2000 edition of The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, a Harvard researcher and his crew of nutrition henchmen released a paper documenting the prevalence of Coronary Heart Disease (CHD) in men aged 40-75. The study, which consisted of 44,875 medical professionals – that’s right, medical professionals have shitty diets, too – tracked eight years’ worth of follow-up (1986-1994) from the test subjects. To summarize briefly, each study participant filled out the equivalent of a 131-question food SAT, known in the biz as a food frequency questionnaire. This tool is used to determine the overall dietary patterns of the eaters and how those patterns lead to CHD. If you’re interested in reading more on the ins and outs of the study (#highlyencouraged) then do so. I don’t want to waste too much time citing another literary piece that you can read on your own.

So what did they find? Basically, that listening to your mom’s advice from your pre-teen years was/is/ideally will always be the gospel. In a trend coined by the authors as the ‘prudent pattern’, study results revealed that the consumption of more vegetables, fruit, legumes, whole grains, fish, and poultry led to a statistically significant pattern of lower risk for CHD and CHD-related death. That’s the positive trend they picked up. The other statistically significant trend derived from the study’s intel: the so-titled “Western pattern” of diet, characterized by higher intake of red meat, processed meat, refined grains, sweets and dessert, French fries, and high-fat dairy products – you know, basically everything that the average person eats during their lunch - led to dramatically increased risk rates for the development of CHD and CHD-related deaths [2].

“Yea, yea, yea,” you all say, “we’ve heard this sermon before.” I won't argue that you havn't. The only reason I take the time to sing your favorite health song’s chorus yet again is that the verdict is in and this stuff is killing people. Let me reiterate: WHAT YOU ARE EATING DURING YOUR LUNCH BREAKS IS KILLING YOU. That is not a statement I bring to the table lightly, nor is it one that I expect people to digest easily. But whether you’re thrilled to no end to hear the news or want to cybersmack me via Skype, the reality of the situation remains the same.

In these next posts, I will begin breaking down some of the current lunch pitfalls in which we find ourselves. There won’t be a constant barrage of dining don’ts in the mix though. I would rather take our time to offer up dining do’s instead. The way I see it is that we only have so many hours in a day to eat. If we begin replacing the things that we should not eat with those that we should, our bodies (and minds) will begin to slowly but surely buy into the idea of being fed rather than simply eating. As that transformation happens our lifestyles will become more harmonized with the bodies that lead them.

Sources:

[1] Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

[2] Am J Clin Nutr October 2000; vol. 7; 2 no. 4; 912-921

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Just a reminder of the before and after.

Let me learn ya something.

Let me learn ya something.

Let me learn ya something.