Cost of living

[red750]

Baked beans are OK - occasionally, but you wouldn't want to live on them. Anything is OK in moderation. HJ's or pizza is OK for a change, but regular meat and three+ vegies is best. If you are out and about, and the only food place around is Maccas or KFC, that may be OK once a year.

 

Baked beans on toast can make a warm lunch on a cold wet weekend. That reminds me - better pop down to Woolies.

[facthunter]

The 2 things with baked beans. They are convenient and make you fart. Nothing's perfect.   Nev

[old man emu]

51 minutes ago, facthunter said:

The 2 things with baked beans. They are convenient and make you fart. Nothing's perfect.   Nev

They only make you fart if you don't eat them somewhat regularly. Nutritionally speaking, beans (typically haricot or cannellini) are a good source of plant-based protein and are high in fibre, as well as being low in fat and calories.  Typically, about a third of the can contents is tomato sauce, which is rich in lycopene – a protective carotenoid that's associated with a lower risk of heart disease. If you want to get way into the health-nut area, you could always rinse the sauce off the beans and then add your own homemade, low salt, low sugar sauce.

 

If you really think about it, buying any type of fast food while away from home is uneconomical. For starters you are paying a contribution to the overheads of the shop. Then there are the variables arising from the cost of ingredients. Add those together and a further BIG percentage for profit, and you can see that there are more economical ways to grab a bite. Do you really need a big calorie intake in the middle of the day? Why not fill up with fruit or raw vegetables? They provide bulkiness that signals the brain that the stomach is fully loaded, so tell the mouth to shut. The only problems with eating a lot of fruit are that it doesn't extract your "sweet tooth", nor overly excite the taste buds in the way that animal proteins and plant flavourings do. And don't forget milk. It is about 90% water and 62 calories per 100 ml.

 

In reality, the best fast food for lunch is a salad sandwich, either from a sandwich shop or Subway. Buying food from these places allows you to control exactly what you want, with no secret ingredients. However, the first thing you need to take the fruit & veg or salad sandwich routes is a massive helping of dietary rethinking. 

 

 

[facthunter]

Mostly I just use fruit  for lunch when I'm on the road.  but it won't travel  forever. The time element is important to if you have large distances and arrangements to fit in with. Dried fruit the tin of beans and nut's are an ok thing.. Keep the water up is more important. Nev

[red750]

There are not many pleasures left in life tese days, very boring. So occasionally I like to treat myself. It doesn't have to be expensive. A Hungry Jacks Barbecue Burger is a small cheeseburger with BBQ sauce. Very tasty, and only $3 dollars. May not be all that nutritious, but perks the spirit. Sometimes, not too often, for lunch at the Men's Shed, I will take one of those bowls of instant noodles, when they are on special at 97c. Just add boiling water and wait a few minutes. What doesn't fatten will fill as my mother used to say.

[facthunter]

These things are sent to TRY us my mother used to say but I'm not interested in being "tried" any more..   Nev

[old man emu]

1 hour ago, red750 said:

So occasionally I like to treat myself.

Our kids are told in primary school that some foods are "sometimes foods". We really should look at fast food that way, and not as a regular part of a diet. But in Australia, our experience of fast food is really only a phenomenon of the late 20th Century. Macca's first store was opened in Sydney about 50 years ago. Then there was the fried chicken. I think there were Southern Fried Chicken places before KFC arrived. I remember Henny Penny. Then we had the Asian and Middle Eastern immigrations which gave us meals based on noodles as opposed to the "traditional" Aussie Chow Feed, then as well the kebab and falafel. These foods come from a tradition of "street food" in those countries.

 

Because we were not as urbanised until the late 20th Century, or maybe it was our British industrial worker heritage, we did not develop a wide range of street food. Perhaps the only examples were the hot dog vendors at the football, or the pie carts in the city.

[Yenn]

I was spoilt for food in my youth, living on a farm which produced vegies, milk and meat.

In the army we had baked beans far too often and I don't eat them now.

Hamburgers are not food to me, I think it is the excess of bread in them and I never eat white bread. All the bread we eat in my house is self baked and sourdough and in over ten years of baking I have never made a white loaf.

Meat and two veg or fish or a pasta type dish is best for dinner and lunch a bit of bread with meat or cheese, some greens, tomato and then fruit goes well. main thing is to have a good breakfast, muesly fruit, toast with the occasional meat or egg cooked. It has kept me fit for a few years, but it didn't stop cancer having a go at me.

[red750]

When we moved to Sydney in late 1972 under Bank transfer, and 6 months after getting married, we were put up at the Bank's expense, in a motel on Liverpool Rd Strathfield while we looked for a house. The restaurant served nice meals, but was closed on Sundays so we would go to Hungry Jacks for a Whopper or a Yumbo, at Yagoona.

 

For me, breakfast is a bowl of cornflakes, or two crumpets with Vegemite. Haven't had a 'cooked' breakfast in over 10 years.

[old man emu]

I make my own muesli. A simple recipe using rolled oats, bran sticks and fruit and nut. A bit of cinnamon  and nutmeg (of mace) for a bit of spice. About $10 per month and it keeps me regular. It's filling, too. 

[onetrack]

Meals are all about balance to me - the right balance of carbs, fats, fibre, sugars and protein. A lot of fruit is high in sugar, so eating fruit still gives you a sizeable sugar intake.

The major benefit of fresh fruit is the fruit sugar comes with fibre and flavonoids (polyphenols) which are very good for you. Flavonoids are found in many other foods besides fruit.

 

Vast amounts of our cooked, bought food today is unbalanced - it's high in processed sugars, high in bad fats, and has a massive level of carbohydrates with it (bread and chips).

Nearly every meal bought in cafes, restaurants, and fast food places comes with huge, doughy, gutless, highly-processed buns and massive serves of chips. The chip serving size is usually big enough for a meal in itself.

 

The buns are horrible things, full of sugar and chemicals and cooked rapidly in bulk in a commercial process that is reliant on speed of production, not on eating and nutritional quality.

 

Too much food today is deep-fried, and cooked in oil that is initially poor quality oil, which is then further degraded by the low-grade fats that come out of the food cooked in it (sausage fats, and all "pre-prepared" fast foods) - then it used over and over again for weeks, until it borders on being rancid.

 

Add in the fact that these cooking oils have "anti-oxidants" added to them (all aimed at stopping the oil going rancid rapidly) - and those "anti-oxidants", despite sounding good, are nearly always chemicals produced in industrial processes, using petroleum industry products as their base!

Polyethylene glycol is a classic petroleum-based chemical used in foods and now there are many warnings about the possibility of adverse effects from the use of it in foodstuffs.

 

This is my ideal meal when I eat out - pan-fried premium local fish, not farmed in polluted Asian fish farms, with a nice balance of salad from local vegetables, and a small serve of chips to provide the balance of fats and carbs. No need for a massive coating of oily, greasy batter on everything.

At home I always cook with olive oil, sometimes with a bit of butter added, as butter adds excellent flavour to almost anything.

 

 

 

 

Edited September 3, 2022 by onetrack

[Yenn]

That's a good summing up Onetrack.

[Jerry_Atrick]

I have to admit, I am a bit of a junk food aficionado. When I am on the road, my body does sometimes take a beating. A few weeks ago, I was in London for three days, leaving the office very late each night. The hotel I was at for two nights was in a motorway services, and only Burger King and KFC was still open by the time I got there. Neither have any form of healthy food option, so it was BK and KFC alternating. Had the BK twice, as the KFC is no where near as good as in Aus. 

 

Although I probably have the sweetest and junkiest food teeth on the planet, my mum did a great job curtailing it as a kid and making sure we had healthy and delicious meals. Sadly, my brother got the food gene in terms of cooking ability and appetite for healthier foods. Remember the days when you or your parents wrote you lunch order on the paper bag and put the money in it for the tuck shop? My brother's order was always a salad roll... mine.. .a pie and sauce.

 

Whenever I visit Aus (usually land in Melbourne), I make a bee-line for Coles Express to get a four 'n twenty pie (7-eleven don't sell them anymore; milk bars are far and few between - and they don't seem to have the pie warmers any more).

 

However, except for Friday morning and Sunday morning, I *try* to keep it healthy enough. This morning - two nitrate and preservative free snags on a mini-baguette.

 

 

[old man emu]

37 minutes ago, Jerry_Atrick said:

This morning - two nitrate and preservative free snags on a mini-baguette.

Went to Homebase for the sausage sizzle, did you?

[Jerry_Atrick]

No sausage sizzles here... That went the way of the UK Bunnings Do Do...

 

Friends up the road rear their own rare-breed pigs, and convert some of their bits into free range, additive free sausages... Very yummy, too... 

[red750]

OK. So it's only 7 days since the last plate of fish and chips, but that's what my son decided on for Fathers Day. However, when we cook at home, which is most days, we don't use fat or oils. If we grill a steak in a frypan, we use canola spray to prevent sticking. Other foods (chicken schnitzels, keivs, rissoles, eetc) are done in the air fryer, using hot circulating air. Fats in the meat drain out. Frozen chips or wedges are also done in the air fryer. All nice and crisp, and no greasy gunk.

 

Home fried chicken is done on a chicken rack (below) and basted in chicken stock. Fat drains off.

 

If we are roasting beef, lamb or pork, it is done in rice bran oil, along with the potatoes, pumpkin and sweet potato. Beans & broccoli are steamed,and carrots are boiled.

 

 

[Marty_d]

1 hour ago, red750 said:

OK. So it's only 7 days since the last plate of fish and chips, but that's what my son decided on for Fathers Day. However, when we cook at home, which is most days, we don't use fat or oils. If we grill a steak in a frypan, we use canola spray to prevent sticking. Other foods (chicken schnitzels, keivs, rissoles, eetc) are done in the air fryer, using hot circulating air. Fats in the meat drain out. Frozen chips or wedges are also done in the air fryer. All nice and crisp, and no greasy gunk.

 

Home fried chicken is done on a chicken rack (below) and basted in chicken stock. Fat drains off.

 

If we are roasting beef, lamb or pork, it is done in rice bran oil, along with the potatoes, pumpkin and sweet potato. Beans & broccoli are steamed,and carrots are boiled.

 

 

One of our Polish friends cooked a chicken vertically once.  440ml tall can of beer up its clacker.  Tasted quite nice.

[onetrack]

Chicken has to be flavoured with something, it's normally a bit bland. My favourite is to stuff a peeled lemon up the chook, with a few little slivers of ginger. The lemon juice preserves the meat too, so any uneaten portion lasts longer.

[Jerry_Atrick]

Tonight, one of my favourite meats - lamb shank.. with vegetables (it's autumn now, although still 20C - or 290K (as I recall). My partner, who is a star home chef, put on potatoes dauphinoise (sp?), with lashes of cream and garlic, so any healthy benefits went out the window. However, to combat it, I got myself a nice Coonawarra Shiraz, for next to nothing.

[Marty_d]

52 minutes ago, Jerry_Atrick said:

Tonight, one of my favourite meats - lamb shank.. with vegetables (it's autumn now, although still 20C - or 290K (as I recall). My partner, who is a star home chef, put on potatoes dauphinoise (sp?), with lashes of cream and garlic, so any healthy benefits went out the window. However, to combat it, I got myself a nice Coonawarra Shiraz, for next to nothing.

Shiraz is health food?  That's the best news I've heard all year!

[old man emu]

16 minutes ago, Marty_d said:

Shiraz is health food? 

Too bloody right, mate. And if you've got problems with your prostate, switch to that great red wine, Pinot Moor.

[Marty_d]

3 hours ago, old man emu said:

Too bloody right, mate. And if you've got problems with your prostate, switch to that great red wine, Pinot Moor.

I've heard that it takes 10 minutes to fill a glass with that stuff, it only comes out of the bottle in dribbles.

[facthunter]

The Chinese rejection of some of our BEST reds has caused the wine industry here about 800 million dollars . Some will go out of business and meanwhile some good reds should be available but I wouldn't recommend alcohol for a Prostate cancer. Nev

[Yenn]

fast food is sorted out by the wildlife. I pick up rubbish on the road during my morning walks and I notice that Macdonalds left overs don't get eaten by the ants or crows around here. They know rubbish food when they see it.

[old man emu]

The Age Pension will receive its biggest boost in 12 years when the second of the twice-yearly reviews takes effect from 20 September. The new Age Pension rates will take the single fortnightly payment from $987.60, with supplements, to $1026.50. 

 

The numbers look good when you see  them in you bank account. Omar Khayyam said it all in Verse 12 of his poem, The Rubaiyat

 

A Book of Verses underneath the Bough,
A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread--and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness--
Oh, Wilderness were Paradise enow!

 

But the price of a jug of wine and a loaf of bread and  a Kindle download of a book of verses are all more expensive than they were this time last year.