[Sca-cooks] Benefits of certain foods vs a balanced diet

[marilyn traber 011221]

You know, I think that we, as cooks, need to chill out a bit. While I'm 
writing this, triggered by the current chocolate controversy, the principles 
involved go well beyond any particular food item.

How many times, over the years, has some new book come out touting the 
wonderful benefits of this or that food? I ignore most of that garbage, but I 
can name off hand watching people go through the benefits of garlic, oatmeal, 
yogurt, the current low carb/high protein fad in its various forms, yogurt, 
organic foods, red wine, and at least a dozen more.

Bottom line is, if you were to eat nothing but the wonderfood of the moment, 
you'd starve to death, or at least come down with serious nutritional 
deficiencies, in fairly short order.

Food is good for you. At least, lack of food is very bad for you. But it's 
not all the wonders of a particular food that will keep you healthy and 
happy, any more than a soloist makes a symphony. Instead, each food 
contributes to the overall effect, with individual foods adding their accent 
notes, to enrich the whole.

Eat a wide variety of foods, in reasonable quantities, and mix your 
consumption with reasonable exercise (unless you think the musicians in a 
symphony orchestra got there without practice, practice, practice) and enjoy 
your particular favorite foods as part of that symphony.

Even our Medieval forebears understood this much- do you see any of them 
suggesting that you live on nothing but a particular food? No- all of them 
say that this food has this characteristic, that food the other, each to be 
used, in concert with others, to create a healthy diet.

And, for those of you who might choose to bring up the various fasts that 
Medieval folk, particularly religious, went through, I'd like to point out 
that they fully recognized that such activities were a sacrifice, and they 
expressed respect and admiration for the sacrifices that the fasters were 
making.

Phlip