Expensive Diet
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Expensive Diet
Those who have no time or money for healthy eating will one day have to make time and spend money to treat their illnesses.
Eating Meat is Expensive
You’re 100% correct, eating meat is expensive, if you’re eating all the traditional sides with it. Let’s break down a steak dinner into the purest out-of-pocket cost using dollar figures from WalMart online, Dec 30 2022. A steak dinner carries the stigma of celebration, or at the very least it’s an infrequent meal, so we tend to roll out bigger portions of sides, or more sides, and soon it starts to look like a Thanksgiving meal! But we are going to treat this like a “special dinner” and not go too crazy.
This is for 1 person, as I am presuming you’re either single or the only one in a household who has to prove to everyone else this works and you’re not crazy. There are many variations of how to do this, such as higher protein and less fat, or higher fat and less protein. I’m going to try to keep it simple and do a small to medium-sized portion for a single dinner plate, presuming the use of cheese to cover a baked potato, salad, and broccoli. You’ll require butter to cook with, so that’s figured in as well.
Let’s treat this like you’re in a fast food restaurant where you get to make a plate. The plate will come with a bowl of salad (with crutons, cheese, and ranch dressing), a serving of broccoli, a baked potato with cheese and butter, a piece of garlic bread and a pad of butter on that. Your only option is to now add a protein, which will be steak, chicken, or salmon.
With the data below, not including protein choice, a plate will cost you $7 to assemble. The larger number is the total cost, the first number in ( ) is the cost per ounc, and the final number is the cost of a suggested serving of that food or ingredient. I am keeping this by the serving suggestion as we read nutrition labels, and those numbers refer to a single serving. Add your protein to get the cost of the total plate. Again, this is one person.
Proteins
Steak, cost is $7/lb ($0.44/oz)
Chicken, cost is $3.50/lb ($0.22/oz)
Salmon, cost is $9/lb ($0.56/oz)
Vegetables
Bagged Salad, cost is $3.18 ($0.13/oz) (.91/serving)
Broccoli, cost is $2.88 ($0.24/oz) (.96/serving)
Salad Toppings
Ranch Dressing, cost is $3.98, ($0.25/oz) (.75/serving)
Crutons, cost is $1.78 ($0.36.oz) (.40/serving)
Shredded Cheese, cost is $5.68 ($0.35/oz) (1.50/serving)
Sides
Baking Potato, cost is $0.88 ($0.98/lb) (.88/serving)
Garlic Bread Loaf, cost is $2.48 ($0.16/oz) (.35/serving)
Butter, cost is $4.18 ($0.52/oz) (1.25/serving)
The Entire Plate
Now let’s add the 6oz of protein:
6oz Steak: $2.64 + $7 = $9.64
6oz Chicken: $1.32 + $7 = $8.32
6oz Salmon: $3.36 + $7 = $10.36
As I began with, I hope you see that eating meat only is not expensive. It’s all of the sides which add up. And that was an example for just one plate. How expensive was that entire dinner, times 2, 3, 4, or 5 mouths to feed? If you’re making meals for one, consider the cost of these veggies if you don’t eat them over the next couple of meals until they’re consumed.
Now you’re probably (and understandably) logically thinking that you’d be full from that original protein plus sides plate, and if you remove the sides to be a carnivore, you’ll still be hungry. Stay here for a second. Using that logic, understand that once you have become fat adapted, which means your body is consuming fat for energy, and you’re using your own body fat for fuel (presuming you’re also doing this to lose weight), after 10-30 days of eating a heavy fat/protein diet you’ll find you only need smaller amounts of the proteins, and you won’t need (nor will you) miss the sides. But this is day one of your new lifestyle, so you’re hungry. Instead of 6oz of steak, you eat 12oz. You’ve still only consumed $5.28 of steak, $2.64 of chicken, or $6.72 of salmon. If you double or triple the healthy part of your meal to reach satiety, you’re ahead of the game because your body won’t be hungry later.
The huge catch to all of this is that you need to get sugar out of your diet, and this is difficult and requires sacrifice. The new trend is keto, and we fall for buying items with the word “keto” because that typically indicates healthy. You can safely add at least 10% up to 100% of the price to anything on your menu list marketed to a keto crowd. Note a sneaky way to charge the same so that you’re seemingly getting a bargain is the quantity may be less. If you haven’t considered a “healthy” alternative to Philly Whipped Cream cheese, the joke is on you. All the manufacturer did was whip air into the same product you used to consume, so a teaspoon of the new whipped product will obviously and naturally have less product, which consequently means it has less of all of the ingredients. This isn’t scientific, but presuming they removed 25% of the original product by injecting and fluffing it with air, doesn’t it seem to follow that particular product has “25% less fat/sugar/oil” or whatever is in it? Also, know that just because it says keto doesn’t mean it’s clean. These manufacturers are going after your sweet tooth, so there will undoubtedly be another ingredient or several to make up for the lack of sugar in one of its 17 cloaked forms. Now you’re putting things in your body that are pretty darned unnatural. This is known as trash keto.
All proteins all the time is boring
Well, I’m not going to disagree with you here, but that is to say I’m not going to disagree that eating the same foods repeatedly can get boring.
As your friend is stuffing their face with oily fried chicken or a couple pieces of pizza, and giving you the side eye because “all you eat is meat” I sure hope you’re taking a hard look at this scenario. While they eat trash foods and give you a hard time about eating only meat, do they really know what they’re talking about? It’s the overweight smoker that steps into the gym and announces they’re your new coach. Seriously? Ask your friend what they eat in a 14 day period. I’ll bet my life they repeat-eat the same things every week, sometimes every day. What they’re eating is killing them though.
We have been taught to have a balanced plate, and you’ve likely seen graphics about this. It may show a plate with a pie chart, explaining how much of the plate should be covered with what food items. That “balanced plate” includes foods that should never be in our dietary intakes, however “the science” has taught us for years, even decades, what is supposed to be healthy for us. When you understand the food pyramid was created in 1977 by the US Dept of Agriculture, and not the US Dept of Health, perhaps you will understand why I say: Follow the money and you’ll find the science. Since when did you let a bunch of suits in Washington DC decide the course of your dietary intake? Seriously, that’s precisely what happened. This was part of a lobbying effort in order to gain momentum for plant-based farming. You were informed by a group of people in the Dept of Agriculture what should be on your plate. That’s like getting health advice from the people who produce athletic clothing. In the meantime, while we’ve reduced cholesterol intake by 30%, meat intake by 33%, and increased our fruits and vegetable intake by 30-40%, we have tripled the number of people with heart disease, strokes, cancer, diabetes, autism, Alzheimers, and so much more. Please visit the video link below this paragraph to hear Dr. Anthony Chaffee explain this.
If you consider there was a time the cigarette industry was being praised by doctors, yet now vilified by health professionals around the globe, it’s easy to consider the impact a retraction of “oops, we may have gotten something wrong” when it comes to cursing cholesterol, red meat, dairy, and other animal based foods would have. Yet nobody on the winning side of your poor health is anxious to curb their enthusiasm for their profits. In fact, they are doubling down and doing so by taking advantage of your sugar addiction. Fat-reduced foods tasted horrible, so sugar in one or more of its many forms was thrown in for good taste measure. Animal fats were replaced with seed oils which are high in linoleic acid and Omega 6 fatty acids. These contribute to or cause your inflammation issues and other very common issues shared with people around the world who eat poorly. Dr. Paul Saladino explains this intensely in a podcast specifically on this topic.
If we were to sit with pen and paper, and truly take stock of an entire week’s worth of eating, I’d be willing to bet your variety isn’t as “varied” as you believe it to be. You likely have your favorite snacks, vegetables, salad dressings, breads, soft drinks, coffee flavors, your go-to lunch visits, and desserts. In fact, it’s probably so routine that you could mentally make a list of all of these items in pretty rapid fashion. Now, when you realize that you also eat the same thing all the time, is it boring, or are you addicted to certain things?
Eating your emotions
We have learned to associate eating with our emotions. We celebrate something special, so we go out to eat, and because the celebration is such a grand thing, we opt for dessert after the meal. Or we eat at home, feast style, clanking our goblets of red wine. We are profoundly sad after a breakup or some other loss, and we eat that sadness in a bowl of ice cream, a bag of chips, or a container of cookies. We might add a glass or bottle of wine to the mix.
Sugar is a huge part of this emotional eating, because it feeds our cravings. Are you aware of the speed at which sugar affects your brain? How about this: Sugar impacts the brain in half a second. Cocaine impacts the brain in 10 minutes. Which one do you believe is harder to give up? If we are sad, we may whip through the drive-up window at a donut shop and scarf down a dozen donut holes and a sugary coffee concoction. Within milliseconds, or brain and gut biome are satisfied and happy, and this lasts for a few minutes to as much as a couple hours. Sadness replaced by temporary joy, followed by body cells now filled with more sugar than the body knows how to process.
Busy Schedule eating
We are exhausted from running the rat race, so we heat up prepared meals of instant-mac-and-cheese, a bag of chicken nuggets, and maybe a bag of steam-in-the-bag green beans. (That’s a $12.38 meal). Single moms find themselves furiously working at the kitchen counter nibbling here and there, but mostly just taking care of the kids so they can get one of a dozen other things done, then they aren’t eating. You are a truck driver, and you’re not paid to sit still, so you grab something easy to keep you on the road. This is typically a high-carb sandwich, burger, hot dog, or piece of pizza. (This is a $7-$10 meal). This convenience comes at a price, and I don’t want you to consider the $ price. I much prefer you stop to think about the price your health pays. The chicken nuggets are full of preservatives, color, and taste ingredients that are profoundly dangerous to your long-term health. Take a look at the ingredients list for a bag of “75% reduced fat” chicken nuggets. I’m going to highlight the sugar in the ingredient list.
When we discuss the topic of eating to meet a frantic lifestyle, we then have to consider all those elements which play into a much larger picture. You say you want to enjoy those years of having kids at home, yet you make some of the most foundational time-building moments like eating around a dinner table the least important. Let me explain: With school, sports, and work schedules dictating our day-to-day, if we are only giving a dinner meal the “just get it done” effort, was this fair? Will we one day look back at a time when we spent up to 1hr (perhaps more) with a true quality time opportunity to share our days, feelings, highlights, and lows with everyone in the family? And when we are doing this, are we setting up our children for future habits of eating bad food? Or are we setting them up for success by teaching them what’s beneficial for a lifetime of good health?
Baked chicken sits in an oven for approx 25 min. During that time, the table is set, and perhaps you steam a bag of veggies over boiling water. Your total food prep/cook/serving time is perhaps less than 30min. You’ll have more time to sit around a table and share with each other about your days. Your stomachs are full, you’ve eaten well, and the food will last quite awhile in everyone’s systems. Alternatively, you have to prepare a bag of frozen chicken nuggets, make a pot of mac and cheese, boil or microwave some other veggies, and toss that on a plate to get everyone fed. Both take about the same amount of time to prepare, yet one is a meal laden with processed ingredients, oils, and sugar, and starts the course of processed food consumption for life.
On your deathbed, would you consider that one major thing you may have changed (given the opportunity) would be dietary intake? Would you like to reclaim the time spent with family at a dinner table?
The socially inconvenient side of all diets
When you choose to eat under a certain umbrella, you’re making a choice that impacts how you will behave in a social setting. You may be counting points, so you find yourself furiously looking at menus ahead of time, trying to decide what you can safely eat at a particular restaurant, within the boundaries of your restrictions. If you’re unsure, you may find yourself at the table excusing yourself from the conversation with others as you enter data into your smartphone, trying to get answers to what’s acceptable for your needs. Now your face is buried in your phone, and you’re contributing to the anti-social aspect of phone use, even if you’re using it for good rather than evil. Others won’t appreciate how important this is to you, but they’ll remember how you seemed to disappear from the social side so you could “be on your phone.”
Someone may have chosen a spot that you can just barely enjoy because nearly everything on the menu is either unsafe for your needs, or too tempting with add-ons. You wind up finding yourself dealing with stress when this is supposed to be fun.
Don’t despair! It’s actually fun to enjoy eating out when you have a very specific ingredient list you adhere-to. Just about anywhere you choose will have proteins. Simply avoid the sides. Heck, double up on the protein. Tell the server you are allergic to seed oils and sugar, and watch them work diligently to meet your needs. You won’t be lying, because technically we are all allergic to these items. Our individual reactions may vary, but overall, we will share most of the same issues of inflammation, energy loss, and weight gain. If saying that is too much, simply say you’re sugar and seed oil averse, which is definitely not lying.
Monday night football and wings? Go to Buffalo Wild Wings where they cook their chicken in beef tallow. Skip the fries, drink club soda and lime or lemon wedge. Going to Outback? Ask for a steak or burger patties with no bun, prepared in butter, not oil. The cooktop may have oil, and that’s ok. We just don’t want them squirting a jar of oil all over the food. Don’t eat the brown rolls and butter. Pass up the Bloomin’ Onion. Drink water over sodas. Drink club soda with fresh squeezed lime or lemon instead of an alcoholic beverage. Maybe you’ve been invited to dinner at a Mexican restaurant. Great! Pass on the chips, but ask instead for some broccoli or cauliflower to dip into the salsa or cheese. Order the fajitas, flank steak, or fish cooked in butter (mantequilla), but tell them you can’t have cooking oil (Sin aceite de cocina). Absolutely skip the margarita, and again go for soda water with lime juice. Don’t order anything wrapped in any form of tortilla. That’s just sugar. You can go to Texas Roadhouse, Logan’s, or Olive Garden. Stick to the proteins cooked in butter, and avoid the rolls, salads, pasta, and desserts. Yes, you can do this, and it won’t kill you. What will kill you is all of those sides.
If you’re conversational, just explain to the server that you’re trying to stick to a very low sugar and no-oil dietary intake, and ask what substitutions can be made to get more healthy animal fats and proteins. Perhaps they’ll prepare off-menu items with a bit larger portions since you’re not consuming the sides. Just about everyone knows what Keto is. Simply explain your diet is the next step down in sugar intake, and you want to still have a full plate, but it needs to be full of healthy choices, and you don’t want to finish your meal well ahead of others at the table. They’ll understand. If you want to be very low key about this, excuse yourself from the table, pull the server aside, and explain all this. When it’s time to order, know what you want, order it, and make no issue of it. If you draw too much attention, your friends who aren’t aware may rib you, or just be prepared to answer some questions. You might actually have folks rethinking their choices!
This is up to You
I know this doesn’t seem as fun, and I make it sound easier than it really is. Yada yada yada yada. But let me tell you, it is very simple. No, your life isn’t simple. Your needs are. Food shopping lists of beef, butter, fish, bacon, eggs, chicken, turkey, and a scattered few veggies are ridiculously easy to fulfill. The costs are so more aligned to your meal prep that you’ll actually be shocked at how far your food purchases can go. Your time spent inside the store is less because you’re not spending time straining to read the fine print of ingredients. You’re not walking the aisles looking for items. Pretty soon that rotten cucumber in the fridge won’t exist. That bag of unfinished salad won’t turn brown. The bottle of dressing won’t exist to run out at the next meal. The leftover steak will be consumed for breakfast with some scrambled eggs. There won’t be any leftover fish.
You’ll trade a $5.69 bag of Doritos for a second or third pound of ground beef or a few chicken breasts. You’ll skip the 2-for-$11 12 packs of diet sodas and spend that $11 on club soda, limes, and a pack of bacon. You’ll divert the $6 for a pint of low-carb ice cream to a carton of eggs that can make 3 breakfasts. Instead of sugary milk or half and half, you’ll spend $5 on heavy whipping cream for your coffee, and use less.
The long-term benefits of eating healthy now will pay in ways you can’t imagine. If you really want a “scared straight” understanding of what diabetes can mean for you, visit any dialysis clinic and ask a stranger how often they have to get treatment. I’m 99.999% sure you’ll find better ways to spend your time, and also just as sure the stranger you’re speaking to would caution you to avoid having to do this every other day. If you’re too timid to ask someone, I’ll save you the trouble. A typical dialysis patient has to spend 3-6hrs, 3 days per week, sitting in a chair at the clinic having their blood cleaned, not to mention travel to and from. If they do this at home (depending on the type of dialysis needed), it can take 2-3hrs per day, 5 and 6 days per week, again sitting in a chair while your blood is being cleaned. If this doesn’t sink in, let me say it this way: you’re looking at a full-time job of cleaning your own blood for what was likely a series of choices that you made in your earlier life. I’ve personally met with dialysis patients who cried over their choices and wished they could go back in time and do better for themselves.
Recall the quote at the top of the page? Take time now, or make it later. Spend money now, or spend much more of it later.
This doesn’t start tomorrow. This starts today. You get to choose what’s on the end of your fork.