I do. :)

Good idea! Mix the grains with super-low-glycemic,
more-soluble-fiber-rich, and higher-protein lentils and
beans. Quite in tune with modern conceptions and knowledge
of meal composition and metabolic responses.

With respect to pasta: is there anything holy about
the original stuff? It is a highly-processed food, made
with high-tech equipment (namely, a big machine called
an “extruder”, with which a hot starch mash is
squeezed through little holes to make long strings –
pasta). Why would the addition of some oat fiber, or
soy protein, or what have you, to improve the
macronutrient and metabolic profile, make for a
product that is any worse (any less “real”) than
the original? Do we have to apologize for knowing
about macronutrients and metabolic profiles, and
wanting to act on that knowledge?

I guess this goes to the whole question of what is and
is not “real” and “natural” — what those things mean,
and what values we place on them.

I am amused sometimes by people who insist on “all-
natural” this and that, in the diet department, while
EVERY ASPECT of their entire life is utterly dependent
on artificial and technological contrivances. A sub-
group of same is all the doctors and dietitians who
insist that you get your micronutrients from
conventional foods only, (“all natural”), NO
SUPPLEMENTS, because those evil vitamin hucksters
are only after your money, and the only thing those
pills can do is make for expensive urine. What an
incredibly hypocritical crock of shit!

I could rant on, but I don’t want to take advantage
of your hospitality. :-)

Alan

I’ll have to disagree with you here, slightly.

I’m as enthusiastic about healthy whole foods as anyone. But
the truth, IMO, is that we CAN often improve on them. “Improve”
relative to various values and objectives: culinary/gustatory,
nutritional, metabolic, and so forth.

You yourself just confessed (unconsciously) to a preference
for an improvement over real food: that square of “real”
dark chocolate — a highly-processed, fractionated product,
blended with other refined ingredients (sugar, fat,
lecithin, etc.). If you really want to go entirely with
“real” food, in the chocolate department, then get the
whole raw cocao beans, and eat ‘em. Plain.

In truth, the dark chocolate square is no less contrived
and “unreal” than the “fake flavoured ‘chocolate brownie’
protein bar”. It just happens that you prefer the former;
that, in your tastebud-informed view, the developer of
the contrived/unreal chocolate square did a better job
than the developer of the contrived/unreal protein bar.
Fair enough. You know what you like. Go for it.

Dark chocolate is a big (gustatory/hedonic) improvement
over whole raw cocoa beans. It might also represent a
health improvement if one would neglect to eat the whole
cocao beans (with all their beneficial polyphenols and
such) in the absence of the refined dark chocolate
squares.

Another example is the wave of reduced-fat and reduced-
glycemic-carb products that have hit the stores over the
last couple decades. Now, you don’t have to tell me that
some of these products are awful; I know that. But many
of them are quite good; a few, even excellent. It is nice
to have access, for example, to a variety of improved
pastas, with higher protein and fiber, and reduced
glycemic/insulinemic profile. Yes, one can get too anal
about all this. Everything must be kept in balance. But,
that said, there’s nothing wrong with taking advantage of
some of these processed products for dietary variety
without the metabolic fallout of the original stuff that
they imitate.

I just came from your (excellent) cottage cheese page,
and it is germane to note that cottage cheese is itself
not a “real” whole food; it is a fraction of a whole
food, namely milk. And low-fat cottage cheese is one
further step removed from the whole food. And I, for one,
call it an improvement! Low-fat cottage cheese –
processed, fractionated and non-whole though it may
be — is an excellent food, rich in protein, low in
total and glycemic carb, low in sat fat. Cheap.
Versatile (see recipes on your page). Tastes OK,
or better than OK in some mixes. Great stuff.