There is a really, really easy way to avoid all of this.
In the supermarket, only buy things that have one ingredient. Only eat and drink things that have one ingredient.
As Michael Pollan says: "Eat FOOD, mostly greens, not too much."
In the supermarket, only buy things that have one ingredient. Only eat and drink things that have one ingredient.
As Michael Pollan says: "Eat FOOD, mostly greens, not too much."
The problem is, back in the day people learnt the skills to prepare food out of necessity. Now you have to want to do it. I suggest a good book on a favourite cuisine. Convince yourself that what you cook at home is nicer than the shit you can buy in shops and you won't want it any more. Don't forget to give your own food a chance and put just as much salt in it as they do, though. I see this mistake a lot. People think prepared/processed food is nicer just because it has more salt. Use salt.
And no, not everything can go in the dishwasher.
1. https://twitter.com/Botanygeek/status/1149968041964396545
2. https://deniseminger.com/2011/05/31/wild-and-ancient-fruit/
1) The fruit that we eat today is hyper-sugarized and available 24/7 all the time. Eg European ancestors NEVER had access to this amount of fruit. Apples, bananas, (water)melons, sweet grapes, ...these things didn't exist 150 years ago in the form we know today. People eat these sugar bombs all the time.
2) There does exist high sugar natural fruit.
Cherries right now (mid-July) in northern Bavaria: $3/lb at the grocery store, cheaper if you buy direct from farmers just outside the towns. Various small plums are free for the taking from trees along trails and rivers. I’m planning some serious jam-making over the next few weekends.
Cherries in January: if available at all, approximately $20/lb, import from South Africa or Chile. Plums are also available, about $8/lb, but not very flavorful.
Every single vegetable. Every single fruit. Water (I get it from the tap), rice, pasta, noodles. Meat. Eggs. Fish.
Steak, chicken breast, cabbage, carrots, mushrooms, turkey thighs, spinach, corn on the cob, some organic peanut butters, flour, salt, zucchini, eggplant, pork chops, tomatoes, potatoes, yams, vinegar, olive oil, bok choi, broccoli, asparagus, beef liver, canned tuna fish (are we really going to split hairs over the salt brine?), ground beef, garlic, onion, shallots, spring onion, iceberg lettuce, watermelon, peaches, bananas, apples, eggs, mahi mahi, chives, cod, romaine, gem lettuce, kale, walnuts, almonds, leek, etc.
Even if you don’t apply common sense to this heuristic and include milk, cheese, bread, good quality bacon, etc., there is a veritable cornucopia of strictly single-ingredient foods available.
But yeah, you’re gonna have to buy ingredients and cook actual meals to be healthy. No way around it, I’m afraid…
You're not putting anything on the chicken or turkey? You're going to have ground beef by itself? Are you biting into that onion like an apple? And the garlic? Iceberg lettuce by itself sucks. What do you mean "flour", what do you mean "salt"?
I also have a hard time believing this is a genuine source of confusion…
I'm not confused by minimizing processing via home cooking, I'm confused by how your list was supposed to be relevant to the comment you replied to. That comment had a very specific objection.
(And yes, I see that the OP has now replied saying you can combine ingredients at home. But I think the skepticism toward the original phrasing was valid.)
"Buy things with one ingredient" is one idea. "Only eat things with one ingredient" is a very different and much more narrow idea.
And don't say it was obvious what they meant. I've seen people claim much wilder things about healthy eating than "don't combine ingredients".