EPThttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pescetarianism
So you eat healthy. Congratulations, but you're not a vegetarian, nor does your blog really concern vegetarianism at all, rather adopting a non-suicidal diet.
Becoming a Vegetarian - Page 3
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Thrill
2599 Posts
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pescetarianism So you eat healthy. Congratulations, but you're not a vegetarian, nor does your blog really concern vegetarianism at all, rather adopting a non-suicidal diet. | ||
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MoonfireSpam
United Kingdom1153 Posts
On September 20 2013 21:44 North2 wrote: Good call! Although I'm very neutral in terms of vegetarians/pescetarians (I don't respect or disrespect them, as long as they don't think they're better people), I would like to congratulate anyone who's gotten out of the life of obesity. As a sushi chef, I would like to warn you that there is a surprising amount of sugar in the rice that we use. It's still waaaay healthier than most meat dishes though. You can always ask for your rolls to be light on rice too, and the sugar isn't even bad if you burn it. Japanese cuisine offers a whole lot of pescterian meals that are very healthy (surprise, surprise). I encourage you to venture further out of just sushi and try other Japanese food. Fish fat is generally good. It's not good to overeat them, but having a moderate amount of it is actually good for you. For cooking at home, I suggest at least trying Umeboshi or Natto with rice THREE TIMES, with one week intervals in between if you didn't like it the first time. Very easy to make(you literally just need to cook the rice), but a rather acquired taste for both. Some people just won't like it, but as it is an acquired taste, it just takes getting used to for many people. You should have some side dish to go with it. Okra is an awesome veggie, tastes great. It's kinda hard to find, but I definitely suggest it if you haven't tried it already. It tastes great with just soy sauce and bonito flakes as far as I'm concerned, although I love it in miso soup the most. I hear there's a lot of Mediterranean dishes that use it as well, although I have no idea about that part. As with anyone changing a lifestyle, I always warn people not to label their original lifestyle as evil. It's a lot easier to stick with where you're going when you understand that you aren't "staying away from the temptation", you're simply choosing a lifestyle that you feel is better. Why go back to what you feel is inferior? Off topic but if you happen to read this, got any tips for making the rice? Tried a bunch of recipies, but can't quite get it as good as stuff from Sushi places. Argh I fucking hate being in a town with no sushi. On topic, grats on new lifestyle. Being active and not eating shit feels awesome indeed. edit: Fuck that pounds to kilos stuff. If I weighed 100 kilos at 5'7 (which is my height) i'd probably feel like shit too. Its like supergravity. | ||
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Foblos
United States426 Posts
On September 21 2013 07:41 MoonfireSpam wrote: Off topic but if you happen to read this, got any tips for making the rice? Tried a bunch of recipies, but can't quite get it as good as stuff from Sushi places. Argh I fucking hate being in a town with no sushi. On topic, grats on new lifestyle. Being active and not eating shit feels awesome indeed. edit: Fuck that pounds to kilos stuff. If I weighed 100 kilos at 5'7 (which is my height) i'd probably feel like shit too. Its like supergravity. A lady friend of mine and I made some sushi as a going away meal for me, and we used jasmine rice. We just googled "how to make jasmine rice" and followed the recipe. Ours was at least as good as all of the sushi places I've tried. | ||
EsportsJohn
United States4883 Posts
On September 21 2013 08:25 Foblos wrote: A lady friend of mine and I made some sushi as a going away meal for me, and we used jasmine rice. We just googled "how to make jasmine rice" and followed the recipe. Ours was at least as good as all of the sushi places I've tried. That's unbelieveable since Jasmine rice is not sticky nor soft like Japanese rice. Rice is arguably the most important part of making sushi, and it's really important to use the right kind of rice and cook it the right way. I may not be the MOST qualified person to speak on this subject, but basically: you need specifically Japanese rice (I don't know what the proper name is) as it's the only rice that really sticks together well enough to be used for sushi. Jasmine and Bismati Rice (the Indian rices) are bad for this, as is "sweet" or "glutenous" rice. To prepare it, you rinse the rice until the water isn't cloudy anymore and cook it in any rice cooker. When it's done, you put the rice in a non-metallic mixing bowl, add "seasoned" rice vinegar (most rice vinegar you buy is already seasoned unless you buy it directly from an oriental market), and then "fluff" the rice. Fluffing the rice is essentially folding the rice while it cools; this is what gives sushi rice it's fluffy, sticky nature. I think that fluffing is the most important part of the process. I think this is a pretty good video explanation of sushi rice. | ||
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EsportsJohn
United States4883 Posts
On September 21 2013 04:13 hp.Shell wrote: This is awesome. I'm glad to hear someone is getting healthy and bouncing back from obesity. I've never been overweight, so it's hard for me to fathom what an overweight person's mind is like. Is it harder to think? I would think it would be, just because of all the blood pumping to the other "excess" areas of the body. So sometimes I assume their minds have slowed due to this idea, and that makes it even harder to recover from because they just can't think or focus a whole lot anymore. From a moral standpoint, I believe in a more collective energy field that some people might call god. For me, I'm not sure what it is. In this case it's difficult for me to look at a dead animal. I believe that after I watched my cat get put down (instant death or paralysis) something changed in me. I was really close to her. I had been thinking about trying to go vegetarian for a while but this was the last straw for me. Hunting for food seems somewhat morally sound in the grand scheme of things, especially when you bring in the concept of a predator-prey population relationship, but ours is a special case because we really don't have predators eating us. However when I think of a dead animal it reminds me of my cat's dead eyes after receiving the lethal injection, and I just can't deal. Later on down the road, a friend of mine showed me the movie Earthlings (you can find it on youtube). It's a documentary about the processed meat industry, and the crazy things people do to animals. If you want to know where hell is, go to a slaughterhouse. Earthlings is really not for the faint of heart but I watched it anyway. Sometimes I regret seeing it but it makes me feel that the industry of meat production (as opposed to hunting an animal to provide food for the week) is not morally sound. Then I started hearing about all the crazy shit people are putting into the meats these days (e.g. Meat Glue) and I just said enough, I will not have crazy people polluting my body for their own financial gain. I will be mindful about what is going into my holy body, what it is telling me, and I will move towards becoming a healthier person with more energy for life. One thing I will say is, try to avoid tofu/soybeans so much. They have pseudo-estrogens in them, which is a female hormone, and it can be dangerous to eat too much whether you're male or female. That said, tofu is a great protein source for vegetarians, but I would say to try to eat something else more often as your primary protein source. What I don't get is why a lot of people tend to want to attack or give weird advice to vegs. At first, my family thought it was weird and gave me shit for it, tried to sneak a bit of meat into my rice dish (which I really got mad about but didn't say anything because it could have been a mistake all those times), etc, but they got over it. Then one of my obese cousins from up north came down for a visit. They were eating stuff like pure chicken, giant steaks, stuff with lots of cheese in a dish, etc and it just hurt to watch but I remained understanding of their choice. Anyway on one of the last days my cousin was here she gave me a quote. "Y'know what they say? Eat healthy, die anyway." I just smiled and agreed, but inside I thought "Eat unhealthy, feel like shit physically your whole life until you change it." If someone looks uncomfortable with eating meat in front of me I lay it out and tell them it's a personal choice and I am not offended by it, which I'm not. Then I'll say "in fact meat smells good to me sometimes, I just don't eat it anymore." Anyway good luck in keeping with what you believe. It's tough to stay veg when it's so easy to just buy a burger or even cook your own. I think you have the right approach by listening to your body. Thank you for this post, and I definitely agree. Once you start eating healthily and being conscious of what you're eating, you stare in disbelief at people who gorge themselves on triple cheeseburgers and milkshakes and your heart breaks for them, especially if it's a common thing. The people I'm surrounded with on a normal basis (my co-workers, I'm a bus driver) are all particularly unhealthy and eat out almost every night at places like Longhorn and Hibachi Grills and fast food places. A lot of them are overweight and a lot of them are on horrible diets, and it just kills me to watch them get more and more unhealthy while I feel like I've figured out the secret to life lol. I...kind of understand your first paragraph, but no, that's not true. Fat people do not think slower. But, as a side note, I feel like exercise stimulates your brain and makes your brain more constantly active throughout the day. On September 21 2013 05:12 Staboteur wrote: On the subject of vegetarianism being overboard... I'll betcha it functions the same for SC2John as it did for me : It forces you to look at the labels of the things you're buying and make conscious choices on what you're going to eat. It's less about "don't eat meat because it's bad for you!" but more about actively experimenting with your diet instead of eating stuff that says "food" somewhere on the label. This is correct. It has expanded my diet a lot and allowed me to try a ton of things I would have never tried before  . If I ever do add chicken back to my diet, it will be in the far future, once I get a lot more comfortable with vegetables and fruits as main parts of meals. For the record though, I don't think cutting out meat entirely is overboard; you can get all of the same things you need from meat through plant-based foods, excepting some "essential proteins". The only reason it seems overboard is because it's against the norm of our meat-based culture that places tons of importance on getting as much protein and calcium as possible. | ||
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hp.Shell
United States2527 Posts
On September 21 2013 04:38 Incze wrote: What the fuck dude? Seriously what were you thinking when you wrote this? On September 21 2013 08:58 SC2John wrote: I...kind of understand your first paragraph, but no, that's not true. Fat people do not think slower. But, as a side note, I feel like exercise stimulates your brain and makes your brain more constantly active throughout the day. So when I said that I wasn't trying to insult fat people. It was kinda stream of consciousness. The way I think of it is, when you have food in your stomach, there's more blood being pumped to that organ for digestion. I guess there isn't blood being pumped to the stomach if there's no food in there. I made a logical error in assuming that the blood would still go there just because someone had a big gut, but now I realize that is probably not true. OTOH, obese people may have food in their stomach more often than others. It's like when you have a big meal and you feel tired because there isn't as much blood going to your "vital" organs, it's being diverted to the stomach. It's almost like not being completely sober. (Not that it makes it harder to drive, but that it can make you fatigued and hazy.) | ||
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Foblos
United States426 Posts
On September 21 2013 08:39 SC2John wrote: That's unbelieveable since Jasmine rice is not sticky nor soft like Japanese rice. Rice is arguably the most important part of making sushi, and it's really important to use the right kind of rice and cook it the right way. I may not be the MOST qualified person to speak on this subject, but basically: you need specifically Japanese rice (I don't know what the proper name is) as it's the only rice that really sticks together well enough to be used for sushi. Jasmine and Bismati Rice (the Indian rices) are bad for this, as is "sweet" or "glutenous" rice. To prepare it, you rinse the rice until the water isn't cloudy anymore and cook it in any rice cooker. When it's done, you put the rice in a non-metallic mixing bowl, add "seasoned" rice vinegar (most rice vinegar you buy is already seasoned unless you buy it directly from an oriental market), and then "fluff" the rice. Fluffing the rice is essentially folding the rice while it cools; this is what gives sushi rice it's fluffy, sticky nature. I think that fluffing is the most important part of the process. I think this is a pretty good video explanation of sushi rice. Give it a shot if you'd like. I'm not a sushi expert either, nor a master chef but all of the sushi I've made myself has been bad, but the stuff I made with her was as good, if not better than all of the other sushi I've had before. | ||
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Fumanchu
Canada669 Posts
However, every eight days I go to town at KFC or IHOP, or Taco Bell or something. It's my cheat day. I'm in great shape and I feel fantastic. But I understand what you were trying to say about switching your diet away from mainly eating that stuff. | ||
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MoonfireSpam
United Kingdom1153 Posts
On September 21 2013 10:30 Foblos wrote: Give it a shot if you'd like. I'm not a sushi expert either, nor a master chef but all of the sushi I've made myself has been bad, but the stuff I made with her was as good, if not better than all of the other sushi I've had before. Heh sorry for derailing the blog into sushi rice making. I agree that the final step gives it that "look and feel". I was kinda just wondering more on ratios of ingredients (if you happen to have your own measurements, would be curious to know what they are) and at which point people add stuff. Since a sushi chef wandered into the thread, it seemed worth a shot! However as with all cooking, everyone has their own way and I'm always looking to incorporate or experiment with other peoples methods. Man I could sure go for some of that eel in the sweet sauce. | ||
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Foblos
United States426 Posts
On September 21 2013 11:01 MoonfireSpam wrote: Heh sorry for derailing the blog into sushi rice making. I agree that the final step gives it that "look and feel". I was kinda just wondering more on ratios of ingredients (if you happen to have your own measurements, would be curious to know what they are) and at which point people add stuff. Since a sushi chef wandered into the thread, it seemed worth a shot! However as with all cooking, everyone has their own way and I'm always looking to incorporate or experiment with other peoples methods. Man I could sure go for some of that eel in the sweet sauce. We just used whatever nori was in her kitchen, enough rice to spread out over the entire nori save about an inch at the end, carrots, tofu that we marinated for about an hour in a soysauce mixture we found on the internet, avacado and cucumber. Like I said, I'm not good at making sushi so I can't be super precise, but we used just enough rice and only as much of everything else as we needed to cover the width of the nori. The reason I said it was as good as professionally made sushi though was because of the rice. The carrots we used had been out for a while and were cracking and dry, the avacados were a little bit less than ripe and the cucumber wasn't as good as others I've had. The only thing that was good (aside from the rice) was the tofu, but imo, like OP said, the rice makes or breaks the sushi and I thought it was really really good. Give it a shot sometime. You might like it a lot :D | ||
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ShadeR
Australia7535 Posts
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North2
134 Posts
On September 21 2013 07:41 MoonfireSpam wrote: Off topic but if you happen to read this, got any tips for making the rice? Tried a bunch of recipies, but can't quite get it as good as stuff from Sushi places. Argh I fucking hate being in a town with no sushi. On topic, grats on new lifestyle. Being active and not eating shit feels awesome indeed. edit: Fuck that pounds to kilos stuff. If I weighed 100 kilos at 5'7 (which is my height) i'd probably feel like shit too. Its like supergravity. I can't really give advice unless you can somewhat identify what is exactly not good about your sushi rice compared to the restaurants. I'd like to know what kind of recipes you go with, and a detailed explanation of how you make it. We just used whatever nori was in her kitchen, enough rice to spread out over the entire nori save about an inch at the end, carrots, tofu that we marinated for about an hour in a soysauce mixture we found on the internet, avacado and cucumber. Like I said, I'm not good at making sushi so I can't be super precise, but we used just enough rice and only as much of everything else as we needed to cover the width of the nori. The reason I said it was as good as professionally made sushi though was because of the rice. The carrots we used had been out for a while and were cracking and dry, the avacados were a little bit less than ripe and the cucumber wasn't as good as others I've had. The only thing that was good (aside from the rice) was the tofu, but imo, like OP said, the rice makes or breaks the sushi and I thought it was really really good. Give it a shot sometime. You might like it a lot :D I personally don't think carrots are any good with sushi even if wasn't cracked and dry. In terms of veggies if you want to make your own sushi, I suggest some combination of cucumber, avocado, burdock roots, daikon sprouts (Kaiware), plum paste, ooba leaves, and asparagus. Plum paste and ooba leaves together (the umeshiso roll) is one of my favorites, and I'm not even vegetarian. Plum paste is the paste of umeboshi that I was talking about earlier, for those that are wondering. There's a few other niche ingredients, but they're pretty hit or miss. To be honest, I think your sushi rice tasted good because of the tofu. I prefer any kind of tofu dish to be complimented with regular steamed rice over sushi rice, if at all. | ||
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MoonfireSpam
United Kingdom1153 Posts
For 1 cup of uncooked rice. 2 tbs rice vinegar, 1.5 tbs sugar, 1 tbs mirin, 1 teaspoon salt. When I really have a go at it, I will wash the rice a few times (not till the water runs clear), then leave it to sit for 1 hour while it drains. I cook the rice over low heat throughout starting from ~1cm of water resting over the rice. I'll cook it for about 15 minutes until the texture feels "done" by nibbling on a few bits. I'd turned towards not disturbing the rice at all while it's cooking. Once done it gets transferred to a wide glass or big plastic mixing bowl and start falling it while folding it over itself. When the rice has cooled some (to warm enough to touch, for a few seconds, but not much more than that) I'll add the vinegar mix and continue to fold and cool until its at room temp. For the vinegar mix, I'll heat the stuff over a low heat just until everything dissolves. I guess the qualitys I think it lacks are it tends to come out a little heavier / stickier than stuff in restaurants at equivalent temperatures. It clumps together a bit too much, which just gets more obvious which I've tried to dry the rice out over extended time / cool it below room temp / left the rolls for a bit in the fridge. I have experimented with using the minimum of water (on one occasion topping it up with hot water since it started to dry out). It feels like it lacks some MSG type flavouring / taste (or umami as I learned later) rather than pure under seasoning. | ||
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MoonfireSpam
United Kingdom1153 Posts
For 1 cup of uncooked rice. 2 tbs rice vinegar, 1.5 tbs sugar, 1 tbs mirin, 1 teaspoon salt. I did try adding 1-2 tbs of saki to the cooking water a couple of times, I think it made minimal difference. When I really have a go at it, I will wash the rice a few times (not till the water runs clear), then leave it to sit for 1 hour while it drains. I cook the rice over low heat throughout starting from ~1cm of water resting over the rice. I'll cook it for about 15 minutes until the texture feels "done" by nibbling on a few bits. I'd turned towards not disturbing the rice at all while it's cooking. Once done it gets transferred to a wide glass or big plastic mixing bowl and start falling it while folding it over itself. When the rice has cooled some (to warm enough to touch, for a few seconds, but not much more than that) I'll add the vinegar mix and continue to fold and cool until its at room temp. For the vinegar mix, I'll heat the stuff over a low heat just until everything dissolves. I guess the qualitys I think it lacks are it tends to come out a little heavier / stickier than stuff in restaurants at equivalent temperatures. It clumps together a bit too much, which just gets more obvious which I've tried to dry the rice out over extended time / cool it below room temp / left the rolls for a bit in the fridge. I have experimented with using the minimum of water (on one occasion topping it up with hot water since it started to dry out). It feels like it lacks some MSG type flavouring / taste (or umami as I learned later) rather than pure under seasoning. edit: aaaaaaand fuck, im hungry again | ||
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North2
134 Posts
There's two types of 'clumping'. If there's parts that are clumped and parts that aren't, it means that you aren't 'cutting' the clumped parts of the rice enough. Remove All clumping while cutting it with the spatula. If the whole thing feels heavier like you mention, then it means you're either cutting and cooling it too much, or using too much vinegar mix. It definitely does not need to cool to room temperature, that is way too much. Rice should still be warm when making the sushi. Try cutting the rice faster and keep it warm somehow(or use it right then and there). The cooler it is, the harder the rice becomes and the tougher it becomes to spread it over the nori. Also, you may or may not be cutting the rice too much. Theoretically, if you cut it long enough you can make Mochi(look up what that is). What I'm trying to say is that the longer you cut it, the stickier it'll become. For a family dinner, cutting the rice takes less than a minute for me. Fast and thorough is what you ought to aim for. We do use umami. We put the actual dried seaweed inside. I do hope you don't believe in the MSG scare (it's not bad for you). If you have a moral problem with using the additive, you can always buy the actual dried seaweed like we do. In terms of taste though, using the umami powder is just fine. You only need about a teaspoon in that mix. Hope that helps. | ||
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ZeaL.
United States5955 Posts
On September 20 2013 23:35 sc4k wrote: Oh right of course. Because the only two options in diet are vegetarian or a big fat MacDonalds meal. There's nothing wrong with eating fresh fruit and veg. I do it a lot. But with meat, that shit is off the hook. A little jerk spices, 3 tomatoes, 2 bell peppers and 500g of chicken is a meal fit for a king. I saw this all the time in college. White American guy whose parents never bothered to show him how to cook/eat vegetables becomes overweight and eats really unhealthily -> becomes obese and sad because he/she eats fried food and starches all day. Realizes that they're really unhealthy and decides it must be the meat, swing in the other direction to vegeterianism and decide, holy crap I feel much better, it must be the meat! Either that or they stay fat but think they're healthier while they eat cookies/cakes/other "healthy" vegetarian options. I dunno why Americans are like this... it's like there's no reasonable middle ground between eating a chicken fried steak slathered in diet coke sauce vs eating tofu and salad everyday. It's always one extreme or the other. | ||
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Passion
Netherlands1486 Posts
On September 21 2013 09:38 hp.Shell wrote: You can get all essential proteins from plant foods. I have this crushed hemp seed that's supposed to be used in a shake, and it has the mg or μg content of each protein per serving on the label. I just cook with it because I'm not familiar with juicing. It's kinda gross tasting (like a very green sandy plant) but I'm lazy and it tops off my protein if I need it. So when I said that I wasn't trying to insult fat people. It was kinda stream of consciousness. The way I think of it is, when you have food in your stomach, there's more blood being pumped to that organ for digestion. I guess there isn't blood being pumped to the stomach if there's no food in there. I made a logical error in assuming that the blood would still go there just because someone had a big gut, but now I realize that is probably not true. OTOH, obese people may have food in their stomach more often than others. It's like when you have a big meal and you feel tired because there isn't as much blood going to your "vital" organs, it's being diverted to the stomach. It's almost like not being completely sober. (Not that it makes it harder to drive, but that it can make you fatigued and hazy.) Shit dude... if you know so little about how the human body functions, keep your random opinions to yourself. | ||
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hp.Shell
United States2527 Posts
On September 25 2013 17:44 Passion wrote: Shit dude... if you know so little about how the human body functions, keep your random opinions to yourself. Ok. | ||
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