Betty Crocker and Me

As a food pyramid eater, I was a grazer.  It seemed like I was never sated, even if I were stuffed from just eating.  About a half an hour after eating a big meal, I would be hitting the vending machine for something sweet.  Some nutritionists recommend eating six meals a day to keep keep sugar from spiking and plunging.  I wasn’t eating six meals…I was eating one….very….long…meal each day.

When I started (kinda, sorta) following The Basic Seven plan about a month ago, I discovered that  I felt satiated on less food and it would last me for hours.  If I started getting hungry before a meal, it was okay.  I didn’t start to panic.  Sometimes I would have a snack but more often than not, I’d just ride it out (and nibble on the raw veggies as I cooked dinner).  I rarely feel like I’m starving anymore and most of my cravings have disappeared (I still crave dark–almost bitter–chocolate, though).

Here’s the deal: According to Sally Fallon in Nourishing Traditions: That Cookbook that Challenges Politically Correct Nutrition and the Diet Dictocrats,

Fats as part of a meal slow down nutrient absorption so that we can go longer without feeling hungry.

I’ve also read (but now can’t find) that fats also help us feel satiated earlier in our meal so that we end up eating less.

Now, I’m not suggesting that we go overboard and start eating deep-fried Twinkies–we are trying to eat like our Grandmother’s after all–but I am suggesting that we not be so afraid of having fat in our diets.  And by eating full-fat food, we’ll feel more satisfied while needing to eat less.

(As a side note, I’ve noticed my level of concentration has improved quite a bit since making the switch to The Basic Seven)

It seems that the only way you can subscribe to the Betty Crocker and Me blog using Feedburner is through email right now.  Just when I’ve thought I’ve resolved the RSS issue, it goes bad on me again. *sigh*  By the way, if you were the one person who managed to subscribe, you will need to redo it because I even tried deleting the feed and starting over from scratch.

Something is getting in the way and I can’t figure out what it is.  This is the 5th blog I’ve set up, so I feel like I kind-a know what I’m doing to set up the basics.  I’m wondering if it is a Google issue because other readers seem to be able to find it if I use the non-Feedburner feed.  I’ll keep at it, though!

UPDATE: As of right now (almost noon, my time), the links on the right side of the page seem to be working.  I installed the links created by Feedburner instead of using the pre-installed program.  Using the links, I’m able to subscribe to various readers–including Google.  However, if I try to subscribe from the Google Reader site, I still get error messages.  *sigh*

Julie Powell had Julia Child as the motivation for her Julie/Julia project of cooking all of the recipes in Mastering the Art of French Cooking.  I bought Mastering back in 2004 when I decided that I was going to kick up my cooking skills a notch or two.  Alas, I think I’ve used two recipes from it.  The truth of the matter is that I found myself returning time and time again to my vast collection of vintage cookbooks–many of them written by the home economists calling themselves “Betty Crocker.”

Betty Crocker and “her” mid-century contemporaries taught women how to cook the foods that we associate with good old-fashioned comfort food.  But with the introduction of The Food Pyramid and “franken-food” (processed and boxed food), it seems like we’ve all forgotten that our grandmothers relied on the victory garden for most of their food.  Madison Avenue launched a campaign to sell their clients’ “convenience” food and we’ve fallen for the propaganda that cooking is a chore that requires hours over the stove.

And now we are fat and unhealthy.

I was in graduate school when my father died of heart disease.  Being very much like him, I decided that I couldn’t change my genetics but I could change my eating habits.  I researched all of the ways to prevent heart disease.  I carefully revised the recipes in my vintage cookbooks to meet today’s “healthy eating guidelines.”  Within a few years I had gained almost 70 pounds and suffered through an extended illness!  That isn’t supposed to happen!  I was doing all of the “right” things!

Recently, I’ve been reading a lot of books and research that debunks the “low-fat, high-carbs” mantra.  As I was researching and writing about mid-century healthy-eating guidelines for my Modern Retro Woman blog, I came across The Basic Seven and also discovered that people were actually healthier during World War II than they have ever been.

Inspired by the movie “Julie & Julia,” I first decided to simply write my adventures in following The Basic 7 using mid-century Betty Crocker cookbooks.  But then my husband gave me The Encyclopedia of Cooking 24 Volumes by The Culinary Arts Institute (published in 1954) for my birthday.  And then I remembered The Green Box filled with my grandmother’s recipes that I had snatched from my mother’s apartment last summer.  And what about the other 75 or so vintage cookbooks in my collection that aren’t by Betty Crocker?  So, even though it is called “Betty Crocker and Me,” I decided that Betty Crocker would go back to her original symbol of being America’s favorite home cooking mentor.

This blog is dedicated to Betty Crocker and all of “her” mid-century contemporaries who taught us how to cook and eat right for maximum nutrition.