"People don't cook anymore, because they don't have to, it all comes out of a package."
This is hitting home for me right at the moment, again. My DH had thyroid cancer (among other things) 2 years ago. Thyroid was removed, and he needed to have radioactive iodine treatment. Prior to the treatment he had to go on a low iodine diet - the idea being that thyroid cells suck up iodine; if starved of it for awhile any cancer cells left in his body would take up the radioactive iodine more readily, and kill themselves. He is scheduled to have a follow up scan in a couple of weeks, and needs to be on the diet again.
The point is: this diet doesn't restrict a lot, but what it does restrict is found in just about anything ready made, pre-prepared. Restaurant food is out because iodized salt is out, and there is no way to tell what kind of salt is used. Same for anything out of a box from the supermarket. Even the natural foods aisle - there the salt is sea salt, but that is also out, as is anything else harvested from the ocean.
This is actually not a problem for me (the cook) because I cook mostly from scratch anyway, and don't use iodized salt even in normal times. The other restrictions are minor - no dairy, no egg yolks, no soy, and a few other things. The most difficult part, for a short term diet, is no butter. The hardest part for my DH is that he can't have commercially produced sausage (he's German!), and can't go out to eat in restaurants.
I did a lot of research into this diet 2 years ago, and was amazed to find that most people commenting on forums were totally at a loss as to how to accomplish it. They didn't know how to cook; they didn't have time to either do the appropriate shopping, or figure out how to put the ingredients together properly; it was too expensive; nothing that they liked came in a form that they were allowed to eat.
Now, granted, I am retired and have time to muck about in the kitchen to my heart's content. But even when I was working I cooked mostly from scratch. I made time to occasionally make bread, and could have done so more often had this episode in our lives happened during that time. At worst I would have borrowed or rented a bread machine.
Not knowing how to cook should be no excuse. If one can read, or watch a video one should be able to cook. Plenty of people in this world do a good job at it even without being able to read. And buying basics, and in season, is not necessarily more expensive.
The multitudes of people who buy into the advertizing telling them that the stuff from factories is better, faster, easier, healthier(!), are being done a great disservice, IMO - and an even greater one is being done to the generations to follow.
)
