The Ingredient "Good Diet" Prescriptions Ignore: Time

In the New York Times, Mark Bittman concludes you need (only) two rules for a good diet:

Here then, is your two-step guide for an unassailably powerful personal food policy.

1. Stop eating junk and hyperprocessed food. This eliminates probably 80 percent of the stuff that is being sold as “food.”
2. Eat more plants than you did yesterday, or last year.

If you add “Cook your own food” to this list, it’s even more powerful, but these two steps alone allow you to reduce the amount of antibiotics you’re consuming; pretty much eliminate GMOs from your diet, lighten your carbon footprint; reduce your chances of becoming ill as a result of your diet; save money; cut way back on sugar, other junk and unnecessary and potentially harmful nonfood additives; and so on.

All without relying on corporate benevolence or the government getting things right. The power lies with you.

Last night I made a butternut squash casserole from the The New Moosewood Cookbook for dinner. It's basically all raw vegetables that you chop, then boil or sautee, then mix together with spices and bake. It was amazingly healthy and delicious, and nailed Bittman's rules perfectly.

But let's be honest about another concern Bittman completely ignores: It took a LONG FUCKING TIME to make. The chopping, the sauteing, the boiling, the mixing, the baking all together took an hour and a half. And that's not counting washing all the bowls and pans.

Parents don't throw a frozen pizza in the oven or order Domino's because they're trying to poison their children. They do it because they're tired, they don't have time to make something from scratch, and they just want to get home and relax with their kids.

Domino's knows this so well it centers its ads around it. Why don't healthy eating advocates?