Entries tagged with 'health'
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Though I've been stuck at 219 pounds for the last month (damn these cursed weight-loss plateaus), it's occurred to me that if I continue to lose weight, I will shortly pass the 50-pound weight-loss threshold. I guess this really is a serious diet I've been on. When I decided to do something about my weight a little more than a year and a half ago, I weighed in at an all-time high of 265 pounds. Small for an NFL offensive lineman, but way, way too much for me, a pretty good, fast-on-my-feet-considering-I-weighed- 250-pounds, scrambling flag football quarterback in college (my teams did win the intramural flag-football championship at Grinnell four years in a row). So being stuck on 219 means...
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©iStockphoto.com/thebroker A large "buttered" popcorn at the typical movie theater contains about 1,220 calories, San Francisco Chronicle restaurant critic Michael Bauer reminds us, quoting a decade-old survey: "You would have to swim 162 minutes to burn off that popcorn—longer than your average motion picture." Not exactly what I want to read before a weekend in which I plan on finally seeing Star Trek (the IMAX version was sold out last week). That reminds me, though, that it's cheaper and healthier to just sneak in a snack of my own. What snack(s) do you sneak in to the movies—and how?...
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This exchange between Mr. Kuban (serving as acting food photographer) and me graphically illustrates how far this serious eater has come in 67 weeks. We were sitting at the bar at Kefi eating our final meal before I had to write the review. Our server brought over a beautiful bubbling casserole dish filled with tangy, creamy, wonderful macaroni and cheese (above). I ate a couple of forkfuls. Damn, it was good. I turned to Señor Kuban and said without a touch of irony or self-awareness, "How could anyone eat all that?" Kuban smiled that devilish half-grin of his and replied, "That's not what the old Ed Levine would have said. The old Ed Levine would have finished that sucker...
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I would have bet any and all comers that pigs would start flying before anyone called me out in the blogosphere for being too thin. But that's just what happened this week. Let me set the scene for you, my merry band of serious eaters. I was at our Hot Dog Hootenanny last Sunday, enjoying the festivities enormously, desperately trying not to eat a whole Chicago hot dog or an entire Papaya King frank or all six inches of a mighty delicious Bulgogi dog, or the full length of a Crif Chihuahua dog with bacon, avocado, and jalapeños. I think I succeeded, but as there is no such thing as a hot-doggometer that reliably measures such things, I had to...
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As a big someecards.com fan, I was excited to finally find a food-related one to share. Go back to the bacon-wrapped pork chops diet, people. Related: Swine Flu: Can You Still Eat Pork? All Signs Point to Yes...
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"Papacito, you don't need relaxed-fit jeans. Have you lost weight or something?" For me, someone who has wrestled with a weight problem my entire life, clothes-shopping has always been an exercise in desperation and denial. Even as a preteen I was always trying to convince my mother and the salesperson at our local clothier, Meyer's, that I didn't need to limit my choices to the clothes in the "Husky" section of the store. For the last 20 years I've hated the fact that the only clothing store I could find a wide (pun intended) selection of pants in my size, 46x30, was Rochester Big & Tall. I used to console myself by telling my wife that at Rochester Big &...
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This little piggy ... is safe to eat. If reports about swine flu and goverments banning pork imports are making you think twice about eating that bacon, don't worry: the World Health Organization (WHO) says swine flu isn't passed through meat and that it is safe to eat pork products. The flu strain in question, H1N1 influenza A virus, is named after swine because it originated in pigs and used to have little effect on humans, but because of recent mutations it has become more harmful to humans, says BBC News....
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Do you ever go out of your way not to eat something seriously delicious? Until I started my diet, I never did. In fact, I've spent my life convincing friends, loved ones, and colleagues that barbecue joints, pizzerias, and fried chicken shacks were in fact on our way even though they might have been ten miles out of the way. When we were in South Carolina on vacation I convinced my wife and son and some friends that Sweatman's Barbecue was right down the road. Of course the road turned out to be 30 miles long. Twenty years ago I convinced my then boss that Lexington Barbecue 1 was right on the way to our ad agency pitch at Hanes...
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Or Is It Just the Ones I See? Yesterday I was at doctor number six's office in my quest to find out the source of my chest tightness (my worry is that acid reflux is not the only explanation). I was telling Dr. X (I am hiding his identity to protect the hungry), a cardiologist, about what I was experiencing when he interrupted me. "All right, let's see if we can find out why you're feeling this way," he said. "By the way, I must say that you have my dream job. I love to eat." Dr. X, like five other doctors before him that I've seen in the past year, wanted to talk to me about food and restaurants....
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I should have known the moment I landed in New Orleans last Friday night that lots of restaurant leftovers were looming. Why? Because when I order in a New Orleans restaurant, I convince myself that I might never get to that restaurant again. Which, of course, is preposterous and absolutely untrue. I have been to New Orleans probably 20 times in the last 30 years, for nonfood business purposes, on assignment to write about the city's astonishing food and music culture, and with my family. So convincing myself I might never get to these New Orleans restaurants again is the ultimate overeater's rationalization. It is true, however, that these days, now that I'm in eating-everything-just-less-of-it mode, I like to order...
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