Traditional is Healthy, Westernized is Not

Traditional is Healthy, Westernized is Not
~Blog Post #4~
By: Sarah Olson
 April 20, 2015

Contrary to what we as Americans believe, traditional Chinese food is actually very healthy! In America, we have "Chinese restauraunts" with "authentic Chinese food", but in reality, those are just high fat, high cholesterol versions of the real thing. Even though Chinese cooking uses alot of rice, it is made from wheat flour, which is healthier than white flour. Also, they eat veggies with every meal, and take in liquid food. Also, their ingredients are overall healthier and they don't use many processed foods. Vegetables are very abundant! Chinese cabbage (napa) and bok choy are the base of many salads, as opposed to lettuce or spinach. Eggs and almonds and peanutes are also used a lot. The Chinese do have fried foods, but they are mostly fried in vegetable oil, and way less fatty than western fried foods. Most 'desserts' use peanuts, almonds, bananas, or melons. There is minimal sugar, minimal fatty ingredients in desserts. I don't even think pizza exists in China, unless they are trying to copy American food.

This can be hard to believe, since when we think of Chinese food in America, greasy potstickers and fatty fried rice come to mind. These meals are not TRADITIONAL Chinese cooking. We "westernized" Chinese food. If the food isn't heart attack inducing, it doesn't belong in America :)

To get a better taste of what Chinese food actually is, I suggest looking up traditional recipes online. It will be really fun to look up and prepare the food first hand. That way, you know everything going into it, and you can know it's more authentic than the take out you get from Panda Express. Here is a link to some pretty legitimate, authentic Chinese recipes: http://www.daydaycook.com/recipe/1/section/192/index.html