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ASIAN AMERICAN ISSUES
Asian Power Lunches
(Updated
Tuesday, Apr 1, 2008, 05:59:14 PM)
iet is an area of life in which Asian Americans were once thought to enjoy the pole position. Simply put, Asian foods have been seen as less fattening, less carcinogenic and more nutritious. Since the late sixties Asian staples like tofu, rice, fish and sprouts have been canonized as virtuous alternatives to beef, cheese, white bread and overdressed salads.
In an age when obesity is pandemic and fatty foods have taken on the sinister overtones once associated with dioxin and lead, even the old saw about being hungry an hour later came to sound like a ringing endorsement of Asian restaurants. Indeed, Americans often enter them with the solemn, almost reverent air of terminal patients seeking a cure. Chopsticks are wielded like syringes. Special requests pertaining to MSG, brown rice and animal fats are passed back to the kitchen like prescriptions.
Best Asian power lunches?
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But are Asian meals really E-tickets for gluttons?
A calories-be-damned American-style workaday lunch might consist of two pieces of fried chicken (500 calories and 35 grams of fat), mashed potatoes with gravy (280 cals., 10 grams), 4 ounces of cole slaw (90 calories, 4 grams) and coke (175 calories). Or it might be a personal deep-dish pan pizza with the works (1,000 calories, 57 gr. fat) and a soda (175 calories).
A damn-the-calories Asian lunch might consist of 10 ounces of boolgoki (650 calories, 30 gr. fat), bowl of short-grain white rice (270 calories), side dishes of pickled vegetables, egg and fish (about 150 calories, 5 gr. fat), bowl of radish soup (40 calories, 2 gr.) and a cup of corn tea (3 calories). An alternative might be a 3-item combo platter of, say, 5 ounces of pepper chicken (250 calories, 11 gr.), 6 ounces of country-style tofu (230 calories, 12 gr.), 8 ounces of fried rice (310 calories, 8 gr.), a fortune cookie (25 cals.) and tea (0 cals.).
In our examples, the Asian lunches contain 35% less fat and 14% fewer calories.
Once upon a time that would have been enough to win raves from nutritionists. No more. The onus is shifting from calories and fat to glycemic index (GI). High GI foods are those that break down rapidly into blood sugar. Under the GI regime, Asian cuisine is suspect because of its reliance on white rice. Despite being a fat-free complex carbohydrate, it metabolizes rather quickly into glucose. A jump in blood sugar levels triggers a surge of insulin, a hormone that tells cells to soak up excess glucose for conversion into glycogen, the precursor to fat. For this reason, high GI foods are now being blamed for obesity, heart disease, diabetes and even cancer.
The GI of white rice is as high as that of white bread and donuts, making it an even more potent insulin trigger than baked potatoes, whole wheat bread, most kinds of bagels or even angel food cake. The answer, exhort nutritionists, is to eat more hi-fiber carbohydrates like brown rice and barley, both of which also contain an abundance of the B-complex vitamins lacking in traditional Asian diets. Unfortunately, most people find these substitutes to be as appetizing as bran flakes. Some experts even urge salvation in high-protein-low-carbo diets, precisely the regimen we've been shooed away from the last four decades.
Are we holding our breaths waiting for resolution of the carbs-vs-protein debate?
Hardly. We turn instead to a huge panel of experts who have dedicated their mealtimes to clinically testing every Asian dish from daengjang-chigae to thom yum goong. That would be you.
What are your favorite Asian power lunches, the dishes that may not satisfy the ascendant nutritional dogma but do satisfy your tastebuds and, what's more, leave you feeling juiced and beatific.
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WHAT YOU SAY
[This page is closed to new input. --Ed.]
Hey TKChang,
Are you trying to become bulky or ripped? If you're trying to bulk, then eating a lot of junk foods is actually a pretty efficient way because of all the fat clories, sugar and hormones. If you want to be ripped, you're better off with a modified Asian diet. By modified I mean cut down on the white rice, add brown rice and increase the amount of fish, chicken and beef. Chicken is actually an excellent source of the right kind of proteins for building muscles without putting on a lot of bulk. And Asian foods generally aren't as oily and more nutritious than junk food so they supply the energy levels needed for long workouts.
It takes about ten times as much work to put on one pound of high quality muscle as it does to add raw bulk on your shoulders and chest. In the long run, American foods will decrease your endurance while adding to your bulk. And it's hard to upgrade all that low-quality bulk to quality muscle fiber.
I have a lean ripped physique that comes from eating nutritiously while doing hill-running, swimming and jumping rope as well lifting weights. I would not be able to maintain my routine on an American diet.
One more note: the chicks mostly like the lean ripped look much better than that piano mover type physique.
DDL
Monday, November 04, 2002 at 11:10:51 (PST)
[12.36.118.87]
I became tired of being small and I've been into weight lifting for a while now. As part of my weight training program, I need a high-protein, high- calories diet. The typical Asian meal just doesn't cut it. I have to replace rice with wheat breads, porks with red meats, etc. I have to consume lots of milk and eggs every single day. I have to switch to Western diets in order to get enough protein and calories in order to put on weight and grow muscles. Asian meals are just too low in protein and diets. That's why you don't see too many huge or muscular Asian guys.
T'K Chang
tkchang@znet.com
Friday, November 01, 2002 at 03:57:59 (PST)
[207.167.96.13]
some good observations about what to eat. let me share my own.
when it comes to powerlunches what you don't eat matters as much or more than what you eat. I never drink sodas, coffee, alcohol, etc with my meals, maybe just a beer or a little wine with dinner. I never eat sweets during the day. sugar and caffein will destroy your body's ability to make use of the energy and nutrients in everything else you eat. your body doesn't need much to produce all the energy you need (unless you're into serious competitive bodybuilding or running the marathon or something) if you just dont' mess it up with sugars and caffein. i would also side with the folks who believe in more protein and less starch. many starchy foods like potatoes, bread and rice are pretty much like sugar.
no-no boy
Wednesday, October 30, 2002 at 12:50:24 (PST)
[151.198.112.44]
What's a power lunch depends on if you're a jock or a brain. I'm a fairly talented tech guy and the best lunches (which are like my breakfasts) are the really oily foods like omelettes, pizza, salmon, fried chicken, fried potstickers and even french fries. They keep me humming along until midnight or later. I rarely have a craving for vegetables or fruit. I hear the Chinese communists used to give all the fattiest parts of meats to the intellectuals.
Techtonic
Tuesday, October 29, 2002 at 21:12:40 (PST)
[138.21.102.93]
Actually the best power lunch is a great breakfast and either no lunch or a light snack for lunch. If I'm training for a triathlon I will eat the traditional Japanese breakfast including a whole broiled Spanish mackerel, miso soup, raw or steamed eggs, pickles, even a big bowl of white rice. I wash it down with two cups of green tea. That gives me ample energy through the middle of the p.m. But if I feel hungry at lunch or have an extra-long training session after work, I will eat a bowl of salted edamame. Those soybeans are perfect before going on my long training runs.
The green tea is important because it helps me get the fat burning started earlier. It also has more antioxidants than the black tea that most Americans drink.
Tri-Me
Monday, October 28, 2002 at 18:27:11 (PST)
[208.48.129.11]
One way I found to cut down on my reliance on white rice is to mix some brown rice and I usually add some navy or black eye beans to my rice before I place it into my rice cooker.
cyclist
Monday, October 28, 2002 at 10:21:10 (PST)
[67.28.88.48]
Best is Asian soups like vietnamese pho and corean sul-nong-tang. The broth is very refreshing and comforting. It also contains a lot of nutritious stuff. As far as calories, they contain way less than most foods. Thom yum gung is good also. You can't beat Asian soups as pickmeups.
Slurper
Monday, October 28, 2002 at 07:52:32 (PST)
[152.163.168.98]
Sushi! If you want power, try uni, toro (the fatty type tuna), unagi. I have found that the oiliest, fattiest types of fish give me the biggest boost and makes me concentrate real well at demanding assignments. It also leaves me maximum energy for my evening aerobics. It flaunts conventional wisdom but those nutritionists don't know everything. I go with what works for me.
Nori
Sunday, October 27, 2002 at 17:35:22 (PDT)
[56.188.201.98]
I have to say yook hwe, marinated raw beef ("beef tartare", to you eurocentric fools). It's a mongol/korean style dish that always leave me charged up for a long afternoon and evening. I eat it with very little rice and lots of sangchoo, the leafy green lettuce and green onions that they serve up with it. You can't beat it for nutrition either because raw meat preserves all the vitamins for your brain, nerves, muscles and, uh, sex organs.
Mongol Beefeater
Saturday, October 26, 2002 at 11:32:40 (PDT)
[67.190.120.17]
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