Interview by Bogdan Munteanu
Is there a connection between happiness and body figure?
Unfortunately women – and more recently men as well – measure their self-esteem on the weighing scale. And then, we blame our silhouette for the unhappiness, the lack of fulfillment and the bad things in our lives. We never consider ourselves slim enough or wealthy enough to move on towards another chapter in our lives. We lose the joy of everyday life in this race for the perfect figure.
What is missing in the life of people who are excessively worried of weight?
I am terrified that this concern regards all age and social categories, even 10-12 years old children. The. concern for dieting and being slim has become an obsession.
I have this theory, and it is almost conspiratorial. I believe that food is intentionally blamed all the time with the purpose of shifting our attention from problems that are more difficult to fix. Maybe the doctors are responsible as well. When the diagnosis is not obvious or stress is the cause, and because there are no medicines available for stress, the doctor doesn’t tell anything clear to the patient and he asks him: “But, how do you eat? Do you eat breakfast?” As a consequence, food is the guilty party…
People have this illusion and they believe that, until we get to fix other problems, we can worry about the food in our plate. But, in this quest for healthy food, we get into this vicious circle: we never eat sufficiently healthy, balanced or diversified. I see people spending more than half of their vital energy on food, which has become some sort of public enemy. Instead of rejoicing in food, and getting pleasure and safety out of it, we end up poisoned in this race for healthy and E-less products.
On the other hand, we do have too many processed foods nowadays, don’t we?
We certainly do, but we cannot control this. This is a necessary evil because the world’s population has grown spectacularly and the traditional agriculture methods are extremely rare. I would be glad if people went all the way in their desire to eat healthily. Meaning they stop going to the supermarket, buy from the local producers, provided that all parties involved in the food chain are honest. In our race for healthy food, we forget that it doesn’t exist anymore.
Therefore, it is not worth poisoning our soul saying that everything found in stores is toxic, unhealthy and dangerous, because we will end up being sick. Mistrust and anxiety towards the food in our plate is more dangerous than any foood additives.
Due to the pressure of consumers, the food industry is forced to produce cheaper and cheaper food. Every- one looks at the price first,and not just in Romania! If, for example, meat became 10 times more expensive, we would be protected from excess because the farmers would stop producing intensively and we wouldn’t eat too much.
We, the consumers, want healthy and cheap food all year round. A French teacher told me that back in the days of his childhood, during wintertime, he would never eat eggs because the hens didn’t lay eggs. What consumer would like to have no eggs during winter in 2017? We cannot turn back the food industry spiral; we cannot go back to the traditional agriculture methods. We cannot remove food excess, our brain doesn’t make the difference between tens of thousands of products on the supermarket shelves.
Then, what solutions can we use to face the abundance of choices?
The only thing we can watch is the quantity, because food nowadays is very concentrated. If our stomach needs 200 grams, it matters if we eat green salad or hard cheese. If it is pastry or frozen pizza, we cannot perceive the actual content of fat or sugar.
We should go back to the basics, to the unprocessed food and to cooking with simple ingredients! Otherwise, all the packed and processed products contain several portions. But we eat the entire content at once. No one wants us to eat and buy less.
We cannot expect the Ministry of Health protecting us, nor the food industry because, fortunately, the extra kilograms don’t kill us unless they are a lot. At the global level, obesity cannot be declared a major handicap, because there is no cure for it.
Besides the foods we eat,do we know how to eat?
The main question is “Why do I eat?” The food I eat is not that important. Even if it is salami, fries or pork pie on the street corner, if we eat little and rare, then we will not have health problems. I see patients eating when they are not hungry, they eat for other reasons. Whenever we have an emotional imbalance, food will become the medicine that brings back our wellness.
Besides being a poor society, we are also a sad one. We eat a lot just to survive psycho- logically and emotionally. Nature is extremely pragmatic and, between a slim figure and wellness, it will always choose the latter.
Often I tell people to stop fighting with themselves, because wellness must be attained from a chemical point of view in the organism, it doesn’t come as an act of will or determination. At the end of the day, if we realize that we ate more than we were actually hungry is because our soul needed anaesthesia and the wellness offered by food. Without food, maybe we would all be depressed. People would be extremely unhappy.
„Due to the pressure of consumers, the food industry is forced to produce cheaper and cheaper food. Everyone looks at the price first, and not just in Romania!“
How can we replace the food anaesthetic?
The French say that, in order to lose weight on the scale, we must gain weight in life – joy, enthusiasm, positive energy. These are not easy for everyone to achieve; maybe we need money, time, or the presence of other people to get hold of them – we are not able to control them.
On the other hand, food is easy to get. In this context, it is very difficult to change the habit of entire generations and to tell people: “The problem is not the food, but the lack of substance in your lives!” If we take away food as the support element from someone who is unhappy with his life, there is nothing to put back.
In Romania, more than in other countries, there is a lack of… genuineness. Since child- hood we are induced with some social preconceptions. Many Romanians live their lives rather for the outer world and less in accordance with what they feel inside. Doing what you feel like doing and choosing a personal path according to different criteria is like a…revolution. We risk losing our partner and fighting with our parents. If we put food aside and we realize it is not our enemy, we are left with a harder battle.
Whenever they get a diet, people follow it, maybe they get good results, but afterwards they go back to their old habits. How can they be guided to change their lives?
This is why I don’t recommend diets. Removing diets has become a popular trend abroad, because if we force people to do something, this is not actually helping them. Any diet leads to weigh loss, but the person concludes he or she cannot lose weight unless they follow a diet, and when they go back to their everyday food, the kilos are regained. In fact, we can lose weight by eating 30% or 50% less of the food we currently eat. Extra kilograms mean too much food and very little exercise.
I know people who, during the weekend wake up at 7.00 as well, because their breakfast is scheduled for 8.00 in their diet. Food shouldn’t be something we think about 80% of our time. We should try to eat a little bit each day, until it becomes a habit. If we eat five meals, we shall lose weight by eating only three. If we eat three meals, we could eat two. But people run away from this responsibility.
The doctors are making a mistake as well, because they don’t admit that we don’t have to eat three meals per day. We were designed to eat as much whenever we found food and afterwards we were using the backups. Unfortunately, our instinct is to eat more than we need. We could eat anything, no matter what quantity, whenever. If we tell someone to restrain himself, to be disciplined about food, it is very hard… Discipline means keeping an eye on ourselves all the time. We are not built to eat every day; all we need is water and joy.
If we are to start a diet tomorrow and stop eating and after 6 month we go back to greedy eating, then we shouldn’t start the diet in the first place… Any change we want to bring in our lives is made with small steps. Unfortunately, nutritionists don’t teach us this; they give a list of foods, fixed meals, and after the diet people don’t know what to do next. We have to be responsible for everything we eat during the day, including a peanut or a biscuit. Some people don’t count the fruits they eat, while others complain about not eating fruits every day…
Yet, don’t we receive many messages that tell us to eat fruits every day?
It is wrong to put vegetables and fruits in the same basket because fruits are not basic foods. We can eat as many vegetables we want, but not fruits. Fresh vegetables, without oil, will not get us fat, but fruits don’t do the same. We lack a nutritional education and a firm attitude of the medical staff who should tell us to re- duce the consumption to half, whenever there is a weigh issue. We can eat sarmale and lose weight, if, instead of five we eat just three.
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If I understand correctly, religious or secular traditions that recommend fasting are giving a very good advice?
Yes, fasting is excellent. By fasting we should remind ourselves how little food our body needs. But we must understand the correct method of fasting, like the ascetics; eating a small quantity and still be hungry, for example eating two slices of bread with zacuska for the entire day. We are not discussing the so-called fasting period when all the sweet foods have an equivalent: soya pesto, soya schnitzel, soya cheese… Fasting with a full stomach loses its significance.
We should regain focus on fasting and see that the purpose of religion was to help people eat less animal products. We should go back to the 19th century fasting and forget about the store labels “fasting product.”
How would you adapt the Romanian cuisine to the life of the contemporary, urban people who sit all day in their office and their car?
First of all, I would dispute the necessity of breakfast. Many adults have the habit of eating in the morning not because they are hungry, but because they heard it is the healthy thing to do. If the organism doesn’t ask, don’t give it! A coffee with milk can be considered breakfast as well.
Considering the 2017 sedentary life, I believe that an adult should have two meals per day at most, and one of them should be a soup or a borsch – in particular because it is part of the Romanian tradition and represents the extremely filling format of a dietetic food. There are many countries that don’t have borsch. It is a balanced food, and it is very hard to gain weight by eating it. It could represent the evening meal.
After that, any main meal could be considered dietetic if it doesn’t have too much oil. The salad, that back in the days was a side dish, it can be a main dish if it has some fish, chicken breast or cheese in it. It fills our stomach with water, but it also pleases our senses.
Pay attention to the following!
Mihaela Bilic never forbids something, she simply warns about certain foods:
MEAT. We shouldn’t consider pork an enemy, because it has less saturated fat than beef. The ideal meat portion is 150-200, the size of a playing cards pack. It is not recommended to eat meat every day, nor three times per day.
LIQUID CALORIES. All juices represent a big trap. They have this false reputation of being healthy, but either a soda or a “fresh” has 110 calories per glass (250 ml). Liquid foods don’t ease the hunger, but they makes us fat. It is only when we chew that the brain know we have eaten.
PACKED FOODS. They are dehydrated and extremely rich in sugar and fat; biscuits, chips, pretzels, sticks, and other “snacks” have 450 calories per 100 g; while a 300 g bread has 250 calories.
PASTRY. One gram of these products has 9 calories, while 1 gram of sugar has 4 calories. The dough is half flour, half margarine, meaning bad quality fat.
SAUSAGES. They are not a food staple, but a “superfood,” therefore they should be eaten rarely and not more than a few slices.
CHEESES. They make us fat, because 1 kilogram of cheese is made out of 7-10 liters of milk. We can drink milk by the glass or we can eat two yogurts, but cheese must be eaten in small quantities, enjoyed for the taste. Cheese is more caloric than bread.
OIL. There is a false conclusion to believe that vegetal oil cannot be harmful. These oils contain essential fat acid Omega 6 that has a pro-inflammatory effect. Cooking oil (100% fat) in excess creates cholesterol and is more dangerous than butter (80% fat) or bacon (70% fat).
