Nutrition structures, dietary health trends, and the relationship between bodies and food.
In 1902, United States Department of Agriculture official Wiley had young people test poisons. Today, borax remains in meatballs, formaldehyde is still used on frozen seafood; multiple legal additives in ultra-processed food may add up. Choose whole foods, avoid the “crisp-and-gummy taste” to cut additives.
Over five years, Grandma Kouzi has turned barren land into a self-sufficient one-person farm, improved her health indicators, and filed a lawsuit against Baidu AI over its rumour-mongering.
From raw nuts and pure dried fruit to roselle stevia, homemade yoghurt, dried pumpkin, nut candy and jerky, these back-to-the-kitchen choices deliver both flavour and good health.
The family tables of the three mothers, Xiaoyunsheng, Lingyu and Xiaojing, stretch from a childhood spent eating only dumpling wrappers to teenage “extra meals” and a rice-ball meltdown, tying together the pressures of motherhood, women’s labour and self-identity.
Xiao Jing, Yu Yang and Li Ye, three heavy users of digital mealtime content, discuss whether watching it while eating can ease loneliness. Research teams found this way of eating increases total caloric intake by 15% and may cause gastrointestinal dysfunction, indigestion and nutritional imbalances.
Sucrose, high-fructose corn syrup and other added sugars hide in sweet drinks, pastries, savoury puffed snacks. Excess fructose, mainly liver-metabolised, can easily trigger fatty liver; long-term high-sugar diets raise diabetes and heart disease risks. Checking labels and skipping sweet drinks can cut daily added-sugar intake.
Research funded by the US Sugar Association, the selection of data in the Seven Countries Study led by Ancel Keys, and the promotion of low-fat guidelines collectively shaped the food industry’s trend of replacing fat with sugar, while the new Dietary Guidelines for Americans explicitly advise against consuming any amount of added sugar.
In Èrén Gǔ, Kouzi served roasted pumpkin, maize and homemade tempeh at the table, using an air fryer and a high-speed blender to make seasonal harvests into everyday staple foods.
Milk travelled the world on Dutch merchant ships, came to the table in Shanghai, and over more than a century was shaped by advertising, scientific discourse and nationalism into a drink for strengthening the nation and the race; after the melamine incident, Chinese people with lactose intolerance still put it on their everyday table.
After oils are extracted with n-hexane and treated twice at high temperatures, refined vegetable oils in supermarkets may have solvent residues and trans fats. A farmer who grows rapeseed and peanuts therefore does not stir-fry and uses walnut oil, nuts and peanuts as substitutes.
