diet rant

[sullidog]

Ok, my dietition thinks I need to make everything I eat from scratch, so that way my phos and calc won't be as hi as they are. I know frozen foods and pre-cooked foods have a lot of that stuff in them and it's not that I don't wanna follow the diet with not eating as much with that stuff it's just that with my limited vision it's hard for me to cook from scratch, now some blind people are good at it, but this one is not and so it's just easier for me just to pop that precooked meal in the microwave or oven. She said I need to hier someone to cook for me, I'd love that but is my dialysis center gonna pay for it? I think not! I mean I really have no choice I can only work with what I got. I know how to do chicken and hamburgers and stuff like that but having that every day would get old too.

[MooseMom]

Frozen veg isn't high in phos and K.  There's nothing wrong with relying on bags of frozen peas or corn or green beans. 

Suddenly we're getting posts about dieticians who lay down the rules but don't help in giving you practical advice on how to incorporate the diet into the lives of very busy people.  That's not very helpful of them.

[mcclane]

when i was on pd, my dietician would say similiar things.

try to cook from scratch, use fresh items.  I'm not arguing that they are healthier, but when you're saddled with dialysis, your time becomes immensely precious.  So I wound up resorting to processed foods when I was doing manual pd.  It was easier to pop it in the microwave than to cook from scratch.

[monrein]

Maybe what we really need to be doing is advocating for companies to start making more healthy, less salty, less preserved frozen foods so that convenience doesn't come saddled with so many detriments...My bias btw is that this true for all of us, renal or not.  Unfortunately, as a society we're a bit addicted to the unhealthy things (salt and fat) that can add flavour to food that isn't top-notch to start off with...industrially raised chickens and eggs being two examples.

On the other hand, frozen veggies (not the ones smothered in highly processed "sauces", just flash frozen veggies) are perfectly good, much better than canned and the dietitian ought to know this.  Nutritionally they can be excellent because they're frozen at the peak of freshness unlike some "fresh" stuff that been sitting around and/or shipped long distances.

[sullidog]

that's a good idea!
My dietition makes me tell her what I've been eating before she'll tell me if it's not good for my diet, why just not make up a full list of what in her oppinion is bad for me then give it to me because some of the things she says is bad for me I can't find on any dialysis list, and what she doesn't understand, sometimes a patient does have to give in to timtation.
yes, also when you are tired from dialysis who wants to come home and make a meal from scratch?

[sullidog]

also I did try that magic kitchen, not only is it expensive, but in my oppinion it tastes horrible!

[mcclane]

I'll admit, now that i'm on home hemo, I do have more time to cook from scratch, I've been searching on the internet for easy basic recipes (ie. basic beef stroganoff) which takes no time to make.  I also make cream of mushroom soup from scratch, using fresh mushrooms.

But still, I know what it is like doing manual PD, and it was tough cooking meals without using processed items (as a time saver, ie. 90 seconds for rice to nuke in the microwave, vs. 40+ min cooking rice from scratch).

[sullidog]

she says that mushrooms are high in phos, is this true?

[willowtreewren]

This is from Wikipedia

[mcclane]

she says that mushrooms are high in phos, is this true?

i thought they were high in potassium, but i could be way out in left field too.

[Zach]

USDA National Nutrient Database for Standard Reference
http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp/search/

Mushrooms, white, raw
1 medium,   18 grams*:

Phosphorus, P   15 mg
Potassium, K   57 mg

*18 grams = 0.6 ounces
1 ounce = 28 grams