Re: chinese fried rice - Is it healthy?

A little birdie told me that Ariane Jenkins said:

My sister, who is rather small (ask Damsel, who's
seen her in person) at 5' 3" and maybe all of 125 lbs. (if that) was larger
than 85% of the women we saw, and that's a _conservative_ estimate.

Yeah, I can vouch for Ariane's little sis. She's so petite I wanted to
slap her. LOL! Naw, the whole Ariane clan was delightful to visit with.
Maybe we can do it again sometime? I'm sure I can still belch garlic with
the same enthusiasm as last year. <EG>

Carol
--
Coming at you live, from beautiful Lake Woebegon

Ariane Jenkins said:

On Sat, 9 Apr 2005 03:11:26 -0500, jmcquown <[email hidden]>

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Taste wise, the guess would be that they add lot of oil.
But I have seen very rarely chinese people being overweight.

Apparently you haven't been overseas. I saw plenty of hefty Chinese
folks in SE Asia.

Being overseas doesn't necessarily lead you to that conclusion.

It led me to that conclusion. There was a large population of Chinese
people in Bangkok (and Malaysia) and while the men were thin as rails the
women all tended to be hefty. I'm not saying morbidly obese; rather plump.

Quoted message said:

In fact, I'd think it would lead one to the conclusion the OP
suggested. I've been to SE Asia, and fairly recently, too.

True, I haven't been there in 30 years.

Quoted message said:

Malaysia's Chinese population was _quite_ slender as well as petite.
My sister, who is rather small (ask Damsel, who's seen her in person)
at 5' 3" and maybe all of 125 lbs. (if that) was larger than 85% of
the women we saw, and that's a _conservative_ estimate. The dress
she purchased off the rack was a size medium. Our idea of XL size
(men OR women) barely exists over there, even in areas used to
tourism.

Ariane

Dinner tonight will be steamed Jasmine rice and sauteed sea scallops 🙂

Jill

jmcquown said:

It led me to that conclusion. There was a large population of Chinese
people in Bangkok (and Malaysia) and while the men were thin as rails the
women all tended to be hefty. I'm not saying morbidly obese; rather plump.

I'm not sure where in Malaysia you went, but that certainly could not
be said to describe the Chinese women we saw. I'd say the majority of them
didn't break 100 lbs. That's not even plump in my book, not even when a
person is below 5'4".

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

In fact, I'd think it would lead one to the conclusion the OP
suggested. I've been to SE Asia, and fairly recently, too.

True, I haven't been there in 30 years.

It just seemed like your experience was a bit of an anomaly. I don't
know how widely you were able to travel, since your experience there
was during your childhood, but perhaps that makes a difference. Our sampling
was a fairly wide range of places including some that tourists generally don't
see. Everywhere, I was struck by how tiny people were, it was just that
obvious.

Ariane
--
Dysfunction: The only consistent feature of all your dissatisfying
relationships is you.
http://www.despair.com/demotivators/dysfunction.html

Ariane Jenkins said:

jmcquown said:

Quoted message said:

Taste wise, the guess would be that they add lot of oil.
But I have seen very rarely chinese people being overweight.

Apparently you haven't been overseas. I saw plenty of hefty Chinese folks
in SE Asia.

Being overseas doesn't necessarily lead you to that conclusion. In fact,
I'd think it would lead one to the conclusion the OP suggested. I've been to
SE Asia, and fairly recently, too. Malaysia's Chinese population was _quite_
slender as well as petite. My sister, who is rather small (ask Damsel, who's
seen her in person) at 5' 3" and maybe all of 125 lbs. (if that) was larger
than 85% of the women we saw, and that's a _conservative_ estimate. The
dress she purchased off the rack was a size medium. Our idea of XL size
(men OR women) barely exists over there, even in areas used to tourism.

My overseas experiences have obviously been different. We were in an
area with a significant Chinese population, did a lot of traveling in both
popular tourist spots and suburbs of KL where you wouldn't lay eyes on a
tourist for miles, and throughout our entire 3-week trip, I saw less than
half a dozen people I'd categorize as "hefty", nevermind obese. This would be
in 2003, very recent memory.

The diet generally eaten by my relatives is high carb, high sugar,
lots of seafood and poultry, almost no red meat, little dairy, and low to
moderate fat. Portions are small, meals are frequent. Three of the visiting
party including myself and Erik actually _lost_ weight while we were over
there due to a combination of several factors, which included the heat.

Ariane

I agree with Ariane. I was in Vietnam, Thailand and Hong Kong twice
in two years. FWIW, I am 5'5" and a size 8 in clothing. *If* I could
find clothing off the rack, it was almost always an XL. I saw very
few (read: almost none) fat locals and certianly no one considered
obese that was an Asian national. I lost weight too and attribute this
to the amount of walking we did and avoidance of snacking. The
portions in all restaurants are much, much smaller than we have in the
USA.

Ginny

Ginny Sher said:

I agree with Ariane. I was in Vietnam, Thailand and Hong Kong twice
in two years. FWIW, I am 5'5" and a size 8 in clothing. *If* I could
find clothing off the rack, it was almost always an XL. I saw very
few (read: almost none) fat locals and certianly no one considered
obese that was an Asian national. I lost weight too and attribute this
to the amount of walking we did and avoidance of snacking. The
portions in all restaurants are much, much smaller than we have in the
USA.

I'd love to go to those places, Ginny. We were close to Thailand on
our 2003 trip, but between visiting all the Malaysian relatives, we didn't
have time to make a side trip. Maybe next time! Fujigirl over on
alt.binaries.food posted some pictures a while back, and the pho ones were
especially tempting. It's challenging to get proper pho tai here, and that's
one of my favorites.

Yeah, portions definitely are smaller over there, particularly
street food. But they were wonderfully cheap... A small plate of noodles
with bean sprouts and seafood was around a dollar U.S. And with the weather
so hot and humid, we rarely felt like eating a heavy meal in one sitting,
anyway. Our method while traveling was to eat small meals and have snacks and
frequent drinks (usually high sugar ones, too) to refresh ourselves inbetween
times. It was more like 4-6 small meals per day, which was fine by me. ;D
The walking, sweating and filling up your stomach with much-needed liquids
rather than food did the rest, IMO. My husband lost an amazing 15 lbs. in
less than three weeks' time. Toward the end of the trip, he was having
dehydration problems despite drinking constantly, and his lunch sometimes
consisted of several glasses of pineapple juice.

And the issue with difference in size over there wasn't merely weight,
but also body frame. If I weighed 100 lbs., I'd look pretty emaciated and my
shoulders would _still_ be too broad for most off the rack clothing. (That's
one of the issues my sister had, despite her small size by American
standards.) The difference between my relatives who'd remained in Malaysia
and the ones who'd moved elsewhere was fairly obvious, too. A couple of my
aunts are around 5'3 and maybe a size six and they said they wouldn't even
bother trying to look for clothes there, either. It would've been a lesson in
humility. <g>

Ariane
--
Dysfunction: The only consistent feature of all your dissatisfying
relationships is you.
http://www.despair.com/demotivators/dysfunction.html