Soymilk and Soy Products: Good or Bad?

[SeattleDeb]

FYI...

"America may be on the verge of overdosing on soy...."

article in the SF Chronicle 5-23-01
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...3/FD155607.DTL

[kokopuffs]

SeattleDeb:

Yeah, well, only in San Francisco.

rice dream also makes some very good ice cream and chocolate covered ice cream bars. i have a 10 month old baby that i am currently nursing and i have started to give him soy milk as a substitute. he loves it. i try to give him everything organic especially meat and dairy because of all the hormones. i use the soy milk in cereal, it took awhile to get used to but i am very glad to have switched. keep trying you will definetly see a difference in the way you feel.
you can also do a comparison
stop drinking milk for a couple of days and then go back to it you will probably notice you are a little congested. thats from all the **** they pump into the cows. let me know how it goes

Cow''s milk as a beverage is for baby cows. Adults -- even children -- don't need to drink it and it is probably not even good for us. But it's great with Oreos.
My basic rule is the less processed the better and soy "milk" is processed like ****.
I keep Parmalat (European style shelf-stable milk) in the pantry for the few times a recipe calls for milk but I rarely keep fresh milk on hand. We just don't drink it.
But there is no way to do without cream or buttermilk or other dairy i8f you really love good food.
Huge percentage of most non-Northern-European people have some degree of lactose intolerance. If you are lactose-sensitive, you can do without milk. If you have no problem with it, use it as you wish. It's a good natural product.
Afra, stop worrying so much. (but, just an opinion -- soy "ice crean" may be one of the most disgusting things I've ever tried!).

[nancya]

margaret, have you ever had tofu-cheesecake? Now that's hideous. There is a special place for people who destroy something as wonderful as cheesecake.

[markdchef]

I beg to differ. If you have not tried Soy Delicious frozen soy then try it. Better than real ice cream!

Also, I make a pumpkin cheesecake out of soy cream cheese and tofu that is creamier than the real thing and wins me rave reviews every time I make it.

Mark Darragh
On The Mark PCS Inc.

[nancya]

Hey Mark, aren't you glad there are so many people with different likes and dislikes in the world? Glad there is something for all of us.

[Svadhisthana]

I just bought Soy Dream 'lil Dreamers. A chocolate flavored soy ice cream sandwich. yummy! I have also recently tried Rice Dream's ice creams. My husband didn't hate it, which means it passed with flying colors. Soy, however, he won't touch with a 15 foot pole.

[CompassRose]

I love all sorts of soy things, from tofu to tempeh to Yves Veggie Cuisine, but there are a few things I try to remember.

First, a LOT of soy these days is genetically modified; if this is a concern for you, look for certified-organic soy products. (As far as I'm aware, you can't get the organic certification if your product includes GMOs.) I'd never buy, for example, the jump-on-the-bandwagon Kellogg's soy cereal -- Roundup-ready out the wazoo, without a doubt!

Second, because soy is included in such an incredible number of commercially-processed foods already (testimony to its versatility) AND it's a legume, it tends to be one of the more allergenic foods around. So I'm careful when serving it to others (specially in concealed form; f'rinstance, I've found MoriNu Light Tofu fantabulous for certain low-fat baking applications, BUT before I hand over the goods, I make sure my victim is comfy with soy!) Also, you don't want to be eating it day in and day out every day, because food sensitivities can develop with high exposure even where you've never had them before.

Still, I think it's wonderful stuff. I suppose, as with anything else, moderation is the word to keep at the back of the old brain.

(As for soymilk... there are some good brands... I really like Silk... and some REALLY, REALLY bad ones. Taste tests are mandatory. Don't expect it to taste like moo-juice -- it doesn't. But a yucky brand will have a catch-the-throat beany harshness to it.)

I definitely love soy products. As a substitute for meat and dairy products?? I dont think so, leave it to the hippy scum but it just adds to the awesome variety of flavours and textures the world has to offer... i can think of soooo many different textures offered by soy products and they all take in the flavours they are cooked in well too. but as a meat substitute, till they can make it taste like blood, i dont think so.

[Svadhisthana]

CompassRose,
You are right about the soy milk. I tried out several different brands and Silk is my favorite. Some of the other ones were just downright nasty.

This question is a good one as the downsides of the Soy bean and its products are not as well known as you may think. The pro Soy marketing here is very effective.

We are not going to put the soy bean down or advocate dairy products either. Each has some pros and cons. What we know on the subject is:

The soy bean is a leghume, it like most beans and seeds have natural means of protecting the bean from disese, insects, mould, etc. Enzyme inhibitors are found in all such foods and each one has it's own unique coctail of protection. The downside of enzyme inhibitors is that they do just that, they inhibit the enzyme actions such as found in our digestive tracts. Some animals are more adapted to digesting seeds and beans and others are not in their raw state.

Environmental influences can reduce the or destroy the enzyme inhibitors, such as fermentation, heat, washing, soaking, etc.

To cut a long story short, the soy bean has a very strong trypsin inhibitor in it's coctail. It is not denatured by heat, it is denatured by fermentation.

Trypsin is a very important digestive enzyme in humans as it is the key responsible for the transfer of some essential nutriements out of the digestive tract. If the trypsin is inhibited regularily then nutritional imbalances may result.

Brewed soy sauce and miso are relatively free of TI and the nutriements are more bio available. Soy milk, Tofu etc do contain lots of TI and the question needs to be asked that if these are consumed regularily then what health effect can they have ?

Do some searching on "Trypsin" and the related medical syndromes when the body fails to produce sufficient, it may be interesting reading.

When I get time I will try to add some more on this post.

Come to think of it, some people lack the digestive enzyme necessary for propper utilisation of lactose in milk.

If it does not feel good or you do not like it, then that is feedback that you should consider in making you decision on anything that you are going to put into your body.

[Katherine]

The people who run this website are opposed to the extensive use of soy in the human diet. There's lot of interesting reading at their website.
http://www.westonaprice.org/soy_alert.htm

[Isa]

It goes to show that there will always be someone saying that such and such products are no good for humans. What is scary is that you never know who you should trust. Scary.

Don't get me wrong I am not saying the the articles on the link that Katherine provides are wrong, I do not know enough to comments on the veracity of the research they did. I am just making a general comment on the subject of what food is good or bad.