For a few months now, I’ve gotten the feeling that Gwyneth Paltrow is trying to make her Goop more appealing to the peasants. Even more specifically, I think she’s trying to appeal to those “flyover states” which she has, historically, written off in previous years. While Gwyneth is just as clueless and ridiculous as ever, now that she’s running Goop like a for-real business, she’s trying to increase her market. That’s how I explain this new Goop post about fast-food. Gwyneth doesn’t even call anyone a fattie or tell anyone to simply NOT eat anything, both of which are her baseline pieces of advice. So what fast-food recommendations is she giving us for “clean” or “cleanish” food? You can see the full Goop post here. Some highlights:
Dairy Queen: The Goop recommendation is a “50-calorie fudge bar,” but if you’re at DQ, how are you not getting a blizzard, for the love of God?
Chipotle: Goop recommends “A salad bowl, with some brown rice if you’re hungry. Load up on the veggies, skip the dairy, add black beans, and you’re good to go.”
Wendy’s: Surprisingly, Goop seems fine with Wendy’s and she recommends the “Power Mediterranean Chicken Salad” with no hummus (which is insane because chickpeas are great for you). She also recommends getting the baked potato (with no sour cream) instead of the fries.
Subway: Basically, order a veggie-heavy sandwich and then don’t eat the bread.
Panda Express: get grilled Mandarin chicken with brown rice and no sauce.
She goes on to list some other places, like McDonalds, Dunkin Donuts, KFC, etc, and inevitably she recommends some special order of “I’d like this salad but take off half the stuff,” which generally defeats the purpose of fast food, but whatever. I feel like Gwyneth just compiled this at gunpoint, actually. It goes against every one of her instincts. Basically, her advice for every fast-food joint is “JUST ORDER THE SALAD AND DON’T EVEN EAT HALF OF IT.”
Photos courtesy of WENN.
so buy and waste your money in other words. throw away the bread and whatever else she advised you to dispose off because I mean hey, there’s no food crisis in the world around you, no need to feel bad. the entitlement *UGH!!*
And if you eat the bread does that do anything to help with the global food crisis?
Using your stomach as a bin instead of throwing out the parts of meals you don’t want doesn’t help anybody. It’s two very seperate issues.
Is it though? bacon doughnut raised the point about throwing food away in other word over consuming (of everything oil,energy,plastics – not just food) which at base level has quite a lot to do with the global food crisis in the developing world. Advising throwing food away is conspicuous overconsumption and exactly as thoughtless as I’ve come to expect from Goop.
I’m a compulsive eater who has often stuffed myself because “I don’t want to waste food” and I’ve found that when I get myself treats like candy, I’ll pour half the box down the toilet because otherwise I’ll eat it all even if I don’t want it.
it doesn’t help that everything is priced so that a whole bag of candy bars (like you get at the supermarket) is only about twice the price as the single serving kind. Not to mention that the movie-theatre-size boxes of candy are now like the norm.
Clearly, Goopy has never set foot in a Subway. If she did, she would know that you can order any sandwich as a salad, meaning you don’t have to order a sandwich and waste the bread. I’ve ordered a Veggie Delight Salad lots of times.
No, she does. It specifically mentions it in the article. I don’t know why she doesn’t make that the suggestion though. (Though it is more expensive, and perhaps a larger serving?)
I agree, it is food waste, but I also see a lot of eating disordered behaviors
As someone who struggled heavily with anorexia, then bulimia, and then general anxiety over the ‘wrong’ and ‘right’ foods – I too would take the bread/rice/legumes off my meal because carbs make you fat (india, china, vietnam, france, italy anyone??); i thought fast food gives you heart attacks; I would only eat half and make myself throw the other half away of a totally normal sized meal, also so I wouldn’t get big.
Eventually I had a dietitian who helped me see – What is wrong with a hamburger with the bread AND a salad? Or a salad with a side of french fries? Or a dairy queen shake one day (that was an actual assignment!) for dessert, and have fruit salad the next.
when i ate enough through the day I slept better, thought better, and felt like I could enjoy my life more, but I needed sooo much help to get over my fear that I was eating wrong or too much or at the wrong time, and basically deal with my phobia of ‘bad’ food.
Maybe I am projecting but I see that with GOOP?
Hardest fear I ever had to face was getting through my food fears (at one point I was scared of eating gluten, dairy, sugar, and fast food aka hard core paleo), but I am so glad I did.
Just wanted to say – I was thin, but not as thin as GOOP – so please know you can have an eating disorder Even if you don’t think you are thin enough to have one! Eating disorder institute (edinstitute.squarespace.com) saved my life.
Thank you! A few years ago, I developed quite a few food phobias that took time to unlearn. Advice like this led me there. At my worst, I was only eating broccoli, tofu, or a teaspoon at a time of organic raw peanut butter. Occasionally a tablespoon of brown rice. Elimination diets are so harmful, psychologically.
Oddly enough, often I just want the burger. I add the condiments with wild abandon. But it’s a veggie burger rather than meat and has grains in it, so I think that’s why. I have no qualms about eating just bread separately if it’s good bread. And if it’s not good bread, why bother eating it?!?
Thanks for sharing, Tata. I’m much healed from the same fears. Let the light shine by talking about it instead of hiding, and healing can begin.
TATA I hear you. Ive been to a therapist and a nutritionist in my recovery for bulimia and compulsive overeating — along the way I’ve read a lot of books and been in several groups with other women in recovery.
To say that a lot of what Goop is shilling here has all he hallmarks of disorders eating would be an understatement. It’s hard to read these articles as someone in recovery and know that there are probably people out there internalizing this advice/view of food.
Its not difficult to order smaller portions.
For chocolates ans candies, if I buy a wholw box I take it to work. That way I share with my colleagues and alsp don’t end up eating the whole box
Better to have zip bags with you so you can save the bread or half of anything for later. Bread and rolls freeze very well. The calorie counts on a lot of fast food really are too much for small sedentary types, but half will work as a full meal.
I often tie junk food up into pieces or portions in cheapie sandwich bags and toss in the freezer. I also do this with bags of rolls and loaves of bread (so I can retrieve and toast a single slice or two any time but am not obliged to eat it up before it goes stale). Works for candy bars, cookies, pie, cake, donuts, anything like that. Big ones can be cut up into more reasonable portions first. I also bag small portions of things like jelly beans – I’m still working my way through a bag of licorice ones from a couple of Easters ago, while if I left them loose in the bag I would have kept having “just one more”.m for a day or two and they would be all gone… Putting a few in a bag and knotting it works for me. I cut up a pizza and freeze the slices before eating my first one, since my body does a lot better with one slice at a time. Sometimes I’ll put preferably non-dairy ice cream (thanks, Ben&Jerry!) into quarter cup containers as a better portion for me – Oxo sells some really sturdy ones for freezing portions of baby food that work quite well. Helps me avoid the “oops, I broke the plastic spoon so of course I have to eat it all right now” type of thinking (I’m not making that up, I used that excuse a few days ago). Chips and popcorn etc. can also be bagged for easy grabbing in reasonable portions to avoid the “oops, I tore the bag so I have to eat it all right now” type of thinking (another true story).
I freeze portions of just about anything, junky or not. Fruit is great this way, and not just for smoothies. I have two huge bags of Clementine sections in the freezer, they’re even better frozen…. likewise blueberries, pineapple chunks, grapes, cherries, etc.
I do this, too. I can’t stand to throw food away, but I refuse to use myself as a trash bin, so I freeze and use later anything I can’t eat right away!
I, too, do not like goop on my food.
Snort 😀
She really is just so awful, I can’t even find her entertaining or bring myself to laugh at home out of touch and utterly clueless she is. I just read another article about her this morning that featured her namedropping the Carter’s, because she’s just so desperate to make everyone think she isn’t the ridiculous, out of touch, delusional privileged white lady… she needs us to know that Jay Z and Beyonce are her token black friends. Her entire existence is eye roll worthy.
No, Goop. I go to fast food restaurants for junk food and get my salad from a bag, like a normal person!!
I’m with you, I love a good salad and fast food salads are usually sad. I don’t eat fast food often, but when I do I’m going to treat myself a little.
…WTF??? Just, W? T? F?
More like STFU!!! She is a truly pointless human being!
I’m not a Goop apologist but I do eat low carb/paleoish and her recs look pretty good. Have you noticed how carb heavy restaurants are, especially fast food?
When I try to order a burger with no bun, counter staff are huh?? When I tried to get a side of tuna on some salad greens at a lunch place near my office this week instead of buying the $7 tuna sandwich and removing g the bread, the owner at first couldn’t understand what I meant, then refused to do it cause she had limited amount of tuna made up. Huh??
And, a lot of commercially prepared sauces are filled with sugar, highly processed,/probably rancid oils, and a bunch of crap.
In and Out Burger lets you order your burger “Protein Style,” which means it’s wrapped in lettuce instead of a bun,
Five Guys, too. Other fast food joints need to get on board with this.
Chickpeas are my go to snack and a staple in the Mediterranean diet. They’re great sources of protein and have all sorts of good minerals in them.
Goop – speak for yourself.
Hummus and carrot sticks are mine
Hummus often contains some nasty preservatives. I had a mild asthma attack after eating some and now I check the ingredients.
Mine doesn’t I make my own.
I forget, is she a smoker? Is that partly why her skin is so fried? She shouldn’t be giving advice to anyone.
Is it just me, or does Goop seem like it’s straying into #pippatips territory?
Right? This stuff is sort of like, ‘duh.’
OMG her life sounds miserable . Doesn’t she ever just enjoy life? Eat this not that, and when you do eat only eat half . She’s invested so much time and anxiety over food and she’s pushing her food issues on everyone else . Sometimes we NEED a blizzard and should enjoy it and not feel ashamed .
As someone on here once said, “Whatever you can eat, I can eat less of.”
Speaking of blizzards – Goop would probably recoil in horror but I think Dairy Queen still has some star-shaped fruit-flavored things that are non-dairy and will also provide your minimum daily requirement of sugar and artificial colors. Back in the 70s, they were the closest I could get to non-dairy ice cream. I would buy several and keep them in my freezer. There’re that kind of consistency. Edy’s has Outshine frozen fruit bars that are also dairy-free and hit the ice cream spot for me. For the minimalists, a good popsicle mold let’s you fill up the slots with cut up fruit (even canned) and then fill in the gaps with fruit juice or water. I’ve also frozen smoothies this way as well as just making popsicles from juice or soda. You don’t really need to add other stuff as in the usual recipes if you’re not picky.
I’ve just had a bowl of crisps (potato chips to you in America). Do I feel guilty? No.
I had a craving for some barbeque flavored potato chips last night so I bought a medium size bag and enjoyed them.
Yummm what flavor crisps? I live in Canada, but travel to U.K. often. Love cheese and onion !
I like plain potato chips, but you have to check the oils used and avoid any with canola oil, soybean oil, or cottonseed oil (ditto for roasted nuts) because those are not tasty. Doesn’t matter with flavored ones but makes a big difference with plain. The cheap store brand is more likely to have the tasty oils. Lays used to have a good plain chip made with corn oil but they replaced it with a blend.
Sometimes I make potato chip sandwiches… either mayonnaise or butter/margarine/coconut oil work well on the bread. I horrified a physician colleague when I told him that I would be celebrating our finishing a translation project with that. If you must have protein, they’re good with cheese or tofurky deli slices. But bread has a lot of protein, especially something like Dave’s Killer Bread loaded with seeds and various grains.
I am otherwise partial to Kettle Food’s maple bacon (vegan) and dill pickle potato chips.
This doesn’t sound tasty to me but you sound like fun!! 🙂
I get fast food maybe once a week before my last shift at work. DELISH
More common sense being sold as enlightening bs because it comes from a celebrity who has every means at her fingertips to look like she does and you can too, if you just do as she says!! You can eat healthy at fast food by picking basics and not getting the extras (cheese, bread, bacon, fat) that make fast food so delicious!! Just like the walking barefoot, her loyal fans with money to spare but limited brain cells will call her genius for such forward thinking
I just…I don’t know, is she really in a position in which she has to take such extreme measures to avoid excess calories? Just seems like she already has a naturally thin build coupled with regular exercise and a diet that’s already regulated so why even worry about the occasional fast food meal? Just seems over the top. I’m naturally thin and workout consistently (without a trainer) and eat healthily (without a meal service or chef) and I wouldn’t worry about a single fast food meal’s calories. This just seems obsessive.
Yes Littlestar I wrote above, she reminds me of my thought process when My brain got locked into an eating disorder. I was scared of most carbs, bread, sugar, fast food, and I almost never went off my diet (my hands would tremble at the thought) so like goop, I could get the salad with protein at a fast food restaurant…but not really anything else. It is a really sad way to live, a really horrible illness.
She might just not feel good if she eats too much at once. I have that problem so it’s safer for me to eat smaller amounts at once. Not that I always do, but I generally regret it. Some people have digestive issues related to volume of food.
zomg more enlightened advice from prof goop. cut calories!
earth shattering!
there must be a Nobel prize in her near future.
🙄
What about Subway’s flatbread sandwiches? Aren’t they supposedly lower in carbs than the regular bread? And I can’t go to Chipotle without getting sour cream and Monterey jack cheese on my burrito or salad.
Dear Goop, yesterday I had an all dressed steamie hotdog and chipstand fries with a whole whack of salt and vinegar for lunch. Oh, and a cream soda to drink. And it was AWESOME. All things in moderation, I’ve learned…
That tan is worse than Emperor Cheetolini’s.
She’s insufferable, but now she’s actually even worse. Because promoting her own eating and weight obsession/disorder under the guise of good health is unhealthy, myopic, and potentially dangerous, especially to women with a proclivity towards eating disorders. I was anorexic for 7 years, and still have food phobias; I know many women w similar disorders. Goop is doing no one any favors w her “healthy” restrictive diets which are designed far less for health (she pays little attention to women’s calcium needs, for instance) than for her overriding passion to stay stick thin. I used to think she was just harmlessly horrible, but she’s harmful: an incredibly ignorant pseudo “dietician” who pushes multiple weight loss tricks onto women, some of whom are too vulnerable not to be influenced by them.
I’m a poor and I would never set foot in a fast foot place. I’m shocked that she’s promoting this.
She’s so invested in staying super-thin. Weird to me. I rarely get fast food because I’m cheap, but when I do, I’m getting a chili dog or a deep dish pizza from the local Pizza Hut. I really don’t have food issues at all, so I can’t relate much with this.
I won’t take advice from someone wearing a dress that looks like that. WTF?
I eat whatever the heck I feel like eating because life is too short to obsess over food. I’m healthy and happy so that’s enough for me.
People like Goop give other people complexes about their bodies and food voices.