is tofu unhealthy?

[Denisemomof4]

I did a google search and I did a search on these boards. Can you share your opinion?

[LidiyaDawn]

I've never heard of it as being unhealthy - I suppose it could be if you were deep frying it or something?

[Guest cowsgomoo]

Soy is an incomplete protein. I suppose in small amounts, it is not harmful. It is also a comprimised crop, being meddled with by Monsanto and is GMO. My mother developed a severe soy allergy to GMO soy and then was unable to have ANY soy products or anything with soy in it. Keep googling it. I do not eat any here, nor do I feed any to my family or livestock.

[IsabelC]

I'm not a scientist, nutritionist, etc. But from what I have read it appears that any soy products that have been processed in a non traditional way and are eaten in very large quantities may be unhealthy. I think fermented soy products or small amounts of other soy products are OK.

[Anne]

A friend of mine who is very health conscious does not eat tofu, I think b/c of the estrogen issue. She says fermented soy products are good for us, but the others are not.

 

I do not like tofu, so it does not matter to me whether or not it is healthy!:D

 

Anne

[beachpotato]

Tofu, soy sauce, tamari, miso, tempeh, and natto are all fermented, so they are OK. Just make sure they are not genetically modified (GMO) and preferably organic. Non-GMO fermented soy products definitely aren't any worse for you than meat.

[beachpotato]

Most tofu isn't GMO anyways, but always check. Soy milk, on the other hand, is not fermented and so I don't drink it. I like Trader Joe's vanilla rice milk.

[ElizabethB]

From what I have read, we stay away from it, except for soy sauce occasionally. However, the only thing that seemed proven beyond a doubt was that you should definitely avoid it if there are thyroid problems in your family, the other studies were some for and some against.

[Rosie_0801]

. She says fermented soy products are good for us, but the others are not.

 

:iagree: We only eat fermented soy here.

 

 

Rosie

[katemary63]

I'm no expert on soy nor on genetically modified anything, but don't believe everything you read. This paragraph, from the article linked, doesn't even make any sense. How can a "gene" from soy "continue to function" in the human gut? Function how, as a gene? What??

 

"Soy can generate allergies. The gene placed in genetically modified soy (which I’ll refer to as GM Soy) is transmitted into the gut flora where it continues to function. Should you stop consuming soy, it can remain in your body for years, potentially causing allergic reactions in your intestinal tract that have the ability to upset digestion"

Edited December 27, 2010 by katemary63

[katemary63]

Again, be careful what you read. These articles are probably BOTH full of cr*p, if you ask me. They do contradict each other while both warning against soy. In one, soy CONTAINS Roundup, in the other, it RESISTS Roundup.

 

 

http://www.holisticwellnessblog.com/nutrition/no-joy-in-soy-why-soy-is-bad-for-you/

 

1. over 90% of Soy in the U.S. is genetically modified, specifically to increase the efficiency of farming by making it grow faster while also making it modified so that its genetic makeup includes the Round-Up herbicide formula. How’s that for tasty? You’re consuming Round-up.

 

 

http://www.toxicsoy.org/toxicsoy/toxic_soy.html

 

Most of this soy (90%) is genetically engineered. The company Monsanto has designed soy varieties to be resistant to their own herbicide RoundUp (glyphosate). Roundup kills all other plants, except the soy.

[Chelle in MO]

We drink banana/berry smoothies made w/silken tofu. I'm picky and I can't taste the tofu at all. The package says it doesn't have any genetically engineered ingredients. How do I know if it's fermented?

[LizzyBee]

I've read that it shouldn't be consumed in large quantities because of the estrogen content.

[IsabelC]

Fair enough, there is certainly a lot of hype and misinformation out there around dietary issues. But I think it's safe to say that, on the whole, for most people, it would be preferable to eat a large proportion of your food in some form that is recognizable as a plant (or a bit of dead animal if you're not vego). I'm just aiming to have lots of stuff that is relatively unchanged from how it grew, and less stuff that is full of ingredients that can't be replicated at home and I don't even know what they are. I think it's logical that if people avoid lots of real food (vegetables, fruits, pulses, grains and animal products) and replace it with fake food (soy milk, soy cheese, soy steak) and radically altered food (hydrolized vegetable oils, GM corn syrup) that it's not going to improve health.

[myfunnybunch]

I wonder about this too. I've read about tofu being unhealthy, but our Japanese students eat a lot of tofu and are very healthy, as are their parents and grandparents.

 

Cat

[colleenebeans]

I eat Tofu...mostly the Non-GMO kind and I feed it to my family. I dont think it is any worse than feeding meat.

[*lifeoftheparty*]

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[JeneralMom]

We only eat fermented soy products and tofu only occasionally and always non-GMO. Personally, I eat little tofu because it is not safe in smaller amounts than for the general pop. for people with thyroid conditions and I have thyroid issues running through the maternal side of my family. I do like tofu alot, so we still eat it sometimes.

[Matryoshka]

Again, be careful what you read. These articles are probably BOTH full of cr*p, if you ask me. They do contradict each other while both warning against soy. In one, soy CONTAINS Roundup, in the other, it RESISTS Roundup.

 

I haven't even read those articles, but wanted to point out that those two statements above don't contradict each other. GMO-Soybeans (also known as "Roundup Ready") are resistant to Roundup, an herbicide - meaning unlike other green plants, they aren't killed by it. So *huge* amounts of Roundup can be dumped on the GMO soybeans so it kills the weeds but not the soybean plants. So GMO soybeans are resistant to Roundup, and will also contiain huge amounts of it.

 

I try to avoid GMO soybeans as much as possible. Organic soy I don't worry about so much, but in moderation because of its estrogenic qualities. I've also read that fermented soy products are your best bet (but again, organic).

[*lifeoftheparty*]

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[amyco]

Since you asked for opinions...my opinion about tofu, based on what I remember reading, is that it is good for your heart (contains protective compounds or something) but not if you are trying to ward off/fight breast cancer, b/c it can mimic estrogen. We don't eat a ton of tofu, maybe once or twice a week tops, but I'm not worried about it. I make sure to buy organic tofu, or one labeled that it's made with non-GMO soybeans.

[Shelly in IL]

I've found them to be a tasty addition to my weight watchers.

[*lifeoftheparty*]

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[JadeOrchidSong]

http://www.drlam.com/opinion/soyandestrogen.asp

 

I found this article quite interesting.

 

I am not "allowed" to eat soy anything, per my nutritionist b/c I have PCOS and the last thing I need is more hormones in my system. It stinks... I have to read labels for everything, and it is IN everything.

 

Meixue,

I disagree with Dr. Lam's claim. I am from China and in every meal (lunch and dinner) we have to have tofu in China. Even here I have tofu three or four times a week. I don't think it is only 2tsp daily. An average person in China would drink soy milk as part of breakfast every day. It is NOT more harmful than other milk if not more healthy.

I only buy Non-GM soy or soy products. In fact, I am going to buy a soy milk maker so that we can all convert to organic soy milk drinkers because we will stop drinking cow's milk (can't afford to buy the REAL organic non treated milk).

It is said to help menopause rather than causing problems.

I seriously don't believe it is more harmful than meat or any other products.

[alpidarkomama]

Tofu, soy sauce, tamari, miso, tempeh, and natto are all fermented, so they are OK. Just make sure they are not genetically modified (GMO) and preferably organic. Non-GMO fermented soy products definitely aren't any worse for you than meat.

 

Tofu actually is not fermented. You just take hot soy milk and add some epsom salt. It coagulates like cheese curds and you strain it. Homemade tofu is YUM YUM YUM.

[JadeOrchidSong]

Tofu actually is not fermented. You just take hot soy milk and add some epsom salt. It coagulates like cheese curds and you strain it. Homemade tofu is YUM YUM YUM.

Homemade tufu? Can you please direct me to the link about how to make it at home? I will make homemade soy milk soon and would love to learn to do tofu too because I can buy organic soy beans to do both and save $$$.

Thank you!

[*lifeoftheparty*]

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[alpidarkomama]

We don't buy any premade foods at the grocery store. Well, maybe a box of graham crackers once a month. :) I just buy ingredients. SO, I know exactly what we're eating and I'm not worried at all about my daily cup of soy milk in my smoothie + tofu 2x/week or so + a cup of hot soy milk fresh from the soy milk maker 2-3x/week. YUM.

 

And for making your own tofu - you can find a recipe here (halfway down the page). I poke holes in cottage cheese containers to use for a mold.

 

Homemade soy milk costs about $0.60/gallon for non-organic and $0.90/gallon for organic. It also doesn't need a THING added to it - it's delicious as is.

 

-The Happy Soy Consumer

[JadeOrchidSong]

We don't buy any premade foods at the grocery store. Well, maybe a box of graham crackers once a month. :) I just buy ingredients. SO, I know exactly what we're eating and I'm not worried at all about my daily cup of soy milk in my smoothie + tofu 2x/week or so + a cup of hot soy milk fresh from the soy milk maker 2-3x/week. YUM.

 

And for making your own tofu - you can find a recipe here (halfway down the page). I poke holes in cottage cheese containers to use for a mold.

 

Homemade soy milk costs about $0.60/gallon for non-organic and $0.90/gallon for organic. It also doesn't need a THING added to it - it's delicious as is.

 

-The Happy Soy Consumer

I haven't purchased a soy milk maker yet. Can you recommend one? I am still looking. A friend gave me a 20-yr old vita mix, but told me it didn't do the work for the carrot she put in it, so I am doubtful it still functions. Still looking. Thanks for the recipe. I will have to try it once I have a soy milk maker.

[athomemom]

We don't buy any premade foods at the grocery store. Well, maybe a box of graham crackers once a month. :) I just buy ingredients. SO, I know exactly what we're eating and I'm not worried at all about my daily cup of soy milk in my smoothie + tofu 2x/week or so + a cup of hot soy milk fresh from the soy milk maker 2-3x/week. YUM.

 

And for making your own tofu - you can find a recipe here (halfway down the page). I poke holes in cottage cheese containers to use for a mold.

 

Homemade soy milk costs about $0.60/gallon for non-organic and $0.90/gallon for organic. It also doesn't need a THING added to it - it's delicious as is.

 

-The Happy Soy Consumer

 

I am a new vegetarian. (I ate mostly veggies anyway and got tired of the weird stuff I kept finding in my meat.) So, I am eating tofu. I have no idea if it is organic or not. I am slowly but surely heading that way. Would you share a menu if you have one or some ideas since you make everything from scratch? I will pm you to make sure you see this.

[ocelotmom]

I haven't purchased a soy milk maker yet. Can you recommend one? I am still looking. A friend gave me a 20-yr old vita mix, but told me it didn't do the work for the carrot she put in it, so I am doubtful it still functions. Still looking. Thanks for the recipe. I will have to try it once I have a soy milk maker.

If you can figure out what part isn't working, you can probably get a replacement. Vita-mix is good that way. We have an ancient one (3600, so 30-40 years old), and were able to get replacement parts.

[mcconnellboys]

Yes, studies have shown that some genetically modified genes do, in fact, continue to live in human (and in animal) gut for some period of time. And genetically modified genes have been shown to recombine with genes in the guts of some test animals. What this will mean for the future is not known. And that's precisely what's scary. Very scary....

[mcconnellboys]

Is organic soy world-wide contaminated by genetically modified soy that was grown in nearby fields due to windblown pollen? That's an interesting question and I've been reading for the past year that many, many farmers world-wide are beginning to concede that they believe there is some level of contamination. How much is too much? Who knows.....

 

Here are some links about the subject:

 

http://www.organicconsumers.org/organic/soy021004.cfm

 

http://www.non-gmoreport.com/organic_foods.php

 

http://www.hour.ca/news/news.aspx?iIDArticle=8719

 

And here's a good bibliography, thoough a little dated:

 

http://www.wanttoknow.info/071008geneticallymodifiedfoodsorganisms

(The Future of Food is a great movie, by the way....)

 

 

As an interesting aside, I have been reading labels closely for a while because when cooking oil prices rose a few years ago many companies began using palm oil and I'm very allergic to it. I've noticed since fall that palm oil seems to be falling out of favor somewhat but absolutely everything now just about contains soy oil, instead. Great......

[*lifeoftheparty*]

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[Sun]

 

So many people claim they only buy Non-GMO Soy, but I have to wonder if it's true with every purchase, considering that over 90% of Soy grown in this country is GMO. Not saying you don't, but just that I hope the advertising is truthful :)

 

 

Doesn't a huge percentage of the soy that's grown get used for feeding livestock and a lot of the rest for making vegetable oil?

[TravelingChris]

I can't eat soy products except in very small doses but that is because I am on blood thinners.

[mcconnellboys]

No, lots of things I've been looking at (I've developed a habit of reading labels on everything I pick up) will say vegetable oil and then either list in parenthesis _____, _______, and __________; or, may contain ______ or ________.

 

I've read that it's because they're constantly checking the market from week to week and buying the cheapest oils available at the time. So they're not sticking long term with any one oil any more. I'm wondering if you can get residual oils in your food that aren't being listed because the system might not be cleaned out completely before it's changed.... That is, sometimes I break out and the label doesn't list anything that I can pinpoint, but what if they switched from palm oil over to soy oil, etc. and there's still residual palm oil in there.....??? Hmmmm.....

[Sputterduck]

Not exactly, IMO. My son only gets it every once in awhile because I don't think the level of estrogens in soy is healthy for a growing boy.

[5KidzRUs]

I have ready some scary stuff about the company Monsanto. From what I have heard - they OTHER soy beans are called "heirloom" and are not controlled by Monsanto.

[Melissa in FL]

I've found them to be a tasty addition to my weight watchers.

 

They make a Boca Burger that is specifically Non-GMO soy, so I would assume their normal patties are GMO soy. Link and ingredients are here. I stopped buying these a long time ago because they started adding artificial color to them, I see that the color is all natural now. Boca just has too many weirdly named ingredients and changes their ingredients all the time for me to trust the product. I would rather just buy good quality lean beef (price isn't too different). Sorry.

Melissa

[Dolphin]

I go with what my granny said "A little bit of everything and not too much of anything." There are so many things out there that are dangerous, or could be dangerous. Soy for me is one of those things that is in a lot of things, so I don't add it in else where, like substituting meat for tofu. I also don't avoid it. The thing I seek out to add as a meat substitute is beans and lentils, since they are not already in a lot of our foods and if you don't make an effort to add them, you can go years without eating them. I have been basing a lot of my food choices on this

 

http://www.med.umich.edu/umim/food-pyramid/index.htm

 

variety is the spice of life.

[Melissa in FL]

Every time I pick up "Vegetable Oil" and read the label it just lists "Soybean Oil" as the only ingredient. Why do they bother calling it Vegetable Oil? Why not just call it Soybean Oil??

 

Just today, I ordered some Organic, unrefined Coconut Oil from Amazon. I "subscribed" to it in order to get %15 off, so 2 15 oz. jars will be delivered here every two months....

 

I'm supposed to cook with it b/c it's good for my Insulin Resistance/PCOS issues....

 

Have you tried different kinds of coconut oil in the past? Have you used this brand before? I ask because I really try to cook as much with Organic Coconut oil as possible. I found a brand locally I like but thought I would go with a cheaper version I could find online. I hated the one I had ordered. I'm slowly using it up outside of my kitchen. There are such huge differences in the taste of coconut oil. Please don't get discouraged if you don't like this one brand you bought, keep trying them until you find one you like.

HTH

Melissa

[mcconnellboys]

Well, and I've read interviews with big organic growers and they say that if their fields are within even quite a number of miles of GM soy fields, they simply can not be sure that their fields have not been contaminated by windblown pollen. Pollen is extremely tiny and light and long-lived. Preventing contamination once it's out there seems to me that it would be nigh on impossible....

 

So I'm not sure, without specific testing, how any of us would know if Organic soy is truly uncontaminated, or not....

[*lifeoftheparty*]

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[*lifeoftheparty*]

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[Melissa in FL]

No, I have only tried the Spectrum brand that I get at the store. I heard about this Nutiva brand from this blog : http://kellythekitchenkop.com/2008/06/organic-virgin-coconut-oil-deals-best.html

 

And I read the reviews on Amazon, which were very good :)

 

http://www.amazon.com/Nutiva-Organic-Virgin-Coconut-15-Ounce/dp/B001EO5Q64/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1293660527&sr=8-1

 

All right, this is sorta funny! I buy Spectrum locally (at publix) and love it. My family accepts it as a substitute with no problems (well, dh prefers butter).

 

I bought Nutiva online after reading the reviews and thinking it would be about the same. I think the Nutiva adds a strong coconut taste to everything. I really tried to get used to it. My kids and dh wouldn't eat anything I made with it and I finally went back to the Spectrum. I'm slowly using it up as a moisturizer and in my hair.

 

Hopefully you and your family will like it more than we did. I would recommend opening it right away (before you finish the Spectrum) and trying it. Amazon has a great return policy and their vendors seem to also. I had bought mine from another place and tried it long enough that I didn't feel I could return it.

 

If you ever see a cheap place online for the Spectrum please post, I love using it!

Melissa

[Brilliant]

Meixue,

I disagree with Dr. Lam's claim. I am from China and in every meal (lunch and dinner) we have to have tofu in China. Even here I have tofu three or four times a week. I don't think it is only 2tsp daily. An average person in China would drink soy milk as part of breakfast every day. It is NOT more harmful than other milk if not more healthy.

I only buy Non-GM soy or soy products. In fact, I am going to buy a soy milk maker so that we can all convert to organic soy milk drinkers because we will stop drinking cow's milk (can't afford to buy the REAL organic non treated milk).

It is said to help menopause rather than causing problems.

I seriously don't believe it is more harmful than meat or any other products.

 

Thank you for sharing this. I have a couple of friends who refuse to eat any soy because they have read the alarmist websites. One of them told me that the Chinese & Japanese can eat soy products because they ONLY eat fermented soy. (No, she has never been out of North America).

 

I believe that non-GMO, organically grown soybean products are fine for my family. Organic tofu & organic soy milk are both enjoyed around here.

[Brilliant]

I wonder exactly the same thing. How is it that everyone is buying that 10%?

 

If by "everyone" you mean everyone that participates in a thread like this - I think that we get participants on these threads who are more aware of the issues surrounding organic vs. conventional and GMO vs. non-GMO. There are plenty of tofu and other soy products on the shelves (not to mention the hidden soy products) that aren't marked organic, and lots of shoppers are buying those, which can easily make up the 90%. Leaving the 10% to those who care to buy non-GMO.