Soy?

Two bread heels (Thad doesn't eat 'em), with dark cherry preserves and egg whites + half an orange

After coding class, we [10+ managers who report to my boss] took our boss to Ruby Tuesday's for lunch.  Ruby Tuesday's has a bangin' salad bar, so I opted for it,  and did what you do at a salad bar.  I made a salad:

I was still really hungry after eating this, so I had another bowl and a half of plain Kashi cereal and just decided to call that dinner.  I don't know what got into me?!  My appetite was out of control.  I blame it on the lightish salad for lunch.  I went on a nice long walk after eating my grains for the day.  As I ate the Kashi, I read the cereal box.  Had I read it before buying it, I wouldn't have bought it.  Kashi is high in protein and fiber, but the majority of the protein comes from soy, textured soy protein to be exact.  Soy is in so much food.  I've been doing research on it the past couple of weeks (the whole is it good for you or not debate), and I really don't feel like I know anything conclusive about it.  None of the studies are definitive as to if soy has a negative impact on your health or not.  I've read that soy can mess with your thyroid and effect your hormones, and that it can produce soy allergies in children and adults that lead to allergies in other food products.  At the same time, I personally don't know anyone with a soy allergy and I'm not sure that I believe that all of America's health problems are from over consumption of soy (as some articles would have you to believe).  During my investigations, I've teetered in between wanting to throw out every box/can/bag/etc. in my cabinets that say CAUTION: CONTAINS SOY, while also thinking "I'll have the tofu, please."  What I've come to conclude is soy lecithin is an emulsifier (stabilizer) and is in a majority of processed/packaged food in trace amounts, no need to freak out over it (then again if it's in everything you eat, maybe that's a bit much...).  But, textured soy protein is something I am going to try to stay away from.  The way I rationalize it in my mind is if I want cereal (i.e. Kashi), then I want cereal in all its grainy goodness.  Not soy!  If you know more about this, please feel free to set me straight.  I do believe in everything in moderation, I'm just not going to seek out soy protein.  I have read that soy in it's closest to whole form (think: edamame, soy milk-ground soy beans, tofu-coagulated soy milk) actually has health benefits.  Afterall, Asians have some of the longest life spans in the world and they eat soy all the time.  Americans just eat it in a totally different way (processed in everything we eat).  I challenge you to go to your cabinets and pull out a few random samplings of goods and see how much soy is actually in your house.  I got way off topic from my Kashi.  How did I end up presenting a challenge when I was talking about cereal?

I have a headache now!  I have to go back to Gainesville in the morning for a quarterly management meeting.  This will be the first time this year we've had this specific meeting.  Think about that for a moment... :)