When I lived and worked in the NYC metro area, I had Italian friends, and Grandma didn't serve a giant bowl of pasta. Indeed, it is a side dish.

Much like my childhood years visiting my grandparents on their farm, meat was always the centerpiece of the meal. Along with a stack of white bread next to the butter dish

But it took the low fat craze, with its demonization of meat, to turn "healthy food" into what birds eat.

Just the No Processed Food rule, if actually followed, would knock out grains long before we got to yogurt.