Eat Out Eat Well

Food for Fun and Thought

What About The Groceries In Your Hot Car?

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It’s hot outside.  When you open your car door after it’s been sitting in the parking lot you’re hit with a blast of heat that seems hotter than an oven .

The Temperature Rises Quickly Inside A Car

The temperature rises quickly inside a closed car — even when it’s only moderately warm outside.

A study found that at 9AM when the outside temperature was 82 degrees, the temperature inside a closed car was 109 degrees. At 1:30PM, when the outside temperature rose to 112 degrees, the temperature inside a closed car reached 124 degrees.

Cracking the windows helped, but only a very little bit. With four windows cracked, at 10AM, when the temperature was 88 degrees outside, inside the car it was 103 degrees.  At 2PM, when the outside temperature rose to 110 degrees, the internal temperature rose to 123 degrees. Certainly not safe conditions for living creatures, especially kids and dogs both of whom are particularly vulnerable to extreme heat.

What About The Food You Just Bought?

Extreme heat is certainly not a safe environment for fresh and prepared food, either.  Pity the poor groceries you just bought.  They’re sitting in extremely hot temperatures  in the back of your car.  Staples and boxed food may be fine, but meat, dairy, cut food like fresh fruit, and prepared foods — not a good situation.  Why?

When you give bacteria the conditions they like:  warmth, moisture, and nutrients, they’ll grow.   A single bacterium that divides every half hour can result in 17 million offspring in 12 hours.

The food you just bought might spoil because bacteria present in the food have multiplied like rabbits while it sits in your car in hot, conditions ideal for food spoilage.  Perishable food can stay safely unrefrigerated only for two hours if the air temperature is under 90 degrees – and only for one hour if the temperature is 90 degrees or higher.

What Can You Do To Protect Yourself And Your Family?

Be aware of the type of food you are buying.  If you have perishable items, take steps to protect yourself and your family:

  • Think about your route and how many errands you have to do. Think about stopping at the cleaners or for coffee before grocery shopping — not afterward while your groceries are baking in the car.
  • Make wise market choices.  When it’s hot outside, take your perishable items straight home.  If you know you can’t go straight home take steps to keep your purchases cool – or buy food that doesn’t need refrigeration.
  • To be on the safe side, think about keeping a cooler, cold packs, or insulated bags in your car for perishable items.  Make sure the cooler hasn’t turned into a portable oven because it’s been sitting in the car for so long.
  • Buy a bag of ice if you need to for keeping cold stuff cold and frozen stuff frozen on the way home. Or, bring some frozen gel packs with you.
  • Keep in mind that in the winter your car might be colder than your refrigerator.  Then there’s no problem stopping for coffee on the way home!

7 Tips For Living Longer And Not Getting Sick

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Accomplish at least six of the following seven heart-health lifestyle factors and, on average, over 14.5 years (the length of time of the study’s follow-up) you’ll be 51% less likely to die of all causes and 76% less likely to die of cardiovascular causes – as compared to people meeting only one or none of the factors.

The 7 Factors:

  1. Don’t smoke
  2. Be physically active
  3. Have normal blood pressure
  4. Have normal blood glucose
  5. Have normal total cholesterol levels
  6. Don’t be overweight or obese (have a BMI of less than 25)
  7. Eat a healthy diet

This Is A Case Where More Is Better

The more factors you meet, the better the result.  The benefits went beyond cardiovascular disease.  According to the researchers, meeting a greater number of the health goals appeared to be associated with a lower risk for all cancer mortality.

The study, published in JAMA and presented at a specialty meeting of the American Heart Association, analyzed data on 44,959 US adults who completed national health and nutrition surveys.

What Eating A Healthy Diet Means

Eating a healthy diet was scored based on 5 American Heart Association recommendations.  They consist of:

  1. Eating 4.5 cups or more of fruit and vegetables daily
  2. Having 2 or more 3.5 oz. servings of fish each week
  3. Having 3 or more servings (1 oz equivalent) of fiber rich whole grains each day
  4. Having less than 1500 milligrams of sodium daily
  5. Having no more than 36 oz. of sugar sweetened beverages in a week

Meeting three or more of these recommendations counted as meeting the healthy diet factor.

The Benefits Are Cumulative

The conclusion of the study was:  “Meeting a greater number of cardiovascular health metrics was associated with a lower risk of total and CVD mortality, but the prevalence of meeting all 7 cardiovascular health metrics was low in the study population.”

But, the benefits are cumulative.  Try changing just one factor at a time – which could make a big difference.  Think about starting with whatever factor is easiest for you to accomplish – do it – and then move on to the next one.

 

Can Obesity Spread Through Social Connections?

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Take a peek at your family and friends.  Do the bulk of them seem to be overflowing their chairs?

A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine (N Engl J Med 2007;357:370-9) found that if you’re struggling with your weight, there is a good chance that your friends and family are, too.

Using data collected over 22 years from a “densely interconnected social network” of 12,067 people  (part of the Framingham Heart Study), researchers determined that the risk of obesity extended to three degrees of separation.

Here’s what they found:

  • A person’s chance of becoming obese increases by 57% if he or she has a friend who becomes obese. In a mutual friendship, the person’s risk of obesity increases by 171% if the friend becomes obese.
  • Among pairs of adult siblings, if one sibling becomes obese the chance that the other becoming obese increases by 40%.  This is more prevalent among siblings of the same sex (55%) than among siblings of the opposite sex (27%).  Among brothers, the chance of becoming obese increases by 44% if a brother becomes obese, and among sisters there’s a 67% increased risk if a sister becomes obese. Obesity in a sibling of the opposite sex doesn’t seem to affect the obesity risk of the other one.
  • Among married couples, when one spouse is obese the other is 37% more likely to become obese. Husbands and wives appear to affect each other similarly (44% and 37%, respectively).
  • Neighbors in the immediate geographic location don’t seem to have an effect on a person’s obesity.
  • Pairs of friends and siblings of the same sex seem to have more influence on the weight gain of each other than pairs of friends and siblings of the opposite sex. In same sex friendships, the probability of obesity in one person increases by 71% if the friend becomes obese.  For friends of the opposite sex there’s no significant association.  In same sex friendships, a man has a 100% increased chance of becoming obese if his male friend becomes obese.  For female friends, the spread of obesity is a non-statistically significant 38%.

The researchers concluded, “obesity appears to spread through social ties.” Is it time to take a look around you?

Vanilla or Chocolate Chunk: What Your Ice Cream Choice Says About You

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HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY

Some Ice Cream Fun Facts

“If you love Double Chocolate Chunk, you tend to be lively, creative and dramatic. Always the life of the party, you charm everyone you meet with your enthusiasm and sense of style. You enjoy being in the spotlight and prefer to be in the company of friends rather than left alone to reflect on life. You prefer passion and excitement in your romantic relationships, and require a lot of attention from your mate.”

“There is nothing plain about Vanilla. In fact, if you love Vanilla, you are actually a colorful, dramatic risk taker who relies more on intuition than logic. Emotionally expressive and idealistic, you tend to set high goals for yourself, and push yourself to meet and exceed them. On the romantic front, you tend to rely on secure romantic relationships that fulfill your emotional needs while working toward future objectives.”

Peanuts, Cracker Jacks, and Cotton Candy

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It’s summertime.  Baseball season is in full swing and so are visits to amusement parks.  What do you usually do at these places – other than watch the game and ride the roller coaster? EAT, of course!

Oh, the food!  Oh the calories! Trust me — this post isn’t about ignoring the good time food.  There are always healthy food options:  you can bring your own or be scrupulous in making healthy choices. But honestly, do you think that most people really want to eat low calorie foods when they’re at a ballgame or amusement park? No way.

So what do you do when you’re at these places with food vendors about every 20 feet hawking dogs, ice cream, and beer?

There Are Ways And Then There Are Ways

If you’ve got a will of iron, I guess you could ignore the food and drinks.  But if you’re like most people and you’re tempted at every turn, you can try to minimize the damage without taking away the fun.  If you know you’re going to be having a stadium or food court meal, do some thinking, planning, and sleuthing.  The best choices are not always the obvious ones.

Do you need both peanuts and popcorn?  Can you make do with a regular hot dog instead of a foot-long?  Can you keep it to one or two beers instead of three?  Can you choose the small popcorn instead of the jumbo tub? Can you ditch the soda — or maybe the second one — and replace it with water?

Make Your Best Choice

Here’s some info to help you make your best choice.  Just a heads up – we’re not talking about the most nutritious choice because given these foods, quality nutrition is not front and center.  You can, however, enjoy your day and make the best caloric choice (with a nod to fat and sugar content) and still enjoy traditional ballpark and amusement park food.

  • Cotton Candy: Nothing but heated and colored sugar that’s spun into threads with added air. Cotton candy on a stick or wrapped around a paper cone (about an ounce) has around 105 calories; a 2oz. bag (common size) has 210. A lot of sugar, but not a lot of calories – albeit empty ones.
  • Cracker Jack (officially cracker jack, not jacks): candy-coated popcorn with some peanuts. A 3.5oz stadium size box has 420 calories but does have 7g  protein and 3.5g fiber.
  • Hamburger:   6oz. of beef on a bun has about 490 calories — without cheese or other toppings — which up the ante.
  • Grilled Chicken Sandwich, 6oz.:  280 calories – not a bad choice.  6oz. of chicken tenders clock in at 446 calories.  Barbecue dipping sauce adds 30 calories a tablespoon.
  • Hot Dog: Most sold-out baseball stadiums can sell 16,000 hot dogs a day. A regular hot dog with mustard has about 290 calories: that’s 180 for the 2oz. dog, 110 for the bun, zilch for regular yellow mustard. Two tbs. sauerkraut adds another 5-10 calories, 2 tbs. ketchup adds 30, and 2 tbs. relish another 40. A Nathan’s hot dog racks up 320 calories; a foot-long Hebrew National 510 calories. Hot dogs are usually loaded with sodium.
  • Pizza: Stadium pizza is larger than a usual slice, about 1/6 of a 16-inch pie (instead of 1/8) making it about 435 calories a slice.
  • Super Nachos with Cheese: A 12oz. serving (40 chips, 4oz. cheese) has about 1,500 calories!!! Plain French fries look like a caloric bargain by comparison.
  • French Fries: A large serving has about 500 calories. A serving of Hardee’s chili cheese fries has 700 calories and 350 of them come from fat.
  • Potato Chips:  One single serving bag has 153 calories (94 of them from fat).
  • Peanuts in the Shell: What would a baseball game be without a bag of peanuts? Stadiums can sell as many as 6,000 bags on game days. An 8oz. bag has 840 calories; a 12oz. bag has 1,260. Yes, they have some protein and fiber.  But wow on the calories.
  • Soft Pretzel: One large soft pretzel has 483 calories – giant soft pretzels (7-8oz.) have about 700 calories.
  • Draft Beer: A stadium draft beer, 20oz. cup, the usual size, has about 240 calories. A light draft saves you 60 calories.
  • Coca Cola:  A 12oz can: 140 calories –- and close to 10 tsp. of sugar.
  • Helmet Ice Cream: Your team’s mini-helmet filled with swirly Carvel, 550-590 calories.
  • Souvenir Popcorn: At Yankee Stadium a jumbo size has 1,484 calories and a souvenir bucket has 2,473 calories.