food shopping

What’s A Food Desert – And What Happens There?

July 26, 2011 By Penny Klatell, PhD, RN Leave a Comment

It’s not stretch of hot white sand. It’s also not where you can come upon an oasis, shimmering in the heat, and find platters laden with fresh fruit like in old-time movies.

Here’s what it is: the CDC defines a food desert as an area “that lack(s) access to affordable fruits, vegetables, whole grains, low-fat milk, and other foods that make up the full range of a healthy diet.”

How Does A Food Desert Affect Health?

It would seem pretty obvious that if there isn’t a readily available supply of good food for people to buy and eat then they won’t eat healthy food.

But here’s the problem: many food deserts may not have a lot of affordable healthy food choices available, but they may have readily available and inexpensive fast food choices.

The CDC indicates that some researchers think a link exists between having easy access to affordable healthy foods and the consumption of those foods. But other studies show that even when healthier food options are available in food deserts, many people continue to make unhealthy choices based on their own personal preferences — or put more simply — because they want to.

Food Choices May Be Unrelated To The Availability Of Healthy Food

A study of 5,115 people, just published in The Archives of Internal Medicine, looked at fast food and fruit and vegetable consumption compared to the availability of fast food restaurants and groceries. The researchers found that in “food deserts,” where fast food is readily available and there are few or no supermarkets, the local population is drawn to the fast food. But even where there are supermarkets and groceries the food choices the locals make don’t seem to be based on healthy eating.

The results showed that in low-income areas, particularly among men living within one to two miles of a fast food restaurant, there’s a strong association between the availability of fast food and how much of it they consumed. But, they also found that there was no strong association between living near a supermarket and eating more fruits or vegetables.

Are Supermarkets Important?

The lead researcher says that it isn’t enough to expect that building supermarkets will make people shop for healthy foods in them. She thinks that healthy foods need to be promoted and affordable and that people also need to be taught that there are better and healthier food choices available in fast food restaurants, too. If someone chooses to go to a fast food restaurant they should have the option to find and choose food items that are “relatively more healthy as opposed to less healthy.”

However, just because there might not be a strong association between food choices and supermarkets doesn’t mean that markets aren’t important. It might be that the market may not be stocked with an abundance of healthy food choices or that the healthier options are expensive and crowded out by an overwhelming array of unhealthier options.

What Is Important?

It’s not enough to just teach people what’s healthy and how to make healthy choices. The food environment is crucial and needs to support making healthy food choices easy, attractive, affordable (competitive with the “cheap” calories of fast food), and the cool choices to make. Just like the oasis in the sandy dessert, there needs to be a welcoming oasis of healthy food choices in the “food deserts.”

Don’t Let An “Organic” Label Pull The Wool Over Your Eyes

May 19, 2011 By Penny Klatell, PhD, RN Leave a Comment

Even though “organic” refers to a method of production rather than nutritional content, an “organic” label can make you believe that food is healthier and tastier. A Cornell University study was designed to test what’s called the “halo effect,” or the theory that people are influenced by how something is described.

The Study

The study looked at the “health halo effect” of whether food products labeled “organic” were perceived as more nutritious and better tasting than conventionally produced products.

144 volunteers compared what they thought were conventionally and organically produced chocolate sandwich cookies, plain yogurt, and potato chips. Everything was actually organic, but the products were labeled as either “regular” or “organic.”

They participants ranked them on taste, estimated the caloric content, and indicated what they would pay for each product.

What They Found

The results showed that organic foods fall under a “health halo” and that having supposedly healthy food – in this case the food labeled organic — within a meal, can lead to misjudging the entire meal as being healthier and lower in calories.

The participants in the study:

preferred almost all the taste characteristics of foods labeled “organic” even though the “regular” food was exactly the same.

thought the food labeled “organic” was lower in fat, higher in fiber, significantly lower in calories, and worth more money.

thought the chips and cookies labeled “organic” were more nutritious than the ones they thought were not organic.

What Does Organic Really Mean?

“Organic produce and other ingredients are grown without the use of pesticides, synthetic fertilizers, sewage sludge, genetically modified organisms, or ionizing radiation. Animals that produce meat, poultry, eggs, and dairy products do not take antibiotics or growth hormones.”

According to the USDA:

“100% Organic” products are made with 100% organic ingredients

“Organic” products are made with at least 95% organic ingredients

Products labeled “Made With Organic Ingredients” have a minimum of 70% organic ingredients (with strict restrictions on the other 30%)

Products with less than 70% organic ingredients can list organic ingredients on their side panel but not on the front

Can You Train And Tame Your Hunger?

May 3, 2011 By Penny Klatell, PhD, RN Leave a Comment

Physical – or real – hunger, the kind you feel when your stomach is growling, you’re irritable as all get-out, you’ve got zilch energy, and probably a throbbing headache, means you body needs food for fuel.

Info You Can Use About Hunger

Hunger is somewhat unpredictable. Your actual hunger levels are not the same every day and can be affected by what your body needs and does — like activity, hormone levels, sickness, and other things.

Hunger doesn’t necessarily follow a time schedule. You can adjust the types and amounts of your meals and snacks to influence the next time you will be hungry. Eating just because the hands of the clock are at noon or 6PM – even though you’re not hungry – can lead to weight gain and unhealthy eating habits.

What you eat affects your hunger level. Carbs, fat, and protein are digested at different rates. Simple, refined carbs like soda and candy are digested rapidly. They give you quick energy from a surge in your blood sugar – which is followed by a rapid drop in your energy. Protein foods give you the most sustained blood sugar levels and satiety without the blood sugar spikes. Eating food that has a balance of nutrients is probably the best way to satisfy your hunger, keep you feeling fuller longer, and give your body the fuel it needs.

How much you ate at your last meal affects you hunger levels since larger meals take longer to digest. Haven’t you ever eaten so much for dinner that you’re not hungry until lunch the next day?

You can put off eating for a while –occasionally ignoring your hunger won’t cause a long-term or significant drop in your metabolism. If you do postpone your hunger the urge to eat will come back and may be stronger when it does return.

Your stomach is about the size of your fist and can be filled by a palm full of food. Of course, since your stomach is a muscle, it can also stretch. When you stretch it out by putting in too much food you probably don’t feel so great (like overly stuffed at Thanksgiving). When you eat small meals you’ll get hungry more often and perhaps fuel your body more efficiently. This is the rationale for 5 or 6 small meals a day rather than two or three larger ones.

Your body is smart. Have you noticed that sometimes you are hungry for a specific food? It might be your body’s way of letting you know that it needs a particular nutrient. Careful: sometimes that hunger is head or emotional hunger that popped up because you just passed a bakery and the smell of just-baked chocolate chip cookies is acting like a trigger!

All kinds of foods can play a role in satisfying your hunger. Labeling food good or bad puts the food in charge. Depriving yourself of a particular food or attaching special meaning to it can set you up for cravings and overeating. It gives the food power over you rather than vice versa. Allowing yourself to make good choices from all foods; eating when you’re hungry; and eating portions that satisfy and not stuff you, put you, not the food, in charge.

When Should I Eat: a numbered scale to help you figure out how hungry you are and when to eat.

A Primer On Reduced, Low, Light, And Free!

April 7, 2011 By Penny Klatell, PhD, RN Leave a Comment

Do you have a clue what the difference is between reduced fat, low fat, light, and fat free. You practically have to walk around with a cheat sheet — or an app — to figure out if something actually lives up to the promise on the product’s label.

The same thing is true on menus, in deli cases, and the little labels perched next to the choices in salad bars. Are the calories in the low calorie tuna salad less than the calories in the reduced calorie? Can you even believe those calligraphied labels behind the glass cases?

Checking The List Of Ingredients May Or May Not Help

Packaged food labels list ingredients in descending order by weight, not amount. The first ingredient listed has the greatest amount by weight, the last ingredient is the one with the least amount by weight. That’s why preservatives are usually at the end of the ingredients list. A ton of chemicals are not necessary to increase shelf life — a little bit will do it. However, fat, sugar, and grains have more heft and usually are closer to the beginning of the ingredients list.

Fatty Labels

Labels have to include the total amount of fat, saturated fat and unsaturated fat. This carves the way for the low, reduced, and fat free categories.

Low fat means 3 grams of fat or less per serving (or per 100 grams of food)

Reduced fat means the food product contains 50% (or less) of the fat found in the regular version

Less fat means 25% or less fat than the comparison food

Fat free means the product has less than 0.5 grams of fat per serving, with no added fat or oil

Salty Labels

Reduced sodium means at least 75% less sodium

Low sodium means 140 milligrams of sodium or less per serving

Very low sodium means 35 milligrams of sodium or less per serving

Sodium free (salt free) means there is less than 5 milligrams of sodium per serving

Sweet Labels

Sugar free means there is less than 0.5 gram of sugar per serving

No sugar added means there’s no table sugar added but there may be other forms of sugar like dextrose, fructose, glucose, sucrose, maltose, or corn syrup

The Low down On Low, Light (Lite), Lean, and Reduced

Reduced calorie on the label means there’s at least 25% fewer calories per serving than in the regular (full calorie) version of the product

Low calorie means 40 calories or less per serving and less than 0.4 calories per gram of food

Light (fat) means 50% or less of the fat than in the regular, full calorie, version

Light (calories) means 1/3 fewer calories than the regular, full calorie, version

Lean (meat, poultry or seafood) means less than 10 grams of fat, 4.5 grams of saturated fat, and 95 mg of cholesterol in a 100 gram serving

Extra lean (meat, poultry or seafood) means less than 5 grams of fat, 2 grams of saturated fat, and 95 mg of cholesterol in a 100 gram serving

Confused???

Confused by the ins and outs of labeling? You’re not alone. Try to be as savvy as possible and do a little investigating. A product sporting a reduced fat label just means that it contains at least 25% less fat than the original version. Unfortunately, this doesn’t necessarily mean that it ends up being a low fat product. Take a reduced fat muffin. If the fat content in the original full fat muffin is 30g and the fat has been reduced to 15g — a 50% reduction which allows it to say it is reduced fat — the reduced fat muffin still has a fat content five times higher than the 3g of fat per serving that officially qualifies as low fat. Check the calorie count and fat breakdown on the nutrition label for more complete info.

Too Few Veggies — You’re Not Alone!

February 22, 2011 By Penny Klatell, PhD, RN 1 Comment

Despite a couple of years of public health initiatives, an explosion in farmers markets, bagged salads, and a White House garden, Americans still don’t eat enough vegetables.

Only 23% of meals include a vegetable (fries don’t count but lettuce on a burger does) and only 17% of dinners prepared at home include a salad (down from 22% in 1994). Salads ordered as a main course at either lunch or dinner in restaurants dropped to 5% (10% in 1989).

Only 26% of America’s adults eat vegetables three or more times a day (not including French fries) according to a study recently released by the CDC, way short of the government’s health objectives set a decade ago, and less than half of what public health officials had hoped.

2010 Dietary Guidelines

The just released 2010 Dietary Guidelines (yes, 2010 released in 2011) recommends that as part of a healthy eating pattern we should increase the amount of vegetables and fruit we eat.

That means filling half your plate with fruit and vegetables. They should be colorful and include a variety of dark green, red, and orange veggies, including beans and peas.

Give Me A Reason I Should Eat More Veggies

Vegetable haters might ask, “Why should I”? There are some really good reasons:

They’re low in calories
They’re rich in the nutrients we often lack (folate, magnesium, dietary fiber, Vitamins A, C, and K)
They may help prevent some chronic diseases
They’re linked to lower risks for heart attacks, strokes, and some kinds of cancers.

Why We Don’t Eat Them

Just telling people to eat more vegetables obviously isn’t working. People know veggies are good for you but lots of us don’t want to admit that we don’t eat them or even like them.

Honestly, veggies can be a lot of work. How often do you get home, open your fridge, look at the veggies (if they’re in there) and just admit you’re too tired to cook them? Cooking fresh stuff does require time and a commitment. And, unfortunately, poorly cooked vegetables can taste terrible – and, especially for out of season or organic, can be costly. We basically want low cost, tasty, and convenient.

What To Do

Change your mindset. Eating vegetables needs to become a habit – the go to, the default, instead of chips, or cookies, or fries.
Think visually: make one half of your plate a color palate of vegetables.
Don’t be intimidated by them. Learn about them and how to cook them.
Experiment with ways to make them taste good (hold off on gobs of butter, cheese, and cream, however, or you’re somewhat defeating your total healthy diet purpose). Try cooking with herbs, broth, and big flavor producers like onions, garlic, and peppers.
Check out the way the food industry is making vegetables easier: fresh cut up vegetables ready to cook; already prepared vegetables to take-out; washed and bagged salad varieties; frozen vegetables ready to pop into the microwave.
Expose children’s palates to vegetables. Make them the norm. Students who gardened in Berkeley’s “edible schoolyard” program ate one and a half more servings of fruits and vegetables a day than kids who weren’t in the program.
Work to make vegetables more affordable and available. Support farmers’ markets (some markets allow food stamps to be used), rooftop and urban gardens. Get fresh veggies into schools.
Plant your own garden or just a pot on the stoop or windowsill.
Do what you can to make vegetables an easy choice.