Have you ever thought about the fact that you might be able to eat your way through several pounds of potato chips, but not the same weight of baked potatoes? How many pounds of baked potatoes do you think you could actually eat in one sitting? A friend of mine came for a visit a while back, and reported to me that she had been discussing my recommendations with her clever boyfriend. This is how he summed it up: “Processed food is a menace to satiety.” Continue reading
Category Archives: Processed Edibles
Stripped Carbs: The Emperor’s New Clothes
I promised a friend that I would write another post about stripped carbs and processed edibles. Sometimes stripped carbs are called simple carbs, but there’s nothing simple about them. Stripped carbs include white flour, white rice, corn starch, corn syrup, sugar, fruit juice, and beer. It’s not that you can’t eat them at all; it’s that Americans are drowning in them. Continue reading
The Miracle that is Yogurt
There’s more to yogurt than meets the mouth, and you sell yourself short when you limit your yogurt consumption to the commercially manufactured dessert-like versions that fill the shelves in supermarkets and cafeterias. Continue reading
The Problem with Girl Scout Cookies
In one memorable scene from the movie The Addams Family, young Wednesday Addams asks the uniformed adolescent who rings the bell at her front door if the cookies she is selling are made with real Girl Scouts. Well, Wednesday, I would say that yes, in a way they are. Continue reading
Coffee Whiteners Aren’t Food
When I ask patients what they put in their coffee, they almost always say cream. So I say, “…like cream from a cow?” And sometimes the answer is yes. But sometimes the answer is no. Continue reading
What’s the Best Way to Eat?
An article entitled Can We Say What Diet is Best for Health? by David Katz and Stephanie Meller, from Yale’s School of Public Health, was published in the Annual Review of Public Health a few years ago. A story about the article was published in the Atlantic by James Hamblin, who called it Science Compared Every Diet, and the Winner is Real Food. I would have edited out the word “Real” and simply called it “Food.” Then I might have presented a review of the differences between Food (With a Capital F) and manufactured calories. Continue reading
Newsflash: The American Diet Causes Obesity
Have you ever heard anyone say that all you have to do to make your diet more nutritious is to stop eating white flour and sugar? Does that seem radical to you? What’s wrong with white flour and sugar? What would such a change accomplish? I’m not going to say you can never eat white flour and sugar. My motto is moderation. Most people can tolerate a treat now and then. But let’s look at what’s really happening. Why are two-thirds of Americans currently overweight or obese? Because the standard American diet is so nutrient-poor that most people are literally hungry all the time. So they eat.
It’s not about willpower; it’s about nutrition. Continue reading
When it’s Not Really Fruit or Vegetables
If I had just ten seconds to share nutrition advice, I know exactly what I would say: Eat more fruits and vegetables. And I don’t think that would surprise anyone. We all know that fruits and vegetables are nutritional powerhouses, rich in not only fiber but also phytonutrients, and everyone knows it’s a good idea to eat more of them. Especially since most of us don’t eat enough produce to begin with.
Now, the brand managers in the food industry know that we know we should eat more fruits and vegetables. This is why there are so many processed food items containing fruit-related words, or some version of the actual word “fruit.” Vegetables, too, to a lesser extent. Like vegetable oil. And which “vegetable” would that be, please? Continue reading
Most Manufactured Salad Dressing Isn’t Food
I recently decided that it was time to look at the ingredient lists of salad dressings, whatever that means, so I picked four popular brands to examine. You will be very interested to learn what I discovered. The first ingredient in the first product I picked up, Wishbone Italian dressing, was water. Frankly, that seems like a very expensive way to buy water. And surprising, too, given that Italian dressing consists primarily (and traditionally) of olive oil and vinegar. Not Wishbone Italian dressing, though. Continue reading
What You Need to Know About Yogurt
Been wondering whether you should be feeding yogurt to your kids? Or to yourself? Here’s what I think! Continue reading