Today, January 31, 2011, the FDA released its new nutritional guidelines. These guidelines, the 2010 Dietary Guidelines, are intended to address the growing number of overweight and obese adults and children in the United States. 2010, eh? Well, it’s only 31 days later than 2010. I’ll cut the FDA some slack, I suppose.
Real fruit is an important part of proper nutrition.
This document can be viewed by clicking here. I’ll warn you, it’s 112 pages of what is probably the most boring thing you’ll read for a while. I’ll be kicking it around over the next couple of days and try to give you a distilled summary of it when I’m done.
I’d like to be optimistic. However, I fear that it will be laden with much of the same crap that has been coming out of the FDA for some time now. If the government really wants to put forth a recommendation that will lead to a healthier society with less incidence of chronic disease, then there’s going to have to be a disconnect between legislation and lobbyists for the companies that are producing some of the food that is contributing to the problem. But that’s a rant for another day and another blog post. For now, I just wanted to give you the heads up. You can read the press release here.
If you want a more simple way to look at nutrition that doesn’t involve 112 pages of reading, then just consider this. If it wasn’t alive within the past week or so, then do your best to avoid it. Food is something that was once alive. Dead things don’t stick around too long unless their processed in such a way as to have potentially harmful ingredients. Like Taco Bell’s pseudo-beef. Click here if you don’t know what I’m talking about.
As always, I encourage you to learn about your body, and what does and doesn’t work for you. I’m not a nutritionist, so I won’t tell you what to eat, (though I may tell you what NOT to eat, cough cough, taco bell, cough cough…) but empowering yourself with knowledge is never, ever a bad thing. There is plenty going on in the world of nutrition research right now. I’ll do my best to keep you abreast of things as they change.
Until next time. Live Dangerously, but eat safe!
So, you’ve heard that trans fat is bad for you, and you have made it a point to purchase only foods that contain no trans fat. Perhaps you look for bold print on the front of a food package that exclaims “0 grams of trans fat per serving”. Maybe you even look at the nutrition label because you are an educated, health conscious shopper. But, even with your diligence, you may still be purchasing foods containing trans fat and not even know it! To explain why, lets explore a very brief history of trans fat, and then I’ll show you how to REALLY tell if you are purchasing trans fat free foods.
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