Maximum Fit Magazine

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?colID=1&articleID=0007C5B6-7152-1DF6... Not about cooking, but certainly intimately related to food and health. I thought readers of r.f.c. might be interested. J.

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?colID=1&articleID=0007C5B6-7152-1DF6... Not about cooking, but certainly intimately related to food and health. I thought readers of r.f.c. might be interested. J. Thanks.  It's another guess, counteracting one bit of nonsense and fuzzy advice with another. 1.  Putting exercise and weight control on the bottom should read exercise and calorie control.  Omitting the significance of calories is a nod to the _meta_bolic magicians who would have people believe that calories don't count and obscures educating too many people that they are simply eating too much food. 2.  Beets, er I mean vegetables, belong on the bottom.  They should also break vegetables and fruits into different categories. Green leafy is a good start! 3.  They shouldn't vaguely prescribe ANY food at most meals (except vegetables .  Two SERIOUS problems are  that no serving number information is given for groups at the bottom and no serving sizes are evident for any category.   Whole grain foods at most meals and fats at most meals means you can have 5 granola bars at most meals or 5 bags of whole grain Fritos (don't be surprised if it happens. Snackwells were invented to fit in the last pyramid).  It means you can have a giant oily whole wheat bran muffin at 500 cal a pop whenever you want, because it also doesn't say what a meal is or how many meals per day.  Basically, they still have not learned the lesson that calories count. 4.  The recommendations should be given in servings per day and a serving should be defined.   Sparingly and moderation are ridiculously vague concepts open to interpretation by all involved- the public and the people who advise them.   Serving has been distorted by the ever-increasing size of servings that we get at home or in restaurants.  A Texas-sized muffin is not one serving, it's more like 3 or 4.  Even the necessary solution of defining a serving of bread as one slice can lead to wide variations.  One slice of supermarket bread may have 100 calories but a slice of homemade bread may have almost twice as many (slice is larger, bread is denser). 5.  A problem with the pyramid concept is that they are putting foods that they advise against (for whatever reason, legitimate or not) at the top.  This was the problem with the old pyramid including sweets and they still have that problem.  Instead of now lumping sweets in with fats and oils, as with the old one, they are now lumping it with (oh horror!) white stuff.  They shouldn't be *recommending* desserts, period.  Now, I certainly don't believe that desserts and sugar are poison, and they shouldn't be prohibited.  But I don't believe that  responsible health professionals should recommend them either unless someone needs to gain weight.  Most people will get them in sufficient amounts *without* recommendation.  They don't need a group and shouldn't be lumped with pasta, rice, and bread of any sort. 6.  Same with alcohol.  Alcohol does not belong in a pyramid for nutrition recommendations. Period.  They might as well include idiotic food supplements or medications.  If they are going to hang stuff off the pyramid that they believe are beneficial for health, they might as well put aspirin too.  Multiple vitamins for most???  If the pyramid was constructed correctly you wouldn't need this.  Now it seems that the chemical  industry is affecting advice rather than the dairy or meat industry. 7.  The pyramid concept should be scrapped if they can't get the recommended amount of foods to come out right.  They are trying to fit a size 10 foot into an attractive size 7 shoe.  Granted, the pyramid is a public education gimmick to try and simplify nutritional information for use by the public.  But the tool appears to be flawed, not even as much by the data as by trying to squeeze so much information and ideology into the form, while omitting other important information (eg. calorie recommendations for various population groups). Sue(tm) Lead me not into temptation... I can find it myself! sue at interport dot net

6.  Same with alcohol.  Alcohol does not belong in a pyramid for nutrition recommendations. Period.  They might as well include idiotic food supplements or medications.  If they are going to hang stuff off the pyramid that they believe are beneficial for health, they might as well put aspirin too. Oh please - alcohol (wine, primarily) has been a regular part of many people's diets for centuries and can validly be considered a food. This is not the case for supplements or aspirin. Plus, the health benefits of moderate drinking are very well established and quite striking. One study, for example, showed that for middle aged women, the increased cardiovascular risk of not drinking (as compared with 1-2 drinks/day) was the same as being morbidly obese. Leaving this information out would be a serious omission. Peter G. Aitken

This is not the case for supplements or aspirin. Plus, the health benefits of moderate drinking are very well established and quite striking. One study, for example, showed that for middle aged women, the increased cardiovascular risk of not drinking (as compared with 1-2 drinks/day) was the same as being morbidly obese. Leaving this information out would be a serious omission. That's pharmacology, not food.  It doesn't belong in a food pyramid. It will be very interesting to see how many public health professionals are going to jump on the middle-aged women should have 1-2 drinks per day bandwagon.  Make mine a marguerita! Strictlly speaking, exercise doesn't belong in the food pyramid either, which again points out the problem of trying to shoehorn a big foot ( things that reduce various types of risk ) into a little shoe ( food pyramid ). Perhaps what is needed is a health or life_style_ pyramid, because that's really the direction in which they're going.  Then they can include exercise, alcohol, tea, whatever.  At the top of the pyramid they can put watching TV with beer and pizza. Sue(tm) Lead me not into temptation... I can find it myself! sue at interport dot net

2.  Beets, er I mean vegetables, belong on the bottom.  They should also break vegetables and fruits into different categories. Green leafy is a good start! Serious question: which vegetables *are* green leafy ? I can only ever think of spinach! Does lettuce count? Kate Orman < This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it http://www.zip.com.au/~korman/ I have no idea what that meant. - Dot Warner

2.  Beets, er I mean vegetables, belong on the bottom.  They should also break vegetables and fruits into different categories. Green leafy is a good start! Serious question: which vegetables *are* green leafy ? I can only ever think of spinach! Does lettuce count? When I was a girl scout oh so many decades ago, one of the 7 basic food groups was green and leafy vegetables.  Peas, green beans, celery, anything green and or leafy.  Colorful vegetables, like carrots and beats, was a separate category.  And fruits was again separate, with a whole category for citrus.  Let's see, that would have left one for milk and cheese, one for meat and fish, what else?  Grains?  I never could remember all seven at once, not sure I got them right this time. Quasi