American Society For Nutrition

Why Parisians don’t get fat

By: Rachel K.

I recently had the pleasure of visiting France for two research conferences, and was able to spend a few days visiting Paris (note to prospective graduate students: traveling is one of the great perks of research!).  What struck me the most were the number of THIN Parisians walking around the city!  It was extremely rare for me to see someone who was overweight (most often a tourist).  Granted, this was a very unscientific experiment, and my French friends tell me that approximately 30% of the population is overweight and 10% obese.  However, this leaves 60% of the population at a normal weight.  How do they do it?

French native Mireille Guiliano details her own story in the 2004 book, “French Women Don't Get Fat,” which I have not had the opportunity to read.  However, here are some of my observations as an American.   

1. Food is expensive.  Very expensive.  When a normal size (i.e. small) espresso is $3.45, and the cappuccino is $5.75, you think twice about whether you really need coffee with milk. 

2. Cars are expensive.  Like most big cities, the cost to own, operate, and most importantly park a car is quite high.  However, the alternative public transportation options are so appealing and cheap that many people don't own a car.

3. Access to great public transportation.  Paris has a great metro system which covers the city like a spider web.  Trains running every 2-5 min. during the day, and you are never more than 10 min. walk from a metro station.  Recently, Paris also started a bike rental system.  Bike racks are located through-out the city stocked with city owned bikes.  You can rent a bike from any rack and drop it off at any other rack throughout the city.  Bike lanes are abundant too.

4. You have to carry groceries home.  When you have to walk 15min. to carry your groceries home from the supermarket, then carry them up five flights of stairs to your apartment, you tend to buy only what you need.

5. 35 hour work week.  While there are many criticisms about the 35-hour work week, one of the perks is the time to prepare meals at home and enjoy slow cooked meals out.  

6. Food taste and quality valued over convenience and price.  In America, we tend to put a premium on food convenience with our hectic schedules.  Also, Americans expect to buy more volume of food with more money.  In France, the quality of the food is very important – they are willing to pay more money for the same volume of food if it is of higher quality.

7. Portion size.  To Americans accustomed to oversized plates, the portions look small.  However, they are actually normal in size.  Beverage portions are smaller as well.  The smallest size beverage at Starbucks in America is equivalent to a “large” in France.  Soft drinks are also served in small bottles and cans. 

The Immigrant’s Fridge

By: Harini S.

As I write this, I am in the throes of preparing for a long-awaited vacation back to my home country.  Apart from all the sounds, smells and experiences that I have missed since I was last home, one of the things that I most look forward to is the food.  Despite having lived away from my home country for over half my life, I find that my food preferences, like that of most immigrants, are largely unaffected by geography.  Indeed, as Michael Pollan suggests in his book, The Omnivore's Dilemma, “...the immigrant's refrigerator is the very last place to look for signs of assimilation.”(1) 

With the increasing availability of foods from around the world, it is easier than ever for immigrants to retain their ties to their homelands through their respective cuisines.  A mouth-watering falafel or a savory samosa – or at least the ingredients to prepare them -- are only an ethnic store away.  So, you ask, how exactly is this culinary tour of the world relevant to nutritionists?

I would argue that it is very relevant.  To illustrate, let me cite a recent episode of when my husband was asked to meet with a dietician to help him evaluate his diet.  When asked for a 24 hour diet recall, my husband found himself coming up with creative ways of describing the traditional Indian meal that he had eaten the night before.  Having lived in a rather cosmopolitan college town, his dietician was able to decipher much of his food recall, but she still struggled with providing him with healthy snack options that would please his decidedly un-American palate.

This got me thinking about the notion of world cuisines and the relative impressionability of American gastronomy.  As the already diverse American cuisine continues to be shaped by foods that immigrants bring with them, dieticians and nutrition educators will also have to incorporate knowledge about these fares into their repertoire.  This applies not only to doctors and registered dieticians, but also to chemists, food scientists and nutrition policy makers.  As ethnic foods gain in popularity, food scientists will no doubt be interested in understanding food preferences in order to come up with products that appeal to evolving tastes.  Additionally, if the increasingly common inclusion of hummus platters and lentil soups in American pub menus is any indication of the times, software programs designed to help calculate nutritive intake will have to incorporate such foods into their databases.  Nutrition policy makers will also have to account for the array of foods that immigrants bring to the American table.
 
Perhaps at present, such complicated food choices are restricted to small populations.  However, as American gastronomy continues to incorporate world tastes, knowledge about world foods will become extremely relevant to guiding the dietary choices of the American Middle Class.

1.    Pollan, Michael.  The Omnivore's Dilemma.  New York: Penguin Books, 2007

What's New with Omega 3?

By: Bobban S.

Undoubtedly, omega-3 fatty acids (DHA and EPA) have been a hot topic in nutrition science for decades and still stand as one of the most proven health supplements having multiple heath benefits for human body.



Omega-3 oils, which normally are produced from fish oil, are a commodity with high market needs for both human nutraceuticals industries and animal feed industries. Further, fishmeal and fish oil, which make up the bulk of the ingredients in diets for farmed carnivorous fish, are obtained from finite sources that are fully exploited or in some cases overfished. Though some marine fishes have the ability to synthesize omega-3 fatty acids, it has become a gold standard to supplement fish oil in the diets carnivorous fish species for increasing consumer acceptability of the final products due to its health benefits. All went fine, until the real sustainability issue came into the focus.

Between 1950 and 2003, the amount of fish and shellfish landed by capture fisheries destined for reduction into meals, oils and other nonfood purposes increased from 3 million tons to 21.4 million tons(1). Over-fishing of the world's oceans has depleted fish numbers severely, leading to a shortage of small fish such as anchovies, herring, and mackerel and in consequence, an imbalance in the marine ecosystem.  As a result, governments all over the globe are taking drastic measures to help mitigate this problem. Beyond diminishing supplies of fish, there is also growing concern over pollutants, such as dioxins, mercury, and PCBs in the world's oceans, causing the fish oil and fishmeal produced from these resources to be similarly polluted.

A challenge in fish nutrition is to generate end-products with high levels of health-promoting long chain omega-3 fatty acids for the consumer, while reducing the use of fish oils. This growing concern is another driving force for the marketing of non-marine based omega-3 oils and alternative feed ingredients.

A commendable insight highlighted by a very recent article by Naylor et al (2009)(2) was the use of products from biofuel industry as a source of aquafeed-ingredients. Algal biofuel stands out as the most promising future feedstock. Investors have already shown particular interest towards algae-based biofuel, for example, in USA on a combined basis, biodiesel plus algae venture capital investments totaled $320 million in 2008 – up from the $307 million invested in 2007. Most recently, industry leaders such as Shell, Chevron, ExxonMobil, and British Petroleum have also invested substantial resources (~$1billion) in developing algal-based biofuels.

Algae naturally produce substantial amount of omega 3's and at least a fraction of this component can be carved from the extracted lipid intended for biofuel production. Algal meal is rich source of high quality protein, vitamins, micronutrients (trace elements), and carotenoids which can be directly used in aquafeeds (3). Policy initiatives for meaningful integration of aquafeed industries with algal biofuel production sector can bring many sustainable deliverables to society such as renewable supply of aquafeed ingredients, thereby relieving pressure on marine resources.

Citations:

1. PewTrust (2007) Sustainable Marine Aquaculture: Fulfilling The Promise; Managing The Risks Report of the Marine Aquaculture Task Force, Takoma, Park, MD.

2. Naylor RL et al. (2009) Feeding aquaculture in an era of finite resources. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 106:15103.

3. Patnaik S et al. (2009) The use of HUFA-rich algal meals in diets for Litopenaeus vannamei. Aquacult Nutr 12: 395-401.

Fatty Fat Fat

By Matt T.

(some rights reserved)

I took a bite of that deep fried Snickers bar, but I didn't swallow.

OK fine. That's a bold faced lie.

And I'd do it again!

As I was enjoying this and other fried delicacies at the state fair (I heard they added ‘food-on-a-stick' as its own level of the food pyramid in the Deep South…), my mind  turned to the controversial topic of dietary fat. Exactly how many minutes sooner would I die as a result of this deep-fried slice of heaven? Would I still believe it was worth it as my heart squeezed out its last beat? Was powdered sugar and raspberry syrup really necessary on a deep fried Snickers bar?

I was amused if not relieved by the proud advertisement hung from the window of the vendor of this delectable nutritional crime against humanity:

“MADE WITH NO TRANS FAT”

Though I found the subtle application of a health claim to a deep fried Snickers bar amusing, the little yellow sign raised an interesting point. Candy bar innards notwithstanding, if we believe recent high profile epidemiological evidence (eg, Jakobsen et al), then the plant oils used to fry this puppy really might be good for me.

Now hold on, simmer down and step back down off those soap boxes. I am NOT actually suggesting a deep fried Snickers bar is health food. On questioning my nutritional conscience, “What would Walter Willett do?” (WWWWD for short, unless you pronounce ‘double u' four times, then it's actually longer…) I was promptly forced to acknowledge there were other problems with this fair fare.

All that aside, let's focus on the fat.

The tide of public health messaging is shifting from “fat = bad,” to, “saturated & trans fat = bad; unsaturated fat = good” Part of this counter-current has been criticism of some of Ancel Keys' early research. The argument usually goes something like this: Keys showed fat intakes strongly predict cardiovascular death rates in several countries. Data for other countries were available, but left out. If we add data for these countries, the trend is softened. In short, Keys “cherry picked” his countries.

After reading what Keys said about his own data, this is how I think he might respond: Adding more countries brings in different economies, medical establishments and leading causes of death. Fat intakes are high and cardiovascular deaths low in several regions where infectious diseases were primary causes of death, but to include these would be irresponsible epidemiology. Keys hand picked his countries for a fair comparison.

I was surprised that even 60 years ago Keys was teaching that polyunsaturated fat decreased serum cholesterol, that dietary cholesterol had very little effect on serum cholesterol and that the human-equivalent dose of dietary cholesterol inducing atherosclerosis in rabbits was far above what may be reasonably consumed by free living individuals. Some of these were concepts I had been given to understand were correct, but only recently resolved.

I cite here only one Keys review paper, a quick read for anyone interested in what he did and did not preach. The paper embodies what I believe was his core message: cut superfluous added fats out of the diet, but keep nutritious fats as part of a varied diet.

Whether we should target fats globally, of course, is  a debate in progress, and requires sorting out fat's influences on the related but not identical issues of obesity and cardiovascular risk. In the meantime, I'll try to keep the deep fried candy bars down to once a year.

Organic Alphabet Soup

By: Rebecca K.

Get it while it's hot! 2009 Limited Edition Organic Alphabet Soup!

Organic Alphabet Soup is manufactured worldwide and year-round by the nutrition community. But this Organic Alphabet Soup is a *2009 Limited Edition!*

The *2009 Limited Edition* of Organic Alphabet Soup contains the following ingredients: IUNS, ICN, ENLP, SLAN, SLAN Congress, Neumann, Scrimshaw, Bronner, Ellenbogen, Latham, Winick, Newberne, Butrum, Sunde, Ju, Lee, Mo, Valyasevi, Nondasuta, Gopalan, Swaminathan, Fujimaki, Giay, Biró, Gabr, Dutra de Oliveira, Wenger, Truswell, Berger, Soysa, Huang, Chen, Intengan.

Nutrition Facts (Serving Size: 1 bowl, Servings per can: 2)

Special 2009 limited edition ingredients: ICN & SLAN Congress
Under the theme “Nutrition Security for All,” the 19th International Congress of Nutrition (ICN 2009) is taking place October 4th-9th in Bangkok, Thailand. Then in Santiago, Chile, the 15th Latin American Congress of Nutrition is November 15th-19th. Special to both ICN and SLAN is the rich diffusion that occurs between older and younger participants, especially among those from developing countries.

Organic Alphabet Soup always includes its famous traditional stock: IUNS & SLAN
The International Congress of Nutrition is held every four years under the oversight of the International Union of Nutritional Sciences (IUNS). IUNS formally began in 1948. The mission of IUNS is to “to promote advancement in nutrition science, research and development through international cooperation at the global level;” and “to encourage communication and collaboration among nutrition scientists as well as to disseminate information in nutritional sciences through modern communication technology.”

Every three years, the Latin American Congress of Nutrition is held by the Society for Latin American Nutrition (SLAN). SLAN was created in 1965, during the first Western Hemisphere Nutrition Congress in Chicago, USA; as a forum for Latin American scientists involved in the health and nutrition of Latin American populations. SLAN works to stimulate the diffusion of food and nutritional knowledge, facilitate the inter-change of experiences between investigators, and contribute to defining solutions to the nutritional problems that affect Latin American countries.

Both IUNS and SLAN consist of an elected council of officers (e.g. president, vice-president, secretary general, and treasurer) and a General Assembly, among other positions. Countries may apply to be one of the ‘adhering [member] bodies' of IUNS. There are now 79 adhering bodies that make up IUNS; including countries such as: Bulgaria, Burkina Faso, Cuba, Estonia, Sudan, and Tunisa. The United States is an adhering body through ASN. You can see the entire list of countries here. There are also myriad ‘affiliated bodies' that include, for example, International Obesity Task Force (IOTF) and The Micronutrient Forum. People may apply for SLAN membership based on criteria, such as merit and student status; which in turn make up bodies in SLAN that are characterized by Latin American region.

Organic Alphabet Soup's signature ingredients—carefully selected live cultures aged with perfection for at least 80 years—from: (USA) Charlotte Neumann, Nevin Scrimshaw, Feliz Bronner, Leon Ellenbogen, Michael Latham, Myron Winick, Paul Newberne, Ritva Butrum, Milton Sunde; (KOR) Jin Soon Ju, Ki Yull Lee, Sumi Mo; (THA) Aree Valyasevi, Amorn Nondasuta; (IND) Coluthur Gopalan, Monkombu Sambasivan Swaminathan; (JPN) Masao Fujimaki; (VNM) Tu Giay; (HUN) György Biró;  (EGY) Mamdouh Gabr; (BRA) JosÉ Eduardo Dutra de Oliveira; (AUT) Rudolf Wenger; (AUS) Arthur Stewart Truswell; (POL) Stanislaw Berger; (LKA) Priyani  Soysa;  (TWN) Po-Chao Huang; (CHN) Chunming Chen and; (PHL) Carmen Llamas Intengan.

Cooked up by the ICN Organizing Committee and the Nutrition Association of Thailand (NAT) is the honorary “Living Legends” special session at ICN on October 5th, 2009. Dr. Emorn Wasantwisut says “it dawned on me that I was inspired, mentored and supported by several Leaders including some of these Living Legends,” and “thought it would be wonderful if [these legends] inspired the future generation in nutrition sciences.” The session includes features such as: video messages of all legends, legends in person, and remarks by the winner of the [1st international/ICN] Young Scientist Award.--as “an opportunity to bring someone who will lead the field of nutrition in the forthcoming years, to listen to the messages of these Living Legends and to reflect upon those words,” said Dr. Wasantwisut.

The information on these legendary ingredients can be found (after the ICN) on the IUNS website.

Organic Alphabet Soup supports: Friends of Nevin; & the European Nutrition Leadership Programme (ENLP)

For consumer information click on: ICN, IUNS, The Congress of Latin American Nutrition, and SLAN.

Warning, Organic Alphabet Soup may have been made on equipment that contains trace sources of:

Congress Information. (n.d.) Retrieved September 15, 2009 from http://www.icn2009.com/congress_information.html

History ICN. (n.d.) Retrieved September 15, 2009 from http://www.icn2009.com/about_icn_history.html

Mission. (n.d.) Retrieved September 15, 2009 from http://www.iuns.org/mission.htm

History. (n.d.) Retrieved September 15, 2009 from http://www.iuns.org/history.htm

Historia SLAN. (n.d.). Retrieved September 24, 2009 from http://www.slanchile.cl/slan/

Inicio. (n.d.). Retrieved September 24, 2009 from http://www.slanchile.cl/index2.php

Early Exposure to Soy Isoflavones May Help to Build Strong Bones

By: Jovana K.



Osteoporosis, characterized by a low bone mineral density, is a silent disease that ultimately results in fragility fractures. Fragility fractures lead to significant morbidity and mortality among North Americans. With the rapidly aging population, it is estimated that 1 in 2 adults will be at risk for osteoporosis related fractures by the year 2020. Thus, there exists an urgent need to decrease this risk and the use of prevention, rather than treatment strategies may prove to be more effective.

It has been hypothesized that attainment of peak bone mass, the maximum amount of bone mass achieved during the life cycle, protects against osteoporosis in later life. Thus, exposure to bioactive food components with the potential to modulate bone cell activity, may augment peak bone mass and thereby confer protection against osteoporosis. Recent scientific evidence suggests that exposure to soy isoflavones, abundant in soy foods including soy protein formula, during a sensitive stage of development may favorably modulate bone metabolism through estrogen-like activity. The United Nations Standing Committee on Nutrition identifies the sensitive stage of development to be from pre-pregnancy to 24 months of child's life so introducing soy isoflavones during this developmental window may improve bone development.

Animal studies using the CD-1 mouse model have shown that neonatal exposure to soy isoflavones, at levels similar to that of infants consuming soy protein formula, improves bone mineral density, bone structure and bone strength of the femur and lumbar spine in adult females. In contrast, males treated with soy isoflavone did not exhibit significant benefits or adverse effects at the femur or lumbar spine, suggesting that early exposure to soy isoflavones may be sex specific. Piglets fed soy based formula from postnatal day 2 to 35 had greater tibial bone mineral density and trabecular bone volume than sow-fed piglets. The observed effects in piglets were associated with an up-regulation of bone formation and a down-regulation of bone resorption, which suggests that soy isoflavones may have positive effects on bone modeling and remodeling.

The relationship between soy isoflavones and bone development has been investigated in numerous human feeding intervention trials. However, the longest studies followed infants to one year of life. Findings from these studies suggest that consumption of soy protein formula does not have a significant effect on infant length, head circumference, body weight, bone mineral content or biochemical markers of bone formation. Prospective studies should be conducted in humans to determine whether exposure to soy protein formula can improve adult bone health and provide protection against osteoporosis.  Moreover, because estrogenic compounds can disrupt reproductive health studies should investigating whether exposure to dietary estrogens (i.e. soy isoflavones) altered fertility and reproductive function.

Menu Labeling: the right to know

By: Harini S.

I recently walked into a fast-food chain restaurant that shall remain unnamed, and upon placing my order, casually asked the server, “How many calories are in that dish?”  The response was a lackadaisical “I have no idea... a LOT!”  A half-eaten sandwich and a few phone calls later, I was able to determine that my meal clocked in at a reasonable 470 calories; but this exchange got me thinking about the issue of nutrition labeling of menus, which has garnered a lot of press attention in recent months. 

Obesity and obesity-related diseases represent the top challenges to global public health, and there's no denying that dietary choices contribute significantly to our ever-expanding waistlines.  With the increasingly demanding work schedules of two-income households, the temptation to eat out is also greater than ever before.  It thus seems a no-brainer that the consumer should be presented with at least some nutrition information in restaurant settings.  However, the food-service industry has managed to crank out many arguments against menu labeling, ranging from the somewhat valid (prohibitive costs of nutritional analysis) to the seemingly ludicrous (expenses of reprinting menus).  But one can't help but think that the main reason for this hesitation has more to do with the fact that customers may be much less willing to order a menu item if they knew exactly how much damage it may cause to their overall health.

As nutritionists, we are constantly asking consumers to make savvier food choices.  Shopping the periphery of the store, being able to read ingredient lists and nutrition labels, choosing organic varieties of certain foods -- these are just a sample of the tools that consumers are now equipped with when they walk into a grocery store.  However, the moment they step into a restaurant, on average 4-5 times a week in the case of Americans, they are virtually left groping in the dark.  Should one choose a salad over a burger?  Should you go with the chocolate cake or the berry crumble?  How big is a serving of steak, again?  The choices are downright daunting for anyone trying to maintain a healthful eating pattern.  This is where menu labeling comes in.  It represents an excellent opportunity to provide the consumer with some crucial information, including total calorie count, to make an informed decision.  Furthermore, requiring menu labeling may force restaurateurs to rethink portion sizes and ingredients, ultimately leading to healthier menu options.

This has been the idea behind some preliminary attempts to legislate menu labeling, which has gained momentum in some parts of the country, including New York City, California and Oregon.  While most of this legislation is limited to fast-food or chain restaurants, the effects are already tangible.  According to the Center for Science in the Public Interest, 82% of people surveyed in New York City responded that seeing caloric information on menus has already affected their choices(1).  Additionally, some food outlets, including Dunkin Donuts and McDonalds, have reformulated menu offerings in a bid to make them more nutritionally appealing.

Although I don't argue that cheeseburgers come with grim warnings and graphic images of fatty livers, I do think that providing consumers with at least a calorie-count for each dish has to become commonplace across the food service industry.  While this may not make the chocolate cake vs. berry crumble dilemma any easier to settle, it will at least equip the consumer with the knowledge necessary to indulge healthfully. 

1. http://www.cspinet.org/new/200906101.html

Traveling and Nutrition

By: Alison K.

Your flight is at 6:00am and you have to take the A line from 190th street to JFK airport. You've got too much luggage and time is ticking! You're also starving. Upon arriving at the airport, your choices are limited and that's being generous. From McMuffins to a classic Old Fashioned from Dunkin', you know this is going to be a tough call. At one coffee stand, you sight what probably looks like the saddest bunch of bananas on the planet.

Why are food choices so incredibly unhealthy while we are traveling?

Clearly this goes not only for traveling, but in general the food choices when eating out in the United States. However, for me at least, I notice this most when I am in an airport at some crazy hour ill-prepared yet again for a flight to or fro the West Coast. There are a few tricks I've been able to work on since I've been flying back and forth from the East and West the last couple of years.

• You can in fact bring a water bottle with you on the plane. It just has to be empty when you go through security. A lot of people don't seem to realize this, and then you don't really feel like spending 4$ for a bottle of water. You opt to wait to get your free 4oz glass of water from the flight attendant, which is really not optimal for hydration.
• You can bring your own food—produce even—as long as you are traveling within the United States. Last time I flew to the East Coast I stopped by the Farmer's market on my way to the airport and loaded up on a few things, which kept me really happy during my flight! Neighboring passengers were clearly jealous. 
• Try to think about this in advance. This works for me at least. Oftentimes I wait until the very last minute and then I end up putting stale bread in my purse thinking I'll actually eat it if I get hungry enough, which inevitably results in me buying some crazy steak burrito when I finally cave. 

As always, share your knowledge with others. I think this has been my overall message of all my posts. When fellow passengers are googley eyed over your beautiful avocado on your next red eye, give them a heads up that they can be just as healthy and prepared as you are—saves a ton of money, too!

Soy-not-so-(de)licious

By: Rebecca K.

I recently read: The Whole Soy Story: the dark side of America's favorite health food, by Kaayla T.Daniel, PhD, CCN. The Whole Soy Story is a well-researched and comprehensive exposÉ of soy—conveyed through Daniel's nutritionist point of view.  Below I offer a glimpse into what I learned from this eye-opening and very educational book.

Soy originated in Asia, but it was not a substantial part of the traditional Asian diet. In the United States, John Harvey Kellogg (of Kellogg's cereals) and Henry Ford popularized soy. Soy is a cheap and non-animal protein source that constitutes myriad products. Following the Food and Drug Administration's (FDA) 1999 approval of a soy ‘health claim,' soy and soy products became even more associated with ‘health food.'

Daniel shows throughout her book why soy is the antithesis of a health food. Soybeans have high levels of phytates (‘four times that found in chickpeas')—causing calcium, iron, and zinc malabsoprtion and often deficiency, high levels of oxalates, low levels of methionine and chloride, high levels of manganese, high levels of protease inhibitors, among other components (e.g. lectins). Soy also contains allergens, goitergens, and phytoestrogens (i.e plant estrogens, which can act as strong endocrine disrupters in the human body). While isoflavones are a type of phytoestrogen that exists in many plants, they are at high concentrations in soy. Soy isflavones interfere with the brain; affecting learning, memory, and the birth of new brain cells. Thus, eating tofu, among both middle-aged men and women, is associated with cognitive decline, senile dementia, and brain atrophy later in life.

Infants fed soy-based formula may suffer even greater nutritional consequences. Soy-based formula is fortified with zinc, iron, and calcium, which subsequently interfere with mineral absorption (e.g. copper and zinc); and also contains “the equivalent of three to five birth control pills per day” and 100 times the aluminum found in breast milk. Infants consuming these formulas also ingest 75 to 80 times more manganese than those breast-fed. Both excess manganese and isoflavones consumed during infancy have been attributed to behavioral (e.g. ADD; crime) and endocrine system disorders. Soy consumption during infancy also likely delays (boys) or accelerates (girls) sexual maturation.

Interestingly, however, it was the Federation of American Society for Experimental Biology (FASEB) who spoke out against soy as a nutritional source, stating in 1979 that “the only safe use for soy protein isolates was to strengthen the sealers of cardboard packages.” According to Daniel, “soy protein isolate (SPI) is mixed with nearly every food product sold in today's stores,” and is “the major ingredient in most of today's soy infant formulas.” Despite the FDA's approved health claim, the FDA still does not list soy protein as a ‘generally recognized as safe (GRAS)' food additive. Thus, while the Select Committee of GRAS Substances recommended in 1979 that 150 milligrams of soy protein per day was the “maximum safe dose,” the soy ‘health claim' promotes a consumption of at least 25 grams soy protein per day for heart-health benefits.

So think twice about that next handful of edamame (16.6g protein per 100g), fork full of firm tofu (15.8g protein per 100g raw), or processed soy product; and about feeding soy-based formulas to infants.

But this is by no means the whole soy story—you'll have to read the book for that!

Source:
Daniel, K.T. (2005). The whole soy story: the dark side of America's favorite health food. Washington, DC: New Trends Publishing, Inc.

Locavore living: how to use local produce

By Emily C.

Omnivore, flexitarian, vegetarian, locavore…wait a minute?! Locavore? If you haven't heard of this term yet, you must not live near a farmer's market. Locavore (which was the New Oxford American Dictionary's word of the year in 2007) refers to people who opt to purchase locally grown or produced food.


You've heard about the organic quandary from fellow blogger Caitlin {note: local is not always synonymous with organic} and seen the benefits of sustainable agriculture in this summer's hot documentary, Food, Inc. If you're like me and have made a commitment to eat more locally grown foods, going to the farmer's market is a fantastic new adventure. On weekends, I wander around, filling my shopping bag {reusable, of course} with all sorts of colorful produce, from ginormous zucchini to perfectly plump Heirloom tomatoes.


However, upon arriving home, I'm at a loss for what to do with all of these new purchases. I enjoy a good salad, but I'd rather exercise more culinary creativity (and really, there's only so much salad I can eat in a week). Thus, I present to you 5 ways to use local produce.


1. Who said you have to use vegetables to make vegetable dishes. This recipe, from Kitchen Gardeners International, is a decadent way to use zucchini.


2. What about eggplant? Michael Chiarello's Stuffed Foccacia with Roasted Eggplant and Oregano only sounds like an uppity dish; it's actually a nice dinner party appetizer.



4. Have you ever spiralized your zucchini or sliced your red pepper, carrots, or cucumbers into noodle form? Gena's Peanut Noodles uses raw veggies in the place of traditional noodles with a tasty Asian-inspired dressing.


5. As we move toward fall, Stephanie O'Dea's Sweet Potato Chili sounds pretty good. For all of you doing research, you can start this dish in your crockpot, do some lab work, and come home to a warm and comforting dinner.


As lighthearted as this post has been, remember that teaching others how to prepare local food is important. We can proclaim eating locally and organically from the rooftops, but if people don't know what to do with produce, they aren't going to buy it. I realize education is not the only problem and that economics and other accessibility issues exist.  But if you have friends who want to start buying local produce (and can afford to do so), help them out by sharing a recipe (or two).