nutrition Archives - GetGoing NC!

Move more, eat better now (not in a month and a half)

JoeMiller — Wed, 15 Nov 2017 21:10:25 +0000

Now isn’t the time that our thoughts turn toward living healthier. That won’t happen for — when’s New Year’s Day? — another month and a half.

We’re here today to suggest, on the cusp of the eating season, that now’s exactly the time to start living healthier. And that typically means two things:

Moving more
Eating better

We’re about to introduce a program for moving more through the holidays. We’re still working out the details, but should be ready to share details next week. Keep an eye out.

Meanwhile, we came across the following blog from five years ago about not letting the holiday feeding season get the best of you. Six simple, easy-to-follow suggestions from Shelly Wegman, a registered dietician with Rex Nutrition Center in Raleigh. You can still enjoy the holidays — and you won’t wake up January 1 with a 10-pound holiday hangover.

Toward that end, Wegman suggests:

Keep a food journal. “Writing it down makes you aware of what you are eating,” Wegman says. If you religiously document your intake, it will help you realize not only how much your are eating but you’ll also be better able to make the connection, say, between all the sugary, fatty stuff you ate and why, a little while later, you felt so sluggish and sleepy.

Think seasonal, think fresh. You don’t have to sacrifice your taste buds to survive the holidays, says Robert Brener, longtime chef and associate professor in the College of Culinary Arts at Johnson & Wales University’s Charlotte campus. “Healthier options are readily available for the holidays,” he says. “I suggest trying to remain seasonal in your vegetable choices. Winter greens are plentiful this time of year: Brussels sprouts, cabbage, kale, turnip, mustard, collard and carrot greens are all packed with nutrients and can be flavored with onion, garlic or even smoked lean meats like chicken or turkey.”

Watch what you drink. “Sugary beverages are where a lot of people get into trouble,” Wegman says. Be especially vigilant when it comes to holiday punches, often saturated with sugars, sodas and juices, and alcohol. “Watch for anything with an umbrella in it,” she cautions, and keep an eye on serving size. “The typical portion size of a glass of wine is five or six ounces; it can be twice that over the holidays.” Want a good holiday drink that makes you appear festive yet keeps you light on your feet? Try soda water with lime.

Use healthy substitutes. Do those lemon bars you’re baking for the office party really need a cup of butter? Probably not, Brener says. “Excellent substitutions for butter and oil include sour cream, apple sauce and fat-free buttermilk. Often these items are used because they provide the moisture, enrichment, binding and texture that fats provide.”

Eat visually First, when you’re at a holiday party, use the smallest plate you can find – our tendency is to fill it to capacity, Wegman notes. Next, she adds, fill that small plate this way: half with veggies (easy on the dips), a quarter with lean protein (salmon, tofu, chicken breast), a quarter with a whole grain starch (whole grain crackers) and fruit. And don’t be afraid to top off with a (that’s one) holiday treat. “Good nutrition is about moderation. You can enjoy all foods, just do it in the right portions.”

Remember breakfast. Especially during the holidays, it’s the most important meal of the day. If you start the morning with a couple of doughnuts or a big bagel, you’ll have trouble recovering for the rest of the day. Get a good balance of protein and carbohydrates, advises Wegman. High on her breakfast list: Greek-style yogurt, spinach and veggie omelet, cottage cheese and fruit, cheese toast.

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Eating MREs so you don’t have to

JoeMiller — Mon, 01 May 2017 23:16:46 +0000

When I started writing about trails in the early’90s, my motto quickly became, “Getting lost, so you don’t have to.” It’s a philosophy I’ve stuck with as my scope has widened to encompass trying all kinds of things so you don’t have to.

A year ago, I had a backpacking class that included three vets, a rarity because most ex-military I encounter have zero interest in voluntarily spending another night in a tent. In our session on backpacking food, the topic of MREs — Meal, Ready-to-Eat — came up. Rather than the universal pan I was expecting from these three critics, the results were mixed. “Some aren’t bad,” they agreed. “But some are.” The next session, one of the vets pulled a brown cardboard box about the size of an iPad out of his pack and handed it to me. In dot-matrix type, it said “Egg Omelette with Vegetables and Cheese.”

Hmm.

The U.S. military version of MREs dates back to the Revolutionary War, when soldiers were dished enough peas, beef and rice to last a day. Field meals began appearing in cans by the Civil War, with a switch to salted and dried meals in WWI. The current MRE went into limited use in 1981 and became standard issue in 1986. Throughout, the emphasis has been on keeping the troops fueled, if not necessarily gustatorily happy.

I’d held onto my MRE, reluctant to tuck it into my pack in part because at at 8 ounces this single-serving breakfast weighs nearly 50 percent more than a Backpacker’s Pantry freeze-dried meal for two. (To be fair, the MRE includes a heating unit, eliminating the need to tote along a camp stove.) This past weekend, though, I decided an impromptu overnight to Falls Lake with a hike-in of less than a half mile allowed for the extra weight.

I spent a fair amount of time reading the packaging for my MRE, which came from AmeriQual Foods of Evansville, Ind. There was significant mention of performance (“Food gives you energy. The more energy you burn, the more fuel you need.”), not so much about taste.

I suppose after you’ve been living on these for a while, the six-step prep becomes rote. The first time, though, I figured it was crucial to get the prep right:

Do not overfill the heating pouch with water
Make sure the heater absorbs the minimal amount of water
Make sure the heater is above the food pouch
Make sure the heating bag is folded over the top
Make sure that once the heating bag is inserted back into the pouch, the top of the pouch is elevated (on a “rock or something”).
Then: wait at least 10 to 15 minutes for the magic to happen. (I waited 17, to be safe.)

I then withdrew the pouch, which was not as warm as one might have hoped, and got out my knife to rip through the tough plastic pouch. I peered inside. My hopes were not high; I expected to see a whitish-yellow sludge with hints of green and red (the promised vegetables). What I saw was a thick paste (think caulk) the color of Carolina clay. The mass slipped out en masse into my bowl.

Could this possibly be among the “not bad” entrees my friends referred to? I took a bite: immediately the debate turned to “edible-or-not”? I ate a little more, because I was really hungry, jotted some notes, ate a little more.

No. Not edible. Definitely not edible.

True, the marketing-bereft packaging had not promised five-star dining. But its mere existence implied edibility, and on that note, they were incorrect.

Perhaps I had gone awry somewhere along the six-step preparation. I went back over the instructions; at the bottom of the box was the obligatory “CAUTION!” — “The contents will be HOT.” My contents were not.

Perhaps I hadn’t let the heater lie flat in its activating water for the requisite full minute. Plebe mistake. (This, my friends, is why you should always pack Pop Tarts.)

Trying MREs so you don’t have to.

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The Paleo Diet: It worked for the cavemen

JoeMiller — Thu, 04 Jul 2013 20:48:18 +0000

Barney on the cutting edge.

I wrote the following for The News & Observer and Charlotte Observer; it originally appeared in both newspapers on Tuesday, July 2.

Another diet, another debate about its effectiveness.

The Paleo Diet, dubbed the caveman diet, promotes simple eating – lean meats, fish, poultry, fruits, vegetables and nuts. Processed foods are out, as are refined sugars, excessive salt, grains and dairy. Eat like our ancestors did 10,000 years ago, goes the Paleo mantra.

“Generally, it’s a healthy diet,” says Dr. Theresa Amerson, with Wake Specialty Physicians City Center Medical Group in Raleigh. “Any diet that focuses on whole foods is a healthy start.”

Among the diet’s claims: grains, dairy, legumes and processed foods contribute to Type 2 diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure, gout, acne and other chronic ailments. Eliminate them and you’ve taken a big step on the road to recovery.

Yet in a recent evaluation of 29 current popular diets, U.S. News & World Report ranked Paleo 28th, saying its experts “took issue with the diet on every measure.”

Their main beef: replicating man’s simple diet of 10,000 years ago is difficult today, if not impossible. For starters, the meat we eat today is nothing like meat consumed in ancient times. You need to eat lean, grass-fed beef that’s far more expensive than feedlot-raised beef sold at grocery stores.

And many of the vegetables we eat differ genetically from what our ancestors ate. Plus, their selection would have been limited to what grew wild in their immediate surroundings; we have ready access to produce from around the world.

Alicia Fogarty, a nutritionist with Carolinas Medical Center in Charlotte, agrees that the diet has a solid “basic, core concept.” She cautions, though, that practitioners need to be aware of what the diet omits. “Calcium, for example, by eliminating dairy,” she says. “But you can supplement that with green leafy vegetables. It’s also low on Vitamin D, but you can make that up with fatty fish.”

The Paleo Diet – short for Paleolithic – was introduced in 2002 by exercise physiology professor Loren Cordain in his book by the same name.

It didn’t gain wide attention until Robb Wolf, a student of Cordain’s, published “The Paleo Solution” in 2010. Since then, it has attracted considerable buzz, both positive and not so.

Some love it

Until 4 1/2 years ago Amber and Carter Lewis of Charlotte lived on what Amber describes as “the standard American diet,” including fatty foods, beer and a little overindulgence on the weekend.

Carter was having trouble with high blood pressure, Amber suffered chronic digestive issues and was plagued by skin problems.

“Seven days after we started Paleo was the first time I could ever remember not having heartburn,” says Amber Lewis.

Carter Lewis’ blood pressure soon dropped to the point his doctor took him off his medication.

As Amber Lewis shared her story with friends, they wanted to eat the way she was eating.

Lewis, 37, started making meals for friends, so many that in January 2012 she launched Mod Paleo, a catering service that supplies fresh, pre-cooked Paleo meals.

“I’ve got about 190 to 200 customers from Spartanburg to Asheville to Hickory,” says Lewis, who has tapped into a market of customers who can afford to eat Paleo, but don’t have time to be their own hunters, gatherers and chefs.

Joy Dvorak of Gilroy, Calif., chronicles the impact Paleo has had on her family’s health in the blog PeaceLovePaleo.net. She says the diet may seem expensive at first. But at least in their case, the added food expense is offset by fewer trips to the doctor and fewer meds.

Because the diet is relatively new, few studies have tested Cordain’s assertions, such as “very few chronic diseases don’t respond positively to this diet.”

The ultimate diet question

That gives rise to critics such as Colin Pistell of Chapel Hill. Pistell is the owner of Fifth Ape, a fitness program that embraces an ethic similar to the overall Paleo lifestyle: Eat whole foods, work out like we did 10,000 years ago. He believes that simple message should suffice. However, “Unfortunately, that’s not enough to put into an ebook, so everyone tries to complicate it or dogmatize it. I think Paleo is a foolish term. It has its uses as a marketing term … but that’s about it.”

The U.S. News & World Report rating also criticized the diet for being restrictive – a common criticism of many diets. That prompts Fogarty to offer the advice she offers anyone contemplating any diet.

“You have to ask yourself, ‘Will it be hard to follow? Is it something I can stick with?’ ” says Fogarty. “I encourage lifestyle changes for the long term.”

Adds Amerson with Wake Specialty Physicians, “People get mired in following a diet to the letter. Rather, don’t be upset if you can’t follow a diet exactly as written.”

* * *

Paleo positives

There’s agreement that the Paleo diet is based on sound principles. Here are five:

• Avoid processed foods. “The fewer chemicals the better,” advises Dr. Theresa Amerson with Wake Specialty Physicians City Center Medical Group in Raleigh. As a rule, if the nutritional label lists more than five ingredients, pass.

• Load up on vegetables and fruits. Fresh is preferable, frozen a close second. Avoid canned fruits packed in syrup, and limit consumption of dried fruits, “as they can contain as much concentrated sugar as a candy bar,” according to “The Paleo Diet.” Potatoes are off-limits as they “maintain high glycemic loads that may adversely affect your blood sugar and insulin levels.”

• Be wary of grains. “This is a bigger issue than we may realize,” says Amerson. “More and more information is coming out about what grains are doing to our system.” She notes the growing link between grains and inflammation to the intestines.

• Eat at home. Preparing your own meals gives you greater control over your diet, says Joy Dvorak, author of the blog PeaceLovePaleo.net. It offers another big advantage: “For the last three years (since going on the Paleo Diet) we hardly spend money eating out.”

• It’s not all about losing weight. Though the science is yet to weigh in, anecdotal evidence suggests there’s some truth to Paleo’s claims that the diet can resolve a host of chronic ailments, from intestinal inflammation to high blood pressure to acne.

* * *

Read more

• “The Paleo Diet,” by Loren Cordain (2010, revised, Houghton Mifflin)

• “ The Paleo Solution,” by Robb Wolf (2010, Tuttle).

• U.S. News & World Report ranking of 29 diets, including the Paleo Diet

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