One unit of study we will be looking at is Food. So this is a good one to read and think about.
When wondering the aisle of the grocery store trying to buy food that is good for you can be difficult. I know for myself eating healthy has been a challenge but I always try to find a Natural food to eat. On the door to room 236 there is a sign "Want to eat healthy? Don't eat anything with a commercial!" and I think of that often. However, the food industry has a hold on us and it can be very difficult to break this habit of eating commercialized food. Check out the link below and answer these questions:
1) What foods do I eat that say Natural?
2) What food item is the most prevalent on the list?
3) What can you do to eat better?
4) What other labels are out there that lead us to believe it is ok to eat.
http://www.onlyorganic.org/pretenders
This is my post for the week.
ReplyDeleteAs a swimmer and active teenager I eat very often and a lot. Because of my frequent eating habits and lack of time I used to grab foods that were packaged for easy eating and minimal preparation time. This proved to be very unhealthy and I noticed my weight began go up. After a while I noticed and confronted my parents about it. They decided that organic foods with the "all natural" brand on them was a good idea and also eating less packaged foods which are full of sodium and processed sugars would be a great start. As I did this I noticed the weight began to slowly drop. After talking to a number of nutritionist and doctors about what to eat as a competitive athlete one thing has come up every single time. That product is "Naturally" flavoured fruit juices and how bad they are for you. Although the juices might say they are all natural and a great source of fruits and in some cases, vegetables, they are usually full of sugars and have many different forms of sugar in order to mask the reality of the contents. For example a Juice might say it is all natural but in the fine print there is a percentage of how much "real fruit" there is in the product. Sometimes this can be as low as 3% for juices like Fruitopia and Minute Maid. I found a good way to eat healthier and drop weight, if need be, is to drink more water rather than sugary fruit juices that drive up sugar in your diets leading to many childhood obesities. I believe that fruit juices are directly connected to the recent sky-rocketing child obesity rates within our communities and should be properly labelled so people are not mislead into thinking they are good sources of fruit because frankly, they are not.
I also find that when a company says that is uses no Genetically Modified Foods there is no reason why that food is still good for you. I recently had some McCain French fries that exclusively claimed they had NO genetically modified ingredients and was stamped with the green health check symbol. That's great for McCain but a French fry is still a French fry. Greasy and full of trans and saturated fats.
here is a link I found about the fruit juices about how deceiving they can
be.
http://www.prevention.com/food/smart-shopping/there-too-much-sugar-your-juice
Thats actually very interesting and rather surprising! I wouldnt think that fruit juices would be a very big problem, but when you think about it that way, they almost have the same effects on you as pop, just without the caffeine. Its all empty calories
DeleteI cannot believe some juice is only 3% real fruit juices. I find that so shocking but at the same time not, because lets be honest fruitopia and minute maid have never really tasted like real fruit juice. I just find it crazy that because of that 3% they can technically advertise as real fuit juice. So many parents are blind to the truths of what they are feeding their children and it really is sad.
Deleteim definitely going to cut down on how much juice i drink now, some of them are equally as bad for you as soda!
Deletethis post really got me thinking how parents always try to encourage the drinking of juice when you think of it. Im not sure about others but when i was younger my family always tried to deter my craving for pop with juice which in their mind was a much more healthy alternative when in hindsight it is not! i will be sure to tell my aunts uncles and cousins to be careful what kind of juices they are giving to their kids!
DeleteI completely agree with your post Adrian.
DeleteI can agree that drinking juice instead of water has a negative effect on your health. Juice not only is full of sugar and calories that will not satisfy your hunger it is missing many of the nutrients of the original fruits and vegetables; The biggest being fiber.
This idea came to my mind as I was reading over your post, and then when I clicked on your article it was mentioned there as well. Soluble Fiber is found in the pectin in many fruits and can decrease the speed that sugar accesses your bloodstream, making it healthier for you, by controlling your blood sugar. It can also lower the amount of insulin a person with type 1 diabetes needs. It is the same fiber found in oat bran, lentils, and root vegetables but is often lost when the juices are extracted for the fruit juice we have learned to love. So in conclusion for hydration it is definitely better to go for water, but if you are looking to get your fruits and veggies their fresh form is a lot better for you.
Ruth I have to disagree with you on this one. Not all juices are bad for you. Personally, my nutritionist encourages me to drink juices just because of all the vitamins they contain. For example, I often drink pomegranate juice for all the amino acids it contains. We have to remember that as long as you're drinking real juice (100% juice I mean) and not using it as a replacement for water, they can provide many health benefits while keeping you hydrated.
DeleteAs a parent I water down my kids juice and he only gets it once a day. Too much sugar, not enough fruit. Great post Adrian.
DeleteThis is my entry for the week;
ReplyDeleteConsidering I have been a type one diabetic since I was two years old, I am always trying to find foods that are "no sugar added" or "sugar free", but they are usually too good to be true. More often than not when I read the ingrediants, one of the first things is sucrolose or splenda like sugar substitutes. Just like Adrian said, juices can be one of the most decieving products in the market today, so many times I spot a low sugar or no sugar added juice product and I know before I look that sucrolose will be in the ingrediants because it is cheap and technically suagr free.
To eat better, I almost always read the label before buying juice and anything else to make sure chemicals like aspartame aren't there. If it says something like 100% apple juice or the ingrediants only consist of real fruit juices instead of things I can't pronounce , or even cane sugar which is a little healthier, then they're okay. I think the most important thing is to know what you're putting in your body, and to make sure you read the back before falling for the "natural" or "organic" gimick so many companies try to play off. Believe it or not, no calorie sweetners like splenda or sweet n' low, are worse for you than processed sugar. It is a synthetic chemical that our bodies struggle to break down, and has been known to cause weight gain despite it's low calorie advertising, migraines, seizures, high blood sugars despite it's advertising towards the diabetic comminity, blurred vision etc.
Large companies like Splenda pride themselves in saying that they are low calorie and diabetie friendly when they actually aren't at all, as I said above, sucrolose can cause weight gain and heightened blood sugar levels, proving that it is neither good for healthy weight loss, or diabetes.
When added to substitute sugar in cookies and other treats, they try to make them seem healthy when in reality they're still stuffed with chocolate, white flour and perservitives.
here is a link that explains how dangerous sucrolose is, and also what foods it can be found in.
http://naturalhealthtechniques.com/list-of-splenda-containing-foods.htm
I agree with Samira. I can't count how many times I've eaten something and immediately tasted the artificial sweeteners. If we have our own foods, why would we need these artificial things? Just the other day, my mom bought some yogurt and we realized it said: "lactose free". Now I'm thinking to myself; if there's no lactose (or milk) in yogurt, what is in it? I look and it's a ton of artificial ingredients I couldn't pronounce. We have to remember that before we buy anything with these misleading labels saying "zero fat" or "no sugar" that they usually mean that these things are being replaced with artificial foods that are equally as bad or worse.
DeleteGreat post. Too bad about the diabetes though but I guess you get used to it eh? I can't drink diet pepsi because it tastes fake to me.
Deletewow thats crazy my dad is diabetic and he always is going on how he is making healthier choices such as splenda! I will be sure to tell him that they are equally if not more harmful than regular sugar.
ReplyDeleteThis is my weekly post:
ReplyDeleteOne of the things that I have noticed in grocery stores is that some things are being branded as "Organics" or something similar even though the items themselves are not certified as organic. I think this is very misleading and similar to the proposition that most things labelled as "Natural", are just the opposite.
This is frustrating to me because the companies are simply preying on consumers who are trying to be healthier, and on top of that they often raise the prices because of this empty title. Another thing that I have noticed is within Schneider's "No additives" products like hot dogs, lunch meats, etc. If you read the fine print on these items it says something like "other than those that already occur in the ingredients". Although they do seem to still have a better list of ingredients than other products, I see the fact that the company decided to write that information in fine print is an admission of guilt in a sense.
Overall I think that it's one thing to sell unhealthy foods but it's completely unacceptable to mislead consumers into believing they are buying better food, especially if they are paying extra money for it. I will attach a link that shows that Safeways Organics brand, although possibly selling organic products, is funding a proposal to allow products made with GMOs to go unlabeled. This seems a little suspicious to me and, similar to the fine print on the Schneider's products, promotes serious distrust in the companies label.
http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_27871.cfm
Great post. It is brutal to think that unhealthy food is cheaper than healthy food. How does someone on welfare eat properly?
DeleteI agree that it's horrible that unhealthy food is cheaper than healthy food. I've seen people spend up to $100 dollars on organic produce because it's so outrageously expensive.
DeleteIn many grocery stores or even restaurants including fast food places, foods are labelled "natural" in order to get people to think they are making a better choice by purchasing and eating the product. However, I agree with the sign that says "Want to eat healthy? Don't eat foods with a commercial" because it is really accurate you never seen a commercial for real fresh fruit and vegetables or grass fed meat, such as apples for example. I agree that if a food is packaged it is usually processed in some way and has additives regardless if the package is labelled natural. For example for a while my family was buying peanut butter labelled natural and organic. However we read the nutrition facts and ingredients and it contained saturated fat and almost as much salt and sugar as regular Kraft peanut butter. It also contained questionable ingredients such as "corn syrup" (why is their corn in peanut butter) and maltodextrin which I have never heard of. This shows how food companies manipulate consumers into thinking a food is healthy when it really isn't.
ReplyDeleteAnother example is I work at Dairy Queen Orange Julius and I have seen many commercial adds for the "Real fruit smoothies" and all of our signs say "Real fruit smoothies" however I work there and there is literally no real fruit other than the bananas. It is all strawberry, peach, raspberry etc syrup in cartons. I happened to read the ingredients on the cartons and sure enough it says "sugar and sucrose." This shows how similar to juice, companies can say "real fruit" but it is not 100% like we are most likely to believe.
This is an article I found explaining how maltodextrin is genetically modified and can be worse than sugar
http://m.naturalnews.com/news/039638_toxins_ingredients_nutritional_supplements.html
Wow insider information at its best. Good for you to look at the label of the peanut butter and making an informed decision.
DeleteAlso that was my weekly post
DeleteI work at McDonalds and we sell "real fruit smoothies" as well. It always baffled me why they thought they could get away with dubbing it as "real fruit" when in reality, it's simply fruit syrups and flavouring that's used. Admittedly, fast food restaurants have taken it upon themselves to release some more healthy alternatives to their menus but that doesn't entitle them to be deceitful in regards to promoting the nonexistent organic/natural ingredients their products consist of.
DeleteThis is my weekly post,
ReplyDeleteI work in a grocery store, so I get to see a wide range of things that people buy. I also get to ask people questions about certain things they are buying. A lot of people do believe that the food they are purchasing is "natural" but as the article proved, we can't exactly be sure that the food in our grocery stores is actually natural. GMO's are a huge factor in the foods that are processed today and that are brought to into our grocery stores. There is no guarantee that any of our food is completely natural, not even the produce labelled organic. In the United States people tried to fight back against their foods being labelled when in reality they weren't. A proposition was made to try and make it the law that all GMO foods had to be labelled saying they were genetically modified. Some of the worst companies for labeling products natural when they are not are Campbell's, General Mills and Heinz. When the proposition was made, all three of these companies donated significant amounts of money to defeat the proposition. Campbell's donated $250,000, General Mills donated $908,200 and Heinz donated $500,000. It's pretty scary that companies that people love and buy from all the time have a hand in hiding food that isn't truly natural. I personally believe that people just need to be vigilant, and it's a lot easier to do when it comes to produce and meat. You can ask any butcher or produce manager in a grocery store where the product came from and if it's truly organic and if they don't have an answer for you then I'd start shopping somewhere else.
http://www.theorganicprepper.ca/blacklist-12-food-companies-to-avoid-and-95-sneaky-aliases-04102013
Great post. Insider information from work is always awesome.
DeleteThis is my post for the week.
ReplyDeleteIn watching the "Natural" commercial I was reminded by the message at the end that encourages us to eat organic foods as they are ensured to be chemical and pesticide free without GMO's. When considering healthy food my family tries to keep in mind the "The Dirty Dozen" rule. The idea behind this is that the dozen or so foods in this group are the most pesticide-contaminated fruits/vegetables; some include apples, celery, cucumber, grapes,strawberries, etc. When we buy these foods we are sure to wash them in a produce wash to help get rid of any pesticides and or try to buy them organic as much as possible. The better produce to buy are on the "Clean Fifteen" list; which includes foods like avocados, grapefruit, kiwi, mushrooms, etc.
Also, when we feel like spending the extra few dollars my mom will take a trip to Nature's Plus, just in the downtown area, to buy truly 'natural' foods. When I go there with my mom we know that our peanut butter is actually natural because we put the peanuts in the machine and make it ourselves and honestly, it tastes much better than the store bought stuff.
These few things we do as a family bring me comfort in knowing what i'm eating is clean and not worrying about the not-so-natural food I could be obliviously eating more of.
For those of you who are interested in the 'Dirty Dozen' and the 'Clean Fifteen', here is the link to the complete list: http://www.ewg.org/foodnews/summary.php
Great post. My wife loves the ewg.org and gives me heck when I buy something from the dirty 12 when it is not organic.
DeleteThis is my weekly post:
ReplyDeleteI honestly find it maddening that food brands of all kinds would go to such great lengths in order to sell their products. It’s a completely deceitful marketing strategy and ultimately, unjust since consumers are investing extra money into these falsely labeled produces under the impression that they’re receiving the health benefits and additional nutritional value that they originally bargained for.
Even simplistic staples like bread is commonly mislead to encompass some highly questionable ingredients. According to Whole Grains Council, you should trust statements that claim their product is “100% whole wheat” but if the line of bread you’re typically purchasing merely insists that it’s “whole grain” or “multigrain” without any additional details – then you should be rendered skeptic. Also, don’t be fooled by colour. Contrary to popular belief, the darkness of the loaf does not contribute to the authenticity of it’s whole wheat labeling. There’s a good chance that these breads consist of caramel coloring and acquire no more additional health value than your run of the mill, redefined white breads.
Other labels to look out for would be “fat free”, “no sugar added”, and so forth. I think we tend to forget that natural fats and sugars are existent and reside in organic foods such as fruits and vegetables. If a product of any sort insists that it doesn’t entail either sugar or fat then it’s a general guarantee that there’s a series of substituted ingredients involved. It’s up to the consumer to decide whether or not the intake of these alternative chemicals is worth the promised “sugar free” benefit that’s being promised.
Here’s an interesting article on some famous food brands that undertook some nutritional testing and as a result, weren’t proven to be up to par with the labels sealed on their products:
http://www2.canada.com/calgaryherald/news/story.html?id=82f5cad4-7388-4900-8292-2d5420e208b6
Furthermore, here’s a source I used to help both formulate and back up my opinion on the matter:
http://www.health.com/health/gallery/0,,20599288_4,00.html
Great post. Man it's hard to eat healthy. How's a guy supposed to lose weight.
Delete