The U.S. Agriculture Secretary, Tom Vilsack is in West Sacramento currently to kick off a campaign motivating people to eat more produce. Check out the September 27, 2011 Sacramento Bee article by Mark Glover, "Agriculture secretary Vilsack kicks off new nutrition guide." Vilsack's message is for everyone to "eat your fruits and vegetables." The My Plate campaign reads, "Make half your plate fruits and vegetables."
This message not only kicks off a national information campaign for "MyPlate," that the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) adopted recently instead of the old food pyramid of a decade ago as a nutrition guide/template. According to the Sacramento Bee article, eating your vegetables and fruit is "important to strong rural communities, general public health, jobs, the economy and even national security."
The U.S. Agriculture Secretary noted that American's food supply is the most affordable in the world. If so, ask the people in Sacramento neighborhoods where vegetables and fruit aren't affordable, there are no large supermarket chains, and the number of families lining up (or driving up) to food banks for supplemental foods is growing.
The idea behind the visit is also to motivate people to eat more produce in order to reverse obesity for all ages. According to the Sacramento Bee article, Vilsack spent his afternoon yesterday touring the 26,000-square-foot Farm Fresh To You facility on Seaport Boulevard. The family-owned organic produce home delivery service serves more than 40,000 customers monthly.
What's Farm Fresh To You?
You can get produce delivered fresh to your home. For example, in Sacramento, the Farm Fresh To You website lets you key in your zip code and a day pops up when the food is delivered in your area. For example, for 95821 in Sacramento's Arden Arcade area, the deliver day for produce is each Friday. As people are becoming increasingly interested about where their food comes from and how it was grown, Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) is becoming a popular alternative for getting high quality food from a trusted local farm, Farm Fresh To You.
By joining Community Supported Agriculture (CSA), families are connecting directly to our farm, Capay Organic, and are receiving regular deliveries of nutrient rich, mouth watering, organic produce delivered directly to their home or office. Click on the following link to see how it works or why join Farm Fresh To You. Also see, Upcoming Events or Find Your Delivery Day.
There's no commitment that you have to keep on having the produce delivered as you can cancel anytime. The deliveries start at only $25 per delivery, according to the present website. The idea is flexibility. According to its website, “For over a decade our meals have been created around the contents of the farm box...we are continually charmed by the delicious fruits and vegetables in each box and truly enjoy the challenge to prepare it all before the next one arrives.”
The MyPlate campaign rolls out in California
Vilsack, who was joined by Farm Fresh owners, regional public officials and various agricultural officials, said California was the perfect place to roll out the MyPlate campaign, given the state's role as the nation's leading fruit and vegetable producer and home to hundreds of thousands of agricultural jobs. The goal is to boost production and distribution of fruits and vegetables. Can eating more produce develop more jobs in California?
Healthier food helps boost national security
Perhaps studies by the USDA showed how many 19-24 year olds need to become more physically fit before they can volunteer for military service or train as police officers and fire fighters. So to increase physical fitness, the MyPlate got rid of the old food pyramid image and arrived at its name from the USDA icon showing a dinner plate divided into four food groups – fruits, vegetables, proteins and grains – plus a glass depicting dairy.
The only problem with MyPlate is that there is a lot of grain that some people react to badly and little seafood, in other words more grain that lean meats, seafood, sea vegetables, and green and red fruit and vegetables or white fruit. Each person really reacts differently from food. Some people do better without all the bread or grains on MyPlate. And others do better on partial more or less vegetarian and vegan or raw produce diets. So food becomes an individual response of a person's genes to an ancestral diet that's healthiest for the individual.
In June 2011, MyPlate replaced the long-standing USDA MyPyramid as the primary nutrition guide symbol. Part one of the MyPlate information blitz urges consumers to "make half their plate fruits and vegetables." Would you like to produce a video on eating more produce? Part of the campaign to eat more fruits and vegetables was a creativity in video challenge. Vilsack announced a "MyPlate Fruits and Veggies Video Challenge," encouraging videos from groups and individuals. Videos can be songs, skits or how-to videos.
The secretary said $9,000 in prize money will be awarded to videos judged the best and featuring tips for kids and tips for eating at home or away from home. Winners will be announced Dec. 14, according to the Sacramento Bee article. You have currently about 4,000 U.S. organizations joining the MyPlate Nutrition Communicators Network. And you have more than 50 national strategic partners, including the National Restaurant Association, GE, Del Monte Foods, and and Kellogg's. Again, each person reacts differently to the portion size of foods and various foods. Some people can't eat grains at all. Other people thrive on grains.
Some people can't tolerate milk. Yet MyPlate urges consumers to switch to low-fat or fat-free milk, vary protein selections, control portion sizes and reduce sugar and sodium intake. There's no mention of drinking almond milk, hemp milk, hazelnut milk, oat milk, rice milk, or soy milk or any information on alternatives to cow's or goat's milk on the MyPlate image. But the MyPlate image is in favor of water instead of sugary drinks.
What's the take on fruit juices? Are they considered too sugary and passed on in favor of the entire fruit with all the fiber and pulp? You don't get too much information because the juice industry is huge with its studies of the health benefits of various fruit juices as the doctors tell some patients to watch the blood sugar spikes from juices and eat the whole fruit. But the whole fruit is part of the produce-eating campaign.
The USDA's MyPlate information campaign is scheduled to run through 2013. More information on MyPlate and the video competition can be found at Choose My Plate. But remember that if you follow the MyPlate image, you still don't know how your body will respond to that. Maybe you need something beyond the Paleo diet or your ancestral diet, or maybe you need the emphasis on vegetables and grains, with all that bread and tiny bits of fish or meat. That's up to your genetic signature, your activities, and how your body responds to various foods.
The goal is a healthier America through eating more produce, such as green leafy vegetables and green vegetable juices for many people. Then again, you can produce a video on how food affects you or on how children' eat more vegetables if they grow them in urban school gardens. Note that the MyPlate says protein foods groups, rather than meat or fish groups.
The advice area of the USDA's "My Plate" website notes, "Choose lean or low-fat meat and poultry. If higher fat choices are made, such as regular ground beef (75 to 80% lean) or chicken with skin, the fat counts against your maximum limit for empty calories (calories from solid fats or added sugars).
"If solid fat is added in cooking, such as frying chicken in shortening or frying eggs in butter or stick margarine, this also counts against your maximum limit for empty calories (calories from solid fats and added sugars).
Select some seafood that is rich in omega-3 fatty acids, such as salmon, trout, sardines, anchovies, herring, Pacific oysters, and Atlantic and Pacific mackerel.
"Processed meats such as ham, sausage, frankfurters, and luncheon or deli meats have added sodium. Check the Nutrition Facts label to help limit sodium intake. Fresh chicken, turkey, and pork that have been enhanced with a salt-containing solution also have added sodium. Check the product label for statements such as “self-basting” or “contains up to __% of __”, which mean that a sodium-containing solution has been added to the product.
Choose unsalted nuts and seeds to keep sodium intake low."
Did the Abstract Old Food Pyramid Contribute to Obesity? Can the Concrete New Food Pyramid Help People Focus on the Details?
Many people blame the old food pyramid for the current epidemic of adult and childhood obesity, according to the article, "The New Food Pyramid and Child Nutrition Basics," by Vincent Iannelli, M.D. But according to today's June 2, 2011 article, "Iconic Food Pyramid Replaced With Plate," by Sarah Lieu, the new food guide is a plate emphasizing portion size not any longer a pyramid where foods at the top meant you should eat fewer of those foods.
The old food pyramid was so abstract people had to think twice before they "got it" or understood how the pyramid worked with the least healthiest and smallest amounts of foods at the top and the largest amounts of food at the bottom that you were supposed to eat lots of--with no mention of portion size. For that past 20 years that was like asking people to think in abstract terms and remember what the top of the pyramid represented, that you should eat fewer of those types of foods.
Most people may have found that concept confusing if they've never understood the abstract concept behind the pyramid's deeper meaning. If you lived in a country where you've never seen a pyramid chart used in that way before, that abstract concept that fewer stands at the top and greater at the bottom in relation to foods, it is confusing.
Now, the new food guide for healthy nutrition is a simple to understand plate with eating utensils. Everyone understands portion sizes when placed on a round plate. You get a smaller piece of protein and a larger portion size of vegetables. You want a plate with food as your food guide because it's universal, even to those who eat on banana leaves instead of plates.
Most people are used to seeing round plates. Maybe your home has square or triangle-shaped plates, but the common concept in restaurants, schools, and institutions, is the round plate. Even camping plates are mostly round, like cups and the majority of plain water drinking glasses. The replacement for the food pyramid shows exactly how half of your plate should be filled with fruits and vegetables, the other half with whole grains and lean protein. That's simple. There are no number concepts to memorize. It's all visual, divided like a pie chart.
The new government food guide makes everything simpler to understand in that 50 percent or half of your food should be fruits and vegetables and the other half or 50 percent should be whole grains and lean protein. You determine your lean protein source--beans, cheese, tofu, meat, fish, poultry, or whatever lean protein source you use. Vegetables and fruits are obvious. Everyone understands half a plate full of vegetables and fruits and half a plate full of protein foods.
The trick now is to teach people which foods have the protein, for example how much protein is needed for your age and body response and how much protein does your food of choice have that's not fruit or vegetables. Also, you have to deal with people who get their protein from plant foods versus those who get their protein from lean animal sources or seafood versus fatty meats.
The number of foods displayed on the new pyramid has been reduced to four foods. The old food pyramid had six foods displayed. The hidden meaning of the new food plate is to control portion size. But do people want variety emphasized or portion size?
You can check out the new, round, pie-shaped plate and eating utensils shape of the food guide which took the place of the old food pyramid. People seem to enjoy seeing a plate of food rather than a triangle when it comes to eating. More people recognize a round plate than a triangle.
Another goal of the USDA besides getting you to reduce the portion size of your foods is to motivate you to stretch your dollars further. One way to save money on plant foods is to grow your own produce.
Another is to figure out which vegetables and fruits are healthiest and whether you can afford them. Instead of calling the new food guide the food pyramid the new food guide is now called choose my plate. That does sound more recognizable globally. Check out the USDA's tips on buying fruits and vegetables at ChoseMyPlate.gov. Also see, Dietary Guidelines Consumer Brochure.
Resources
Comments