Archive for June 29th, 2010

While I would normally wait until Fun Friday to make this posting, I was so intrigued/appalled by this story that I wanted to share it sooner than later. Health.com just posted an article titled The 50 Fattiest Foods in the States – complete with pictures, written by Sarah Klein. No state is spared. Some of the creativity that went into these concoctions is noteworthy, if not artery-clogging.

One that caught my attention is from the state of Iowa: a hot beef sundae complete with mashed potatoes, roast beef, gravy, cheddar cheese and a cherry tomato on top. There is also a breakfast burrito from Colorado that weighs 7 pounds. No, that is not a typo. It contains seven potatoes and a dozen eggs, amongst other ingredients.

There are photos for each “winner”. In KeepWell’s home state of California, the winner is a double-double from In-n-Out. For those of you from the golden state, you know how wonderfully tasty and fresh In-n-Out burgers are and that it’s worth eating salad for a day or two to compensate for the food. Or, you could simply have their single cheeseburger and spare yourself some of the fat. Remember, all things in moderation. It’s lunchtime now. Wonder if I have time to make it to Louisiana for a beignet? :p

While visiting the Natural Products Expo West Show in Anaheim, CA last March, I discovered a new product called the Measure Up (MU) bowl. Measure Up bowls contain markings inside the bowls so you can see, in cups, how much cereal, fruit, veggies, chips, etc. you are eating. Recent studies have shown that we regularly underestimate how many calories we consume and our increased portions have to led to increased waistlines.

Spatial reasoning is not one of my strengths and I am too lazy to drag out a set of measuring cups every time I eat, so I thought an MU bowl would help me determine how much I should be eating when it comes to cereal. While most people eat cereal for breakfast, I typically eat it in the evening after exercising. I am usually starving after a good workout but know that eating an entire bag of potato chips followed by an ice cream sandwich is not the best choice. So I opt for a cereal that has some flavor and fiber to tide me over until morning.

To the left is the nurtitional facts panel for my cereal of choice. The label says 3/4 cup equals one serving . In order to see how much I actually eat, I poured my usual amount of cereal into a cereal bowl and then transferred it into the MU bowl. As I suspected, I eat more than one serving – 1.33 to be exact. So that means either cutting back on how much I am eating or multiplying the information on the nutrition facts panel by 1.33 to calculate what I am actually consuming: 160 calories, 7g of fiber, 7g of sugar, 5g  of protein, etc. There is non-fat milk involved, too, but I’ll save those calculations for another blog posting.  I have yet to do this experiment with ice cream as I am certain that my MU bowls would somehow mysteriously disappear. Thank goodness for those new single serve ice cream cups – they have saved me from myself. 

When it comes to food, ignorance is not bliss. Education is key and understanding portions is an important lesson.