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PT blog: The doctor weighs in

Food labels (RSS)


So you can see that ingestion of certain foodstuffs, such as glucose-containing carbohydrates, trigger a number of responses that help to balance food seeking behaviors with whether an individual is fed or fasting. These complex processes interact to help us maintain weight over both the short and the long run. Fructose, unlike glucose, does not turn on these regulatory mechanisms, leaving individuals with high fructose ingestion vulnerable to overeating and weight gain. Read More

posted by: Pat, Wednesday, October 04, 2006 12:00 AM   203 Comments
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Every morning, he has the same cereal for breakfast. It is also a Kellogg’s All-Bran, but it is their “Bran Buds” product. He thought it was lower in calories than the Yogurt Bites version. But when he looked at the serving sizes of the two cereals, he was in for a surprise. Bran Buds lists a serving size of 1/3 cup. That barely covers the bottom of the cereal bowl. The serving size of Yogurt Bites is 1-1/4 cup—a decent amount. Read More

posted by: Pat, Monday, August 28, 2006 7:23 PM   3 Comments
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Successful strategies for getting it off and keeping it off included Self monitoring (weigh oneself, planning meals, tracking fat and calories) Exercising 30 or more minutes daily Adding physical activity to the daily routine. The odds of being a successful weight loser were 48% - 76% lower for those reporting that aspects of exercise behavior were influencing factors (no time to exercise, too tired to exercise, no one to exercise with, too hard to maintain exercise routine) compared to those who reported little or no barriers to exercise as a weight control measure. Read More

posted by: Pat, Tuesday, August 22, 2006 11:45 PM   2 Comments
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Cheerios for breakfast? The box says only 110 calories per serving. But, that is without milk or sugar or fruit. Read More

posted by: Pat, Saturday, August 12, 2006 8:34 PM   (Comments Off)
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It is fascinating to learn from this document that retailers are now selling significantly larger apples than those represented by serving sizes on the old nutrition labels. Apples are 57% bigger now than in 1975 when the serving size of 154 g rams was established. Large apples today have a serving size of 264 g of which 242 grams are edible. Read More

posted by: Pat, Friday, August 11, 2006 10:17 PM   1 Comments
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“Eat more, weigh less” sounds like a slogan for the type of weight loss products you find on the back pages of your favorite woman’s magazine. But, a study in the August 2006 issue of Journal of the American Dietetic Association has found that people who eat diets containing a lot of low energy density foods, such as fruits and vegetables, eat more than people who eat diets rich in energy-dense foods (such as chips and other snack foods with high fat contents). Despite eating a greater amount of food, by weight, people eating a low energy density diet consume fewer calories. So, they can indeed eat more and weigh less than people who eat high energy dense diets. Read More

posted by: Pat, Tuesday, August 08, 2006 12:19 AM   7 Comments
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Fructose is a dietary sugar that is found in a number of naturally occurring foods, most particularly, fruit.  Eaten in moderation, especially when ingested as a complex foodstuff (e.g., an apple), it is not harmful.   On the other hand, Read More

posted by: Pat, Monday, July 31, 2006 10:27 PM   2 Comments
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In most of the Western world, salad is not a traditional breakfast food.   Most of us wouldn’t touch the green stuff until lunchtime as least, preferring instead to start the day with cold cereal, an egg dish, or a pastry.    Read More

posted by: Pat, Tuesday, July 25, 2006 11:43 PM   (Comments Off)
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Hey, calorie counters out there. Did you add it all up and think you did a pretty good job this week? But you still didn’t lose any weight. Must be your slow metabolism, right? Or maybe it’s your condiments. Condiments are those little dabs of this and that we slather on food to make it taste better. There are hundreds, maybe thousands, of different kinds of condiments, ranging from the more mundane (ketchup and mayo) to the exotic, such as raita (a South Asian treat made from yogurt, vegetables, herbs and spices), bagoong monamon (salted fish sauce), and ponzu (a Japanese dipping sauce). Like all other foods, some are low fat and low calorie and others pack a diet-busting wallop of both. If you aren’t paying attention, you could be getting more calories and more fat from your condiment than you are from the food you put it on. Here are some examples from my own refrigerator: Read More

posted by: Pat, Friday, July 14, 2006 9:37 PM   (Comments Off)
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Most of the oranges we consume in this country are consumed as orange juice. Most of the orange juice we drink is prepared (not fresh) orange juice. Some of the orange juice is orange drink, not real orange juice. A lot of us eat oranges in one form or another because we have been taught that it is naturally a good source of vitamin C, and, while that is true, some of the OJ preparations we consume actually have vitamin C added There is a lot of confusion about what how much vitamin C we need to be healthy. But there are a lot of good scientific studies to help inform recommendations. One trusted source, the Harvard School of Public Health, recommends the following: Read More

posted by: Pat, Friday, July 14, 2006 1:19 AM   (Comments Off)
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So, what exactly is in the yogurt we are buying? Let’s take a look, starting with “Yobaby,” the health food for babies and toddlers. The food label states that “Yobaby” is made from cultured pasteurized organic whole milk. Sound good? I guess. All real yogurts are made from milk, although not necessarily from organic milk nor from whole milk which is naturally rich in fat content. The package label also says that “Yobaby” is made without the use of antibiotics, synthetic growth hormones or toxic pesticides. All of that is indeed good. However, the second ingredient listed on the “Yobaby” label is “naturally milled organic sugar – organic, yes, but sugar nonetheless. Ingredient order on labels is based on how much of the substance is in the food. There are 16 grams of sugars in a 4 ounce container of “Yobaby.” Although some of these sugars are the naturally occurring milk sugars, the label makes it clear that additional sugar has been added. In fact, there is twice as much sugar in “Yobaby” than there is in plain unsweetened yogurt. Is this a health food? Or is it a dessert? No wonder my granddaughters love this stuff! Read More

posted by: Pat, Wednesday, July 12, 2006 1:37 AM   15 Comments
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Multiple choice - What is the leading source of saturated fat in American diets? a. Beef b. Milk c. Cheese The answer is cheese according to Marion Nestle, a university based nutritionist, in her recently published book "What to Eat." She goes on to explain that a hard cheese, like cheddar, may be one-third fat by weight (oh my!). Close to two-thirds of the fat in cheddar is saturated (bad fat). A slice of cheddar cheese or a few small cubes can have 120 calories and about 10 grams of fat, 6 grams of which are saturated. Read More

posted by: Pat, Monday, July 10, 2006 11:41 PM   (Comments Off)
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So, is the new 7-Up “natural?” Should it be allowed to be advertise in a way that makes you think it is as good for you as eating freshly picked fruit (which, by the way, also have other beneficial nutrients, such as vitamins and fiber, missing from 7-Up and other sodas). We applaud Cadbury on taking a baby step in the right direction, but consumers beware, 7-Up is still a high calorie, artificially sweetened, soda pop devoid of beneficial nutrients. No matter how much the company tries to convince us that 7-Up cans can be picked from fruit trees, this “natural” soft drink does not count as one of your recommended daily fruit and vegetable servings. Read More

posted by: Pat, Tuesday, May 30, 2006 4:32 PM   2 Comments
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According to a survey by the Food Marketing Institute, almost 60% of food shoppers are trying to buy healthier foods.  Most of them said they were trying to buy foods that would help them lose weight.   And the food industry is always trying Read More

posted by: Pat, Friday, May 26, 2006 7:21 PM   54 Comments
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Fiber, sometimes called roughage, is an important dietary component that is often under-consumed in our modern “fast food” lifestyles. In ancient times, dietary fiber was commonly ingested as primitive man foraged for wild, fiber rich vegetables and fruits. Today, we forage for food at Mickey D’s, Jack-in-the-Box, and the frozen food section of the supermarket. Most of us ingest less than 20% of the amount of fiber that our early ancestors ate. Even as recently as the beginning of this century, fiber rich foods were commonplace in our eat-at-home meals. Today, all too frequently, our fiber consists of a limp, mayonnaise-slathered wisp of lettuce laying on top of a double cheeseburger. Read More

posted by: Pat, Wednesday, May 24, 2006 11:36 PM   1 Comments
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