Food Facts

Reading the short essays of my classmates has proved to be very interesting. Reading Rebecca Conrad's post, I learned about how healthy cereal can be for you. As I have never been a big cereal eater, I never really though too much about how healthy cereal is, but reading this article it seems like it can actually be one of the healthiest meals you can have in the morning. According to her research eating a bowl of cereal can be healthier than eating eggs or waffles. Reading Quinn's post was equally interesting. He talked about how unhealthy soda can be for you. The comment that I found most interesting was that drinking soda can actually prevent your body from getting the nutrients that it needs.

SE 5

Eating Healthy on Campus Is Possible?

Living on a college campus can have a strong effect on what you eat every day. With classes and activities, the last thing on most people’s minds is eating healthy. Looking over the food journals of members of the class, I noticed that snacks were one of the main ways that people ate, especially over the weekend. It’s easy to grab a bag of chips in between classes or snack on a bagel before leaving for the day. Snacking usually tends to lead people to eat less healthy than they should with so many different kinds of fattening snacks available around campus. However, based on my observations there are a lot of people that are eating fairly healthy snacks. One of the main forms of this that I saw was yogurt.

                Now most people could guess that yogurt is a healthy snack—it’s dairy and usually has fruit in it. Still most people do not realize how healthy it can be for you. Yogurt is full of various nutrients including protein, niacin, thiamin, vitamin B12, magnesium and of course calcium. These various nutrients are very important to people of any age. An article by the International Journal of Obesity discusses the health benefits of a diet that has yogurt in it. One of the ideas that it discusses is how studies have found that a calcium-rich diet promotes healthier eating all around. Dairy provides both children and adults with many nutrients that are very beneficial and is proven to combat obesity by lowering a person’s total body fat (Zemel). Yogurt can also be found to have a greater variety of options to the average consumer. Walking down the grocery store aisle, you will probably see dozens of different yogurt options from plain vanilla yogurt to key lime pie yogurt. These different flavors make eating yogurt easier to eat on a daily basis. You can choose from a variety of flavors every day, giving you something different to try every day.

                As you can see yogurt is a great way to get calcium and other nutrients, but the same could be said about drinking a glass of milk with every meal. However, yogurt does have even more benefits that outweigh the benefits of drinking milk. In an article by the International Journal of Dairy Technology, the author discusses how yogurt can be eaten for probiotics and by people who are lactose-intolerant. Yogurt is one of the leading ways that probiotics are available to consumers. Probiotics are living microorganisms that, when introduced to the body, have numerous health effects. Most of the proposed benefits of probiotics are centered on the digestive system; however, some have been linked to helping with some types of cancer.  Another benefit of yogurt is that people who are lactose intolerant are able to eat it without reacting to the lactose. This is because during the fermentation process the lactose is turned into glucose. Therefore yogurt is a great way for people who are lactose-intolerant to get the numerous nutrients that are normally only available in milk and other dairy products that contain lactose (McKinley).

                With all of the numerous health benefits that are available just from eating yogurt every day, it is impressive that it is so easy for people to obtain it on campus. Sometimes the easier choice can be the healthier one. Most people will warn you about gaining the “Freshman 15” and getting into really bad eating habits. However, we seem to be choosing right and getting our full recommended amount of dairy products with yogurt, a tasty nutritious snack for any college student.

Works Cited

McKinley, Michelle C. “The nutrition and health benefits of yoghurt.” International Journal of Dairy Technology. Volume 58, Issue 1, 14 Jan 2005: Society of Dairy Technology. <http://jc3th3db7e.search.serialssolutions.com/?ctx_ver=Z39.88-2004&ctx_enc=info%3Aofi%2Fenc%3AUTF-8&rfr_id=info:sid/summon.serialssolutions.com&rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:journal&rft.genre=article&rft.atitle=The+nutrition+and+bealth+benefits+of+yoghurt&rft.jtitle=International+Journal+of+Dairy+Technology&rft.au=MICHELLE+C+MCKINLEY&rft.date=2005-02-28&rft.issn=1364-727X&rft.volume=58&rft.issue=1&rft.spage=1&rft.externalDBID=NTDT&rft.externalDocID=875786231>

Zemel, M B. “Dairy augmentation of total and central fat loss in obese subjects.” International Journal of Obesity. 29, p. 391-397 11 January 2005: Nature Publishing Group. <http://www.nature.com/ijo/journal/v29/n4/abs/0802880a.html>  

Food Journal Observations

Looking at everybody's food journals I see a lot of interesting things. Because it was the weekend, most people  had different schedules for eating than they would have during the week. Our group seemed to have some opposites. About half ate very healthy things and had more legitimate meals, while the other half mostly snacked and ate unhealthy food. I think it is interesting how during the week most college students follow a schedule that allows them to eat better and within a more structured time. During the weekend, when we have more flexibility with when and what we eat, we can go either healthier and better structured or more unhealthy with most snacks.

Food Journal

Just to preface this lovely and completely healthy food journal, I thought I should just mention that I usually don't eat breakfast, in case you might think that I forgot to put that in there. 

Day 1

10:00 - Chocolate milk bought from Olin for breakfast

12:00 - Chicken pasta soup (only a few bites taken of this, did not taste very good), salad, 1 slice of pepperoni pizza, washed down with a Dr. Pepper. (Nelson)

7:00 - Salad and pepperoni with black olive pizza, Kool-Aid (Nelson)

8:00 - Bag of goldfish and a blue gatorade

11:00 - Movie night! Ate a crunch bar and a bag of barbecue pop chips with a sierra mist while watching Captain America

Day 2

10:00 - A single bite of friend's Poptart

12:00 - Pepperoni and green pepper pizza with burntish curly fries and a Dr. Pepper. (Nelson)

6:00 - Salad and some green beans, there was nothing good at Halls that day (Halls)

Day 3

1:00 - Chocolate milk, 2 sausages, plate of potato cubes, and a slice of raspberry bread (Halls)

3:00 - Snacked on some Pringles

5:00 - Sneaked a Dr. Pepper into the movie theater to watch the Avengers

7:00 - Caesar salad, penne with marinara sauce, and bread from the Corner Bakery down on 16th street

11:00 - Late night Jimmy John's BLT sandwich with avocado

The History of Avocados

As a kid I wasn’t known as much of a picky eater. I was, within certain limits, willing to try almost anything. However, when my parents offered me a bowl of green mush to try I was more than a little hesitant. I carefully dipped my Tostito chip into the dip, making sure to get as little of the repulsive stuff on there as possible. Imagine my surprise when I realized how tasty it was and was almost begging for more. Ever since that moment I have not been able to get enough guacamole, and by extension avocados. Avocados are becoming increasingly more popular in the U.S., with it being used in everything from salads to cosmetics. It is an interesting little fruit that has an interesting back story.

                The oldest known origins of the avocado are from Puebla, Mexico from over 10,000 years ago. Over time the cultivation of avocados spread across South and Central America. Many artifacts have been found that suggest that both the Aztecs and the Incas grew and consumed the fruit. When the Spanish explorers traveled to the Americas in the 1500s and 1600s they too discovered the avocado from the Aztecs. Unable to pronounce the Aztec name for it, the ahuacatl, the Spanish decided to change the pronunciation and called it the “aguacate”. Seeing its nutritional value, the Spanish brought it back to the Eastern part of the world to distribute the wealth (Freir). First, the avocado plants were brought to Indonesia and then later to everywhere from South Africa and Australia to North America and Europe. Once brought to Europe the English translated the Spanish term aguacate to what it is known as today, the avocado. Now, the avocado is grown commercially all across the world (Whiley).

                Avocados grow and mature on trees similar to a banana. The avocado can be left on the tree for several months once it reaches maturity before it needs to be picked. Once the avocado is picked from the tree it begins to ripen. Because of this the avocados are transported commercially at cool temperatures to prevent them from ripening.  Once the avocado is in a room temperature area, it will ripen within two to three days. Many grocery stores use ethylene gas so that they can sell pre-ripened fruit. Ethylene gas is a natural gas that is given off by many different types of produce that help keep the surrounding produce from becoming over-ripe. However, many sellers will use a synthetic ethylene gas to slow the ripening process, rather than counting on it to do so naturally (Smith).

                Today the main center of avocado production is still its place of origin, Mexico, with more than one million metric tons produced in 2005 (Galindo-Tovar). Along with Mexico, different variations of the avocado can be found all over the world because of its distribution back in the 1700s and 1800s. The avocado plant itself can be grown in varying climates, which is how the plant can be grown in so many different locations. Despite the worldwide growth of avocados and the majority grown in neighboring Mexico, the United States sells only American grown avocados fearing the affect that foreign insects and diseases may have on other types of produce.

                In the United States most avocados are grown in either California or Florida. California is the main center of avocado production in the U.S. by being where the two favorite types of avocados, the Hass and the Fuerte, originated. The Fuerte avocado is named such because of how it originated in America. Avocado plants were brought to California in 1911 in the hopes of building up production of avocados in the U.S. However, in one year every tree had been killed by a particularly disastrous frost except for one. The entire Fuerte avocado industry has been built from this lone, surviving tree. The Hass avocado has a similar story. In the 1920s a man named Rudolph Hass, decided to start his own avocado farm, trying to build upon the growing trend of avocado production. He bought seeds from Mexico and combined this plant with the Fuerte variation that had been started in the U.S. 10 years earlier. This seed combination proved to be tricky, with every tree that he planted dying before any avocados had a chance to grow. About to cut down his final attempt, a friend convinced him to let the tree grow and see what happened. After some time the Hass avocado grew, which has grown today to be the most popular avocado in the U.S. Like the Fuerte avocado, all of the Hass avocados that are eaten today descend from that first tree (Freir).

                Avocados have become important in American food culture today. They are extremely healthy with more potassium than a banana and high levels of varying vitamins. Studies have been done that show that avocados can lower harmful and raise beneficial blood cholesterol levels. New studies today are also being done to see if avocados may contain certain chemicals that help prevent cancer (Ding). With all of the great benefits of eating an avocado, it makes it a very important ingredient in our food culture. Seeing how the majority of avocado production in the U.S. is naturally done, has caused me to look at it in a different light. No longer do I see a fruit that can be turned into a particularly tasty green, mushy dip, but something that can be used to better the way that we eat.

Works Cited

Ding, Haiming “Chemopreventive characteristics of avocado fruit.” Seminars in Cancer Biology. Volume 17, Issue 5, October 2007. P. 386–394. 2007: Elsevier Ltd. <http://0-www.sciencedirect.com.bianca.penlib.du.edu/science/article/pii/S1044579X07000272>

Freir, Pam. “Avocado’s history filled with lust, luck: Fruit got its name from Spanish explorers.” Calgary Herald. 12 Nov. 2006: Calgary, Alta. <http://0-proquest.umi.com.bianca.penlib.du.edu/pqdlink?did=1161572321&Fmt=3&clientId=48347&RQT=309&VName=PQD>

Galindo-Tovar, Maria Elena. “The Avocado (Persea Americana, Lauraceae) Crop in Mesoamerica: 10,000 Years of History.” Harvard Papers in Botany. p. 325-334. 12 Dec 2007: Harvard University Herbaria  <http://0-dx.doi.org.bianca.penlib.du.edu/10.3100/1043-4534(2007)12[325:TAPALC]2.0.CO;2>

Smith, Andrew W.J., Poulston, Stephen. “A New Palldium-Based Ethylene Scavenger to Control Ethylene-Induced Ripening of Climacteric Fruit.” Platinum Metals Review, Volume 53, Number 3, July 2009, p. 112-122. Johnson Matthey <http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/matthey/pmr/2009/00000053/00000003/art00001>

Whiley, A. W. Schaffer, B. B. Wolstenhome, B. N. “Avocado: Botany, Production and Uses.” 2002: CABI Publishing Wallingford, Oxon, GBR p. 1-15.

Food production in the U.S. articles

Reading all of three of these articles has given me a new perspective on food production in the United States. I think that the one main thing that all of these articles touch on is how separated food production has become in America. Animals used to be killed and then eaten by the same person that killed the animal. They were raised on farms where they were respected and treated humanely. However, nowadays most people will never see the animals that they are going to eat. These animals are shoved into small confined spaces that may never see the light of day. I think that this was one of the most important things that these articles touched on because it is one of the main reasons that food production is so out of the general public’s control. There is no transparency to what is involved in raising and slaughtering animals. Pollan’s essay, “An Animals Place” focused on this fact more than either of the other articles. He poses the notion that perhaps if the general public could see more of how food is produced than they would be far less likely to eat meat from animals that are raised in common slaughterhouses. This idea really got me thinking because looking back at all of the meat that I have eaten, I have no idea where any of it came from. It’s strange that in a society so bent on eating healthily, most people still do not care about how their main ingredient was raised.

                Along with this lack of transparency within food production, these articles focused on how the workers at these farms suffer the most. The “Tomatoland” article showed how many workers on tomato farms work under such poor conditions that the only people that are still willing to do the job are illegal immigrants. Many of these farms enforcing slavery so that their quotas can be met. I found this article extremely interesting because it was a topic that I had done some research on in high school. I learned a lot about how the farms that grow crops can very easily force people into working on their farms. Reading these articles was very enlightening and is causing me to reevaluate some of my own meal choices. 

Pollan Article Response

In his article “America’s Eating Disorder” Pollan discusses the problem behind American eating. He notes the paradox of other cultures eating foods that are much higher in fat and calories having a healthier average weight. He says that this is mainly due to the fact that Americans worry much more about food. Being the great Melting Pot of the world, we have standard meals from almost every culture, but not our own history of food. Because of this we have no stable eating pattern passed down like other countries do. With the increase in available choices, we have forgotten how to choose foods for taste and health. Pollan notes that “we've learned to choose our foods by the numbers (calories, carbs, fats, R.D.A.'s, price, whatever), relying more heavily on our reading and computational skills than upon our senses” (Pollan 4). Food is chosen based on the nutrition facts that are supplied by the companies that make the products themselves. Americans have become so worried about eating the proper amount of different nutrients that we have lost the ability to choose food instinctually. We eat what we are told is the proper amount to eat. With this great concern for what we are eating, Americans end up eating the wrong amounts of the wrong food. We assume that because we ran two miles we can trade this for having a lot of snacks for the rest of the day. This is an interesting observation compared to the French culture of eating. Because they have a stable eating schedule and do not worry about what they eat, they ultimately end up eating healthier than the average American.

                This is a very interesting analysis of how Americans eat. In my own paper I focused about how Americans do not choose the healthiness of a food product enough. However, in this paper it shows how focusing too much on the health can become a problem. We forget to trust our own instincts on what to eat, and focus way too much on what our culture is telling us to eat. Looking over these observations it’s causing me to reevaluate my own food choices and the way that I view food.