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A Country without a Food

January 26, 2009

I think I neglected to mention that I finally got my hands on a copy of Michael Pollan’s Omnivore’s Dilemma. Although I am now half way through it, I was only a few pages into the intro when I knew I would love it. This was all due to the comment below:

As a relatively new nation drawn from many different immigrant populations,
each with its own food, Americans have never had a single, strong, stable
culinary tradition to guide us.

The moment I read it I wanted to exclaim, “Yes, that is exactly what I had been thinking!”

If you are from the US (or even if you aren’t) have you ever thought about this issue? It is one of those things that really came to the forefront for me when I moved abroad. The US doesn’t have a traditional claim-to-fame food. We try to say foods such as hamburgers and fries or apple pie, but the truth is most of those things can be traced back to European countries.

There are some things here and there, but none of them really stand out and say US. You know, like Brazil and feijoada, Ireland and shepherd’s pie, Germany and sausages, France and bouillabaisse, Japan and sushi. The list could go on and on, and the truth is many of these countries have multiple dishes that hold some portion of their identity.

The main reason this issue comes to mind as a traveler and ex-pat is that many of us go to other countries to experience the food. Then we have conversations with those of that country about coming to the US. If you’ve ever had a discussion like this you know where the food conversation goes.

Yep, you guessed it – fast food.

Around here, people go on and on about all the fast food places we have in the US. This always makes me cringe. It is downright embarrassing. Is this really what we are known for in the world of food? Unfortunately, to many people, yes.

I live in a smaller city in Brazil and every year they have a world food fair. At this event there are booths that serve foods typical to other parts of Brazil and other countries of the world. Want to know what they have in the US booth?

Hotdogs.

And people are lined up for these every night. It is a foot long hot dog bar. You get to choose the toppings of your choice.

At first sight of this I was pretty disgusted. I mean, I love a good hot dog at a cookout or better yet a Chicago style dog, but, once more I ask, is this really what we are known for?

Then again, when I tried to think of a substitute nothing came to mind. It was when I read that statement by Michael Pollan that I realized that we really don’t have a food.

That isn’t too say we don’t have great food. Our melting pot is brimming over with delicious eats, but when you get to the core of things nothing stands out as ours.

As the book somewhat suggestions this is what might lead to our unrealistic accusations that come out about once every few years identifying a certain food as an enemy – white rice, pasta, potatoes. I can only imagine what other cultures think of our damning these real foods they see as staples. Not to mention the fact that we feel these foods are killing us and the countries who regularly consume them seem to be happy and healthy without problem.

So what do you think of this issue? Is there a food out there I am missing?

Does our lack of a food of our own make us who we are as a melting pot or is it hurting our ideals regarding healthy eating?

Photo by Nicolas Raymond, http://www.morguefile.com/

Another Diet

January 9, 2009

Periodically I contribute articles to the web-site Livestrong.com. I hadn’t done any for a while, since the launch of the site last summer, but this week I got an assignment for some articles. All of them were focused on the new book by Jillian Michaels – Making the Cut.

I enjoy reading books focused on health and sometimes I read diet-plan books just to pull out the good points. I’m not a fan of diets. Is anyone anymore? We have good reason. They are short term and they don’t work.

I had high hopes for this book. I really had no idea what it was before I got the assignment, but given the fact that I am a huge fan of The Biggest Loser I felt like I knew Jillian’s fitness philosophy well.

Turns out this book is a 30-day plan to lose 10 to 20 pounds before a big event. A big event?! Seriously, it states that right on the cover. I can’t believe fitness experts are still promoting this kind of behavior with all we know about successful weight loss and health improvement.

Man, was I disappointed. I guess I feel like you are either one way or the other when it comes to health. Either you believe it is truly about lifestyle change and you swear off quick fixes and fads, or you believe in diets, and well, regaining weight.

Maybe I’m being too critical, but when you come out with a book like this you are just adding to the belief that people have of weight loss being a quick fix problem.

On a positive note, I will say that book is focused on healthy choices. It isn’t about cutting out a food group, well, unless you consider alcohol a food group. (I kinda do.) It is focused on balanced, healthy foods and intense workouts. There is also a lot of mental and lifestyle focus, but with the book being a 30 day plan it doesn’t promote the long term.

I’m not sure if this is what the people were wanting, what the publishers were wanting or what Jillian Michael’s truly believes in, but it definitely left me questioning her priorities. Health, and even weight loss, isn’t a goal you shoot for in 30 days it is a way of living.

Have you read the book? What do you think?

Portion Problems

January 5, 2009

Things are slowly returning to normal for me and I’m glad to be blogging again. I’ve missed you all!! I’m not back in Brazil yet. I still have about a week left to spend in the US.

Of course, it is that time of year when everyone seems to get a little more focused on health and I’ve had a topic on my mind that really presented itself during our travels the last few weeks – portion sizes.

You probably know all there is to know about portion sizes and how the US in terms of restaurants and unhealthy eating has a really skewed view of what is appropriate.

If you do any traveling outside of the US, this is when the whole portion size issue really becomes quite baffling. I don’t think all countries have a good grasp on proper portions. For example, I think Brazil is almost as bad as the US when eating out. However, the majority of other places in this world serve a lot less food than we do.

A big reason why this came to mind is because of our trip to Jamaica. We stay at Sandals Resorts when we are there. Despite the fact that many people think all-inclusive resorts are all buffets, we know this isn’t true and I can’t wait to show you some of the amazing food we had in my post tomorrow.

When I read travel reviews about these resorts I almost always find a large majority of people complaining that the portions were too small at the resort. We even witnessed a couple ordering two entrees each.

I guess people don’t understand the idea that there are supposed to be 4 to 5 course meals and you are supposed to order all courses. This means each item is small. Personally, I love this because you get to try a lot of different things. We are beyond stuffed after all the courses which makes the small-portion complaint unbelievable to me.

It reminds me how our ideas of an appropriate amount of food to sustain our bodies are so amazingly far off.

When we came back and then arrived in Vegas we were greeted with the massive amounts of food USAmericans have become accustomed to. Below is a picture of my LUNCH-sized Asian salad from Grand Luxe Café in the Palazzo. Look at that thing! It is huge! It was awesome for sure, but it should have been about ½ the size.

Now here is a picture of my lunch salad in Jamaica. A much better size. It was amazing by the way. It had curry chicken, toasted coconut and mango chutney on top.

It can be quite interesting if you get into a conversation of who’s at fault for this distorted portion problem. Consumers blame restaurants and companies. Restaurants blame the fact that the customer demands it so they give them what they want. My perception is we are all at fault.

If you have ever struggled with weight loss I am sure you know that our stomach can be trained regarding how much food you need to be full. No, at the moment, I don’t have the scientific evidence to support it, but from personal experience I know my stomach will expand and shrink over time.

If we train ourselves to stop when we are full and to eat less food our body and stomach will eventually be satisfied with less. I go through this each year around the holidays. I go into them needing only small portions to fill me up. Then, after several weeks of eating too much, I find I can eat more and more before feeling too full. The beginning of the new year is spent getting things back to normal.

I guess my question is, how in the world are we going to solve this problem? I don’t see restaurants giving smaller portions anytime soon and I don’t see people without health at the front of the priorities to eat less. Sure, you can order a ½ salad at places or take ½ home, but not everyone is going to do this. Basically the people who need to do this for their health are not doing it. How are we going to retrain ourselves as a society to eat normally again? Will we?

Things just seem so far out of control that this issue truly worries me. Not only is it a problem for our health, but also our environment. We use a lot of resources for these mega portions.

What is your opinion on the issue?

A Nighttime Treat

December 11, 2008

I enjoy reading diet and food related books. While I tend to dislike most uses of the word “diet”, over the years I’ve developed my own health philosophy by taking bits and pieces from the different things I read. I rarely agree with everything in a single book, but there is usually something even in the most farfetched that I can gain from.

A few years ago I read The Good Mood Diet by Dr. Susan Kleiner, a sports nutritionist, modern dancer who used her knowledge to examine the links between food, mood and weight loss.

I am a big believer that the foods we eat directly affect our mood and mental wellbeing so I found many parts of the book interesting.

There was one particular practice she spoke of in the book that stuck with me. I have incorporated it into most of my days – nightly hot chocolate.

In the book Dr. Kleiner recommends a nightly cup of homemade hot chocolate for a few reasons.

– The whey protein in milk contains tryptophan which raises serotonin levels and can help relax you.

– The cocoa is a treat and has natural phytochemicals.

– Drinking the hot chocolate creates a bedtime ritual.

The book recommends non-dutched cocoa powder and sweetener. You know how I feel about artificial sweeteners so I simply use sugar. I’m sure any other natural sweetener would work too.

I take the easy route and put about 2 T of cocoa in a mug with about ½ t sugar. I add a little milk and mix it well, creating a paste. A milk frother works great for this. I have the Aerolatte Milk Frother and it is one of my most used kitchen gadgets.

I then heat up the rest of my milk, about 1 cup in the microwave. I add it to my mug and mix well.

This is an especially great treat during the winter when I tend to drink it more. It really does have a calming effect and I am glad to know what ingredients are in it as opposed to when using a packaged mix.

Have you picked up any good habits from the health/nutrition books you’ve come across?

Photo by Chance Agrella, www.freerangestock.com

Water Intake Is Not a Myth to Me

November 10, 2008

If you’ve kept up with current health news over the past year you’ve probably come across all the hype about the need for 8 – 8oz glasses of water a day being a myth.

I talked a little about this when I commented on the popularity of tap water in Ireland during my travels this summer. However, I have some new readers so I thought I’d introduce the topic again and get your thoughts.

There was a review of studies that came out mid-year saying most of the things we believe that water does for us aren’t scientifically supported. I am an 8 – 8oz glasses a day girl and I routinely come back to thoughts of these claims when I see them mentioned in magazines and on web-sites.

The truth is most people working in the nutrition field were well aware that the original recommendation was simply 8 glasses of fluid a day, not specifically water. As we began to see that the most popular drinks were sugar-laden fruit juices and soda, the recommendation moved to water because it is a healthier choice.

I think many of us reach the point in areas of health where personal experience overrides some of the research we come across. This is one of those areas for me. I know the placebo effect is alive and well, and some things can be all in our heads, but I am a firm believer in water being a healthy and beneficial drink.

The reasons I drink water don’t have anything to do with many of the things the research points out as being false. I mean, I had kidney function on the back of my mind, but it wasn’t my main motivator.

Drinking water makes me feel good. It gives me energy, clears up my skin, makes me feel less bloated and helps prevent headaches. When I don’t have enough, for example when I am traveling or out all day running errands without a bottle near me, I can definitely tell. I get dehydrated quickly and it greatly affects my energy levels.

So I say listen to how water makes you feel before you listen to the media’s twist on some research.

Is drinking water an important part of your health routine? How do you feel about all these claims of 8 x 8 being a myth?

By the way, I was able to find the editorial article on this in the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology. Yay!!

Photo by David Ellis, morguefile.com

Savory Squash and Healthy Supermarkets

November 6, 2008

I’ve really gotten into the pumpkin craze and have been amazed at all the recipes floating around. I still tend to lean towards sweet with my pumpkin and butternut squashes so I continue to look for more savory recipes.

I found this one for butternut squash, but I didn’t have it on hand at the moment. I decided to try it with pumpkin instead since I had some already roasted and waiting to be used.

I loved the combo although I think next time I will caramelize the onions before throwing them in. They needed to be more soft and tender.

Savory Pumpkin Side
Modified from Amazing Butternut Squash

2 cups roasted pumpkin puree
½ cup mayonnaise
½ cup onion, finely chopped
1 egg
1 tsp brown sugar
Salt and pepper to taste
¼ c crushed crackers, cereal or bread crumbs
2 tbsp grated Parmesan
1 tbsp butter, melted

Mix first 6 ingredients in a bowl until combined well. Transfer to a baking dish. Mix butter, Parmesan and crumbs and sprinkle on top of pumpkin mix. Bake uncovered at 350 degrees F for about 35 minutes or until bubbly.

Did your favorite grocery store make the top 10? I got this article from Health Magazine yesterday. Top 10 include:

Whole Foods
Safeway
Harris Teeter
Trader Joe’s
Hannaford
Albertsons
Food Lion
Publix
Pathmark
SuperTarget

If you are located near a Trader Joe’s let me say I am so jealous and I hope you have counted your blessings. I love that store and have only been able to go when I travel. I keep telling my husband we should base our next move on their locations!

We had a SuperTarget near us when I was in undergrad and I loved that too. I was always able to find unique and fun things there. I was also able to visit a Harris Teeter while traveling in Alexandria, VA and really liked it.

What’s your favorite?

Açaí: The Real Thing

October 10, 2008

I had something incredibly interesting last night that I just have to share with my fellow health advocates so today I’m going to back to my ‘foods of Brazil’ theme.

You’ve probably heard about açaí a million times by now. I saw infomercials for it in the States last June and I think I get a spam email about Oprah and açaí in my junk mail box at least three times a week.

People go crazy over this little berry from the Amazon with its antioxidants, essential fatty acids (similar to that of olive oil) and its essential amino acid complex. It is a major powerhouse when it comes to healthy food.

Despite the fact that I am pretty far south in Brazil, it is quite the craze here as well. I’ve had the opportunity to try it in 100% juice form and mixed with other fruits. My favorite is açaí and grape juice.

Last night I got to try it in a way I never had before. It is becoming increasingly popular to eat açaí in a tigela. This is simply açaí in a bowl. They just opened a restaurant here that specializes in these treats along with juices and many fruits from the north of Brazil.

I’ve tried to figure out a way to describe eating açaí like this. The consistency is like a thick milk shake. In my selection a huge bowl of fruit – grapes, strawberries, bananas, kiwi, mango, apple, star fruit and chunks of coconut – were covered in the açaí and topped with granola.

It has to be one of the most interesting things I have ever tried. I wish I could find another word for ‘interesting,’ but I’m not sure how else to describe it. It was complex, yet simply amazing. I loved it!

There is so much açaí in it that the pigment turns your mouth practically black. Is it possible to overdose on natural antioxidants? If so, I think I probably came pretty close to the limit.

My Portuguese is awful, but the friend I was with inquired about how the açaí mixture was made. It turns out the pulp of the berries is mixed with organic sugar and guarana syrup.

In case you aren’t familiar guarana is another berry from the Amazon that contains about five times as much caffeine as coffee! There is actually a soft drink named for it that is popular here.

Considering I had my tigela at 5:00pm I didn’t sleep so well last night. I’m thinking it should really be a breakfast food.

Oh, the juice next to my bowl in the picture is cashew juice. I honestly had no idea that the cashew nut actually came from a fruit until I visited Brazil. Maybe I’ll cover that in my next ‘foods from Brazil’ post.

Mock Foods

October 1, 2008

I just love it when you are trying to come up with a post topic and one just falls into your lap. My good friend just sent me an article on fake foods. Thanks Karen!!

The wacky world of fake food published on chicagotribune.com today.

This article is entertaining and full of information. It provides an interesting look at our food history from trying to make one food look like another to all those manufactured substitutes that have snuck into our daily routine such as sugar replacers.

Some of these things are actual food made to be other foods while others are those fake products a lot of us are trying to reduce in our diets.

One interesting thing it brought up is that some foods such as peanut butter have requirements regarding the percentage of an ingredient (peanuts) that must go into the product. Other things, can contain little of the product it is actually named for.

The example mentioned involves a lawsuit filed against Kraft and their Guacamole. Apparently it is less than 2% avocado.

It even gives some reasons why fake food has become so popular.

Here are a few:
impress
deceive
fun
religious reasons
nutritional reasons

Some of the things mentioned I have never heard of. Read the article to find out more, but here are some that either brought back memories or gave me a good laugh.

Ritz Mock Apple Pie
City chicken
Turkey Bacon
Cheese-food
Mock Lobster made of soybeans????

Hope you enjoy the article as much as I did!

Photo by Hillary, www.morguefile.com

Both Ends of the Spectrum

September 26, 2008

It seems that at any given time what one part of the population is fighting for, another part is fighting against.

Take food labels and nutritional information for example. For a long time those of us who are concerned about the health of our nation and our families have supported the fact that this information be made public so we can all make informed decisions. This is especially true for those not-so-healthy places that like to hide their nutrition info a bit.

Well this article originally posted in the Harvard Crimson tells the other side of the story.

By the way, how cool would it to be to write for a college newspaper and have CNN pick it up. Well, then again, she goes to Harvard so maybe it isn’t such a big deal. She’s probably already used to a lot of success and exposure!

The article talks about how parents have requested that nutrition information for dining hall foods be taken down from the hallways and dining rooms.

The reason? It contributes to the struggle of those with eating disorders.

I like to know what is in my food, but I have thought about this issue a lot. First, I think it is great that the school made the effort to supply the info. However, now I can definitely see how this is a concern for people who struggle with eating disorders especially in an atmosphere where the rates of such conditions are so high.

Those disorders aside, sometimes I think they can even have an influence on those of us who try to be healthy in general. It is so easy to become obsessed with food whether it is in a manner where you eat a lot of unhealthy stuff or if you are to the point where you are overly concerned with the nutritional benefit.

I consider thinking about food all the time to be a bit unhealthy. Enjoy food, yes, but constantly thinking about its benefit, burning the calories off, what will hurt and won’t hurt me can be considered a somewhat unhealthy relationship.

Well, and let’s be honest. Sometimes you just want to indulge a bit. In those cases, when it comes to nutrition information, I don’t wanna know!

So how do you feel about posting nutrition information and its influence on our relationships with food?

Could It Be?

September 16, 2008

I will admit I am a huge Starbucks fan. Unlike some others I know, for me this does not translate to frequent visits. It is much too difficult for me to part with $5.

I kind of like it this way though because it has remained a real treat for me. Back home I went about 3 times a month. It would be my meeting place with friends to catch up or something to cheer me up when I was having a really bad day.

By the way, have you ever been to a Starbucks in Seattle. I’ve never heard such complex orders in my life. I actually felt a little stupid when I just ordered a non-fat latte. I felt like I should be more creative or something.

Okay, back to the point.

Well, surely you’ve noticed how desperately hard they are trying to appeal to the health conscious. Considering the fact that they have always had a skinny latte, yet now they feel the need to market it.

I’ve never really had a hard time choosing a healthy beverage there. Their pastries are a different story.

I rarely get one, but when I do it has to be a scone. Unbelievable! Luckily I have as much of a conscious about consuming 500 calories in 3 bites as I do parting with $5.

When I saw all their ads for healthy foods I thought – Here we go. Lets load ‘em up with sugar and fat replacers and call ‘em healthy.

But I got a friendly marketing email from them last night.

Could it be that they’ve actually created a truly health option? Part of the email stated,

“Together they are made from a range of great ingredients, including whole grains, fruit, nuts and seeds. None contain artificial sweeteners or high fructose corn syrup.”

Now, I haven’t seen the whole ingredient list, but this is enough to make me look into it. Here are the products if you haven’t seen them yet.

Now, I can’t say this will make me start buying breakfast there. It is really just a specialty coffee place for me. I still need to see the calorie content, but I am glad to see the bit about the sweeteners.

They may provide a better option for those frequent visitors. Well, that is as long as they don’t pair it up with a venti, whole milk, white chocolate mocha every day.

Photo by blitzkrieg, www.morguefile.com