Sunday, July 7, 2013

Wednesday, June 12, 2013

WholeFruit vs FruitRollUp (click on image to enlarge)

Many of the snacks that kids eat are really just desserts and should be treated as such.  I noticed during my time student teaching that many of kids would eat these unhealthy, processed, snacks at the expense of real fruits.  The high amount of added sugar that foods like Fruit Roll-Ups contain is contributing to the high rates of overweight/obesity in our youth.  

Read more about the importance of choosing real fruits and vegetables at ...

Monday, May 27, 2013

Pay Attention (click on image to enlarge)

Most restaurants now list the calories - and other nutrition facts - on their menus or on their website.  This is useful for consumers, but only if we put this information to use.  If I am at Panera/St. Louis Bread Company, I will either split this cookie with someone, or take 1/2 home.  Even 1/2 of this cookie has plenty of calories, so ideally this would be your dessert for the day.  I also used to eat the pumpkin muffin at Panera until I saw on their nutrition link that they contain 590 calories and 53 grams of added sugar (we should have no more than 40 grams of added sugar for the entire day).  The pumpkin "muffie" is a better choice at 290 calories and 26 grams of added sugar, but again this would hopefully be my dessert for the day.  For those trying to lose weight, cutting the muffie in half might be a better strategy.

Read about how to use visual cues for portion control at ...



Wednesday, March 6, 2013

Sugar and Fatty Liver (click on image to enlarge)

Your liver can be damaged by something other than drinking too much alcohol - too much sugar!  While 40 grams of added sugar per day is a good limit for most people, the average American eats about 92 grams of sugar per day!  Watch as Dr. Alan Greene, Dr. Miriam Vos, and Dr. Oz discuss how too much sugar affects your liver in this video (to the right of Dr. Oz's picture in the link below).