Got Vitamin D in Your Milk? Got Fat?

You may have a negative association with fat - when there is extra on your body you might not be happy so you may attempt to avoid it when you hear the term associated with your food. And it is definitely a healthy choice to avoid meat that has a lot of fat, foods that are deep fried with fat soaking into every crevice, and other foods that slide down nice and easy because they're coated in the stuff (ie: pizza, nachos, anything else smothered in cheese).

If you have some basic vitamin knowledge, you probably also know that we need some dietary fat in order for our bodies to absorb the fat soluble vitamins which you can remember using the image of a deck of cards: ADEK. Other vitamins are water soluble so our body doesn't have a very hard time absorbing them and also any excess that we have in our body comes out in our urine, just as excess water does that is not needed by the body. But back to our friends ADEK.

I learned early on that these vitamins need fat in order to be absorbed. That's all well and good. Many foods containing these vitamins are naturally often served with fats (A and K found in veggies might either be sauteed in oil or served with a dressing for example). But it took a rotation during my dietetic internship for a lesson to really sink in about vitamin D.

A little bit of quick back story: I grew up in Wisconsin, drinking milk with meals. Because my parents were health conscious, the milk that I grew up drinking was skim milk. It has calcium, protein, and 0% fat - healthy, right? Well, mostly right.

Vitamin D, the sunshine vitamin, can be hard to find in natural dietary sources. Those places you can find it, like some types of fatty fish or beef liver, also have a lot of fat. But one of the main sources of vitamin D for many people, especially in the winter, is in milk where it has been added. It makes sense to add vitamin D to milk because it helps with calcium absorption. And if you drink a delicious, refreshing glass of skim milk, which has 0% fat, or your pour some skim milk into your fat free cereal, or you get a latte made with skim milk, you're not able to absorb any of that good vitamin D that has been added to your milk for your health benefit!

This is why just about any dietitian that you talk to will likely recommend that you switch from skim to 1% milk unless you have a weight issue. If you often drink your milk with meals that contain fat, you can also stick with the skim stuff. But if you tend to consume your milk either on it's own or with a meal or snack that doesn't contain fat, the bottom line is: switch it up and treat yourself to 1% milk. After all those years of drinking skim, trust me, it'll taste decadent!

Clever companies use the science behind fat-soluble vitamins as a marketing tool. This salad dressing's label reads: "Naturally helps better absorb vitamins A&E from salad with the oils in [the dressing]"

Go Nuts!

I'm a huge fan on snacking on raw almonds. They've got protein, calcium, monounsaturated fat (the good kind), potassium, vitamin E... the list goes on. So this morning I was excited to read in the Tufts Health Letter that new research by the USDA Agricultural Research Service shows that almonds actually have 24% fewer calories than originally thought! The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition published the article, which shows that for some foods like nuts, the original way of figuring out how many calories a food contains could be inaccurate. They got real nitty gritty to measure this, by analyzing "output" shall we say, from people participating in the study. Here's an article that summarizes the study. Keep in mind that this new information only applies to whole, raw almonds, not chopped or roasted or those covered in wasabi, honey, or chocolate!

Decoding DRIs

In the world of nutrition it can be hard to remember how much of what you need to be eating on a daily basis. Add to that confusing abbreviations and the whole absorption issue and many are left scratching their heads. If you’re one of those people, you’re not alone. It can even be hard for those of us in (or soon to be in) the profession of nutrition to keep track of it all!

Here’s a quick guide to some abbreviations you may see for suggested intakes of nutrients, vitamins, and minerals:

DRI – Dietary Reference Intake. This is based on gender and age group for people living in North America. The following abbreviations all fall under the category of DRIs.

EAR – Estimated Average Requirement. By figuring out the EAR for a nutrient, half of the population will be getting enough of it and half won’t be getting enough. That’s why this is rarely used as a recommendation and is instead used to figure out the RDA.

RDA – Recommended Dietary Allowance. This is the EAR plus 2 standard deviations, which makes it so that 98% of people will be getting enough of the nutrient.

AI – Adequate Intake. This is used as a measure for nutrients when there is no known EAR and is based on known amounts that people can handle of a specific nutrient.

UL – Upper Tolerable Limit. Most people will have adverse affects when consuming a nutrient above this amount. There is an UL set for some vitamins (for example) when a large amount could cause toxicity, but many others have no UL because excess amounts will have no effect.

So let's look at calcium. The recommendation for adults is 1,000 mg/day. That means that your body needs 1,000 mg of calcium each day in order to do important things like rebuild bone which helps prevent osteoporosis. Right? Wrong. The recommendation takes into account a little thing called absorption. Your body does not treat all nutrients equally; some are absorbed better than others. Your body actually only needs 300 mg of calcium each day. But the rate of calcium absorption is around 30% (this is called the bioavailability) so the recommendation accounts for that, saving us all from doing lots and lots of math each time we plan a meal! And what happens to the other 700 mg of calcium that you're consuming each day? In one end, out the other...

How Your Brain Affects What You Eat

I recently attended a nutrition symposium presented by the Harvard Medical School called "Your Brain Can Help You Eat Better." The sessions were all extremely interesting and each warrant their own post, but in the meantime I wanted to give a brief summary of a few things that I got out of some of the talks that I was able to attend. Hopefully they'll give you something to think about next time you reach for that large bowl or consider whether or not you really have time to exercise...

Primary Obesity: Automatic Effects of Food Marketing presented by Jennifer Harris, PhD, MBA

Take away: During studies done at Yale's Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity they discovered that when food advertisements were shown to kids during a TV show, the kids ate 45% more. Adults shown snack ads also ate more. Seeing food ads caused people not just to eat more during the show that they were watching, but after as well. Pre-schoolers were given the exact same food; one from a package with a cartoon character and one in a plain package. They thought that the one coming from the package with the character tasted better.

Thought for Food: How Imagined Consumption Reduces Actual Consumption presented by Carey Morewedge, PhD

Take away: Imagined consumption reduces actual consumption. People who imagined consuming 30 M+Ms (one by one) then ate fewer M+Ms than those who imagined eating either three or none at all. Thinking about something like a spider can cause the same affect in your body as actual seeing it in person; the same is true with food, if you think about the look, taste, and smell it can have a similar affect (in your brain) as eating it, so you'll then actually consume less.

Effects of Exercise on Brain and Cognitive Function presented by Kirk Erickson, PhD

Take away: Exercise, even modest amounts, and even if you don't start until later in life, can:

• increase brain volume (even after just 6 months!)
• improve cognitive function
• increase functional connectivity
• increase brain perfusion
• improve task-evoked brain function

The more fit the person, the greater the volume of the hippocampus. However, the exercise must be aerobic (vs stretching/toning). There is not yet a good understanding of why the brain is getting bigger.

A Limited Resource Model of Self-Control: Implications for Eating Better presented by Kathleen D. Vohs, PhD

Take away: The more you use self-control in one situation, the less self-control you have left in the next situation. For example, if you're told to suppress emotion when watching a sad movie, then you are given food, you'll eat more than if you weren't told to suppress emotion (this is if you're actively dieting).

Combating the Sugar, Salt and Fat Addiction presented by David Kessler, MD

Take away: You can probably read this for yourself in his book The End of Overeating: Taking Control of the Insatiable American Appetite. He looked at why we're so overweight now vs in the past. One reason is that the barriers are gone: food is available 24/7 and on every corner. People in the past would never have eaten walking down the street, in their cars, in class, etc. Another point is that processed food, which has lots of salt, sugar, and fat, is self-stimulating and addicting. There's a lot more than that and it's all very interesting so definitely check out his book.

Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More Than We Think presented by Brain C. Wansink, PhD

Take away: This was probably one of my favorite presentations. I had learned about a lot of his studies in my nutrition classes already. You should also check out his book, Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More Than We Think. Based on studies that he has performed, you should:

• Eat out of a smaller bowl (you'll eat more out of a bigger bowl even if you don't like what you're eating)
• Put the healthy options at eye-level in your cupboard (you're more likely to eat what you see first)
• Only eat in your kitchen or dining room (in one case study even just putting a fruit or vegetable on the table, not necessarily eating it, caused a couple to lose weight)
• Think about the layout/design of the places you eat most and how that might affect the choices that you make (see his article in the Washington Post about getting kids to eat better in a school cafeteria without them knowing it)
• Not necessarily trust your stomach to tell you that you're full (in a study with refillable soup bowls participants said that they were not full because they thought that they had only eaten a half of a bowl of soup).

So, as you can see, there is a lot to think about when it comes to how your brain affects what (and how much) you eat! If you're interested in watching the webcast of these talks, they'll be posted soon here.

Would You Rather...

There was a multisport expo this past weekend in Boston. It's the third year that I've gone and I always come away from it feeling very inspired; to train more, sign up for races, eat healthier. This time was no exception!

On Saturday morning I went to a seminar put on by a local triathlon coach and he talked about questions that he is asked the most frequently. Of course a lot of people ask about the best food to eat before, during, and after a race because we all know how important nutrition is to performance. He had a great way of phrasing the importance of the post-workout meal. He said: "Think about it, would you rather rebuild your muscles with a twinkie or with salmon?" When you consider the 'you are what you eat' aspect of life, it should help inspire you to put healthier things in your body. Food is constantly rebuilding in your body, so make smart choices about what those building blocks are made out of.

You've Got Questions? I Might Have Answers!

Since I've started to tell people that I'm going back to school to study nutrition I've gotten some questions from friends and family members regarding what they should be eating to be healthier, lose weight, have more energy, etc. I'm still in the very early stages of my education, but I'm always happy to take a stab at questions and will gladly post them here if I can come up with an answer. Feel free to ask questions in the comments section or send me an e-mail - if I end up posting your question you can remain anonymous if you'd like. Here is one recent question...

Question:
I've had the impression recently that people are getting/staying beyond their ideal weight because of eating too many carbohydrates, which convert to fat when they are not burned.  And eating too little fat (everything has to be "nonfat"), so they are not getting that full/satisfied feeling...that maybe eating some fat provides.  If they then are still hungry again/always, they will keep eating more and more carbs, and not losing weight.  I think this may be part of my experience.
- 61-year old male, very physically active

Answer:
As a runner I don't think that you should be too concerned with eating too many carbs because they're so necessary for working out. There should definitely be some fat in a healthy diet, but with the emphasis on healthy fats like those that come from avocados, nuts, and fish (rather than those that come from beef, whole milk, or butter for example). I think that if someone is hungry they should make sure that they're getting enough whole grains, lean protein, and fiber in their diet.

Because carbs are present in so many food groups (veggies, fruits, grains, dairy) it's hard to say that people are beyond their ideal weight because of them. Too many grains, potentially, especially if they're eating refined grains rather than whole grains. Did you know that half of your 6 servings of grains per day should be whole grains? Oh, also this might be helpful for you to know: per day your nutrient breakdown should look something like this

Carbohydrates: 45-65%
Protein: 10-35%
Fat: 20-35%

Besides water those are the essential macronutrients that you get from food. It might be helpful for you to go to mypyramid.gov and type in all of your info to see how much of each food group they recommend that you get per day, especially since that is not broken down by carbs, protein, fat, but rather by grain, dairy, veggie, etc with recommendations for the best types of those things that you should be getting. For a healthy diet make sure what you're eating is balanced with lots of different nutrients, you're getting the right number of calories, there is moderation, and there is variety.

Nutrient Density - Science for Your Stomach!

Those of you keeping an eye on my career change from editor to nutritionist will be happy to hear that I'm really enjoying my first nutrition class (especially after an entire semester of just science and math courses!). I'm starting to think that a class like this should be required of everyone, maybe before graduating from high school and being released into the real world where you have to cook your own meals (or choose your own food in a dining hall).

Anyway, like I said, I'm excited about learning all of this great stuff and figuring out if I know as much as I thought I did. I came across this bit in my text book the other day and it makes so much sense that I want to share it:

"To eat well without overeating, select nutrient-dense foods - that is, foods that deliver the most nutrients for the least food energy... Just as a financially responsible person pays for rent, food, clothes, and tuition on a limited budget, healthy people obtain iron, calcium, and all the other essential nutrients on a limited energy (calorie) allowance. Success depends on getting many nutrients for each calorie "dollar." For example, a can of cola and a handful of grapes may both provide about the same number of calories, but the grapes deliver many more nutrients." -Understanding Nutrition, 12th Edition by Whitney and Rolfes

When I read this I couldn't help but think of those 100-calorie snack packs. I've always had an issue with them and this is basically why: sure there is 100 calories worth of food in each tiny bag. But you can extract 100 calories from just about anything and put it into a bag; that doesn't make it healthy. I don't suggest that people who use these as a substitute for junk food go back to the full size. They do serve a purpose in that way, just not a nutritional one.

If you're counting calories to try to lose weight, keep in mind what those calories are providing you - if the answer is either "nothing" or "oils and fats and refined white flour" maybe you want to reconsider your plan. Sure, you might shed some pounds by cutting calories dramatically while only eating junk (like this nutrition professor did when he went on a twinkie diet) but you'd be doing yourself more harm than good. Think nutrient density instead and opt for a piece of fruit, low-fat yogurt, handful of almonds, glass of vegetable juice, carrot sticks with hummus, whole-grain cereal bar, sweet potato chips... you get the picture!