Extension Foods and Nutrition, Cooperative Extension Service, Kansas State University
Welcome Our New Secretary
Michelle (Shelly) Burklund joined our staff on June 7, as
secretary to Mary Clarke, Karen Penner and Jeanne Dray. Shelly
and her husband, Kirby, live in Olsburg along with their 3
daughters, Amber 12, Amy 10, and April 8.
Shelly enjoys cooking, sewing, reading and photography. Their family enjoys softball, basketball, fishing and working on the girls 4-H projects together. Shelly looks forward to meeting many of you and helping you by phone when she can.
Nutrition Motivation Contest
The Kansas Nutrition Council is sponsoring the third annual
Nutrition Motivation Contest to discover and honor programs which
motivate children, teens or adults to improve eating behaviors. A
$100.00 cash prize will be awarded to the winner.
All programs must originate at the community level -- no nationwide or statewide programs are eligible. The winner of the contest will be announced at the annual KNC conference on February 24, 1994 in Manhattan. You do not have to be a member of the Kansas Nutrition Council to submit an entry.
Entries must be received by the Kansas Nutrition Council no later than January 7, 1994. For more information regarding criteria, rules and how to enter please contact Cindy Evans, Home Economist, Shawnee County Extension Office, 1740 S.W. Western Ave., Topeka, KS 66604-3095 (913) 232-0062.
New Numbers for Foods and
Nutrition
Beginning soon, we will have individual phone numbers. If you
want to reach any of the specialists you will be able to dial
their office directly. If they are unavailable, you will get Sue
or Shelly. The new numbers are as follows:
Karen Penner 532-1672 Paula Peters 532-1666 Mary Clarke 532-1671 Fadi Aramouni 532-1668 Jeanne Dray 532-1673 Steve Anderson 532-1669 Meredith Stroh 532-1675 Sue Roscovius 532-1665 Shelly Burklund 532-1670 Tami Clymer 532-1667 Jane Fryenberger 532-1677
Pesticides and Children's
Diets
It's a challenge to feed children healthy food that they like.
Fruits and vegetables are colorful, crunchy and tasty ways for
children to get vitamin C, vitamin A and fiber in their diets.
These nutrients can help lower the risk of cancer and heart
disease. Yet, many people today are concerned about pesticides in
foods, and the increased risk to health that they may pose.
Pesticides are used to prevent pest damage and loss of crops. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) sets limits on the amount of pesticide that can be used on crops. These limits are based on how toxic the pesticide is, how much is left on the crop (the residue), and how much of the crop a person eats. Then, a safety factor of 100 times the amount deemed to be safe is built into the level allowed. But because there is great variation in how plants respond to pesticides, weather and growing conditions, as well as the foods people eat, scientists at EPA must use many assumptions to set these pesticide limits.
Children eat more food relative to their body weight than do adults. Children may also handle pesticides differently from adults. This may result in health risks from pesticides that are lower or higher than for adults. The EPA takes these differences into account when making assumptions and setting limits on pesticide use. A recent report from the National Academy of Sciences recommends changes in some of the assumptions made, and calls for better information about residues in food and how much children eat.
Most fruits and vegetables consumed by children have no pesticide residues or have residues hundreds of times below the level allowed. Studies have not been able to link the small amounts of residues that are present in produce with any risk of cancer. The American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Dietetic Association, and the National Cancer Institute all recommend that children increase the number of fruits and vegetables in their diets. The benefits of lowering heart disease and cancer are far greater than the risks.
There are some things parents can do to reduce the risk of pesticide residues in children's diets:
Source: Rapid Response Committee of the University of Massachusetts Cooperative Extension System, July 1993.
Modified Recipe: Chicken
Salad
| Nutrition per serving | Original | Modified |
| Calories | 503 | 240 |
| Fat | 41 g | 10 g |
| Cholesterol | 81 mg | 59 mg |
| Sodium | 367 mg | 262 mg |
| Percent of Calories from fat | 72 | 39 |
Low Fruit
and Vegetable Consumption
It is recommended that Americans eat 5 servings
of fruits and vegetables daily to reduce risk of
some chronic diseases. Even though low income
groups are at an increased risk for some chronic
diseases, surveys show that people with limited
resources consume fewer fruits and vegetables
than those with higher incomes. A series of focus
group interviews was conducted by the University
of Minnesota to determine why people avoid eating
fruits and vegetables. Participants in the study
were 19 - 39 years of age and most had an annual
income under $10,000.
Three types of obstacles to
including fruits and vegetables in the diet were
identified:
Participants suggested ways for overcoming some of these barriers including offering small servings of fruits and vegetables to children and parents. It is especially important that the male caregiver eat fruits and vegetables to set an example to the children. They recommended that Extension programs include recipes, cooking classes, and information on storage to increase fruit and vegetable consumption. (MS)
Source: Minnesota EFNEP Vol. 5, No. 2 June 1993
WIC Reduces
Anemia in Preschoolers
Participation in WIC by preschool children is
associated with a decrease in anemia, according
to a study recently conducted by the Food
Research and Action Center (FRAC).
The FRAC study compared the anemia rate among children aged six months to five years at the time of a screening conducted at the beginning of the child's WIC participation, and then during a follow - up visit conducted within a year. In each year from 1980 - 1992, the anemia rated for these children dropped by an average of 16% between the two visits.
According to FRAC, children are the least served group in WIC, with a participation rate of 49% of those eligible. Infants are the most served group (93%), followed by postpartum women (58%) and pregnant women (54%). Preschool children at risk of anemia often fall into a lower-priority category and thus are excluded from the program. FRAC released the findings of this study to coincide with congressional voting on President Clinton's proposal to fully fund WIC. Full funding would open WIC to serve all of those eligible. (MS)
Source: CNI June 11, 1993
World Food
Day
The tenth annual World Food Day teleconference
will be offered on October 15th from noon to 3:00
pm. The title of this year's conference is
"Seeds of Conflict: Biodiversity and Food
Security." It will focus on worldwide
concern for the natural environment and awareness
of shrinking biological diversity. An
international panel of experts will discuss
issues of biodiversity loss, genetic erosion and
food security, how they impact each other and the
struggle to find solutions to these complex
problems.
The teleconference will be downlinked at Kansas State University. If you would like to attend the conference contact Meredith Stroh (913-532-5782) for more information. (MS)
Source: U.S. National Committee for World Food Day Study/Action Packet
The History of Food and People, Part II
How far have we come
nutritionally?
If you were to believe everything you see or hear
about diet and health, you would not only be
mightily confused but perhaps responding as many
are, "I'm not going to pay attention to what
I eat until you experts (real or self-proclaimed)
get your act together."
In the last Digest issue, we looked at human biology noting that what is good nutrition for humans was determined over some 55 million years beginning with primates eating mainly plant foods such as fruits, seeds, leaves, and perhaps insects and other animal-based materials. Humans, Homo sapiens, developed during the Pleistocene period, 2 million to 10,000 years ago in such places as present-day Iraq, provided a more stable food supply supporting population increases.
The next major food and nutrition change resulted from the industrial revolution. Industrialization changed where and how people lived, worked and obtained food. Inevitably, these changes affected people's health and nutrition with such changes continuing to this day.
Starting in the early 1800's in England and spreading to Continental Europe and the U.S., workers left the farm for rapidly growing, crowded, coalfired, smoggy cities with woefully inadequate water, sewage, food supply facilities and noisy, hazardous, dimly lit, poorly heated or cooled manufacturing plants. Ramshackle, dirty housing and long working hours contributed to the many health problems. There were no child labor laws or protection from dangerous equipment. The prevailing poor wages meant poverty.
The diet of the poor in a northern England manufacturing city has been described as "--animal food (was) only a bit of bacon cut up with potatoes -- lower still were those who had only bread, cheese, porridge, and potatoes -- (with) only potatoes left for the very poorest." There were no land spaces available for the poor to grow food. Richer people could buy food when the supplies were most plentiful and freshest but working people could only find poorest quality food after working hours. With no refrigeration or food protection laws, spoiled, tainted meat from diseased animals were offered for sale.
There were many other food and diet changes. Tea replaced beer and many workers lived mostly on bread, butter and potatoes. Milk was expensive and often contaminated with typhoid, dysentery and TB causing microbes. Any scarce commodity was often adulterated by a cheap additive, e.g. pepper extended with mustard husks, pea flour, juniper berries and "pepper dust," and ash tree leaves, dried and curled adulterated tea. Bread was whitened with alum. Brick dust was added to cocoa and chicory, acorns or mangel-wurzel (a type of beet) became coffee. Copper salts (a poison) made pickles green and red lead added color to cheese rind.
Such practices led to 100s of 1,000s of child deaths with many more suffering scurvy and rickets. People were frequently ill and untold numbers died from unsafe food. Malnutrition was more widespread in Europe at the turn of the 19th century than anytime since the Middle Ages.
Bad as things were, they were not the only contributors to poor nutrition. Industrialization brought with it the ability to mill refined flour. High society in France, the arbiter of fashion, sought white bread. Coarser, whole wheat was for common folk. White flour milling removed large amounts of E and B vitamins, minerals, and most of the fiber . In this century, some B vitamin deficiencies, notably beriberi and pellagra and iron-deficiency anemia, were corrected by bread enrichment laws but in general low levels of other vitamins and minerals were not corrected until cereal fortification became common. Although bread-making practices have been changing recently, white flour products are still by far the biggest sellers.
Has industrialization been
good for human nutrition?
By and large, yes. Certainly the food supply of
the industrialized world is the safest that it
has ever been. Refrigeration, freezing, canning,
drying and proper packaging, an intricate network
of transportation and storage facilities have
vastly increased food availability so that most
any food item can be purchased year round.
Updated food laws including labeling have
improved food quality. This very diverse diet is
one of the key factors protecting health through
improved nutrition and the prevention of disease.
On the other hand, it is also true that nutritionists do not have all the answers about nutrition and health. In this last quarter of the 20th century, we have learned about the harmful effects of too much fat and cholesterol on cardiovascular disease such as coronary heart disease. High sodium intakes show correlations with hypertension. It is obvious that diet is related to a number of cancers, especially colon and stomach cancer. Diet can help protect against other cancers such as lung cancer caused by smoking. Mature-onset diabetes mellitus is closely related to obesity in susceptible people.
The cutting edge of nutritional science is probing the intricate, complex relationships between multiple nutrients and human health. One nutrient impacts another. Drugs, legal and illegal, play key roles in nutritional health. Even exercise and mental health practices impact nutritional well-being. And people are individualistic in that each has a unique set of genes and lifetime pattern of environmental exposures including the all-important accumulation of nutritional status from dietary practices.
Complicating matters is our rapidly changing food and nutrient supply. Many people depend heavily on convenience food items and food prepared away from home. Modern technology is responsible for our individual diets becoming unplanned experiments with no adequate "control subjects" for comparison. Such experimentation can become critical when people consume large doses of individual nutrients such as vitamin C or B6 without considering potential toxicity problems. It is also true that some nutrients such as trace minerals may be in too short supply or be unbalanced in relation to other nutrients.
In the U.S., we want the government to protect us from harmful substances and unethical practices but we don't like to have government dictate to us as to what we can and can't do. In such a situation, the most acceptable course of action is for people to become educated so that they can choose appropriate diets to fit their personal needs and desires.
At this time in history, the best and safest dietary advice nutritionists can offer is to practice moderation, variety and proportion or balance. These principles are our best safeguards as we anticipate the next century and live longer. How many disease-free years we enjoy can depend heavily on what we routinely eat now. (MC)
Sources: Benham, H. 1981. Man's Struggle for Food. Univ. Press of America, Lanham, MD. Milton, K. Diet and Primate Evolution. Scientific American. August 1993. Tannehill, R. 1973. Food in History. Stein & Day, NY.
Eating
Alone
Eating alone isn't always a joyous experience.
Studies show it can depress mind, body, and soul.
Between 1960 and 1990, the number of solo diners
more than tripled from seven to 23 million.
A California study of 4,400 men and women over the age of 55 found that men who lived alone ate diets that provided less than two-thirds of the RDAs for vitamins A, B6, and C, and calcium and magnesium. Women living alone had diets below two-thirds of the RDA for thiamin, riboflavin, vitamin B6, calcium and manganese.
The men and women in this study did not choose foods that were less nutritious. Rather, they skipped meals or ate very little in order to shorten the time required for the less-than-pleasant experience of solitary eating. In contrast, those with extensive social and psychologically nourishing networks of friends and relatives tended to eat healthier diets.
In another study of seniors, University of Tennessee researchers found a significant correlation between loneliness and lowered intake of calories, calcium and vitamin A.
Researchers from the University of Nebraska found that children who lacked companionship at mealtime ate poorer quality meals than children who ate with parents or brothers and sisters. Specifically, they ate fewer servings of fruits and vegetables and consumed below the RDAs for iron and vitamin C.
Source: Environmental Nutrition, July 1993
Help Making
Food Choices: FAT
Many people are not clear how to make food
choices based on the recommendation that fat not
exceed 30 percent of calories. How do you decide
between a candy bar (4 grams of fat, 190
calories, 19% calories from fat) and a bag of
popcorn (3 grams of fat, 70 calories, 40% of
calories from fat)?
The 30 percent of calories from fat guideline is based on a day's total diet not a single food item. If you based your decision solely on 30 percent of calories from fat for every single food item you'd have to eliminate all cooking oils, margarine, nuts, many cheeses, meats and desserts. That's not necessary or even desirable.
Let's say you eat 1,500 calories a day. To keep your fat calories at no more than 30 percent, you'd not want to eat more than 50 grams of fat.
That brings us back to choosing either a candy bar or popcorn. From a fat-gram point of view, they are just about equal. Each one makes up a small portion of your daily fat maximum. So you need to decide two things: (1) whether you feel like eating something sugary (the candy bar) or something that tastes more buttery and perhaps salty and (2) whether you can "afford" the extra calories the sugary item provides. If you've been eating rather sparingly and at the same time making sure to include plenty of nutrient-dense fruits, vegetables, and whole grains in your diet, you certainly can make a choice. If you've been eating a lot of calorie-dense sugary foods, however, you may want to opt for something else--perhaps not popcorn or even a fruit (although that would make a perfectly reasonable alternative)-- but maybe, if nothing less than sugar will do a sweet-tasting snack that provides fewer calories: one or two smallish cookies, say, or a piece of whole-grain bread spread thinly with jam. You may even decide to eat only half of a candy bar.
Incidentally, because most adult Americans eat at least 1,500 calories a day, their recommended daily fat is at least 50 grams. Thus a serving of a food that contains 3 or 4 grams of fat is never a lot in and of itself. Obviously, a food that contains 15 to 25 fat grams makes a substantial impact on the daily total and should probably be either an entire entree or a rich treat that you don't very often eat in large amounts. "Ballparking" the fat grams in your diet in this manner is a most effective way of keeping down your fat intake-and a lot easier than trying to add up every single gram of fat you eat. (JD)
Source: Tufts University Diet and Nutrition Letter, July 1993.
Body Fat
and Physical Activity
Excess body fat appears to build up from too
little physical activity rather than too many
calories. In studies of two groups of sedentary
men -- one group in their 20s and another over 65
-- there was no relationship between the men's
body fat levels and their calorie intake. There
was, however, a significant inverse relationship
with physical activity. Those who engaged in the
least physical activity had the most fat. Both
groups ate significantly more calories each day
than currently recommended and burned
significantly more. These finding support
evidence that the current RDAs for energy
(calories) significantly underestimate actual
requirements. The older men, for instance, burned
an average 2,800 calories daily compared to the
2,400-calorie RDA. That's because their physical
activity was significantly higher than the value
used to calculate the RDA even though they did
not exercise on a regular basis. The new data
will help health professionals reassess the
adequacy of food intake for different populations
and also allow USDA to fine-tune its food aid
based on how many calories individuals actually
eat. (JD)
Source: Food & Nutrition Research Briefs Oct. -Dec. 1992.
Breast-Feeding
Prevents Ear Infections
We all know that breast-feeding is the best for
babies, but a recent study gives us even one more
reason why. Pediatricians at the University of
Arizona Health Sciences Center in Tucson reviewed
medical records of more than 1000 infants. They
found that those who were fed solely by
breast-feeding for at least the first four months
had an average of half the number of ear
infections in their first year of life as those
who were not breast - fed at all. They had 40%
less than the babies who were given a combination
of breast milk and other foods. They also had
only half as many recurrences of ear infections
than babies who were not solely breast fed.
The reason breast-feeding reduces the chance of ear infections isn't entirely understood. It may be that breast-fed infants are held more or less upright during nursing, allowing the fluid to flow directly to the stomach. Bottle-fed babies are often in a more reclining position that may allow small amounts of fluid to make their way from the back of the throat to the tubes connecting the nose and ears. It could then collect in the inner ear, where bacteria could multiply and cause an infection.
The antibodies that are naturally present in breast milk could also help the baby defend against the bacteria responsible for ear infections. Or perhaps, the high levels of prostaglandins found in breast milk could keep the body from reacting to the bacteria and prevent the swelling and inflammation of the inner ear that is so painful.
Ear infections are a serious problem during the first year, as any parent who has been awakened in the middle of the night due to one knows. It is one of the most common childhood illnesses. Three out of five infants will suffer at least one painful ear infection before the first birthday. Many of them will become recurrent, occurring at least three times in that year. Along with the many other benefits of breast-feeding, another benefit may be helping prevent this painful illness. (PP)
Source: Tufts University Diet and Nutrition Letter, August 1993.
Will Chubby
Little Girls be Obese Middle - age Women?
Not necessarily, say researchers at the Human
Nutrition Research Center on Aging at Tufts
University in Boston. A study of 50 years of
height and weight data from the Harvard
Longitudinal Studies of Child Health and
Development shows that childhood obesity in
females does not predict obesity at age 40 or 50
as it does in males. The researchers examined
body size measured by weight divided by height
squared or body mass index (BMI). They found no
correlation between females' BMI at age five to
seven years and at middle age. They did find BMIs
in early adolescence were good predictors of
their relative weights at age 40. But not until
the young women reached age 18 did their BMIs
correlate well with those at age 50.
Body sizes of males at all ages, on the other hand, were more reliable predictors of body size in middle age. The differences between the genders may be due to the many body changes that females go through starting at puberty when they have a marked increase in body fat. Some may thin out due to their adolescent growth spurt; others may not and begin a history of dieting. (PP)
Source: Food and Nutrition Briefs, USDA, Agricultural Research Service, October - December 1992.
Carbo-Loading
May Not Improve Performance
Studies at the Ohio State University and the
Beltsville Human Nutrition Research Center seem
to be dispelling the widely held belief muscle
glycogen must be replaced between daily workouts
to maximize performance. The Ohio State
University study examined runners and cyclists,
some on a moderate carbohydrate diet (42% of
calories) and some on a high carbohydrate diet
(84% of calories). Although the athletes on the
high carbohydrate diet had higher muscle glycogen
levels, they did not perform any better than
those on the moderate carbohydrate diet.
In the Beltsville study, men in their 20's and 30's were tested after eating both high and low carbohydrate diets. One third of the men were sedentary, the rest either ran or lifted weights three to four times a week for an hour or less. After three weeks on a diet of 62% of calories as carbohydrate none of the men could pedal a stationary bike significantly longer than when they got 42% carbohydrates. Neither could their leg muscles overcome any more resistance, nor could their upper bodies bench-press any more weight.
Although these two studies indicate that eating more carbohydrates probably won't improve performance, such a diet does cut down on fat intake, and that's beneficial for everyone. (PP)
Sources: American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, January 1993, and Food and Nutrition Research Briefs, USDA, Agricultural Research Service, October - December 1992.
Overweight
Teens Need to Shape Up!
An overweight teenage male has twice the risk of
dying earlier than a lean male. And overweight
teenagers of both sexes have a higher risk of
serious disease before age 73. These risks don't
depend on one's weight in middle age, according
to a recent follow-up study of 508 men and women
who participated in the 1922-35 Harvard Growth
Study from first grade through high school.
Those in the top 25 percent for weight in their teens were twice as likely to have been diagnosed with coronary heart disease, seven times more likely to have atherosclerosis, and nearly three time more likely to have gout by age 73 than their leaner peers. Excess teenage weight also increased the risk of colorectal cancer in men by six times and doubled the risk of arthritis in women.
The researchers interviewed those Harvard study participants who were still living and could be reached after 55 years, and obtained dates and causes of death for the deceased. They also used height and weight data from a mid-life follow-up in their analysis to see if it influenced risk. Middle-age weight status did not change risk significantly. This doesn't mean that middle-aged people can ignore excess weight; it's still an important risk factor. But the study emphasizes that successful treatment of excess weight in adolescence , may prevent a significant proportion of adult disease and death attributed to obesity. (PP)
Sources: Avia Must, Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging at Tufts,Boston, MA and William H. Dietz, Floating Hospital, New England Medical Center, Boston, MA, as reported in Food and Nutrition Research Briefs, USDA, Agriculture Research Service, October - December 1992.
Food
Allergy Brochure
About one in three adults believe they have a
food allergy, but true food allergy actually
affects less than two percent of the population.
IFIC Foundation and the Academy of Allergy and
Immunology have produced a new brochure Understanding
Food Allergy.
This brochure gives health professionals and consumers information on the basic symptoms, diagnosis and management of food allergy as well as answers to questions commonly asked. A single free copy is available by writing: IFIC Foundation; 1100 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Suite 430; Washington D.C., 20036. (JD)
Egg
Teaching Unit
"The Incredible Journey from Hen to
Home" is a cross curricular educational unit
for students in grades four, five, and six. There
are 7 lessons which take about 30 to 40 minutes
each.
Content includes classifying foods into the food groups, egg food safety, label reading, cooking scrambled eggs, identifying properties and function of eggs in recipes, using math to compare cost of eggs to other protein sources, identifying grade and size of eggs, and a game. The game includes a poster and the pieces needed; it teaches the sequence of steps required to bring eggs from hen to home.
This teaching unit can be obtained free by writing to; Kansas Poultry Association, c/o Al Adams, 1816 Alabama Lane, Manhattan, KS 66502. There is a limited supply. (JD)
Where to
find Clearjel?
The only place I know to get Clearjel is from
Maid of Scandinavia, 800-328-6722. When I called
them on August 2 they were out and expected to
have more in 2 or 3 weeks. (JD)
K-State Research and Extension is a short name for the Kansas State University Agricultural Experiment Station and Cooperative Extension Service, a program designed to generate and distribute useful knowledge for the well-being of Kansans. Supported by county, state, federal and private funds, the program has county Extension offices, experiment fields, area Extension offices and regional research centers statewide. Its headquarters is on the K-State campus, Manhattan.