Sugar, Fat, and Salt

Paradise greetings,

I am writing today from my mother's home in the Louisville area. We played in the Bardstown Road area yesterday (no, I didn't get to Lynn's Paradise Cafe). The weather is about as tropical as south Florida's weather only here you have the Ohio River valley effect, where the exhaust from combustion engines becomes trapped by sunlight, forcing those with respiratory illnesses to stay inside. Yuck. I don't have any respiratory illnesses but I don't want to be breathing in all that stuff either.

We stopped by the Floyd County, Indiana library so I could give them an autographed copy of my book, Healthy Living with Diabetes: One Small Step at a Time (http://www.ourlittlebooks.com/). While there, I checked out The End of Overeating by David A. Kessler, MD. I have always admired Dr. Kessler, a pediatrician and former head of the FDA, and now I have one more reason to do so. In his book, published last year, he talks about the sugar, fat, and salt triad which the food industry uses to get us addicted to foods so we consume more calories than we need and they make more money than they need. Chapter 3 of The End of Overeating is titled "Sugar, Fat, and Salt Make Us Eat More Sugar, Fat, and Salt." This is exactly what I talk about with parents and employers who are feeding these (often hidden) ingredients to their families and their employees every day.

In Chapter 4, Dr. Kessler writes:
"Higher sugar, sat, and salt make you want to eat more," a high level food industry executive told me. I had alrady read this in the scientific literature and heard it in conversations with neuroscientists and psychologists. Now an insider was saying the same thing. My source was a leading food consultant, a Henry Ford of mass-produced food who had agreed to part the curtain for me, at least a bit, to reveal how his industry operates. To protect his business, he did not want to be identified. But he was remarkably candid, explaining that the food industry creates dishes to hit what he called the "three points of the compass." Sugar, fat, and salt make a food compelling, said the consultant. They make it indulgent. They make it high in hedonic value, which gives us pleasure.
"Do you design food specifically to be highly hedonic?" I asked.
"Oh, absolutely," he replied without a moment's hesitation. "We try to bring as much of that into the equation as possible."

Thank you, Dr. Kessler, for your courage to identify the root causes of America's obsession with overeating. If you are a parent and your family eats in restaurants regularly, such as Chilis or McDonald's, read Dr. Kessler's book. Before your next visit to a national chain restaurant, go to their website and look up the nutritional content (if they dare to let you see it) of what you and your kids usually eat there. Just remember that higher sugar, salt, and fat makes you want to eat more sugar, salt, and fat. We owe it to our children and to all of America's children to make informed choices about what we eat. Today, read a food label and choose to eat less sugar. And less salt. And less fat. Help reduce and halt childhood obesity.

Growing Healthy Kids - improving the health - and lives - of America's children, one child and one garden at a time.

To your perfect health,
Nancy Heinrich
Founder, Growing Healthy Kids

Party with a Purpose for Growing Healthy Kids

Paradise Greetings,

Tomorrow is a big day for Growing Healthy Kids!! We are the first beneficiary of Chicks with Checks, a socially conscious networking organization started by the amazing Ann Newell up the coast in the Carolinas. Tomorrow is the Vero Beach chapter's first Party with a Purpose and we are so excited to be the lead dog!

Growing Healthy Kids is raising awareness about children who have been influenced and peer pressured to consume more calories than they are spending in physical activity and normal growth and development and as a result are at unhealthy weights. Who are these persons of influence? You decide.

Being overweight or obese increases one's risk for heart disease, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, type 2 diabetes, skeletal problems, arthritis, sleep apnea, and psychological problems like depression. The risk for some cancers also increases with excess weight.

It's one thing if an adult chooses to eat and drink too many calories and not balance it with the calories they are burning. Any idea how many calories YOU ate and drank today in food and drinks?? It's another thing when adults turn a blind eye to kids who are eating 3 days worth of calories, salt, and fat when they have a drive-by dinner from McDonald's, Burger King, or KFC. Balancing the energy equations for overweight and obese children is OUR job and it's time for us to get to work. NOW. The health - and lives - of one out of three kids is America is depending on it.

We must act deliberately to increase awareness about how to halt and reverse obesity in children. This is what Growing Healthy Kids is all about. We are gently and playfully teaching children in Indian River County how to have fun (planting and maintaining vegetable gardens) and to prepare and eat healthier foods. I swear to you, when the kids try the healthy foods we make together, you'd think they'd never eaten real food before. They love the choices they are getting!

So come Party with a Purpose tomorrow in Vero Beach. Call the head chick - Donna Vernon - at 772 569-2390 for more information. For me, it's back to the drawing board to plan the next month's programs for the kids and our first parent workshop. See you tomorrow evening!

To your perfect health.

Nancy Heinrich

Founder, Growing Healthy Kids