Calorie counting advice

Press, 1 June 1989, Page 13

Calorie counting advice

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BY

JUDI SHEPPARD MISSETT

Q. To control my weight, I’ve been counting calories. But “counting calories” is only another way of saying “cutting the amount of food I eat”; if I do that, don’t I also reduce the amount of nutrients I recive? How can I be sure to get all I need? A. Quite simply, some foods pack in many more nutrients than others; you shouldn’t be surprised to learn, for example, that 100 calories worth of chocolate cake is nowhere near as nutritious as 100 calories of steamed broccoli. So the trick to controlling your weight is not simply to restrict your caloric intake, but also to choose foods that give you

the most nutrition per calorie. In other words, choose the foods that nutritionists call “nutrient dense.”

How can you know which foods those are? You can depend on one generalisation: foods high in fat, sugar, or alcohol tend not to be nutrient dense.

Those include sugared pop, candy, fried snacks — they don’t call it junk food for nothing. But beyond that generalization, distinguishing nutrient-dense foods becomes challenging, even

for the pros. They’ve traditionally relied on dividing foods into four basic groups — milk, meat, fruits and vegetables, and breads and cereals — and saying that one should balance meals by eating foods from all four groups. That remains good advice, but it doesn’t go quite far enough, because it suggests that all foods in a particular group are equally nutritious. But sausages, for instance, is a fattier, and less nutritious meat than baked salmon; low-fat milk is better than whole milk, at least for adults. One nutritionist, Jean A. T. Pennington, has formulated a new scale that emphasises nutrient-dense

foods. According to Pennington, you should eat liberally of leafy vegetables, other fruits and vegetables, legumes, and grains (preferably whole, but refined are ok). Low-fat milk, yoghurt, and cheese, and lean meat, fish, and poultry rate moderate consumption, while whole milk and cheese, nuts and seeds eggs, and fatty meats, game and sausage rate very moderate consumption. You should eat desserts, sweets, alcohol, and fats only very occasionally. Actually, says Pennington, an ideal diet would comprise only foods in the liberal and moderate categories.