Drop Dead Healthy A. Jacobs (good novels to read .TXT) đ
- Author: A. Jacobs
Book online «Drop Dead Healthy A. Jacobs (good novels to read .TXT) đ». Author A. Jacobs
I ask her to show me the least healthy food in Whole Foods. âOh, letâs go look at the breakfast cereals,â she says. âTheyâre always the most fun.â
We walk to aisle one. And there, we find box after box of cereal with pictures of farmhouses and grain fields. She picks up a carton. She slides her glasses from atop her curly gray hair to her nose, and lasers in on the nutrition label. Nestle has spent more time reading nutrition labels than most Americans have spent reading novels (which, I suppose, isnât saying much). And she knows how to unlock their secrets.
âEvaporated cane juice,â she reads aloud. âTranslation: sugar.â
Really? It sounds so natural.
âOrganic molasses,â she keeps reading. âTranslation: sugar.â
Itâs not better?
âItâs got a few nutrients. But not enough to make a difference. Sugar is sugar.â
What about agave nectar? Thatâs the healthy sugar, right?
âNo.â
Some sugars are slightly better than others, but only slightly. If you eat too much, they all end up as fat and can lead to metabolic syndrome and diabetes and all sorts of other horrible maladies.
A little farther down the aisle are all the faux-healthy protein bars. âOh, look, itâs organic!â says Nestle, with more than a bit of sarcasm. âThereâs now research that shows that when people see the word âorganic,â they think it has fewer calories.â
So if high-cane-juice cereals are the least healthy, what foods are the healthiest? Nestle leads me to the produce section.
âHere. Anything in here.â
âBlueberries?â I say. âTheyâre a superfood.â
âYes, theyâre healthy,â says Nestle. âBut I donât believe in superfoods.â
Hold on now. Whatâs this?
Nestle thinks that we have an outsize obsession with ranking our fruits and vegetables. Her argument is, in a way, similar to Bratmanâs. Our reasoning is too reductive. We figure: Fruits and vegetables are good for you. Fruits and vegetables have antioxidants. Therefore itâs the antioxidants in the fruits and vegetables that are good for you.
This type of thinking leads us to believe the idea that the fruit with the most antioxidants is the best. It makes us overlook all the nonsuperfoodsâwhat one writer called âClark Kentâ foodsâsuch as apples and oranges, which are perfectly healthy. Antioxidants are just one of dozens of good chemicals in food.
Nestle says that the blueberry obsession can be traced, in part, to the clever marketing efforts of the Maine wild blueberry growers. A decade ago, the Maine blueberry industry was in trouble. In years past, blueberry promoters had tried several strategies: They attempted to market blueberries as candy. Even odder, they ran a campaign suggesting blueberries as a condiment to put on hamburgers. Nothing worked. But when a Tufts study said that wild blueberries had a high antioxidant rating, they ran with it, and blueberries have become the prototypical health food.
We finished our Whole Foods adventure and went to lunch at a nearby café. I order the Bibb lettuce salad, dressing on the side.
The waitress looked at Nestle and Nesheim. âAre the profiteroles good?â asks Nestle.
âSo good,â says the waitress.
âIâll have that.â
Huh. Iâm here with quite possibly the most knowledgeable nutritionist in the world, and sheâs having a plateful of sugar and fat.
âYouâve got to enjoy food,â says Nestle, noticing my raised eyebrows. âItâs one of the great things in life.â She assures me that she eats plenty of fruits and veggies as well.
Iâm not a doctor, but I can say with certainty: Marion Nestle does not have orthorexia.
Checkup: Month 6
Weight: 160
Average number of errands sprinted per day: 3
Waist size: 34 (down from 35)
Pounds lifted on squat machine: 90 (improvement!)
Sleep per night: 6.4 hours
Half-ounce Purell bottles used this month: 14
Overall state: Iâm feeling okay, though a little stressed out about how much of my book advance Iâm spending on fitness equipment. My closets are filling up with a bizarre collection of weights, gadgets, and clothes. Itâs as if I were given access to a SkyMall catalog, a cell phone, and a jug of whiskey.
I am now the proud owner of a yoga mat and a Swiss exercise ball. I also have a compression suit from Under Armour. This skintight silver outfit is supposed to help your muscles recover more quickly postworkout by reducing swelling. I wore it to the gym one day, and got plenty of feedback from the gym staff. âHey, Superman!â âNanu, nanu!â And so on. But thereâs something comforting and womblike about its snugness.
I own a custom-fitted mouthpiece that is supposedly similar to the one worn by Derek Jeter. A modern spin on my eighth-grade retainer, the mouthpiece is designed to open your airways, and relax you by unclenching your jaw. It does make running easierâthough I can get the same effect for free by jutting my jaw forward a half inch while running.
Of all the gadgets that clutter my closet, the most successful has been one of the simplest: a twenty-dollar pedometer. Actually, I have two, since Julie agreed to join me in my pedometer experiment.
Studies show that the more you pay attention to your bodyâs statistics, the greater the chance youâll adopt a healthy lifestyle. This idea underpins the Quantified Self movement, in which adherents track everything from caloric output to selenium levels.
The mere act of weighing yourself daily makes it more likely youâll shed pounds, according to a University of Minnesota study. Keeping a food journal makes you eat fewer fatty foods, according to another study. And pedometers make you walk more.
Julie and I wear our silver bubble-shaped pedometers clipped to our pants. Our stated goal is to rack up ten thousand steps per dayâan amount that the Presidentâs Council
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