Food Guide Pyramid now Replaced with Food Guide Plate

June 7, 2011 /NewsRelease/ - The USDA Dietary Guidelines 2010 are just away (Yes, I know it’s 2011, but these are US government guidelines).

USDA features a new idea - the Food Guide Plate

And the Food Guide Pyramid is actually officially dead! In the future it will only be available to nutrition
school teachers.

You may remember the Food Guide Pyramid. The idea recommended 6 to 11 servings associated with whole grains, 3 to 5 helpings of fresh vegetables, Three to five servings of fruit, 2 to Three or more servings of milk and 2 to 3 helpings of meat, espresso beans, eggs & nuts.

It was clear. It was succinct. And anyone following that plan would likely be improving their health.

The issue was that practically nobody followed the meals Guide Pyramid plan. No more than 5% of People in the USA actually ate this way on a regular basis.

There have been lots of suggestions as to why the Food Guide Pyramid would have been a bust:

• Some people said that it was also complicated.
• A few said that the average National had no idea what an amount size was.
• Some said that it absolutely was just too far away in the reality of the way that will Americans actually consumed to be taken seriously.
• And some pointed out that the actual millions spent with the USDA to educate consumers regarding the benefits of eating good Food Guide Pyramid may have been swamped out by the billions spent with the food industry advertising and marketing junk and benefit foods.

In an effort to easily simplify and create a goal that’s closer to the way that People in america actually ate, the USDA began promoting the very idea of just 4 to 6 servings/day involving fresh fruits and vegetables.

And again The US yawned!

So now the USDA features rolled out a new idea – the Food Guide Plate (trumpets please, and a drum roll for good
measure!).

It’s out with the old (the Food Guide Pyramid) and in with the new (the Food Guide Plate).

The new visual consists of a dinner plate and an 8 ounce glass of milk. Fruits and vegetables occupy half of the dinner plate, using grains and health proteins occupying the other 50 percent. And if you look a little more closely, the veg portion is a bit bigger than the fruit portion and the materials portion is a bit bigger than the proteins portion.

That is certainly easier. No more counting portions or trying to figure out how large a serving is.

There is one big problem, however.

Less than 50% of what we ate in 2003 were sit down foods at home – the sort that you might eat from a plate.

The particular unfortunate truth is that more of the foods that we eat at home tend to be eaten out of any bag or package rather than from a denture.

And when we try to eat away from home, we often try to eat on the run - a new muffin here, a carrier of chips right now there, a fast food meal somewhere else.

And when we all eat inside a restaurant we have absolutely no control over the way the various foods tend to be portioned out on the dish. A stir fry may seem like a healthy plate – but certainly not if two thirds in the dish is taken on by white rice.

In other words the Food Guide Plate is an easy concept, but it reflects only a small part of what we actually eat each day.

My fear could be that the Food Guide Plate will be of actually less use pertaining to actually changing the particular eating behavior involving the general American general public than was the meals guide pyramid.

Even so, not all is lost! If you are serious about enhancing diet the new USDA site (www.ChooseMyPlate.gov) is a great useful resource.

If you are willing to invest time to go through the site you will understand a lot about making healthy food choices
choices and you can create a personalized diet simply for you.

I recommend the application of the Food Guide Plate as a graphic to help you eat balanced portions of the various
meals groups when you are eating at home and use www.ChooseMyPlate.gov to make an overall healthy diet regime.

To Your Health!
Dr. Stephen G Chaney

Dr. Stephen Chaney

Shaklee Master Coordinator
http://www.chaneyhealth.com
888.860.2075

These statements have not been examined by the Food and Drug Administration. This information is not
intended to identify, treat, cure or prevent any illness.

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