THE NEW FOOD GUIDE PYRAMID NEW BUT IMPROVED? May 25, 2005 Susan Noble Family and Consumer Science Extension Agent

Updated versions of older products are often advertised as new and improved. Forget dancing tubes of toothpaste or pans so good they can cook without you. Soon you just might hear the government using this familiar slogan to promote its new version of the Food Guide Pyramid.

Yes, it's new, but is it improved? It's even bigger, but is it better?

Last month, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) unveiled its updated Food Guide Pyramid based on the 2005 Dietary Guidelines for Americans. The new plan is called MyPyramid.

MyPyramid is made up of motivational and educational tools designed to help us make healthier food choices. The motivational tools are the new pyramid symbol and its accompanying slogan, Steps to a Healthier You. The educational tools are health messages on a new poster and interactive activities that help people find a Pyramid just right for them.

In this article, I'll attempt to explain the whys behind the new Pyramid plus provide information to help you explore it. Then you can decide if new and improved are truly partners or just advertising jargon.

Dietary Guidelines
First, let's go back to those 2005 Dietary Guidelines for Americans which are the basis of the new MyPyramid. These were released in January 2005 prior to the release of MyPyramid.

Dietary Guidelines are released by the federal government every five years. The purpose is to give us current science-based advice for improving our health and reducing our risk for major chronic diseases through diet and physical activity. Considering that the major causes of morbidity and mortality in the United States are related to poor diet and sedentary lifestyle, we apparently need this advice. The Guidelines are for people two years of age and older.

As I studied the 2005 Guidelines, three key recommendations really stood out to me as new. One is the recommendation to eat even more fruits and vegetables -- 2 cups of fruit and 2 1/2 cups of vegetables daily are recommended. (These numbers are for a reference 2,000-calorie intake, with higher or lower amounts depending on calorie level.) This translates to about 9 servings versus the old 5-a-day. Try picturing half your plate covered with fruits and vegetables, not meat as is the American custom.

It is now recommended that at least half of the daily grain servings we eat be whole grains.

The third new recommendation is safe food handling and storage. I point this out with great personal satisfaction as I have often been accused of being too picky about the way I handle and store food.

Enough gloating; back to the subject. Obviously, a major reason for revising the Pyramid was to include new dietary recommendations such as these. The updating of the Pyramid was coordinated with the development of the new Dietary Guidelines.

Personalized For You
The major criticism of the old Pyramid was that it was too general. For example, a range of 6-11 servings of grain foods was recommended daily. Each person had to choose for himself exactly how many servings to eat within this range.

So another reason for revising the old Pyramid was to make it more tailored to individual Americans. According to the USDA, MyPyramid "symbolizes a personalized approach to healthy eating and physical activity." The USDA believes this personalization will be more effective in motivating people to make healthier food and activity choices.

Though more personalized, MyPyramid still categorizes food into food groups. Each triangle in the pyramid represents a food group. From left to right these are Grains, Vegetables, Fruits, Oils, Milk, and Meats and Beans.

I would have preferred for the Milk Group to be called Dairy to help people realize that foods other than straight milk are included, such as yogurt and cheese. I would have called the Meats and Beans Group Protein; again, because more foods are included. However, to borrow one of my father's favorite sayings, this may be a case of "too much knowledge can be a dangerous thing." My professional knowledge of nutrition may be overshadowing common sense and simplicity.

How many servings of each group a person should eat depends on his age, gender, and activity level. This number of servings relates to how many calories the person needs to eat daily for a healthy weight. To help a person better tie number of servings to needed calorie level, there are 12 calorie levels in the new Pyramid for males and females ages 2-76+ with activity levels of sedentary, moderately active, and active.

The Symbol
What - you don't see all this info on the MyPyramid symbol? You're right; the new symbol is simple with no written information on it. There are not even pictures of food on this new symbol, so how can it guide us?

The symbol was designed to be simple. After all, no one symbol can carry all the nutrition guidance we need. The symbol is to visually remind people to eat healthy and be physically active.

For instance, notice the person climbing steps in the graphic. This sends the message to get up and move.

So for that personalized information, you will need to go to the computer and visit www.MyPyramid.gov. To avoid scaring the computer illiterate, I've been slow to mention that the new Pyramid is web based.

However, I believe having the new Pyramid on the Internet is a good move. The government is wisely taking advantage of the move by many Americans to getting info from the Internet. Also, it is Internet technology that allows for MyPyramid to be so personalized. I'm also guessing that a huge amount of money can be saved by the government by not producing massive amounts of paper Pyramids.

Trust me -- my computer skills are limited, and I can handle the new Pyramid with no problems. So turn on the computer, if you have one, and follow along as we continue exploring MyPyramid.

Proportionality
Back to the food groups. Each of the six bands on the Pyramid symbol represents a food group. Each group is a different width with grains being the widest group and oils the skinniest. These widths suggest how much food a person should select from each food group. The wider the group, the more you should eat from that group. This recommendation by widths is a general guide. It's good for those without Internet access.

By visiting the MyPyramid Plan section of the website, you can get more specific recommendations on how much YOU should eat from each group. Amounts depend, again, on your calorie needs, which depend on your age, gender, and activity level. Here is that personalization I've been writing about.

The website will guide you to enter your age, gender, and activity level. Then you will get a pyramid tailored for you that you can print out; hence, the name MyPyramid. Your pyramid will recommend a specific amount of food, not ranges, you should eat daily from each group based upon the approximate number of calories you need.

For example, the general recommendations for a 2,000-calorie diet are:

• Grains - 6 1-ounce equivalents, 3 of which should be whole grains. Examples of 1-ounce equivalents include 1 slice of bread, 1/2 cup cooked rice or pasta, 1 ounce cold cereal, and 1/2 bagel.
• Vegetables - 2 1/2 cups
• Fruits - 2 cups
• Dairy - 3 cups of milk or cup equivalents, such as 2 cups of cottage cheese
• Meats and Beans - 5.5 ounce equivalents. Examples of 1-ounce equivalents include 1 ounce lean meat, poultry, or fish; 1 egg; 1 tablespoon peanut butter; 1/4 cup cooked dry beans; and 1/4 cup nuts or seeds.
• Oils - 6 teaspoons. I imagine this will strike many readers as a really small amount. Realize this amount includes dressing on your salad, mayo on a sandwich, oil used in cooking, and even foods naturally high in oil like olives or nuts. Those 6 teaspoons get used up fast.

I just gave you only a few examples of serving sizes. By clicking on each food group, you can get a list of serving sizes for more foods in that group. Unfortunately, there are a few typos in these lists. According to E-mails that have crossed my desk, some eagle-eyed nutrition experts visiting the site have noticed some strangeness, such as wild rice being listed as a vegetable.

For the record, rice - wild or not - is not a vegetable, though we Southerners might have trouble accepting this. Rice is a grain with wild rice being a whole grain.

Such problems that have been reported to the Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion have been or will be corrected. Given the vast amount of information on the website, a few mistakes were bound to happen. If you notice some info that seems questionable, use Contact Us on the website to send an E-mail to the Center.

Persons likely to be on the 2,000-calorie diet given in my example are sedentary boys ages 13-14, moderately active teen girls, sedentary young women, moderately active adult women, and sedentary elderly men. Calorie levels in the program range from 1,000 to 3,200.

If you actually register on the site with your name and a password of your choosing, you can also enter your height. This will get you a more accurate calorie estimate.

And More
And that's not all folks. Once you have obtained your pyramid, the section Inside the Pyramid can help you plan meals and snacks that meet those recommendations. In this section of the website, there is info on meal patterns and menu suggestions and even work sheets you can print out. There's also advice on making smart choices from each food group and tips for getting the most nutrition from the calories you are allowed.

In MyPyramid Tracker, you can enter the foods you eat and your physical activities for a day. The website will evaluate the quality of your diet by comparing what you ate to current nutritional guidance. If your diet doesn't cut the mustard, you'll get advice on what you should be doing. You can indicate if you want this advice tailored to help you maintain your current weight or to lose weight.

You can get a similar analysis of your physical activity status.

As an added bonus, you can track your progress for up to one year by entering information for multiple days.

Technically, you enter your dietary info in the Tracker, not by typing it in but by making selections from many choices of foods. Then you'll have to do just a bit of math. Let's say you selected steak. It will be listed as 1-ounce boneless cooked steak. If you ate 6 ounces of steak, you will need to mark this as 6 servings.

To gain entry into the Tracker, you will need to log in with a password of your choosing.

Tips and Resources includes downloadable suggestions for all the food groups and for physical activity plus a work sheet to track what you are eating.

So certainly, the new plan is bigger; better is debatable. If you just want a quick, generic formula for what to eat, you will be disappointed.

If you're willing to spend some time and take advantage of all the info on the website, you can plan a diet and physical activity program that really fits you. I believe that most health and nutrition experts, myself included, favor this individualized approach.

The new printable mini-poster, which gives the basics of healthy eating and physical activity, is a nice compromise between the two camps.

Variety
As explained, MyPyramid is composed of six bands representing the five food groups and oils. This is to remind us to eat foods from all food groups every day to get all the different nutrients we need for good health. Each food group makes a distinct contribution to our diets.

Usually oils (and other fats) get beaten up in nutrition news, but they can be good for us - in small amounts. Research has shown that vegetable oils and oils in some fish contain fatty acids that can help prevent heart disease. The omega-3 fatty acids in tuna are an example. For this reason, oils are included as an actual food group for the first time.

Moderation
Now look at the bands which represent the food groups vertically instead of widthwise. Each band is wide at the bottom and narrows as it goes up to the tip of the Pyramid.

The wider base represents foods in each group that have little or no solid fats or added sugars or other sweeteners with calories. You should choose more foods from this area to get the most nutrition for the least calories.

The narrow top represents foods with more added sugars or other caloric sweeteners and solid fats. Go easy here as these foods give you less nutrition with more calories.

For example, plain steamed broccoli would be at the base of the Vegetable band. Moving up the band, the broccoli might be topped with olive oil. Then there would be broccoli with cheese sauce, and at the very top, deep fried broccoli dipped in ranch dressing. Or for Meat, how about broiled chicken, then chicken baked in a sauce, and at the top, fried chicken parmigiana? You get the point I'm sure.

Physical Activity
The couch-potato syndrome has overtaken America. Too many of us lead sedentary lifestyles. The results are showing on our figures and in increased rates of chronic diseases, such as diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure, and cancer.

Because physical activity is a great way to shape up couch potatoes, recommendations for physical activity are included in the Pyramid for the first time. This is yet another for revision.

So the person climbing the steps on MyPyramid should be YOU. Recommendations are to include at least 30 minutes of exercise on most days of the week to reduce your disease risk. (This is above and beyond your normal daily activity level unless your job involves lots of vigorous physical activity.)

To manage your weight and prevent unhealthy weight gain, you need up to 60 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity on most days of the week. To lose weight or to keep the weight off, you need 90 minutes of moderate exercise every day.

For many people, this amount of physical activity will require adjustments in their schedule plus a big dose of motivation. But you don't need to invest money in expensive equipment or joining a gym. Nothing beats plain, old-fashioned walking. You will need to make a minor investment in good walking shoes.

Slow But Sure
The USDA recognizes that it would be difficult for anyone to change their diet and activity patterns overnight to get in step with their individual MyPyramid recommendations. Instead, target one small positive change you need to make and work on it. Once that change has become a habit, target another change.

Just remember MyPyramid's slogan, Steps to a Healthier You. Take on improving your health in small steps.

Future Additions
The USDA is just getting started. The next step will be to help teachers and health professionals working with children teach them about the new plan. A child-friendly version of MyPyramid will target children ages 6 to 11 with messages about making smart-eating and physical activity choices.

More interactive tools for consumers are planned. The USDA also plans to partner with other agencies to get the new Pyramid out to more people.

Now What?
Take a rest - just reading about MyPyramid can be exhausting. Then go to the computer and start exploring. Get started now on your gradual change. Since sooner is better, I need to do something more active than sitting at my computer typing this article. Maybe the next Pyramid should be physically interactive.

The use of brand names in this column does not imply endorsement by the North Carolina Cooperative Extension Service of the products or services named or criticism of similar ones not mentioned.

E-mail address: Susan_Noble@ncsu.edu

Mailing address:
P. O. Box 2280
Lumberton, NC 28359-2280

Phone: 910-671-3276
Fax: 910-671-6278

Date Created 10/14/05