Happy 4th of July, everyone!
Here are some simple good eating habits to keep in mind while we celebrate.
Have a great holiday weekend and be safe!
Posts Tagged ‘health’
Good Eating Habits by The Diet Joke
Saturday, July 2nd, 2011ForeWord Book of the Year Award for The Diet Joke
Monday, June 27th, 2011The Diet Joke receives an Honorable Mention in the Self Help category of the 2010 ForeWord Book of the Year Awards!
Thank you, ForeWord Reviews.
The New MyPlate
Saturday, June 18th, 2011Boy, are we glad the pyramid is gone. That thing was more confusing than taxes. In its place, the simple and easy-to-understand MyPlate.
Additional recommendations from the USDA:
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Watch your portion sizes.
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Pay attention to sodium content and choose lower-sodium foods.
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Drink water instead of sugary drinks.
Boy, all this sounds familiar. I think someone at the USDA got their hands on a copy of The Diet Joke and realized we were onto something. Well, no credit needed. We’re just happy to see the improvement.
New Plate Replaces Old Pyramid
Saturday, May 28th, 2011Well, when you’re right, you’re right. And we at The Diet Joke were right about this one. That whole food pyramid thing is a piece of crap. We even devoted a whole chapter in our book to its problems.
Thankfully, the Obama administration got wind of our critique and took it to heart. The result: the pyramid is out!
According to the New York Times article Goodbye Food Pyramid, Hello Dinner Plate, the next big thing is going to be a circle, meant to represent a plate, divided into four color-blocked sections. Half of the plate will be devoted to fruits and vegetables. The other half: grains and protein.
Well done, Obama administration! That’s exactly what we recommended in The Diet Joke.
The new plate also includes a smaller circle next to the plate for dairy, as in a glass of milk or a cup of yogurt.
We can’t wait to see the dairy industy’s reaction to that.
“What do you mean, a small circle next to the plate?” they’ll say.
“Hey!” the meat industry will say. “At least, you got your own circle. We’re practically getting pushed off the plate over here.”
The new plate will be unveiled Thursday. The fighting should begin right away.
Stadium Snacking
Friday, May 27th, 2011We at The Diet Joke know nothing says summer like baseball. But some of those ballpark treats can fill out our bikinis in all the wrong places. That’s why we were curious to read the article Diet-Friendly Ballpark Snacks on MSN’s Fitbie page.
It’s not really an article. It’s a slide show. Everything’s a slide show these days because, apparently, reading takes too much time. You think reading takes a lot of time, writing takes forever. It takes as long as a baseball game.
Among the slide show recommendations:
- Sunflower seeds over peanuts (less fat, fewer calories)
- Snow cone over ice-cream cone (less sugar, fewer calories)
- Hot dog with mustard over chicken fingers with ranch dressing (less fat, fewer calories)
- Soft pretzel without salt over nachos (less sodium, fewer calories)
- Cracker Jacks over cotton candy (less air and you get a prize)
Happy Memorial Day, everyone!
The Cost of Calories
Wednesday, April 27th, 2011As someone who loves to order fresh fish in restaurants, believe me when I tell you, eating well ain’t cheap. And it’s getting costlier. According to a study from the University of Washington, the cost of healthy food is going up at twice the rate of unhealthy food.
Over a four year period, researches tracked the cost of some of the most and least nutrient-dense foods in supermarkets. Their findings: the healthiest foods rose almost 30% while the least nutritious foods rose just over 16%.
How did that translate at the cash register? The healthiest foods rang in at $27.20 per 1000 calories while the junk food rang in at a mere $3.32 per 1000 calories.
We at The Diet Joke have decided to do our own investigation.
Specimen #1: A Chili Hot Dog and Regular Fries from Wienerschnitzel
$1.40 (using coupon)
Total Cost – $1.40 (tax included, I used a coupon)
Nutritional Information for one chili hot dog and regular fries:
Calories 600
Fat Calories 320
Fat 36 grams
Saturated Fat 15 grams
Sodium 1430
Cost per calorie: 0.0023 (4.3 calories per penny)
Those are some inexpensive calories.
Nutritious? Not so much.
Life-Sized Barbies
Friday, April 8th, 2011To be honest, I never played with dolls. Not even beautiful, busty Barbie. In recent years, we’ve all heard how ridiculous her doll-sized proportions are, and how those proportions would translate to an actual woman: 39″ bust, 18″ waist, 33″ inch hips.
If you have difficulty imagining what a real-sized Barbie might look like, have difficulty no more. Then high-school student Galia Slayen built one for her school’s first National Eating Disorder Awareness Week (NEDAW). You can read the HuffPost College article about how Gail built the full-sized doll here, plus some “Get Real, Barbie” statistics.
Galia Slayen and her full-sized Barbie doll
That sad thing is, except for small head, which isn’t in the right proportion anyway, I think most guys would date real-sized Barbie. I mean, except for the goofy head, she looks a lot like Pamela Anderson, but with longer legs.
Or Brigitte Nielsen.
Or even Julie Strain, except for the brown hair. (Who’s looking at her hair?) Not to toot my own horn, but I did a movie with Julie Strain. The movie’s called Magus and I’m the one with the short legs who keeps my clothes on.
I don’t just have short legs. I’m also barely a B cup, and can I tell you how hard it is to get a guy’s attention. I have to actually knock something over or they won’t even notice I’m there. For years, men have thought of me as clumsy, which isn’t the least bit true, but at least now when I walk in a room, they keep an eye on me. If they don’t, I’m likely to take out their coffee.
“Whoops, sorry,” I say, which they may or may not hear if there happens to be a life-sized Barbie in the room.
Dinner’s On!
Thursday, April 7th, 2011Dinner’s on.
But what is it?
Surprise!
It’s Mashed Potatoes with Meatloaf and Tomato Sauce!
Uh, what’s for dessert?
Bye Bye BMI? Maybe
Sunday, March 6th, 2011A few months ago I wrote an article entitled What is BMI and How Do I Get Rid of It? Turns out I’m not the only one thinking that way. Scientists now say they may have something better to measure a person’s fat. Better than BMI? WTF?
The new measure is called BAI, or Body Adiposity Index. Adiposity means fat. Why they don’t call it BFI, or Body Fat Index, which everybody would understand, I don’t know, except that maybe it’s too close to BFF. LOL. Imagine if instead of saying best friends forever, you just called your best friend fat. BBBF. (Bye-bye best friend.)
BAI uses height and hip measurements rather than the traditional height and weight calculation of BMI. To learn more about the proposed scale you can read the Reuters article here. According to the article, the new scale has promise for faraway places where they have plenty of food, but not enough scales.
WATDJ (We at The Diet Joke) don’t think a new way to measure fat is going to make much difference. Here in America we have plenty of scales, plenty of food and plenty of ways to measure fat. We have plenty of fat people too.
Obesity is fast becoming a global epidemic with one in ten adults worldwide considered obese. It might make us feel better to know we’re not alone in our struggle, but it shouldn’t.
The Diet Joke Receives Reader Views Award
Saturday, March 5th, 2011
The Diet Joke receives a Reader Views Award in the category of Health/Fitness. Thank you, Reader Views!
