Shaw's Helps You Shop Smarter

Shaw's Supermarkets has rolled out a new program in their New England based stores that color code thousands of items in their supermarket based on their nutritional information.  The aim of this system is to help shoppers identify healthy items faster and easier.  For example Dark Orange is for whole grains and Purple is low in calories.  I think this is a fantastic idea and I hope it gets adopted in some form or another in grocery stores across the country (hell, world!).  It can be very tedious walking around the store looking at countless nutritional labels.  This way if I see something new I might want to try, I can know before I even get to it if I should really be eating it or not.

Miss America Hopeful - A Former Heavyweight

I just read about Miss South Carolina who in the past few years has lost 110 lbs and is now on the road to a possible Miss America crown.  Inspirational?  Hell yes.  I also love that she lost her weight over a period of 3 years by simply eating well and exercising.  We aren't all 'The Biggest Loser' nor should we be.  With simple lifestyle changes and hard work and a forgiving attitude, you too could be the next Miss America!

Wisdom For Your Holiday Weekend

I thought this blog post over at Huffington Post was quite good.  It talks about the behavioral and psychological issues that can be behind humans having a difficult time losing weight.  As a tease, here is the first line of the blog...which I'm in love with right now.  Enjoy your weekends!

If you gave a test to a million people and three-quarters of them flunked, would you attribute their failure to a lack of willpower or laziness?

Can You Spot 100 Calories?

Take this fun little quiz from Women's Health and see if you can guess which serving size of each food or snack is 100 calories.  They asked which 'Healthy Snacks'...but some of the items you guess are french fries, a whopper, pizza and doughnuts.  I think they should  have stuck with which FOODS are 100 calories.

Post your scores!

New Health Care Prevention Strategy

So the White House announced it's new strategy for prevention in Health Care yesterday.  It is a very broad sweeping initiative that goes outside of the normal areas of health care to include transportation, housing, the workplace and the environment.  You can see an overview here and also download the entire plan.  From what I've ready if we can actually start getting people to think about health and the impacts their seemingly unrelated decisions can make on it, that would be fantastic.  I would never have thought to say 'I'm building a new housing community...are there sidewalks for exercise?  Is it close to shops?'  It makes you think.  There are so many little things we can all do to help with the big picture.  But can we change people enough to have an impact?  What do you think?

New Healthier Oils Coming To You

It looks like scientists have been hard at work.  The folks over at Dow AgroSciences have just announced that they have created the first ever saturated fat free sunflower oil.  This is not only great for just us as consumers using it around the house, but it would be FANTASTIC if companies started using it in their food processes thus eliminating a lot of the saturated fat in their products.  According the the press release:

Omega-9 Sunflower Oil is all natural and can support an all natural package claim, as the oil comes from NEXERA™ seeds which were developed by Dow AgroSciences through traditional plant-breeding. And because the oil has a very high level of  stability, many formulations will not require antioxidants, TBHQ or partial hydrogenation to achieve the desired shelf life allowing for a cleaner ingredient label.

 I say good job science!  If we can start creating better ingredients in a natural and healthy way we can improve ALL of our food offerings, even if it's processed.  All I want to know is when I can find this on my grocery shelves!

Get Spark*D!

The folks over at SparkPeople have rolled out a new program just for diabetics called Spark*D.  I think this is a great addition to their already comprehensive site.  I myself use SparkPeople to track and gain support from other users.  Now maybe I can get my husband, who has diabetes, on the site as well.  If anyone has used this, let me know what you think of it!

Comprehensive Fitness Tracking + Social Interaction

It seems fitness tracker RunKeeper is upping it's game.  Not only can you track your run via an app for your smart phone, but now you can implement other tracking devices and pull together your daily movements, heart rates, sleeping habits and more.  And what's even better is you can compare yourselves to your friends and other users.  I'm personally liking the FitBit which is about the size of your standard money clip.  It senses motion via a 3-D motion sensor and tracks your movements day and night...though I'm not sure how comfortable it would be to sleep with it clipped on, but I'd have to try it.  Granted, this is even MORE money we would have to spend, but it might be nice to have something tracking that for me...since I'm not the best at writing this down for myself.  It will definitely be great for anyone that loves graphs!

The Complex System That Is Our Bodies

Another great article I found about how our bodies work and how to work with them in order to keep our weight and health in check.  I like that there are a few small changes you can take from the article that could potentially have a big impact on your weight.  I mostly want to show my husband the section about how the brain doesn't know the difference between walking in the mall while shopping or walking on a treadmill.  He laughed at me when I used to walk in place while watching TV.  I was still moving!

Choose My Plate

The new graphic replacing the USDA's pyramid has been revealed today along with a (new?) website, http://www.choosemyplate.gov/.  I really like the new look of the graphic.  It's simple to understand and visually appealing.  I browsed around the site and they also have some really useful tools like a food tracker, foodepedia and meal plans for the likes of preschoolers, moms to be and the general population.  Now, they don't give you recipes, but they do tell you how many cups/ounces/etc you should be getting of a particular food group each week.  This is based on your age, gender, height, weight and physical activity.  I will definitely be checking out the food plan for moms-to-be when I get pregnant.

New Plate Shaped Design To Replace Traditional Food Pyramid

It looks like the Obama administration will be changing out the old Food Pyramid design with one that shows your food groups and percentages on an actual dinner plate.  I think this will work much better as it will be a real life visual that people can go by.  However, I'll reserve my final decision until it's released this Thursday.  But it makes a hell of a lot more sense to me, especially as a designer.  What do you guys think?

Yet Another Weight Loss Journey Show

Who here has seen the ads for ABC's new show Extreme Makeover: Weight Loss Edition?  I'm pretty much a sucker for watching any weight loss show (though some are much better than others) so I will definitely be watching the first episode of this.  I enjoy the concept of each episode being a journey of 1 year with each participant.  I also like that this takes place during their normal lives (as normal as having a trainer move in with you is) so that we can see people losing weight while still having jobs and families.  Who else is going to watch this?

Your One Stop Recipe Shop

I just found out about this great new recipe search engine called Foodily.  This search engine aggregates recipes from all over the web from tiny little blogs to giants like Food Network.  They then not only spit out the recipe but their own nutritional calculations based on each ingredient.  You can search by ingredient, vague food term (i.e. Mexican dish) and also refine your search with things like 'low-fat' or 'low-carb'.  I think this is fantastic.  I have so many recipes bookmarked all over the damn place that I lose track.  So you can also save favorites or even 'Like' a recipe on Facebook.  I will definitely be utilizing this new search engine, how about you?

Jenny Craig For The Win!

It looks like Consumer Reports has ranked the most popular and doctor approved weight loss programs and Jenny Craig has come out on top.  It looks like the rankings are determined by nutrition, weight loss and the dropout rate.  An astounding 92% of participants stayed with Jenny Craig for 2 years.  Of course, as they warn and I do as well...that doesn't mean it's right for you.  If you like to cook, then eating prepackaged meals isn't going to be something you will stick with.  I, however, might give it a try.  I'm very good friends with my microwave.

In case you were wondering here were the top rankings overall:

1. Jenny Craig
2. Slim Fast
3. Weight Watchers
4. The Zone Diet
5. The Ornish Diet
6. The Atkins Diet

Are You Ready For This Jelly?

I looks like Beyonce is now involved with Michelle Obama's 'Let's Move' campaign.  The singer recorded a video of her dancing w/ junior high school students to a remake of one of her songs.  Apparently the song will be distributed to students around the country in an effort to make exercise more fun.  I'm not sure how well this will actually work, but celebrity endorsements can surprise you.  Either way it's a fun idea and I'm always up for a good dance!

Too Much Sitting, Not Enough Movement

I don't know if any of you have heard about the articles going around about how even if you exercise regularly, if you have a job where you sit all day, it might not be enough.  This has sparked talk of standing desk and the like.  This article not only explains the health issues of sitting all day, but also offers advice on how to insert a little more movement into your day.  Apparently just standing up a few times a day will help a great deal.  I'm particularly fond of the animation of the man disco dancing at his desk.  Because that wouldn't garner any odd looks...

I personally like to keep things moving a bit by listening to music on my iPod and tapping my feet around. What do some of you do to keep moving throughout the day?

The Soda Tax: Yay or Nay?

Obama tried to tax sodas as part of his health care reform package, but it got destroyed by lobbyists.  Now some states are debating putting a tax on soda.  Honestly, at 1 cent per ounce it's not going to break anyone's bank (an extra 12cents per can...go check your couch!), but it could bring in millions of dollars to help fund various healthy initiative programs.  I, for one, think this a great idea.  Some naysayers think this is a slippery slope, that we could start taxing bread and milk next.  But really, soda has absolutely NO nutritional value.  In the scheme of our daily nutritional needs, soda is a luxury...and not a particularly healthy one.  What do you think?

Two Myths Debunked

Eating low-fat foods will make you healthy
Verdict: False

A low-fat diet and a healthy diet are not, surprisingly, one and the same. As mentioned above, low-fat foods are often deceptive, containing marginally reduced levels of fat in exchange for a high dose of sugar. You’ll often see it in the office environment: People concerned with their weight will stick with microwaved low-fat meals and never lose an ounce. If you are trying to become healthier through your diet, the rules are simple: Eat fresh, unprocessed foods. Get enough fruit and vegetables in your diet. Remember to balance. An all-protein diet might be the diet of choice for a weight lifter but not for your average Joe. You need to reduce your calorie intake (and sugars contain fats alongside calories). Eating simple, unprocessed food that you have prepared yourself is the best way to take control of your health.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/health/2011/04/19/6-health-myths/#ixzz1K5BVgxaW

The fatter you are, the unhealthier you are
Verdict: False
If we think about the opposite of this statement (the thinner you are, the healthier you are), we’d be a nation of anorexics. It’s pretty obvious that people who are morbidly obese are unhealthy -- but so are those at the other end of the scale, who suffer from malnutrition and vitamin deficiencies, among a host of other health problems. It’s worth pointing out that if you are eating "low-fat" products regularly, you should be checking the nutrition labels. These are usually packed with sugar, often more than regular products. Sports fans will have known this from day on. Those linebackers are just as fit as the rest of the players on the field and yet they’re about three times their size. There are, however, a number of illnesses associated with being overweight, so if you are piling on the pounds, get yourself to the gym and dismiss this health myth.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/health/2011/04/19/6-health-myths/#ixzz1K5BZe7s0

Great New Online Comparison App

I just found out about this great new site that lets you compare items in hundreds of catagories.  It's called http://www.findthebest.com/ and I'm sharing because they have an entire section dedicated to health comparisons.  They have things like Diet Plans (which only a handful were medically sound), Snacks, Exercises, Frozen Dinner Nutrition, etc.  Check it out and maybe you'll learn something!

Baby Wants Carbs...

I was reading about a study that has been going on about finding a link to what a pregnant woman eats and the DNA outcome of their child in reference to obesity.  Apparently, they have found that women who eat a low car diet in their first trimester can actually alter their babies DNA to make them MORE prone to obesity later on.  With all the low carb hype that is going around these days, I expected the opposite.  As did my fiance, who when I started telling him about this study, said 'Yeah, you'll be eating chicken and salad...'.

I hope they eventually find out enough about a mothers nutrition while pregnant that they can give a good outline for woman to go by.  And hopefully in the next few years so I can use it!