10 Healthy Nutrition Myths and Facts
Nutrition advice can be confusing, and sometimes contradictory. Should you gobble a big breakfast? Is fat-free fare best for weight loss? We asked our experts for the truth behind these and other myths about healthy eating. Here’s what you need to know...
When you hear the same thing repeatedly, you assume it’s true. But when it comes to nutrition advice, that strategy can lead us to eat more than we should and overlook healthy food choices.
From the benefits of a big breakfast to the nutritional value of organic food to the real cost of a healthy diet, we look for the truth behind 10 common nutrition “rules.” (What we found may surprise you.)
Healthy nutrition myth #1: Eat a big breakfast to lose weight.
Dieters have long been told that a heavy morning meal helps you eat less throughout the day, so you shed pounds.
But people who consume a 400-calorie breakfast don’t eat any less at lunch and dinner than those who have a smaller breakfast, according to a German study published in the Nutrition Journal in 2011.
Still, experts agree that you shouldn’t pass up breakfast, says Timothy S. Harlan, M.D., author of Just Tell Me What to Eat! (Da Capo Press) and medical director of Tulane University Medical Group in New Orleans.
“Skipping breakfast is associated with eating more over the course of the day, and people who eat breakfast have an easier time overall losing weight,” he says. Smart nutrition advice: Don’t order the truck driver’s special. Instead, stick to a lighter morning meal of 250-300 calories, Harlan suggests.
That’s about one slice of whole-wheat toast, 1-2 eggs and half a banana.
Enhance your modest breakfast by incorporating complex carbohydrates and some high-quality protein, he advises.
“You need both,” he says. “If you just have one or the other, you’ll run out of steam by midmorning.”
Healthy nutrition myth #2: Avoid red meat.
Actually, red meat is a good source of protein, iron and other essential nutrients. It has a place in a healthy diet along with poultry and fish, says Malena Perdomo, R.D., C.D.E., adjunct professor of nutrition at Metropolitan State College in Denver.
Dive into that red meat infrequently, however, according to a Harvard School of Public Health study published in the March 2012 online issue of Archives of Internal Medicine. Eating just 1 serving per day of unprocessed meat, like a steak, raises the risk of dying of cancer and cardiovascular disease 13%, and 20% for processed meats, such as bacon and hot dogs.
Smart nutrition advice: Skip the well-marbled porterhouse and rib-eye steaks, and look for lean cuts such as top sirloin, top round, bottom round and eye of round.
“If you choose lean cuts of meat – and there are plenty of those – and cook it in a low-fat manner, like grilling or broiling, you can still enjoy a nice steak,” Perdomo says. Healthy nutrition myth #3: Go fat-free to lower calorie intake.Fat-free treats often contain as many calories as regular versions do, and some have even more. For example, a typical fat-free oatmeal raisin cookie has 108 calories, while a regular one has 106.
That’s because “manufacturers replace those fat calories with something else, usually carbohydrates and sugar,” Harlan says.
Fat-free foods can be higher in sodium too.
Smart nutrition advice: “If you see a packaged, processed food labeled ‘fat-free,’ you need to be suspicious,” he says. “There’s a lot of research suggesting that if you choose something labeled ‘healthy,’ you’ll actually eat more of it.”
Ignore the claims on the front of the package and check out the Nutrition Facts label to compare calorie counts.
And it’s OK to eat the original version of your favorite treat – in moderation.
“It’ll taste better and you’ll be satisfied with less,” Harlan says. Healthy nutrition myth #4: Snacking throughout the day is a good idea.The concept of grazing all day long has led many of us down the path of overeating, say researchers at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.
They analyzed 30 years’ worth of data and found that U.S. adults ate a daily average of 4.8 meals and snacks in 2006, up from 3.8 in 1977. Eating more often added an extra 570 calories per day.
Smart nutrition advice: Skip the snacks unless you’re truly hungry, Perdomo advises.
“You don’t need three square meals and three snacks a day,” she says. “You shouldn’t need more than one snack a day.”
If you eat satisfying meals on a regular schedule, chances are you won’t need extra snacks.
However, if a hectic schedule tends to delay meals, keep healthy nibbles, such as fruit and nuts, on hand.
Healthy nutrition myth #5: Organic produce is more nutritious.
When comparing nutritional values of organic and conventional produce, it’s often a wash.
For example, a 2007 U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) study found that conventional grapefruit was higher in the antioxidant compound lycopene, while the organic version had more vitamin C.
Similarly, Washington State University researchers found that organic strawberries had more antioxidants, but the conventional ones were higher in potassium, a mineral that regulates blood pressure.Organic food has one distinct advantage: By law, companies can’t use chemical pesticides to produce organic fare, and avoiding those may be especially important for women of childbearing age.
Prenatal exposure to common agricultural pesticides was linked to decreased cognitive development by the time kids turned 7, according to 2011 research published in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives. An earlier study in the same journal tied prenatal pesticide exposure to increased blood pressure in young children.
Smart nutrition advice: Enjoy fruits and vegetables of all kinds. To minimize your exposure to agricultural chemicals, buy organic versions of the Environmental Working Group’s “Dirty Dozen” list of fruits and vegetables most likely to be contaminated with pesticides, such as apples and celery.
Healthy nutrition myth #6: If a food is 95% fat-free, it has only 5% fat.
This is another example of misleading food labels.
A “95% fat-free” claim simply means the food is 5% fat by weight. But fat has more than twice the calories of protein or carbs, so the percentage of fat calories per serving can be much higher.
For example, a serving of 95% fat-free ground beef has 152 calories, including 52 calories from fat. That’s about 35% fat calories.
Milk labeled “2% fat” also gets about a third of its calories from fat. Smart nutrition advice: Scrutinize the Nutrition Facts label.
“Look for the serving size – is it realistic?” Perdomo says. “Also look at the trans fat and saturated fat [listings].”
If the serving size is smaller than what you’d eat, do the math to calculate the amount of calories and fat you’ll really consume.
Healthy nutrition myth #7: Dietary cholesterol raises blood cholesterol.
Although the government’s Dietary Guidelines for Americans and other experts recommend limiting dietary cholesterol to less than 300 milligrams a day, other experts say that’s misleading.
“For 85% of Americans, dietary cholesterol doesn’t matter,” Harlan says.
A 2010 editorial in the journal Current Atherosclerosis Reports called for revisiting the 300-mg-a-day recommendation, noting that it was based on outdated animal research from the 1960s.
In fact, Canadian and European national health recommendations don’t set a limit on dietary cholesterol.
“Maybe 15% of people are ‘hyper-responders’ to cholesterol,” Harlan says. “When they consume dietary cholesterol, it raises their serum [blood] cholesterol. They usually have much higher cholesterol that’s much more difficult to control.”People with diabetes also tend to respond more to dietary cholesterol, he adds.
But for most people, cholesterol levels depend on a variety of factors, including saturated fat (and trans fat) intake, body fat, exercise and genetics.
Smart nutrition advice: If you’re healthy (and not diabetic or prediabetic), keep saturated fats to less than 10% of your diet – the amount recommended by the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, Harlan says.
Healthy nutrition myth #8: All carbohydrates make you fat.
The popularity of low-carb diets, such as Atkins and South Beach, fuels this misconception. But all carbs aren’t the same.
“Carbohydrates aren’t only in bread,” Perdomo says. “They’re also in vegetables, milk and yogurt.”
Refined carbohydrates, such as white rice, white bread and soda, may contribute to weight gain, according to the Harvard School of Public Health.
But in general, what makes you fat is consuming more calories than you burn, Perdomo adds.
Smart nutrition advice: Complex carbohydrates are rich in fiber, which helps you stay satisfied longer. So eat a variety of vegetables, fruits, beans and legumes. And choose whole grains, such as whole-grain bread and pasta, quinoa, brown rice, bulgur, oats and barley. Healthy nutrition myth #9: A healthful diet is too expensive.That can be true – but it doesn’t have to be.
The USDA’s new MyPlate guidelines recommend devoting half your plate to fruits and vegetables – about 4 cups a day for women.
That costs just $2 a day, or 50 cents per cup, according to a 2011 USDA study that averaged the price of fresh and processed fruits and vegetables.
But new research, also from the USDA, finds geography greatly affects the affordability of healthy food. Across the country, for example, whole grains tend to be pricier than refined grains – from 23% more expensive in San Francisco to 60% more expensive in rural Pennsylvania and New York.
“This price variation may contribute to geographic variation in diet and health outcomes,” the researchers note in the report.
Smart nutrition advice: Shop around and compare prices, because the USDA study found processed fruits and vegetables weren’t consistently more or less expensive than fresh produce. And look for sales, especially on fresh produce that’s in season.
Frozen vegetables can be just as nutritious as fresh, because they’re usually frozen right after harvesting.
If you do buy canned or frozen fruits and vegetables, choose the least-processed version you can find. Canned produce especially can be high in sodium and/or added sugar. Healthy nutrition myth #10: Dairy is the best source of calcium.Milk and other dairy products are a good source of calcium, but many other foods can provide a lot of calcium, with fewer calories and other nutrients too.
Smart nutrition advice: Make room for beans and greens on your plate.
“There are so many other things you can eat that are great choices for calcium – collards, turnip greens, spinach, broccoli,” Harlan says.
A half-cup of cooked spinach has 145 mg calcium and just 32 calories.
Leafy greens are also rich in vitamin K, which helps your body absorb the calcium to build strong bones.
Harlan is also a fan of fiber-rich beans as a calcium source: 1 cup of navy beans has 130 mg.
When you hear the same thing repeatedly, you assume it’s true. But when it comes to nutrition advice, that strategy can lead us to eat more than we should and overlook healthy food choices.
From the benefits of a big breakfast to the nutritional value of organic food to the real cost of a healthy diet, we look for the truth behind 10 common nutrition “rules.” (What we found may surprise you.)
Healthy nutrition myth #1: Eat a big breakfast to lose weight.
Dieters have long been told that a heavy morning meal helps you eat less throughout the day, so you shed pounds.
But people who consume a 400-calorie breakfast don’t eat any less at lunch and dinner than those who have a smaller breakfast, according to a German study published in the Nutrition Journal in 2011.
Still, experts agree that you shouldn’t pass up breakfast, says Timothy S. Harlan, M.D., author of Just Tell Me What to Eat! (Da Capo Press) and medical director of Tulane University Medical Group in New Orleans.
“Skipping breakfast is associated with eating more over the course of the day, and people who eat breakfast have an easier time overall losing weight,” he says. Smart nutrition advice: Don’t order the truck driver’s special. Instead, stick to a lighter morning meal of 250-300 calories, Harlan suggests.
That’s about one slice of whole-wheat toast, 1-2 eggs and half a banana.
Enhance your modest breakfast by incorporating complex carbohydrates and some high-quality protein, he advises.
“You need both,” he says. “If you just have one or the other, you’ll run out of steam by midmorning.”
Healthy nutrition myth #2: Avoid red meat.
Actually, red meat is a good source of protein, iron and other essential nutrients. It has a place in a healthy diet along with poultry and fish, says Malena Perdomo, R.D., C.D.E., adjunct professor of nutrition at Metropolitan State College in Denver.
Dive into that red meat infrequently, however, according to a Harvard School of Public Health study published in the March 2012 online issue of Archives of Internal Medicine. Eating just 1 serving per day of unprocessed meat, like a steak, raises the risk of dying of cancer and cardiovascular disease 13%, and 20% for processed meats, such as bacon and hot dogs.
Smart nutrition advice: Skip the well-marbled porterhouse and rib-eye steaks, and look for lean cuts such as top sirloin, top round, bottom round and eye of round.
“If you choose lean cuts of meat – and there are plenty of those – and cook it in a low-fat manner, like grilling or broiling, you can still enjoy a nice steak,” Perdomo says. Healthy nutrition myth #3: Go fat-free to lower calorie intake.Fat-free treats often contain as many calories as regular versions do, and some have even more. For example, a typical fat-free oatmeal raisin cookie has 108 calories, while a regular one has 106.
That’s because “manufacturers replace those fat calories with something else, usually carbohydrates and sugar,” Harlan says.
Fat-free foods can be higher in sodium too.
Smart nutrition advice: “If you see a packaged, processed food labeled ‘fat-free,’ you need to be suspicious,” he says. “There’s a lot of research suggesting that if you choose something labeled ‘healthy,’ you’ll actually eat more of it.”
Ignore the claims on the front of the package and check out the Nutrition Facts label to compare calorie counts.
And it’s OK to eat the original version of your favorite treat – in moderation.
“It’ll taste better and you’ll be satisfied with less,” Harlan says. Healthy nutrition myth #4: Snacking throughout the day is a good idea.The concept of grazing all day long has led many of us down the path of overeating, say researchers at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.
They analyzed 30 years’ worth of data and found that U.S. adults ate a daily average of 4.8 meals and snacks in 2006, up from 3.8 in 1977. Eating more often added an extra 570 calories per day.
Smart nutrition advice: Skip the snacks unless you’re truly hungry, Perdomo advises.
“You don’t need three square meals and three snacks a day,” she says. “You shouldn’t need more than one snack a day.”
If you eat satisfying meals on a regular schedule, chances are you won’t need extra snacks.
However, if a hectic schedule tends to delay meals, keep healthy nibbles, such as fruit and nuts, on hand.
Healthy nutrition myth #5: Organic produce is more nutritious.
When comparing nutritional values of organic and conventional produce, it’s often a wash.
For example, a 2007 U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) study found that conventional grapefruit was higher in the antioxidant compound lycopene, while the organic version had more vitamin C.
Similarly, Washington State University researchers found that organic strawberries had more antioxidants, but the conventional ones were higher in potassium, a mineral that regulates blood pressure.Organic food has one distinct advantage: By law, companies can’t use chemical pesticides to produce organic fare, and avoiding those may be especially important for women of childbearing age.
Prenatal exposure to common agricultural pesticides was linked to decreased cognitive development by the time kids turned 7, according to 2011 research published in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives. An earlier study in the same journal tied prenatal pesticide exposure to increased blood pressure in young children.
Smart nutrition advice: Enjoy fruits and vegetables of all kinds. To minimize your exposure to agricultural chemicals, buy organic versions of the Environmental Working Group’s “Dirty Dozen” list of fruits and vegetables most likely to be contaminated with pesticides, such as apples and celery.
Healthy nutrition myth #6: If a food is 95% fat-free, it has only 5% fat.
This is another example of misleading food labels.
A “95% fat-free” claim simply means the food is 5% fat by weight. But fat has more than twice the calories of protein or carbs, so the percentage of fat calories per serving can be much higher.
For example, a serving of 95% fat-free ground beef has 152 calories, including 52 calories from fat. That’s about 35% fat calories.
Milk labeled “2% fat” also gets about a third of its calories from fat. Smart nutrition advice: Scrutinize the Nutrition Facts label.
“Look for the serving size – is it realistic?” Perdomo says. “Also look at the trans fat and saturated fat [listings].”
If the serving size is smaller than what you’d eat, do the math to calculate the amount of calories and fat you’ll really consume.
Healthy nutrition myth #7: Dietary cholesterol raises blood cholesterol.
Although the government’s Dietary Guidelines for Americans and other experts recommend limiting dietary cholesterol to less than 300 milligrams a day, other experts say that’s misleading.
“For 85% of Americans, dietary cholesterol doesn’t matter,” Harlan says.
A 2010 editorial in the journal Current Atherosclerosis Reports called for revisiting the 300-mg-a-day recommendation, noting that it was based on outdated animal research from the 1960s.
In fact, Canadian and European national health recommendations don’t set a limit on dietary cholesterol.
“Maybe 15% of people are ‘hyper-responders’ to cholesterol,” Harlan says. “When they consume dietary cholesterol, it raises their serum [blood] cholesterol. They usually have much higher cholesterol that’s much more difficult to control.”People with diabetes also tend to respond more to dietary cholesterol, he adds.
But for most people, cholesterol levels depend on a variety of factors, including saturated fat (and trans fat) intake, body fat, exercise and genetics.
Smart nutrition advice: If you’re healthy (and not diabetic or prediabetic), keep saturated fats to less than 10% of your diet – the amount recommended by the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, Harlan says.
Healthy nutrition myth #8: All carbohydrates make you fat.
The popularity of low-carb diets, such as Atkins and South Beach, fuels this misconception. But all carbs aren’t the same.
“Carbohydrates aren’t only in bread,” Perdomo says. “They’re also in vegetables, milk and yogurt.”
Refined carbohydrates, such as white rice, white bread and soda, may contribute to weight gain, according to the Harvard School of Public Health.
But in general, what makes you fat is consuming more calories than you burn, Perdomo adds.
Smart nutrition advice: Complex carbohydrates are rich in fiber, which helps you stay satisfied longer. So eat a variety of vegetables, fruits, beans and legumes. And choose whole grains, such as whole-grain bread and pasta, quinoa, brown rice, bulgur, oats and barley. Healthy nutrition myth #9: A healthful diet is too expensive.That can be true – but it doesn’t have to be.
The USDA’s new MyPlate guidelines recommend devoting half your plate to fruits and vegetables – about 4 cups a day for women.
That costs just $2 a day, or 50 cents per cup, according to a 2011 USDA study that averaged the price of fresh and processed fruits and vegetables.
But new research, also from the USDA, finds geography greatly affects the affordability of healthy food. Across the country, for example, whole grains tend to be pricier than refined grains – from 23% more expensive in San Francisco to 60% more expensive in rural Pennsylvania and New York.
“This price variation may contribute to geographic variation in diet and health outcomes,” the researchers note in the report.
Smart nutrition advice: Shop around and compare prices, because the USDA study found processed fruits and vegetables weren’t consistently more or less expensive than fresh produce. And look for sales, especially on fresh produce that’s in season.
Frozen vegetables can be just as nutritious as fresh, because they’re usually frozen right after harvesting.
If you do buy canned or frozen fruits and vegetables, choose the least-processed version you can find. Canned produce especially can be high in sodium and/or added sugar. Healthy nutrition myth #10: Dairy is the best source of calcium.Milk and other dairy products are a good source of calcium, but many other foods can provide a lot of calcium, with fewer calories and other nutrients too.
Smart nutrition advice: Make room for beans and greens on your plate.
“There are so many other things you can eat that are great choices for calcium – collards, turnip greens, spinach, broccoli,” Harlan says.
A half-cup of cooked spinach has 145 mg calcium and just 32 calories.
Leafy greens are also rich in vitamin K, which helps your body absorb the calcium to build strong bones.
Harlan is also a fan of fiber-rich beans as a calcium source: 1 cup of navy beans has 130 mg.
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