But it's Diet Coke!

Figure 6

When I was growing up, my mom had something of a Diet Coke addiction.  Actually, addiction is a huge understatement; if my mom could have had an IV drip of Diet Coke hooked up to her she would have been ecstatic.  Sadly, a similar relationship recently existed between Dr Pepper and me.  You would think that my mom would relate, but after eight years of rehab involving Weight Watchers and many, many tennis matches, she kicked the Diet Coke habit and can hardly stand to have soda in the house.  (Sometimes when I come home from school my dad will sneak some Dr Peppers into the back of the fridge though…shhh.) So why did my mom drink Diet Coke in the first place?  I would say it was because she was looking to drink a “healthier” option of Coke, but the two products hardly taste the same.  Perhaps the only reason is Diet Coke is well, diet.

Like my mom, I have also tried removing soda (lifeblood) from my diet.  My grand (what I thought was genius) scheme was to remove one harmful ingredient at a time.  I’d heard horror stories of Dr Pepper drinkers like me going through actual withdrawals; without the constant flow of sugar and caffeine, they got shaky, sweaty, and experienced piercing headaches for at least a week.  Not wanting that to happen to me, my soda-eradicating timeline was as follows:

Alex's Farewell to Dr Pepper

Dr Pepper --> Diet Coke --> Sprite --> Lemonade--> Water aka Freedom

As I’m drinking a glass of Diet Coke right now, I can tell you right now that this master plan didn’t work out.

            What did stick was a switch from Dr Pepper to Diet Coke.  I know that replacing sugar with aspertame isn’t the most ideal way to cut out sugar or my ties to a booming corporate business, but keeping up my addiction without the calories is enough for me.  Maybe I’ll kick the habit after graduate school when caffeine won’t be an essential component of my diet. The point is, Diet Coke has given me and other Americans an opportunity to keep purchasing their product without affecting our waistlines. By labeling processed food with health claims, food distributors look to gain the business of the consumer who’s looking to lead a healthier lifestyle.  As someone who has done their soda research, I know that labeling a can as a “diet drink” and adding chemical substitutes isn’t much better than the original product.  I’m still drinking it though.

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Figure 6 is a direct copy from the Coca-Cola website of one 16 oz bottle of Diet Coke.

Subway

Figure 5

Besides their slogan “Eat Fresh” and a promise that selected sandwiches are “six grams of fat or less,” the first thing Subway wants you to think about as a consumer is Jared, the man who lost over 100lbs eating Subway sandwiches.  As someone who’s being paid to be a spokesman, I don’t feel all that bad for Jared, but he has forever deemed himself as the Subway sandwich guy.  Jared might be a great father to ten children from Zimbabwe, teach Sunday school, or volunteer at soup kitchens, but everywhere he goes he is a walking advertisement for mediocre sandwiches.  Jared may not be doing it in the same way, but he has allowed himself, like many other Americans, to be defined by the food he eats. 

I recently found out that Subway surpassed McDonald’s in the number of restaurant locations this year and is currently leading with a staggering total of 34,218, about 200 more than its fatty competitor (NPR).  Although it’s a relief to hear that people are more likely to eat a deli sandwich than a Big Mac, the fact remains that Subway is still just a fast food restaurant at heart.  You’ve seen the shiny floors and the dirty booths; those booths are dirty because minimum wage earners don’t care if you’re eating your $4 sandwich of processed products at the Taj Mahal of Subways.  A foot-long sub with chips and a drink cost as much as one hour of their labor. While Subway generally has more healthy options to offer, it still shares the same basic business ideals as McDonald’s and fast food restaurants in general.  Americans are looking for convenience, fast production time, and something that goes with soda when it comes to the average workweek lunch.  Instead of packing their own lunch and saving money, however, at Subway Americans can have a meal that says, “I’m healthy and cost effective.” Wouldn’t our founding fathers just beaming with pride?

If one less Big Mac is consumed in this world because of the existence of Subway, more power to them.  But Subway is now the leading representation of what Americans crave the most: convenience.  In Austin between MLK and 30^th street (about 9 blocks) I can think of at least four Subway locations off the top of my head.  If Subway’s sole purpose is to help Americans become healthier, make us walk the extra two blocks! I think our Big Mac shaped bodies can handle the extra strain.

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Figure 5 is not the Nutrition Facts for actual convenience, but rather a 6” Subway turkey breast sandwich plain and dry.

Eating Your Feelings

Figure 4

 

I’ve been there too.  You’re feeling a little down, maybe your significant other and you got in a fight or broke up.  You find yourself at the freezer, cold air blasting at your face and sneaking down to your feet…and there it is: your favorite chocolate ice cream.  After all, chocolate ice cream has the magical healing powers to mend your broken heart.  Whether your go-to mood lifter is ice cream, mac and cheese, or mom’s leftover meat loaf, comfort food provides an immediate sense of emotional relief that burning your ex-boyfriend’s sweater just doesn’t deliver. 

When I look back on my fondest memories of home or family gatherings, food is almost always involved.  This makes sense, as preparing food and eating is primarily a social activity. As a child, just about every night before I went to bed my dad and I shared a bowl of ice cream and looked at the moon.  So, now when I have some ice cream, I get the warm fuzzies and think about my childhood home. This is an example classic Pavlov conditioning: “an environmental event that previously had no relation to a given reflex could, through experience, trigger a reflex” (Fredholm).  In other words, ice cream gives me the sense of being comforted even if I’m thousands of miles away from home and my dad.

               So our brains are to blame then, right?  Not exactly.  Although psychologically an individual may associate certain food with a feeling of comfort, diving into that half gallon of Blue Bell is choosing to gain immediate emotional relief rather than actually deal with the problem at hand.  It’s like treating a recurring headache with fast-acting pills rather than going to the doctor and seeing if it’s something more serious.  Americans shouldn’t be using food as a way to treat their problems.  That’s how The Biggest Loser wound up being a popular television show.  Sure, eating is associated with being around loved ones, being social, and celebrating special occasions.  This doesn’t mean that food itself should be labeled as something more than what nourishes our bodies.  Make sure the next time you’re looking at the chocolate ice cream nutrition label that you’re not mentally inserting comfort into the list of ingredients. 

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Figure 4 is not the Nutrition Facts for all comfort food, just my personal comfort food, a half-gallon of Blue Bell milk chocolate ice cream.

Nabisco Fig Newtons

Figure 3

When looking at a nutrition label, the first thing you should look at (literally) is serving size.  I’ll admit it, I’m not an expert at nutrition label reading, nor do I really care to read them, but serving size is one of the main things I pay attention to when I do.  Now, don’t think I read nutrition labels or look at serving sizes because I’m concerned about my weight.  I would rather eat a lot of what I love (chocolate) and keep the extra pounds rather than staring longingly at that extra cookie I can’t have.  Personally, I look at the serving size on nutrition labels to see how honest the food distribution company whose product I’ve purchased is being with me.

            For example, in his skit, comedian Brain Regan pokes fun at the serving size on a box of Nabisco Fig Newtons.  Regan states that his doctor told him to “watch what [he’s] eating” and to “read food labels.”  He stops in the middle of inspecting the label, whose “fat content looked good” and notes the serving size is only two cookies.  I share Regan’s disbelief that a single serving of Fig Newtons is only 31 grams, or two cookies.  Does Nabisco honestly believe that the average consumer will only eat two Fig Newtons?  As Regan also states, I eat Fig Newtons by the sleeve. In his act, Regan points out the obvious disconnect between food distributers and the public.  

            So are the food labels themselves to blame?  The Food and Drug Administration, the agency that regulates food labels, states in their 1996 study that food labels serve to aid consumers in “comparing two products, judging healthfulness, verifying claims, estimating servings needed to meet the daily requirements for a nutrient, and balancing nutrients in a daily diet” (Levy, Fein, & Schucker). While the FDA has given the public a tool to muddle through our beloved artificially produced food, the malleability of food labels easily allows big food distributors to trick the public into buying their product.  Who actually has time to convert a serving size given in grams into an actual edible object?  Food labels are supposed to illustrate what consumers are putting into their bodies, not serve as a way to backhandedly gain a buyer’s trust. 

            It pains me that it’s come to the point that you have to bring your ‘A’ game to the supermarket.  Walking through those middle aisles give me a bigger headache than watching Rick Perry stumbling through a speech.  Big food companies will try just about anything to get you to purchase their product, whether it be through advertising Sour Patch Kids as a “fat free food,” offering lower prices than a leading competitor, or manipulating serving sizes in order to make nutrition values look more favorable.  American values of big production and low cost become glaringly obvious when it’s staring back up at you in the form of a giant nine dollar steak on your dinner plate.  If you care about what you eat, be smart. Don’t let the big guys (or food labels) fool you. Next time you go to grab those processed fruit-filled treats, ask yourself, can you have just two?

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Figure 3 is a direct picture from the NabiscoWorld website of the Nutrition Facts of a 1lb. bag of Fig Newtons.

KFC's Cheesy Bacon Bowl

Figure 2

“Would you like fries with that?” is usually the question that comes to mind when getting an addition to your order at a fast food venue.  KFC’s introduction of their Cheesy Bacon Bowl, however, might be changing that tune.  KFC attempts to sweep fast food lovers off their feet with their new product.  Keep in mind their fans have gotten a little chunkier after eating their concoction of mashed potatoes, gravy, fried chicken, sweet corn, a four-cheese blend, and bacon, so it might be a little difficult.  So what makes KFC’s famous bowls so famous? “We put bacon on it” (CBS News).  After all, everything is better with bacon…right?

          Let’s face it, some meals are better when certain ingredients are added to the mix: sugar, butter, and garlic, to name a few.  All of these ingredients, however, were not once living animals.  There are even dog treats with artificial bacon flavor; since when would a dog eat a pig?  Don’t get me wrong; I like bacon an appropriate amount, which is every once in awhile next to my eggs.  Being an average American omnivore I don’t have a particular problem with eating animals, but something about crumbling what was once a pig onto to everything, including other meat, seems shameful.  

               Jonathon Foer, author of Eating Animals, describes shame as “what we feel when we almost entirely—yet not entirely—forget social expectations and our obligations to others in favor of our immediate gratification” (37).  The pork, beef, and poultry industry have given Americans immediate access to large amounts of meat at an affordable price to consumers (Dollar menus, anyone?) but at a terrible cost.  The price of a Cheesy Bacon Bowl means different things to different people.  At the register, it’s $3.99 plus tax.  If you’ve read the book Eating Animals or just like barnyard animals in general, the cost is animal suffering.  If you’re a vegan, the cost is the thousands of animals slaughtered per day.  If you’re a fast food giant, it’s a whole lot of money in your pocket.  However, the shame of purchasing a product for the sake of immediate gratification applies to every American.  Our country is consumed with instant gratification; at what point will oour greed consume us?

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Figure 2 is a representation of the Nutrition Facts of one KFC’s Famous Bowlã-Mashed Potato with Gravy as listed on the KFC website (minus the “1 bowl of shame”) and does not include the additional calories or nutritional value of the sweet corn and bacon in the Cheesy Bacon Bowl. Because it is only offered for a limited time, by law KFC is not required to list the Nutrition Facts of the Cheesy Bacon Bowl.  As consumers we are only left to guesstimate what the Nutrition Facts actually are.  Comforting. 

The Most (least) Important Meal of the Day

Figure 1

I hate mornings.  I know a lot of people in this world say that, but my hatred rings truer than an oven timer going off hours after your Mom told you her famous cookies were almost ready.  While most of my detestation comes from not getting as much sleep as I want (at least 10 hours), another main reason mornings aren’t my favorite time is because breakfast food is simply sub-par compared to that of lunch or dinner.  For me, breakfast food just isn’t that memorable; I know my mornings of high school have completely blurred together.  It was always the same question: “Do you want toast, cereal, oatmeal…Cream of Wheat?” They’re all the same: bland.  I know that there are other breakfast food choices out there, but if breakfast is really the most important meal of the day, why do other meals take the cake?

            When you think about going out on a nice date, you think about going to a nice restaurant with good service, maybe with romantic lighting, candles, having a nice glass of wine, looking into your loved one’s eyes, you name it.  Now, this nice date is happening over dinner, right?  Meals have come to take on certain standards because of the social situations that are associated with that meal.  You’re more likely to whisper sweet nothings into someone’s ear over filet mignon and asparagus than over cold cereal (or maybe an omelet if you’re getting fancy) when you’re hardly awake, right?  Breakfast in the United States has turned into a time where eating a bar (whether Power or cereal) is socially acceptable because of the fast pace most Americans move at today.

            This fast paced mentality, which mainly can be attributed to a society where corporate interests have a higher value than those of individuals, has actually come to affect the way we nourish our bodies.  Research on breakfast in America conducted by the United States Department of Agriculture shows that breakfast only accounts for “16% of the day’s total energy intake,” with the most common items being coffee, milk, and cold cereal (Kiczynski, Cleveland, Goldman, & Moshfegh).  So, according to the USDA, you gain just about nothing from breakfast compared to lunch or dinner.  I would like to think that Americans don’t take their time with breakfast because it isn’t normally an incredibly social meal, but maybe it isn’t a social meal because we’ve told ourselves we have better things to do.  I can’t ever think of a time where I had a long, elaborate breakfast during a workweek.  With earning money as the top priority in the United States today, you’ve got to get out of your bunny slippers, get your briefcase and head out the door.  Power bar?

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Figure 1 does not accurately represent the nutrition facts of a bowl of cereal but is a symbolic representation of breakfast accounting for 16% of average energy intake (according to the USDA).