Comments on: For The Love of Food

By: Maureen

Maureen — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 17:27:41 +0000

I think you took the Time Magazine story (10 Most Dangerous Foods) out of context. The caption to the story reads, “The American Academy of Pediatrics released a policy statement on Feb. 22, recommending the labeling and possible redesign of hot dogs to prevent choking deaths among children. Here’s a look at 10 risky foods.” It appears this is a list of foods that could cause choking or allergic reactions in young children, and I definitely can see how leafy greens, if cooked but not chopped appropriately, could be a choking hazard for a small child.

By: Adam | SEE

Adam | SEE — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 12:42:21 +0000

*Thanks for the links!
*Last weekend, I made the chick peas w/spinach. Looks like carrots this Sunday.

@Drew

*I am not sure that labels do anything, but serve as a strange form of advertising (which kind of fits with your two points). I explore this idea a little more in this post. http://goo.gl/F1YO

By: thomas

thomas — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 09:08:05 +0000

oh, just realized the article isn’t in your top10 but came from your delicious :/

By: thomas

thomas — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 09:04:29 +0000

“Physically fit students do better academically too: study”

Don’t you find their claims to be bogus? They found young people who are fit and do well in school. How did they find a correlation between the two measurements? Worse, now they probably want another grant to find the ‘why’ although they haven’t even proven the correlation. wicked.

By: Darya Pino

Darya Pino — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 17:39:21 +0000

Wow, excellent point Drew. I agree, though I am just happy to see them taking a stance at all in a direction indicating they care about the consumers.

But I agree with you completely and this is one of the main reasons I avoid foods with labels and packages at all!

By: Drew @ Cook Like Your Grandmother

Drew @ Cook Like Your Grandmother — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 14:53:29 +0000

I'm really conflicted on the FDA story. On the one hand, of course it's good to stop the bogus claims. And the Juicy Juice one you mention is one of the best. If it's not actually 100% juice they shouldn't be allowed to say so. But the first five items are all cases where saturated fat levels are not disclosed. Saturated fat is not unhealthy. To require it be "disclosed" is perpetuating fear of something that is actually a vital part of a healthy diet. (And I'll ignore any vegan who disagrees with that one. I know their arguments. I disagree.) This is the same FDA that won't allow companies to say that their milk comes from cows not treaded with bovine growth hormone, even though it's not. Because making that claim would imply that there's something wrong with BGH. Then there's the huge list -- about half of what's on that chart -- where you effectively can't claim anything for baby food, "because appropriate dietary levels have not been established for children in this age range". Well then how about establishing some guidelines? I may not agree with all your guidelines (see saturated fat claims) but apparently no one is able to tell me what's in their product until after you decide what "should" be in it. So the two problems are 1) The FDA has some really wrong-headed guidelines, based more on corporate preferences than science, and 2) They haven't been enforcing those guidelines anyway. I'm worried about the precedent of increasing enforcement before getting the guidelines fixed. I would much prefer guidelines that increase disclosure of what's in products. I would even like to be able to choose to buy products that don't meet FDA recommendations. Things like raw milk.