FREELY EAT
2/4/2015
Acai – Have you heard of this wonderful fruit and all of it’s benefits but been blown away by the price???? The acai fruit has been incorporated into many nutritional beverages and foods which are then sold at premium prices. After reading all of the information, I almost became convinced that my diet was severely lacking because I wasn’t buying these foods and drinks and almost went ahead and paid the money to try it. But… it was a LOT of money. Around $40 for one bottle of juice from one company. And nagging little thought kept playing around in the back of my mind- did I really need something so expensive? Wasn’t there another less expensive way to bet the benefits? Well, I think I’ve answered my question. And on the off chance that you’ve encountered these or other similar nutritional foods and beverages and wondered the same thing- I thought I’d share what I learned.
First of all, what is the acai? The short answer is that it’s a berry grown on acai palm trees that has some pretty amazing nutrition properties. For one, it has a huge amount of antioxidants. (1) To put it in layman’s terms, the acai berry is very very good for you!
For the purposes of this article, I’m going to pick on one specific nutritional beverage. Please don’t think I have something against the makers or distributors of this or any other food or beverage – I don’t. I’m actually thrilled that their customers are experiencing better health and their distributors are making money at the same time. I’m simply trying to point out the facts because I believe that it can be easy to get caught up in the marketing of these products. I also work with low income people who could never afford $40 for a bottle of juice, but are in as much need of healthy food as those who can easily afford the high cost.
So that we can make a comparison- but let’s put a number on the antioxidant capacity, otherwise known as and ORAC score (Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity). And it happens to be measured in micromoles of Trolox Equivalents, or TE. Kind of makes me want to come up with some unit of measurement- then I could say something like- you need 50 Kempson Equivalents. If you knew the Kempsons, you’d know that 50 in one spot is always complete chaos. But I digress…. If the nutritional beverage we’re discussing was 100% acai juice, then one serving would have and ORAC score 61,620 TE. Wow!!! That’s amazing!!! But it’s not. Basically, if you drink 2oz a day of this juice (which is the recommended serving), you’ll get just under 2000 TE. (2) That’s quite a dilution, but still pretty good, right? But consider the lowly small red bean. 1/2 cup of small red beans have an ORAC of 13,727 TE (3). That’s right. 1/2 cup of small red beans have about 6 times the amount in the recommend daily amount of 2oz of this acai nutritional juice.
So instead of spending $40 a bottle on juice, why not eat small red beans (also called the Mexican red bean)? Well, for one, I’m betting you’ve probably never even heard of small red beans. Are they some other exotic nutritional super food that you have to travel to a specialty health food store to buy? Or buy from a multi-level marketing company? Or end up joining the multi-level marketing company in order to get a discount on so you can afford to buy it? No. They are sold at Wal-mart. That’s right. Wal-mart. You can buy a 1 pound bag of small red beans at Super Walmart for about $1. 1 pound cooks up to approximately 5-6 cups. That’s 10-12 servings. Add in about $.01-.02 per serving for the cost of cooking, (4). And that puts us at a whopping $0.11-0.12 per serving. Or you could pay 25 times more for a serving of the Acai nutritional beverage and get 1/6 the antioxidants. (~$40 a bottle for 12-13 2oz servings.) Is it worth it?
The makers of the nutritional juice would argue that there are more benefits than just the antioxidant capacity of the juice that should convince you to spend your money on it. The American Cancer Society says… oh sorry- make that the American Cancer Center says that the acai berry “Provides High Energy, Reduces The Signs Of Aging, Lowers Cholesterol, Kills Cancer Cells And Greatly Increases Heart Health.” (5) OK. I’m sure there are many benefits from the juice. However, I would argue that there are more than antioxidants you are getting from small red beans too. Take the fact that in a 1/2 cup serving- which you could eat in a burrito, a burrito bowl, made into almost any kind of soup or chile, or just cooked with seasonings, have about only 60 calories and 16 grams of fiber. Hmmm… That fiber is not only healthy for you, but it helps to fill you up so you feel fuller without eating so many calories (which can lead to weight loss.) Add in the iron, calcium and multiple other nutrients, and I’d say you have not only a super-food, but a WOW-THAT’S-AMAZINGLY-CHEAP-AND-NUTRITIOUS-SUPER-FOOD.
But lest you think I have an axe to grind with the makers of this and other nutritional beverages and foods (I don’t), here is one benefit of the juice- it’s easier to pour a glass of nutrition-insurance and then not have to worry about eating right. Wait, is that a good thing???
Another benefit the juice has over beans is that eating beans can cause gas. True. But did you know that beans cause gas when they are not soaked before cooking them? If you prepare the beans properly (read the package directions) and give your body a week or two to adjust to eating more fiber, you can eat beans without losing your friends. I should add here that you should talk to a doctor, nutritionist or health care professional before introducing new foods into your diet. (I’ll save the article on America’s love-affair with law-suits for another time.)
Now, I’ve picked on one nutritional beverage. I’m NOT saying it’s a bad product. I’m saying it’s expensive. If you don’t mind paying the money- I think you can get some benefits from drinking it. And to be fair, I should compare it to all of the other acai products out there, but honestly, I believe that most, if not all of the acai nutritional beverages and foods currently being marketed might fall into this same category- good nutritional benefits at an exorbitant price.
Kathryn Kempson, M.S. Nutritional Science
Kathryn Kempson is a Nutritional Consultant with Freely Eat, Nutritional Consulting.
(1) Researchers have found that the acai has the highest oxygen radical absorbance capacity (ORAC) ever reported for a fruit or vegetable. And just what does the high ORAC score mean? The ORAC is “a widely used testing method, which measures the anti-oxidant activity or capability of a food ingredient.” www.milnefruit.com/info/definitions.php. It’s usually measured in terms of micromoles of TE- or micromoles of Trolox equivalents- sometimes written as umolTE. Stay with me here- it’s just the unit of measurement. The higher the ORAC score of a food, (the higher the micromoles of TE) the more anti-oxidant activity it has.
(2) That’s considering 60g/1oz serving and there are 1027 micromoles TE/gram). 61,620 micromoles of TE is an amazingly high number!!! (Remember micromoles TE is just a unit of measurement of the ORAC score of a food- the higher the number, the better it is at being an anti-oxidant.) But it is not 100% acai juice. There are around 18 juices in the drink. According to a randomized controlled study, this particular acai Juice has High Antioxidant Capacity, accessed athttp://www.monavienow.org/html/antioxidant_study_results.asp on January 29, 2008, “the antioxidant capacity of (the nutritional beverage) in a cell-based antioxidant capacity (CAP) assay, as well as using the TEAC assay that found it to be 28,421 umolTE/L.” Or 28,421 umolTE/1000ml. According to Google, there are about 29.57ml in 1 ounce. That’s about 840.4 umolTE/ounce. Assuming you take the 2oz per day recommended (it might be recommended to be higher for some people?) that’s 1680.8 umol TE. Phew- that was a bunch of numbers. Bottom line- if you drink 2oz a day of this juice, you’ll get just under 2000 umol TE.
(3) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxygen_radical_absorbance_capacity#_note-3, accessed January 18, 2007) 1/2 cup of small red beans have an ORAC of 13,727 umolTE, 1/2cup of red kidney beans have 13,259 umol TE and pinto beans have 11,864umol TE.
(4) (as estimated by http://missvickie.com/library/investment.html, accessed January 18, 2008) which is about $0.12-0.24 an hour per batch or even less if you cook them in a crock pot.
(5) (http://www.american-cancer-center.org/cancer-news/publish/fignting-cancer-with-acai-berry.shtml accessed January 18,2007.)
2/4/2015
Fat. What other tiny word elicits such enormous reaction? The word conjures up images of unwanted pounds or the fatty foods we’re no longer “allowed” to eat.
For years, the public has been urged to eat fat-free foods, follow the low-fat diet plan, and most important rid our plates of the worst culprit— saturated fat. Most recently, the media has focused on another “bad” fat called “trans fat” that is produced through a process called hydrogenation.
The FDA mandated that food manufacturers label the amount of trans fat contained in foods. And as of 2006, they have done just that. This intervention should have been a giant step in helping us avoid unhealthy fats, right? A flood of foods—everything from tortilla chips to butter substitutes that tout “0 Grams Trans Fat!” on the packaging—hit the market. Surely, they are healthy choices! Right?
Not necessarily.
The problem is in the labeling. Food manufacturers are allowed to advertise a food has “0 grams of trans fats” as long as the food contains less than 500 mg of trans fats per serving, which explains why you can see 0 grams of trans fats on the nutrition facts label but can still find “hydrogenated oil” (the process of hydrogenation is what produces the trans fat) in the ingredients list. So “0” doesn’t actually mean trans-fat free. It just means that there’s less than 500 mg.
OK. 500 mg. What’s the big deal?
Well, first of all, consider the serving size you’re eating. Are you eating the 11 chips that make up one serving size? Many listed serving sizes are much smaller than the actual amount people eat. Because there’s no way to know how much trans fat is in one serving—from 0 mg or 499 mg— for argument sake, let’s assume the worst and say there’s 499 mg per serving. How many chips did you eat? If you ate 3 servings (33 chips), you could be getting 1,498 mg of trans fat from a food that’s labeled trans fat free!
Is 1,498 mg (just under 1.5 g) of trans fat bad? Is that small amount really going to hurt you? The answer is yes. The findings from health at The National Academies of Sciences report that “…no level of trans fat is safe.” 1
Another issue to consider is that many people eat many types of “trans fat free” foods per day—butter replacements, crackers, snack foods, or even chicken nuggets. Add up the actual amounts of these foods you consume, and you quickly become aware of the possibility that you could be consuming a significant amount of trans fats in the daily diet, even though you—the health-conscious shopper—select foods labeled as having “0 grams trans fat”!
So what’s the solution? You need to read the labels of the foods you buy. If it says“partially hydrogenated oils”, or “hydrogenated oils”, assume there are trans fats in the food—even if the nutrition facts label reads 0 grams trans fat per serving. Another option is to work on changing your eating habits so that you choose more whole foods and avoid processed foods that typically contain hydrogenated oils in the first place.
I realize the precautionary measure takes a little more time in the grocery aisle, making your shopping trips longer. In my profession, I’ve spent hundreds of hours reading labels in countless supermarkets, and I could possibly help you in your quest to purchase healthier foods. I would love the opportunity to work with you to find solutions that work.
—Kathryn Kempson, M.S.
1 Severson, Kim. “Clues on labels reveal hidden trans fats” San Francisco Chronicle, Wed. July 31, 2002. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-in/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2002/07/31/FD183554.DTL
