Speech - Emily Cashman

Emily Cashman

Waistlines and Serving Sizes on the Rise

More than 1/3 of American adults are obese. This fact isn’t meant to surprise you because it’s pretty common knowledge that obesity is a problem in America. It’s even one of our nation’s stereotypes. I have first hand experience with this because when my family housed a French exchange student last summer we learned that she was extremely concerned with becoming fat while in America, and she told us of how she and her friends were under the assumption that all Americans were fat. While this assumption of hers is false, unless we start making more changes in regards to the food that we put in our bodies, our future might be more and more like what she imagined. These adjustments don’t need to be drastic and they aren’t super innovative, but by being more informed about proper meal proportions, knowing more than just the calorie content of an entrée, and being able to notice the real differences between and “Original” version of a product and a “Reduced Fat” or “Zero Sugar” alternative, we can come one step closer to ending the obesity epidemic in out nation.

“Clean your plate” is a phrase that often can be heard around a dinner table with young children. At least when I was little, I wasn’t allowed to leave the table without eating most, if not all, of the food on my plate. Now a phrase like this wouldn’t be a problem if our plates were correctly sized and the proportions of our food were appropriate. However, that is not the case. A study done by researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill shows that between 1977 and 1996, food portion sizes increased substantially in both restaurants and in the home. This includes all areas except for pizza. Somehow, pizza has been able to remain roughly the same size since 1977. Other popular foods have not been so lucky. Take a hamburger for example; this study concludes that the size of your average hamburger increased by 23% over the course of 20 years. The recommended serving size of a burger is 5 oz., but that doesn’t stop restaurants like McDonald’s and Wendy’s from selling 11 oz. burgers aptly titled the “Angus Deluxe” and “Double Baconator”. You may be wondering if fast-food chains offer appropriate sized hamburgers, and they do. But with the words “juniors” or “kid-size” slapped on the front, people become less likely to select that item because they are under the false impression that it won’t be enough food to fill them up. If Americans had more access to proper nutritional information and had more knowledge about how much food is really necessary in a meal, then fast-food chains and other restaurants wouldn’t be able to get away with cramming so much food into a single dish. This type of knowledge would greatly aid Americans who are looking to combat obesity and live healthier lifestyles.

Americans also need to look into the more specific details of the meals they consume. Just because an entrée doesn’t exceed the recommended caloric content provided by the USDA does not mean it is healthy or a good choice of meal. Cambridge Journals offers a study done by Helen Wu and Roland Sturm where they gathered information regarding the nutritional statistics from over 200 restaurants, both sit-down, family-style and drive-thru, fast-food establishments. They found that as high as 97% of the entrées they studied had more fat, sodium, or saturated fats than what is recommended. The Cheesecake Factory is known for its unhealthy meals, but the actual extent of unhealthiness is surprising. Their pasta “Farfalle with Chicken and Roasted Garlic” entrée has 63 grams of saturated fats. Considering that the American Heart Association recommends about 16 grams of saturated fats per day, based on a 2,000-calorie diet, it’s a bit frightening to realize just how much more we are eating than necessary. Although it is becoming a more common practice to offer the caloric content of meals at many restaurants, this isn’t enough. In order to successfully lessen the number obese adults in America, people need more well-rounded and easily accessible nutritional information when making these food-related choices.

The problem isn’t just confined to restaurants. It’s almost impossible to walk through a grocery store without seeing products promoted with phrases like “Zero Calorie”, “Low Sodium”, or “No Sugar”. The food industry loves to plaster labels like these all over their products in attempts to make them seem more appealing and healthier to consumers. For example, Cheez-It is a well-known snack company. When you walk up to the section of a grocery store dedicated to Cheez-Its and see a box of their “Original” version sitting next to the “Reduced Fat” option, it’s very easy to select the “Reduced Fat” one and believe that you have made a healthier choice. But upon closer comparison of the two nutritional labels, it can be noted that even though there is a smaller amount of fat in the “Reduced Fat” box, the company had to compensate for changing that by adding more sodium and carbohydrates. So even though they are being honest when promoting “Reduced Fat” on the front on the box, in order to tell the full story, labels like “Increased Sodium” or “More Carbs” should be printed right there next to it. This idea sounds very unlikely because it would make consumers less likely to buy the product. But in order to solve this obesity epidemic, Americans need greater access to all of the nutritional information of their food.

We all know obesity is a major problem in our country. That’s not breaking news. And we all also know that many people and organizations are working to reverse this unfortunate stereotype our great country now holds. With simple changes like serving meals of correct proportions at restaurants, giving a more holistic nutritional review of food, and taking a closer look at the real differences between products with labels like “Low Sodium” in the supermarket, we can be one step closer to ending the obesity epidemic. This can help better the lives of millions of Americans working towards healthier lifestyles.

       

Works Cited

Helen W Wu and Roland Sturm (2013). “What's on the menu?” A review of the

energy and nutritional content of US chain restaurant menus. Public Health

Nutrition, 16, pp 87-96.

Mckenzie, John. "Food Portion Sizes Have Grown -- A Lot." ABC News. ABC News

Network, 21 Jan. 2003. Web. 12 Dec. 2014.

Super Size Me. Dir. Morgan Spurlock. By Morgan Spurlock. Perf. Morgan Spurlock.

Samuel Goldwyn Films, 2004. DVD.

Taubes, Gary. Why We Get Fat And What To Do About it. New York, New York.

Alfred A. Knopf, 2010. 272. Print.

Zinczenko, David. "Stuffed: The Weighty Truth behind Restaurant Portion Sizes."

TODAY.com. Men's Health, 01 Sept. 2010. Web. 14 Dec. 2014.