"A meal without cheese is like a beautiful woman who lacks an eye." - Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin
Jimmy Moore is up in arms this week on his podcast, and rightfully so, decrying the ridiculous decision in the UK that the Atkins Nutritional Approach could not be described as “healthy”. A print advertisement for the Atkins diet was forcibly removed by a consumer watchdog group. Their “reason”ing? There is not enough evidence that the low-carb diet is a “healthier lifestyle.”
In more craziness from across the pond, cheese was classified as “junk food” under new advertising rules for children's television. The Daily Mail reports that the ban will come into effect this month, with all commercials promoting cheese prohibited during children's TV shows and other shows with a large proportion of young viewers. The fate of the cheese-loving claymation characters, Wallace and Gromit, remains to be seen...
But seriously, examining the criteria used by the Food Standards Agency to determine junk food reveals just how ridiculous these new regulations are. The FSA model assesses the amount of fat, sugar and salt in a 100g portion of food, or 100ml serving of beverages. 100g – that's 3.5 oz, or just under ¼ lb of cheese. Helpfully, the British Cheese Board pointed out that a serving of cheese for most people is 30-40g, or 1 -1.5oz. But no matter: cheese is on the banned list.
Along with cheese, the following foods made the blacklist: Greek yoghurt (from sheep's milk), ham, sausages, bacon rashers, peanuts, cashew nuts, pistachio nuts, peanut butter, olive oil, and butter.
Escaping the ban, and being advertised freely to kids in the UK: fish fingers, lasagna ready meals, currant buns, frozen roast potatoes, frozen oven chips, sliced white bread, frozen chicken nuggets, canned strawberries in syrup, and chocolate-flavored milk.
This is mind-boggling to me. Why on earth would anyone want to ban healthy fats like olive oil, and nutrient packed nuts, and push something so utterly devoid of any nutritional value as sliced white bread? I guess it follows the same “logic” that tells us a diet which restricts sugar and processed junk, and instead relies on whole foods like meat, fish, eggs, cheese and vegetables is not healthy.
A figure often trotted out on the low carb boards, but one I feel is worth repeating is the cost of the grain that goes into a box of cereal. I asked a friend what he thought the cost would be.
“Two dollars? A buck?” I shook my head. “Fifty cents?”
“Nope – try four cents. Four lousy cents, and then they sell the box at $4 or more.”
Obviously, there are other costs associated with producing a box of sugary crap, but what this indicates to me is that a lot of profit is made from dressing up cheap grains in tasty sugar and passing it off as food. And where there's a lot of profit, there's a lot of motivation to keep those dollars rolling in, even if it means the population is rolling around in wheelchairs due to obesity.
The more studies that come out, the more the low carb approach is vindicated. Even researchers who set out to prove how unhealthy low carb diets are came up with undeniable evidence that low carb diets were at least equal to low fat diets in improving health markers, if not better.
Mary Quicke, who runs Quickes Cheese in Devon, sums up this whole situation with more pith than I can hope to muster: “Frankly, it's bonkers,” she said.
I've had enough. I'm off to eat some gouda - and maybe a bacon rasher or two.
You must be based in the UK, since you speak of bacon rashers. For those in the US, it should be pointed out that UK bacon isn't at all like US bacon. UK bacon is extremely lean, usually with no visible fat at all.
I can't believe that they've declared cheese to be a junk food in the UK. In fact, just about everything on that list is extremely good for you.
On the other hand, most of the stuff in the "good" list that can be advertised to children is just pure, unadulterated junk food.
What a topsy-turvy world we live in.
Posted by: Calianna | January 18, 2007 at 05:51 PM