One often hears people say “You are what you eat.” What a frightening thought, when you consider all that has passed down our gullets! Who among us would ever want to be a pepper or a prune or a pig?
But, fortunately, in daily life becoming what you eat does not demand thought. Eating well does. And that means knowing how to be smart about food shopping.
In that spirit nine Massachusetts nutritionists, concerned to help older eaters shop smart and eat well, have developed a seventeen-minute video called “A Supermarket Tour for Elders.” I recently watched this video with a group of fellow elders at the Somerville Council on Aging.
Jean Bianchetto, nutritionist at Somerville-Cambridge Elder Services, presented the video that day to about twenty of us, all women except for one other guy and me. Introducing the tape, Jean emphasized the need for variety. “Trying out some new products can put some pizzaz in your eating habits,” she advised us.
The handsome star of the video is Ann McGonigle, a Somerville resident who incidentally boasts about her position as matriarch of a thriving five-generation family. That suggests that some people, at least, are eating well.
In taking viewers around a supermarket, Ann shows, among other things, how to shop for single servings, how to read food labels, and how to approach the nutritional ideal of “variety, proportion, and moderation.”
Key to achieving a healthy diet is choosing what to eat in accordance with the “Food Guide Pyramid,” a graphic that illustrates ideal amounts of basic food groups. The American Dietetic Association has developed a special pyramid for people over fifty years old.
This structure, from bottom to top, has four sections: at the base, – bread, cereal, rice, and pasta (6–11 servings each day; second, – vegetables (3–5 servings) and fruits (2–4); third, – milk, cheese, and yogurt (2–3) and meat poultry, fish, eggs, dry beans, and nuts (2–3); and, finally, at the tip, – fats, oils, and sweets (to be eaten sparingly.)
The American Dietetic Association also notes the importance of water and recommends that adults drink six to eight 8-ounce cups each day. This very month Lillian Glickman, Massachusetts Secretary of Elder Affairs, urged everyone to “recognize the vital role water plays in ensuring the health and independence of elders.”
She emphasized this need in summertime and quoted Howard K. Koh, Massachusetts Public Health Commissioner: “It is very important for everyone to drink at least 8 glasses of water a day, especially the elderly who are most at risk for dehydration during the hot summer months.”
Among the twenty people present for the video, only two or three were familiar with the food pyramid. That suggests the need for much more publicity about balance in our diet. Some people, I suppose, have developed good eating habits through an instinct for health, but the record suggests that many Americans eat badly. How often one sees people standing in the check-out line at the supermarket and eating junk food before they have even reached the cash register to pay!
In the brief discussion period that followed the film, elders spoke well of what they had seen. One woman said that the information about sodium had been helpful. Another expressed surprise to discover that the stores have lists of products to guide shoppers around the shelves aisle-by aisle. A third woman confessed, “I’m embarrassed about asking for only a quarter pound of something,” a problem others interested in small portions presumably experience.
Later over lunch I spoke at length with Peg Durkin, who had come to the presentation in order to find out how people with diabetes should shop for food. Of the meeting she says, “I definitely picked up quite a few tips; all I have to do now is apply them.”
Peg, a retired reference librarian at the Somerville Public Library, also proved remarkably frank about herself and food. Asked if she was in the habit of reading nutritional labels, she answered, “I never was, but now I have to. My doctor is angry with me that I’m not sticking to my diet.”
About preparing food at home, she says: “I wouldn’t call myself a great cook – – I’m an ‘everything in the pot’ cook.”
But she recognizes this as the time for change: “I know that, if you don’t start taking care of yourself at sixty-two, which is what I am, you’re going to really be in trouble. I have to get on the stick.”
If you wish to see the video, I suggest you contact your local Council on Aging at your city or town hall and get the people there to purchase it for group showings. You can get further information from Jean Bianchetto at (617) 628-2601.
Richard Griffin