Medical Reports: More to Taste

WSVN -- It's the age-old question: What's for dinner or what's for lunch? You must make food choices every day.

Oscar: "I ate out for breakfast. I ate out lunch, and, 75 percent of the time, I eat out for dinner."

For Oscar, taste and convenience influenced all his meals.

Oscar: "If you go somewhere, and you are really hungry, you want to make something substantial that is really going to fill you up."

His all-time favorite: a big piece of steak.

Oscar: "Basically, the type of food that I like is a lot of meats."

Helen tends to pick foods she had as a child.

Helen Condra: "The type of foods that I like are pastas and probably all the bad stuff."

Helen Condra: "The Czechoslovakian and Italian in me, it's the foods that I grew up with."

But what's the difference between Helen and Oscar? Research is showing culture and income can affect what you eat.

Lisa Dorfman, National Media Spokesperson for the American Dietetic Association: "Lower income level whites tend to have higher fat and saturated fat intakes, and African-Americans, on the other hand, eat generally higher fat, higher saturated fat diets, regardless of there income levels."

Lisa Dorfman: "Latin Americans tend to have a higher consumption of calories, of fat, and simple sugar."

And there's certainly a difference between men and women.

Lisa Dorfman: "Women tend to be more health-minded, more health conscious, choose healthier foods like fruits and vegetables."

Men of course, in general, just eat more of everything, and all of these factors can predispose people to a number of health and weight problems.

Helen Condra: "I was about 30 pounds overweight and didn't like what I saw when I looked in the mirror."

But, with the help of Lisa, Helen managed to change her eating habits.

Lisa Dorfman: "It's very difficult for people to make permanent changes in their eating patterns."

Now, to be successful, Lisa says pick foods you like the taste of.

Lisa Dorfman: "So that healthy food that I recommend has to taste good."

And that's exactly what Oscar has been doing. With the help of Lisa, he's become a better role model for his kids.

Oscar: "Now that I watch everything that I eat and everything that I drink, I'm a lot more conscious and reading the nutritional information on everything that they eat."

Diana Diaz: "And, of course, food advertising also has a lot to do with what you may be purchasing."

FOR MORE INFORMATION:

Lisa Dorfman
Baptist Medical Arts Building
8940 North Kendall Drive
Suite 903-E
305-595-2969
http://www.foodfitness.com/