Posts Tagged “healthy weight”
Americans’ vegetable habits lean towards french fries and ketchup, and proof of that is in new data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Nearly 50 percent of vegetables and legumes available in the U.S. in 2013 were either tomatoes or potatoes. Lettuce came in third as the most available vegetable.
The USDA’s dietary guidelines recommend that adults consume 2.5 to 3 cups of vegetables a day, but the agency’s researchers found only 1.7 cups per person are available.
The federal dietary guidelines do not recommend relying primarily on potatoes, tomatoes and lettuce for most of our vegetable needs. They prescribe a varied mix that includes dark leafy greens, orange and yellow vegetables, and beans—along with those potatoes and tomatoes. The USDA wants us to eat them because they help reduce the risk for heart disease, stroke and some cancers as well as help keep a healthy weight.
So the vegetables that are available don’t really match what we’re supposed to be eating. What about what we are actually eating?
Some 87 percent of adults failed to meet the vegetable intake recommendations during 2007-2010. Recent survey data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found a lot of variation state to state — with 5.5 percent of people in Mississippi getting enough vegetables to 13 percent in California meeting the recommendations.
Most people are likely to be eating tomatoes and potatoes, but as the USDA points out we often get them in the not-so-nutritious forms of french fries and pizza. About one-third of potatoes, and two-thirds of tomatoes, were bound for processing via items ranging from chips, to sweetened pizza sauce and ketchup.