Midterm Assignment: 3-day Food journal and its impact on the mind and body. Ashley M. Alcon Pueblo Community College June 22, 2024 Dietary Nutrition Dr. Tara Mashburn I really enjoyed this assignment because, as a mother and wife, I am responsible for meal planning and preparation for my entire family. During the 3-day assignment, my family also joined in and actively participated with me. However, I was mindful not to put too much strain on my boys' eating habits as they are still kids. I also sought input from my husband and son on their thoughts and feelings about the meals. Here are the meals that I have planned out for the 3 days: Day 1- Morning- Breakfast: Oatmeal with berries and milk - Macronutrients: - Carbohydrates: 40g (oats …show more content…
Day 3- Breakfast- Smoothie with spinach, banana, almond milk, and protein powder - Macronutrients: - Carbohydrates: 30g (banana) - Protein: 20g (protein powder) - Fat: 5g (almond milk) - Micronutrients: - Potassium (banana): 400mg - Vitamin A (spinach): 1500 IU - Calcium (almond milk): 200mg = 300 calories Lunch- Quinoa and black bean bowl with avocado and salsa - Macronu Beef stir-fry with bell peppers, onions, and jasmine rice - Macronutrients: - Carbohydrates: 40g (jasmine rice and vegetables) - Protein: 25g (beef) - Fat: 10g (cooking oil) - Micronutrients: - Iron (beef): 3mg - Vitamin C (bell peppers): 60mg - Vitamin B12 (beef): 2.5g = 700 calories Total calories = 1600 Total fat: 52 g …show more content…
Personally, I enjoyed the food portions, but my husband did not. However, my 10-month-old and 6-year-old both enjoyed the food, although I made sure to give them more snacks and fruits and vegetables than I did myself. This is because they are growing boys and have a strong preference for these healthy options. For myself, I appreciated how the meals kept my mood and energy levels stable. I didn't feel like I was overeating or gross after a meal. I had more energy and felt happier about myself, which motivated me to be more productive. Moving forward, I plan to continue eating healthily and incorporating more nutritious options into my husband's meals as well. This assignment was eye-opening, and I was amazed at how quickly my body responded to the food in terms of my mood and energy levels. Additionally, I only drink water and I believe this also contributed to keeping me stable in terms of my mood and energy levels. Usually, I portion myself a lot more than I usually did for this assignment, and I felt a huge change in my mood and energy since I learned how to portion
After completing my three-day diet analysis, my overall report on food groups and calories showed that I have consumed ½ oz of whole grains, I cup of starchy vegetables, ¼ cup of fruit juice, 5oz of seafood, 2 ½ oz of meat, poultry, and eggs, 287 calories of empty calories, 147 calories of solid fats and 140 calories of add sugars. I noticed that I did not consume the right amount of fruits and vegetables, 0 cups of dairy, and consumed too much empty calories. To make my results appear better, I need to modify my results on how much food I consumed, list the food I have consumed, and list the functions of the nutrient rich food I consumed and what I need to consumed.
Another section that I labeled for that two days is fruit and vegetables section. I realized that I am getting lower amount of calories from fruits (462 and 197 calories) that is not beneficial for my healthy life-style. 8-10 servings are needed for my age group as recommended by Canada’s food guide.
In the original three day diet analysis, Susanne Coleman found that she was not eating from all of the food groups recommended by the food pyramid. Particularly, she was not eating the amount of fruits, vegetables and grains recommended. While she felt she made wise food decisions, there was room for improvement. When completing another three day diet analysis, Susanne received different results. After completing the original three day diet analysis, Susanne has been more conscientious of her food choices. Since the first analysis, Susanne has begun to plan meals ahead and to pack her meals for the day to stay on track.
My goal is to consume 1500 calories per day. According to the Super Tracker website, for breakfast I should have 1 ounce of grains, ½ cup of fruit and ½ cup of dairy. I will be able to have a midmorning snack that can include 1 ounce of grains and ½ of fruit. For lunch, I can have 1 ounce of grains, ½ cup of vegetables, ½ cup of fruits, and 2 ½ ounce of protein foods. This meal plans also allows me to have an Afternoon snack, that can include ½ cup of vegetables and ½ cup of dairy. Finally for dinner, I can consume 2 ounces of grains, 1 cup of vegetables, and 1 cup of dairy, and 2 ½ ounces of protein food.
The following is an analysis of Joe Smith's food intake for one day by using the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion (CNPP) website using a food tracker program. The analysis addresses the serving sizes consumed, which food groups were represented, and adjustments in consumption that should be made since Mr. Smith would like to loose weight. Visual representations are attached for reference in the appendix.
I have learned a lot from this two-day diet analysis assignment. In my two day assessment, I recorded my food intake, quantities, drinks, snacks, condiments, where and who I was with during the meal, the time of day, and the amount of time I spent eating. I was able to analyze my diet to examine what I was eating and what types of nutrients I was getting. I then compared all aspects with my recommended levels of nutrients for my dietary recommended intake. I learned that my eating habits are not the best and could lead to serious health problems in the future that may be detrimental.
Nutrition, I have learned plays a big part in our life. To be honest I was clueless about how much nutrition affected our everyday lives. I love going to the gym working out, now that I know what should go into my diet I think I will see a lot more improvement. I occasionally follow the latest diet fads because I believed it would be better for my health, but in turn it really hurt more than it helped! This Diet Analysis project has been extremely useful course because I can personally relate to it and can use much of the information learned to my daily routines. The Diet Analysis project was a real eye opener because it let me see what exactly I was putting into my diet.
The food tracker benefited me in so many ways. I total three days out and all calculated 4800 calories. The food tracker allowed me only 2000 calories a day and wanted me to target at least 150 min/week in physical activity. The recommendations for my calories were very direct and limited to only a certain amount that I could manage. It help me manage my daily food intake, inform me of the calories and fats I was placing into my body, and educated me on the need foods needed from the food pyramid. My son even loved placing the items we ate into the system to look at “our numbers” (he it calls that).
Having a balanced nutrition is a necessity to live a life full of an efficient diet. Watching your diet leads to good health and a lack of disease. This was demonstrated through the experiment of tracking your everyday diet. This was recorded through the use of the SuperTracker program that analyzed the nutrients/minerals and the food groups of the foods I consumed from a 5-day food log. Observing my diet changed my perspective on what I eat, how much I eat, and how the foods I eat effect my body.
Since we have been learning about nutrition in class, our task was to record a food log. Nutrition requires a well-balanced diet containing nutrient and vitamins like amino acids and fatty acids. Over the past seven days I have been recording and have been looking very carefully at my intake of nutrients, minerals, vitamins, and fats. In our task, the objective was to record the basic foods we ate during the period of seven, but it did not require recording every single detail or our intake of food. Doing this food log was a pain and it was disturbing because I never wrote about what I ate like breakfast, lunch, dinner, or additional meals. I found this food log useful because it helped me learn what I can change in my intake of foods to make my diet healthy and to see what about my diet is affecting me from being healthy because I could affect me in the future.
In this task I had to record what I ate and the amounts of each serving over three consecutive days during the week. This tasks aim was to get us to be aware of what we are eating and what we should change in our diet to be as healthy as we possibly can be. Having a healthy weight can reduce risk of chronic diseases such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes and obesity. 21-25% of Australia’s adolescents are overweight or obese and 2-5% are underweight. (2007 ANCN Survey) This report is to support the aim as it will include how well I have done fulfilling each food group throughout the three days. Instead of a food pyramid, which is what is usually referred to, the new way of measuring these is in a pi graph on a plate as it is more accurate and also easier to determine how much you should eat of each food group compared to the others. There are six food groups all together, all with important roles to the human body. I will be comparing my intake to the latest Australian Dietary Guidelines to see how healthy my daily diet is.
As part of learning about nutrients and food, in health class, we kept a food diary. In this food diary we kept track of every thing we ate and then calculated the calories, carbohydrates, proteins, and fat amounts in each item that we consumed. Being able to see what all we have consumed allows us to know what we should be eating more of and what we are consuming too much of. I believe that this is a very good way to maintain a healthy and well-rounded diet.
Food is one of the necessities of life in order to survive. Everyone has different views on what to eat and different eating habits. People are so busy in their everyday life that they don’t keep track of what they eat on a daily basis. However, it is important to understand the role of nutrition. Nutrition and exercise are vital to maintain physical health. Proper nutrition is required by our body for energy, growth, maintenance, and repair (Grodner, Roth, & Walkingshw, 2012). Even the brain requires nutrients in order for a person to be intellectually healthy. Along with nutrition, exercise can be controlled by an individual. Exercise helps to strengthen bones and muscles, control weight, improves mental health and mood, reduces risk for cardiovascular disease, type II diabetes, and some cancers, and overall increases the chances of living longer (CDC). For this assignment, I kept a food journal by tracking what I ate and the amount of exercise on a daily basis on a food tracker for three weeks. The purpose of that was to analyze my diet and exercise in more depth in order to determine the amount of vitamins, minerals, fat, protein, carbohydrates, and calories I am eating daily. Based on the results, I made some modifications.
Food labs are great technique for experiencing and learning the right method for preparing healthy and clean food. For some people like me, who have no cooking experience it is very challenging, stressful, and enjoyable. I used to think that cooking is just adding variety of ingredients together, but it is more than that. Through the first two food labs I discovered that there are many things that people have to remember and watch for when cooking such as managing their time, planning a head, following proper knife handling techniques, following proper measuring techniques, following kitchen safety, and following the recipe. Also, through this food lab, I have faced some challenges, success, learned a lot of things, and discovered the roles of some important ingredients including salt, pastry flour, sugars, fats, baking soda, and eggs.
I chose to have the same meal for breakfast, lunch and dinner for three days, not in a row, of course. So day one, two and three will look the same; it is roughly what I consume on a regular basis, I really didn’t have to alter my meals much at all, only to make sure I had the same meals each day.