A Look Back on ’90s Food Trends: How Has Nutritional Knowledge Evolved?
A recent article in Mashed explored why experts don’t use the food pyramid anymore.
“It was hung in the examination rooms of doctors’ offices and was touted as the model of a well-balanced diet. Yet nowadays you don’t hear about it much,” states the article.
As a younger person, for the most part I listened to and believed in the nutritional advice taken from the food pyramid invented in 1992.
Yet the Mashed article writes, “according to Scientific American, ongoing research from 1992 — the same year the pyramid was introduced — and beyond had proven that the food pyramid in its current model was deeply flawed.” (Read More: https://www.mashed.com/870734/why-dont-experts-use-the-food-pyramid-anymore/?utm_campaign=clip)
It wasn’t until my early to mid 20s that I began altering my mentality to fit with more recent discoveries. Trends have changed significantly since that decade, beyond just the food pyramid. From the hefty carb helpings to the three glasses of milk a day recommendation, here are some ways in which they have.
1.) ”Drink three glasses of milk today.”
My parents were among the many families of the time who bought margarine, mistakenly believing it to be a healthier alternative to butter (thanks in part to the misleading claims made by margarine manufacturers). Both my sister and I were also encouraged to drink three glasses of regular (not almond, oat, or soy) milk per day. Celebrity Got Milk? ads were all the rage at that time. I flinch now when I think about all that dairy going into my body!
According to webmd, “now, in a new review, Walter Willett, MD, DrPH, a professor of nutrition and epidemiology at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and his co-author, David Ludwig, MD, PhD, a professor of pediatrics and nutrition at Harvard, say eating too much dairy may cause harm to both our bodies and the planet.”
https://www.webmd.com/diet/news/20200214/rethinking-mik-science-takes-on-the-dairy-dilemma
2.) “Eat 6–11 servings of carbs.”
Many people took this to mean that above fruits, vegetables, and lean meats, carbs should be the staple of one’s diet.
A Magic School bus magnet held the food pyramid up on my family’s refrigerator. The image of the hefty carb recommendation flitted through our eyes and mapped itself onto our brains every time we opened it to pour a glass of “light” orange juice (see: 29 grams of sugar instead of 55, still half of the recommended daily amount).
Many other American households used it too.
According to healthyway.com, the prioritization of the consumption of carbohydrates “often resulted in diets dominated by excess calories, sugar, and starches.”
The article highlighted how registered dietitian Susan Bowerman “pointed out that the base of the pyramid being a ‘grain’ group was heavily influenced by lobbying efforts from the grain industry, which led people astray into thinking carbs were separate from fruits and vegetables.”
3.) Fat is worse than sugar.
Almost every weekend as a kid I’d bike down to Safeway to buy a Lucerne block of low-fat birthday cake ice cream. I’d then stop at Silverscreen to rent VHS tapes and purchase a king-sized pack of Sour Punch straws. Both were low in fat, so I figured they couldn’t be that bad for me.
School sold massive Heath bar cookies at brunch. With crunchy toffee pieces on the inside surrounded by warm, gooey dough on the outside, these cookies were sublime. I’d buy one almost every day, along with sugary flavored waters to gulp down during English class.
I never thought to check the sugar content of these foods. Sugar just wasn’t a concern to me. Fat was the real bad guy. After all, sugar wouldn’t lead to weight gain. It just made me hyper, and I could use the extra energy.
And yet, numerous studies have since shown that sugar really is that bad for you; even if it doesn’t result in any immediate consequences. According to Lancaster General Health, “The Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee, an independent panel of experts who regularly make evidence-based recommendations to the federal government, identified sugar as the prime enemy in American’s diets. A large body of research showed that sugar is even worse for your heart than saturated (bad) fat.”
For women, the recommend amount is 25 grams. For men, it is 30. Yet the average person in the U.S. consumes upwards of 82 grams of sugar per day. As a kid and teenager I was likely consuming way more than this.
Also according to Lancaster General Health: “As long as the fats we eat are primarily healthy, fat isn’t the enemy anymore.”
https://lancastergeneralhealth.org/health-hub-home/2022/january/is-sugar-or-fat-worse-for-your-heart
4.) ”Diet doesn’t affect acne.”
Researchers have established a clear connection between gut health and skin health. According to the National Library of Medicine, “Cumulative evidence has demonstrated an intimate, bidirectional connection between the gut and skin, and numerous studies link gastrointestinal health to skin homeostasis and allostasis.” https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6048199/And as stated on nature.com, “Diet contents and quantity have a major role in shaping the human microbiota composition and function.”
Since processed foods are known to disrupt gut health, it only makes sense that by extension, the skin would be affected too.Yet I remember being by told by dermatologists throughout adolescence that this is a myth; that lifestyle choices and diet have little to do with acne, despite studies now pointing to their playing a role.
When my acne improved at the age of 15, I’d started exercising and was eating fewer processed foods, while upping my consumption of fruits and vegetables.
5.) Food and health were seen as “women’s issues,” while wellness topics were given less critical consideration.
Like so many other neutral things that have taken on gender associations, food is no exception. When men jump on the bandwagon and begin to condone or promote it, the food goes from being a women’s fad or a niche market (ironic that 50% of the population still constitutes a “niche market”) to a legitimate category.
As Jaya Saxena writes, “If a man is fussy about craft beer or protein shakes, it’s food that should be fussed over. If a man requires nothing more than meat, potatoes, and a Budweiser, neither should anyone else.”
Food is meant to energize. Ideally it would also give us pleasure. Once in our mouths, it doesn’t matter how it was presented on our plates. Health is gender-neutral. So is food, yet “that hasn’t stopped people from associating tofu and chocolate with women or bitter alcohols with men” (Saxena again). https://tastecooking.com/women-arent-ruining-food/
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