Redesigning food guide pyramid

[zbr5]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:USDA_Food_Pyramid.gif




Food pyramind recommended by USA Department of Agriculture is a huge crap. 40% of its base makes "Bread cereal and pasta" group.

How would your pyramide look like if you were to instruct the society?

What groups of food would you include and what percentages would you assign them?

[p0wer]

30-50% of the calories from fruits, the rest from unprocessed animal foods.

[p0wer]

A serving or so of steamed white polished rice could be recommended for those who don't like so much fruits and need a higher ratio of glucose to fructose in the diet (e.g. highly active people).

[KD]

30-50% of the calories from fruits, the rest from unprocessed animal foods.

what statistics is this based on as resulting in healthy people?

[KD]

http://www.rawpaleodietforum.com/off-topic/raw-paleo-food-pyramid/msg36345/#msg36345

[p0wer]

what statistics is this based on as resulting in healthy people?

Well it doesn't seem that much different from that raw paleo pyramid (just that it's not so specific).

[p0wer]

Well it doesn't seem that much different from that raw paleo pyramid (just that it's not so specific).

Actually no, that pyramid seems to be very low carb (10% fruits). Is that by calories? 2 fruits per day? Which statistics shows that such low carb diet is better than my version with higher carb for healthy people?

[Techydude]

Everyone has different needs. A pyramid is too set in stone and rigid. Paleo is about flexibility, instinct, and adaptation and that can't be put on a pyramid 

[KD]

Actually no, that pyramid seems to be very low carb (10% fruits). Is that by calories? 2 fruits per day? Which statistics shows that such low carb diet is better than my version with higher carb for healthy people?

theres no percentages in those pyramids..only suggestions of hierarchies of importance of the diet as with the regular food pyramid..and they are something of a joke anyway.

 like 'sweets' or 'salt' featured in the standard pyramid the things closer to the top..like fruits might be helpful additions to the diet but arn't the most important components or even mandatory...so in that respect they are accurate as to what constitutes 'paleo'. people are certainly free to prioritize one thing over another..but in many camps these constructions would cease to be 'paleo' as if honey was 90% of the diet or any other thing.

as for 'low carb'
there are examples of traditional peoples eating in such a way..and its inevitable that without going back too far in human history that such would be the diet for much of the year. This doesn't prove its the only or best diet for man..but that people did live healthfully on it.

the diet you are suggesting has no such precedent.

There are of course traditional peoples (healthy by comparison to others) on the high carb spectrum of things and very few of these people consume a large portion of their food from fruits and other raw foods..even when abundantly available.

but the best statistics are to be found in people that have actually had success or failures on 'diets' over the last 50 years or so and how these even compare to the regular western diets results. I've personally seen junk food vegans do better than diets containing 50% +fruit by calorie..or go back to cooked veg or cooked meat diets more healthfully. People like to present this idea from time to time that theres some small missing link of animal foods from typical raw high fruit diets..yet cooked veg/vegans rarely suffer the same major issues even without such animal foods. This forum and other sites serves as possibly another statistic worth investigating as to which things yield which results.

[p0wer]

All that history about the traditional people living healthfully on low carb diets is a bit too uncertain (and we can only guess whether it's the diet or something third).

Low carb is unnatural. Many parts of the body prefer glucose over fat and definitely over ketones. Why should we force it into ketosis then, do we know better than our own body? Some say the heart works X% better on ketones, and they are good for this and that.. why aren't they produced as needed if they are so good, but we instead need to force it into some special state (low carb). In addition you waste protein getting converted to glucose. If you don't get enough dietary protein, bye bye muscles.

It's a wrong, unoptimal diet for people who have no problems utilizing dietary carbs.

On the other end you have high carb (811..). Even worse..

So as a general recommendation something balanced in between these extremes would be best.

[KD]

All that history about the traditional people living healthfully on low carb diets is a bit too uncertain (and we can only guess whether it's the diet or something third).

Low carb is unnatural. Many parts of the body prefer glucose over fat and definitely over ketones. Why should we force it into ketosis then, do we know better than our own body? Some say the heart works X% better on ketones, and they are good for this and that.. why aren't they produced as needed if they are so good, but we instead need to force it into some special state (low carb). In addition you waste protein getting converted to glucose. If you don't get enough dietary protein, bye bye muscles.

It's a wrong, unoptimal diet for people who have no problems utilizing dietary carbs.

On the other end you have high carb (811..). Even worse..

So as a general recommendation something balanced in between these extremes would be best.

my belief its generally better to respond to what actually is as opposed to what should be. in terms of what is working.

what you say reads largely of inexperience with self experimentation or close scrutiny of other people or even understanding of those concepts to begin with. clearly above about protein etc..is something you have read online about such diets..as it hasn't happened to me

To me other than my actual experience and people I know I can look to many different communities like this site, Dirty Carnivore site, crossfit communities and other things to see people implement paleo and low carb diets at least to some sucess with or without ever dipping into raw foods. Again its a gross simplification to just cite problems of only extreme fruit dieters or this and that when you can find equally limited diets (all/mostly potatoes) (mostly soy bacon/beans and rice or whatever) that don't have the same issues. Even easier is finding people who went from high carb raw omnivorous versions of paleo to low carb. Of course there is also the reverse. I'm sure you can find tons of Matt Stone accolades or other individuals who claim poor experiences on low carb/zero carb etc.. but these arn't as statistically devastating, consistent in what exactly they are criticizing, or intellectually acute at lobbying their criticism as former fruit dieters nor do they really ever end up with any solutions as to what and how to eat.

so what it comes down to is are you are not talking about long term experience with these so called inefficient diets..but short term experimentation with high fruit diets...as to render an acceptable or 'moderate' solution for large sections of already unhealthy people. Probably better left to the politicians.

I would say respectively...that many people are in fact doing 'better' doing what they are doing...then diets made up largely of fruits which in most cases would be pretty much a fiasco.

particularly people looking to improve their health with various conditions...I would definitely not suggest that as a 'moderate' path whatsoever.

if you can't understand how this could possibly be...(and I can see it is a bit confusing) I really don't think you are scrutinizing whatever success stories or inspirations or prehistoric logic you are using enough.

[p0wer]

My belief is to rather do what's more logical. Instinctive too, but we shouldn't forget using the brain.

Going by other people's experiences.. I don't think so.
Self-experimentation.. if it works for some short period it doesn't mean you won't burn out soon.

[KD]

My belief is to rather do what's more logical. Instinctive too, but we shouldn't forget using the brain.

Going by other people's experiences.. I don't think so.
Self-experimentation.. if it works for some short period it doesn't mean you won't burn out soon.

hmm  if everyone walks through a door and immediately gets their head chopped off, how logical is it to walk through that doorway?

 I wasn't presenting any solution myself, only suggesting which diets are viable and which in my research are not going to be healthful particularly for people with existing conditions.

you still seem to be expressing concerns snipped together from websites as far as I can tell..and very far away from knowledge about humanity, history or science never-mind practice. As I already said we already know from observation or elimination (minimal carbs available year round for much of humans recent development) the diets of various post and pre civilizied peoples. We can't extrapolate if these are the MOST healthy.. and course everything good has some experimental component for modern people but these people by most definitions thrived and went at the very least on to reproduce...so that people today can buy some shipped fruit and packaged lean meat and call that a diet and awkwardly attempt to do the same.

Not exactly my hero or the epitome of health perhaps but Owsley Stanley ate nothing but animal products (much of it cooked) since 1959 and then died in a car accident. Not exactly a burn out at least by the way you are using it. Yet all the people promoting high fruit diets died prematurely and horribly (even when many have been discovered to be secretly not vegan)..long before their cooked junk or vegetarian leaning counterparts.

As for the importance of low carb over other aspect, many people have the same experiences as Owsley that for them the low carb aspect is far more important then even the paleo or raw aspect. No one is suggesting this is the case for everyone..but to state arbitrarily that people will benefit from having 50% of their diet fruit..is just a naive sweeping statement. It goes against accumulated research on such subjects in both conventional science and 'raw' research/science. What we would have eaten also would have been limited/defined by nature not box stores/deliveries and its even been shown that children free of such addictions won't actually choose to eat carbs anymore..but that is something I don't know enough about to support.

Saying people all people would benefit from low carb (which I am not exactly saying currently) would be less extreme based on statistics of what works. thats my point.

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I personally like to go from my experiences rather than whatever bullshit comes from people who generally don't even post information regarding their progress and changes or other signs of health and yet still have TONS of information on how 'mamas meatballs taste the best'. Almost equally I praise the earnest and non-romantic observations of others as having more value over what some website or person claims or downright insists is on the other side of that door (to use the metaphor above)

I can say based on that observation that other than one person, I've yet to interact with anyone (in person or on the internet) in 6 years that didn't exhibit qualities that I would associate with negative aspects of high fruit eating..and these are often absent as i've said from people on the worst diets or cooked vegans/vegetarians and standard dieters as well as particular cooked LC or raw LC or primal etc... dieters. So its fairly ridiculous to me when people try to say that this has to do ENTIRELY with being extreme/vegan/deficient etc.. I'm talking people that eat 100% solid junk and heroin to people just drink green juice and eat nut pate and lettuce..none of which are even 'paleo'...and both of which being fairly extreme in terms of nutrient intake/lack of etc...

I've also communicated with many a former fruit dieter (including people who ate plenty animal products) to respect their beliefs that limiting 'gods food' had significant value to their recovery if not the possibly for others.

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Its usually helpful turn you suspicions away from what you don't embrace to what you do..you might find people actually have all kinds reasons for doing the kinds of things that they do...particularly when they require more effort/planning/thought then it seems worthwhile or obvious.

I've certainly done my time thinking fruits were wonderful, that people need carbs for performance, that if not eating cooked foods or fats or eating plenty of fruits one becomes healthy etc...

btw how old are you and how long have you been eating a diet of which you promote while thinking you have acquired some kind of knowledge to 'warn' others or to formulate a diet for humanity? precisely why its a pain in the ass sometimes to post here.

[p0wer]

The door -- not very logical.

I wasn't presenting any solution myself, only suggesting which diets are viable and which in my research are not going to be healthful particularly for people with existing conditions.

Saying people all people would benefit from low carb (which I am not exactly saying currently) would be less extreme based on statistics of what works. thats my point.

What statistics is that? Based on people from forums on which people usually have some existing problems (with sugar, etc.)? I don't think this is a very representative sample of the whole population.

The OP asked what food pyramid would you suggest; something like this needs to be general enough to cover the whole population. I suggested 30-50% fruits, not 50% as you seem to see it. It's a general guideline, feel free to eat less or more fruits if that works better for you.

E.g. 30% would be about 150 grams of sugar. 5.5 medium bananas or 7 medium apples for example. Is that a lot of fruit?

[eveheart]

To me, the central question is not "How should be food guide pyramid be designed," but "In a nation founded on individual liberty, what gives a government the authority and wisdom to design a dietary guideline?"

Of all the cultural variations of food intake, the government has no right to select one as the official version of correct eating, any more than it has the right to select one religion.

Oh, yeah, forgot to say, "IMHO."

[KD]

The door -- not very logical.

What statistics is that? Based on people from forums on which people usually have some existing problems (with sugar, etc.)? I don't think this is a very representative sample of the whole population.

The OP asked what food pyramid would you suggest; something like this needs to be general enough to cover the whole population. I suggested 30-50% fruits, not 50% as you seem to see it. It's a general guideline, feel free to eat less or more fruits if that works better for you.

E.g. 30% would be about 150 grams of sugar. 5.5 medium bananas or 7 medium apples for example. Is that a lot of fruit?

at this point most of the population is on prescription medication and have many other problems that bode for inhospital/fermenty situations with raw fruits than many of the health seekers here who still choose LC/ZC etc... so i'll have to disagree there. This information is usually lost on the fruit->stomach->anus crowd that neglects all the other internal occurrences and results. Theres plenty of people in the movement who you can talk to about such things..even vegos that avoid fruits like they are flamable..and they arn't all totally cukoo.

I don't consider 5 fruits or 7 apples minimum a day to be a particularly natural diet. Is it automatically unhealthy? no but the point of a pyramid (if there could be a successful one) is to lay out what exactly is the foundation of a healthy diet and a general distribution of other foods. perhaps using the word 'statistically' is unfair in such small quantities compared to the masses but its fairly visible that basing the diet on fats/meats seems to correct alot of the problems created by modern damage. One could call this an opinion I guess but its more of an  observation that applies even beyond raw etc...

One of many problems with eating that many carbs (which really isn't representative of 30% of intake for many) is it already makes eating such a diet of fats/meats less doable and generally for many people means more addictions to other carbs etc... Even for people that don't have that problem..they arn't going to be processing higher volumes of animal foods for energy very well OR using carbs efficiently and this is very well articulated in both high fat and high carb camps. speaking of optimal, it doesn't make sense that the optimal way for utilizing fat and protein is an environment where carbs are scarce if they are meant to be eaten every day in quanitity.

Ultimately the thing about LC etc...is its a tool that also doubles as a 'diet' and does happen to be one of the only known default largely raw diets practiced by known people with all high carb diets being largely cooked starches for a variety of real reasons people choose to neglect. What the critics of the 'diet' or control aspect often don't recognize is that many people would not really make the kind of progress without such..so it therefore becomes silly to then say that there is some ideal diet that has nothing to do with LC etc...or that these states were harmful...because humanity would not survive if they could not function very well during times with few carbs. This doesn't prove that the diet is the most optimal or yes even necessarily a long term solution but this talk about LC being unatural or that "cavemen didn't know how to count carbs" or whatever neglects what the actual situations many humans were presented with at least in the last 200,00 years etc...not to mention the very credible arguments of modern peoples needs for more fats/less carby foods than even are ancestors who didn't even necessarily always eat carby foods regularly if at all.