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Top 12 Hot Nutrition Education Topics

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Are you looking for a hot topic for your next class, workshop, or client consultation? Or for Nutrition Month (R)?

As much as consumers want a magic bullet for their health, teachers want a magic topic that will engage, educate, and motivate their audience.

Here we have assembled all of the best and hottest topic predictions for 2023. With nutrition there is always plenty of lessons to help people learn anything from the basics, to skipping fads, to shopping and preparing meals with ease, or to making better choices when dining out!  

The hottest topics listed here are chosen from our expert writers’ recommendations, research in the news, views from our blog posts, many telephone and email inquiries with customers and readers, Amazon bestseller book lists, and over 100 food, health, and nutrition professional blogs that we follow. 

Here are the hot topics and trends that you can use to plan your own presentations and classes.

  1. Dietary Guidelines: The Dietary Guidelines are here! Check out all of our resources that support the 2020-2025 messages. Many practitioners are focusing on nutrient density and the avoidance of ultra-processed foods. The Dietary Guidelines focus on getting the nutrients needed in the calories allotted based on age and activity levels. New this year are recommendations for children in specific age groups.
  2. New Food Label: The new Nutrition Facts Label is ready to empower shoppers to lower their intake of added sugars. Check out the newest food label resources.
  3. MyPlate On A Budget is very timely since most folks are pinching pennies with the current inflation bringing food costs up by about 7%  – see the new app at MyPlate.
  4. Plant-Based Diets: Plant-based food sales are a hot topic, and sales are steadily growing, according to Statista. Focus on a plant slant! How to Plan Meals, New Foods, Benefits. 
  5. Sugar: How to Find It, How to Consume Less now that added sugars are featured on the new food label and still mentioned in the latest edition of the Dietary Guidelines, particularly for the younger set and adults. Our clients are always looking to teach people to drink fewer sugar calories. 
  6. Fiber is a great lesson for consumers to understand gut health, plus all of the new research about the microbiome.
  7. Kitchen How-To – Americans are still cooking at home after the pandemic, so they are open to learning about new foods and cooking methods to save time. There is no better time for cooking demos, social media tips, and more!
  8. Weight Loss – Over 65% of all adults are overweight or obese, according to CDC. A CDC survey found that half of all adults over the age of 20 have tried to lose weight over the past year, but two-thirds of all adults in the US are still overweight or obese. Check out our 12 Lessons Program! The pandemic showed us the importance of avoiding chronic diseases like obesity, heart disease, and type 2 diabetes, all of which can cause severe illness and death in COVID patients. 
  9. Sleep – for better habits and weight loss success – a new study shows how and there are numerous studies on sleep and weight control. Sleep is an important part of any healthy eating plan. 
  10. Diet is more important than exercise – Diet is more important than ever to help people keep BMI, blood pressure,  and cholesterol low. Check out our new poster; You Can’t Outrun Your Fork!
  11. High blood pressure is a concern. We get more searches on low-sodium shopping lists than any other topic. Furthermore, diet is an excellent strategy, with research showing the low-sodium DASH diet as the most effective approach. This can bring many great teaching opportunities for health professionals. 
  12. Prediabetes is an important educational topic. According to the CDC, diabetes is increasing at an alarming rate, with over 10% of the population diagnosed with this disease. This makes an excellent screening topic for health fairs. 

All of these and more are in the new theme finder!

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Do You Have to Drink Green to Eat Clean?

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Green drinks and clean eating are all the rage, but what exactly is “clean eating?”

Margaret McCartney, GP, notes in the British Medical Journal,

“The command to eat cleanly implies that everyone else is filthy, being careless with their bodies and lives. It comes with promises of energy boosts, glowing skin, spirituality, purity, and possibly immortality. But this nonsense is all based on a loose interpretation of facts and a desire to make the pursuit of well-being an obsessive, full-time occupation.”

Let’s also add that there isn’t a single definition of clean eating that everyone agrees with. Here are a few examples…

  • At its simplest, clean eating is about eating whole foods, or “real” foods — those that are un- or minimally processed, refined, and handled, making them as close to their natural form as possible.  Fitness Magazine
  • It used to imply eating lots of whole, real foods — veggies and fruit, whole grains, animal and plant-based protein, nuts, seeds, and oils. It also meant that what you eat should be as close to nature as possible — minimally processed, not packaged or originating from a factory. Good Housekeeping
  • The soul of eating clean is consuming food the way nature delivered it, or as close to it as possible. It is not a diet; it’s a lifestyle approach to food and its preparation, leading to an improved life — one meal at a time. Clean Eating Magazine
  • Eating clean is simply the practice of avoiding processed and refined foods and basing your diet on whole foods. Eating Clean for Dummies Cheat Sheet

Some clean eating programs ban gluten, dairy, sugar, any food that’s not organic, or any food that isn’t sourced locally. What starts off sounding like a simple concept can get buried in an overwhelming list of food don’ts – without any science to back it up.

It’s clear from the 2015-2020 Dietary Guidelines for Americans that eating plenty of vegetables, fruit, whole grains, dairy, protein foods, and more healthful types of fat while limiting added sugars, saturated fat, trans fat, and sodium will result in a healthful eating pattern. Clean eating and green drinks aren’t mentioned.

How do you define a processed food?

While we probably all agree that Twinkies or frozen meals are processed, what about bread? Do you have to make your own bread to avoid processed foods? Do you have to mill your own flour? We most likely think of fresh fruit as fitting into the clean eating concept, but what if that fruit is shipped to my home in Arizona from China? It’s easy to overthink clean eating to the point where we throw up our hands and head to the nearest fast-food drive-through.

Here’s our take on clean eating: read the list of ingredients, and choose foods where you can visualize each of the ingredients. The Triscuits cracker label states: whole grain wheat, vegetable oil (soybean or canola oil), sea salt; while the Carr’s Rosemary Cracker label lists: enriched flour (wheat flour, niacin, reduced iron, thiamin mononitrate <Vitamin B1>, riboflavin <Vitamin B2>, folic acid), vegetable oil (sunflower, olive, canola and palm kernel oil), leavening (yeast, baking soda, monocalcium phosphate), contains two percent or less of dextrose, salt, maltodextrin, rosemary, spices, dried garlic, malt extract, onion powder, sugar, whey, natural flavor, and soy lecithin.

Which cracker contains ingredients you can visualize?

Now, if you relate to Sam I Am from Dr. Seuss and don’t like to drink anything green, does that mean that you’re missing vital nutrients? I’m convinced the green smoothie/juice craze was started by companies who make super blenders like Vitamix as a way to market their products. Before juicing became a health fad, we either ate vegetables raw in salads or cooked, drank fruit or vegetable juice, and ate fruit. While eating plenty of vegetables is of course an important component of a healthful eating pattern, you don’t have to drink green juice to get the health benefits of vegetables. Choose a rainbow of fruits and vegetables for optimum nutrients. Red, purple, blue, white, brown, orange, and yellow fruits and vegetables are important sources of phytochemicals that are crucial to good health. Stick to green veggies only, and you’re missing out on essential nutrients.

If you enjoy making your own vegetable/fruit juices or smoothies, use these tips:

  1. Choose plain, unflavored Greek yogurt for an excellent protein source without added sugar.
  2. Use ½ – 1 cup total fruit, choosing a variety of colors of fruit and incorporating fresh, frozen, or fruit canned in its own juice.
  3. Toss in 2-3 times the amount of vegetables as fruit. For example, if you use ½ cup fruit, use 1-1 and 1/2 cups vegetables. Vary the colors of vegetables for the most nutrients.

If you’d rather purchase juices or smoothies, follow these recommendations:

  1. Read the list of ingredients to make sure you can visualize each ingredient and that you’re purchasing a beverage made from whole foods.
  2. Avoid juices/smoothies with added sugar, even from healthier-sounding sweeteners such as brown rice syrup, raw cane sugar, honey, maple syrup, agave, etc. The fruit in the juice/smoothie will provide all the sweetness you need without added sugar.
  3. Note the number of calories per serving – you might be surprised! 1 cup of 100% fruit juice has about 100 calories, and 1 cup of tomato juice has about 40 calories.

By Lynn Grieger, RDN, CDE, CPT, CHWC

References:

Margaret McCartney:  Clean eating and the cult of healthism. BMJ2016; 354:i4095

Jocelyn Voo. The Complete Crash Course on Clean Eating. Fitness Magazine. http://www.fitnessmagazine.com/weight-loss/plans/diets/clean-eating/ Accessed 3-20-17

Jaclyn London, MS, RD, CDN. Why Clean Eating is Total BS. http://www.goodhousekeeping.com/health/diet-nutrition/a37595/what-is-clean-eating/ 3-29-2016. Accessed 3-20-17

What is Clean Eating? Clean Eating Magazine. http://www.cleaneatingmag.com/clean-diet/what-is-clean-eating 4-29-13. Accessed 3-20-17.

Eating Clean for Dummies Cheat Sheet, from Eating Clean for Dummies, 2nd edition. http://www.dummies.com/food-drink/special-diets/eating-clean-for-dummies-cheat-sheet/ Accessed 3-20-17.

Dietary Guidelines 2015-2020. https://health.gov/dietaryguidelines/2015/guidelines/executive-summary/ Accessed 3-30-17

Eat a Colorful Variety Everyday. Fruit & Veggies More Matters. http://www.fruitsandveggiesmorematters.org/eat-a-colorful-variety-of-fruits-and-vegetables Accessed 3-30-17

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Salvaging: What Is It?

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Salvaging. That’s what my friend called it when she invited me to go shopping with her. She had a long list of salvage stores in the area that she wanted to visit. Intrigued, I decided to give it a try.

Salvaging: What Is It?If you’ve never heard of such a thing, here’s the scoop.

Salvage stores sell scratch and dent items and stuff that the regular stores can’t sell. These items may be overstocks, returned merchandise, clearance, or just things that didn’t sell at the retail store. Salvage stores buy products by the pallet and truckload and then resell them at a drastically-reduced price. Each load is different, so salvage shoppers will never know what will be available at any store.

Most of the items were dry goods, canned goods, and nonperishable food. The salvage store also had paper goods, pet food, and some cleaning supplies.

Many of the products were past the dates on the labels. The “food safety hairs” on the back of my neck started to go up quickly. That said, by being cautious and paying attention, I was able to find some real bargains.

How?

Well, salvage shopping feels like a balancing act to me. Some foods are perfectly safe, while others needed to be skipped. Here’s the lowdown on what you need to know if you or your clients want to pursue salvage shopping.

SalvagingThe expiration date on food has nothing to do with food safety. There is nothing “illegal” about stores selling food that is beyond the expiration date. The one exception here is infant formula and some baby food.

Packages frequently have words like “best by” or “use by” on them. This does not mean that you can’t eat the food after this date. These dates are provided by the food manufacturers as a way for you to judge quality and freshness. Putting these dates on packages is entirely at the discretion of the manufacturer. After all, they would like you to eat their food when it is at its best.

Many unopened shelf-stable products will be of good quality long past their sell-by dates. Foods like mustard, ketchup, pickles, crackers, and cereal may lose quality, color, and texture, but can remain perfectly safe to eat.

Here’s a little key to those dates:

  • The sell-by date tells the store how long to display the product for sale.
  • The use-by date is the last date recommended for use of the product while it’s at peak quality.
  • The best-if-used by dates is recommended for best flavor or quality. It is not a purchase or a safety date.

Walking the Aisles...Non-perishable shelf-stable foods such as sugar, dried beans, spices and canned goods do not spoil unless they are handled carelessly. They will lose quality and nutrition, however, if stored for a long time, even if kept under ideal conditions.

Some shelf-stable foods are called semi-perishable and have a shorter shelf life. These are foods like flour, grain, dried fruits and dry mixes. They can usually be kept unopened for 6-12 months without much noticeable quality loss.

Commercially-processed low-acid canned goods like meat, poultry, fish, soups, corn, carrots, potatoes will usually keep (unopened) in a pantry for 2-5 years. High acid foods like juices, pickles, sauerkraut and items in vinegar-based sauces will generally keep for 12-18 months.

When shopping, avoid dusty cans or torn labels, this may indicate very old stock.

Don’t purchase bulging, rusted, or leaking cans. These could contain dangerous bacteria.

Unsafe CanBe wary of deeply dented cans. Carefully check dented cans before buying them. Cans with dents may have exposed the contents to air, which results in the perfect environment for bacteria to grow.

Watch out for pantry pests (bugs) in salvaged foods. These pests can hitchhike into your house in foods like cereals, flours, herbs, spices, chocolate and dried fruit. Storing these items in air-tight plastic or glass containers can help prevent the infestation from transferring from one food to another in the pantry.

Consider the geographic area of where you live. Where have your salvage foods been stored? Food stored in warm and humid climates tends to have a shorter shelf life.

Don’t overbuy. Don’t get so excited about the deals you’re getting that you buy more than you can eat in a reasonable amount of time.

Once you get the items home, store them in a cool, dry place and rotate them, using the oldest first.

Remember the old saying “when in doubt, throw it out!”

I’ll add this… a deal isn’t a deal if you end up throwing the food out later. When you salvage, shop smart!

By Cheryle Jones Syracuse, MS, Professor Emeritus at The Ohio State University

Want to share salvaging tips with your clients? Here’s a SalvageHandout, just for you. Get your copy now!

Free Grocery Handout

For healthy shopping advice and guides to food safety, look no further than the Nutrition Education Store! 

Supermarket Shopping DVD

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6 Grocery Shopping Tours

Plus, there are tons of new materials in the store. Check them out, or just review the featured category below…

ALL-NEW Nutrition Posters

There are a whole bunch of new nutrition posters, and I really think you’ll like what you see. Help your clients choose healthful beverages, make balanced meal decisions, track their progress, and review nutrition basics, all with colorful and engaging posters. Take a look today!

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