Once legitimate journalist Bud Buck continues his effort to bring us the news in a way that might interest people who are so overloaded with information, they can only respond to a crisis.
Here’s his latest try at re-reporting a ho-hum headline.
Fruit & Vegetable Forces Fail to Win Hearts & Minds
By Bud Buck
Many Americans were filled with resolve (and chips and pop) ten years ago when the Healthy People Mission was launched in response to the shocking news that our own bodies were stockpiling calories.
We were alarmed at the news that catastrophically destructive WMD (Waistlines of Mass Distention) were hidden in plain sight inside millions of our own homes, thinly disguised by roving bands of elastic. We were horrified to learn that a lethal cabal of Deep Fry Fanatics had taken hold and were promoting WMD in every little café up and down the Main Streets of our small towns and large cities!
We committed ourselves to find a way to turn things around, even if turning things around meant we might have to see our own backsides in the mirror.
Our mission – to achieve nothing less than a revolution in eating.
Our method – to transform the dietary landscape, to institute a form of nutritional regime change that would oust the oppressive twin dictators, sugar and fat, and bring relief to a land where people were suffering from a severe lack of opportunity to tie their own shoes!
Our goal – to send daily vegetable consumption skyrocketing from a miserable 26% to a respectable 50%, and daily fruit consumption from a paltry 34% of the population to a glorious 75%.
Going phone-to-phone, the brave surveyors of our BRFSS (Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System) have engaged the locals and using culturally appropriate techniques, they’ve managed to have a look inside the cupboards where the battle has been fought and apparently lost.
Here are the questions they asked:“How often do you…”
1) “…drink fruit juices such as orange, grapefruit, or tomato?”
2) “Not counting juice, how often do you eat fruit?”
3) “…eat green salad?”
4) “…eat potatoes, not including French fries, fried potatoes, or potato chips?”
5) “…eat carrots?”
6) “Not counting carrots, potatoes, or salad, how many servings of vegetables do you usually eat?”And now, ten years on, the results are in. Fruits have taken a beating, and Vegetables have barely held their own! Americans have spent a decade at the buffet, and have chosen chocolate pudding over green beans!
Is it this the moment to retreat from the relentless expansion of expansionist eating habits, or should we launch a Fruit Surge? Are we going to go belly up in response to bellies going out, or does America have the appetite for a prolonged Vegetable Engagement Strategy?
These latest statistics suggest that an increasingly wide-ranging defeat has already been awkwardly, but completely, embraced.
Time will Tell.
This is Bud Buck!
Bud sounds unusually breathless in this latest report, but it might be because he had to walk up some stairs to file it.
Fruits and Vegetables vs. Everything We Actually Eat. Which side are you on?
Trail Baboon 
Rise and Shine Babooners:
I come down on the side of Fruits and Sweets of many kinds. I do eat vegetables, too though, with the exception of asparagus, a vegetable that never won my heart. If you count fresh tomatoes as a fruit, then my consumption increases massively late July through early October when my tomato plants freeze–during that period I’ve been known to eat many meals of just sweet corn (with butter) and fresh tomatoes.
The bain of my nutritional and weight management existence are sweets and mashed potatoes. I love ’em both and can really go overboard despite my otherwise healthy eating habits.
A leftover problem from my bout with cancer 20 years ago, is osteopenia–a mild form of osteoporosis. I cannot tolerate the medications meant to treat that. I have had several stress fractures as a result. So I try to follow Dr. Christine Northrup’s recommendation that one eats a vegan diet one day/week. So you can add TOFU to my list of “veggies–well sorta,” on that day every week. I’m getting better at that, too. I’ve never been crazy about meat, but I get very hungry without it.
As the member of a family with many obese people, combined with good cooks, I also embrace defeat! But I do try really hard to eat lots of F and V’s.
Off to the day!
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Definitely on the side of fruits and vegetables! A couple of years ago, I radically altered my diet, and for the most part I no longer crave a lot of the “bad” foods I once ate. If I am logging a lot of running miles, I must think of the quality in addition to the quantity of food I eat, or I don’t feel well. At first it felt like a sacrifice to give up the foods I felt everyone else was enjoying penalty free, but over time I experienced the benefits of my choice. Scones at Cafe Rustica are still on my menu, just not every day of the week.
Tell Bud Buck that ho-hum headlines are probably better for your health than the others. 🙂
Happy Friday, all!
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Greetings! Like Elinor, as I’m training hard for the higher belts in karate, I have to choose carefully what and when I eat. I’m trying to get more fruits and vegetables, but I focus on quality protein as well. I especially like the protein shake powders in my morning smoothie or after my karate workout in evening. But it’s still hard to eat a salad when those carbs are so easy to grab and go.
To Jacque regarding ostopenia: the best source of available calcium and all the mineral co-factors that build bones are GREENS! Dark, leafy greens — and the best way to eat them is in a green smoothie with fruits to balance them. It sounds weird, but they’re very tasty. A great book called “Green for Life” by Victoria Boutenko goes over her research and information in detail — I highly recommend it. It’s far better than the drugs available which are very dangerous and damaging to body. FYI …
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Thanks for the recommendation–I’ll look at that. I do eat a lot of those dark greens, too… but I don’t always enjoy how they are prepared. Always a challenge.
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The book is very easy to read as she is a charming but thorough writer. The difference between eating/chewing greens and blending them can be significant. Most of us may not have the ability to chew and break down greens to a liquid before swallowing. A high end blender like a Vitamix or Blendtec (although any quality blender will suffice) will break the tough cell walls to release the nutrients inside more efficiently than we may be able to chew. It’s a paperback and not very expensive — well worth it.
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You need your vitamin D to absorb the calcium, too. Have you had your levels checked? Almost everyone is deficient.
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Absolutely correct.
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for years and years i was a vegetarian that didn’t eat meat but didn’t eat much in the way of fruit and veggies either. i quit eating meat for reasons other than health, as a statement of respect for life in protest of the viet nam wart many years ago. i was and may still be an abstinent owly veggie who drank like a fish and smoke marlboros, i had an affection for peanut butter, did some eggs and cheese and found myself malnourished after a year of turning veggie. it took a while for my body to aclimate but it did and i am now 30 or 40 pounds heavier than i was oh those many years ago. part is age part is potato chips. i have potato chips call out to me for their hiding places. i recently read that sleep deprivation causes one to crave junk food and i suspect i can improve both by straightening out my act but time will tell. i make big enough batches of sunday morning eggs with potato and onions to carry me over for the week, whne i have fruit i love it but it doesn’t jump into my cart at the store so contact is less frequent than it could be. my kids school is changing to a local supply healthy eating program and i will support it every way i can. the cheese pizza and mac and cheese form the box they love can not be good for them in the long haul.
i give my self and my family about a c+ on the healthy road. we are aware and make weak efforts to go in the correct direction more lip service to the concept than to the food itself. we will work on it
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Truly, a peck of provender: I could munch your good
dry oats. Methinks I have a great desire to a bottle
of hay: good hay, sweet hay, hath no fellow.
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Bless thee, Bottom! bless thee! thou art translated.
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The eye of man hath not heard, the ear of man hath not seen, man’s hand is not able to taste, his tongue to conceive, nor his heart to report, what my dream was.
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I am a great eater of beefs and I believe that does harm to my wit.
Eight wild boars roasted whole at breakfast, but twelve persons there.
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This is so painful. My dad’s generation got to defeat the Third Reich and Japanese Imperialism. In contrast, my generation declared war on poverty in the late 1960s. Poverty won that one pretty handily. Then we declared war on drugs. Drugs won that one; no contest. So we declared war on Unwise Eating. And now we have a classic Bud Buck Hype-the-Story article informing us that Unwise Eating has been kicking Sensible Nutrition’s butt.
Is it too late to rally? We could send veggie storm troopers into school lunch rooms every day to force-feed broccoli to any student who didn’t eat enough health food. “Look, kid, this is a carrot, and it is going inside you. Do we do this the easy way . . . or do we do it the hard way?”
Or maybe we could fight this war with taxes like the way we have taxed cigarettes until killing yourself with fags is a rich man’s perogative. It is discouraging that Burger King can’t give away leafy salads at $1.18 a copy while Double Whoppers fly off the shelves at $3.29 apiece. But if we institute a fat tax, how well would Big Macs sell if they cost ten bucks (and another five bucks for fries)?
I know, I know. If we ban fatty foods or make them too expensive, we’d get a rerun of Prohibition. Mexico would set up underground pipelines to meet the demand for refried beans and greasy tacos. Our porous border with Canada would come alive with fast boats running in jumbo boxes of Count Chocula, and every city of any size would have speakeasies trafficking in sugary breakfast items and bags of chips.
If we get serious about forcing people to eat health foods, we should anticipate a monstrous kickback from our own citizens. “You can have my Hostess Ho-Ho when you pry it from my cold dead fingers.”
I hate to say it, but when we went to war against bad eating we might have (as Bud Buck might put it) bitten off more than we could chew.
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fun, funny
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Another battle we are losing here in SC MN: the war on loose dogs.
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Clyde: Are you proposing that we should get a healthier diet by supplementing it with frequent servings of (formerly loose) dogs? I’ve tried to get excited about reading the journals of Lewis and Clark, but most of the talk is about how flavorful last night’s serving of dog was.
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Okay, Steve, I said a gentle revolution below, but may be we should send the the Green Giant to the class rooms to provide a more forceful approach to encouraging better eating.
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I appreciate the support, Jim. But do you think a ten-foot tall mostly naked green man could make it past security in our schools these days? I am picturing this in my mind, and the results might not be pretty!
In case you’ve forgotten how short the Giant’s, umm, leafy skirt is, I suggest you do a Google Images search.
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I’ve seen the Green Giant standing near the town of Blue Earth, but he never seems to leave the spot where he is standing. I think he is more than 10 feet tall and would send security gaurds running if they saw him.
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Don’t forget about his niblets.
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Snicker.
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As a former Pillsbury employee, we had an 8-9 ft tall figure of the Green Giant in the reception area, and in some of the more naughty conversations, we wondered about what that very short leafy skirt was covering. It was just long enough to cover, but so short you just had to know …
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Great post, Steve! Several weeks ago, I think I had posted a link as to why a Big Mac costs less than a salad. It mainly has to do with the amount of farm subsidies to grain crops and cattle ranchers. There are VERY few subsidies for produce and practically none for organic (I could be wrong on that one). Our entire farming, manufacturing and food production framework is based on grains as I understand it. That explains a lot of things.
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This morning for breakfast I am having a peach and my husband is eating a green salad. I could live on fruit, and I have increased my consumption of veggies since I met my husband and started a vegetable garden. My husband eats far less fruit than I do.
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Good Morning and Good Eating,
As a supporter of sustainable farming I’m glad that there is an increasing interest in buying locally grown fruit and vegetables and also other locally produced food including meat. My mother was a high school home economics teacher before she got married, so we ate a lot of vegetables and fruit. I do have a sweet tooth and a love of some junk food, and eat more of some unhealthy foods than I should according to my own idea of what should be included in a healthy diet. I do grow most, but not all, of the vegetables that I eat.
Regarding Bud’s report, I think the battle to win over more people to the side of better eating is still under way, but let’s hope it is a gentle revolution, not a war.
Renee: Thanks for the info on things to see in N. Dakota yesterday. On our trip we are planning to stay over night in Medora and spend a little time visiting Theodore Roosevelt Park
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Jim, if you get a chance try the Cowboy Cafe in Medora. Locals eat there and the food is decent and the Tomato Mac soup is good. There is also a pretty good Western book store. The Cowboy Hall of Fame just won a national award for Best cowboy museum. Medora is a tourist trap but there are gems nestled amongst the kitsch.
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“Oats: a grain, which in England is generally given to horses, but in Scotland supports the people.'” Samuel Johnson’s dictionary
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Thanks the additional info, Renee.
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Jim: one of the most fascinating characters in the old West was the Marquis de Mores, a Jew-hating hotheaded Frenchman who was forever getting in duels and killing people. He created Medora as a way to ship beef to the east, naming the town for his wife. The Marquise, is a welcome exception to the rule that most women of the frontier were homely as a plow. If you don’t have much time before the trip, read the Wikipedia writeup on the Marquis. It covers the basics well. A somewhat nicer version of the story is told in one of the most entertaining books I ever read, Ian Frazier’s The Great Plains. Highly recommended!
The Roosevelt park right across the freeway from Medora is great, especially early and late in the day.
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Okay, even more info. Thanks Steve. I think I do have time to check out the Wikipedia information.
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I knew a guy who went to Medora to play Roosevelt in the show. Looked the part and loved the horse, but he wasn’t quite prepared for the ‘Less than Metropolitan’ aspects of performing out there… gave it up fairly soon after learning they couldn’t accommodate his dietary requests (to get this back on topic…)
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Ben, I had a friend who played Teddy Roosevelt for years all over ND. Still does I bet. Steve Stark
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Ben and Clyde: This is getting creepy. I too know a guy who worked at Medora playing Teddy Roosevelt in the pageant. A lot of “Bully! Bully!”
I’ll not name mine. I used to think he was a friend but then he was convicted of a serious sexual assault. But he isn’t either of the guys you knew.
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Morning….
Was it tim that called it “…lip service…” earlier? And then Steve’s well written post…. yeah… I’m not going to even pretend we’re trying. And Renee and Joanne and Jacque and equivoque– we just; — I’m not– , but then–……… my son, however…. *sigh*
I’m going to take my Kwik Trip cappuccino and my ham and cheese sandwich for lunch and the bag of potato chips and go find a dark place to hide until this topic blows over.
(tim, thanks for the advice late last night. You are right… blow the dust off and get it out there again…)
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Better move over and make room for me and my brick of cheese.
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Glad to have the company. Push those empty spam can over and have a seat… I got donuts for dessert too.
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Mmmm. Donuts. Got room for my bread pudding (with caramel sauce, of course) appetizer?
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“I went to a restaurant that serves ‘breakfast at any time’. So I ordered French Toast during the Renaissance.”
Steven Wright
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love it
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I am, well…okay. I’m not up to Elinor’s level. Or Joanne’s. I am, well, average. I try. Most meals have at least one fruit or vegetable, but I’m not sure the dried strawberries in my boxed cereal count (even if they are organic). I probably do better than the average American, but only because I don’t live within walking distance of Curran’s Restaurant and their fabulous mashed potatoes…
Daughter, on the other hand, may be a picky eater – but if she could eat broccoli 3 times a day, 7 days a week, she would. She might occasionally take a break for green beans or the odd apple slice, but she is a broccoli lovin’ gal. I take hope for future generations.
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“Fatherhood is telling your daughter that Michael Jackson loves all his fans, but has special feelings for the ones who eat broccoli.” Bill Cosby
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“The new KFC Double Down sandwich is real! This one-of-a-kind sandwich features two thick and juicy boneless white meat chicken filets (Original Recipe® or Grilled), two pieces of bacon, two melted slices of Monterey Jack and pepper jack cheese and Colonel’s Sauce. This product is so meaty, there’s no room for a bun.”
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I love lots of vegetables and fruits. Asparagus and artichokes are my favorites. Sweet corn is right up there too, in season. I eat cabbage and beets and rutabagas and brussels sprouts – not out of virtue or self-discipline, but because I love ’em.
I have a pet theory that most people are eating when they’re not terribly hungry, and that’s what makes them want to enhance the food with lots of fat and sugar, to heighten the taste. If you’ve been doing some physical work, or hiking or biking or whatever, and you haven’t been snacking, you can get a very keen pleasure out of a simple dish of green beans with a little butter and salt, and you don’t need a bacon cheeseburger.
Of course, I do eat some junk, too, since I have no self-discipline. Nothing chocolate is safe around me.
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“We kids feared many things in those days – werewolves, dentists, North Koreans, Sunday School – but they all paled in comparison with Brussels sprouts.” Dave Barry
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I was just having some fun with quotes; not really making a comment. I do not happen to like strong-flavored veggies, such as asparagus, parsnips, brussels sporuts. I just like that Barry quote.
steve, my wife and I encourage our kids, bribed them now and then, never required. My daughter does the same. Because we feel that is a battle is a loss in the long run.
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I suppose I love them because they were never forced on me.
I think I’m in the minority on the beets too.
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I guess there are lots of people who don’t like the taste of certain vegetable and I don’t want any one to eat any thing they don’t like. I think beets and Brussels sprouts are very good to eat.
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Linda: you touch on a sensitive issue for me. My former wife made family meals a battleground on the issue of eating diversity. She would tell our stubborn daughter, “You are NOT leaving this table until you at least try the spinach!” (spinach, Brussels sprouts, peas and mushrooms, cauliflower, etc, etc).
Baboons, has it EVER worked for you to make a kid eat something loathsome during a family meal? Did that EVER have a good result? As the parent from the Planet of Harmony, I just cringed when we had yet another battle over “just try a little” food items.
“The poor starving children of Armenia would love to have this food you are too picky to eat.”
“Great! Invite them to dinner next time. If they wanted to eat this cr@p on my plate, everybody might be happy.”
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I was never made to eat anything I didn’t want and I really had a pretty limited diet until I went to college. At that point I started experimenting with many different foods and I think I have an extrememly varied diet now. One of my first memories is standing in our kitchen when I was no taller than the kitchen table (so I must have been pretty young) and I clearly remember making the decision that I was no longer going to eat cooked carrots. There was no reason for the decision. I liked cooked carrots. I think I was just asserting my little self. My mother wisely went along with it without comment. I didn’t eat cooked carrots for several years after that. Then, I just started eating them again. I once made my son eat a bowl of homemade minestrone. He has never forgiven me for it and I never made him eat anything again.
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Steve – I’ve always strongly encouraged my children to try all foods, but avoided making it a battle. Rancor at mealtime is just unacceptable overall in my view. My mother used Catholic guilt trips to make us eat everything, which I still do.
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Making a battle out of it is never a good strategy, but I think a lot of modern parents go too far in the other direction. They make a list of all the foods that their toddler does and doesn’t like when he’s three, chisel it in stone, and go through the next twenty years saying “Oh, he won’t eat carrots,” or “He hates asparagus.” You know, the kid might forget and start eating carrots or asparagus if you didn’t keep reinforcing the idea that he doesn’t eat them.
I know one mother who started buying white pepper when her kids were toddlers because they objected to food with black flecks in it. The kids are 17 and 20 now, and she’s still using only white pepper when she cooks.
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I like Steve’s spelling for cr@p. Almost as good as $hit.
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I eat lots of fruits and veggies every day. Everything else too. Except liver. Not liver.
Nice setting sun view today, Blevins! I’ll be back next week after Rock Bend…
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Enjoy the festival. Don’t overdo, work that is not drink.
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Hey, off topic, but I just got an e-mail from MPR noting that Bill Kling is resigning and there is a search on for a new CEO.
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Wow.
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got his
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We’re in the part of the year when I eat lots of F’s and V’s, because the garden is pumping them out like mad and I love them all, including beets and kohlrabi. Looking forward to the carrots and blue potatoes… the rest of the year I’m like y’all — I do pretty well but there are certainly lapses.
I took some nutrition classes when working at Nutritional Weight and Wellness (weightandwellness.com) and learned a lot of non-mainstream wisdom, in part how there are a lot of healthy ways to eat fats (there’s an online article somewhere by Mary Enig and Sally Fallon called “The Truth about Saturated Fats”). Sugar is the one that’s really insidious. Ah, see, you got me started, Bud Buck.
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Yesyerday was your day to rant; today is yours.
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Yes, we’ve all got it in us somewhere, I bet, if the right buttons are pushed.
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Just so nobody wonders where I am and/or what is happening:
I will be off-line for the weekend starting some time in the next hour or two, dealing with stuff. Back on Monday or Tuesday or maybe Wednesday.
Then it gets exciting. Friday my wife and I plus daughter and her husband and two children fly to San Diego. We think we have all the issues for transporting my wife worked out.
Rehearsal Friday night. Wedding in Balboa Park Saturday afternoon, dinner and dance to follow in same place, in part of park called the Mexican Village or something like that. All Mexican food, etc. Not because anyone is Mexican, just because our future daughter-in-law loves Mexican food and colors and clothes, etc. Cannot argue with that.
Sunday a picnic on the beach.
Monday all including bride and groom go to Disneyland, if my wife can go. She and I may stay back if she is too tired. Notice all the events I get to attend that will put my FM in over-drive.
Tuesday we all fly back, including bride and groom, who are honeymooning with us. So a busy week, working and going places. Etc.
Then the week after that bride and groom fly back and my wife and start the process of figuring out how we manage my retirement in December, which will include putting our house on the market, and making several other major changes in our life.
BTW: my son works quite near the explosion in San Bruno.
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Your week ahead deserves a “Holy Wah!”
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Clyde: We all will miss you but wish you and your family well. Have a wonderful extended weekend!
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go for it clyde. glad to hear you worked out the challenges ( or replaced them with different challenges)
have a glorious week and come back safe and satisfied
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Ditto — I can’t think of a way to say it better, Clyde.
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Inspired, in part, by today’s topic, I got a salad from the cafeteria today. Dark leafy greens, peas, cukes, green beans. It all sounds so virtuous until I add the bleu cheese dressing. 🙂
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Mmmm….. bleu cheese…. Bring that along to the cave Anna– I think we’re about set then!
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I’ll need a few dark chocolate bars, too. But I think we’re set.
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Well this has been an interesting topic. I think the reason Americans don’t eat as many fruits and vegetables as they used to is because we have become so impatient that we want watermelon in January so we get it but it has no flavor because it was shipped from who knows where. Tasting the fruits and vegetables in season is like nothing else. What can compare to a tomato that still has the sunshine on it? Or apples from the orchard. My newest favorite is another developed by the Minnesota Arboretum, Sweet Tango. So yummy. It joins Honeycrisp, Zestar (which it is a combination of) and Haroldsons. Support your local growers!! The produce will have real flavor. P.S. I also got the MPR announcement. Do you think there will be any Heartlanders on the search committee?
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Search committee? I was thinking one of us who is looking for a job should apply!
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whats the note? i don’t read with the same vigor as in the past.
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oops, i was gonna say something intelligent but i got a potato chip wedged in the keyboard.
have a great weekend, All. Harvest Festival (Lake Superior Sust. Ag. and Energy Assoc. collaboration). hoping for good weather.
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Snort.
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st peter is free free free
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MPR is talking about national search-we can make it easier for them and just invite them over here to the trail!
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as thinking mpr could run much more efficiently with toal computerazation and shuffle of music and various news sources. we have no need for offices officers djs radio personalities or any of the fringe decorations that weak minds cling to. our conrtributions could go toward automated programming for a fraction of the cost of the musical chairs of personalities they go through over 40 or 50 years. who needs em
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