Food first!

A growing trend in the food industry today is to have products be more clean label and of course have ingredients that sound like something you and I would know how to say and figure out what it is. With that approach being undertaken, what is now emerging is that the people are now putting food first and vitamins second. Is this a good thing or a bad thing?

I’m a huge proponent of eating food to get the nutrients you need but two things must be considered when eating food. Do you want to eat something because it is food and it is time to eat or are you eating a quality food item that has benefits? Eating a cheese sandwich/burger may give you nutrients like protein, calcium, and various vitamins and minerals but is eating the burger the best way to get it? If you ate a burger everyday, I’m pretty sure your waist line would increase. I think there may even be a documentary on Netflix or online that talks about the 30-day McDonald’s diet. Either way, your choice of food definitely makes an impact on how many of those nutrients are actually available to you.

By putting vitamins second, I fear that we might be deficient in key nutrients like B vitamins if we aren’t eating enough leafy greens and healthy foods. Plus, how many of us actually eat completely healthy everyday or even eat enough veggies and fruits to make a dent in our recommended daily allowance of the needed nutrients? My guess is that very few of us do. So by not buying fortified foods, perhaps diseases like scurvy could see an increase.

As a consumer, what’s most important to me is that the food is healthy and I’m getting a benefit from it when I eat it. Price is also of importance to me because just because I want to eat healthier doesn’t mean that I want to break the bank in doing so. So should you put food first and vitamins second? Good question with no straight-forward answer!