Axia College Material
Appendix E

Assess Your Food Intake

This activity demonstrates how to select a healthful food regime. Go to http://www.mypyramidtracker.gov/ to begin the activity. Using the steps provided below you will enter your daily food intake for a typical day. Once you finish the activity complete the three follow-up questions.

Step One
Click on the New User Registration on the bottom left side of the screen. Once you complete the registration, you will be able to enter food items based on your typical daily diet.

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Step Two
Once you complete the personal profile, click on Proceed to Food Intake.
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Step Three
Below Enter food Item typing a food item into the search bar and click on Search.

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Step Four
Once you have completed entering your typical daily diet for one day, click on Save & Analyze on the bottom left hand side of the screen and then and click on Analyze Your Food Intake located on the toolbar at the top of the screen.

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Step Five
Click on Meeting 2005 Dietary Guidelines.
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Step Six
Click on Maintain your current weight or Leads you to gradually achieving and maintaining a healthy weight and click on Go.

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Step Seven Dietary information is now available based on what you inputted. Click on the emoticons to receive summary information on your choices.

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Follow-up Questions

1. Based on the summaries you received by clicking on the emoticons, what did you learn about your daily food intake?

I learned that my grain, vegetable, fruit and milk intake did not meet the daily recommendations. I was not getting half of the recommended amount of whole grain products that I should be eating. The number of vegetable cup equivalents to me was reported low. The number of fruit equivalent cups I consumed did not meet the recommendation for me. My milk intake was low and it stated that I am eating fewer cup equivalents than the recommendation. My meat and bean group intake shows that I am eating the recommended number of oz equivalents.

My total fat intake was poor. The recommended range from fat is 20 to 35 percent of total calories and my intake was 55 percent. My total saturated fat was too high as well, being the norm is 10 percent and my intake was at 17 percent. My recommendations for cholesterol was high as well. The recommendation was less than 300 mg and my intake was 642 mg. My sodium was average compared to the recommendations. The recommendations for sodium intake was 2300 mg and my intake was 2874 mg.

2. What recommendations were provided to improve your food intake according to the emoticon summaries?

There were plenty of recommendations provided to help improve my food intake. For grains there was tips for selecting a diet with plenty of whole grain products. It gave examples like, consuming foods rich in fiber, such as whole grains. It also said to eat more whole grains you can substitute a whole-grain product for a refined product such as eating whole-wheat bread instead of white bread.

Here are some recommendations I learned to add a variety of fruits and fruit juices in to my diet each day. I can keep a bowl of fruit on the table. I can refrigerate cut-up fruit to store for later. I can buy fresh fruits in season when they may be less expensive and at their peak flavor. Also, buy pre-cut packages of fruit for a healthy snack in seconds and choose packaged fruits that do not have added sugars.

Most dietary fats should come from sources of polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fatty acids. Sources of poly and monounsaturated fatty acids are liquid vegetable oils, including soybean oil, corn oil, safflower oil. soybean oil, canola oil, olive oil, walnuts, and flaxseed. Fish and shellfish are also sources of unsaturated oils.

3. How can being aware of your daily food intake help you achieve healthy eating habits?

When you are aware of the potential effect of unhealthy eating habits you are more most likely to choose healthier eating habits. Let’s say you are going into the kitchen to get a snack, you look in the pantry and you see a bag of chips and right next to that you see some bananas. In your head you know you are trying to stick to a healthy intake of calories so you would choose the banana because it only has 100 calories. The chips are 170 calories per serving, so being aware of your daily food intake you are able to make the right decision for healthier eating habits.