Your View of Food

Americans are bombarded with television programs that show where to find the best dinners, pizzas, and cakes, and the restaurants that serve the biggest and juiciest burgers. Other programs feature chefs battling to prepare meals, and the top places to burst your belly from consuming atomic chicken wings and deli sandwiches longer than a foot. There are also shows that feature bizarre foods from cultures around the world. How do you use the information from popular network food shows to build a nutritious meal? You don’t—these shows are for entertainment. The construction of a nutritious meal requires learning about which foods are healthy and which foods are not, how foods and nutrients function in your body, and how to use scientific resources. This text is designed to provide you with the information necessary to make sound nutritional choices that will optimize health and help prevent disease.

How do you fill your plate? © Shutterstock

The word nutrition first appeared in 1551 and comes from the Latin word nutrire, meaning “to nourish.” Today, we define nutritionThe sum of all processes involved in how organisms obtain nutrients, metabolize them, and use them to support all of life’s processes. as the sum of all processes involved in how organisms obtain nutrients, metabolize them, and use them to support all of life’s processes. Nutritional scienceThe investigation of how an organism is nourished, and how nourishment affects personal health, population health, and planetary health. is the investigation of how an organism is nourished, and incorporates the study of how nourishment affects personal health, population health, and planetary health. Nutritional science covers a wide spectrum of disciplines. As a result, nutritional scientists can specialize in particular aspects of nutrition such as biology, physiology, immunology, biochemistry, education, psychology, sustainability, and sociology.

Without adequate nutrition the human body does not function optimally, and severe nutritional inadequacy can lead to disease and even death. The typical American diet is lacking in many ways, from not containing the proper amounts of essential nutrients, to being too speedily consumed, to being only meagerly satisfying. Dietitians are nutrition professionals who integrate their knowledge of nutritional science into helping people achieve a healthy diet and develop good dietary habits. The Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics (AND) is the largest organization of nutrition professionals worldwide and dietitians registered with the AND are committed to helping Americans eat well and live healthier lives. To learn more from the AND’s nutritional advice, visit http://www.eatright.org/default.aspx.

Your ability to wake up, to think clearly, to communicate, to hope, to dream, to go to school, to gain knowledge, to go to work, to earn a living, and to do all of the things that you like to do are dependent upon one factor—your health. Good health means you are able to function normally and work hard to achieve your goals in life. For the next few minutes, take some time to view snapshots of the insides of the refrigerators of American mechanics, doctors, school teachers, hunters, short-order cooks, college students, vegans, and more. Visit Mark Menjivar’s portrait exhibition, “You Are What You Eat” (Note 1.7 "Interactive 1.1"). Menjivar hopes these images will invoke new thoughts about, “How we care for our bodies. How we care for others. And how we care for the land.” As you look at these images think about your personal health, the health of your family and friends, and the health of this planet. These hopes encompass the inspirations for this book.