Beverage consumption guidelines are hard to swallow
By Beth Teitell
Tuesday, March 14, 2006 - Updated: Mar 16, 2006 10:30 AM EST
Just how many healthy lifestyle guides can one person be expected to remember, let alone follow? Or, as the case may be, flout? You’d think one know-it-all geometric shape telling us what to consume was enough, particularly since no one I’ve ever met pays much attention to it, but where there’s a buck to be made, there’s a pyramid to be built, or in this case a pitcher.
The Unilever Health Institute, the parent company of Lipton Tea, figured that what Americans need is a pitcher-shaped beverage pyramid, the better to graphically demonstrate that we should drink up to eight cups a day of - guess what? - unsweetened tea. Coincidence? Yeah, right.
The nutritionists that put together the new ‘‘healthy beverage guidelines,” which recommend up to nine servings of water a day and up to four cups of unsweetened coffee, have said the company didn’t play a role in their recommendations. Nonetheless, where there’s a pyramid there’s sure to be controversy. Particularly because the new recommendations allow men to drink more beer (24 ounces a day) than low-fat milk or soy drinks (16 ounces per day). Was Homer Simpson on the Unilever panel?
The American Beverage Association, whose members are producers, marketers and distributors of nonalcoholic beverages, has stepped forward to point out the report’s ‘‘misguided suggestion that it’s healthier to drink more alcohol than sweetened beverages, and, in some scenarios, drink more tea than water.”
All valid issues, to be sure, but I’ve got a different beef (and a full day’s required serving at that): Enough already with the pyramids. I fear this latest little marketing gimmick will set off a new round of triangles with control issues. Will the cosmetics association come out with a face-shaped ‘‘pyramid” showing how much moisturizer, nanosomes, alpha hydroxy and foundation you should be using per day?
I was midway through my rant when a friend stopped me to point out that the pyramids can be manipulated for one’s own purposes. ‘‘I use the food pyramid as an enabler,” she said. ‘‘If I’m having a bread binge day, I tell myself I’m getting in my six to 11 servings of grains. There’s a bit of food Alzheimer’s involved. The top of the food pyramid says oils and sweets are like no more than three (or is it two) times a week, but each time I have some, I can’t remember if I’m having the second or third serving, or if I’m borrowing from next week.”
She, for one, is actually happy about the proposed beverage pitcher guidelines, as long as they make melted chocolate count as a liquid.
And, given the propensity for these healthy consumption guidelines to change with the frequency of New England weather, I’m sure in time it will be on there. Right next to the minimum daily requirement of martinis.
