veggie-mon

The new federal guidelines for nutrition as explained in the new Food Pyramid, in addition to information and tips about good nutrition choices, gives some direction about discretionary calories.

Your body needs a certain number of calories just to keep your heart pumping, your lungs working, your brain thinking, etc. Then you have to have calories for physical activities you do every day, like walking, eating, P.E., and playing a hot game of basketball with your friends. These essential calories are the minimum calories required to live and function every day. By selecting the lowest fat and no-sugar-added foods in each food group, you make the best nutritional choices.

You may be able to spend a few more calories over what your body needs to do its work each day. These “extra” calories are called discretionary calories. They are the “extras” you can work into your diet, in the form of solid fats (like whole milk, cheese, and sausage) added sugars (like candy, sodas, and sweetened cereal), and even extra helpings of low-fat, low-sugar foods (an extra serving of meat, an extra apple, etc.)

Unfortunately, most Americans use up all their discretionary calories before lunch! Since most discretionary calorie allowances are only between 100-300 calories, you can see how this is easy to do. Some people use all their discretionary calorie allowance by choosing foods with higher fat and sugar content in their daily diet, instead of lower calorie choices.

For example, 1 scoop of vanilla ice cream uses up about 205 discretionary calories from your daily allowance! That's more that many people's entire daily allowance!

And 3 small pieces of fried chicken uses up 335 discretionary calories! On the other hand, a skinless roasted chicken breast has only 140 calories, with 0 discretionary calories.

The bottom line: Make most of your daily choices low-fat foods with little or no added sugars for the healthiest diet. If you do choose higher calorie foods, don't choose them all the time, or even every day!