1.
Nov 17, 2007 10:41 PM
in response to:
Guest
I imagine this diet is not superior to the average American's, despite the fact that it may provide more servings of fruits and veggies than the average American gets. The reason I say that is that beer is empty calories even beyond the empty calories most people get. Beer has nothing going for it in terms of essential fatty acids, protein, vitamins, or minerals (it has a little bit of magnesium, but that's it). Many people eat a lot of junk food, but junk food is often based on flour products, which are at the very least fortified with iron and B vitamins and may contain fiber.
Beef jerky is the only source of fat or protein in this diet, but is very high in sodium and saturated fat (yes, so are many of the regular people eat, but there's at least the option they might pick a lean fish, poultry, or non-meat sources of protein). Additionally, beef jerky doesn't provide much in the way of essential fatty acids, although the Omega-3 to Omega-6 ratio is probably superior to most diets (about 1 to 4.5). Jerky is a good source of zinc and an okay source of protein, but provides scant amounts of everything else.
Orange juice balances the vitamin profile out a little by providing lots of C, potassium, as well as some B vitamins. However, this diet is completely lacking Vitamin A, D, E, calcium, and fiber and falling way short on a lot of other nutrients. Even Americans who eat very little fruits and veggies probably get more variety in their plant foods than just OJ (at least they get ketchup!) I think that the addition of more solid food, even if the choices were similarly limited, would certainly improve this diet.
