“Despite the appearance of an endless bounty of food, it is a fragile bounty, dependent upon the integrity of the global oil production, refining, and delivery system.”
—William Church,
“Why Our Food Is So Dependent on Oil”
When it comes to carbon footprints, Americans have some of the biggest feet in the world. How big? A recent study by MIT students found that even a homeless American still has a carbon footprint of 8.5 tons—twice the global average. And his shelter-living peers produce a whopping 20 tons of CO2 per capita. What uses the most energy in our lifestyle? Transportation, housing, and food.1
The Go Green Get Lean Diet is about to take you on a delicious journey that will reconnect you with the right types of foods that can make you healthy and trimmer while also thinning your carbon footprint at the same time. These are foods that are fresh and flavorful, that are connected to a sense of place and transport you away from all the faux food that is oozing from every corner of our culture today. It’s food that can absolutely be enjoyed in a way that allows you to thrive, but doesn’t compromise the ability of those who come after you to do the same thing.
As it stands now,
so much of our current eating landscape dulls these vibrant connections—we are encouraged to gobble down our food while multitasking, and our children are learning that dinner comes from the car rather than the kitchen.
Earlier in my career, when I was actively counseling clients, I could already see the outcome of this lifestyle. One-third of my practice was comprised of young adults who came to me because they were living on their own for the first time, with no idea of how to cook or plan meals and shopping lists. All they knew how to do was survive on takeout. And they were miserable and often gaining weight.
That’s why week 1, the “Take Action” phase, of the Go Green Get Lean Diet is designed to address the biggest problems associated with our food system, and the payback, in terms of both weight loss and a lightened carbon footprint, is going to be huge. Specifically, it’s going to do three things:
If you do nothing but read this chapter and put these quick fixes into action, you’ll have cooled some of the largest areas of your food’s carbon footprint and cleared out a bunch of unnecessary calories that are keeping you from moving toward your personal best health. Done. Enough said. Close the book. But if you want to know the answer to the “whys” behind it, or want to delve deeper into the new green and lean cuisine, keep reading.
Yes, and it is happening quicker than we thought.
As I’ve said, the consequences of your daily food choices go well beyond whether or not you’ll be able to fit into your “skinny jeans” tomorrow. Your choices resonate high up into the atmosphere, and like the extra fat cells on your derriere, they’ll linger there for a long time unless you do something about them. According to a 2008 report in Human Ecology, our food supply now accounts for about 19 percent of total US greenhouse gas emissions.2 And researchers estimate that up to 50 percent of this “energy bill” could be trimmed with a few tweaks to the American diet (hint: eat less animal products and junk food, and eat more local food) and a few changes in packaging and agriculture.
Here’s the deal. To lose weight, you have to change what you eat. You need to eat less “junk” and more real food. To cut your personal carbon footprint, you need to change what you eat. You need to concentrate on eating less “junk” and more real food. See any overlap? Wonderful.
So let’s get started.
A key hallmark of an SUV diet is the amount of beef you consume. A 2006 UN report found livestock production (especially beef) created almost 20 percent of total greenhouse gases worldwide, eclipsing even transportation. A 2008 report in Environmental Science and Technology estimated that red meat (30 percent) and dairy (18 percent) account for nearly half of all greenhouse gases from food in an average US household. This is why skipping beef and cheese is Quick Fix #1. No other food is likely to have as significant an impact on your dietary carbon footprint as beef. Cheese is also eliminated in this phase because it is another high-carbon, high-calorie food, especially if it comes from cows. Remember, we’re certainly not taking it away for good—we’re just shelving it until we see how to make greener choices. Want another compelling reason? It’s also an easy way to a leaner diet.
Realigning the amount of beef and cheese in your diet does two things: It helps trim excess calories from unhealthy saturated fat from your diet (and thus your waistline), and it can reduce damage to your arteries. That’s because cheese and beef represent the top two sources of artery-clogging saturated fat in the American diet, accounting for 13.1 percent and 11.7 percent respectively.3 And Americans are consuming more cheese than ever. According to the USDA’s Economic Research Service, between 1970 and 2005, the availability of cheese nearly tripled, from 11 pounds per person to a heart-stopping 31 pounds per person. Ounce for ounce, most cuts of beef (such as a burger, ribs, or steak) are higher in calories than fish or poultry. As a general rule, replacing beef with fish, poultry, or wild game (i.e., venison), you will cut unhealthy saturated fat while trimming calories from your plate.
While many beef cuts come in a high-calorie package, cheese almost always comes that way, weighing in at about 100 calories an ounce (much of it in the form of saturated fat). (Here’s a news flash: To lose weight, it is best to omit any food that packs 100 calories per ounce.) Even low-fat and fat-free cheeses are still high carbon, so for now, during your “Take Action” phase, avoid them.
So what should you eat? For the next 2 weeks, swap all of your beef meals for vegetarian ones (without cheese). This swap immediately moves you to the coolest place to eat from a global warming standpoint, and points you to the leanest choices as well.
Here are some easy ways to accomplish this: Order a grilled veggie and hummus sandwich instead of a cheeseburger, make bean burritos instead of beef ones, and enjoy a warming bowl of oatmeal instead of a meat-and-cheese omelet. Total savings in 1 day? Almost 9 pounds of carbon and 890 calories. Do this every day for 2 weeks and those savings multiply to become 122 pounds of carbon (about 6 gallons of gasoline) and 12,460 calories (3.5 pounds). Now think if your whole family did it. Your friends.
Check out the “Is Your Diet Warming the Planet?” table on page 33 to see the immediate savings you’ll make with each meal. Don’t worry, though; omitting beef and cheese entirely from your diet is only for 2 weeks, at which point you can begin reintroducing the right kinds of beef and cheese in the right quantities to maximize health.
As you move through your program, you’ll see that each chapter will begin with a “Prescription” that provides specific guidelines on how much of a given food you should include each week or month. But the actual portion size you choose at each meal is up to you. Take chicken, for example; essentially, you can enjoy up to 12 ounces of chicken per week. I suggest three 4-ounce servings over the course of the week as a general guideline on “how,” but it’s important for you to work within your own comfort zone. Do you like the feeling of “meat on the plate” at nearly every dinner meal? Then serve smaller sizes more often (3 ounces of meat is roughly the size of a deck of cards), and heap lots of seasonal vegetables, beans, and whole grains alongside it. Or you could toss 2 ounces of chopped grilled chicken (about the size of two matchbooks) into your salad 6 days of the week. Alternately, you could skip the bird all week and then enjoy an 8-ounce grilled chicken breast at the Saturday barbecue and sneak some leftovers for a yummy sandwich the next day, tucking in 4 ounces’ worth.
It’s the same logic with pork and lamb; you can savor one large sitting of pork tenderloin, or else make it last by tucking 3 ounces of sliced pork loin into a veggie stir-fry one night, and another night stuffing peppers or zucchini with a mixture that includes 2 ounces of ground lamb along with rice, mint, currants, and pine nuts. Indeed, “stretching” meat to go further by pairing it with plant- based cuisine not only has economic benefits, but it also is one of the hallmarks of some of the world’s healthiest (and most delicious) eating styles, such as the Mediterranean diet.
But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. Let’s focus on how eliminating beef and dairy from your diet can impact the planet, too.
Calorie for calorie, growing plants is a much more efficient use of “fuel” than raising animals; growing produce (fruits and vegetables) requires about 2 fossil fuel calories to create 1 calorie of food, while growing animal protein requires 20 to 80 fossil fuel calories to create 1 food calorie.4 And research from both the United States and the Netherlands has found that beef and dairy account for about 50 percent of a household’s food footprint.5
Taking this oil-dependent staple off of your plate for 2 weeks creates immediate savings. Now let’s look at another way we could save; consider that in 2000 Americans grilled up an annual average of 113 pounds of beef per person, at an average of 2.17 pounds (boneless and trimmed) per week.6 This translates into about 2,430 food calories per week (assuming lean cuts of beef at about 70 calories per ounce). Look at those calories in terms of the fuel calories required to bring them to your plate, and Quick Fix #1 cuts at least 100,000 fossil fuel calories from your lifestyle in those first 2 weeks. Imagine if each household in America did this; if everyone lowered their beef consumption by 4 pounds over the course of 1 year, it would save 1 trillion gallons of water, which is the volume that flows over Niagara Falls for 20 consecutive days.7
Check out these immediate carbon and calorie savings that can be achieved through leaner living. The Bon Appétit Management Company is one of the leaders in sustainable eating with their Low Carbon Diet Initiative. Using data from 40 peer-reviewed studies that looked at total life cycle and carbon, they have created a helpful online calculator that lets you see the immediate carbon savings of making greener swaps. I’ve also added the calorie savings so you can see why it’s usually a leaner bet, too.
| INSTEAD OF THIS | EAT THIS | AND SAVE THIS |
| Beef soft tacos (2), 4 lbs CO2e, 490 calories |
Black bean soft tacos (2), 1 lb CO2e, 260 calories |
3 lbs CO2e, 230 calories |
| Grilled cheese sandwich, 1.9 lbs CO2e, 319 calories |
Grilled veggie and hummus sandwich, 0.6 lb CO2e, 306 calories |
1.3 lbs CO2e, 13 calories |
| Cheeseburger, 4 lbs CO2e, 572 calories |
Grilled chicken sandwich, 1.5 lbs CO2e, 361 calories |
2.5 lbs CO2e, 211 calories |
| Meat and cheese omelet, 3.3 lbs CO2e, 562 calories |
Steel-cut oats with yogurt and fruit, 1 lb CO2e, 168 calories |
2.3 lbs CO2e, 394 calories |
Smokestacks, automobiles, private planes … and gummy bears? Does what you nibble in the minivan while waiting for soccer practice to end, or that treat you purloin from the office candy jar, really have that big of an impact?
Yes indeed, and here’s why: More than 80 percent of Americans snack, and experts estimate that, overall, snacks contribute about 23 percent of total calories to a person’s diet. This is why your snack habits play a significant role in your weight and health. It’s also why your snacks probably play a bigger role in the carbon footprint of your diet than you may think.
In a nutshell, snacks can do one of two things. When done correctly, snacking can keep your energy level up and your blood sugar stable; it can prevent you from overeating at night; and it can deliver key nutrients, all while keeping you in a cool shade of green. On the flip side, snacking can pack on pounds, zap energy, and contribute to carbon bloat. It all depends on what you’re noshing.
Americans currently consume about 500 more calories a day than they did back in the 1970s (which goes a long way to explain why Americans weigh more than they did in the 1970s).9 Why? We are surrounded by more food, more of the time, than ever before. Supersize portions and eating opportunities beckon constantly. Essentially, we have created a culture where the line between “eating” and “not eating” has been obscured, so that most of us are either sipping or nibbling something most of the day.
Then there is the issue of the quality of most snacks themselves. How do I say this gently? Most snack foods today, especially those marketed for optimal convenience, are of dubious quality. Highly processed foods contain a long list of ingredients that sound like they came from a lab and provide little real nutrition. Perhaps the snack comes fortified with a smattering of nutrients to give it a healthier image, but still you’re better off with real, whole food rather than what I call food product. And some of today’s “snacks” pack a caloric punch more suited for someone who’s about to chop wood for an hour rather than, say, plop their rear into a chair and surf the Web researching wood prices for a home remodel.
Further, when it comes to snacking, the research is clear. When people are surrounded by large amounts of ready-to-eat foods, they eat more.10 In other words, overly convenient foods boost calorie intake. It also turns out that for people trying to lose weight, they may be better off shunning the 100-calorie snack packs. A 2008 study in the Journal of Consumer Research found that people ate nearly twice as much from 100-calorie snack packs than did people who were given larger packages.11 Another drawback was that people viewed “dietfriendly” packages as a sort of calorie-free ride and ate more than those who were given regular-size packages. Believe me, a lot of research has gone into how to make it possible for you to reach for snacks whenever and wherever the impulse strikes you. To give just one example, consider the emergence of all of these “bites,” such as cheesecake or ice cream, that have pushed what was once considered special occasion splurges into the realm of a bona fide daily snack option. While it may be good for food companies’ bottom lines, it’s terrible for your own bottom.
Making a shift to cleaner snacks is Quick Fix #2 because it immediately packs more nutrition and fewer calories into your snacks while reducing carbon and saving money. And you will become refreshed and rebalanced after taking a break from all of those overly salted, sugary food products.
So how often should you snack? As a rough guideline, most people need to refuel every 3 to 4 hours to stay energized and satisfied. This usually translates into a midmorning and midafternoon snack, each about 100 to 175 calories. Eat too little, and it might not do the trick, while snacks creeping up toward 250 calories start to resemble a meal. Think airline portions (back when airlines actually gave you food, that is). If you find you prefer to snack less than this and can still meet your goals, that’s okay, too.
Not a jogger? Forget shelling out big bucks for diet foods and fancy weight loss programs, and consider trying the other proven diet tactic that begins with “j”—journaling. A 2008 study by Kaiser Permanente found that those who kept a food log lost twice as much weight as those who didn’t.12
Accountability to yourself is a powerful thing, and a journal helps you see your own eating patterns—the good, the bad, and the ugly. For many of my clients, it was a key in producing an “aha” moment that motivated them to change.
It also prevents what I call “eating amnesia,” making you focus more closely on the portion sizes and “freebies” that can sneak into your day. Best of all, it’s easy and free. Leverage these powerful benefits to your advantage and start tracking. A few moments of planning can yield tremendous reward. Athletes do it. Financial planners do it. And you should do it. It’s a key to getting the results that you want.
Simple Tips for Keeping a Food Journal
Go high tech or low tech, but go. Use whatever method of tracking works for you—whether that’s a simple piece of paper, an e-mail or text message to yourself, or a PDA program—but the key is to start tracking. Keep a food journal for at least a week of what you eat, including how much of each item. If you can spare a bit more time, include the time of day, where you are, and how you feel. You can make your own food journal, or print out a free form at www.leanandgreendiet.com.
Write as you go. After each meal or snack, quickly jot down what you ate. Keep your food journal in a spot that’s handy for you, whether that’s the kitchen, on your desk, or in your purse; saving up for the end of the day may raise the odds of forgetting something and make it suddenly seem more time- consuming.
Be specific. Estimate specific portion sizes, whether in cups, ounces, or “how many” (e.g., 1 cup of pasta, 12-ounce latte, four cookies). This will help you see precisely how much you’re eating and is the reason why a journal is so insightful for most people.
Include the good, the bad, and the ugly. This isn’t about just keeping track of the “good” stuff you’re proud to show someone else. Include all of your food and drinks, even those consumed during weekends, late nights, or anything in between. For most people, there is a big difference in weekdays versus weekends, and you need to understand your own variations in order to make positive changes.
Show me yours, I’ll show you mine. For even more powerful results, show someone else your food journal and tell the person what you’ve learned. The extra accountability makes you even more likely to stick to your leaner, greener guns and get losing.
What should you choose? Start with any snack listed in “Your Guide to Sustainable Snacking” on page 40. The keys to sustainable snacking are actually pretty easy to remember. For your waistline, keep the calories in the right range (which we’ve already defined above). For your carbon footprint and your health, snacks should be real food (minimally processed, all-natural foods, preferably something in season). And, for maximum staying power and energy, choose a snack that includes some protein or heart-healthy fats.
There is an immense discrepancy between the amount of fossil fuel our highly processed, convenience-oriented snacks are hogging, versus the limited nutrition or health benefits they provide (and in some cases, the very real diseases they help foster, such as high blood pressure, heart disease, or high insulin response). Let’s think of snacks, for a moment, in the context of resource use.
Did you know that it takes about 98 tons (a staggering 196,000 pounds) of prehistoric buried plant material to produce just 1 gallon of gasoline?13 A 2003 study from the University of Utah determined that you would have to put the equivalent of 40 acres’ worth of wheat into the tank of your car for every 20 miles you drive. For most people’s SUVs, that equates to less than 1 gallon of gasoline. Forty acres of wheat to create less than 1 gallon of gasoline! How many acres of wheat went into meeting your snack attack?
“Every day, people are using the fossil fuel equivalent of all plant matter that grows on the Earth in an entire year,” the researchers wrote. (Of note: They also included right down to microscopic ocean life.) Yes, and in America, they’re blowing through it on essential life staples such as cheesy doodads and calorie-dense bars made with choco-bits and fats specially engineered to cruise through unabsorbed so we can eat them guilt free.
So to recap: It takes millions of years to create the biomass that becomes crude oil that then becomes gasoline that is used to create a snack that takes less than 2 minutes to eat. Hmmm … does that seem sustainable? And are humans really designed to handle eating 300-calorie “snacks,” often devoid of true nutrition? Of course not. This type of eating is not sustainable for anyone, except, perhaps, food companies.
Carbon Dioxide Equivalents (or CO2e) is an internationally accepted standard of measure that considers the total impact of all global warming gases (including methane and nitrous oxide) from a particular choice.
Look back at “How Much Fossil Fuel Did Your Lunch Require?” on page 6 for a moment and consider the journey required to produce something like a 100-calorie snack pack, something so easily scarfed down in just a few minutes, something that provides no specific nutritional advantage when compared to real food. Biomass aside, for each gallon of gasoline needed to produce and get that snack into your mouth (which we’ve already covered), nearly 19 pounds of carbon have been released into the atmosphere. Yikes.
The more types of highly processed food products like this that you eat, the greater the percentage of your total food calories that are likely creating carbon bloat, not to mention belly bloat. Plus, in my experience, consuming these products may well leave you feeling less satisfied and energized. (Doesn’t that defeat the whole point of snacking in the first place?)
So what does that mean for the way we snack? Fortunately, there are tons of delicious, easy noshes that are convenient, fast, fresh, and tasty, as well as a lot better for your weight and the planet. It’s pretty simple; snack on real food rather than “food product.” See pages 40 and 41 for a great list.
Eliminate all of those 100-calorie snack packs, single-serving-size packages, and any snacks that have high-fructose corn syrup in the ingredient list. Clear away your carbon clutter by donating these high-carbon snacks to a food pantry, a school, a church group, or some other organization. Instead of snacking on produce flown in from another country, buy fruits and vegetables that are local to you and in season as much as possible (if you’re starting your program in the winter, this may be a bit more difficult; see Chapter 9 for a guide to seasonal produce in your area).
“Hold on a minute here. In the last chapter you assured me you weren’t one of those nagging nutritionists pulling every pleasure from my plate. But this is starting to sound suspiciously like that’s exactly what you’re up to.”
Okay, fair comment. So let me assure you that this isn’t a permanent removal as much as a way to help rebalance and reset your palate and your cravings, particularly those nasty ones you haven’t been able to tame.
Sustainable snacking is one change that will serve you (and the planet) well in the long haul. The route to fabulous snacks starts with fabulous food. Consider this a starting point, but by all means feel free to experiment with the best that the seasons (and your geography) have to offer. All snacks listed below contain 100 to 175 calories. Be sure to avoid any with cheese until after your 2-week turnaround phase.
100–175 Calories:
10 kalamata olives (106 cal)
½ cup shelled steamed or boiled edamame (100 cal)
¾ cup edamame in pods with a pinch of sea salt (135 cal)
1 oz almonds, peanuts, or pistachios (dry roasted and/or minimally salted if high blood pressure is not a concern) (164 cal)
¼ cup Healthy Trail Mix (146 cal) (see page 282)
½ cup pumpkin seeds (143 cal)
1 oz sunflower seeds (165 cal)
3 Tbsp roasted soybeans (152 cal)
1 Tbsp almond butter on ½ slice of whole grain bread or 2 whole wheat crackers (120 cal)
1 Tbsp cashew butter spread on 1 cup of apple slices or on ½ medium banana (143 cal)
3 cups air-popped popcorn (134 cal)
1 Tbsp peanut butter with 1 cup raw carrot and celery sticks (130 cal)
6 oz fat-free organic yogurt and ½ cup fresh blueberries (140 cal)
½ cup organic fat-free Greek yogurt drizzled with 2 tsp raw honey and
1 Tbsp slivered almonds (142 cal)
⅓ cup baba ghannouj (eggplant dip) with 1 oz local whole wheat bread, naan, or pita (170 cal)
⅓ cup Garlicky Edamame Hummus (see page 241) with ½ cup crudités (175 cal)
6“ whole wheat tortilla with ¼ cup black beans and 2 Tbsp fresh salsa (140 cal)
1 hard-cooked egg mashed with 1 tsp extra virgin olive oil on ½ slice dark rye bread (158 cal)
100 Calories or Fewer:
1 fresh cantaloupe wedge or 1 fresh fig wrapped with 1 thin slice real prosciutto (70 cal)
A 100 percent frozen fruit bar or 3 frozen cubes of 100 percent pomegranate, blueberry, or cherry juice (70 cal)
½ cup confetti bell pepper strips (any combo of red, yellow, orange, or green peppers) dipped in 2 Tbsp Tuscan Lemon Vinaigrette (see page 239) or hummus (95 cal)
1 cup cubed watermelon or honeydew with ¼ cup organic fat-free cottage cheese (100 cal)
101–175 Calories:
⅓ cup sliced fresh figs with 2 Tbsp real ricotta on 2 Wasa crisps (or use 2 tsp fig jam in winter) (160 cal)
2 Tbsp olive tapenade tossed with ½ cup sliced cherry tomatoes on 4 whole grain crackers (126 cal)
½ cup Summer Pepper Sauté (sauté a variety of bell peppers with 1 tsp olive oil, garlic, and a pinch of kosher salt; add fresh chopped basil at the end) served with 1 oz pita crisps (164 cal)
95–175 Calories:
Handful of dried local fruit (e.g., cherries, cranberries, blueberries, or raisins) and ½ oz dark chocolate (142 cal)
10 dark chocolate chips and 10 walnut halves (168 cal)
1 cup organic local fat-free milk (or soymilk), steamed, with 1 tsp almond extract and 1 Tbsp dark cocoa powder (114 cal)
¼ cup avocado “mash” (with 1 Tbsp fresh lime or orange juice and a pinch of kosher salt) on ½ slice whole grain bread (138 cal)
⅓ cup chickpeas or cooked lentils swirled with 2 Tbsp pesto, salsa verde, tapenade, or other intensely flavored spread (175 cal)
Citrus/avocado bowl: ½ cup grapefruit or orange wedges with 2 slices of avocado, cubed, tossed lightly with a pinch of sea salt (95 cal)
Broiled grapefruit with a dollop of fat-free yogurt and sprinkled with cinnamon or star anise (100 cal)
Reference: The Food Processor, ESHA version 8.8, December 2006 USDA CALCULATOR: http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp/search/index.html (Accessed July 8, 2008)
For most people, the reality is “the more you eat, the more you crave.” Eliminating added sugars and sweeteners is one of the fastest ways to free your body of chronic sugar cravings. Over and over again I have seen clients so wrapped up in a sweetness seesaw that when they lay off of it for 2 weeks, they have a clarity of energy (and often weight loss) that sparks their enthusiasm for more satisfying and sustainable snacks to meet their health and weight goals. And here’s some more good news: You’ve already done much of this heavy lifting by switching to sustainable snacks.
Getting rid of the sweet stuff will also help slow your carbon burn, as these ingredients are often found in high-carbon, highly processed foods such as soft drinks, energy drinks, juice “blends,” and desserts. Remember, it’s only for 2 weeks. After your body has “reprogrammed” itself, you can start bringing the right kinds of green treats back into your life.
You’ll notice this Quick Fix specifies that we want to avoid added sugars. That is because naturally occurring sugars present in foods such as fruits, vegetables, dairy products, and grains are healthy and perfectly fine to keep enjoying in your diet; in fact, these foods will be a cornerstone of your new lean and green lifestyle. (During the height of the low-carb craze, when clients would tell me they were avoiding things such as bananas and carrots and apples because “they were loaded with sugar,” I would respond like this: “Let me ask you something; do you believe the reason Americans are the fattest people on the planet is because we’re eating too many bananas, carrots, and apples?”) Naturally occurring sugars found in whole foods like these provide energy and sweetness without the dark underbelly of blood sugar swings and cravings.
Added sugars and sweeteners themselves aren’t so much the problem, but rather it’s the massive amounts that most Americans are eating. On average, Americans indulge in about 150 pounds of sugar per person each year, which is about 31 teaspoons of sugar per day, or about 500 extra calories a day from sugar.14 This means that most of us are getting more sugar in one day than our hunter-gatherer ancestors consumed in their entire lifetimes.
Roughly half of this amount is in the form of high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS), a highly refined corn sweetener that is prevalent in nearly all processed food. For manufacturers, the benefits of HFCS are clear. It’s cheap, it’s plentiful, and it is shelf-stable into the next millennium (consider that our food supply provides about 200 calories per person each day in soft drinks alone, all in the form of HFCS).
While HFCS is certainly not the sole cause of our obesity crisis, it definitely plays a role; between 1970 and 1990, consumption of HFCS increased by more than 1,000 percent (that is not a typo).15 During that same period, there has been a suspiciously similar rise in obesity rates; between 1970 and 2000, obesity rates more than doubled, from 15 percent to more than 30 percent of the adult population. And worse, obesity among children ages 12 to 19 more than tripled, climbing from 4.2 percent to 15.3 percent. Further, a 2004 study that followed 50,000 nurses found that those who drank one soda or fruit drink per day (containing either HFCS or sugar) had an 80 percent increased risk of developing type 2 diabetes and were more likely to gain weight.16
We’ll talk more about artificial sweeteners in Chapter 14 when we discuss diet sodas, but the reason artificial sweeteners are also included in this list is that they still can promote a craving for sweetness, and they are highly processed (which means high-carbon) ingredients found in high-carbon food products (as opposed to real food, which is what you want to be eating more of). And while you may assume that foods containing zero-calorie sweeteners get you on the fast track to weight loss, think again; the research has found that they may actually make it harder to lose weight.17 (Or if you want to take a less scientific approach, simply ask yourself this: If all of these products worked, shouldn’t it stand to reason that people using them would be thinner? Then take a good look around.)
As for alcohol and its role in weight loss or gain, it’s important to remember that alcohol is almost twice as high in calories as carbohydrates, weighing in at 7 calories per gram as opposed to carbohydrates’ 4 calories per gram. And, because your body will burn calories from alcohol for energy first, before calories from carbohydrate or fat, you can see why it’s easy to pack on the pounds if you consume alcohol regularly.
An analogy my clients always seemed to love is equating drinks with bread. Consider that one alcoholic drink has about 130 to 150 calories, significantly more than a regular slice of bread (which contains about 100 calories per slice). So if you normally have one glass of alcohol a night, for example, that’s like having, oh, an extra loaf of bread a week. Should you be eating an extra loaf of bread a week if your goal is to become a lean and green machine? My professional answer would be no. If you drink, ahem, say just a tad more than that, the savings when you stop will be even bigger.
The other reason I advise clients to remove alcohol for the first 2 weeks is that because drinking alcohol can lower your inhibitions (in case you haven’t heard), it can derail even the most wellintentioned eaters when they’re just starting out on a new eating style. In some people, alcohol may also stimulate appetite, so for these reasons, it’s better to eliminate it for the first 2 weeks. The added bonus? An immense psychological boost to your commitment to health and a new you from the added weight loss that this provides.
Unlike many other eating plans, where alcohol is verboten the entire time you’re on the plan, you can resume drinking wine in moderation as part of a delicious lean and green cuisine after 2 weeks. If you’re not trying to lose weight but simply looking to green your diet, then feel free to continue to enjoy a bit of wine in moderation now.
“Sweeteners and sugars” is a broad category indeed—there are beet and cane sugars; then there is HFCS, which comes from refining corn; then there are the artificial sweeteners. So to keep it simple, let’s focus on the key characteristics that make them high-carbon choices when compared to the naturally occurring sugars found in whole foods.
While there is little specific data in the United States about the carbon footprint of any of these sweeteners per se, a 2007 industry report identified the key factors of the UK beet sugar carbon footprint as the following:18
Beet Cultivation: 14–26 percent
Refining: 47–58 percent
Packing and Transportation: 9–11 percent
Waste Recycling and Disposal: 4–6 percent
You can quickly see that the single largest element of carbon footprint is the refining step, which isn’t surprising. Take a basic food found in nature, and if you start processing it highly, it’s going to add pounds of carbon to that food’s final footprint. (I am going to make the same assumption for the leap from corn to high-fructose corn syrup, knowing the large number of refining steps involved.) Artificial sweeteners, on the other hand, being synthesized in a factory (from other ingredients, each of which has its own carbon footprint) before they even get sent for use in foods and beverages, are high-carbon little buggers from the start.
Perhaps it’s little coincidence, then, that both sugars and sweeteners are often key ingredients in highly processed foods, adding layer upon layer of petroleum and carbon to each step, whether it’s in a candy bar, a sugary coffee drink, or a cookie purchased from under a glowing heat lamp. Or perhaps teaspoon-size amounts of that sweetener are wrapped in individual packages and sent to coffee shops around the country.
So what’s the green impact? Researchers estimate it requires nearly 10,000 fossil fuel calories to produce 1 pound of sugar, or about ⅓ of a gallon of gasoline.19 If every American cut out those 31 teaspoons of daily sugar for 2 weeks, this one change would spare roughly 90 million pounds of CO2 from entering the atmosphere.
Here’s another thought. The HFCS in one 32-ounce soda requires about ⅓ of a pound of corn to produce.20 If every American cut out just one 32-ounce soda per week, that’s 100 million pounds of corn—enough to feed a meal to every starving person in Africa. And in the process, each American would easily shed those pesky “last 10 pounds.”
Of course, I will be the first to agree that sugars bring flavor to other foods, can add delicious taste to any eating plan, and can be enjoyed as part of a leaner, greener lifestyle for most healthy individuals. I’m certainly not saying we should never eat it. In fact, after just 2 weeks, you’ll be able to reintroduce things such as honey, maple syrup, and small amounts of regular, old-fashioned sugar. However, we currently consume way too much sugar, and for many of my clients, eating too much sugar fuels an unhealthy drive to seek more, adding “empty calories” to their diets and pounds to their carbon footprint. So experience the clarity and energy that come from skipping it for 2 weeks; then you can introduce smaller portions of green treats that are more sustainable for you and the planet.
Depending on the State of Your Plate (and glass) when you start this program, you may find that these Quick Fixes remove a little or a lot of your current food choices. What to eat instead? It’s easy: Choose vegetarian options (or at the very least, chicken and fish) instead of beef and cheese. Enjoy water, herbal or green tea, or coffee instead of soda or sweetened beverages, skip the alcohol for now, and load up on foods included in “Your Guide to Sustainable Snacking” on page 40. You’ll be well on your way to leaner, greener living.
“If the United Nations were organized by industry,” said Michael Oshman, founder of the Green Restaurant Association, which provides green certification for restaurants throughout the United States, “restaurants should be sitting side by side with other businesses negotiating the Kyoto Protocol.”21
Here is another of the most basic overlaps between leaner and greener living: Cook more often for better health and carbon savings, especially if you have Energy Star–rated appliances. And in today’s economic squeeze, it will save your food dollar as well.
Taking food on the go (dining out, drinking out, snacking on the run) is a critical hot spot because it’s a prime area of adding a bunch of “middlemen” to your food. All of these steps, of course, require fossil fuels and cough more carbon into the atmosphere. It’s also an eating style with a high ratio of packaging waste and food waste, as restaurants dish up larger portions to create “value,” or wrap up each part of your meal-to-go with all the accoutrements, such as tiny packages of ketchup, salt packets, and straws. Eating on the run is also a prime way that Americans get too many of the wrong types of calories. So if you are serious about getting lean, healthy, and green, it is essential to dial back dashboard dining. Period.
When it comes to food choices, Americans are choosing the “dashboard dining” route more than ever before, which ultimately means we have much less control of what’s on our forks. In fact, while the 2008 downturn may have softened these stats just a bit, according to the USDA’s Economic Research Service, half of every food dollar is spent on food we don’t make ourselves.
If you’re like most Americans, you probably woefully underestimate how many calories or how much salt or fat is in your “on the go” meal. I know. I’ve run hundreds of “guessing games” at corporations around New England, and I saw it time and again; employees regularly guessed much lower when it came to things such as the number of calories in that morning muffin and coffee drink, that fast-food meal, or even that salad.
A healthy weight starts with healthy foods in healthy portions. The easiest way to keep track of calories and maintain the right portion sizes is to make sure everything you eat comes from your own kitchen. Otherwise, it can be a fast and furious slide into overeating.
In fact, study after study has shown that when people eat out, they are more likely to consume too many calories and too much saturated fat, trans fat, and cholesterol.22 Further, experts estimate that between 75 and 85 percent of our total sodium intake comes from the processed food and restaurant food we eat. Diners on the go are also likely to eat too few whole grains, fruits, and vegetables.
Think you’re smarter than that? Think again. Oftentimes these studies were conducted using faculty and staff (read: educated people) at university settings during regular mealtimes—not, as you may be tempted to think, overeager slobs with no self-control who were simply offered a free meal so researchers could see what they did.
“We all think we’re too smart to be tricked by packages, lighting, or plates,” wrote Brian Wansink, one of the world’s top researchers on food psychology. “We might acknowledge that others could be tricked, but not us. That is what makes mindless eating so dangerous.”23
The mega-portions, dollar menus, and other incentive pricing are building more than just brand loyalty to a restaurant; they are also helping to build your backside. Put another way, portion sizes are linked to pants sizes.
To repeat: Dining out does not get you lean. It’s unfortunate, but even those well-intended menus that list calories alongside lighter options have been cast into doubt; a recent investigation by a news station (sampling from eight cities) found that dishes aimed toward weight-conscious consumers at some leading national chains contained as much as twice the calories and eight times the saturated fat as the restaurants claimed in their published information.24 Cook your food yourself and you’ll stay in ultimate control, and consider eating out a splurge in every sense—for your wallet, your waistline, and the planet. Health professionals have been telling you this for years, but ditching the grab-and-go lifestyle also creates immediate savings in one of the hottest spots of our supersize American diet: our supersize waste.
We’ve all seen it (and if we’re really honest, we can admit we’ve all sat in it), that line at the drive-thru that creeps along, be it for a morning jolt of java at the local doughnut drive-thru or a dinner rush at a casual dining chain. And the line of SUVs, trucks, and cars spewing planet-warming exhaust in various amounts from their tailpipes, creeping along a drive-thru line and blasting AC or heat until their drivers can order some combo of artery-clogging, low-nutrition, high-carbon meals, represents perhaps one of the biggest dietary splurges on the planet.
The additional element of having all your food run through what is essentially another production system, and the river of materials, packaging, and petroleum that carries these convenience meals to you, pack on the carbon in much the same way that their oversize portions will pack on the pounds.
Restaurants are the retail world’s largest energy user and, according to Pacific Gas and Electric’s Food Service Technology Center, use almost five times as much energy per square foot than any other type of commercial building. Restaurants also produce far more garbage every day than almost any other retail business.25 Although there are certainly some notable exceptions, as an industry, much remains to be done before it merits any sort of green bragging rights.
And then there is the matter of any leftovers that you throw away. Food waste, when it goes to a landfill, emits methane, a powerful warming gas that’s 23 times as potent as carbon when it comes to warming the planet (of course, that’s true for the home cook as well, which is something to consider, but having worked in restaurants for 14 years, I doubt most people are tossing out similar volumes of food at home).
Americans, despite having only 5 percent of the world’s population, are the planet’s worst trash offenders, contributing about 40 percent of the global garbage scene. All of this dashboard dining is creating supersize waste even by American standards. A disposable lunch creates between 4 and 8 ounces of garbage every day, which can add up to 100 pounds per person each year.26 With establishments annually churning out an average of 50,000 pounds of waste, and using around 300,000 gallons of water every year, restaurants are one of America’s largest waste-generating and water-hogging industries.
Eric Schlosser’s groundbreaking book Fast Food Nation already got people thinking about the true cost Americans have to pay to subsidize that popular dollar menu, and now it’s time to add the global warming piece on top of that. Bags for kids’ meals, toys and wrappers, drinks, straws, and cardboard containers bring you what amounts to around a 5-minute, super-high-calorie eating experience, and then end up in a landfill, where they emit the powerful warming gas of methane.
As with sugar, I’m certainly not suggesting people abstain completely. Dining out can be pleasurable and delicious, and many restaurants around the country are leading the way toward healthy, sustainable foods that support healthier, more sustainable communities. But all things considered, restaurant food, especially fast food, is, as a category, seldom a green choice, so it’s something to limit as much as possible. While there is now virtually an entire spectrum of “food on the run” these days, from fast-food joints to fine dining, from coffee bars to doughnut drive-thrus, for the next 2 weeks, focus on eating food from your own kitchen as much as you can. One of the fastest ways to get back to a healthier body and weight, and to a lower carbon lifestyle, is to use the kitchen more and the drive-thru less.
As famed personal coach Tony Robbins said, “Hope is not a strategy.” Achieving the body and health that you want will require that you summon the discipline to make a few changes, but therein lies the good news: A few well-considered changes is all it takes.
While installing solar panels or rethinking the family wheels may not be in your immediate future, with food it’s different. The fact is, sometime in the next couple of hours, you will have to eat. And you will have a choice to make. A choice that doesn’t need to wait for car manufacturers, politicians, or nations to act. A choice that depends only on one person: you.
Now let’s move on and consider what is the single most important aspect of your diet’s carbon footprint: the type and amount of protein on your plate. Are you ready to jump in with me? Fantastic. Welcome to your new style of eating. It’s time to become a flexitarian.
1. “Carbon Footprint of Best Conserving Americans Is Still Double Global Average,” Science Daily, April 29, 2008, http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008 /04/080428120658.htm. Accessed August 3, 2008.
2. David Pimentel, Human Ecology (2008) DOI: 10.1007/s10745-008-9184-3.
3. 2005 US Dietary Guidelines for Americans, Chapter 6, Fats, Table 10.
4. David Pimentel and Marcia Pimentel, “The Future of American Agriculture,” in Sustainable Food Systems, ed. Dietrich Knorr (Westport, CT: AVI Publishing Co., 1983).
5. K. J. Kramer, et al. “Greenhouse Gas Emissions Related to Dutch Food Consumption.” Energy Policy (1999) 27: 203-16; and C. L. Weber and H. S. Matthews, “Food Miles and the Relative Cclimate Impacts of Food Choices in the United States.” Environ Sci Technol (2008) 42(10): 3508–13.
6. USDA’s Economic Research Service.
7. Elizabeth Rogers and Thomas Kostigen, The Green Book (New York: Three Rivers Press, 2007), 70.
8. Bon Appetit Management Company Low Carbon Diet Initiative, www.eatlowcarbon.org, accessed June 30, 2008, and The Food Processor, ESHA version 8.8, December 2006, accessed July 8, 2008. USDA CALCULATOR: http:// www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp/search/index.html.
9. USDA Economic Research Service.
10. Brian Wansink, “Environmental Factors That Increase the Food Intake and Consumption Volume of Unknowing Consumers,” Annual Review of Nutrition (July 2004) 24: 455–79, and J. A. Ello-Martin et al., “Increasing the Portion Size of a Unit Food Increases Energy Intake,” Appetite (2002) 39:74.
11. Maura L. Scott, Stephen M. Nowlis, et al. “The Effects of Reduced Food Size and Package Size on the Consumption Behavior of Restrained and Unrestrained Eaters.” J Cons Res (2008) 35(3).
12. J. F. Hollis et al., “Weight Loss during the Intensive Intervention Phase of the Weight-Loss Maintenance Trial,” Am J Prev Med (2008) 35(2):118–26.
13. J. S. Dukes, “Burning Buried Sunshine: Human Consumption of Ancient Solar Energy,” Climatic Change (2003) 61(1–2):31–44.
14. USDA Economic Research Service.
15. George A. Bray, Samara Joy Nielsen, and Barry M. Popkin, “Consumption of High-Fructose Corn Syrup in Beverages May Play a Role in the Epidemic of Obesity,” Am J Clin Nutr (2004) 79(4):537–43.
16. M. B. Schulze et al., “Sugar-Sweetened Beverages, Weight Gain, and Incidence of Type 2 Diabetes in Young and Middle-Aged Women,” JAMA (2004) 292:927–34.
17. S. P. Fowler, 65th Annual Scientific Sessions, American Diabetes Association, San Diego, June 10–14, 2005; Abstract 1058-P, Sharon P. Fowler, MPH, University of Texas Health Science Center School of Medicine, San Antonio; T.L. Davidson, “Artificial Sweeteners May Damage Diet Efforts,” Int. J. Obes (July 2004) 28:933–55.
18. “Carbon Footprint.” A report in December 2007 by Tate & Lyle Company. http:// www.sucrose.com/bsst/2008agm1.pdf. Accessed August 2, 2008.
19. David Pimentel and Marcia Pimental, Food, Energy, and Society (New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1979).
20. Michael Pollan, The Omnivore’s Dilemma (New York: Penguin Press, 2006), 115.
21. Michael Oshman interview with WBUR’s Meghna Chakrabarti, 12, 2007. “And how would you like that cooked? … Green.” http://www.wbur.org/news/local/ dininggreen/story.asp.
22. CSFII 1994, and CSFII 1995.
23. For an in-depth look at the food psychology of eating, see Brian Wansink, Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More Than We Think (New York: Bantam Books, 2006).
24. Isaac Wolf, “Restaurant Menu Promises Buried in Calories, Fat.” SeattlePi. com, May 22, 2008. Accessed on November 10, 2008. http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/ local/364097_calories22.html
25. Bruce Horovitz, “Can Restaurants Go Green, Earn Green?” USA Today online. Posted 5/19/2008. http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/environment/200805- 15-green-restaurants-eco-friendly_N.htm. Accessed August 3, 2008.
26. Elizabeth Rogers and Thomas Kostigen, The Green Book (New York: Three Rivers Press, 2007), 57.