Copyright 2005 Newsquest Media Group All rights reserved

The Herald (Glasgow)

January 17, 2005

SECTION: HEALTH AND WELLBEING; Pg. 12

LENGTH: 1667 words

HEADLINE: The nuts and bolts of healthy snacking So you thought eating between meals was unhealthy? Think again - snacking can be good for you, says Jennifer Cunningham

BYLINE: Jennifer Cunningham

HIGHLIGHT: MUNCH TIME: Eating frequently keeps blood sugar levels constant, but attention must be paid to the nutritional content of snacks.

BODY:

No brand name, no advertising banners, just global publicity linking the product with world-beating success, but as the dietary secret of Kelly Holmes, the new golden girl of British sport, cashew nuts are marking a sea-change in British snack habits. In exchange for getting the first trackside interview after the race, BBC reporter Sally Gunnell - herself an Olympic gold medallist - handed Holmes, pictured below, a bag of cashews each time she powered herway through the heats to her double victory over 800m and 1500m at last summer's Athens Olympics. Holmes's nutritionist had ordered her to rehydrate with a protein drink as soon as possible and she arranged the nuts supplement for an extra nutritional punch. Sports dieticians approve, since nuts are a rich source of dietary protein, carbohydrates and essential minerals, and therefore an excellent replenishment food after a race.

There's also evidence that nuts can help to reduce the risk of some forms of cancer and diabetes. Nutritionists promoting the benefits of eating nuts point out that, as with other snack foods they should not be in addition to meals, but as part of the overall daily intake. We still tend to equate snacks with unhealthy eating habits. For years, the weight-loss mantra was "cut out eating between meals". Meals good, snacks bad said the diet gurus. Yet these days, nibbles have been rehabilitated: it's OK to snack. Jacqui Lowden, of the British Dietetic Association, says there is no evidence to show that people who eat snacks and have smaller main meals eat less healthily. It all depends, of course, on exactly what you eat. With the snack market in Britain worth an annual pounds-9.2 billion, there's no denying that the amount of chocolate, crisps, nuts, biscuits and cereal bars being guzzled is more than is strictly healthy.

Increasingly, however, people are following the rules for healthy eating and choosing fresh or dried fruit, nuts and cereal bars as ways of stocking up between meals. The UK market for snacks has grown 5-per cent in the last five years, and as more people state that fruit is the first thing they reach for when hunger strikes, the indications are that our grazing habits are changing for the better. Lowden says there is no conclusive evidence to suggest a connection between body weight and frequency of eating, either in adults and children. "Just because you have a grazing pattern, it does not follow that you have an increased calorie intake, or that people who are snacking are eating foods with a low nutrient value, unless, of course, they are eating crisps and chocolate, " she says. "A European study found that people in Hungary and Poland tended to eat three meals a day with no snacks, while people in Holland and Switzerland ate more frequently and in smaller amounts, often seven times a day, but had much smaller meals." She adds: "Children and adolescents definitely need snacks for growth. Young children have such small appetites that it is impossible for them to get enough energy with only three meals a day, and adolescents have a calorie requirement for growth. "For adults, I would encourage them to eat regular meals, probably about every four hours. If people are snacking in between meals, that is not a problem as long as it is smart snacking. They should go for fruit or low-fat yogurt. Nuts can be high in fat, but they have good nutritional values with minerals and essential fatty acids." It's not just Holmes's favoured cashews that are good for you: almonds can help to lower cholesterol levels, brazil nuts are rich in selenium, essential for the immune system, while peanuts provide iron, zinc, vitamin E, magnesium, folic acid and walnuts contain potassium, vitamin E, iron, manganese, phosphorus, folic acid and vitamin B6.

Among the other benefits of cashews is that they contain twice as much iron as minced beef. It is what you eat, not when, that makes the crucial difference, says Lowden. "Obviously, if you are snacking on crisps, chocolate, biscuits and cake, you will put on weight."Which leads us to the key question: does snacking make you fat? A study in 1964 showed that men who ate infrequently - less than three times a day - had less body fat than those who ate five or more times a day. Yet the study is far from conclusive. "Eating healthy snacks can prevent people overindulging at mealtimes, " says Lowden. "There is some evidence that people who eat small amounts regularly eat less than those who eat fewer, larger meals; certainly blood sugar levels will be more constant. Sometimes if you are very hungry, when you eat you don't stop until you are full, but by then you have overeaten. With smaller, more regular meals, you can pace yourself. The downside is that if you fill up on lots of snacks, you don't eat properly balanced meals." Lowden's advice when it comes to commercially produced snack bars is to scrutinise the ingredients carefully, particularly in the light of evidence that morning snacks are increasingly replacing breakfast. "Breakfast bars sound healthy, but very often they are very high in sugar and fat and can have more calories than a bowl of cereal. They are more nutritious than a bar of chocolate because they often have extra vitamins and minerals, but they can be very high in calories, so anyone worrying about that should not assume they are a healthy option." From October, manufacturers will have to list every single ingredient, but that will still not overcome the problem of poor nutritional labelling. For instance, there will still be no obligation to state what percentage of fat, sugar or salt items contain. The nutritional content of snacks can vary widely. Research at the University of Reading found that children who ate sugary snacks instead of proper breakfasts had the reaction times of a 70-year-old when tested midmorning. The researcher, Dr Claire Pincock, attributed this to the fact that the fizzy drinks and chocolate snacks give an initial energy boost, but because they are made up of simple carbohydrates, this is not sustained. Conventional breakfasts such as cereals or toast contain complex carbohydrates which release energy over a longer period. Those nine to 16-year-olds are at odds with the national trend towards healthier snacks. A report this summer by the consumer analysts Mintel found that fruit is now the favourite snack in Britain, with 57-per cent of adults claiming it as their snack of choice compared with only 50-per cent two years ago. Women are particularly healthy snackers, with 76-per cent favouring fresh and dried fruit, nuts and vegetables. Moreover, between 2002 and 2004, there was a significant decline in the number of people who snacked on crisps, falling from 40-per cent to 33-per cent, and biscuits, down from 45-per cent to 30-per cent. Chocolate, however, remains the preferred option after fruit, the surprise being that more men (58-per cent) than women (50-per cent) admitted to snacking on chocolate bars and contributing to an overall increase in consumption. Lowden's argument that regular, but healthy, snacks are likely to reduce the amount of food eaten at a meal, may make judicious snacking an important weapon against putting on weight. A study published in the Journal of Nutrition found that a small increase in portion size results in large extra calorie intakes. The old advice still holds good: eat if you're hungry, but balance the overall intake. WHAT DOES HEALTHY REALLY MEAN? Just how healthy are so-called healthy snacks? Here we analyse a number of popular snack foods for fat content and calories. Other factors to look out for include added sugar and salt. CHOCOLATE BARS Twix by Masterfoods Ingredients: sugar, glucose syrup, wheat flour, hydrogenated vegetable fat, skimmed milk powder, cocoa butter, cocoa mass, vegetable fat, lactose, milk fat, whey powder, fat-reduced cocoa, emulsifiers, salt, raising agent, flavouring Per 100g: cals 494; fat 24.1g (no details given on saturates) KitKat by Nestle Ingredients: milk chocolate, wheat flour, sugar, vegetable fat, cocoa mass, yeast, raising agent, salt, calcium sulphate, flavouring Per 100g: cals 508; fat 26.4g, of which saturates 17.9g FRUIT AND NUTS Nature's Harvest Sunset Mix (69p for 100g) Ingredients: honey dipped bananas (with sugar, honey, coconut oil flavouring), raisins, Brazil nut pieces. dried papaya pieces, dried pitted apricots, cocnut chips, sugar, preservatives E220. Per 100g: cals 427; fat 25.6g of which saturates 10.4g Jordan's Frusli cranberry and apple cereal bar (39p for 30g) Ingredients: oat flakes, cranberry fruit pieces (with sugar and sunflower oil), oat flour, glucose syrup, raw cane sugar, honey, vegetable oil, rice flour, apple puree, malt extract, natural flavouring, fruit pectin, lemon juice concentrate, sea salt Per 100g: cals 381; fat 10g of which saturates 2.4g Shepherd Boy Carob bar (46p for 45g) Ingredients: granulated sugar, hydrogenated vegetable oil, wheat flour , sultanas, carob flour, lecithin, natural orange oil, flavouring. Per 100g: cals 512; fat 27.3g (no details given on saturates) Eat Natural macademia and fruit bar (59p for 50g) Ingredients: macademia nuts, coconut, brazil nuts, glucose syrup, sultanas, apricots, honey, puffed rice, sesame seeds Nutritional information not given Lyme Regis Foods Fruit Break date and fig bar (48p for 42g) Ingredients: dates, figs, hazelnuts, sultanas, apple juice concentrate. Per 100g: cals 512; fat 27.3g of which saturates 1.4g Lyme Regis Foods La Fruit raspberry chunks (55p for 35g) Ingredients: apple puree, pear puree, raspberry puree, plum puree, vegetable glycerol, dietary fibre, pectin, elderberry concentrate, natural flavours. Per 100g: cals 287; fat 0.8g, of which saturates 0.3g Brazil nuts Per 100g: cals 682; fat 68.2g Peanuts Per 100g: cals 564; fat 46.10g Walnuts Per 100g: cals 688; fat 68.5g Hazelnuts Per 100g: cals 650; fat 64g Cashews Per 100g: cals 611; fat 50.9g Almonds Per 100g: cals 612; fat 55.8g Pecans Per 100 cals: 689; fat 70.1g