These are the paradoxes of food psychology.

In 20 years, a portion of soda in the United States has increased from 261 grams
This fact is reflected in a study published last October in the Journal of Consumer Research.Research shows that the tendency to choose less healthy dish is accentuated when the culinary offerings are more appropriate forms are added to consumer health. According to its authors, the sight of salads, fruit or juice reduces the guilt qualified for purchasing any junk food dish.
Given the findings of the authors of the analysis suggest that some of the efforts to control and improve nutrition among the population could be counterproductive. Therefore invited to discuss in detail the impact of changes in dietary behavior. In any case, the goal remains to make society aware of that fast food affects the development of obesity by the high energy density, the large portion sizes and low cost product that invites you to eat it often. An effect that has not diminished despite the inclusion of menus, apparently more balanced.

Healthy Choices, only apparently

Salads, fresh fruit salads, fruit juices and light drinks are the stars among the growing number of alternative balanced diet of fast food. However, his appearance healthy blend into extra ingredients are added, accompanying sauces and creams that make up the intention of eating a healthy dish.

Salads
The supply of fast food establishments including salads, but also suggests genuine align with their sauces and dressings, making salad lightly on a dish very energetic. The inclusion of cheese, bacon, fried chicken strips, fried bread cubes (croutons) or nachos is a marked increase in calories and fat dish. A salad of lettuce, corn, cherry tomatoes and cucumber per serving contains about 55 calories (without dressing) if you add yoghurt vinaigrette, add about 90 calories. The same salad with crispy chicken strips is 5 times more calories (260 calories) than the original, while the one made with strips of grilled chicken (instead of battered and deep fried) records an intermediate energy intake (145 calories ).

Desserts
In many fast food restaurants offer fruit pieces (salad or skewer) or yogurt, but if accompanied with caramel syrup or chocolate fondue, add-ons available for the client to serve the amount you want, nutritional value is unchanged. If you opt for sweet desserts like brownies, profiteroles, truffles, cakes, biscuits, pancakes and ice cream, energy value is higher. And if you combine several proposals the outcome is still worse. Of those already providing 355 calories a serving of chocolate brownie, passing the 411 if you carry a portion of ice cream. If vanilla ice cream provides 257 calories, chocolate syrup added, is increased by 61 calories a dessert already very caloric.

The light drinks
The difference in calories between a small soda (300 ml, 126-156 calories) and large (500 ml, 210-260 calories) is considerable. The advantage of soft drinks is that the value light energy is zero, regardless of size. However, the continued consumption of soft drinks is not healthy: the cola containing phosphoric acid in excess, cause bone demineralizing effect, the acidity and high sugar content soft drinks, including juices, deteriorate the enamel and promote decay; the fizzy drinks are associated with episodes of aerophagia, accumulation of gas in the stomach and intestine, making it difficult to digest, and if they contain caffeine, can be exciting and stress the anxiety and insomnia.

The portion sizes

It is usual image of a customer who orders a hamburger and the waiter asks if you want another size larger for just 1 euro more. Saying yes is an extra intake of 200-400 calories, plus the rest of the menu, can be up to 1,500 calories, more than half the recommended energy intake for an adult in a day.
In the United States within 20 years, a portion of a soda has increased 260.78 grams, 50 grams burgers, salty snacks 23 grams, and chips, 120 grams. It was the late 80′s when a well known restaurant chain sold, first in the U.S. and years later in Spain, the size "super size" for soft drinks and chips. This excessive size has invaded all segments of the food industry and has come to our country. At present, the global expert nutritionist Lisa Young warns that a popcorn bucket is big enough to feed a whole row of people in the cinema. Even more surprisingly, the cup holders of American cars are manufactured with superior size to hold the beverage giant one or two liters. The current medium-size equivalent to a few decades ago, but the client does not pay much more for this increase. However, overeating is takes its toll, not money, but in consumer health.

There is evidence that the greater the portion offered, the more you eat
Numerous studies show that the greater the availability to purchase food and the greater the portion, the more they eat, and not always aware of this behavior. A person generally does not feel much compunction about eating a cupcake kind muffin on the way home or work, but think twice before eating five slices of bread to the equivalent. Another clear example of mindless eating is food that is made in a buffet setting, breakfast, lunch and dinner are consumed in these places are far from the amount of food, as usual, eat at home.

Calories, to the letter, have a deterrent?
In 2006 the Department of Health of New York issued a document requiring chain restaurants to include a clear and concise the calories of every dish on their menus. Two years later he launched a revised version as a more of this department in its commitment to reduce obesity rates in the city.
Health authorities justify this proposal with the results of studies supporting the usefulness of this measure. According to its promoters, helps to raise awareness about what you eat and causes them to consume 15% less calories. However, the authors of the report published in the Journal of Consumer Research are not so clear. They assert that the greater the propensity of people to underestimate the energy content of main dishes and side dishes at restaurants that offers healthy report for establishments that do not make that allusion.

The patient therefore should know which the value of the is "circulating currency" that serves to nurture its organism, that is to say debit side to know how many calories he/she has each food that consumes day by day. To this respect, it can be of great help to mention some of the most illustrative prejudices here:

the grissini doesn’t put on weight:
it is a legend that the grissini is very good for the slimming diets. They have a humidity valued around 3%, in front of the humidity of the bread that can reach the 40 ~. To equality of weight, 100 g of grissini has a much higher caloric power that 100 g of bread, in the measure in that you/they are everything flour and fatty and they don’t contain water, that is to say the only element that doesn’t possess to be able to caloric; the caloric value of the bread is of approximately 250 calories for each 100 g, while the energy value of the grissini is of around 400 calories for each 100 g (the fellow that 100 g of grissini eats with the food is as if he/she ate but of 150 g of bread) consequently, the grissini puts on weight more than the bread due to its biggest caloric power;

the rice doesn’t put on weight:
the rice is a complete, healthy, nutritious food and of superior digestibility to all the other ones farinaceous. This incorporated one fundamentally, and the same as the pastas, for hydrates of carbon, it has a short permanency in the stomach and it releases in the intestine and with a high grade of absorption, giving place to a quick reappearance of the appetite. For this reason the rice, contrary to as much as one believes, it can be very useful in the diets fattening, while it is not adapted in the slimming ones. Their high digestibility is due to the almost total absence of cellulose, that makes him to be specially suitable in the intestinal inflammatory affections (colitis, enteritis, etc.), in the measure in that it requires little work on the part of the digestive roads;

the fresh cheese doesn’t put on weight:
the dairy like the white cheese, the fresh cheese, the cream of milk, etc. is considered not very nutritious and without fat; in fact these dairy possesses a fatty percentage of around 20% and its caloric value is not at all under: 100 g of semi-greasy cheese provides 340 calories; 100 g of cheese meager 334 calories and 100 g of cream of milk 269 calories. These data are not reconfortantes if one keeps in mind that a normal portion of semi-greasy cheese of about 200 g has a value of some 600 calories, superior to the one from a plate of noodles to the Bolognese one (590 calories), to that of a fillet of ox of 200 g (586 calories), to that of a portion of fruit tart (535 calories), to that of a plate of pasta with butter (509 calories) or to that of a spaghetti plate with tomato (463 calories).

There are people that eat fresh cheese to lose weight at night, accompanied by a slice of bread, and then they eat up an abundant mixed salad very seasoned with oil, everything watered it with a good one came, after that which you/they rise of the sure table of having eaten very little and clever to compensate up-to-date following, to the smallest sign of fatigue, the "I fast nocturne" with coffees with milk and brioches. The calculation of the calories of so "frugal food" it shows that, stingy cheese, bread and oil, an ingestion of some 1.000 calories takes place, what corresponds to a rational diet fattening;

the special allowances,
as the pasta hypocaloric (to the gluten), the bread and the integral pastas, the cheese "light", the skimmed yogurt, etc. doesn’t put on weight: it is really allowances hypocaloric, but only in comparison with the corresponding products normal present in the market, for what the difference in calories that it characterizes them is very small. The pastas to the gluten possess 362 calories, in front of the 368 calories of the normal pasta; the integral bread has 240 calories, in front of the 276 calories of the white bread; the fresh cheese of cow has 250 calories in front of the 340 calories of the fatty cheese; the yogurt of milk semi skimmed has 51 calories in front of the 72 calories of that of whole milk;

the wine, the beer, the liquors, the Coca Cola, the orangeade, the fruit juices,
etc. non very fat often, for the single fact of being liquid, these drinks are not neither so at least kept in mind as possible sources of calories. In fact, the water doesn’t only have calories, while any other drink should be considered a liquidate-food because he/she has calories.

If we analyze them for separate and always considering 100 g, we see that the dry white wine provides 65 calories, the wine tints dry 70 calories, the wine sweet 145 calories, the brandy 298 calories, the beer 51 calories, the sweet liquors some 500 calories, a syrup of fruit 310 calories, a juice of fruit 310 calories, the juice of orange 50 calories, the juice of grape 63 calories and the Coca Cola some 110 calories.

It is very easy, mainly in summer, to increase in an important way the daily ingestion of calories through the consumption of drinks that you/they should always be kept in mind when carrying out the caloric recount;

the saccharin and other synthetic sweeteners don’t put on weight:
a saccharin tablet substitutes to a teaspoonful of sugar, with a value of 20 calories, If 5 up-to-date tablets are used, they are hardly saved at the end of the day to avoid 100 calories. The use of the saccharin can be considered valid during a diet hypocaloric when the saving of some how many calories can favour the ingestion of much nobler allowances that the sugar, being in. I change ridiculous their habitual use when other sources of calories, much richer, are not neither so at least kept in mind

The dietary one is mathematical science applied to the medicine and consequently there is that approach, so punishes of failing in the dietary program The dietary calculation of the calories it is very exact expressed in grams, for what is not possible to value the quantity of admitted allowances by sight; it is necessary to weigh all the ingredients using a scale that can estimate variations of at least 10 g-

Any importance is not generally given since to the transgressions that can be made along the day, it is considered that many small errors don’t influence in the final result.

All calorie above the admitted ones must be kept in mind, since the sum of many small errors, fruit of the temptations of the indulgence toward oneself and mainly of the prizes like recompense to the stringency with the one that the diet is continued, they can make that until the strictest in the diets hypocaloric he/she staggers.

The life of the men and of the animals it can be compared with the operation of a machine; in both cases a continuous expense of energy exists to produce heat and movement and in both cases a continuous supply of fuel is required.

When a machine has drained its fuel he/she stops. while yes the human motor stops to receive food it can continue living using its reservations and burning its fabrics (weigh loss). Yes a machine receives too combustible it can drown and to stop, while yes the human motor receives a quantity from food superior to its necessities it can transform it and to store it in its standby adipose tissues (it puts on weight).

On the other hand, it is possible to interrupt the operation of a machine that won’t consume fuel under such conditions; the human motor on the other hand cannot stop, so death penalty, and in consequence it is in a state of continuous movement and of constant consumption.

In absolute rest (basal metabolism) the caloric consumption is minimum, while this increases proportionally to the physical activity (I spend energy). The caloric necessities are the sum of the basal energy metabolism and of the consumption in any other energy way, and they are satisfied by the quantity and quality of the allowances ingested in 24 hours.

The caloric necessities vary from an individual to another in function of numerous factors, as age, weight, height, sex, race, constitution, temperament, etc., but they are conditioned mainly by the fellow’s physical activity. The consumption difference between a work and another is enormous: he/she spends that the caloric consumption of an intellectual working hour (students, employees, etc.) that ascends to hardly 1,75 calories per minute, to the 1045 calories in the event of heavy works.

The calorie (kilocalorie, lime or. Keal) it is an unit of measure of the heat-energy taken place by the allowances. By definition, a calorie is equal to the quantity of necessary heat so that, to normal atmospheric pressure, a liter of water distilled reach of 14,5 to 15,5 ºC.

The allowances introduced in our organism and burned in the different transformation phases they produce heat-energy and they are therefore able to satisfy the necessities caloric singular. If the same quantities of straw burn in a stove, paper, fossil coal, oil or gasoline are obtained a duration and a very different power of heat for each element. In the same way, the alimentary principles able to produce energy, as proteins, fatty and hydrates of carbon, possess different caloric value (vitamins, mineral salts, enzymes, hormones, etc., they only have a function regulator).

A gram of fat develops some q calories, a gram of proteins some 4,5 calories and a gram of hydrates of carbon some 4,5 calories.

The different present allowances in our table few times are pure, that is to say most of the times contain fatty. proteins and hydrates of carbon in different proportions, besides water, mineral salts, enzymes, etc. to determine the caloric value of the allowances is necessary to consult some charts created to such an end and that they specify the proportions of the different present elements in each food and they indicate the total caloric value.

To continue with cause knowledge a reasonable diet it is necessary to know the caloric value of the different allowances. This avoids them to always be made the same errors and that the lost kilos are won with so much effort.