RIP Food Pyramid (1992-2011)

Le Roi est mort, vive le Roi!  Or in this case, the USDA Food Pyramid is dead, long live My Plate!  First Lady, Michelle Obama, just unveiled the latest incarnation of the government's nutrition guidelines.  

Gone is the familiar shape, initially divided into horizontal slabs, supported by a foundation of 6-11 servings of bread, cereal, rice & pasta.  Part of the problem was determining what constitutes a serving size.  

6 years ago, the pyramid was updated to show someone walking up the steps (representing exercise) with the slabs converted into vertical stripes, representing the various food groups.  Complicating this was the fact that there were actually several different pyramids depending upon your sex & age, if I remember correctly.  And that was its problem.  It was too complicated.

So now we have the plate.  Fruits & veggies represent 50% of your intake, with the proportion of veggies slightly greatly than that of fruits.  Grains appear to represent slightly more than 25% of your meal.  And proteins make up the remainder.  Notice that it's not meat but rather the nutrient that's listed, as compared to the food group for the remainder.  That's because you can obtain your protein from sources other than meat.  Plus there's a small round circle representing a glass, I suppose, for dairy.  But no mention of sugars, fats, salt, etc.

I'm sure there'll be lots of controversy.  For instance, Scientific American has already weighed in w/their opinion.  But while there may be arguments over which form of protein is best, why grains aren't listed as whole grains only, etc, let's face reality.  Junk food is like pornography.  To paraphrase Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart's immortal concurring opinion, I might not be able to define junk food, but I know it when I see it.  My Plate gives us another way to visualize what we should eat but until we can avoid eating junk foods, we'll continue to gain weight.