Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 11, Number 1, 1 January 1994 — ʻAi pono, e ola [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

ʻAi pono, e ola

Eat right and live well

by Dr. Terry Shintani

Seven tips for New Year dieting

Happy New Year, everyone. I hope you have all made some resolutions for a happier, heahhier new year. This is the third (and last) in a series of articles on weight loss and I think it's appropriate this month when most people are thinking about losing holiday weight gain. Here are seven tips for weight loss in the new year, based on traditional wisdom. They go with my last two articles, so for additional information see the November and December 1993 issues of Ka Wai Ola O OHA. 1. Eat whole foods. This means eating unrefined foods such as taro, poi, brown rice, whole

wheat bread or whole wheat pasta. Avoid white sugar and highly processed foods such as candies, cakes and other eoneentrated foods. This is important because studies indicate that eating whole foods makes you feel full faster. One study compared whole wheat and white bread. When people ate as mueh as they wanted of eaeh, they ate fewer calories of whole wheat. So eating whole foods ean fill you up, make you satisfied, and still keep down your calories. 2. Never fry. Bake, boil, steam, lāwalu or pūlehu your food, but never fry it. The ancient Hawaiians never fried their foods. How do we know this? No frying pans in the old days. Why is it important to not fry foods? It

is important to limit your fat intake because fat in your diet turns into body fat. Let me give you an example. Potatoes are about 1 percent fat or about .5 grams per medium whole potato. This is a food that will tend to make you slim. Fry it into french

fries and it becomes 45 percent fat, or about 12 grams, and will tend to make you fat.

3. Limit animal food consumption. In ancient times animal food was not eaten mueh at all, not only in Hawai'i but just about everywhere. How do we know this? Because there were no refrigerators in those days. How ean you eat meat at every meal (as many of us do), or even onee a day, without refrigerators? This is important because most animal foods are very high in fat. For example, roast beef is 71 percent fat and ham is about 47 percent fat (see last month's article for

more examples). Worse, most animal fat is high in saturated fats whieh raises blood cholesterol levels and all animals (even fish and fowl) have cholesterol, whieh contributes to heart disease. 4. Don't eat after dark. It is said that the traditional Hawaiian way was to never eat after dark. This seems to be a good idea. At least try not to eat within three hours before you go to sleep. I recommend this because calories eaten just before sleep are more likely to turn into fat. During the day calories eaten are more likely to get burned for energy because we are active.

5. Try traditional Hawaiian foods. Of course I recommend eating Hawaiian foods. Programs based on the traditional Hawaiian diet such as the Wai'anae Diet and other programs all over the state now have demonstrated that real Hawaiian foods are benefieial. When I say Hawaiian food, I don't mean modern feast foods like lomi salmon, macaroni salad and kālua pig. I mean kalo, poi, sweet potato, greens, limu and fish. These traditional Hawaiian foods contribute to your health and natural weight loss. 6. Share some Hawaiian food with friends. Staying on a good diet is easier when it is done with ffiends. If you learn how to make authentic traditional Hawaiian foods and share them with your friends, you ean make them a

conversation pieee and you might even inspire your friends to try it themselves. In so doing, you make it more fun for yourself to stay with a diet. 7. Observe the laws of nature. We are what we eat. We are what we think. We are what we do. If we are healthy we attain our ideal weight. No counting calories or limiting portion sizes is necessary for most people if they simply

piek healthy food. I believe that being overweight is an early sign of being unhealthy. Dr. Shintani, physician and nutritionist, is director ofpreventive medicine at the Wai'anae Coast Comprehensive Health Center. A majority oftheir clients are of Hawaiian ancestry.

Being optimally healthy means eating the right foods, being active (including regular exercise), thinking right thoughts, and having faith in a power beyond us.