:: TASTY AND HEALTHY
:: DIET MANAGEMENTThanksgiving is very nearly upon us. What better way to keep the kids happy than by giving them the opportunity to smash up food, while also learning of the benefits of moderation? That's precisely what Smash Your Food offers all year round, and with a new Thanksgiving focused pack, too!
We had a word with Marta about exactly how she came up with the idea behind the educational app.
"While teaching nutrition in the classroom, I noticed that kids had a hard time grasping the concept of how much sugar are in common foods. When I asked 'How many cubes of sugar are in one can of cola?' They didn’t know. Then when I told them that there are eight, that didn’t seem like a lot to them. Once I was able to show them the actual amounts and compare it [to] their allowance for a day, they started to understand what is a lot and what … it means to them."
As she explained, by teaching them such things, "…their answers became more realisti I knew we needed to literally show kids what is in the foods they are eating. I was inspired to create games and tool that kids and families could use to help have a better understanding of their current food choices and learn alternatives of these high calories foods …[thereby] helping them live healthier lifestyle."
Don't worry, Thanksgiving fans, Marta did offer us some great tips on how to eat a little healthier this holiday season. Namely, to "use low fat cream" where possible, "cut the amount of sugar in half", when baking. Also, and this is the hardest one, try to portion your plate out and don't fall for the "eyes are bigger than your stomach" issue. Marta makes "a dish of roasted vegetables, pumpkin soup and peaches topped with a delicious chestnut puree," for her Thanksgiving meal which sounds pretty tasty to me!
For those looking to learn more, Smash Your Food is available now for free. It's pretty insightful, but make sure you still enjoy that tasty dinner this Thursday!
:: HEALTHY EATING BOOST
:: IDEALIntroducing a new nutritional app that you'll want to have with you every time you pop out to go buy some groceries. Fooducate offers UPC spanning and a database of over 200,000 items (and growing) to not only give you a full nutritional rundown of the items you've bought, or plan to purchase, but healthier alternatives too.
Fooducate takes all the nutritional information available about each product and provides you with an overall score. It will also give you any particular warnings and important information about the products themselves, in additional to the Food Points value for dieters.
You can use Fooducate every single time you shop to make healthier choices, without having to scour the labels and nutritional facts of each product. This app offers several Healthy suggestions for each item you choose, giving you alternatives to help you make better food choices.
It's worthy to note that Fooducate is not affiliated with any brand, product, label or food manufacturer. So the suggestions you're getting are not meant as marketing or advertisements in any way. The Fooducate people are simply trying to promote healthier lifestyles by giving you an easy way to know exactly what you're buying and eating. Please do keep in mind that this app is still for information purposes only and that they can not be held responsible for out of date or missing information when it comes to products listings, and nutritional information.
Fooducate can be used on any iPhone, and iPad 2, and iPod touches (with cameras). It is available for free from the iTunes App Store, have a quick look at the video below to see how it works:
