MyPlate vs. Your Plate

Last week, the U.S. Department of Agriculture finally retired MyPyramid, a confusing, multi-colored icon that did very little to clarify what and how much Americans should be eating.  I appeared on FOX to discuss this initiative.

The new graphic replacing the pyramid is called MyPlate. It’s a simple image of a dinner plate showing five food groups and indicating portion sizes for each. 

Of course, there were both cheers and jeers after the icon was unveiled. Some of my colleagues were downright appalled by the ambiguity of the guidelines. They wanted quinoa and millet and bulgur listed in place of grains; they growled about dairy being included (What about those who are intolerant!? Allergic!?) And do we dare discuss protein? (“Legumes and grains can be your source of protein!”)

Let’s face it. If you’re making corn and amaranth griddlecakes for breakfast and eating a Swiss chard and feta tart in a teff crust for dinner, you really don’t need this icon.

An icon isn’t going to help you eat smarter, lose weight, get in shape or feel better about yourself. That’s up to the individual. This initiative is about education — closing the gap between those who are informed and those who are not. Is this icon perfect? No. But as I see it, this basic plate makes it very clear to people what a “healthy meal” should look like. Right now, there are few plates out there that mimic this graphic. So, I applaud this small, positive step toward change.  It will make a wonderful teaching tool and may just inspire people to think before they eat.

I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Comments

[Tina Ruggiero]

Thank you so much for taking the time to share your thoughts! You bring up excellent points. Feel free to follow me @Tina_Ruggiero on Twitter, where we can continue our dialog about all things nutrition! Have a great weekend.

[Joan Guthrie Medlen, MEd, RD]

I agree!

I work with people with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities. I had to abandon use of the pyramid when they went to My Pyramid.gov. I couldn't even teach food groups from it.

This gives me many opportunities to craft easy-to-understand nutrition education including visual tools that will be understandable.

My only complaint is this: They should really run things past their own experts in health literacy. I realize they wanted "my plate" to stand out, but....white on a light lime green background will be HARD for those with emerging literacy skills to read.

But nothing is perfect and this has FAR more potential than we've had for some time.

Thanks for your blog!