Meatingplace.com, a meat industry online publication, reports today that USDA has received and approved voluntary requests from meat purveyors to disclose on product packaging the inclusion of lean, finely textured beef. Meatingplace.com is a members-only site but the relevant excerpt of the post reads as follows: USDA has agreed to approve requests by ground beef product [...]
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Before signing off, I wanted to share a few links related to yesterday’s remarkably high-wattage press conference, arranged by BPI yesterday to defend its lean, finely textured beef, also known as “pink slime:” Helena Bottemiller of Food Safety News has a good recap and analysis, including a description of some heated exchanges between BPI’s panelists and Jim Avila of ABC [...]
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In the past few days there’s been a flurry of posting in the blogosphere about a topic much discussed here on TLT in the past — Big Food’s marketing of junk food to kids. For those new to the issue, Big Food spends almost $2 billion annually on advertising processed food products to children, a viewing [...]
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In the early days of TLT I used to post here as often as four or five times a day (really!) but sometimes a post was little more than my passing on a link to an interesting kid-and-food article. Eventually I regained my sanity and I now use TLT’s Facebook page for that purpose. (By [...]
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A while back I said I had a big question to ask Lunch Tray readers. I’m a few weeks late in posting, but here it is: When we talk about “processed food,” what do we really mean? As someone who writes daily about food and healthful eating, this is a question I think about often. [...]
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Well, the biggest story in the “kid and food” world yesterday was an announcement by McDonald’s USA of its plan to improve the Happy Meal. Rolling out in September, Happy Meals around the country will start to contain a smaller serving of fries (1.1 ounces down from 2.4 ounces) and will now automatically contain a bag of [...]
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I used to work as an advertising lawyer, first at a large New York City law firm and then for one of the world’s largest consumer products and food companies. My bread and butter for a long time was the vetting and analysis of advertising claims – often related to food products — in advertisements, [...]
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A few hours ago, the USDA released its 2010 dietary guidelines for Americans (yeah, they’re a little late.) You can read an executive summary of the new guidelines here. According to the USDA’s Q&A document, here are some key changes from the 2005 guidelines: Recommendations for food group intakes are directional rather than providing a precise [...]
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Last week I reported on Walmart’s announcement regarding its new, wide-ranging nutrition initiative, formulated in close association with the First Lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! program. To recap, the retailer has pledged to: improve the nutritional profile of thousands of packaged food products sold under its Great Value house brand, meeting specific targets for sodium, [...]
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Yesterday I hastily posted about the USDA’s proposed new regulations for school food, but because I was burdened with a lengthy To-Do list and a doctor’s appointment that ran late, I don’t think I did this topic justice. So let me lay it out in terms that will get your attention: The new school food [...]
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