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Food composition data for dietitians - a report from a EuroFIR workshop: |
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| This web feature outlines some of the presentations made at a eurofir workshop that took place at the Nutrition and Health conference in London November 2006. The workshop aimed to update attendees on recent developments in the project and to gain feedback on how food composition data affects them. The majority of those that attended the workshop were health professionals. | |
| Susan Church, an independent public health nutritionist, outlined the scope of nutritional analysis software currently available in the UK at the Nutrition and Health Conference’s EuroFIR workshop. With increasing legislation in the area of nutrient standards for meals provided in institutions, like hospitals and schools, there were comments from the audience that it was difficult to choose the most appropriate software for their purpose. A summary of ‘top tips’ on choosing the most appropriate nutritional analysis software has been published on the EuroFIR website and can be downloaded at the bottom of this page. | |  | |
| Julie Lardie, a dietitian working for ARAMARK, a company supplying catering to hospitals and schools, spoke of her experiences of using nutritional analysis software to ensure meals met nutrient guidelines. The package used contains data from the latest McCance and Widdowson food composition tables. This data is sufficient for generic items but does not necessarily contain information on branded products. One example of this was a branded chicken nugget included in a school meal. Data on the ‘Big 8’ nutrients (energy, protein, fat, saturates, carbohydrate, sugars, fibre and sodium) was provided on the product packaging, but levels of micronutrients for the meal, which are required in the application of new legislation on school meals, were not. | |
 | | These were available for a generic chicken nugget in the database, however the fat content was more than double that of the specific product actually eaten. The rapid development and reformulation of manufactured foods is a constant challenge in maintaining up to date food composition data. The EuroFIR project is trying to address this by forging links with industry in order to gain and provide direct access to via the portal to data on the nutrient composition manufactured foods. | |
| A number of the recipes used in Julie’s work were cooked from scratch and their nutrient content calculated by using the software to combine the ingredients used in the appropriate proportions. The programme has an inbuilt facility to take nutrient losses into account, for example, the loss of some vitamin C when cooking cabbage. However, it does not calculate changes in weight upon cooking. Meat and vegetables may lose weight during cooking due to the evaporation of water, whereas products that absorb water, such as pasta and rice, gain weight. This concentrates or dilutes the nutrient content accordingly and affects the quantity of nutrients per gram. This was addressed in Julie’s work by calculating nutrient content of the meals by portion rather than per 100g.
Dietitians deal with an increasingly diverse population consuming a growing variety of foods. Another issue that was addressed at this workshop was that there is a current lack of data on the nutrient composition of ethnic foods. ‘Ethnic foods’ encompasses the home cooked dishes made by those who have come to the UK from other countries. It also includes so-called ‘modified ethnic foods’, dishes originating from other countries that have been modified to suit the tastes and available ingredients of the host country. There is a huge market for these products, particularly in the UK where the market is estimated to be worth £1.5 billion.
Penelope Gilbert from the University of Leeds, who are leading the work on ethnic foods in EuroFIR, presented some of the work that is ongoing. The project is looking at a selection of ethnic foods across the EU and the focus in the UK is on foods of South Asian origin. A number of dishes will be analysed directly to provide accurate data on their composition. | |
 | | These will be done as pooled samples (i.e. a combination of a number of samples of the same dish from different sources) and so will give average nutrient values but not data on variation. Analysis will also be done on the common ethnic foods from other EU countries, including North African foods from France, Latin American foods from Spain and Turkish foods from Denmark. These data will be available via the online EuroFIR portal and should help provide dietitians and others with more complete information, allowing them to assess dietary intake and make recommendations more effectively.
Overall, many who attended the workshop felt that the current climate of labelling and legislation demanded more and more information on the nutrient content of foods and yet the general public tended to see food composition figures as 100% accurate down to the last kilojoule or milligram. | |
| In fact, the process of estimating the nutritional composition of foods, diets and menus can be an inexact science with gaps in the data on food composition, processing and cooking effects and portion size. It was felt that there needed to be more awareness of how food composition data are produced and used, and the limitations faced by health professionals and others who have to estimate the nutrient content of foods. Data on some nutrients were particularly important for those in specialist fields, for example, information on the potassium and phosphorus content of foods for dietitians working with patients with kidney failure. | |
| The EuroFIR project should help to address some of the difficulties faced by dietitians in their use of food composition data, including providing more detailed composition information, data on ethnic and traditional foods in Europe, improved links with industry to provide data on branded products and specialised data sets on compounds like phytochemicals and trans fatty acids. From the views expressed at this workshop it is also clear that more education is needed on the production and use of food composition data. | |
More Information:
| Nutritional analysis software: top tips Download
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