and protein from foods like chicken. All calcium and protein comes originally from plants and is
plentiful in a plant-based diet; suggesting dairy and chicken are necessary for health is marketing
for the USDA, the primary representative for the dairy and beef boards.
Nonetheless, vegetables and fruits and grains (ideally whole) represent 75% of this Plate—strong
advice from the government that is worth applauding!
Noticing the remaining holes in the new government plate,
Harvard’s School of Public Health—only a few months
later—came out with their own Healthy Eating Plate. This
stepped up the Plate even further toward what is actually
healthy. As a public school, it touted its lack of influence by
commercial interests. But it too fell short, because the
difference between nutrient-rich and nutrient-poor food is
still misrepresented.Promoting added oils and “healthy” animal protein (a
contradiction in terms), is misguided. You get plenty of oil naturally packaged in nutrient-rich
whole foods, and animal protein is not nutrient rich (as we’ve explained extensively in previous
sections). This plate does say to limit dairy, so the trend is to move away from animal foods, and
expanded recommendations for whole, natural plant foods.
The Healthy Eating Plate is another big next step in the
evolution towards what it really means to eat healthy—
which means eating nutrient rich.Enter The Nutrient Rich® Healthy Eating Plate.You simply minimize animal products, and of course, you
would want to also minimize your consumption of refined
foods, to approximately 10% or less as well.As you learned in Part II, the 90% or More Plant Based
Nutrient Rich Approach is not limited to animal products
alone, it’s also an even more so about minimizing refined
foods, which comprise as much as 60% or more of the average person’s food consumption.
The American diet is taking a major shift toward plant-based eating. For the first time ever, the
2010 Dietary Guidelines for Americans told us loud and clear: eat a plant-based diet that includes
plants as an important source of protein. 171
(^171) Dietary Guidelines for America. Briefing for Capitol Hill and Press on Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee Report
Release 2010. http://www.cnpp.usda.gov/Publications/DietaryGuidelines/2010/DGAC/
Report/BriefinDGACAdvisoryReport.txt. Accessed June 16th, 2010.