Ballydehob expert Dr Janette Walton talks about all things nutrition with EMMA CONNOLLY

JUST one fifth of Irish adults meet the daily recommended guidelines for fruit and vegetable intake, the nation’s fibre intake is ‘shocking’ while dairy has been demonised by certain industries.

That’s according to Ballydehob native, Dr Janette Walton, who is a senior lecturer in Biological Sciences and Head of the NutRI research group at MTU, with over 30 years’ experience spanning industry and academia in food, nutrition, and health.

Dr Walton has written the introduction for a newly-published book called What Nourishes Us by Dr Gregor Haslerr, Professor of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy at the University of Fribourg, who specialises in depression, eating disorders, and the complex relationship between nutrition and mental health.

He stresses that it’s ‘not a diet book,’ instead ‘it’s a complete rethinking of what food actually is — and what it does to us when we treat it as nothing more than a collection of numbers’.

Chapters cover mindful eating, microfasting and macrofasting, whole foods and the food matrix, eating rituals and communal dining, the transformation of nutritional energy, and cleansing.

‘The book draws the reader into the narrative of why and how we eat rather than what we eat and takes our thoughts away from individual nutrients and foods and more towards the occasion of eating and seeing pleasure in food rather than counting the calories and nutrient content,’ explained Dr Walton.

‘It allows us to understand the difference between hunger and appetite and embraces both. It encourages consumption of whole foods without being overly prescriptive in what is being recommended. It centres mealtimes as a priority and cooking using fresh ingredients.

‘Most of all it focuses on the mindfulness of eating and the environment in which we do so, and highlights the advantages of eating in company and the abundance of food within our natural ecosystem,’ said Dr Walton, who lives in Bandon.

Ultimately, Dr Hassler is ‘taking the chaos out of the food environment, and helping to create a calmness around food,’ she added.

‘I don’t think he’d approve of our over reliance on the Airfryer, let’s just put it like that. He wants us to learn how to give time for meals, time to prepare them, eat them, and socialise with people, enjoy and talk about food,’ she said.

She highlights how ‘industry and marketing drive a lot of what’s available to us – for example chocolate at Easter, low calorie food in January –  and he’s getting us to make our own choices, to be mindful and to focus on the pleasures and celebration of eating and to use all our senses while doing so.’

The writer, she says, feels that lot of disease is not only due to nutritional imbalance but the way we’re treating food.

‘We eat on the go, in the car, we snack a lot as a population, we pick up what’s available because we’re very time poor. As we’ve gotten more affluent as a country we tend not to cook as much and go for the quicker options; and he’s trying to bring us back to thinking about food, every bite we take, sitting down with people and making the meal more than just what’s being consumed.

‘The guidance isn’t rocket science, however altering our busy lives to change behaviours is really difficult, and during the pandemic we possibly moved back to that a bit, but we moved out of it the first chance we got.’

Dr Walton feels  that as a society we ‘need support to make these changes.’

‘It’s hard to make changes as an individual and at a consumer level, as we all live in a busy environment, food is so available, shops don’t even close on Sundays any more, but it’s not helping our health or longevity or quality of life,’ she said.

Dr Walton is also lead investigator of national dietary surveys in Ireland including the National Adult Nutrition Survey (NANS) and successive child and adolescent surveys, which  show a pattern of diets characterised by high availability of energy-dense, nutrient-poor foods alongside persistently low intakes of dietary fibre, whole grains, fruits and vegetables in many population groups.

‘These patterns are not simply the result of individual choice or lack of nutritional knowledge; they reflect an environment that powerfully influences what and how we eat,’ she said.

Despite growing education, 20% of adults and less than 10% of children and teens have the recommended five servings of fruit and veg a day.

‘Dietary fibre intakes are also low among the Irish population and there is high quality evidence to suggest that higher consumption of dietary fibre is associated with a lower risk of non-communicable diseases such as obesity, Type II diabetes, and certain cancers,’ she said.

She pointed to the wave of popular diets such as Dukan and Atkins which restricted carbohydrates. ‘But there is simply no place else to get dietary fibre,’ she warned.

For children, teens and young adults, getting enough calcium is her top advice.

‘We spend so much time telling groups of people that we must reduce sugar and salt and demonising food groups, but we forget we’ve only a certain time in life to build bone density, from when we’re born to our early 20s. Calcium is critical. Simply put if we don’t have enough calcium we can’t live.’

Dr Walton feels dairy can be demonised by certain groups who recommend plant based alternatives to milk such as oat or coconut, but says ‘they’re not milk and don’t always contain the important minerals and vitamins that are natural in milk. Breakfast cereals can also be demonised but they can be a good choice for children and teenagers and also provide a way for people to consume milk. Hot chocolate can be demonised for its sugar content, but I’d look at it as a way of getting a glass of milk into a child.’

There’s no ‘one size fits all’ approach.

‘Healthy eating very much depends on the life stage, health status and goals of the individual but from a population point of view, our food pyramid gives us guidance/choices from which to choose a healthy diet.’

She feels that GLP-1 medications have a role in weight loss but as with any ‘quick fix’ solution there are concerns.

‘Obesity is now classed as a disease, so there’s a role for these drugs in helping someone with obesity to manage their weight.

‘But anecdotally we hear that they’re being used as slimming tools for aesthetic reasons. Also, if we’re eating say 40% less calories will we now need a multi vitamin/mineral supplement to account for a shortfall of important nutrients? So are we medicalising food completely and where is the pleasure and enjoyment of food gone? There’s a lot of questions to be answered still.’

Ultimately, she recommends the book as a ‘wholesome read.’

‘It’s a reminder to eat mindfully, to enjoy and respect the privilege of the food that we have available to us.’

• ‘What Nourishes Us’ is published by Mercier Press