[Image: Wheat]Dietary Fiber
Have you ever suffered from constipation? Did you know that there is something in food that helps with that problem and offers other health benefits as well? It's called dietary fiber. We will learn about dietary fiber in this lesson. We will learn what dietary fiber is, what foods are good sources, what the health benefits are, how much dietary fiber we need and tasty ways of getting more fiber into our diets. Intake of foods high fiber intakes leads to reductions in chronic diseases.
What You Will Learn
- About dietary fiber and where to find it
- What dietary fiber is
- Types of fiber
- How to Increase fiber in the diet
- Health benefits of fiber
Food Guide Review
The USDA Department of Agriculture developed a Food Guide to help you see what foods you and your family should eat each day for good health. Foods that make similar nutritional contributions are grouped into basic food groups. The Guide also lets you know how many servings of each of the food groups are needed each day. Eat some food from each of the basic food groups in the pyramid and eat the recommended number of servings.
Activity:
Look at the Food Guide and write down the name of each of the basic food groups; write down how many servings you need each day.
Dietary Fiber and Where It Is Found
Question 1:
What is dietary fiber?
What foods give us fiber, plant or animal foods or both plant and animal foods?
Dietary fiber is the non-digestible part of plants that adds bulk to your diet. It is found only in foods that come from plants. Fiber is found mainly in the cell walls, providing the structure and shape of the plant. Fiber gives celery its rigid stalk and gives turnip greens the strong stem that holds up its leaves. Fiber is the part of whole grains, fruits, vegetables, beans, nuts and seeds that we cannot digest. Since it can't be digested and absorbed in our body, fiber is really not a nutrient. It's called a non-nutrient part of plant foods.
Dietary Fiber types
- Lignin: found in the cell walls of woody plants and seeds.
- Cellulose: found in all plant cell walls.
- Beta-Glucans: found in oats and barley, which are particularly rich in beta-glucans.
- Hemicelluloses: found in plant cell walls.
- Pectins: found in fruits and berries.
- Gums: found in seeds.
- Inulin and oligofructose: found in plants, such as onions and Jerusalem artichokes.
- Resistant starch: found in bananas and legumes. Resistant starch may also be formed by food processing or by cooling and reheating of food.
Functional Fiber
Functional fibers are carbohydrates that have been isolated or extracted from a natural plant of animal source, or they may be manufactured or synthesized. They have to show physiological benefit in humans. Fibers identified as potential functional fibers are:
- Psyllium: isolated from the husks of psyllium seeds.
- Chitin and chitosan: a nondigestible carbohydrate extracted from the exoskeletons of crustaceans, such as crabs and lobsters.
- Fructooligosaccharides: are used as food additives.
- Polydextrose and polyols: are synthetic polysaccharides used as bulking agents and sugar substitutes in foods.
- Resistant dextrins: are indigestible polysaccharides formed when starch is heated and treated with enzymes and are used as food additives.
Question 2:
How fibers are grouped and why is that important?
There are two kinds of dietary fiber. They are not all alike and they keep you healthy in different ways. Fiber is grouped as being either water soluble or water insoluble. This means that some fibers dissolve in water and some don't. You need to eat foods that give you both kinds of fiber. Since fiber cannot be digested, it is carried all the way through your gastrointestinal tract. It attracts water and also some of the bad cholesterol, removing them from your body. Attracting water helps stools to be soft and easy to eliminate. If you don't have enough water, stools are drier and harder, making using the bathroom difficult and painful.
Fiber attracting some of the bad cholesterol (LDL) is a great way to get rid of the bad guy. If the bad cholesterol builds up in our body, it increases our risk of heart disease. Eating a mixture of soluble and insoluble dietary fiber helps both with constipation and with decreasing the risk of heart disease. The more fiber you get from the foods you eat, the more bowel movements you have. The more water fiber absorbs, the easier it is for you to have bowel movements. Drinking plenty of water and other fluids is important to help fiber do its job!
It's Your turn:
- Write down the names of two kinds of dietary fiber and what they mean.
- Tell someone why it is important to drink plenty of water and other fluids.
Insoluble Fiber
Insoluble fiber does not dissolve in water.
Water insoluble fiber refers to the rigid material that gives structure to the leaves, stems and seeds of plants. It is also called roughage. Plant foods that give us insoluble fiber are broccoli, celery, turnip greens or other deep leafy green vegetables, Chinese cabbage, okra, carrots, green beans, squash and wheat, rye, legumes, rice and nuts. The insoluble fiber in these plant foods gives structure to plant leaves, stems and seeds.
Insoluble fiber is concentrated in the protective outer layers of whole grains, called the bran layers. Wheat bran, bran and whole-grain cereals and cereal products are excellent sources of insoluble fiber. Select cereals that have the word bran in their names for the best sources of bran.
Water insoluble fiber is also concentrated in stalks, seeds and skins or peelings of fruits and vegetables. Examples of stalks, seeds and peelings of fruits include skins of apples, pumpkin or sunflower seeds and celery stalks.
Insoluble fiber is most often found in whole-grain products such as whole-wheat bread. Wheat bran seems to be one of the most effective stool-softening fibers. When eating foods that are good sources of water insoluble fiber, drink plenty of water and other fluids. This increases bulk, frequency and ease of bowel movements. Insoluble fiber tends to speed the movement of the solid wastes through the lower part of the intestinal tract, increasing the frequency of bowel movements. If you don't have regular bowel movements or if you may go days without having a bowel movement, you need to include more [Image: Broccoli]insoluble fiber and water in your food intake. Insoluble fiber also helps to satisfy appetite by creating a full feeling.
Soluble fiber:
Soluble fiber dissolves in water and is broken down by bacteria in your colon. Soluble fiber is found in dry beans and peas, in some cereals such as oats and barley and in some fruits and vegetables. Water-soluble fiber such as oat bran, oatmeal and the fiber of apples helps lower blood cholesterol levels and helps regulate the body's use of sugar.
Visit the http://www.quakeroatmeal.com to see about healthy living, heart health, and managing weight. Click on the Quaker Kitchen tab to find out about recipes and about increasing fiber in the diet.
Review of Food Guide:
Questions:
Which food groups are good sources of dietary fiber?
How many servings do you need each day?
You need to eat a variety of fruits, vegetables, whole-grain breads and cereals, nuts and seeds to get all of the different kinds of dietary fiber needed for maximum health benefits.
You need to eat a variety of foods as recommended by the Food Guide, including foods that are good sources of complex carbohydrates and fiber. The Food Guide recommends that you eat more than six servings a day of grain-based foods like bread, cereal, pasta and rice. Be sure to select whole-grains for at least three of your daily complex carbohydrate servings. A study of 30,000 women ages 55 to 60 found that they were 30% less likely to die of a heart attack if they ate at least three of the six servings of breads and cereals as whole-grain instead of as refined grain foods. Americans eat only 5% of grain foods as whole-grain foods.
We need to increase complex carbohydrate and fiber-containing foods in our diets:
- Eat nine servings of fruits and vegetables, including legumes, daily.
- Eat six or more servings of grain products daily.
The Amount of Dietary Fiber You Need
Question:
How much dietary fiber do you need?
The National Cancer Institute recommends 20 to 30 grams of dietary fiber per day with an upper limit of 35 grams. The % Daily Value for dietary fiber on the nutrition label is based on 12 1/2 grams of dietary fiber per 1,000 calories or 25 grams of fiber for a 2,000-calorie diet.
Health benefits of fiber:
Question:
Name two health benefits of fiber.
1. Dietary fiber helps in preventing, controlling or lowering risk of chronic diseases or conditions:
2. Dietary fiber helps in blood sugar control.
Blood lipids. Studies show that increasing the intake of dietary fiber, especially viscous soluble fiber, decreases blood lipids.
Heart disease. Several large scale studies have shown that higher intake if fiber rich foods results in reduced incidence of heart disease and stroke. Fiber binds lipids (types of fats in the body) such as bile and cholesterol and carries them out of the body with the solid wastes so that the blood lipid concentrations, such as blood cholesterol, are lowered. Fiber-rich foods are protective in many ways: they reduce cholesterol, triglycerides, insulin, glucose, blood pressure and diabetes. All are risk factors for heart disease.
Cancer. Some studies suggest there may be reduction in colon and breast cancer with higher fiber diets. Some fibers speed the passage of food materials through the digestive tract, thus shortening the time they are in the intestinal tract. This shorter time helps prevent exposure to cancer-causing agents.
Obesity. A diet high in dietary fiber helps you feel full. Enriching a diet with dietary fiber leads to reduced caloric intake. Good sources of dietary fiber are lower in calories than fats and sweets. Eating more fruits and vegetables and fewer sweets and fats will help control weight.
Constipation and diarrhea. Some fibers attract water into the digestive tract, softening the stools and addin[Image: Oatmeal]g bulk and thereby speeding the passage of food and stools through the digestive system. Others help make watery stools more solid.
Hemorrhoids. Softer stools make elimination easier and reduce the pressure in the lower bowel.
Diabetes and blood glucose levels. Monosaccharides (carbohydrates made of one kind of sugar, such as glucose) absorbed from some complex carbohydrates (carbohydrates made of several sugars, such as glucose and fructose), in the presence of fiber, produce a reduced insulin response and a gradual rise in blood glucose.
Cooking tip: Some dietary fiber can be lost in foods when you prepare and cook them. To get the most dietary fiber from foods, do not remove from fruits and vegetables skins that can be eaten and eat the seeds as well. Use whole-grain cereal and grain products. Look for the words whole-grain or whole-wheat in the list of ingredients. If whole-grains or whole-wheat is listed first, it is the ingredient in the largest amount in that product. The more refined the cereal, the more fiber is lost. Fiber is added back to some cereals. Look for the words dietary fiber on the Nutrition Facts panel of the food label. Select whole-grain and minimally refined cereals for maximum fiber content. Don't be mislead by terms on the front of packages that say multi-grain and seven-grain. They don't ensure that the product is a whole-grain one. Look for the word bran on the label; for example, Bran Flakes Cereal or Bran Muffins.
Tip: Try these ideas to get more fiber in your meal:
- Make more sandwiches with whole-grain bread such as whole-wheat and oatmeal.
- Choose whole-grain cereals for breakfast such as bran and oatmeal. Choose cereals with five or more grams of fiber per serving.
- Eat bran muffins and whole-wheat waffles.
- Snack on whole-grain cereals.
- Replace lower-fiber choices with high-fiber foods when eating out. Order a side salad with your hamburger.
- Eat dry beans and peas two to three times a week.
- Eat five servings of fruits and vegetables a day.
- Make cornbread from whole, ground cornmeal
- Replace poorer sources of fiber with high-fiber foods.
- Eat fresh fruit or vegetables instead of the juice or select juice with fiber added.
- Eat the skin or peelings of clean fruit and vegetables such as apples, pears, potatoes and tomatoes.
- Snack on popcorn, fresh fruit, raw veggies, high fiber muffins, nuts and sunflower seeds.
Next>