Food for thought?! 
Bananas vs Custard Creams?
No comparison ?!

 I read an article in the Metro newspaper on Tuesday 29^th March entitled, “Five – a –day too costly, say young”. The article claimed that young people (under 25’s), students and those on low incomes are buying less fruit and vegetables because of soaring prices. According to the research by trade magazine, ‘The Grocer’, fruit prices rose 7.9% in 2010/2011 and vegetables 2.9%. The price of a pineapple was up by 43p (33%) and red grapes by 70p (20.6%). Bananas dropped in price to 20p per kilo.

This made me think of how, if I am researching body image and health education for dancers, we can promote nutrition and eating healthy if it is expensive to eat healthy as most dance students live on a shoestring and many new to the profession are on very low incomes. Wouldn’t the fact that someone couldn’t afford to eat healthy add further burden to someone with an eating disorder or who had been told by the college/company they had to lose weight or even increase their weight?

This issue is not just pertinent to those who are told to lose weight but there are dancers who are naturally too thin and there are other knock on effects of not eating healthy for those dancers who may be naturally aesthetically perfect and these include the effects on hair, teeth, skin, nails etc, as well as fatigue, loss of stamina and fitness which ultimately can lead to increased risk of injury. For all these reasons and more it is vital for dancers to eat healthy but if eating healthy is expensive, do they take the unhealthy option to save money?!

Dancers usually ‘graze’ between classes, rehearsals and performances and so eat little and often. I remember witnessing when I was at college students snacking all day on  packets of custard cream biscuits, or cookies, crisps, chocolate or those who were on diets ‘Snack-o-jacks’ or a box of cereal? And of course the usual student fodder of Super Noodles, Pot Noodle and Baked Beans! Is this because it’s a cheaper option?

So decided to do a little sleuthing, donned the mackintosh and deer stalker with magnifying glass in hand and headed for my local Tesco (not really- just dressed normal in jeans and T with note book and pen but you do get funny looks when you’re not really putting stuff in your trolley but jotting prices down in a notebook – I thought they might think I was some sort of spy for Asda?)

Here are a few price comparisons I did:

Healthy Snacks                                               Other favourite snacks (energy givers)
Bunch of bananas(4small)- 70p                           Packet custard creams – 30p (400g)
Soreen malt loaf    -  £1                                         Mars bar -  65p 
Muller light yoghurt  - 25p                                   2 x large bags Doritos £2 (50p each)
Smoothie -  £1.89                                                  Coke – 42p
Dried fruit - £2.99                                                 Marshmallows – 60p
Nuts - £2.99                                                           Maryland cookies £1.29 (bogof)
Raspberries/ Blueberries – 2 punnets £3              Crisps pack of 12 -  £1.39
Apples (pink lady) for 4 -  £1.89                           Pot Noodles 59p or 5 for £3        

On the High Street I passed ‘Gregs’ and I noted a sausage roll was 60p and a steak bake £1.07, 4 doughnuts £1 and a bag of 4 large cookies £1.49. A tuna mayo & salad baguette was £2.40, a cheese and tomato sandwich on wholemeal bread £1.79. So the healthier options do always seem to be more expensive.

 

As I was looking in ‘Gregs’ at prices it reminded me of Bird students who often did the ‘Greg’s run’ in Sidcup on a Thursday because timetable finished just before closing time and they could get all the food that was going to be thrown away for free – so they’d have a feast that night on pasties, bakes, sausage rolls, doughnuts, cookies. I, fortunately or unfortunately, depending on your point of view never went on the ‘Greg’s run’ as I was cycling home in the opposite direction! I suppose you couldn’t blame them for a good binge when they were getting it all for free!     

I also looked back at an article in a previous Metro paper. This was an article I remember I’d saved for reference on  February 21^st 2011 which was an article following the release of the film ‘The Black Swan’ and the effect it had had on promoting ballet as a form of exercise. In the article Jacqueline Birtwisle the Royal Ballet’s Sport and Exercise nutritionist gives advice on what dancers must eat to keep healthy. She says 2000 to 4000 calories a day and 2 litres of water. A one hour ballet class burns around 223 calories.

She suggests muesli and berries or banana for breakfast plus fresh fruit juice preferably 100% and not from concentrate.
Sushi or a filled pitta bread for lunch with a smoothie and a piece of fresh fruit.
A large meal of lean meat or fish with rice, salad or vegetables for dinner.

For grazing she suggests croissants/muffins, a skinny latte, fruit juice, nuts and dried fruit.

Using my sleuthing and price crunching evidence this could work out a rather expensive diet in comparison to cheaper alternatives.

Berries in particular are expensive although often there are deals on – at Tesco on the day I checked the prices, fresh raspberries and blueberries were 2 punnets for £3 – but frozen varieties do come cheaper at £2.  Bananas were the cheapest fruit at 70p for a small bunch of four. Smoothies @£1.89 are quite expensive and dried fruit is particularly expensive coming in at £2.99 for a bag of finest mixed dried berries (400g). ‘Pom’ pure concentrated pomegranate juice (as recommended by Jacqueline Birtwisle) is £4 per small bottle (not really student affordable?) Muffins are much more expensive than doughnuts or cookies and the good old custard creams come in the cheapest at 30p a packet (400g). Suschi is not a cheap lunch option at £4.99 for a mixed selection for one person. 

I did often wonder why custard creams were so popular at college, now I think I know why!  I am reliably informed they come even cheaper at the bargain pound store where you can get 3 packets for £1. Muesli can also be quite expensive (Dorset Muesli a particular favourite of mine crammed with berries and fruit is £3.69 per box) when compared with other cereals (eg: Frosties @ £1 .39).
 

I was advised by a sports nutritionist to snack on Soreen Malt Loaf  as  a healthy low fat snack. This is £1 per loaf (I tend to stock up when it’s on a ‘bog off’ offer) but it still can’t compete with the price of custard creams @ 30p for 400g.

As I did one of my workshops this week (Year 10’s and 11’s) I observed what the young dancers had during their breaks – crisps, quavers, biscuits (custard creams and Maryland cookies are the most popular), buns, Pringles, Haribo sweets, cheese strings and yoghurts but there wasn’t one banana!? In fact I didn’t see any fruit at all.
By comparison I had malt loaf, a banana and some grapes!  

So what are the nutritional facts and figures?

Bananas                                    vs                  Custard Creams
70p for 4 small bananas                            30p for 400g (20 biscuits)
per banana -                                               per biscuit -
calories 116                                                calories 60
protein  1.4g                                                protein 0.6g
carbs 27g (sugars 24g)                              carbs 8g (sugars 3.5g)
fat 0.3g (saturates nil)                                 fat 2.8g (saturates 1.7g)   

fibre 36g                                                       fibre 0.2g
sodium nil                                                     sodium  0.1g

Hmmmmm.................................. it is food for thought?

The banana does have more calories and is high in carbs (natural sugars) fibre and protein whilst having no fat or salt – the cost for 1 small banana = 18p. Containing three natural sugars – sucrose, fructose and glucose combined with fibre, a banana gives a sustained and substantial boost of energy. It is reported that just two bananas provide enough energy for a strenuous 90-minute workout.

By comparison the custard cream has only 60 calories per biscuit.The nutritional content is much less and will only give you a short burst of energy although they are relatively low in salt, sugar and saturate fats but the cost for one custard cream is only 1½p.

[Believe it or not the custard cream has it’s own Wikipedia page and has won Britain’s favourite biscuit award 12 times.]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Custard_cream

So as grazing animals who need to snack often to replenish energy do dancers on low incomes buy the bananas or the custard creams?
Mentioned this to someone at a rehearsal yesterday and they said, “Who would only eat one custard cream?”
Yes, this is probably true – they would maybe eat a couple at a time in between classes or  as was suggested  "the whole packet"?
If you ate all 4 bananas you would get only 464 calories for your 70p.
Your bananas would be burnt off in 2 classes but it would take 5 classes to burn off the calories from the full packet of custard creams but it would still only cost 30p!
If one ballet class burns off 233 calories you could have 2 small bananas at a cost of 35p or 4 custard creams at 6p.

Of course most of us know that the banana is the healthy option, the facts and figures speak for themselves but I wonder how many dance students who are told they have a weight issue are sent away with a list of ‘healthy foods’ and suggested healthy options but get to the supermarket and when they check the cost buy a cheaper option that has less calorific value.

I think it is interesting that the students I observed this week when I asked them about their ‘snacking’ habits said they weren’t worried because they knew they were going to “burn it off in class”.

Another interesting article I read in a magazine this week was about healthy skin and it suggests the best foods to ensure our skin is at its healthiest are avocados, blueberries, cherries and pure 100% pomegranate juice. Again when price crunching at Tescos all were amongst the most expensive options – the blueberries were the only one on a promotion at 2 punnets for £3.  

What do others think that are considering body image issues?
Is there an issue here for making sure we support the healthy option by factoring a cost issue in to the advice that is given to dance students?

Sending someone away with, for example Jacqueline Birtwisle’s, diet plan may not really help someone who also has to carefully consider the financial cost.

So, are you team ‘banana’ or team ‘custard cream’?

vs

            

You are a struggling student dancer on a very low income - would you compromise the healthy option because of the cost when we are in a day and age where every little really does help?




Reference:

Articles in Metro newspaper,

         February 21^st 2011 – ‘Swan your way round the barre’

         March 29^th 20011 –   ‘Five- a – day too costly say young’ .

Research by Emily Rose Harris based on prices on Wednesday 30^th March 2011 at Tesco and Gregs (Hemsworth).