Jim

Thanks. Lots of good points about wellness grifters. For sound diet-health advice I trust Harvard Healthy Eating Plate guidance & other HSPH advice, all science based. Online diet-health influencers promise quick fixes & never acknowledge weight loss plateaus & regain common to all rapid loss diets.

The current rate of US overweigh/obesity is arguably a real health crisis. How do we fix it? Smart people within the food system need to focus more on solving this problem.

I’m fascinated with Kevin Hall’s discussions of how metabolism works & how it’s full of counter intuitive surprises. Online influencers pitching low carb never mention plateaus, how to break through them or counter backsliding; never post plots of daily weight over 2+ years for actual people.

When you see grams sugar per serving on label, multiply that by 0.8 to get the pounds sugar per year if you eat one serving per day. A kids flavored yogurt with 20 grams sugar eaten daily is 16 pounds per year. That’s 4 sacks of sugar. A kids gummy vitamin: one sack. Parents take note.

Sounds like iceberg model, “structures” and “mental models” layers. In some cases, disruptive emerging competition can push change In incumbents.

Finally, I speculate on whether the proposed novel meal portion model’s ability to fine-tune both weekly average meal calories and level of day-to-day calorie variance could yield insights on avoiding plateaus in a long-term weight loss program. 24/

Exploit novel sales options for convenience;
Help reduce plastics waste;
Use package QR codes to inform consumers about positive food system topics;
Help tame today’s obesity crisis through a novel portion model & an app integration that allow low-effort average calorie fine tuning… 23/x

In summary,
This thread contemplates how a reinvention of mass distribution frozen meals could
Be a convenient time saver, while still being a minimally processed, healthy meal option;
Promote nature-positive food production methods;
Promote regional crop sourcing… 22/x

Is it possible that this fluctuation level, by swamping the average loss rate, could obscure from the metabolism that a weight loss program is underway, helping to avoid plateaus? Perhaps the novel 400 : 600 portion model could provide a “control knob” to explore whether “noise” can be helpful. 21/x

For every 10-day moving window, I did a linear regression & found the standard deviation of weight data about the local trend line. On average, these day-to-day fluctuations were nearly 5 times the average loss within 10-day windows. 20/x

Based on my experience over some 850 days of weight tracking, graphical feedback, and a very gradual target loss rate, I suspect that variance may play a role in successfully staying on track with weight loss goals. 19/x

Thus, with the novel 400 : 600 portion model, one has control over both weekly meal (say, lunch) calorie total, and the amount of day-to-day ups & downs. It seems unclear whether greater or lesser day-to-day calorie consistency is better for weight loss success. 18/x

The novel portion model provides an actuator for tuning total weekly lunch calories. It may also provide a 2nd “control knob”. As it turns out, for most given calorie values, several distinct portion profiles will produce the same total weekly calories; but with differing standard deviations. 17/x

The app could give advice on frozen meal portion choices to help a person keep weight loss on track. This could accomplish calorie tuning without calorie counting, per se. One could, for example, just grab 1 or 2 of the app-recommended packet sizes from the freezer before heading out to work. 16/x

If the moving average weight lies above the target trend line, eat a bit lighter; if it dips below target, ease up on restriction. One could also adjust daily exercise calories burned to help stay on track with loss progress. 15/x

In the adaptive control approach, you log your pre-breakfast weight daily in an app. The app plots a 10-day moving average smoothed curve vs time, overlaid with a descending straight line with slope reflecting user target loss rate (e.g. -0.01 kg/day). This takes only a couple minutes each day. 14/x

This 400 : 600 model of frozen meals could play a part in an “adaptive system control” approach to weight loss along the lines of Walker’s 1991 “The Hacker’s Diet”. The ability to fine-tune one’s weekly lunch calories provides an actuator “control knob” to nudge the weight in desired direction. 13/x

If a person were to eat 7 of these meals per week (say, for lunch), eating 1 or 2 portions per meal, then the average calories per meal over the week could be any one of 29 values ranging from 400 to 1200, in increments of 28.57 calories. This precision is about the calories in 3 cashew nuts. 12/x

Suppose frozen meal products follow a standard where each meal comes in 2 sizes: a small size with 400 calories, and a large size with 600 calories. If one eats 1 or 2 portions chosen from these 2 sizes for a given meal, then the available calories for that meal are 400, 600, 800, 1000, & 1200. 11/x

The US is in the midst of an ever-worsening overweight/obesity crisis, with some 73% of adults having a BMI over 25. I believe that the multisolving frozen meals can play a supporting role in helping to tame this crisis by adopting a novel approach to the sizing of frozen meal portions. 10/x

It’s unlikely that commercial meal offerings could, at least initially, embody every problem-solving feature outlined here. Package QR codes could take the consumer to a site describing the virtues specific to each meal. This can potentially introduce people to unfamiliar food system topics. 9/x

The world is “drowning” in plastic. The envisioned multisolving frozen meals could use 100% plastic-free packaging. The French invented baking parchment paper, mid 19th century, by applying a safe acid wash to fiber paper. I assume a similar method could create a microwave-safe fiber meal tray. 8/x

The envisioned multisolving frozen meals could be sold in grocery stores. They could also be sold in refrigeration equipped vending machines in workplace break rooms, highway rest stops, inner city laundromats, and so on, adding to convenience. 7/x

Frozen meal offerings could strive to include regionally grown foods to as great an extent as possible, as well as de-centralize food production. This can minimize transport impacts (saving energy) & spread job creation across regions. 6/x

Frozen meals could embody agricultural sustainability best practices, e.g. regenerative farming principles for restoring soil health; and plant polyculture practice promoting plant & insect biodiversity, which can naturally suppress pests, reducing the need for chemical inputs. 5/x

Meals could be tasty & embody sound health advice, e.g. Harvard Healthy Eating Plate guidance. Multiple product lines could cater to various dietary “camps”, e.g. low-carb, vegan, etc. The multi-solving frozen meal could improve public health, while recognizing differing views on what’s healthy. 4/x

Ultra processed foods are widely believed to contribute to health problems. I believe that, with flash-freezing, frozen meals could duplicate from-scratch home cooking made solely using ingredients available at grocers; even ingredients that people would have recognized as food 1000 years ago. 3/x

Frozen meals can be a time saver for busy people. Folks in industrialized societies have busy schedules & often lack time for cooking. Even office workers who can afford to go out for lunch may value microwaveable frozen meals as a convenient time saver. 2/x

“Multisolving Microwaveable Frozen Meals”:
Could reimagined frozen meal products embody Dr. Elizabeth Sawin’s lessons on finding solutions that concurrently address multiple societal problems?
This thread outlines various problems that frozen meals in the US could potentially address in tandem. 1/x

Fall 2021 I did retrospective “what-if” numerical simulation on US COVID. I used daily new cases to estimate avg Re; vax data, efficacy, waning to get avg Ro estimate; boosted actual vax rate by x%; went in reverse to get idealized Re, daily rates. For some x%, cases dropped to 0 by September 2021.