Healthy food

Henna and Lisa got the assignment to talk about healthy food in Finland. We looked for information on the internet and found some typical things about the food. We interviewed a teacher namely Lena Granér-Strand, she´s a teacher of home economics.

Here are the results of our research.

Healthy food in Finland is called functional food. Functional foods are products, which, in addition to their nutritional function, have been scientifically proven to enhance health or prevent illness.
Traditional foods such as rye, oats, barley, as well as rediscovered pine bark and spruce shoots contain large amounts of fibre, flavonoids, lignans pro- and prebiotics.Finland invests a lot of money in food research.

Today Finns are keen exponents of a healthy diet. According to consumer surveys more than 70% of Finns think positively about functional foods. Due to public health efforts, most Finnish consumers know their cholesterol level and their blood pressure.

Here are some examples:

Functional food:

  • Fruisana

Fruisana is the original brand of fruit sugar, or fructose, found naturally in most fruits and honey. Fruisana Fruit Sugar is the perfect sweetener for all types of food and drink and the natural alternative to cane sugar. Fruisana Fruit Sugar contains the same number of calories as ordinary sugar, but you need much less of it because it is a sweeter, more stable and satisfying energy source.

  • Benecol

This product contains the unique ingredient Plant Stanol Esters, which has been proven to lower cholesterol. It was launched in Finland in 1995, as part of a major public health initiative to lower the nation's cholesterol.

Typical healthy food in Finland:

  • Fish soup à la Kainuu

* 1-1 ½ l water or good fish stock
* 1-2 onions
* 5-6 allspice berries
(- salt)
* 4-5 potatoes
* about 1/2 kg of filleted fish
(- salmon, whitefish, pike, perch)
* dill, chives, chopped parsley

  • Karelian Hot Pot

* 300 g chuck steak
* 300 g pork shoulder
* 300 g stewing lamb or mutton
* 2-3 onions
* 1 1/2 tsp salt
* 8 allspice
* water

This is the interview with Lena Granér-Strand:

How important is healthy food for our well-being?

It’s very important!! If people have diseases, like diabetes, heart problems and blood pressure problems. It’s very important that they eat healthy.

Is it important to serve healthyfood in schools?

Yes, I find it very important! If homes lack their healthy food it’s up to the school to set a healthy example.

What would you consider to be healthy food?

I would consider that the “platemodel“ is a good example. So then you eat healthy. For young people, sugar is a really big problem. They drink a lot of soft drinks and also eat a lot of candy.

How often could you eat unhealthy food without it affecting you negatively?

Pizza and hamburger, you can eat it once a month. But if you cook it at home, you can use more healthy ingredients. Then you can eat it once a week.

How important is it that schools try to get students to eat healthy food or is it more to the parents at home?

It’s important that schools set examples for how to eat healthy. In home economics, I can show the children a good way to eat healthy. Even in upper classes it’s very important. And in my class, I just teach them to make healthy food. Unless the parents do it, that’s also very important.

How often do you eat something with much butter and oil?

Not often. And when I eat butter and oil, it’s just one time in a week.

Then we also interviewed the kitchen of the school:

How much butter do you use in the food?

We almost never use butter in our food. We almost always cook the food in theoven.

Do you consider the students’ health when you prepare the food?

Of course, the students are the most important factor when it comes to eating food. And that’s our job: (laughing)

The difference between the schools:

In Belgium we eat at 12 o’clock and in Finland it’s at 11 o’clock:.

There aren’t many differences because they eat much salad and also in our school we eat salad. The school also gives meat like meat balls and all the other kind of meats.

In Finland, they don’t eat French Fries. But in Belgium at school, they have it one time in a week.

So this is everything about healthy food in Finland.

Henna & Lisa