Cooking and grocery shopping ideas to be given at fair

Top Ramen is cheap. Microwavable burritos are fast. Pizza delivery is almost too easy.

Too often in the fast-paced, tight-budget world of collegiate life, cheap convenience wins out over healthy eating decisions, says Tamara Vitale, a clinical assistant professor in the dietetics program. But Vitale says it doesn’t have to be that way.

“It’s not necessarily hard and it doesn’t have to cost a lot,” she said. “Healthy eating is definitely attainable for college students.”

Friday in the TSC Sunburst Lounge, Vitale and a handful of dietetics students will be presenting information about cooking and food-purchasing techniques from 9 a.m. until 1 p.m.

Students will perform cooking demonstrations every 30 minutes. There will also be samples of healthy foods at the expo, Vitale said.

“A lot of students don’t know how to cook,” she said. “There’s so much information about nutrition and health, we’ll try to make it seem doable.”

Vitale said the Health Expo will also focus on the prevention of chronic diseases and what students can do to prevent such diseases at a young age.

Along with information about prenatal nutrition and eating disorder prevention, there will be free blood pressure and blood glucose screenings at the fair.

Krista Viau, a sophomore majoring in nutrition, is one of the students responsible for organizing the blood glucose screenings. Screeners will take small blood samples from a finger.

Viau said the symptoms of diabetes, particularly Type II, come on slowly and before most people think they need to get tested, they already have the condition.

Vitale said about 2,000 people participated in last year’s Health Expo and said she expects this year to be even bigger.

-acf@cc.usu.edu