Taste-Testing Demonstrations for FirefightersANN BLANKENSHIP AND R. DONALD HAGAN

Institute for Human Fitness, Texas College of Osteopathic Medicine, Fort Worth, Texas 76107

We have developed a novel approach to nutritioneducation and meal preparation for firefighters duringtheir work shifts at the fire station. Firefighting is aunique occupation. In addition to an all-encompass­ing concern for public safety, there is emotional stressdue to the unusual 24 hours-on and 48 hours-off workshifts. Moreover, firefighting is characterized by pe­riods of intense activity followed by periods of monot­onous duties and sedentary living (1). Health and fit­ness data on firefighters collected by the Institute forHuman Fitness, Texas College of Osteopathic Medi­cine, reveal that between 30-35% have hypertensionand elevated cholesterol and/or triglyceride levels.Food frequency records indicate that typical dietstend to be high in total fat, saturated fat, cholesteroland sodium (2).

Increased civic responsibilities leave the firefighterwith little time for meal planning and preparation.Our worksite program was designed to educate thefirefighters and introduce them to more nutritiousfoods that could be served regularly at the fire station.This report describes "Good Nutrition CAN TasteGood," a series of taste-testing demonstrations pre­sented to selected groups of firefighters at theirworksite.

We began our project by visiting local fire stationsand interviewing the firefighters about their food se­lection habits. Eating meals at several stations gave usinsight into foods typically consumed by the men andwe learned that easily prepared, convenience foodswere preferred by those firefighters assigned to cook­ing duties. Further observation and additional inter­views with station firefighter-cooks helped determinespecific foods frequently served. We also learned thatrecipes and nutritional guides were not generally con­sulted for meal preparation.

Because firefighters remain on duty while shop­ping, grocery stores are selected solely by their prox­imity to the fire station. While at the grocery store,ease of preparation, personal food preferences, andcost are used to determine which foods to purchase.Moreover, one-third of fire station meals are inter­rupted by a fire alarm, and it is not uncommon for sev­eral hours to elapse before a firefighter returns to hismeal.

We found that biscuit pizza, tuna casserole, beefand corn pie, baked fish, and chicken and noodle cas­serole were frequent meals for firefighters. However,firehouse recipes for these dishes were virtually non-

VOLUME 18 NUMBER 1 SUPPLEMENT 1986

existent. Therefore, we consulted basic referencecookbooks to obtain representative recipes and calcu­late the nutritive value of these entrees. We then modi­fied the recipes to reduce total fat, saturated fat, so­dium and/or cholesterol by at least 25%. On theaverage, total fat was decreased by 26%; saturated fatby 42%; cholesterol by 31 %; and sodium by 45%. Al­though caloric restriction was not a primary objective,calories were also reduced by an average of 36% perserving. Original and modified versions of all recipeswere tested, retested, revised and evaluated by ourstaff members to ensure quality, yield, ease of prepara­tion, and acceptability.

The fire department administration selected fivestations to participate in a taste-testing project and wemade arrangements with each station captain to pro­vide the entree for a noon meal. Since we wanted ourtaste testing to be unbiased, both the original andmodified entrees were prepared and placed in un­marked containers.

At the station, a brief description and overall reviewof the general principles of recipe modification and in­gredient substitution were presented to the firefight­ers. Subsequently, the entrees were baked and servedin one-half cup portions to each firefighter. We re­quested that no seasonings be added and that discus­sion of the products be withheld during the time oftasting. Each firefighter then scored the entrees andwe answered any questions. Upon completion of thetaste test, we encouraged the participants to have ad­ditional servings and they were free to add desiredcondiments. At that time, comments ranged from,"Pass the salt," to "Where are the jalapeno peppers?"

Each fireman completed a simple score sheet toevaluate the original and modified entrees for appear­ance, texture, flavor, aroma and overall acceptance.We used a nine-point hedonic scale in which an in­crease in quality reflected an increase in numericalvalue. In addition, we invited personal comments aswell as suggestions for improvement.

After the men completed the score sheets, we com­puted averages for each characteristic and shared ourfindings with the firemen while they completed theirmeal. We distributed copies of the original and modi­fied recipes and discussed the effect of each ingredientsubstitution as well as the cost per serving and ingre­dient availability. It is interesting to note that onetaste-testing session was interrupted by a fire-alarmand that during another session we completed kitchen

JOURNAL OF NUTRITION EDUCATION 571

Figure 1.

cleanup alone because the station was suddenly calledto duty.

On our scale of 1 (dislike completely) to 9 (like ex­tremely), both the original and modified versions ofbiscuit pizza, tuna casserole, beef and corn pie, andchicken and noodle casserole received an average rat­ing of 7 (like moderately), indicating no difference inacceptability between either version of the entrees.The modified version of baked fish was slightly pre­ferred, however, and received a rating of 8 as com­pared to a score of 7 for the original version.

Our results indicate that recipes can be developedfor favorite firehouse foods and successfully modifiedto reduce amounts of saturated fat andcholesterol, so-

dium and calories with no loss of taste and acceptabil­ity to this population.

It is also gratifying to note that we received positiveevaluations from each fire station. The firemen reportthey are continuing to serve and enjoy the modifiedentrees and have sought our help in modifying otherrecipes and personal favorites.

Our taste testing project was endorsed by the fire de­partment administration, and was well received bythe firefighters. Our community newspaper gave ex­tensive publicity to one taste testing session and fea­tured several of the modified recipes in their specialfoods section. As a result of other media coverage, wehave received requests for information from across thenation and have furnished recipes and shared detailsof our project with other municipal fire departments.

This project could easily be duplicated by other nu­trition educators, and we believe that taste testingdemonstrations are an effective learning tool for nutri­tion education at the worksite. To paraphrase the an­cient Chinese proverb, "One TASTE is worth a thou­sand words."

UTERATURE CITED

1 Davis, P.O., R. J. Biersner, R. J. Barnard, and J. Schma­dan. Medical evaluation of firefighters. How fit are theyfor duty? Postgraduate Medicine 72:2, 1982.

2 Weiss, S., R. D. Hagan, R. L. Kaman, S. C. Taylor, andR. M. Woodworth. Age-related changes of coronaryheart disease risk factors in municipal firefighters. Medi­cine and Science in Sports and Exercise 16:194, 1984.

Nutrition for Pregnant and Lactating Women:Implications for Worksite Health Promotion

ROSEMARY BARBER-MADDEN, 1 CATHERINE COWELL, 2 MARYBETH ALBANESE PETSCHEK1 AND KAREN GLANZ3

lCenter for Population and Family Health, Columbia University, School of Public Health,New York, NY 10032; 2New York City Department of Health, New York', NY 10032;and 3Department of Health Education, Temple University, Philadelphia, PA 19122

ABSTRACT Recent statistics provide strong evidencethat more American women are entering and remaining inthe work force. The majority of these working women are ofprime childbearing age and choose to work during preg­nancy and after childbirth. This labor force trend, coupledwith the increasing interest in worksite health promotionprograms, raises the issue of pregnancy, lactation and thenutritional needs of working women, and how worksitehealth promotion programs can best respond to these needs.This article aims to provide a framework for developingworksite maternal nutrition education programs for thispopulation.

Over half of all women in the United States are cur­rently in the labor force. Of those employed, it is esti­mated that 85 % will become pregnant at some pointduring their working lives (1). This labor force trend,coupled with the increasing interest in worksitehealth promotion programs, raises the issue of preg­nancy, lactation and the nutritional needs of workingwomen, and how worksite health promotion pro­grams can best respond to these needs. This articleaims (1) to present the rationale for initiating health

S72 JOURNAL OF NUTRITION EDUCATION VOLUME 18 NUMBER 1 SUPPLEMENT 1986