Nutrition in convenience stores – for when you want healthy, low calorie fast food on the go

If you’re hungry in America, chances are there’s a “c-store” (a.k.a. a convenience mini mart) nearby, ready to serve you a wide variety of snack foods. The National Association of Convenience Stores reports that 145,000 such c-stores in the U.S. sold $569 billion in goods in 2006, a 15 percent increase over the previous year.

That’s a lot of potato chips. And beer. And extra large fountain drinks – 64 ounces of liquid candy for the long drive home.

Some of these food choices are what the non-profit Center for Science in the Public Interest refers to as “food porn.” The organization roots through marketing hype from snack food manufacturers to uncover misleading products such as Enten-minis (one Napoleon snack looks restrained and small, but it still packs in 270 calories and 5 grams of saturated fat) and Blue Bunny’s Sweet Freedom Supremes ice cream bars (with reduced sugar, but still containing a third of a day’s intake in saturated fat). Should a Mount Vesuvius-like pyroclastic flow ever encase and preserve a contemporary convenience store, it will instruct future archaeologists about food consumption behaviors of the populace. What will they think about ring dings, hot dogs on rollers – and us?

Even if you’re trying to do the right thing, nutritionally speaking, it’s pretty hard not to patronize a convenient store. So is there any hope for smart nutrition at your favorite gas-and-go mini mart?

The answer is yes. You just need to know what you’re doing and why you’re doing it.

Mental framework, hungry stomach

Why does anyone go to a convenience store in the first place? Well duh, maybe because it’s convenient. That’s why they took in a half trillion dollars in sales in 2006.

Even I, a fitness trainer and nutrition writer, visit convenience stores two or three times a month. Sometimes a guy’s gotta eat, and sometimes a guy is nowhere near his kitchen with cupboards chock-filled with wholesome good food. I need a snack to tide me over.

And that’s the key word: snack. Snacking can be good for you. Snacks that are slow to digest help modulate blood sugar, reducing the highs and lows in energy that might happen otherwise. A well-timed healthier snack should reduce your appetite enough so that you don’t eat something nutritionally abominable.

Which are the foods that constitute a good snack? Look for the following:

Degree of processing: A fresh apple is the picture of unprocessed food (once you remove the annoying little sticker and scrub off the wax coating). Apple juice, on the other hand, is extremely processed, with all fiber removed leaving only the apple sugars and some color remaining. Peanuts and most other nuts are unprocessed, while peanut butter is more processed. However, peanut butter still contains all edible parts of the plant, including beneficial fibers. Whole grain breads and crackers are baked, but all parts of the grain are not processed out of the product.

Fiber: Actually, fiber is a subset of the processing question. Fiber is good not just because fiber is in itself beneficial (it is in spades), but because fiber generally connotes other good nutrients in the food. Fruit, fruit drinks containing pulp, vegetables and whole grains are high in fiber and nutrients, including antioxidants and other phytochemicals that are believed to impart health benefits. A super soft, crazy-creamy Twinkie is the anti-fiber; somewhere in its past were grains, corn and soybeans, but processing left the sweet and soft parts, while the fibrous parts went somewhere else.

Holding power (protein, good fats and fiber): You want your snack to tide you over until you find yourself able to eat a self-respecting meal. Processed carbohydrates don’t hold: that Twinkie (or cola, or potato chip, or Mars Bar) will shoot right into your bloodstream, giving you an initial burst of energy followed by a crash-inducing surge of insulin, assuming your pancreas is in working order). Protein, fiber and good fats take longer to digest, therefore the release of energy is amortized across hours instead of minutes. A good fat, by the way, is one that comes from something that doesn’t have feet (fish and plants, not pigs or cows). Fats with the words “hydrogenated” next to them should be off your list too – those are transfats, the kind that clog up your arteries like SUVs on urban highways.

To summarize: convenience stores are places for snacks, not meals, and those snacks are best comprised of unprocessed proteins, fiber and good fats.

The short shopping list

The best news on c-store nutrition is that major companies are waking up to nutrition. Said 7-Eleven CEO Joe DePinto to the San Francisco Chronicle, "the public perception is that you go to a 7-Eleven and grab beer, cigarettes and a lottery ticket.'' The company is working to change that, encouraging their franchisees to sell bananas, sliced carrots and other produce in their stores. Other chains located near residential areas (e.g., in high rise condominium buildings) already have entire produce sections featuring various types of fruit as well as lettuce, tomatoes, onions and avocadoes.

Elsewhere in the industry, things are looking up as well. “Convenience stores have a great deal of promise for produce sales,” said Kathy Means, vice president of the Produce Marketing Association, to NPN MarketPulse, a convenience store trade publication. “There’s a lot of opportunity to market healthy produce snacks in convenience stores,” she said, emphasizing that newer technologies and distribution practices are ensuring better quality and consumer-friendly packaging, such as carrots sold in car cups.

Of course, some c-stores lack produce altogether (primarily due to limited space). Aside from produce, here are other items you can easily pick up in most convenience stores:

• Protein bars: Look for a higher protein-to-fat ratio (at least 3:1) versus “energy” bars which are predominantly high-carbohydrate (i.e., sugary) treats.
• Nuts: Almonds, walnuts, peanuts.
• Peanut butter: Just try to avoid those that are hydrogenated in order to avoid transfats.
• Fruit chips in re-sealable pouches. Note: dried fruit have a higher concentration of sugar/calories due to the removal of water, so eat with restraint. For example, a cup of grapes at only 60 calories will fill you up faster than a handful of raisins at twice that calorie count. Still, the nutrients and fiber are present in dried versions.
• Hardboiled eggs – yes, there are some saturated fats in these (chicken still have feet), but only about 5 grams; combined with its 6.3 grams of protein, it should hold you well.
• Beef jerky – High in protein and salt, almost no fat.
• Oatmeal packets – If you can get hot water, you can make a cholesterol-reducing snack.
• Protein drinks – Check the ingredients and nutrition label for relative sugar and fat content.
• Vegetable drinks (tend to be higher in sodium, in case that is an issue to you).
• Whole grain crackers or breads (but avoid hydrogenated oils, excess salt or sugar).

Noticeably absent from this list: high-sugar sports drinks. If you’re about to run eight or more miles on a hot day, go ahead and quaff one back. But check the ingredients. Sugar is a major component of these drinks – every 8 ounces have 60-80 calories – and that’s going to leave you with less energy if you’re not using it for extreme sports.

If you have to have a 64-ounce cola drink, go for the diet version. With full sugar, you otherwise take in 420 calories, which is about 20 or 25 percent of what your total daily caloric intake should be. Wouldn’t you rather have something more interesting, containing actual nutrients?

A final bit of advice: Snack marketers really do their best to play with you by offering “no fat” or “no transfat” or “no sugar added” and even “organic” to their labels. These words in themselves do not connote true health and often serve as license for consumers to overeat. Instead consider the degree of processing, the fiber content, the protein, the fat source and total calories as your guide to making the best convenience store snack choices.

Block that food porn for good!