To receive our monthly newsletter in your email inbox, please click “join email list” at the top right corner or click here.
Better Bowls Newsletter
News from Better Bowls: May 2011
May 26th, 2011Eat Healthy, Save on Gas
May 13th, 2011
Better Bowls is participating in the Giant Food Stores Extra Gas Rewards Program during the week of 5/22/2011. Purchase any of our products at a participating Giant Food Store and receive extra points toward gas for your vehicle.
For more information on Better Bowls, please visit our website @ http://www.betterbowls.com/
To find a Giant Food Store near you, please visit their website @ http://www.giantfoodstores.com/
Help us Raise Money for Diabetes Research by “Liking” our Better Bowls Facebook Page
November 16th, 2010In honor of National Diabetes Awareness Month, we’re going to donate 10 cents for each new “like” we get on our Better Bowls Facebook page this month towards Diabetes Research.
Help encourage others to “like” us, and we will donate 10 cents for each new “like” up to $500 this month towards researching efforts on finding a cure for Diabetes.
There are 23.6 million people in the United States, or 8% of the population, who have diabetes.
Hershey, Pennyslvania Firm Better Bowls, Makes Healthy Gelatins and Puddings
October 27th, 2010Malathy Nair had a personal reason for starting her own business.
“A couple years ago, my mom had a heart attack,” Nair said last week. “She was at Hershey Medical Center in intensive care. The dieticians gave her a low-sodium diet and told her she needed fiber and calcium. … When you have an issue like that, your whole life changes.”
Although puddings and gelatins became part of Nair’s mother’s diet, Nair said she found it “alarming” when she read the labels and found out how much sodium was contained in many products.
With 17 years of experience in the food industry, Nair was hardly a novice. She spent time in General Mills’ cereal group and in the Yoplait group, and about eight years as a nutritionist with Hershey Foods, where she worked on the health benefits of cocoa.
She opened a lab/office for her company, Better Bowls, in the Hershey Center for Applied Research with a goal of producing gelatins and pudding “that are great tasting and make it a little bit better for you.”
Better Bowls’ strawberry gelatin, for example, has 3 percent of the daily value of sodium, compared to 20 percent for competitors’. It contains no fat or cholesterol and 20 percent of the recommended daily amount of dietary fiber.
“Our target market is baby boomers,” said Nair, who has a Ph.D. in food science from Rutgers University. “Fifty percent are dealing with obesity, high blood pressure or diabetes. They’re looking for better ways to snack.”
Malathy Nair had a personal reason for starting her own business.”A couple years ago, my mom had a heart attack,” Nair said last week. “She was at Hershey Medical Center in intensive care. The dieticians gave her a low-sodium diet and told her she needed fiber and calcium. … When you have an issue like that, your whole life changes.”
Although puddings and gelatins became part of Nair’s mother’s diet, Nair said she found it “alarming” when she read the labels and found out how much sodium was contained in many products.
With 17 years of experience in the food industry, Nair was hardly a novice. She spent time in General Mills’ cereal group and in the Yoplait group, and about eight years as a nutritionist with Hershey Foods, where she worked on the health benefits of cocoa.
She opened a lab/office for her company, Better Bowls, in the Hershey Center for Applied Research with a goal of producing gelatins and pudding “that are great tasting and make it a little bit better for you.”
Better Bowls’ strawberry gelatin, for example, has 3 percent of the daily value of sodium, compared to 20 percent for competitors’. It contains no fat or cholesterol and 20 percent of the recommended daily amount of dietary fiber.
“Our target market is baby boomers,” said Nair, who has a Ph.D. in food science from Rutgers University. “Fifty percent are dealing with obesity, high blood pressure or diabetes. They’re looking for better ways to snack.”
The strawberry and orange gelatins and chocolate and vanilla instant puddings are gluten-free, with natural colors and flavoring.
“We really tried to combine natural health and taste elements,” Nair said.
Better Bowls’ products come in four-serving pouches and are available at 350 Giant and Weis stores throughout Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Maryland, as well as at some central Pennsylvania Walmarts. The serving sizes were chosen based on feedback from focus groups in a research study at the Hershey Medical Center.
“There needed to be healthier products in this category,” Nair said. “I knew we could make it.”
Thanks to LDNews.com for writing this article.
For more information, visit our website www.betterbowls.com.
Nestle S.A. to Pioneer a New Industry between Food and Pharma
October 27th, 2010Just read a great article about how Nestle S.A. announced recently that they plan on embarking a sweeping global initiative to “pioneer a new industry between food and pharma.” For Nestle, the world’s largest food/beverage company, this is quite an aggressive step, and it may create future shock waves for food and beverage marketers as well as ingredient manufacturers as they have to focus their efforts on the functional foods market.
From the article: “With prevention in mind, Nestle is intending to enter the health care category by offering food and beverage products designed to prevent chronic conditions such as diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Chronic diseases account for 60% of all deaths, the company said.”
“Taking everything into consideration, it becomes apparent that our actual health care system, which concentrates basically on treating sick people, is not sustainable and will have to be redesigned drastically,” said Peter Brabeck-Letmathe, chairman of the board for Nestle. “It is our strong conviction that disease prevention will have to play a much bigger role and, in this sense, personalized health care nutrition will become the first and most efficient step in an active prevention policy and for wellness and wellbeing.”
I applaud Nestle for taking such a bold step to develop foods to prevent and treat chronic diseases. I firmly believe that functional foods have a big role to play in the coming years as obesity continues to rise and chronic diseases are exploding at alarming rates. The focus on prevention and management is very critical. For example, if an individual has high cholesterol or high blood pressure or diabetes or has recently suffered from heart attack or other cardiovascular diseases, lifestyle changes are important and food choices play an important role.
Even if foods are not overly fortified, functional foods could simply be better choices in terms of ingredients, adding more of the good stuff…such as fiber, protein, necessary vitamins, minerals and less of the bad stuff…less fat, less saturated fat, lower sodium.
Better Bowls with its regional North East launch of heart healthy puddings and gelatin mixes leads the way in the functional foods area in the instant puddings and gelatin mix category. Fiber One snack bars and Tropicana heart healthy orange juice are other examples of what I consider national brands functional foods in the bar and juice category.
– Malathy Nair – Ph.D.
Read the entire article about Nestle’s new approach on the FoodBusinessNews.net.
Diet and Dieting are Appearing Less on the Packaging of Weight Control Products
October 25th, 2010Just read a great article on Food Business News Net called “Diet claims fade as marketing tools“. The article discusses how people are now looking at eating smaller portions and being sensible, rather than focusing on marketing terms such as “diet” and “dieting” on weight control packages.
“Today’s consumer is really looking at ways to control eating for weight management but the words ‘diet’ appears less on the package. It is all about portion control, according to a recent suvey by Data Monitor. The big trend is around satiety, products that help keep consumers feel full and not eat as much. Products high in protein and fiber can certainly help with feeling full. In addition, 74% of consumers also look at calories. Better Bowls has recognized this trend and created products that fit the consumer needs.
Better Bowls has created great tasting, high protein, high fiber, instant puddings and gelatins in both regular and sugar-free varieties that are perfect filling snacks or minimeals or desserts. These products are natural and gluten – free as well.
We have used the right protein blend to maximize the satiety effect and added fiber in our puddings to help with weight management. The gelatins contain 5 grams of added fiber as well. The front of the package calls out the calories, protein and fiber. Try them out and provide your comments.
The World of Functional Foods
October 17th, 2010With health care costs on the rise and the increasing number of baby boomers, the focus on health and nutritional value of foods has never been greater. While it is always better to eat natural and eat as much fruits and vegetables as possible, sometimes, processed foods help to supplement deficiencies in the diet. That is exactly where functional foods fit it. Whether they are fortified with more protein or fiber, or they have more vitamins and minerals, or they have added omega-3s or sterols for heart health, or added probiotics for digestive health, the food industry in the last two years has made tremendous progress and is working hard to bring more of such functional foods into the market.
Since I am a part of the food industry, I have access to a lot of information on new ingredients and new, functional foods introduced in the market.
Having founded Better Bowls which is a functional foods company selling heart healthy puddings and gelatin mixes, I am always interested in finding out what’s new and healthy among different food categories that you can buy at your local grocery store and will provide routine updates. I would love to hear from you as well.
Thank You and looking forward to interesting discussions !
Dr. M.Nair, Founder
Better Bowls