siness

Grocery-store tour
focuses on nutrition.

STEVE STEIN STAFF WRITER

Registered dietitian Gail Posner talks to the women on her tour.

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magine eating your way through a grocery store, stopping every few
minutes to sample what's on the shelves. Sounds like fun, doesn't it?
It is. But registered dietitian Gail Posner's 90-minute nutrition
tours at Shopping Center Market have a serious undertone.
Her goal is to teach the "tourists" how to read the new food la-
bels and find products which are low in calories and cholesterol and
high in fiber and nutritional content.
During a recent tour at the Shopping Center Market on Maple
and Orchard Lake roads in West Bloomfield, a group of nine women
heard an introductory lecture from Ms. Posner and tasted some
cheeses, margarine and crackers in the lobby before entering the
store.
Once inside, they made several stops as curious shoppers looked
on. If the women wanted to taste a product, they tasted it and the
opened package was placed into a shopping cart.
Some foods received rave reviews; others were given a unanimous
thumb's down. Most were greeted with mixed reactions.
"That's normal," Ms. Posner said. "As long as someone likes a prod-
uct, it's going to be available."
Besides the cheeses, the women tasted items like Nabisco Snack-
Wells crackers and Manischewitz bagel pretzels.
Shopping Center's fat-free muffins didn't go over well, but Peter
Pan Smart Choice peanut butter on carrots passed everyone's taste
test. Carrots also were used to try out salad dressings.
One woman asked about the calorie content of bagels. Ms. Posner
told her they are about 80 calories per ounce. Since most bagels in

the Detroit area are three ounces, Ms. Posner said, bagels are a 240-
calorie item.
Is halvah fattening? Yes, was Ms. Posner's quick answer. But Em-
pire turkey breast was given the OK for dieters.
Ms. Posner recommended this salad dressing: A tablespoon of
vinegar, one-quarter teaspoon of mustard and one-eighth of a pack-
age of artificial sweetener.
Looking for a way to spice up low-fat mayonnaise? Try mustard,
pepper or lemon juice, Ms. Posner said.
The tour ended with a stop at the frozen-food section, where the
women tried frozen yogurt and fruit snack bars.
This is the eighth year that Ms. Posner has conducted the grocery
store tours, and they've all been held at Shopping Center, where
she's worked out arrangements with owner Sid Hiller. She does
groups of tours an average of four times a year.
Mostly women take the tour, but more and more men are show-
ing up, just like in her nine-year-old West Bloomfield-based prac-
tice.
"The market is a wonderful place to teach," Ms. Posner said. "It's
more fun and exciting than sitting in a room. Shopping Center works
out well for me because it has a marvelous selection of products."
Julie Levinson of Farmington Hills, a client of Ms. Posner who
took the tour about a year ago, says she found it to be quite valuable
because she does the shopping and cooking for her husband, Jay,
and children Ilana, 11, and David, 8.
"I thought I knew how to read food labels, but now I really know
how to read them," Ms. Levinson said. "Until I took the tour, I was
walking right past several items I should have been considering.
"And I now know that a food which has no fat can still have calo-
ries."
Ms. Levinson says Ms. Posner keeps up with new products which
are offered by Shopping Center, often displaying the labels in her of-
fice. ❑
23' Ms. Posner will conduct grocery-store nutrition tours at 7:30 p.m.
Tuesday, March 28, and 9:30 a.m. and 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, March
29, at the Shopping Center Market in West Bloomfield. The cost is
$15. For reservations, call (810) 855-4558.

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