I Had Fried Pickles Once And They Were Awesome
Mississippi has been ranked the fattest state in the nation. It’s interesting to see how this news gets reported when the journalist is trying to be “colorful.” For instance, tThe Meadow Free Press says:
Mississippians need to skip the gravy, say no to the fried pickles and start taking brisk walks to fight an epidemic of obesity, experts say. According to a new study, this Deep South state is the fattest in the nation…”We‘ve got a long way to go. We love fried chicken and fried anything and all the grease and fatback we can get in Mississippi,” said Democratic state Rep. Steve Holland, chairman of the Public Health Committee.
People from Colorado, by the way, are the leanest. Here are the state-by-state rankings. If you’re an American, where does your state rank?
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Fried pickles are delicious.
the state where i was born and lived most of my life, kentucky, is #7. which is really not surprising, considering the poverty and illiteracy rates of the state and how those correlate to obesity.
ohio, where i currently live, is #15. the funny thing is, i gained way more weight when i moved to ohio and started working a desk job. ohio has pretty much sucked the life out of me.
also, did anyone notice how the headline and first paragraph on that site are completely wrong based on the statistics at the bottom?
“Colorado Adults 51st Most Obese in Country; Youth 49th Most Overweight”
am i just reading this wrong? it is going to be a long day in the office.
I’ve had fried pickles multiple times and yes they are very delicious.
My beloved Kentucky, as previously mentioned, is number 7 on the list.
I’m from Wisconsin, #22. Not bad, given all the cheese, sausage, and beer we’re so well-known for.
I’m surprised Colorado ranked leanest. I just moved here from Arizona (#43), and people here look a lot more healthy than they did there, especially the women. (Scottsdale seems to be populated entirely by matchsticks with blonde heads. Yes, always blonde.)
I live in Mississippi, although I’m not from here. Be forewarned, I’m about to venture into the massive generalization category, so I hope I don’t offend anyone.
Contributing factors: the climate–in my experience, summer lasts from April to November, and a MS summer is an exercise in PAIN. I actually grew up in central south FL, and can tell you that FL heat has nothing on MS heat. In the worst of it, like this August, all you want to do is just lay around and do absolutely nothing. I know it gets bad in other places, too–but until you’ve experienced summer in central Mississippi–oooh! It’s a revelation.
Cultural foodways: food preparation technicques are definitely on the unhealthy side of the scale. Fried everything is a staple. Most of the nutrients seem to get overcooked out of stuff. Gravy or cream sauces abound. Fresh ingredients are expensive and variety is not so easy to come by. We don’t have a lot of the gourmet/speciality/good quality grocery stores (like Whole Foods or Trader Joes or even Publix) that other states have, and it does seem like what fresh whole foods we can get are expensive.
The article referenced poverty as a contributing factor to obesity, and I’d say that certainly plays a role here–I think it’s the poorest state (?). The cost of groceries isn’t helped by the fact that our Governor has refused to consider reducing the state sales tax on food in exchange for a sales increase on cigarettes, despite widespread support.
I’ve definitely gained weight since I’ve been here:-(
I notice that the “Trust For America’s Health”* considers my eating habits a threat to the future of this nation on a par with pandemic flu, bioterrorism, and natural disasters.
I guess that puts me neatly in MY place.
*whatever!
I find it interesting that Utah, where I live, has the lowest rate of ‘overweight’ children and is pretty low on the scale of overweight citizens period.
Couldn’t have anything to do with the genetic homozigenation in the state, could it?
(For those of you that don’t live in Utah, it really isn’t uncommon for people, particularly those coming from old pioneer families, to be related to many, many other people in the state.)
Alabama, my home state and the place I’ve lived most of my life, is #3. I agree with the other posters who mentioned poverty as a big factor. If you looked at a list of the poorest states, it would pretty much mirror this list. Generalization alert: Not only are fresh foods not available at specialty stores, lower income people often don’t buy them at the regular grocery store because of cost. As a matter of economics, they’re more likely to spend $4 to feed their whole family dinner off the McDonald’s value menu than spend $4 on five apples. I think the key is making fresh, healthy food more available and less expensive.
I also think you’re correct, G.G., about the way Southerners generally prepare food as being to blame. Old Southern ladies will not hesitate to turn something healthy (i.e. a vegetable, an apple, etc.) into a “fritter” or to fry stuff like tomatoes or pickles.
I now live in DC, which is #1 for children. Again, poverty is a huge factor. Many of the children who live in the District proper (not the kids of government workers who live in the suburbs, etc.) live in poverty.
New Jersey represent! Coming in at #40, tied with D.C. I really am surprised, though I’m not sure why. Perhaps it’s because NJ gets such a bad rap in every other way, I figured we’d be on top of the BIG BAD OBESITY EPIDEMIC list as well.
But in more important news–because I do have priorities here–someone tell me more about these fried pickles. Are they battered? Are they…hot? I’m not sure how I feel about hot pickles. I’m imagining that dill is the standard frying pickle, but do you think it would be possible with bread & butter chips, since they’re my favorite?
ev,
Fried pickles are hot, batter fried, and GOOD! Bread and butter chips would be awesome if they were deep fried, I’m sure. The ones I had were slices. Be warned, they are quite addictive. :D
Connecticut’s #47, which is pretty darn good. You wouldn’t know it to go out and look at people, though… I feel like these studies have got to be flawed, anyway, because how can you possibly gather enough data for these numbers to really mean something?
I had fried pickles a couple of months ago and expected them to be better than they were. Kind of disapointed really, I mean, it’s pickles and they’re fried! This seemed like a totally winning combo. They were just okay. Maybe I should try them somewhere else.
Oh and I’m from New Jersey, I thought we Jerseyites were fatter than No. 40.
Hmm… Virginia (the state I just left) is #23 (with PA), Washington (the state in which I just arrived) is #31 (with neighboring ID). Here’s hoping I can skew Washington’s numbers just a bit. ;)
Incidentally, I almost revised my plans a couple of years ago when Seattle was named the most physically-fit city in the nation. Who needs that kind of pressure?
Big 3-0! I notice, however that Oregon has experienced a significant increase this year, which I lay, of course, entirely to my account.
:-)
I’m curious to know how accurate this could possibly be. I haven’t allowed anyone to weigh me for quite some time. Going back to check on where their data came from.
the article about this that i read [in Cleveland’s Plain Dealer], was similar in the “put down the glazed down and go for a walk!” stance. i pointed out each annoying point as i read, until my mother left the kitchen and refused to listen to me til i calmed down :P
i actually live in NYC right now, and NY is 38.
Maybe I’m missing the source. Did they just do a survey, and ask people their weights, or what?
Also love the title of the report “F as in Fat.”
I was born in WA, lived there a year and a half, spent 3 1/2 years in England, back to WA for 2 years, then Illinois for 11 years, WA for 4 years, Illinois for 17 years, and now MN for the last 14 years. So I’ve lived in states ranked 31st (WA), 25th (IL) and 28th (MN).
This is just so much crap:
Excuse me, we’re all going to die someday, thin or fat. So I think, while I’m on that journey, I’m going to enjoy my life and not restrict the hell out of what I eat or exercise till there’s nothing left of me.
I live in Alabama, where we are #3.
I’m from Montgomery, to be exact, and we just got a string of Publixs (Publices?) in the city within the past couple of years. We don’t have a Whole Foods or Trader Joes’ or anything like that here.
I was raised on southern food, from fried pork chops/chicken/steak to homemade biscuits (my dad’s are OUT OF THIS WORLD) to grits to gravy to you name it, I’ve had it. (Though I think collards/turnip greens, black-eyed peas, and fried okra are disgusting.)
And I’m with the commenter from MS. Alabama’s summers are UNBEARABLY hot and humid, especially this year. The first 3 weeks of August, our high temps were over 100 every day with the heat index over 105. It barely rained all summer. I usually walk on my lunch breaks, but it’s just been too hot. That’ll start up again in a few weeks when fall finally decides to arrive.
Grew up in CT (#47), Massachusetts (#50), and now I live in Colorado (#51).
If I had to guess, I’d say the first two scores are largely socioeconomic (even though NJ is now richer than CT, everyone who grew up in the tri-state area knows that the same people just don’t choose NJ that choose CT- that’s the ‘socio’ of socioeconomic), and the last is lifestyle.
G.G., I could’ve totally written that post! Same experience. Hard to find and afford healthy food at the store or a restaurant, and my BOG it’s too frackin hot to exercise. “Let’s go walkin’ Mississippi” is a ridiculous exhortation when the heat index is over 100, which it has been for weeks now. I’ve gained about 30 lbs. in my six years here, and I moved here from *New Orleans*, which is one of the fattest cities in the nation.
I agree that poverty is one of the primary causes of obesity – you can buy a sack of pasta for a dollar and feed your family, or you can buy an apple. A crappy apple, at that.
Fried pickles? That sounds kind of weird, but in this country (UK) you can get battered Mars bars and chips (fries, that is) covered in cheese. Tasty!
I’m in Massachusetts. Like holls said, the weight issue stems mainly from economics. In parts of Roxbury and Dorchester, it is VERY hard for families to afford healthier food. In fact, (like Alabama and Mississippi) there are no health food stores in either area. I grew up in Dorchester, and my single dad could barely afford meat. I grew up on pasta, white bread, fried bologna, spam, hot dogs, canned veggies and government cheese (oddly I was a skinny kid). I can afford to be vegan thanks to my amazing job because organic produce, hell, whole food in general is pricey! I also have to say that it makes me very angry to see McDonalds’ dollar meal ads posted in my old neighborhood. Grrrrrr!!!!!
The PDF of the actual report:
http://healthyamericans.org/reports/obesity2007/Obesity2007Report.pdf
They gather data using this:
http://www.cdc.gov/brfss/
According to the methodology information, this is random phone surveys, so data is based, for adults, on self-reporting of height and weight, with BMI formula applied to the data. The standards of BMI greater than 30 defined as obese, BMI from 25-30 defined as overweight were used.
I grew up in Illinois (#25, tied with Maryland) and moved to Georgia when i was 19 (#14). For several years, i have been one winning lottery ticket away from moving to Texas (#12), where most of my friends live.
I think the climate certainly plays a factor: i do not have any air conditioning in my car or my house, and with the heat wave we’ve had this year? About all i’m up for in this heat is laying in a tub of cold water, reading a book.
When i was growing up in Chicago, it was more bike and pedestrian-friendly than Atlanta is. It was not uncommon for me to walk home from school or ride my bike both ways (and it was eight miles, one way). I didn’t learn to drive until after i’d already moved south – i never needed to know when i was in Chicago. Many parts of Atlanta (and it’s gazillion suburbs) completely lack sidewalks, and the people all drive like bats out of hell.
I think there are honestly too many factors to pin it down to a mere dozen. I could sit here all day listing several differences between my experiences in Chicago and Atlanta, and most of them have nothing to do with food. Heh.
In California (36) where i reside, there is a terrible divide between the emaciated and overpaid celebs and socialites, as well as the upper middle class smug vegans in northern california, and the poor (a lot of whom are immigrants) in most of southern california in terms of their health and appearance. To me this indicates that obesity is most definately a social problem and it is no coincidence that obese people are stereotyped as being less educated and more ignorant than thin counterparts.
However, i have a problem with the concept that a relatively thin person feels socially pressured to lose weight because of poor self image combined with unrealistic expectations is put in the same category of outrage as telling someone not to eat fried pickles every day. If your eating habits are the source of your obesity, you are not doing yourself any favors and continuing to do so will not contribute to your overall health. even if you believe obesity itself is not connected to health, there can be no arguing that eating a certain way and engaging in physical activity results in a variety of benefits.
I grew up in Las Vegas and Nevada is ranked #37 but for the past 2 years have been living in Oregon which is #30.
I’m in Florida right now, I was originally from Maryland. It says that Florida is 34th. And I remember the 48pt extra bold headline from the Sentinel that day. “FLORIDA IS FAT, BUT OTHERS ARE FATTER.” I didn’t want to read the whole thing, but judging from that, the subheading probably said, “At least we’re not those stupid slobs over there.”
Also…. frying things. I feel like some kind of fatty traitor for thinking most fried foods are disgusting. Things like poutine make my stomach turn. @_@
ho_cho = What about thin people who can eat whatever they want and not gain weight? Would you cast the same self-righteous comments at them too? Health and weight do not have a strict correlation, honey.