Few topics occupy people and the media as much as nutrition. The amount of information, some of which is contradictory, is large and makes it difficult to understand. Dietary recommendations often seem complicated and unsuitable for everyday use. The nutrition pyramid of the Federal Center for Nutrition can be a useful tool for implementing a balanced and tasty diet with ease and fun in everyday life and can shed light on the darkness without confusing. Scientifically based recommendations have been translated into clearly understandable building blocks that provide good guidance and a framework for daily food choices.
A healthy and balanced diet includes fruit, vegetables, pulses and cereal products such as pasta. The German Nutrition Society (DGE) recommends a predominantly plant-based diet. The diet should be supplemented with animal products such as milk, fish, meat and eggs or vegetable protein sources such as tofu or tempeh as well as nuts, seeds, high-quality oils and fats. Pasta makes you happy and is part of a balanced and healthy diet!
Pasta does not make you fat. They contain hardly any fat and only a few calories. In fact, pasta is one of the foods recommended by nutrition experts. In the food pyramid, they are on the second level as a cereal product. Products from this stage should be consumed several times a day.
Pasta has a high carbohydrate content and is therefore a perfect source of energy. They also provide vitamins and minerals. Pasta is therefore ideal for a healthy diet. As pasta is extremely low in fat, it can be combined very well with other valuable sources of nutrients. They go equally well with vegetables, fish and seafood or with meat, eggs and dairy products such as cheese.
Pasta with egg has a fat content of less than three percent. Egg noodles are therefore a “lean” food. They contain minerals such as phosphorus and iron. 100 grams of egg noodles (uncooked) contain 190 mg of phosphorus and 2.2 mg of iron, which corresponds to around 27 and 15 percent of the daily requirement respectively.
Pasta consists of 70 percent carbohydrates. These are complex carbohydrates in the form of starch. They are slowly utilized by the body and thus form an energy supply that can be constantly drawn upon. This increases performance and provides energy for body and mind. Pasta gives you energy not only for sport or hard work. Even if you sit at a desk and work with your head, you need carbohydrates. After all, the brain needs energy to function. For this reason, a sufficient intake of carbohydrates is equally important for physical and mental performance.
Carbohydrates are the most important fuel in the human body. Because pasta has a high carbohydrate content, it is at the top of every athlete’s diet. Humans store energy from carbohydrates in the form of glycogen in the muscles and liver. It is called up when required and helps to increase stamina. For athletes, it is important that energy from glycogen, i.e. from carbohydrates, is provided four times faster than by burning fat. The body also uses less oxygen. This means that people can perform better under great stress if they can draw their energy from carbohydrate stores. The problem: our carbohydrate stores are limited! However, they can be expanded and endurance athletes in particular take advantage of this: If they eat plenty of carbohydrates after an intensive endurance training session in which they have completely emptied their stores, their muscles can store more glycogen than before. This explains why cyclists, for example, cannot eat enough pasta on grueling tours. Endurance sports and pasta belong together!
