New food composition data on selected ethnic foods consumed in Europe

Abstract

Background: Reliable data on the composition of foods is needed to better understand individual diets, measure nutrient intakes and provide nutritional guidance for improving the health of the populations. Ethnic foods are becoming increasingly popular among all European consumers, and are the main source of nutrients in the diets of ethnic groups. However, there is limited information on the nutrient composition of ethnic foods in Europe. The objective of this study therefore was to generate new and reliable data on ethnic foods using harmonised methods for chemical analyses. Methods: New data on 128 ethnic foods were generated for inclusion in the national databases within the European Food Information Resource Network of Excellence through participants from France, Israel, Spain, Denmark, Italy, The Netherlands, Belgium and the United Kingdom. In each selected country, the list of prioritised foods and key nutrients, methods of analyses and quality assurance procedure were harmonised. Results: This paper presents the nutrient composition of 40 ethnic foods consumed in Europe. The nutrient composition of the foods varied widely because of the nature and variety of foods analysed, with energy content (kcal) ranging between 24 (biteku-teku, Blegium) and 495 (nachos, Italy) per 100 g of edible food. Polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fatty acids were generally higher in most ethnic foods consumed in Italy and Spain compared with ethnic foods of other countries. Conclusions: The new data were scrutinised and fully documented for inclusion in the national food composition databases. The data will aid effective diet and disease interventions, and enhance the provision of dietary advice, in all European consumers.

Consumers' attitudes towards ethnic food consumption

“…Thanks to the growing interest in ethnic food, the supply of ethnic food has been increasing throughout Europe over the past 30 years (Khokhar et al, 2010). The trend of ethnic food consumption is also recorded in America.…”

“…Furthermore, Verbeke and Poquiviqui López (2005) have established that Latino Americans living in Belgium believe that Belgian food is delicious, safe and available, while on the other hand, Belgians regard Latin American food as tasty, practical and spicy. In addition, the popularity of ethnic food has led to the research of the nutritional value of the most frequently consumed ethnic food in Europe, precisely because of their contribution to total nutrition intake (Khokhar et al, 2010;Khokhar et al, 2012).…”

Implementing the EuroFIR Document and Data Repositories as accessible resources of food composition information

“…This approach has been used to provide access to the documents and information resulting from the EuroFIR work on ethnic foods that analysed 5 Surinamese foods consumed in the Netherlands (Khokhar et al, 2010). A webpage 3 summarising the reported information and providing links to the individual analytical reports was added to the EuroFIR Document Repository site.…”

Mineral composition of commonly consumed ethnic foods in Europe

“…The most popular ethnic cuisines in European countries were identified as South Asian (for the UK), North African (France and Italy), Turkish and Pakistani (Denmark), Congolese (Belgium), Romanian (Italy), Mediterranean and Ethiopian (Israel), Latin American (Spain and Italy), Surinamese (The Netherlands) and Asian (Italy and Spain). The macronutrient composition of these foods has already been published (15). …”

“… 2 Modified ethnic food: ‘A commercially-modified version of food as prepared in an immigrant country to suit the taste and preference of host country’ (15). …”