Minimum-cost palatable diet: A pilot study

Leung, PingSun; Miklius, Walter; Wanitprapha, Kulavit; Garrod, Peter; Johnson, Nancy E.

doi:10.1016/0308-521x(92)90070-5

Cited by 5 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 12 publications

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“…Leung, et al (1992) provided an alternative in estimating the minimum cost diets by optimizing over popular recipes. The recipes were assumed to reflect the available technologies for converting food items into meals.…”

Section: Using 'Feasible' Minimum Cost Dietmentioning

confidence: 99%

Demand for nutrition vs. demand for tastes

Leung¹,

Miklius

1997

Applied Economics Letters

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This paper extends the analyses by Silberberg (1985) of the relationship between the expenditures for food to satisfy nutritional requirements and the expenditures to satisfy the desire for tastes using alternative estimates of the minimum cost or technically efficient diet. The hypothesis originally tested by Silberberg is retested by following his procedure for estimating the minimum cost diet but using data supplied by the 1977-78 Food Consumption Survey in Hawaii. The results are roughly consistent with the hypothesis, i.e., if the lowest income group is excluded, the ratio of actual food expenditures to the minimum cost diet rises with increase in household incomes. However, an argument could be made that the procedure used by Silberberg in estimating the minimum cost or technically efficient diets did not satisfactorily separate the expenditures for nutrition from the expenditures to satisfy the demand for tastes. We, therefore, re-estimated the hypothesis with the minimum cost diet which satisfies Recommended Daily Allowances (RDAs). We find that the results again are consistent with the hypothesis but the effect of changes in income on food expenditures to satisfy tastes is relatively small. It is argued elsewhere that the technology (as embodied in available recipes) is not available to convert all nutrients contained in a typical minimum cost diet into palatable meals. Therefore, the minimum cost diet estimated by optimizing over the raw foods is not feasible and, therefore, is not an appropriate measure of how cheaply the demand for nutrition could be satisfied. We retested the Silberberg's hypothesis using the 'feasible' minimum cost diet estimated by optimizing over those bundles of foods that represent reasonably popular meal recipes. Using this procedure, it is estimated that about 60% of the food expenditures were to satisfy the demand for tastes versus about 70% obtained using Silberberg's procedure.

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Section: Using 'Feasible' Minimum Cost Dietmentioning

confidence: 99%

Demand for nutrition vs. demand for tastes

Leung¹,

Miklius

1997

Applied Economics Letters

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“…The method employed is an extension of the model of Leung et al (1992), including several time objectives in addition to minimizing total cost. The various time objectives include minimizing preparation time, waiting time, attentive cooking time, and/or inattentive cooking time.…”

Section: The Mathematical Modelmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Lancaster (1992a, b) provided a detailed account of the historical evolution of menu planning and diet models. Leung et al (1992), using a similar approach to that of Balintfy (Balintfy, 1964;Balintfy et al 1974) developed an integer programming model that uses a pool of 217 popular recipes in Hawaii to derive the minimum-cost palatable weekly menus for a family of four. The model seeks to minimize total cost while satisfying the recommended dietary allowances (RDA) established by the (US) National Research Council, Food and Nutrition Board (1989) and a predefined daily course structure.…”

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confidence: 99%

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A recipe-based, diet-planning modelling system

1995

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In a recent article in the Brifish Journal of Nutrition, Sklan & Dariel(1993) presented a method for diet planning employing a mixed-integer programming algorithm for meeting nutritional requirements at minimum costs for institutions or individuals. They recognized that most food items are generally consumed in whole units and as such they are represented as integer variables. However, as in most previous studies, they derived the minimum cost diets by optimizing over purchased food items. The present paper presents a computer-assisted, diet-planning modelling system for individuals by optimizing over recipes instead of food items. This is accomplished by restricting the integer programming solutions to those bundles of food that represent reasonably popular meal recipes. The modelling system is composed of three main components: recipe data entry, database management, and the model. The recipe data entry component creates and stores recipes. It also provides nutritional analysis of the recipes. The database management component creates and maintains several databases necessary to build the modelling data file. The modelling component solves the user-specified model. Currently, the model component can solve for the optimal diet by minimizing cost or minimizing cooking and preparation time. The optimal diet is prepared to satisfy the recommended nutritional guidelines for a predefined group of individuals for 1 week. The system currently has 895 popular recipes found in Hawaii. Diet plans generated using this modelling system with differing objectives are discussed and compared. Diet-planning model: Recipes: Minimum cost: Minimum time Minimum-cost diets have their origin in the seminal work of Nobel Laureate George Stigler (1945). Stigler (1945) formulated and provided an approximate solution to the now famous 'diet problem', which seeks the minimum cost of achieving the recommended daily allowances of nutrients known to be beneficial to humans. Since then the linear programming formulation of the classic diet problem has continued to evolve. Smith (1959), Prato (1973), Bassi (1976), Foytik (1981a and Silberberg (1985) have reestimated Stigler's (1945) original problem 'as is' or with minor changes. The common characteristic of all these studies is that they optimize over raw food materials subject to two sets of constraints. One set of constraints is used to specify the minimum nutritional requirements, and the other set is designed to raise the degree of palatability. Diets generated by these models are given in terms of raw food materials and ingredients rather than menus or recipes. Menu items are defined as mixtures of foods and ingredients, defined by recipes. While all these studies have demonstrated the surprisingly low cost of satisfying the purely nutritional needs, it remains up to the individual meal planner to construct meaningful meals from the selected raw food materials and ingredients. But in many cases there is no available technology (as represented by recipes) to convert the food materials a...

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“…To overcome this problem Leung et al (1992) estimated the minimum-cost diet by optimizing over meal recipes rather than food items. While this approach is an improvement over the previous estimation methods, several problems remain.…”

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confidence: 99%

Effect of Preparation Time on the Minimum‐Cost Diet

Leung¹,

Miklius²,

Wanitprapha³

et al. 1997

Journal of Consumer Affairs

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The implications on a minimum‐cost diet of introducing meal preparation time are explored using a multiple criteria framework. Using a bicriterion method, the tradeoff between the money cost of home‐cooked meals and the meal preparation time is empirically estimated with a set of 895 recipes popular in Hawaii. There is a clear tradeoff between cost and time in preparing home‐cooked meals, and it is found that the minimum‐cost diet is very sensitive to the meal pre‐parer's value of time.

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Minimum-cost palatable diet: A pilot study

Cited by 5 publications

References 12 publications

Demand for nutrition vs. demand for tastes

Demand for nutrition vs. demand for tastes

A recipe-based, diet-planning modelling system

Effect of Preparation Time on the Minimum‐Cost Diet

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