Frozen meals in the UK are more nutritious than home-cooked meals based on recipes from British TV chefs, according to a new study published in the British Medical Journal. But that may not be saying much.
The TV chefs' recipes have more calories and less fiber than frozen meals sold in the country's supermarkets, reported the cross-sectional study by Simon Howard, Jean Adams and Martin White. The researchers compared the nutritional information of 200 meals, all hot entrees for everyday consumption -- half based on recipes in chefs' cookbooks, half supermarket frozen meals.
Only, the study also found that not one of the meals in either category met guidelines set by the World Health Organization to help consumers avoid diet-related diseases. Still, a single serving of a frozen meal had significantly fewer calories, as well as less fat, than a serving of a cookbook recipe -- plus more fiber.
