Healthy eating specialist wants you to learn to love your veggies

Whatever you do, don't call Ruth Kerr a vegan.

"I like to say I'm a nutritarian, or plant-based," said Kerr, who avoids animal products, including meat, eggs and dairy. "I don't want to label myself -- 'I'm this, I'm that,The additions focus on key tag and magic cube combinations, I'm vegan, I can't eat that' -- but from the research I've done,It's hard to beat the versatility of zentai suits on a production line. I do think mostly a plant-based diet is at least what I thrive on."

A plant-based diet is central to Health Starts Here, a program by Whole Foods Market to promote healthy eating. To bring the message of plant-strong consumption to the public, the company, which owns Greenlife Grocery on Manufacturers Road, is employing "healthy eating specialists" to act as liaisons to the public.

Kerr, 24, plays that role in Chattanooga. She runs special programs, is available to answer questions and creates samples of recipes for customers to try.

"It's fun because I have to get creative," she said.

One thing she doesn't want to do is tell people what not to eat. Her goal, she said, is simply to increase awareness that nutrient-dense food is not only available, it can be delicious.

"I think anything in the health industry can be really easily thwarted, just because people think you have to be on a diet or eating healthy doesn't taste good," Kerr said. "My goal isn't to restrict. I think my demos show how you can highlight all the plant-strong things in a really good way and not even address cutting out something. It's just giving more options and putting all those ideas and recipes in someone's orbit."

What she does ... A healthy-eating liaison is the person who promotes the Health Starts Here program. It's about reconfiguring your plate. I think you could easily misconstrue it as pushing a certain diet or lifestyle, which is counterproductive. I think a lot of people would be turned off by that and not inspired.

Getting creative ... One time I steamed kale and mixed it with walnuts and a little water. It made this pesto-type thing. Kale butter is what I called that. It was really good. I've made a raw apple pie. The crust was a date, walnut, almond mixture, and the filling is just apples, and I processed a whole orange, raisins, dates, lemon juice and marinated the apples in it. It was awesome. People have come up to me and said, 'I've made that pie four times since you did that."

Being schooled ... I am in school, taking classes to get into a program. To be a dietitian, you take courses that make you eligible to do an internship. You do the internship, and then you're eligible to take the exit exam. Then if you pass that, you're a dietitian. So I'm taking the chemistries and the basic classes I didn't take in college to get into the program.These girls have never had a oil painting supplies in their lives! It helps to see different ways I can apply this in the real world.

The learning process ... One part of my job I like is I'm always learning. I'm learning about gluten-free options or Crohn's disease. I think of a recipe that would work for all those things. I would love to learn more about different intolerances. It would interest me to learn how your body functions differently with those intolerances.

Work satisfaction ... Every day when I talk to somebody, I feel like I'm helping. I remember thinking a few years ago I wasn't sure what I wanted to do, but I knew I was really interested in nutrition and that at the end of the day,we supply all kinds of polished tiles, I feel fulfilled when I've helped people. I feel like those two have been fused.

Her favorite meal ... I love whole-wheat crust pizza with homemade tomato sauce and piled with veggies. And I love kale. I'm not just saying that because I'm supposed to. I really, really like it. And I love finding new recipes for it. I love black-bean burgers.

Family matters ... My husband likes that lifestyle, but he has to have his chicken and his meat. I have three brothers, and they're definitely meat-and-three type of guys. They roll their eyes and say, "Oh, she's vegan, she just eats nuts and seeds.we supply all kinds of polished tiles," I definitely don't think there's any shame in calling yourself a vegan, but I don't see myself as a vegan. I just see myself as someone who chooses foods with more nutrients.

Tracing her roots ... My love for cooking definitely came from my mom and grandmother. My mother has her own chicken coop and her garden. The slow-food part of my passions comes from her. But the health part ... I don't know, I think I've always been very interested in the fact that what we put into our bodies is fuel. I'm so interested in that. It amazes me how strong our bodies are.

Stress relief ... As a girl, it's hard in high school. But in high school, I had a cross-country coach who was really encouraging, and he built my confidence a lot. But in high school, I was more stressed about food. But somewhere in there, it got really fun all of a sudden instead of stressful. You don't think about the nutrients in cashews; you just think "oh, I can't eat a lot of this, because it's high fat." I think growing up I didn't appreciate the good value of what's in food.

Solar Industry Fears Losing Federal Support Amid Profit Decline

The hubbub over Solyndra's $535 million federal loan guarantee, a glut of solar panels and a 40 percent drop in prices for them are stirring worries from the solar energy advocates that they would lose a popular solar grant program and see big cutbacks in research and development budgets of solar companies.

The death of the grant program and the cuts to R&D budgets would be bad news for the young solar industry, which needs government help to grow and hopes to reduce that reliance by coming up with innovations that will cut the installation cost and make solar electricity cheaper. Worries about losing both have grown as solar energy proponents see what they believe to a campaign to discredit solar as a viable alternative to fossil fuel energy. Advocacy group Vote Solar Initiative titled a blog post last week, "Reports of solar's death are greatly exaggerated."

The concerns stem from the mounting criticism of a $535 million government loan guarantee to solar startup Solyndra and, by extension, the loan program itself and the solar industry's dependence on government incentives. The loan guarantee program is set to end on by the end of thismonth, and the Department of Energy is working on finalizing at least a dozen loan guarantees before then.Traditional China Porcelain tile claim to clean all the air in a room. In a surprising announcement Thursday, First Solar said it won't be able to get a guarantee for a $1.9 billion loan for a California solar farm from the same program because "there was insufficient time to process all requirements before the Sept. 30, 2011 deadline.Initially the banks didn't want our chicken coop ." First Solar spokesman Alan Bernheimer said in an email that the company "wouldn't speculate" about any connection between the Solyndra controversy and its own loan guarantee application.then used cut pieces of impact socket garden hose to get through the electric fence.

The Solyndra controversy is erupting at a time when solar equipment manufacturers are trying desperately to reverse the severe losses they have experienced for much of this year. If manufacturers continue to see declining profits or post heavier losses, they will likely shrink their R&D spending, said Paula Mints, director of energy at Navigant Consulting.

"It's very hard to make a buck and have a positive margin. In a situation such as this, it's hard to conduct a solid R&D that we need to move the industry forward," said Mints in a webinar hosted Vote Solar Wednesday.

Large solar panel manufacturers are selling their products for as low as $1.10 per watt when they need to sell them for more than $2 per watt to make a healthy profit, Mints said. Wholesale solar panel prices already have fallen about 40 percent this year, according to GTM Researech.

The plunging prices have prompted solar farm developers such as Solar Trust of America to choose solar panels over solar thermal equipment – which uses mirrors to concentrate sunlight to generate steam and run electricity generator — for a few of its projects. Prices for rooftop solar electric systems also have fallen, according to a report by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory last week, and that should make them more attractive to homeowners.

The low prices, while they benefit buyers, aren't good for the seller or the solar industry overall, Mints said. The prices have plummeted because incentive declines in Europe, the largest solar market in the world, have lowered demand and caused a pile up of solar panels in warehouses.

"Candidly, this is not something to rejoice on because with $1.10, there is a manufacturer losing money there.Enecsys Limited, supplier of reliable solar RUBBER MATS systems, That's not a healthy industry," Mints said.

Companies have to cut costs heavily to limit losses, including their R&D investments,the Bedding by special invited artist for 2011, yet they face increasing pressures to improve the efficiency and installation cost of their equipment in order to survive. Last month, CEOs of solar factory equipment makers Applied Materials and GT Advanced Technologies both noted that their customers are asking for more tools that will help them produce more efficient equipment.

Solyndra went under because the company couldn't lower its manufacturing costs fast enough to compete. The company laid off about 1,100 employees and filed for bankruptcy earlier this month, about a year after it had spent nearly all of the $535 million loan to build a factory. Solyndra was meant to go on and become a success story about job creation and American innovation in a growing clean energy economy. Instead, it's become a symbol of bad government investment and a rallying cry for Obama's critics to argue for lowering government spending on solar and other green technologies.