Food Consumption Patterns Part 2

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Annex 3: Most Nutritional Foods Free-lists
Before we get into the categories, we here review the original source we use to develop the
categories for further analysis and exploration. The first two was the freelist survey. The survey
involved interviewing 40 women and 13 men between the ages of 17 and 73 with average age of
33 years old. The questions were what are the most nutritious foods for, a) babies, b) children c)
pregnant women, d) women, and e) men. viii
Table A3-1: Respondents per category
Baby Children Pregnant Woman Man
53 47 47 45 48
The following steps were taken to simplify the data for analysis. In doing so important features of
the data became evident and must be noted here. The distinctions help describe the data and suggest
further areas of investigation in the subsequent research.
In first level analysis mixed foods were separated and the dimension of mode of preparation
such as pureed beans vs beans kole (mixed with grains) was omitted
If a mixed food was specified, such as rice and beans, or rice and vegetables, the categories
were broken down and listed as their constituent entries. Thus, rice and beans became, rice
and then beans. Spaghetti and milk became spaghetti and then milk. The only exception
was bouyon (stew), a concoction so frequently mentioned that we kept bouyon as if it were
a single food. A justification for this is that bouyon included several of the most commonly
cited foods that were listed apart from bouyon itself, therefore keeping it as a single food
type did not effect the frequency of citations for the ingredients
Smoked herring (imported) became fish
All poultry and meats were put under meat
All malt drinks, extrait de malta and guiness, were put in the single category of malta
All energy drinks were put in the single category of energy drinks
All vegetable and fruit juices were put under natural juice vs processed juice (but not the
blended starches mentioned above). The most venerated juices in terms of nutrition are
lime and passion fruit. Carrots have a very high place on the list of respected nutritional
foods and it were often cited as a juice in which cases we translated it not as “natural juice”
but, because it is a vegetable, as carrots. This logic may or may not be appropriate
All non-starchy vegetables and greens were combined together even though among popular
class Haitians they are distinct categories (legim vs fey)
When respondents said labouyi with no qualifier we interpreted it to be understood as
‘wheat flour.’ But it may in times have been used as a catch all