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For anyone who’s struggled to tug collectively a grocery checklist or plan every week of household meals, the promise of help from synthetic intelligence is downright appetizing.
AI could make uninteresting, time-consuming duties a breeze, and vitamin consultants who perceive the rising expertise are enthusiastic. However they season their enthusiasm with greater than a touch of warning.
“These tools are really good at giving you what you ask for, as long as you know what you’re asking for,” mentioned Raul Palacios, director of the Didactic Program in Dietetics at Texas Tech College in Lubbock.
Palacios is a registered dietitian nutritionist who teaches about AI and often makes use of AI interfaces, referred to as chatbots, for every kind of duties. Professionally, AI has streamlined his work with meal plans. At dwelling, he is taken footage of what is in his pantry and fridge, uploaded them and requested, “Hey, based on the ingredients I have on hand right now, what can I make for a family of four?”
It’s also possible to say, “‘I’m trying to reduce the amount of salt in my diet. What are some substitutions that I can make to reduce the amount of salt?” And these instruments are fairly good about figuring out that if we add some extra herbs and spices, versus salt merchandise, that could be useful,” he mentioned.
Palacios has additionally requested AI to tweak recipes, say, by placing a Mexican spin on a stir fry, “just to see what it gives me.”
However earlier than AI suggestions flip right into a wholesome, tasty, edible meal, there’s loads to be taught and a few severe points to contemplate.
Perceive AI’s limits
For all of AI’s gee-whiz potentialities, Palacios had some essential realities.
One is, do not use a general-purpose AI device to search for a solution to one thing you do not perceive, he mentioned. “This is especially dangerous for the general public,” most of whom are going to be on the lookout for assist with one thing they aren’t consultants in.
One other is, do not use AI for recommendation on medical considerations. “That’s not what we should be using those tools to do,” Palacios mentioned. “They are not a replacement for a health care professional.”
AI and machine-learning instruments have proven promise, however analysis hasn’t proven they will enhance care sufficient to justify widespread use in a medical setting, in accordance with a 2024 American Coronary heart Affiliation scientific assertion on the expertise.
Analysis on AI instruments and their effectiveness in meal planning is restricted, Palacios mentioned, as a result of analysis takes time and AI expertise is up to date quickly.
One examine, revealed within the journal Vitamin in 2023, examined one AI chatbot’s potential to advocate allergy-safe diets. The preliminary evaluation of “robo-diets” discovered that the AI-recommended meals have been balanced but additionally monotonous, at occasions inaccurate in detailing meals portions and power values, and, in a single case, unsafe.
This 12 months, a evaluate of analysis revealed within the journal Vitamins concluded that whereas AI has “significantly reduced errors that are common in traditional methods” of assessing diets, it additionally raised points about privateness and an absence of range within the knowledge getting used.
So for something however informal use, follow human professionals who perceive your wants, Palacios mentioned.
Methods to chat with an AI
Directions to an AI are referred to as prompts. The extra particular you might be, the extra seemingly you’re going to get good outcomes, mentioned Janice MacLeod, a registered dietitian nutritionist in Glen Burnie, Maryland.
Give the AI as a lot context as potential, mentioned MacLeod, a marketing consultant whose background is in diabetes care. She teaches dietitians about adapting to AI expertise, together with learn how to craft good prompts. Inform it, “Here’s what I’m interested in” and “Here are things I don’t like.” Then add one thing like, “I am trying to eat more plant-based foods. Can you give me some good ideas for that?”
You are not restricted to typing when offering prompts. You possibly can dictate or, as Palacios does, add images. However he agreed that it is all in regards to the particulars.
Simply saying, “I want a seven-day meal plan” will not work, he mentioned. Steer the AI towards what you need. For meal planning, you may ask, “I want you to act as an expert dietitian who specializes in cardiac care. I want you to give me a seven-day meal plan that’ll give me roughly 2,000 calories, 80 grams of protein and is low in salt for myself and a family of four.”
Once more, AI cannot substitute a well being skilled. However asking it to behave as one will steer it towards extra dependable knowledge sources, Palacios mentioned.
If it would not know your tastes, a general-purpose AI will give outcomes that replicate the preferences of others, he mentioned. Palacios has witnessed this throughout demonstrations for his college students. “When I do this in my class, for whatever reason, unless you give it specific details, it’s always going to give you avocado toast for breakfast.”
Refine the outcomes
Prompting is a multistep course of, Palacios mentioned.
“It’s going to give you a draft, and it’s very likely not going to be good after the first try,” he mentioned. However “there’s so much opportunity to refine and to make it better based on your preferences and lifestyle.”
AI professionals name this back-and-forth course of iteration, he mentioned. So as soon as the chatbot produces a meal plan based mostly on what you’ve in your pantry, you possibly can inform it, “On Tuesday, I really don’t like that idea. Give me five more options.” Or “I don’t want to cook breakfast every day. I want something that I can make and then just put in the microwave each morning.”
Though free variations of AI chatbots have restricted reminiscence, paid variations can be taught your preferences and use them to offer sharper outcomes, Palacios mentioned.
Make it an inventory
After you have a meal plan, use the AI chatbot to export it into no matter format fits you. That features turning it right into a grocery checklist. This works “the vast majority” of occasions he is tried it, Palacios mentioned.
AI has limits, although. “One thing that it hasn’t been very good about is staying within a budget,” he mentioned. “It’ll probably get there really soon.”
Watch out for hallucinations
Like Palacios, MacLeod has seen AI make professionals vastly extra environment friendly at meal planning. Routine duties that after took hours might be finished in seconds. However the general-use chatbots “are still not quite accurate, and that means the dietitian still has to go back and check all of that.”
So will you.
Palacios checks AI for at-home meal planning day by day. And about 15% of the time, he mentioned, he spots an error, usually in how a lot of an ingredient to make use of.
“Sometimes, the AI will suggest grams instead of milligrams,” he mentioned. “Sometimes it’s quarts instead of cups.” As soon as, it beneficial 4 tablespoons of salt when the proper measure was teaspoons. “That’s a lot of salt,” he mentioned.
Such errors are simple for him, as an expert, to identify. Others may not be so fortunate.
So bear in mind, he mentioned, AI outcomes ought to be regarded as a draft. “It’s going to be something that you’re going to have to tinker with.”
Take into account an app
Palacios mentioned that AI can take a look at a photograph of a meal to estimate energy and vitamin. In his expertise, it is OK at energy and never so good at estimating fats or protein.
To get correct outcomes, MacLeod mentioned, think about a longtime app, lots of that are incorporating AI into their outcomes. Apps can assist observe consuming or scan barcodes on merchandise for dietary knowledge. The perfect apps use data from verified sources.
It is totally different from utilizing a chatbot, she mentioned, however when utilized in partnership along with your well being care workforce, it may be handy and “really powerful for people.”
The place to start
Palacios suggests you discover the duty that takes up probably the most psychological area in your life and “ask the AI to do that thing and see what it gives you.”
AI will solely get sooner and higher, he mentioned. However do not let it push apart your individual intelligence.
Individuals needed to find out how to not consider the whole lot they learn on the web, he mentioned, and AI would require the identical sort of digital literacy. “I would hope that we would always have something in the back of our heads that says, ‘Hey, let me just check that. Let me read this twice to make sure that this looks right.'”
Extra data:
Hanin Kassem et al, Investigation and Evaluation of AI’s Function in Vitamin—An Up to date Narrative Evaluate of the Proof, Vitamins (2025). DOI: 10.3390/nu17010190
Supplied by
American Coronary heart Affiliation
Quotation:
AI can serve up concepts for wholesome meals in a snap, however they arrive with a aspect of warning (2025, March 28)
retrieved 29 March 2025
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