Hidden hunger: Do you know where your nutrients are?

When you cruise the drive-thru (50 million Americans eat at a fast-food restaurant every day), chances are you're not eating highly nutritious, good-for-you food. The Double Bacon King Burger at Burger King weighs in with 1,150 calories and 2,150 mg of sodium, not to mention 79 g of fat (31 g is saturated fat-50 percent more than you should get in a day, and in just one burger)!

But if you're feasting on a tasty baby kale salad, 100 percent whole-wheat bread or a side of fresh peas, well, you're expecting to get a big nutrient bang for each bite.

Less bang for your bite: Unfortunately, a combination of yield-increasing agricultural-biz changes in plants and the effects of increasing carbon dioxide and methane in the atmosphere (carbon-based fuels and massive livestock farms add to climate change) have altered plant nutrient levels. Even kale, whole wheat and tomatoes are delivering fewer vitamins and minerals per bite than they used to, while their carbs per bite have gone up.

How does this happen? As carbon dioxide is pumped up in the atmosphere (almost doubling in recent years, and expected to go much higher), it increases the sugar (carb) content of plants and decreases their levels of calcium, phosphorus, zinc and iron, as well as protein in wheat and rice-and, depending on whose data you look at, the drop could be between 2 and 8 percent. This comes on the heels of a 2004 study in the Journal of the American College of Nutrition that found 43 garden crops with notable declines in nutrients such as protein, calcium, phosphorus, iron, vitamin C and riboflavin between 1950 and 1999.

That means even on a plant-lovin' diet, you can suffer from hidden hunger-and that undernutrition or malnutrition can drive-thru YOU to overeat ever-more empty calories, disrupt your weight-managing and nutrient-processing gut biome, and set you up for everything from Type 2 diabetes to heart disease and some forms of cancer.

Power up your nutrition: There's a lot you can do to make sure you get the nutrition you need without overeating, even as your food supply dips in nutrients.

 Opt for locally grown, organic (if you like) seasonal veggies that haven't been picked, kept super cool (apples and pears may be stored for up to 12 months), shipped halfway around the world (that takes weeks) or trucked across the country (five to seven days) and then delivered to the grocery store to languish until you buy them.

Then they may sit in your fridge for a week before you eat them. Why that matters: Green peas stored around 33 F for seven days (a lot colder than most fridges) lose 15 percent of their vitamin C; green beans lose 77 percent! And that's just the tip of the iceberg (lettuce)!

 For non-local, non-seasonal produce, it's fine to consider frozen; it may have more nutrients than long-ago-picked fresh produce.

 Make very sure you get seven to nine servings (think handfuls) of produce daily. Most folks get so little produce that upping the ante to that level has huge, immediate health benefits.

 Upgrade your snacks: Have sliced or diced fruit and veggies on hand; enjoy nonfat, no-added-sugar yogurt with fresh fruit; drink beverages without any added sugars or syrups.

 Take a daily multivitamin (half in the morning, half at night) with nutrient doses that are around recommended levels (avoid megadoses of anything); take 900 mg of omega-3 DHA daily or eat salmon, sea trout, mackerel or anchovies two to three times a week; take 1,000 IU of vitamin D-3 (and get your blood level checked to see if you are deficient).

 Then, help your body to use the nutrients to improve your health and well-being: Go for 10,000 steps a day or the equivalent, and two to three 30-minute strength-building sessions a week. Increased muscle tone burns the nutritional fuel you provide to help strengthen your immune and cardiovascular systems and brainpower.

Mehmet Oz, M.D. is host of "The Dr. Oz Show," and Mike Roizen, M.D. is Chief Wellness Officer and Chair of Wellness Institute at Cleveland Clinic. To live your healthiest, tune into "The Dr. Oz Show" or visit sharecare.com.

(c) 2017 Michael Roizen, M.D. and Mehmet Oz, M.D.

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