Diet and Nutrition

Go Bananas with Homemade Sweet Frozen Treats

Though National Ice Cream Day is in July, sky-high August temperatures might have you craving cool, sweet treats. Whether you eat a vegan diet, a dairy free diet or are simply trying to incorporate more fresh fruit into your diet, frozen bananas are a simple, healthy and unpretentious way to get your summer dessert fix.

At the Smorgasburg Market in Brooklyn NY, Rob & Anna’s (raw bananas- get it?) provides an organic, vegan, unprocessed frozen banana dessert that boasts the same consistency and flavor of ice cream, but with no dairy or added sugar. While New Yorkers are lucky to have this option at their fingertips, the rest of us don’t have access to frozen banana “ice cream.”

For those who are craving a homemade banana-based treat, there are a few ways you can enjoy frozen bananas as a dessert, whether it’s dipped in yogurt and granola or coated in your favorite cereal.

Frozen bananas are great in smoothies and milkshakes, but if you have a blender or food processor you can make one-ingredient ice cream that tastes rich, creamy and sweet, like decadent ice cream.

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Posted on August 10, 2024 by Maris

Budgeting For Better, Healthier Meals

By Ashley Watson

Budgeting for meals can be easier than you think if you remember that saving money will also encourage healthier eating habits. You already know that whole foods are more healthful than processed foods, but did you realize they were cheaper, as well?

Here are some tips to remember when creating your grocery budget and shopping lists:

Plan Your Meals

Planning your meals for the week may feel a little too ambitious, but it will save time and money in the end. Think about how long it takes to decide what you want to eat after a long day at work when you are already tired and hungry. You don’t have to sit down and write a detailed menu for every night of the week, but it’s a good idea to have a general sense of which meals you want to prepare.

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Posted on August 10, 2024 by Health Buzz

Bag School Lunches Blamed for Disease-Causing Bacteria

With healthier school lunch guidelines on the way, some parents might prefer to let their child buy lunch, especially with the recent findings that “sack” lunches can pose serious health threats for children.

According to ScienceNews.org, a recent study from the University of Texas, Austin found that bag lunches are likely to harbor bacteria that causes food borne illness. Researchers tested the temperature of 235 packed bag lunches with an electronic temperature gun to determine the safety of the food inside.

According to Science News, roughly 40 percent of lunches containing perishable foods arrived without ice packs and more than 90 percent of meals were packaged in thermally insulated plastic containers. Of the 618 perishable foods packed in lunch bags with a single ice pack, only 14 food items were deemed to be at an acceptable temperature, according to the report.

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Posted on August 10, 2024 by Maris

Are Hot Dogs as Dangerous as Cigarettes?

It’s no surprise why there are warning labels on cigarettes and other tobacco products. The research shows that they cause cancer. No one contests that point. But what about other products? When there is research pointing out a true risk, should there be a warning on those items too? The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine thinks so and you may be surprised what product they’re currently comparing to cigarettes: hot dogs.

The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, a Washington, D.C. group that promotes preventive medicine and a vegan diet, has recently launched an ad campaign likening hot dogs to cigarettes. The group’s intention is to make consumers aware of a link between colorectal cancer and hot dogs. Based off research, the committee believes that hot dogs and other processed meats should come with a warning label, just like cigarettes.

The medical committee has done their research and has very valid points for their arguments. Studies from the World Cancer Research Fund and American Institute for Cancer Research have made a clear connection between processed meats and colorectal cancer. The research shows that a single 50-gram serving of processed meat a day increases the risk of colorectal cancer, on average, by 21 percent. A typical hot dog contains 50 grams of processed meat. Other meats that are highly processed are deli meats, ham, sausage, bacon and pepperoni.

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Posted on August 9, 2024 by Lacy

Why Fatty Foods Boost Moods

Warm bread fresh out of the oven, mom’s homemade spaghetti, and chocolate chip cookies could make anyone have a good day. While it’s no mystery that fatty or sugary foods can alleviate just about any bad mood, hardly anyone questions why while reaching for that next Oreo.

Dr. Lukas Van Oudenhove’s study at the University of Leuven in Belgium discovers that the fatty acids in comfort food may be what is making us so happy when we’re consuming junk food. The study examined 12 non-obese volunteers the morning after a 12-hour fast. The volunteers were hooked up to a gastric feeding tube that gave either saline solution or fatty acid and their brain activity was recorded during a 40 minute fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging) scan.

Before the participants were given either the saline or fatty acid, the researchers played sad classical music and displayed sad faces on a screen. The results of the study were that the participants who were given the fatty acid were 50 percent less sad than those given the saline solution.

Dr. Lukas Van Oudenhove and his team proved that the fatty acids in comfort foods were able to give the participants the same feeling without the visual and oral stimulation of eating the food.

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Posted on August 9, 2024 by Jamie

Cost of Eating Healthy Should not Cost You Your Health

As the economic times seem to get leaner, it’s getting more difficult to afford the groceries we need to keep up with the nutritional guidelines. Whether the cost of food has gone up or the income of the average American has dropped, shopping for optimal health isn’t as simple as it once was. There are options and ways to avoid throwing in the towel in the battle for better health.

The numbers were crunched and the cost of meeting the recommended daily requirements of “My Plate,” the new U.S. nutritional guideline, will cost an extra $7.28 a week. This dollar amount is factoring in that “My Plate” calls for more consumption of potassium, dietary fiber, vitamin D, and calcium rich foods.

Most of these nutrients can be obtained from healthy foods that tend to cost more at the grocery store. Let us help with some easy cost-cutting suggestions that do not cut the quality of your food.

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Posted on August 9, 2024 by Lacy

Studies Doubt the Hydration Benefits of Coconut Water

Coconut water is the natural juice found in green coconuts. Over the past few years, coconut water has become a popular alternative to electrolyte-enhanced sports and energy drinks.

While many brands claim that there are numerous health benefits to coconut water as compared to other leading sports drinks, a recent study by product testing company ConsumerLab.com, suggested that those claims may not be entirely accurate.

“This is a major focus of the marketing for coconut water,” Dr. Tod Cooperman, president of ConsumerLab told the Huffington Post. “When you start making claims comparing it to sports drinks, you expect them to at least deliver on what they are promising. People should be aware that the labels are not accurate on some of the products, and they shouldn’t count on coconut water for serious rehydration.”

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Posted on August 9, 2024 by Maris

SchoolMenu.com is Serving School Lunch Support that Every District and Parent Needs

The father-son team of Frank and Craig Kohler at SchoolMenu.com is taking a stance against childhood obesity, making themselves an active player in doing something for children throughout the U.S. and giving parents the tools to in turn empower themselves.

The Kohlers created SchoolMenu.com almost by accident. Frank led the charge on turning the side of milk cartons in to an ad medium in schools 20 years ago, working with Warner Brothers to share kid-friendly messages like saving the environment. That led to learning about the multi-million dollar business that is school food service, and thus begun their school menu service 15 years ago. They had an audience of four million elementary school children who received their “Tooned-In” school menu each month, which in addition to the menu included nutritional games, puzzles, and advertisements from the entertainment industry (for instance Shrek or Harry Potter). Then to complement the printed menu, Craig Kohler tells us that they created the dot-com part of the business as an “ancillary site that was kid-focused with games and puzzles.”

It’s only recently that they stopped printing the menus and started publishing them exclusively online at SchoolMenu.com, a move Craig says was due to “a combination of the decline in print advertising and the increased cost of printing and shipping.” He also adds that the site moved away from being kid-centric and instead more focused on meeting the needs of moms.

Simply put, SchoolMenu.com is a free online resource for schools and parents to share and have as much information about the cafeteria menu as possible. Schools can publish their menus on SchoolMenu.com, and parents can view the menus and their related nutritional information, all at no cost. (more…)

Posted on August 8, 2024 by Natalie K

MyPlate Goes Back to School

A teacher with three students eating fruitThe fall of 2024 will begin the first school year since MyPlate was introduced as the official replacement for MyPyramid. Much of the success of the new icon is in the hands of the educators who will use it in their classrooms. Many schools are preparing to incorporate MyPlate into their curricula for all age groups, and it is also already being used in nutrition education for adults and families.

“MyPyramid has gone through changes over its lifetime,” said Sharre Littrell. “I would say that this is the first one that I feel is really consumer-friendly, because we don’t eat in a pyramid. We eat on a plate.”

Littrell is a nutrition educator for UC Davis Cooperative Extension (UCCE), an organization that helps educate communities in California about healthy eating. Although the school year hasn’t started yet, Littrell has been using the MyPlate icon in family and adult educational sessions. In the fall, UCCE educators will visit about 55 low-income schools to teach both students and teachers about healthy foods and to distribute curricula for future use.

For Littrell and her colleague Josie Rucklose, incorporating MyPlate into an existing curricula wasn’t difficult because MyPyramid is based on the many of the same underlying principles. “We’re already talking about fruit and vegetable consumption, we’re already talking about whole grain consumption, but what we get to do now is incorporate that by showing them a plate,” said Littrell.

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Posted on August 8, 2024 by Margaret

Diet and Fitness Tips for Your Kids

Maruchy Lachance is president of Running Ninja!, a lifestyle brand for runners by runners. Running Ninja! offers a wide variety of apparel and gifts for runners to keep you happy and inspired while you’re on the run.

Adopting a healthy lifestyle is difficult enough, but sometimes the biggest challenge is getting your kids on board. Here are some ways to make the transition delicious and enjoyable for them and stress-free for you.

When it comes to food the best approach is to keep the same favorite foods while substituting the ingredients. When using ground beef or ground poultry to make meatballs, hamburgers or meatloaf, save money, calories and fat by just adding seasonings and oatmeal. This healthy substitute will go undetected and keep your dish moist. (more…)

Posted on August 7, 2024 by GuestBlogger

Tainted Ground Turkey Could be Largest Meat Recall in U.S. History

There have been at least two cases of salmonella food poisoning caused by tainted ground turkey in the U.S. so far this summer. Strangely enough, the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention knew where these tainted meats were coming from two weeks ago, but they did not issue a recall on the poisonous food because they “simply did not have enough information,” according to Fox News.

“There were two cases in the same state, and in two days we were able to confirm that the two cases were related to the [Cargill meat plant in Springdale, Arkansas],” said Dr. David Goldman, an assistant administrator from the USDA-Food Safety and Inspection Service.

That sounds like enough information to issue a recall to me, but Goldman claims that this really isn’t enough to warrant one.

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Posted on August 5, 2024 by Health Buzz