Fun Food Friday: Beets!
06 Aug 2010 Leave a Comment
in Fun Food Friday!, Nutrition Tags: Cancer Prevention
I don’t know why, but lately I have been obsessed with beets. We never ate them at home, but I tried one in a salad this Spring and fell in love! I also “noticed” them for the first time at the cafeteria at my work, so I have been making up for lost time and eating a lot of them.
Beets are a very interesting vegetable. The red beet part that you eat is the root vegetable of a plant that is in the same family as Swiss Chard. Beets have a uniquely sweet and crunchy taste, and an interesting color. Color, in the world of nutrition, almost instantly equals phytonutrients! The bright colors you see in red cabbage, leafy greens, pomegranates, blueberries, blackberries, and carrots & sweet potatoes are due to the phytochemicals that deliver that magnificent hue (such as anthocyanin, beta carotene, and so on). The purplish-red color that beets posses is due to betacyanin, which is a major cancer-fighting antioxidant.
Beets also protect you from heart disease and colon cancer, and the high folate content (roughly 30-35% of your daily required intake) protects unborn babies from birth defects (specifically spina bifida, which is a neural tube defect caused from a deficiency in folate during the early stages of the gestational period). Beets are also a good source of manganese, potassium, fiber, vitamin C, iron, and phosphorous.
You can eat beets raw in salads or as a tasty snack, or you can use them to make the famous Russian soup – Borscht. We once made this soup in my cultural foods lab, and I had never had it before! So I guess I technically did eat a “beet” when we used them to make this delicious soup. Here is an easy recipe for Borscht, property of the Food Network.
Summer Borscht ~ The Barefoot Contessa (Ina Garten)
Cook Time: 40 Minutes Yield: 6 servings
Ingredients:
- 5 medium fresh beets (about 2 pounds without tops)
- Kosher salt
- 2 cups chicken stock, preferably homemade
- 16 ounces sour cream, plus extra for serving
- 1/2 cup plain yogurt
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice
- 2 teaspoons Champagne vinegar
- 1 1/2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper
- 2 cups medium-diced English cucumber, seeds removed
- 1/2 cup chopped scallions, white and green parts
- 2 tablespoons chopped fresh dill, plus extra for serving
Directions:
Place the beets in a large pot of boiling salted water and cook uncovered until the beets are tender, 30 to 40 minutes. Remove the beets to a bowl with a slotted spoon and set aside to cool. Strain the cooking liquid through a fine sieve and also set aside to cool.
In a large bowl, whisk together 1 1/2 cups of the beet cooking liquid, the chicken stock, sour cream, yogurt, sugar, lemon juice, vinegar, 1 tablespoon salt, and the pepper. Peel the cooled beets with a small paring knife or rub the skins off with your hands. Cut the beets in small to medium dice. Add the beets, cucumber, scallions, and dill to the soup. Cover with plastic wrap and chill for at least 4 hours or overnight. Season, to taste, and serve cold with a dollop of sour cream and an extra sprig of fresh dill.
Enjoy 
Fun Food Friday: Healthy 8 Chopped Veggie Mix
30 Jul 2010 Leave a Comment
in Fun Food Friday!, Nutrition Tags: Cancer Prevention, Digestive Health, Soluble Fiber
This Friday I wanted to write about a new product that my mom has been using at home as a neat addition to our regular dinner salads. It is a chopped veggie mix that she buys from Trader Joe’s. It’s a little pricey ($2.99) for about 4 cups of veggies, but she uses it sparingly in salads and mixes.
It consists of 8 healthy veggies that you can add to a salad, casserole, or stir-fry. The chopped veggies are broccoli, carrots, green and red cabbage, jicama, green bell peppers, radishes, and celery. A 3/4 cup serving provides 2 grams of fiber and 60% of one’s daily requirement for Vitamins A and C.
Some of these veggies are major superstars, including broccoli and cabbage – cruciferous vegetables that have major anti-cancer properties – green peppers, and carrots. Jicama is a delicious crunchy vegetable for salads, and radishes have many antioxidants as well. A higher intake of these vegetables helps with cancer prevention, digestive health, and helping you stay fuller for longer – so keep them on your radar! If you don’t eat foods like broccoli, carrots, and cabbage enough, this is a product that is easy to use. You could also put a scoop of this mix in a bowl and add some olive oil and vinegar for a tasty nutrient-rich snack!
The veggies will stay fresh in their container for probably about a week, and if you add these daily to a dinner salad you will definitely bump up your vitamin and nutrient intake. I’m always looking for easy ways to add more veggies to my daily meals, and this way is quick and easy! Of course, you could always buy these veggies individually and chop them yourself and save them for use throughout the week, but if you’re busy this is a quick way to get some extra fiber and vitamins!!
It All Comes Down to Calories…
26 Jul 2010 Leave a Comment
in Calories, Nutrition, Research Tags: Portion Control
I recently read an article regarding the “six meals a day” concept and its role in weight loss and/or gain. Many of you have probably heard from nutrition experts, doctors, your friends, or the media that having more frequent – but smaller – meals throughout the day is more efficicent for your metabolism and can help with weight loss. Apparently many aren’t getting the “smaller” part of the equation… and end up gaining weight when incorporating more snacks and meals to their diet plan.
In essence, the theory behind eating smaller and more frequent meals, set 2-3 hours apart throughout the day, is that you are allowing your metabolism to effectively work on smaller meals instead of having to breakdown larger meals spread apart. By stoking your metabolism more frequently throughout the day – instead of at three huge spurts – you are increasing your energy levels, increasing the thermal effect of food, and regulating peaks of insulin in the bloodstream. It can also curb food cravings and keep you fuller throughout the day so you don’t crash in the afternoon (this also has to do with balancing the insulin levels).
However, one must remember to eat small frequent meals, and not 6 huge meals during the day. What research is finding is that the excuse to eat more often throughout the day leads to even more unhealthier choices and even more calories than a 3-meal-a-day plan! This is not ideal…
One thing you can start off doing is having three healthful meals per day (Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner) with two snacks – one in the mid-morning and one in the afternoon. If you are an athlete or you exercise regularly, your afternoon snack can be your pre-workout meal, followed by Dinner to replenish glucose/glycogen for energy and protein for muscle-building and repair.
Stick to snack items that are low in calories but have good nutritional value – such as fruits, vegetables, yogurt, nuts, or granola bars (watch the cals and sugars on these!). While the key to eating more frequently throughout the day is to lose weight, you have to make sure that these meals are kept in portion and calorie control… otherwise you may be setting yourself up for weight gain! It is always important to research and use common sense when reading nutritional information… if something you read is advertising for you to “eat more” and “weigh less,” chances are it’s too good to be true. But by eating more frequently and keeping those calories in check throughout the day, you will be stoking your metabolism all day long and balancing your blood sugar and energy levels!!
Taoist Meditation on Nature
21 Jul 2010 Leave a Comment
in Uncategorized Tags: Meditation, Nature, Peace, Serenity, Taoism
For my birthday I would like to celebrate by sharing with you my favorite Taoist meditation on Nature. Written by Deng Ming-Dao, I love this short piece on how to respect the simplicity and perfection of Nature:
Learning is a passion shared by many of us. There is a great allure to education and a fascination with the accomplishments of civilization. We go to libraries and museums. We go to exhibits showing the diggings from royal tombs. We are enchanted with new inventions. And yet, if we look out our windows and see a tree in its perfection, or gaze into a tide pool, or watch a cat as it strolls its territory, or see the flash of a blue jay, we can see another order of beauty and intelligence in this life.
The works of humanity cannot compare to the works of nature. The works of civilization lack the balance and refinement of nature. Too many times, our accomplishments are tainted by impure motives: profit, hardship, desire for fame, simple greed. We achieve, but we cannot forsee the results because we are unable to place our actions into a greater context.
Nature is a conglomeration of contending forces, of tooth and claw, venom and perfume, mud and excrement, eggs and bones, lightning and lava. It seems chaotic. It seems terrible. And yet, for all its unfathomable workings, it far surpasses the business of our society.
Think about what you do. How much of it can compare to the perfection of nature?
-Deng Ming-Dao
Got Milk? Or Got Hormones?
19 Jul 2010 Leave a Comment
in Nutrition, Wellness/Health Tags: Antibiotics, Bovine Growth Hormones, Dairy Products, Milk
Last week I wrote a post about organic fruits and vegetables, and today I’d like to tackle America’s favorite dairy product: Milk! Before I go any further I just want to mention that dairy is an excellent source of calcium, phosphorous, Vitamins A&D, and protein. Choosing non-fat milk and low-fat dairy products like cheeses and yogurts are great ways to keep your diet on track and get all your essential vitamins and nutrients!
Milk is an interesting food in our country… While much of the world is Lactose-Intolerant, milks, yogurts, and cheeses are popular and used often in cooking. There are soy options, Lactose-free options, and – most importantly – organic options. I’m not going to get on my soapbox about how unnatural it is to drink milk (think about it- it’s another animal’s breastmilk! Intended only for their offspring), but rather mention some things to consider when purchasing milk.
The first is the use of hormones. Be warned that no milk can be completely “hormone free”… cows are animals and, like us, they produce hormones. The hormones that you want to look out for, and which shouldn’t be in your milk, are administered hormones such as Bovine Growth Hormones (rBGH) and others given to cows. Cows only produce milk during the state of pregnancy, but dairy farms keep their cows producing so that they have something to sell. But rBGH is not a good substance for humans to ingest. Conflicting studies about rBGH exist; some have reported its link to producing a cancer-causing agent in humans, which others insist that the small amount of it is destroyed by our digestive system. Since it is not proven either way, and since the only true proponent of its existence in milk is its developer (Monsanto – a company I hate for various other unethical reasons), my stance is to avoid it at all costs.
Another thing to look out for are antibiotics. As mentioned, cows do not generally produce milk constantly, but are made to do so by farmers. In nature, a cow will only produce milk when pregnant and be milked during that time. Since dairy cows are over-milked, they often get infections in their utters. Farmers will administer antibiotics to their cows to avoid infections. Many of you probably think this is a good thing, because you probably don’t want to drink infected milk (even though bacteria are killed in the pasteurization process), but you don’t want to be pumping antibiotics into your system either! An overuse of antibiotics is how antibiotic-resistant bacteria (superbugs that are hard to treat, like MRSA) develop. Ideally we would want to drink milk from cows that are producing milk naturally and without artifical growth hormones and anitbiotics.
All that being said, there are organic and non-organic varieties of milk on the market that do not contain unwanted growth hormones and antibiotics. I prefer to purchase USDA certified organic non-fat dairy milk that states that it does not contain these products only because I choose not to ingest them. Another alternative I will try occasionally is low-fat organic soy milk, which completely eliminates worrying about rBGH and antibiotics. But this is just food for thought and something for all of you to think about!
Fun Food Friday: Kefir!!
16 Jul 2010 Leave a Comment
in Fun Food Friday! Tags: Calcium, Hormone-Free Dairy, Kefir, Lifeway, Organic, Probiotics
Every Friday I’d like to introduce you to a new or interesting or extremely healthy food that I either love or just started eating. This week it will be…… Kefir!
For those of you who don’t know what Kefir is, it can be described as the “cousin” of yogurt. It is bascially a liquid yogurt drink. Now before you say “yuck!” because I know that description isn’t really appealing, try it out! I drink a single-serving bottle of kefir everyday at work for my mid-morning snack around 9:30, and it keeps me satisfied until 1:00 for lunch time!
Kefir can come in many varieties. When I first started drinking it, I tried the low-fat version, which contains 2gm of fat. Now I drink the non-fat version and there isn’t really a noticeable difference in taste. I am a fanatic about low- and non-fat dairy products, so I urge you to try one of those two… there’s no sense in drinking a full-fat yogurt drink. You might as well eat ice cream.
The brand I prefer is Lifeway, which is organic and can be found at Whole Foods and other fine, trendy, organic healthfood stores. Lifeway does not use milk that contains any antibiotics or bovine growth hormones. It contains 10… yes 10… probiotics, which means it has more of those little probiotics guys than a 6oz serving of yogurt! If you don’t know what probiotics are, you’re missing out – they are helpful GI bacteria that help regulate your digestive system and keeps you healthy!
In it’s convenient drink format, Kefir is easy to take with you and have on the go – whether in the car on the way to work, on the job, or right out of the fridge. Remember, this is a milk-based product so you must keep it refrigerated at 45 (preferrably 40) degrees F or below.
Speaking of milk, for those of you who are vegan or lactose-intolerant, there are many soy versions available. They contain the same great probiotics but unfortunately none that I have found (but I haven’t really searched that hard among the soy variety) are fat-free. But that’s okay, because fat from soy milk isn’t bad at all!
At 11 grams of protein and only 160 calories and 25 carbs, Kefir makes a great snack in the morning, afternoon, or post-workout. With plenty of protein and calcium in not very many calories, Kefir is a fun food you should add to your meal plan!
Love it!
What You Need to Know About Organic Produce
14 Jul 2010 Leave a Comment
in Nutrition, Research, Wellness/Health Tags: Organic
Inspired by a recent article from MSNBC/Prevention, I wanted to write today about organic fruits and vegetables. Often given a bad reputation for high prices and “too good to be true” health claims, choosing to eat organic foods is a personal preference… but one that you should consider in light of current agricultural issues. Keep in mind that this article is based on my opinion of organic foods and a preference for not putting chemicals into my body.
Before the invention and use of pesticides, all food was technically organic. There were no fertilizers, spray pesticides, or genetic modification in our food supply. However, today that is not the case. With the onset of the industrial revolution and booming population, the need for these products was necessary to ensure food supply. One bad year or crop cycle could bring havoc, especially if on a large scale. Farmers and food suppliers depended on things like fertilizers and pesticides to make sure that their crops grew and were free of pests that could destroy their crops.
In the 1960s, a few leaders in conservation began to notice how devestating these chemicals were to people and to the environment. One of the first leaders in the field for organic foods was Rachel Carson, who published Silent Spring in 1962, which detailed the harmful nature of DDT. The first woman biologist hired for the US Bureau of Fisheries, Carson knew her stuff and argued against the use of DDT in our food supply.
DDT was a very strong chemical that can stay in the body for several years, stored in a person’s fat. Though DDT was banned in 1972 by the EPA, traces of it are still found in persons today! Nowadays, pesticides that are used are as potent as DDT if not stronger, but have a much shorter half-life and don’t remain in the body nearly as long. But what you have to remember is that these pesticides are still chemicals, and by eating food containing them you are ingesting them, too.
Your best bet is to avoid what people in the food and nutrition industry call “the dirty dozen,” which are the top 12 fruits and vegetables that contain the highest amount of pesticides. This is bascially due to their porous skin which absrobs the pesticide and is more likely to remain there despite a thorough washing. The following is the list of the updated 2010 dirty dozen, in order of most contaminated: celery, peaches, strawberries, apples, blueberries, nectarines, bell peppers, spinach, kale, cherries, potatoes, and grapes. Kind of disappointing, isn’t it?!! All of these are great sources of nutrients, vitamins, minerals, and powerful antioxidants, yet nonorganic versions are crippled by abundant pesticides on their skin.
Speaking of nutrients, let’s segue into the MSNBC/Prevention article I mentioned at the beginning. This article was devestating for me to read! It basically points out that researchers have found that fruits and vegetables are losing their nutrient power over the last 30 years! I invite you to read the article in its entirety on your own, but I wanted to highlight some reasearch that was discovered. Researchers in the US analyzed produce and found that 43 fruits and vegetables from 1950 to 1999 reported reductions in vitamins, minerals, and protein! One example given is broccoli, which in 1950 had 130 mg of calcium, but today contains barely 48 mg.
In investigating why this has happened, researches found that in efforts to grow produce faster and bigger – through the use of pesticides, fertilizers, and selective breeding – produce is unable to synthesize nutrients or absorb them from the soil. Furthermore, plants have their own defense mechanisms for combating pests and hardship, and when put through that kind of stress they release more phytochemicals. The use of fertilizers and pesticides has allowed plants to avoid that stress and phytochemical production. Another report mentions that organic tomatoes have 30% more phytochemicals than conventionally grown tomatoes!
There are many studies that prove that some organic companies are too good to be true. For example, organic farms too close to conventional farms will absorb the pesticides and fertilizers through soil, wind, and water flow/irrigation. Sometimes these things cannot be helped. If you are interested in purchasing organic food, make sure you do so from a reliable source and look for the appropriate USDA Organic labels. For mixed foods and convenience or boxed items, read the ingredients label to determine how much of the product is certified as organic.
The last thing I want to do is scare you about the fruits and vegetables that you are eating. Fruits and vegetables are excellent sources of many vitamins, minerals, and important antioxidants that we need to fight diseases like cancer and improve our immunity. However, if you want to make a small difference in what kind of produce you buy, buy organic for the dirty dozen. Since these are the fruits and vegetables with the highest concentrations of pesticides, choosing organic for these foods will make a huge difference in the amount of chemicals that you are consuming. Or go one step further and plant your own organic garden in the backyard!!
My name is Christine and I am passionate about nutrition, exercise and wellness! Read more about me in the "About" section of this blog and check out my other pages!
