The Holiday Feast Survival Guide

Holiday dinners are filled with comforting, and delicious foods. Most of the times these meals leave us feeling stuffed and with some remorse to have consumed much more calories that we should have.
What we can do about it? Two registered dietitians have drawn up a survival guide that we can implement this coming holidays.
Patricia Nicholas, a registered dietitian at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Medical Center, suggests to add "new favorites" to the traditional dishes. "Healthy meals can be festive as well and hopefully, you have been making healthy changes to your diet all year."
Michelle Morgan, a registered dietitian at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center, further adds "Stay in tune with your hunger during holiday meals. If you feel satiated and comfortable – stop eating!"

Seaweed: An Amazing Source Of Protein

Historically, edible seaweeds were consumed by coastal communities across the world and today seaweed is a habitual diet in many countries, particularly in Asia. Indeed, whole seaweeds have been successfully added to foods in recent times, ranging from sausages and cheese to pizza bases and frozen-meat products.
Today, researchers at The Irish Agriculture and Food Development Authority looked to seaweed for proteins with health benefits for use as functional foods.

How Many Calories In One Gram Of Sugar?

Sugar is at the center of attention lately. We’re getting too much of it, and we kind of all know that.
However, do you know exactly how a gram of sugar looks like? And how many calories it has?


That little amount of sugar (which is more or less a pinch) scores 3.87 calories.

Seitan: Good Or Bad?

Seitan is becoming increasingly popular in today’s cuisine. It’s no longer only vegans and vegetarians who are eating it. Its resemblance to meat paired with its high palatability makes it an appealing choice to almost everybody. Brown in color and chewy in texture (but not weird chewy), seitan easily absorbs flavors and seasonings.
I try it in several different recipes, and there’s no denying that it tastes pretty good, especially if cooked right.
However, the fact that it’s basically 100% made of gluten puzzled me a bit. So I asked myself: is it healthy to eat seitan?
I did some research, and here’s what I discovered.

My Grandma Used To Say...

When I was at my grandma’s place as a little kid, and I would ask her for something to eat - outside of mealtimes - she would say: “You’re hungry? Eat an apple!” When I would refuse her offer, she would then reply: “You don’t want an apple? You must not be hungry!”


In her way, she was right in challenging my request for food, because, 99% of the times it was driven only by craving, not real hunger.
Today, I hold to that lesson close, and every time I feel like I want to eat something I stop and think about it for a moment : “Am I really hungry? Or am I just craving something?”
What about you: are you able to distinguish between cravings and hunger?

The Iron You

The Amazing Properties Of Pumpkin: October's Superfood!

There’s much more to pumpkins than just that Jack-O-Lantern or filling a pie for Thanksgiving dinner. This vegetable is an amazing source of Vitamin A, antioxidants and fiber, but very low in calories. That’s only if you consider the orange flesh, because if you take into account the seeds then there’s an additional array of health benefits you'll get from this veggie.
In other words, there’s never 'too much' when using pumpkin in your kitchen!

Are You Getting Enough Zinc?

Zinc is an essential micronutrient necessary to maintain a healthy immune system, building proteins, triggering enzymes, and creating DNA. If this is not enough, zinc also helps cells in the body communicating, as it’s used by the body as a neurotransmitter.
Notwithstanding its importance, it has been reported that as many as 2 billion people around the world have diets that are deficient in this important mineral, and even in affluent countries, such as the US, about 12% of the population is probably at risk of zinc deficiency. This figure raises to almost 40% if we take into consideration the elderly.
A new research has unveiled, for the first time, a biological mechanism by which zinc deficiency can develop with age, leading to a decline of the immune system and increased inflammation associated with many health problems, including cancer, heart disease, autoimmune disease and diabetes.
In other words, we should give zinc more credit, especially as we age!

Always Scan The Ingredient List From Top To Bottom!

We talked about how important is to read nutrition labels on food, but that’s not the only thing you should look for. As crucial is to scan the ingredients list.
You’ll be surprised to see that some foods comprise numerous ingredients with weird and complicated names that more often should belong in a chemistry lab, rather than on your plate.
Here’s a few things to help you successfully scan the list...

Source FDA

Why You Need To Read Nutrition Labels More Carefully

In our quest to become healthier, one of the strongest tool we have in our hands are the nutrition facts labels printed on the food we’re buying.
They've often been the subject of criticisms, as some claim that they fail to provide enough information and that the data displayed can be misleading.
I'd rather say: they’re there, let’s take advantage of them.
All we need to do is to learn how to read them correctly and with some common sense we are going to do a lot of good to ourselves.

Source FDA

Do You Know How Much Caffeine You're Drinking?

Judging by the line I see every morning at the coffee shop down the street from where I live, it seems that we’re a city, a country and maybe a world running on caffeine.
It would be actually fascinating to see what would happen if we took caffeine out of the picture for just one day. I don’t think much will be achieved, but who knows...
Anyway, this is not my point. My point is: do you actually know how much caffeine are you getting each day?
If you’re not sure, take a look at this infographic below.
It’s accurate and very accessible. You can find the original file here, along with a detailed explanation of how this infographic was created alongside the data collected. It’s too bad that there’s no reference to tea (especially green tea, which is my only source of caffeine), but the creators did an awesome job in displaying how much caffeine contain the most notorious drinks you can find today on the market.



The Iron You

Let's Talk About Malnutrition

When we hear the word malnutrition, we immediately think about not getting enough food. However, that issue has another name: it’s called undernutrition.
Undernutrition happens when the human body doesn’t get enough calories in order to function properly.
For millennia mankind has struggled with undernutrition. Only during the last century or so, in the most affluent societies, this issue has been almost eradicated. Unfortunately, it still afflicts the poorest parts of the earth where, people still struggles to get food on their plates daily.
Malnutrition, is broader category, that includes undernutrition but is not limited to it.
In fact, malnutrition has been defined as the condition resulting from an unbalanced diet in which certain nutrients are lacking, are in excess or are in wrong proportion.
In other words, malnutrition includes undernutrition, overeating and nutrients deficiency.
The latter being the insufficient and/or unbalanced supply of nutrients that the body needs.
So, even in affluent societies, where undernutrition is no longer an issue, and where we have the luxury of throwing away more food than we actually consume, malnutrition is still an issue.
How come? Because the modern unhealthy diet makes us overfed and overweight, but may fail to provide for all the micronutrients that the body needs to maintain optimum health.
And it’s this latter issue that I would to focus on today.

Don't Get Fooled: Multigrain Doesn't Mean Whole Grain

This is a mistake one might easily fall into: seeing a food labeled as “multigrain” (such as multigrain bread, crackers or cereals) and thinking that it’s a “whole grain” food.
But this is not always the case as the label multigrain just means that are two or more different types of grains have been used in a product. Not that the grains used were whole.

Frozen Meat 101

I don’t know about yours but as far as my freezer is concerned, besides some frozen fruits, it’s stocked with meat. It’s so convenient to have it there. When I arrive home late at night, I can always resort to my freezer for some chicken or turkey meat.
But I never cared that much about the freezing process of meat. I just threw it in the freezer in after buying it and forget about it until time had come to eat it.
However, I recently discovered that there are several different methods of freezing and, moreover, that physical and chemical reactions can still occur in meat during storage in freezer.
The more I red about it, the more I realized how little I knew and that it was about time to fill this gap.

Have You Had Your Blueberries Today?

Let’s make a bet. If I win you’ll promise to eat only healthy foods for the remainder of the month. If I lose, I’ll do the same. But also if I win I’ll do the same. And also if you win you should do the same. It’s basically a win-win-win-win situation.
Anyway, I’ll bet that if you look around on the internet (or on magazines) for articles on the healthiest foods around (so-called “powerfoods”), blueberries will make the cut 9 times out of 10.
There’s a reason for that: blueberries are a health wonder; packed with vitamins, antioxidants and other precious nutrients.

An Ode To Greek Yogurt (The Perfect IronYou Food!)

Sometimes I wonder: “What my life would be without Greek yogurt?”
I’m one of the biggest consumer of Greek yogurt in the whole world. My fridge is constantly stacked with huge amounts of Greek yogurt: 0%, 2%, plain, you name it.
When I feel like having a snack there’s nothing else I’d rather have than Greek yogurt.
Funny thing is that I don’t like regular yogurt but I’m totally hooked on Greek yogurt.
With Greek yogurt the combination are endless: blueberries, raspberries, nuts, honey, etc..everything goes well with it. Plus, it is a great substitute for mayo in all the recipes that call for the latter ingredient (such as chicken salad).
Last, but not least, the fact that it’s low in fat and carbs and super high in protein makes it a perfect IronYou food. Are you convinced? If not keep reading...

Watermelon: A Perfect Weight Loss Food!

First question: who doesn’t love diving into a juicy, crisp, slice of watermelon when it’s toasty outside?
It’s probably the most refreshing fruit one can think of and a great friend when it comes to fight the heat. But watermelon does much more than that as it is one of the most recommended fruits when it comes to weight loss. To the point that some dietitians have created a “watermelon diet”.

Cherry An "All American" Superfruit

We search the four corners of the world to find the next superfood: açai, goji berries, quinoa, etc. Everyday someone comes up with the next miraculous food, found in some remote places that promises to bring health. And by doing so we forget to look in our homegrown gardens, that are instead jam packed with superfoods. Such as cherries: a homegrown powerfood.
About 95% percent of cherries consumed in the U.S. are grown here, with most coming from Michigan, Wisconsin, Utah, Washington, Oregon, Pennsylvania and New York.
This homegrown advantage, coupled with potential health benefits, make cherries "America's Super Fruit."
Cherries come in dried, frozen and juice forms so they're readily available to enjoy all year long but as right now is cherries’ season why not get some fresh ones?
Let’s discover the amazing health benefits of this fruit!

Bananas Are Better Than Any Sports Drink!

Bananas are probably one of the most convenient, easy to carry and available fruit around. They are also one of the favorite athletes' snacks .
Who doesn’t remember Michael Chang’s run to the French Open title in 1989? Down two sets to none to Ivan Lendl in the fourth round, Chang rallied to claim one of the most improbable victories in tennis history.
Chang began cramping in the fourth set. He had to employ some very unusual tactics to defeat the world’s top-ranked player. Chang used moon balls, an underhand serve and quickly ate many bananas to help with his cramping.
Because bananas are, among other things, rich in potassium and other precious nutrients that make them one of the preferred snack of athletes around the world.
And a recent research conducted at Appalachian State University’s Human Performance Lab in the Kannapolis-based North Carolina Research Campus (NCRC) has revealed additional benefits.

The Importance Of Adding Curcumin To Your Diet

We have already talked in the past of the magic wonders of turmeric, which are mainly due to its high curcumin content. And the more researchers dig into the properties of this compound, the more awesome stuff they found about it.
The newest findings have been made by researchers in the Linus Pauling Institute at Oregon State University and published in the Journal of Nutritional Biochemistry, in collaboration with scientists from the University of Copenhagen in Denmark.
In this study researchers discovered that curcumin can cause a modest but measurable increase in levels of a protein that’s known to be important in the “innate” immune system, helping to prevent infection in humans.

Three Really Bad Eating Habits

There are many bad eating habits out there, but three of them make the top of my list: portion distortion, distracted eating, and skipping meals.
I personally don’t know if one is worst than the other.
Truth is, if you have any of those three you better make sure to break them as soon as you can, because they might compromise your health!