How good is the evidence that flossing is effective? According to randomized controlled trials, what is the optimal toothbrushing and flossing sequence? 

“Over the years, it has been generally accepted that the use of dental floss has a positive effect on removing plaque. The American Dental Association (ADA) even reports that up to 80% of plaque may be removed by this method.” How do we know? You can use what’s called a split-mouth design, where each person can act as their own control—for example, by flossing only one-quarter of their mouth. Researchers asked study participants to stop brushing their lower jaw so that plaque would build up, then they were randomized to floss half and leave the other half as the non-flossed control. As you can see below and at 0:37 in my video Should You Floss Before or After You Brush?, not only did flossing cut plaque by about 60 percent after just three weeks, more importantly, it also halved gingivitis signs—bleeding on probing and another index of gum inflammation. Note, though, that this compared flossing to doing nothing. The study subjects weren’t allowed to brush their lower jaw. So, flossing is better than nothing, but is flossing plus brushing better than just brushing alone? 

“The advocacy of floss as an interdental cleaning device hinges, in large part, on common sense,” but common sense doesn’t go very far as a form of evidence. You don’t really know until you put it to the test. What’s the efficacy of dental floss in addition to a toothbrush? Surprisingly, only 3 out of the 11 studies the researchers looked at found a significant added benefit. 

The anti-flossers were positively giddy, comparing dentists who continued to advocate flossing in the face of the data to flat-earthers. Dentistry is a profession “in denial,” they wrote. “Over 80% do not floss regularly and it is hard to accept that these ‘the great unflossed’ were right and we, ‘the highly educated intelligencia’ may actually have been wrong…Flossing doesn’t work—get over it!” 

So, you’ve heard of the tooth fairy. Is flossing just some tooth fairy tale? The review showing that only 3 out of 11 studies found a significant benefit to flossing in addition to brushing was published back in 2008. Since then, more studies have found that while the evidence on additional plaque reduction is weak, there is at least some evidence that flossing with toothbrushing helps with gingivitis, which is a primary reason you want to reduce plaque anyway. Why might they not have found stronger evidence? “Trials were of poor quality and conclusions must be viewed as unreliable,” so basically, we don’t have good evidence either way because good studies really haven’t been done.  

Why not? Why wouldn’t Big Floss fund the studies? It appears that all floss works the same. If you compare unwaxed to woven to shred-resistant floss, they all have about the same plaque-removal efficacy, something all such studies appear to have found. So, why would a floss company fund a study to show that flossing in general is good if it can’t show that its product is better than another? You might just buy its competitor’s floss. 

Where do we stand today? “Although technically the evidence for flossing is weak, more importantly, the methodology and rigor of the studies examining flossing effectiveness are also weak.” For example, the studies didn’t assess the frequency or quality of people’s flossing. (You can see an incorrect way of flossing below and at 3:18 in my video.) The bottom line is that the American Dental Association continues to recommend brushing and flossing every day. But what’s the proper sequence? Should you floss before or after you brush? 

“Some dentists argue that flossing should come first because you stir up the particles and plaque that the toothbrush can brush away subsequently. The fluoride from your toothpaste is also more likely to reach the interdental areas [the spaces between teeth] if food wedged in between the teeth is removed before brushing.” Others, however, “recommend brushing be done first and their rationale is that brushing teeth first removes the bulk of the particles on the teeth and flossing afterward can remove interdental plaque better. It could also force the remaining bit of fluoride that is left on the teeth from toothpaste into the interdental spaces.” You don’t know until you put it to the test. 

An article titled “The Effect of Toothbrushing and Flossing Sequence on Interdental Plaque Reduction and Fluoride Retention: A Randomized Controlled Clinical Trial” reported that flossing first won—both in terms of getting rid of significantly more plaque, as well as getting more of the fluoride between the teeth. “When we use dental floss after brushing, much of the particles that are removed by dental floss would stay in place.” The bottom line is that flossing followed by brushing is preferred. 

What about oil pulling? Short answer: Don’t do it. Long answer: You’ll find out in my four-part video series listed below in Related Videos.  

Treating the cause of cavities by reducing added sugar intake is the most important thing for protecting your teeth, but is there anything else we can do to improve our oral health? See below. 

Given their oxalate content, how much is too much spinach, chard, beet greens, chaga mushroom powder, almonds, cashews, star fruit, and instant tea? 

There was a tragic case in which a “green smoothie cleanse” shut down the kidneys of a woman who had had two cups of spinach a day for just ten days. Complicating the matter, she had had gastric bypass surgery and was on prolonged antibiotics, both of which can increase the absorption of the oxalates in spinach. So, too, can taking mega-doses of vitamin C: A man juicing spinach and beet greens went into kidney failure, but he was also taking about 2,000 mg of vitamin C each day. Vitamin C is metabolized into oxalate inside the body and likely played a role in his oxalate overload. In both of these cases, the individuals were getting more than 1,200 mg of oxalate a day just from their juicing. As you can see in the graph below and at 0:50 in my video Kidney Stones and Spinach, Chard, and Beet Greens: Don’t Eat Too Much, that’s easy to do with spinach—it takes only two cups of spinach a day—but it’s practically impossible with most other greens. Kale, for instance, requires more than six hundred cups a day. 

There is one case, however, of apparent dietary oxalate overload–induced kidney failure uncomplicated by surgery, antibiotics, or vitamin C: a man who had lost about 80 pounds eating a diet of berries, nuts, and greens, including spinach, six times a day. Tragically, his kidney function never recovered. 

Remember that study that purported to show a “massive” load of dietary oxalate didn’t have much of an effect on urine levels? As you can see in the graph below and at 1:30 in my video, that study went up to 250 mg of oxalates a day. That is massive if you’re talking about most greens. For instance, to get 250 mg of oxalates, you’d need to eat 25 cups of collard greens, 60 cups of mustard greens, 125 cups of kale, or 250 cups of bok choy at a time, but less than half a cup of spinach. 

Spinach really is an outlier. Even though there are small amounts of oxalates found throughout the food supply, spinach alone may account for 40 percent of oxalate intake in the United States. The Harvard cohorts found that men and older women who ate spinach eight or more times a month had about a 30 percent higher risk of developing kidney stones.  

What if you cook the greens? Oxalates are water-soluble so, for example, blanching collard greens can reduce oxalate levels by up to a third. So, to reach 250 mg of oxalates, instead of 25 cups of collards at a time, it’s 33 cups! For low-oxalate greens, though, it doesn’t matter whether they’re cooked or not, since they’re so low to begin with.  

As you can see below and at 2:33 in my video, steaming spinach reduces oxalate levels by 30 percent, and boiling cuts oxalate levels by more than half. Boiling any of the three high-oxalate greens—spinach, beet greens, and Swiss chard—results in 60 percent of the oxalates leaching into the cooking water. But, those greens start out so high that even when they’re cooked, they would contain hundreds of times more than low-oxalate greens like kale. For high-oxalate greens, though, it doesn’t matter whether they’re cooked or not, since they’re so high to begin with. 

The bottom line is that anyone with a history of kidney stones, is otherwise at high risk, or eats cups a day should probably avoid the three high-oxalate greens. This is especially important for those who juice or blend their greens, as oxalates appear to be absorbed more rapidly in liquid than solid form.  

Another reason to give preference to low-oxalate greens is that they are less stingy with their calcium. As you can see in the graph below and at 3:27 in my video, while less than a third of the calcium in milk may be bioavailable (whether from a cow or a plant), most of the calcium in low-oxalate vegetables is absorbed. The calcium bioavailability in some greens doubles that of milk, but the oxalates in spinach, chard, and beet greens bind to the calcium, preventing the absorption. 

Other high-oxalate foods that have been associated with kidney problems at high enough doses include chaga mushroom powder. Four to five teaspoons a day, and you can end up on dialysis. Four cups a day of rhubarb is also not a good idea, nor is more than a cup a day of almonds or eating that many cashews. Then there is star fruit. (You may have seen my video Neurotoxicity Effects of Star Fruit.) Consuming a single dose of about a cup and a quarter (300 mL) of star fruit juice, which is just four to six fruit, can lead to problems. Excessive intake of tea can also be a problem, especially instant tea, which boosts urine oxalate nearly four times higher than brewed tea. Two cases of kidney damage have been reported, both of which were attributed to drinking a gallon of iced tea a day. Tea, like spinach, is super healthy—just don’t overdo it. 

If you missed it, be sure to check out my video Oxalates in Spinach and Kidney Stones: Should We Be Concerned?.

To be clear, I encourage everyone to eat huge amounts of dark green leafy vegetables every day, as they are the healthiest foods on the planet. But if you follow this advice—and I hope you do—choose a variety of greens, not only spinach, beet greens, and chard. If you only eat typical amounts of greens, like just one serving a day, then it doesn’t matter which ones you choose. I eat spinach, beet greens, and chard all the time, but it’s possible to overdo those three. When I’m trying to hit my pound-a-day green leafy quota, I mostly eat kale, collards, and arugula, which also happen to have the added benefit of being cruciferocious!

How are greens so good for us? How aren’t they?! Check the Related Videos below for more on this.

Also, look below for some tips on how you might prep them for maximum benefit.

I’m thrilled to announce that preorders are now open for How Not to Age, my new book coming out in December after three years in the making. There was so much juicy research on the many aspects of aging and longevity—more than 13,000 citations’ worth!—that I couldn’t even fit it all in. So, throughout the book, you will find links to special videos I made just for How Not to Age to provide you with even more life-changing, life-saving information.

Preorders are available now. If you plan to buy How Not to Age, please do me the favor of preordering. All preorders count towards first week sales, which factor into the New York Times Best Sellers list calculations. So, the more preorders How Not to Age receives, the more likely it will make the list, which could help expose millions to the message of healthy eating. In fact, the book lands on December 5—perfect timing for holiday gifts for everyone in your life you want to live long and healthy lives! Please consider getting some of your holiday shopping done early by ordering a whole stack of them! 

Preorder and Immediately Receive a Chapter

We are also offering a gift! Everyone who preorders a copy of How Not to Age can immediately receive the Preserving Your Bones chapter from the book. After you place your order, enter your order number on this page to receive your free chapter. Be among the first to get this sneak peek into the book by preordering now. 

As always, all proceeds I receive from all of my books are donated directly to charity. 

P.S. In a few weeks I will be announcing an upcoming webinar where I will share my brand-new How Not to Age presentation before opening it up for questions. Keep your eyes out for that email at the end of September.

Were the flaxseed studies showing 20 pounds of weight loss just flukes? 

Canada now allows a health claim on the labels of products with flaxseeds, saying that we know with sufficient certainty that flaxseeds do indeed help lower cholesterol levels. The products must contain at least two tablespoons of ground flax and be relatively healthy in the first place, so they can’t boast about the cholesterol-lowering effects of flaxseed-enriched meatballs or something.

Such claims are based on studies like one that I review in my video Benefits of Flaxseed Meal for Weight Loss: a double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled trial that supplemented research subjects’ diets with flaxseeds. How do you come up with placebo food? There are placebo sugar pills for drugs, but how can you slip spoonsful of flax past someone? The researchers made special products—snack bars, muffins, bagels, and more—so the study participants would unknowingly be getting tablespoons of either ground flaxseeds or the control, whole wheat. And they did this for a year. No one knew who got which until the code was broken at the end. Their findings? The dietary flaxseed group saw a 15 percent reduction in LDL cholesterol as early as one month into the trial, but it only fell significantly lower than the whole-wheat group in those on cholesterol-lowering drugs. In whole-wheat group participants not on drugs, their cholesterol went down, too, diminishing the efficacy of the flax in comparison. You can see charts at 1:12 in my video. That’s why food placebos are so hard. 

In another trial, the researchers conducted an “open label” study, where the participants were aware they were eating flaxseeds, because they couldn’t come up with an inert placebo for flaxseed. Whole-wheat flour is a whole grain and could be beneficial in its own right, for instance, whereas white flour could make the control group look even worse. So, for this study, the researchers randomly assigned overweight participants to receive either lifestyle advice and daily ground flaxseeds or just the lifestyle advice alone as the control group. And, not surprisingly, body weight, waist circumference, and body mass index decreased significantly in both groups. (Even without lifestyle advice, simply enrolling people in a study where they know they’re going to keep getting weighed can get them to lose weight.) However, there was “a significantly greater reduction in [the] flaxseed group in comparison with controls.” And not just by a little. As you can see at 2:21 in my video, the control group that just got lifestyle advice lost nearly seven pounds and about an inch off their waist, while the group receiving the same advice plus spoonsful of flax a day—so, in effect, given more food to eat—lost more than 20 pounds on average and cut nearly four inches off their waist over the same period. Those are extraordinary numbers for an intervention that added rather than actively removed calories from the diet. Was it just a fluke? 

How about using flaxseed supplementation for non-alcoholic fatty liver disease? Thanks to the obesity epidemic, “it is the most common liver disease and now recognized as a major public health problem in contemporary society around the world.” The most common cause is a high-fat diet, but flaxseed fat may be better, compared to lard. Lard? Well, that’s not very helpful. Let’s put it to the test. 

As with the last study, participants received lifestyle modification advice with or without flaxseeds. They were told to mix the flaxseeds with water and juice and drink it down after breakfast. And? Their body weight went down, along with liver inflammation, and scarring and fat inside the liver in both groups, but the results were better in the flaxseed group. And again, there was that extraordinary 20-pound weight loss for the subjects told to add something (flaxseeds) to their diet, as you can see at 3:36 in my video. So, maybe that first study wasn’t a fluke—or maybe they both were. 

There have been dozens of randomized, placebo-controlled trials of flaxseeds and weight loss, and, as you can see in the graphic below and at 3.54 in my video, most were more equivocal. Those two recent 20-pound weight-loss studies appear to be the outliers. But still, after putting all of the studies together, you do see a significant reduction in body weight, BMI, and waistlines following flaxseed supplementation in randomized controlled trials, though one should expect more like 2 pounds of weight loss rather than 20 pounds. 

What else can flaxseeds do? So much! Check out the Related Videos below. 

What about the cyanide? Cyanide? See Friday Favorites: How Well Does Cooking Destroy the Cyanide in Flaxseeds and Should We Be Concerned About It?.

For more on weight loss, based on my book How Not to Diet, see the topic page here and the list of videos below. 

Duct tape beat out ten other wart treatments for cost and effectiveness, so why isn’t it standard practice? 

One of the “unusual, innovative, and long-forgotten remedies” noted in a dermatology journal article was the use of duct tape to cure warts. It was finally put to the test. There are all sorts of conventional therapies, from acid to cryosurgery to lasers, but most are “expensive, painful, or labor intensive,” whereas the simple application of duct tape is none of those and may even be more effective than trying to freeze off the warts. 

As I discuss in my video Can You Really Remove Warts with Duct Tape?, some doctors lauded the study, noting they had been using duct tape as a “painless, yet effective, therapy for several decades,” instead of “surgery and other destructive therapies.” Said one physician, “Sometimes, when I’ve mentioned this type of therapeutic option to a patient, they will look at me as if I’ve lost my mind! When the treatment works, however, they appreciate the wisdom of my advice and my ‘minimal discomfort and fuss’ philosophy.”

Other doctors were not so amused. After spending money on all sorts of fancy equipment, along comes duct tape? Studies like that “could damage the reputation of cryosurgery,” wrote one physician, who also complained that the ten-second application of liquid nitrogen used in the study was too short, so it was an unfair comparison. And, evidently, you really have to get in there and freeze until there is a blistering reaction. It’s painful, but too bad. The doctor even joked and made light of a poor child who, before each freezing treatment session, vomited out of fear of the pain! 

Did he have a point, though, about the ten seconds? In the trial comparing duct tape to cryotherapy, those ten-second cryotherapy treatments worked 60 percent of the time, which is actually better than the results of most cryotherapy studies that only seemed to cure about 50 percent. In fact, typical cryotherapy for warts works so poorly that, statistically, it didn’t even beat out placebo, so all of that pain may have been for nothing, though aggressive cryotherapy does seem to work better. 

What they should have done, wrote another doctor in response to the duct tape trial, is take a scalpel to the wart and really blister it before going back a week later and trying to cut and crater it out. Maybe even go back a third time. ”If the procedure I detailed had been followed, the resolution rate would have been closer to 90%”—but at what cost? In the duct tape trial, one patient “lost his study wart in a trampoline toe-amputation accident.” (Amputation—a 100 percent effective treatment!) But, at what cost? In this study, 85 percent of the duct tape patients were cured without any pain or tissue damage, whereas aggressive cryotherapy may require lidocaine injection nerve blocks, “taking the cry out of cryotherapy.” It can also cause permanent tissue damage. As you can see below and at 2:48 in my video, you can end up with big, necrotic, frostbite lesions. In one sense, tissue damage is the whole point of freezing warts, but you can end up causing deep burns, rupturing tendons, which can cause permanent disability, or causing extensive scarring in rare cases. Just the psychological stress of having to keep going back for such a painful procedure may ironically impair our ability to fight off the wart viruses in the first place. 

So, “even if the effectiveness of duct tape occlusion is shown to be merely equivalent to that of cryotherapy,” duct tape would be better. And it was shown to be even more effective than cryotherapy; in fact, duct tape may be the most effective treatment. As you can see in the graph below and at 3:25 in my video, compared to ten other wart treatments, duct tape beat them all in terms of effectiveness and cost. It was cheaper than all but the “DN” option, with DN standing for Do Nothing. Compared to the most cost-effective prescription treatments available, over-the-counter duct tape is ten times cheaper. “It is an unusual and welcome event in health care when a common ailment is proven equally amenable to an inexpensive, tolerable, and safe alternative therapy.” 

Hold on. If you look at the latest Cochrane review, which many consider to be the gold standard of evidence-based reviews, it acknowledges that cryotherapy “is less convenient, more painful, and also more expensive,” but despite being excited about the effectiveness of duct tape in an earlier review, in two subsequent studies, duct tape seemed to totally flop. So, should we give up on duct tape for warts, or is there another side of the story? You can find out the thrilling conclusion in Which Type of Duct Tape Is Best for Wart Removal?, the next and final video in this three-part series. 

This is the second video in my three-part series. If you missed the first video, check out Duct Tape and Wart Removal. 

What are the risks of contracting the brain parasite toxoplasma from cat litter or meat? 

The brain parasite toxoplasma “is responsible for considerable morbidity and mortality,” that is, disease and death, “in the United States.” It holds second place as the leading cause of foodborne-related death in the United States, after Salmonella. The parasite can invade through the placenta, so it can be especially devastating during pregnancy, leading to miscarriages, blindness, or developmental delay. It can impair cognitive function in adults, too, which explains why those who are infected appear to be at increased risk for getting into traffic accidents, for instance. “Multiple lines of evidence indicate that chronic infections caused by T. gondii [toxoplasma] are likely associated with certain psychiatric disorders in human beings.” It may even increase the risk of developing leukemia. That’s a lot! So, how do you prevent it? 

The parasite can get into the muscles, so we can contract it through meat consumption. We can also get infected through contact with feces from animals like cats. Thankfully, in cats, the “danger of infection exists only when the animal is actively shedding oocysts,” the tissue cysts formed by the parasite. Cats get it from eating infected rodents, so those “that are kept indoors, do not hunt, and are not fed raw meat are not likely to acquire T. gondii infection and therefore pose little risk to humans.” If neighborhood or feral cats are turning gardens or sandboxes at your local playground into a litter box, though, that could be a problem. As many as 6 percent of stray cats or those with outdoor access may be actively infected at any one time. They only shed the parasite for a few weeks, though, so if you adopt a cat from a shelter, they should be safe as long as they hadn’t just gone in. 

Many women have heard about the cat connection but may be less aware of the risk of foodborne infection. Only about one in three may be aware that toxoplasma “may be found in raw or undercooked meat. Nevertheless, a high percentage of women indicated that they do not eat undercooked meat during pregnancy and that they practice good hygienic measures such as washing their hands after handling raw meat, gardening [where cats may be pooping] or changing cat litter.” 

What’s the riskiest type of meat? “Cattle are not considered important hosts” for the parasite; it’s more pigs and poultry, as well as sheep and goats. The prevalence of infection among factory-farmed pigs varies from 0 to more than 90 percent. Ironically, “the likelihood of T. gondii infection in organic meat…appears to be higher than that in conventionally reared animals” because organically raised animals have outdoor access. 

Who undercooks pork and poultry, though? Surprisingly, when it comes to reaching necessary pathogen-killing temperatures, about one in three Americans may undercook meat across the board. A single slice of ham, for example, can carry more than a thousand parasites per slice. 

“Current meat inspection at slaughterhouse cannot detect the presence of T. gondii” parasites. There are tests you can perform, but “there is no widespread testing in meat inspection.” However, the risk from a single serving of meat is very small. The average probability of infection per serving of lamb, for example, was estimated to be about 1 in 67,000. The reason there are 16 times the number of cases attributed to pork consumption is not because pigs are more affected; we just happen to eat a lot more pork chops than lamb chops in the United States. 

Is there anything we can do if we’re one of the approximately one in four Americans who has already been infected? Well, one of the problems with having these parasites in our brain is accelerated cognitive decline as we age. A study evaluated older adults every year for five years and found that the executive function of those testing positive for toxoplasma seemed to drop more quickly over time, as did a measure of their overall mental status. You can see this at 3:26 in my video How to Prevent Toxoplasmosis. 

Reduced folate availability is also associated with cognitive decline, and the two may actually be related. “Recent evidence suggests that T. gondii may harvest folate from host neural cells”—directly from our nerve cells. So, beyond dopamine production, which is why we think toxo increases the risk of schizophrenia, the parasite may be sucking folate out of our brain. Enough to affect our cognitive functioning? 

Perhaps so. In the graph below and at 4:04 in my video, you can see a chart measuring cognitive function across a range of folate concentrations. Among those who are uninfected, it doesn’t seem to matter whether they have a lot of folate or just a little; they obviously have enough either way. But those who are infected have worse scores at lower levels. The same with vitamin B12, so it’s important to get enough B12 and folate. For B12, the official recommendation is that all people aged 50 and older should start taking a vitamin B12 supplement or eat vitamin B12-fortified foods every day. And, anyone on a plant-based diet should start taking that advice at any age. Folate is found concentrated in beans and greens, so following my Daily Dozen recommendations will get you more than enough. For example, half a cup of cooked lentils gets you halfway there, as does three-quarters of a cup of cooked spinach. 

Of course, toxoplasmosis is not the only reason to make sure you get enough vitamin B12. See, for example, Vitamin B12 Necessary for Arterial Health, and check out my optimum nutrient recommendations. 

This was part of my four-video series on toxoplasmosis. If you missed any of the others, see: 

The brain parasite toxoplasma may be one of the most important risk factors for schizophrenia.

Toxoplasma “infects about one-third of the population of developed countries” and about one in four adults in the United States. However, the “life-long presence of dormant stages of this parasite in the brain and muscular tissues of infected humans is usually considered asymptomatic from a clinical point of view.” There is “a complex and dynamic interplay between the parasite, brain microenvironment [our brain], and the immune response that results in the detente that promotes the life-long persistence of the parasite in the host.” We can’t rid it from our brain, but we can at least keep it from killing us, unless we get AIDS or another disease that causes our immune defenses to drop. 

“Within the past 10 years, however, many independent studies have shown that this parasitic disease…could be indirectly responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths due to its effects on the rate of traffic and workplace accidents, and also suicides. Moreover, latent toxoplasmosis is probably one of the most important risk factors for schizophrenia.” 

As I discuss in my video Does Toxoplasmosis Cause Schizophrenia?, schizophrenia does have a strong genetic component. But, even if you have the exact same genes as a schizophrenic—for instance, if your identical twin has schizophrenia—the chances of you having it are still probably less than 50 percent. So, what else might increase risk? As you can see at 1:22 in my video, studies performed over five decades in 20 countries found toxoplasma infection nearly triples the odds of schizophrenia, “which is more than any ‘gene for schizophrenia’ that has been described so far.” Now, obviously, everyone who gets this parasite in their brain does not develop schizophrenia. It may depend on where exactly in the brain the parasite takes up residence. But this “increased prevalence of toxoplasmosis in schizophrenics was demonstrated by at least 50 studies…” 

Those were published studies, though. What about studies that weren’t published? Maybe some didn’t find any connection, or perhaps there were others that were just shelved. “In schizophrenia, the evidence of an association with T. gondii [toxoplasma] is overwhelming, despite evidence of publication bias.” 

It’s still just an association, though. Instead of toxoplasma causing schizophrenia, maybe schizophrenia causes toxoplasmosis. “Institutionalized psychiatric patients may be fed undercooked meat, thereby increasing their exposure to T. gondii,” for example. That’s where military studies come in. “The U.S. military routinely collects and stores serum [blood] specimens of military service members,” which “affords a unique opportunity” to check people for infection well before the diagnosis of disease, so you can see which came first. And, indeed, the toxoplasma came first. The infection was found prior to the onset of psychotic symptoms. 

“The strongest evidence for the causal [cause-and-effect] role of Toxoplasma in triggering schizophrenia comes from a recent magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) study showing that differences in brain morphology [structure], originally thought to be characteristic of schizophrenia patients…are actually present only in the subpopulation of Toxoplasma-infected patients,” that is, only in those infected with the parasite. There are “gray matter anomalies” more often found in schizophrenia patients. But, as you can see at 3:12 in my video, when you divide the subjects into those who tested positive and negative for toxoplasmosis, you only really see it in the infected brains. 

Does this mean we might be able to treat schizophrenia with antiparasitic drugs? There is a tetracycline-type drug, minocycline, that can kill toxoplasma in mice and seems to improve symptoms when given to schizophrenics, but it may also have independent anti-inflammatory and neuroprotective properties, so we don’t know if was a toxo effect. “Future research should look to delineate the antiparasitic effect of minocycline” by testing the patients for toxo to see if the drugs work better in those who have been infected. 

There have been four randomized controlled trials specifically evaluating antiparasitic drugs in patients with schizophrenia, and no effect has been found. But, incredibly, not a single one of those studies used a drug that has been shown to actively kill off the parasites once they have been walled off in the brain. “After acute infection, parasites form walled cysts in the brain, leading to lifelong chronic infection and drug resistance to commonly used antiparasitics.” However, “there are currently no ongoing trials of anti-Toxoplasma therapy in schizophrenia despite ample evidence to justify further testing.” I hope a researcher reading this will realize the “time is ripe to evaluate antiparasitic drugs in Toxoplasma-infected patients with schizophrenia.” 

 This video is part of a series on toxoplasmosis, including: 

Nearly one quarter of Americans have already been infected with the brain parasite toxoplasma. 

Toxoplasma is a brain parasite that may infect a million Americans every year, making it “a leading cause of severe foodborne illness in the United States.” Nearly one quarter of adults and adolescents in the United States have already been infected. Newly acquired infections in a pregnant woman can be devastating. In most people with intact immune systems, though, these parasites just sit in your brain in a fine-tuned balance between the parasite and your immune system, just lying in wait, hoping you’ll get sick so your immune system will slip, and it can come back raging and spreading throughout the brain. Indeed, the “infection is lethal in the context of active HIV-AIDS,” for instance. 

But in healthy, non-pregnant individuals, the parasite just sits there with “long-term, potentially lifelong residence in the brains of healthy individuals and animals”—kept at bay by our immune system—“without any significant clinical consequence,” and, as such, “chronic toxoplasma infection has been viewed as a benign condition.” Until now, that is. As I discuss in my video Toxoplasmosis: A Manipulative Foodborne Brain Parasite, “This absence of overt symptomology has contributed to the view that tissue cysts and the bradyzoites they house”—that is, the cysts in the brain formed by the parasites—“are dormant entities.” However, recent developments “directly challenge the notion that chronic toxoplasma infections are without consequence. An emerging body of evidence suggests that the presence of an established chronic infection may contribute to the pathogenesis [development] of diverse neurological conditions including schizophrenia, epilepsy, and neurodegenerative conditions.” That doesn’t sound good. 

These effects may not be a direct consequence of the parasite, but rather “driven by persistent low level of inflammation in the infected brain.” Either way, not good. Let’s explore these new data that have gotten neurologists so worried, review strategies on how not to get infected in the first place, and determine what one might be able to do to mediate the effects if you are one of the one in four Americans who is already infected. 

Suspicions that infections might play a role in mental health date back more than a century. An editorial from an 1896 publication of Scientific American asked, “Is insanity due to a microbe?” Well, “for millions of years, parasites have altered the behaviour of their hosts.” 

Consider the diabolical effects of the rabies virus, which is “usually transmitted in the saliva by biting animals, so it makes sense that the virus taps specifically into the limbic system of the brain, turning its victims from Fido into Cujo to facilitate transmission of the virus. But brain parasites can do more than just switch behaviors on and off. “Some parasites can adaptively take over and completely control the behavior of their hosts,” like the famous “zombie ants.” “‘Enslaver’ fungi make their insect hosts die perched in a position that favors the dispersal of [fungal] spores by the wind.” You can see the head of a manipulated ant, colonized by tendrils of the fungus, below and at 3:06 in my video.

“Ants infected by the fungus…die in a dramatic way.” Once the ant is positioned just so, “dying is preceded by biting behaviour where ants clamp onto plant surfaces” to keep it stable while the fungus bursts out of the back of the ant’s head and grows a long stalk, as you can see below and at 3:30 in my video. Can you believe that?! 

There are others, too. For example, some aquatic parasites “cause various insect hosts (e.g. crickets, ants) to drown themselves so the adult parasite can reproduce in water; parasitoids cause bees to bury themselves alive or spiders to build aerial cocoons so as to protect the developing parasitoid pupa…” Those are parasitic wasps that lay their eggs in the abdomen of spiders. On the night the larva eats its way out—“the night that it will kill its host”—the larva marionettes the spider to build it a little home. How creepy is that?! 

These are insects with simple brains, though. Surely, brain parasites couldn’t affect complex behaviors in higher animals, could they? This brings us to toxoplasma. 

“Toxoplasma is known to manipulate the behavior of their hosts to increase the probability that the host is captured by a predator.” For example, toxoplasma can reproduce in cats, but how is it going to get itself from the brain of an infected mouse into the cat? It can hijack the mouse’s brain and “change their native, inborn fear of the odor of cats into an attraction to this odor.” The parasite causes the mouse to develop a fatal attraction to cats, which is good for the parasite, not so good for the mouse. 

I know what you’re thinking: What does this have to do with human mental illness? How do I avoid becoming infected in the first place? This video is part of my series on the toxoplasma this parasite. The others are: 

The biggest barrier to reducing toxic pesticides in cannabis is, not surprisingly, the cannabis industry itself.

California was the first state to legalize medical marijuana. When labs started reporting they were finding high levels of pesticide residues, the Los Angeles city government “covertly acquired and then tested three medical cannabis samples available to patients through dispensaries and found that in two of the [three] samples exceedingly high levels of bifenthrin [a pesticide] were found,” up to a thousand times the legal limit.

But how much ends up inside the consumer? As I discuss in my video Pesticides in Marijuana, only about 10 percent of the pesticides in tobacco make it through a filtered cigarette, which was found to be comparable to using cannabis in a water pipe with filters attached. But, as you can see in the graph below and at 0:45 in my video, if you use a regular bong, about half of the pesticides end up in your lungs, and using a glass pipe is even worse. Because most users don’t attach a carbon filter with 7.5 grams of activated charcoal to their bongs, “in general the portion of pesticide recovery is alarmingly high and is a serious concern.” “Although it remains unknown precisely how damaging these chemicals are to humans, the fact they are present in smoke at such high levels should be concerning.” According to researchers, “Considering these results, high pesticide exposure through cannabis smoking is a significant possibility, which may lead to further health complications in cannabis consumers”—especially if we’re talking about medical marijuana use by sick, vulnerable people.

“The potential of pesticide and chemical residue exposures to cannabis users is substantial and may pose a significant toxicological threat in the absence of adequate regulatory frameworks.” Okay, so what are states doing about it? Colorado recently suffered some high profile recalls of marijuana batches contaminated with harmful pesticides that made it into some of the edibles. Evidently, “growers sometimes find themselves quite overwhelmed by pest issues…[and] resort to nuclear tactics,” trying anything to protect their crops. This has created “a public safety threat,” with “intensified toxicity in concentrated products of particular concern.” In fact, “pesticide levels were approximately 10x higher in concentrated cannabis products,” like the oils and waxes sometimes used in edibles or dabbed as concentrates, “than the flower heads.”

A study of pesticide use on cannabis crops in Oregon found a similar problem. A survey of samples off of store shelves in Washington state found five out of six to be contaminated, including with “potentially neurotoxic and carcinogenic agents.” Many samples “harbored multiple contaminants,” attaining levels that were basically off the chart, including 24 distinct pesticide agents, insecticides, and fungicides, and none of them is approved for use on cannabis. But it isn’t their fault. The EPA hasn’t approved any because cannabis is still a federally illegal crop. In fact, testing labs in California have “become hesitant to publicize their service or list agents for which they could assay [test], as they suspected that such information” might just be used as an instruction manual of sorts by “unscrupulous growers to seek out possibly more toxic agents.”

So just regulate it then. That’s been tried, but guess what the biggest barrier has been? Surprise, surprise, it has been the multibillion-dollar cannabis industry. “Like the tobacco industry before it, the cannabis industry is attempting to weaken pesticide regulations pertaining to cannabis. Reportedly, the Colorado Department of Agriculture: ‘…initially hoped to limit permissible pesticides to the most nontoxic,’” but this proposal was quashed by industry pushback, just like the tobacco industry has been able to do.

Big Tobacco “has provided a detailed road map” for King Cannabis: “Deny addiction potential, downplay known adverse health effects, create as large a market as possible as quickly as possible, and protect that market through lobbying, campaign contributions, and other advocacy efforts.” Indeed, “bolstered by enormous profits,” the tobacco industry was able to get itself “exempted from every major piece of consumer protection legislation even after the deadly consequences of tobacco were established.” That should be a cautionary tale for us now, given that public health advocates have definitively fewer billions of dollars to work with.

Big Tobacco may not just be providing the roadmap, but waiting in the wings to own the road. “As a result of litigation against the tobacco industry, more than 80 million pages of internal company documents became available….These documents reveal that since at least 1970, despite fervent denials, major multinational tobacco companies,” including Philip Morris, have been scheming, willing, and prepared to enter the legalized marijuana market to become Big Blunt. “Because of the tobacco industry’s demonstrated ability and willingness to modify its products to increase addictiveness, obfuscate information, deceive the public, and use advertising to target vulnerable groups to increase demand, the industry also has the power to dramatically change (and expand) the use of marijuana.”

For more on the link between the tobacco and cannabis industries, check out Will Cannabis Turn Into Big Tobacco?.

My Daily Dozen recommends at least one tablespoon of ground flaxseeds a day, but what’s this about cyanide? 

Sweden’s dietary guidelines are pioneering in many ways. For example, they encourage people to decrease their climate impact by choosing more plant-based foods, which tend to produce far fewer greenhouse gas emissions, which “is why it’s important for us to cut back on meat…” I was surprised by a page on the official Swedish National Food Agency website, though, which discusses cyanogenic glycosides and hydrogen cyanide and recommends for people to “refrain[] from eating” ground flaxseed for fear of cyanide toxicity—as in the ground flaxseeds I encourage everyone to eat every day. No surprise that this was the first question I was asked when I gave a presentation in Stockholm! 

Was the Swedish government onto something? Had I been duped by Big Flax-funded researchers who claimed you could eat pounds—more than 150 tablespoons—of ground flaxseeds every day without worrying? First, some background. 

As I discuss in my video Friday Favorites: How Well Does Cooking Destroy the Cyanide in Flaxseeds?, as many as one in five plants that we eat produces cyanide. In fact, if you look at the major food crops in the world (shown in the table below and at 1:07 in my video), more than half are “cyanogenic,” meaning cyanide-producing. But, unlike toxic elements like lead, mercury, or arsenic that can’t be broken down into anything, cyanide is an organic molecule—one carbon atom attached to one nitrogen atom. In this organic state, it can definitely be toxic, but it loses its toxicity once it’s broken down or complexed to something else, and we have a cyanide-detoxifying enzyme in our body that does just that. That’s just one of five main ways our body can detoxify cyanide. It does require protein to do it, though, so that’s why there has been chronic cyanide toxicity among malnourished populations in Africa trying to live off of improperly processed cassava root, for example. But, as long as we’re getting adequate protein in our diet, our body can detoxify the normal amounts of cyanide we eat every day. 

There is a rare, congenital genetic condition called Leber’s disease, though, where you’re born without the ability to detoxify cyanide. Theoretically, “people with the potential for Leber’s disease can go blind” from drinking apple cider, for instance, “because of the effects of cyanide in cider,” but other than that, our bodies evolved to be cyanide-detoxifying machines. Of course, there’s a limit. For example, there was a case of cyanide poisoning after ingestion of bitter almonds. Not regular almonds, which produce about 40 times less cyanide, but bitter almonds, which you can’t even buy. (They’re used in flavor manufacturing.) If you did manage to get some, eating 50 of them could kill you, or even just a handful for a small child. This suggests that eating 2,000 regular almonds at one sitting could also be bad news. 

Although you can’t buy bitter almonds, you can buy apricots and apricot kernels, which are the seeds inside the stone. They actually have pretty toxic levels and have been implicated in cases of severe cyanide poisoning all linked to “Laetrile: the cult of cyanide, promoting poison for profit” scam that you may recall I talked about in my Do Apricot Seeds Work as an Alternative Cancer Cure? video, so I’m totally sympathetic to regulators wanting to take a precautionary approach. But, are flaxseeds like bitter almonds, where just a few ounces could kill you, or are they more like regular almonds, where regular dietary intake wouldn’t even come close? 

Although the fact that flaxseeds can produce cyanide sounds like it would be a significant health concern, “it is not for several reasons,” according to scientists funded by the flax industry. First, an adult human has the ability to detoxify up to 100 mg of cyanide per day. That’s where the “pounds of flaxseeds a day are safe” number came from. And if you wanted to consume even more than those totally unrealistic 150 tablespoons a day, you could just eat them in baked goods since cooking destroys the cyanide. What’s more, eating seven or eight tablespoons of raw flaxseeds doesn’t even bump up the level of urinary thiocyanate, which is an indicator of cyanide exposure. So, it doesn’t even look like your body is exposed to it. “Thus, the toxicity of flaxseed from CGs [cyanogenic glycosides] is not a realistic health threat.”  

Let’s unpack that. The cooking part is mostly true. Baking muffins with just a quarter cup or so of ground flax for 15 to 18 minutes at about 450 degrees Fahrenheit eliminates the cyanide-forming compounds. The same appears to happen with baked bread, but, if you bake ground flaxseeds on their own, only 20 percent of the compounds are wiped out in even an hour at 350 degrees. Baking them whole wipes out 80 percent, though, and baking them in bread or muffins eliminates 100 percent. How does that make any sense? It’s the moisture. Heat plus water wipes out the cyanide. It can be eliminated by boiling for just five minutes, when making hot cereal, for instance. So, yes, in most cases, it’s true that cooking eliminates the cyanide compounds in flax, because they are typically in a batter as an egg substitute or in a moist dough when baking crackers, for example. In those cases, the cyanide is gone upon cooking. But, you can’t just spread ground flaxseeds on a baking sheet because they dry out so fast that only a minority of the cyanide is lost. Why does it matter, though, if your body doesn’t even seem to notice seven or eight tablespoons of them when they’re raw? Because your body does notice. Urinary thiocyanate excretion doubled at that level, though that’s just a sign your body is actively detoxifying it. And if we can detoxify a kilo’s worth of flax a day, what’s the problem? 

Even if the “adult human body has the ability to detoxify ≤100 mg cyanide/day,” kids eat flax, too. Furthermore, as you can see below and at 5:47 in my video, a kilo has about 50 percent more than the 100 mg we could detoxify and I’m not interested in how much we can detoxify “up to.” For safety, we should be interested in the worst-case scenario, not the best-case scenario. Would someone please just give study participants different doses of flaxseeds and measure how much cyanide ends up in their blood? They did, and I cover that study in my video Friday Favorites: Should We Be Concerned About the Cyanide in Flaxseeds?. 

So, Friday Favorites: How Well Does Cooking Destroy the Cyanide in Flaxseeds and Should We Be Concerned About It? Watch the thrilling conclusion. 

I mentioned my Daily Dozen Checklist, which includes my recommendation for at least one tablespoon of ground flaxseed a day. Check it out to learn more. 

For the last few decades, fitness fans who grew to love unique and bold beers were left to drink watery, bland light beer from the big guys if they wanted to keep their waists trim.

Thankfully for beer lovers, breweries have figured out how to make light craft beers without having to compromise (much) on flavor.

These newest takes on “light” beers — typically around 100 calories and 3 to 6 carbs per 12-oz. serving — run the gamut from ales to pilsners to IPAs, and will keep even the most discerning beer nerd satisfied after a long day recreating.

Keep in mind, however, that carbs make up about 12 to 24 of those 100 calories. The remaining 76 to 88 calories come from alcohol, which is every bit as impactful as carbs if not more so.

Also remember that, while these are light beers, alcohol is still alcohol. Most of the 12-ounce cans or bottles here are just shy of one “standard” alcoholic drink, so it’s important to drink responsibly.

With that said, we sampled the 10 best light craft beers now available across the nation so fitness buffs can still enjoy a satisfying beer without compromising on taste.

Calories: 100 | Carbs: 3 g | ABV: 4.5%

A more sessionable take on a witbier than the company’s flagship White Rascal, Avery Brewing’s Little Rascal zigs lemon where its predecessor zags orange, with one-third fewer calories.

Brewed with Meyer lemon and Lemondrop hops, Little Rascal pours slightly hazy, drinks citrusy, and finishes crisply.

Calories: 110 | Carbs: 8.7 g | ABV: 4%

Perennial hop-head fave Two Hearted Ale gets a lean makeover with this recently released, light version.

Sipping it brings forth a bit of watery-ness at first taste, but that classic floral hoppiness found in its higher-calorie brother quickly follows up.

It’s brewed with a blend of Galaxy and Centennial hops that imparts piney, citrus notes.

Calories: 75 | ABV: 2.9%

A rare farmhouse entrant in the category, Jester King has managed to pack a relative abundance of saison flavor into a beer with such low calorie and ABV counts.

Earthy notes of yeast and barn funk customary to the style combine with spice and lemon for an unusually fizzy table beer with a dry finish.

Calories: 95 | Carbs: 3.6 g | ABV: 4%

Slightly Mighty brings a nice tropical sweetness with the addition of monk fruit, one of the better low-calorie sugar alternatives out there.

It pours into a golden haze and offers a crisp taste with well-developed and dynamic flavors of pineapple, mango, and citrus.

Calories: 99 | Carbs: 5 g | ABV: 4.1%

This “slightly tart, subtly salty” blonde ale is positioned to active folk as refreshing, easy-drinking, and even restorative of nutrients lost to exercise, thanks to electrolytes added during the brewing and fermentation processes.

While its value as a hydration beverage — ethanol is a desiccant, after all — is debatable, Easy Sport’s bright, tangerine tang is unquestioned.

Calories: 99 | Carbs: 4 g | ABV: 4.2%

A smooth and crisp blonde ale under 100 calories, this Kona creation is superb for sipping on slow days off. It features Millennium, Mosaic, and Amarillo hops that provide a bit of spice mixed with subtle mango flavors. Pours clear and is very refreshing.

Calories: 98 | Carbs: 3 g | ABV: 4%

An American IPA, this light entry from Lagunitas pours clear and golden with nice hints of sweetness cut by acidic citrus notes that taper off to a grassy, earthiness.

Not too hop-forward, but it has nice, subtle floral aromas that make it very sessionable.

Calories: 99 | Carbs: 3 g | ABV: 4.2%

A great session beer, this golden ale from Omission is — along with being brewed for lower calories and carbs — also made to remove as much of the gluten.

Hops used are Millennium, Citra, and Galaxy, which bring the expected citrus hints to this light beer.

Calories: 100 | Carbs: 8g | ABV: 4%

This bright hazy IPA was engineered to offer an easy-to-drink brew with a full flavor profile.

It’s stacked with hops — El Dorado, Mosaic, Chinook, and Idaho 7, to name just a few — making sure this lower-calorie version of Firestone’s Mind Haze IPA doesn’t sacrifice much in taste.

Notes include pineapple and citrus, finishing only slightly on the bitter side.

Calories: 100 | Carbs: 5 g | ABV: 4%

Hazies are common in the lo-cal category, but High Light manages to distinguish itself by not really standing out in any individual aspect: It strikes a balance between malt and hop, isn’t overly bitter, and doesn’t taste too sweet.

Notes of grapefruit, watermelon, and pear subtly carry this baby-bear’s-porridge of light beers (i.e., just right).

The post The 10 Most Flavorful Light Craft Beers appeared first on BODi.

Whether you opt for the open road or a stationary bike, it’s easy to fall in love with cycling. The sport offers a myriad of benefits — from improved endurance to mood-boosting endorphins — that are only amplified by a healthy cycling diet.

Nutrition for cycling isn’t unlike most other healthy, balanced diets. It’s based on nutrient-rich whole foods that provide your body with energy.

But there are some nuances to a cycling diet — both before and after a ride — that concern meal timing, portion sizes, and types of foods. We asked a few experts to weigh in with their thoughts and recommendations.

Nutrition for cycling is as much about when you eat as what you eat. How long you’re in the saddle is also important.

Hopping on the bike for an hour? No need to worry about pre-workout fueling. But, if you plan to pedal for longer, food needs to be part of your strategy, says Stacey Krawczyk, M.S., R.D., president of FoodWell Strategies.

“If your exercise is going to be longer than 60 minutes, you should eat a small meal a few hours beforehand,” she says.

If you don’t have long before your ride, opt for a small snack. Ingesting too much food too close to your workout could leave you feeling sluggish or queasy.

Krawczyk explains that carbohydrates play a “crucial” role in a cycling diet.

“Active individuals (who exercise at this extreme level) should eat 50 to 65 percent of their total daily calorie intake as carbohydrates,” she says, so look to healthy, easy-to-digest carbs for pre-ride snacks and meals.

Some pre-workout ideas include:

What you drink is also a critical component of a healthy cycling diet. “Always remember to consider hydration and electrolyte status!” says Lauren Sambataro, FDN-P, CHEK, IFHC.

“If you’re exercising for a prolonged period of time, or you tend to sweat a lot, pre-loading with an electrolyte source including sodium and potassium can be extremely helpful for preventing cramps and fatigue,” she explains.

Like any form of regular physical activity, riding a bike may help you nudge the numbers on the scale.

“As a general rule of thumb, creating an energy deficit (more calories out than in) could potentially encourage weight loss,” says Sambataro.

And because cycling is low-impact and can typically be tolerated for an extended period of time, Sambataro explains, it’s a great option for individuals interested in losing weight.

One study published in the International Journal of Obesity found that previously inactive, overweight adults who began biking to and from work lost just as much weight as participants who performed daily “leisure time” exercise.

However, Sambataro cautions that weight loss is a complicated equation, and exercise is just one variable.

In addition to your workouts and diet, factors like genetics, hormones, sleep, and stress also play an important role in weight management.

A healthy cycling diet isn’t about excessive restriction, says Garret Seacat, C.S.C.S., head coach of Absolute Endurance.

“Trying to cut back [on calories] while exercising can lead to decreased performance during your training, and you can even see worse results as you begin to deny your body the proper fuel it needs over time,” he says.

However, many cyclists run into the opposite problem.

“Athletes make the mistake of finishing a large ride (4 to 6+ hours), burning up to 4,000 calories, then gorging themselves at a restaurant afterward and replacing all the calories (and then some) by accident,” he says.

Even if you’re not spending half of your day on a bike, the same principle applies: If you eat more calories than you burn, you’ll likely gain weight, not lose it.

“If your goal is weight loss and you are putting in big mileage, on those days, you should have a protein shake ready to go afterward,” recommends Seacat.

A protein shake will not only take the edge off your hunger and prevent you from overeating, it will also aid muscle repair and overall recovery.

Nutrition for cycling should be made up of as many real, whole foods as possible, including:

“Eating after a ride is important because it replaces your muscles’ glycogen (sugar) stores,” says Krawczyk.

Seacat recommends refueling with a protein shake or a snack that provides protein for muscle protein synthesis and carbohydrates to replenish those glycogen stores.

Some examples of post-cycling snacks include:

While the consensus among most fitness professionals is that you should consume a meal or snack within 30 minutes of exercise, a small study indicates that the window for replenishing glycogen stores is much larger.

So, eat when you’re hungry. Just be sure to make healthy choices.

The post Help Your Results off the Bike With the Right Cycling Diet appeared first on BODi.

Craving sweet food is natural, but consuming lots of added sugar isn’t. Too much of it in your diet can lead to poor digestion and moodiness and negatively impact your overall health. So if you’re cutting down on added sugar, learning how to use bananas as a sweetener can go a long way.

Ripe bananas contain over 14 grams of sugar, making them one of the sweetest fruits we eat, but they also come packed with fiber, which helps regulate blood sugar.

Plus, thanks to their creamy texture, and how well they hold up to freezing and baking, bananas are an incredibly versatile and inexpensive way to sweeten food without refined sugar.

Using bananas as a sweetener in treats is just one way to eat more dessert and make them fit into a healthy eating plan.

Below are some easy ways to substitute bananas for sugar in desserts.

Thanks to their rich and creamy texture, bananas are an excellent base for a frozen treat.

Though traditionally used as a fat replacer, bananas are sweet enough to swap out for sugar in quick breads and muffins.

Blended bananas work their magic way beyond smoothies!

If you have a dessert idea, chances are bananas fit well with it.

You can make a sauce for bread pudding by mixing mashed banana with coconut milk, a topping for pancakes by mashing a banana with a smidge of maple syrup, or sweeten your overnight oats with thinly sliced layers of them.

Whichever way you cut — or mash— them, bananas are a healthy substitute for sugar.

The post How to Sweeten Food With Bananas Instead of Sugar appeared first on BODi.

Viewing a nutrition label, it might appear that protein is simply protein, since that’s the only way it’s ever listed. But there’s a difference between incomplete proteins and complete proteins.

Proteins consist of amino acids, each of which can appear in food in varying quantities — or not at all. That can make it hard to know if you’re really getting the protein you need.

One way to make eating simpler is to consume complete protein sources, which contain the essential amino acids in the required quantities.

Read further for the differences between complete and incomplete proteins, as well as a list of complete protein foods.

There are 20 total amino acids that comprise protein in the body, but only nine of these are considered essential. An essential amino acid is one that the body can’t make on its own, and therefore must get from food.

A complete protein is one that has all nine essential amino acids in the amounts needed. They include phenylalanine, valine, threonine, tryptophan, methionine, leucine, isoleucine, lysine, and histidine.

The simplest way to consume a complete protein is to choose animal sources like meat, poultry, fish, eggs, and dairy.

These foods contain what is called high biological value protein, which refers to how efficiently a protein can be utilized by the body. Those containing the greatest supplies of essential amino acids score highest.

That doesn’t mean you can’t get all your amino acids on a vegetarian or vegan diet. For example, soy is a complete protein, and there are ways to combine other vegan foods to get everything you need.

By eating a variety of plant foods throughout the day, you can get all your essential amino acids.

Below is a quick review of the quality and quantity of protein found in different food groups.

Meat, poultry, and seafood: These have the highest amounts of complete protein per serving of any whole food. This protein is well absorbed and utilized by the body.

Eggs (6 g each): While they don’t contain as much protein per serving as meat, poultry, or fish, eggs are among the highest in biological value.

Dairy: Cow’s milk has among the highest amounts of protein per serving compared to other milks, and is a complete protein with a high biological value.

Soy milk is comparable in protein quantity with 7–8 g per cup and is also a complete protein, but has a lower biological value than cow’s milk.

Greek yogurt (17 g per 6-oz. serving): Also a dairy source, Greek yogurt is so concentrated (compared to other yogurts), it’s an excellent source of protein — perfect for breakfast or after a workout.

Soybeans (22 g per cup, cooked): Soy is the only food in the plant kingdom that’s considered a complete protein.

With the exception of soybeans, foods from the plant kingdom are considered incomplete sources of protein as they are typically limited in one essential amino acid or another.

That’s where combining foods is vital, to ensure that you get all the essentials! Below is a list of some plant foods with their limiting essential amino acid and protein content.

Legumes: Legumes include beans, peas, and lentils. They are high in lysine but limited in methionine.

Seeds: While high in other amino acids, many seeds are limited in lysine.

Grains: Whole grains provide protein, carbs, and fiber, but like seeds (and nuts), most are high in methionine and tend to be lower in lysine.

Conventional wisdom once held that complementary proteins must be combined at each meal.

But now we know our bodies are smart enough to do this on their own as long as we eat complementary protein sources throughout the day (or even over 2 to 3 days!).

The classic vegan combo that most of us are familiar with is rice and beans.

While neither is complete on its own, together they provide all nine essential amino acids at the levels needed to be considered complete, and more often than not tons of heart-healthy fiber.

But there are plenty of other delicious and creative combinations you can try.

One good rule of thumb to keep in mind is to try and mix legumes with grains, such as hummus and pita, or to add quinoa and beans to your salad.

The post Complete Protein Foods for Every Diet appeared first on BODi.

If you spend any time in the kitchen preparing meals, having a basic understanding of the various culinary knife cuts will help you make better food. Many knife cuts are very easy to achieve, and learning to use the right ones will not only improve your results in the kitchen, it will also make you look like a total badass!

Don’t be scared off by the term “knife cuts.” It simply refers to the many different ways of cutting and shaping food. In culinary parlance, every shape and size has a different name, so that when reading a recipe, the person cooking will know exactly what to do to.

This fancy stuff isn’t just for show. The size and shape of vegetables in a recipe affects the flavor and texture of a dish, and how long it needs to cook. Small pieces cook faster than large pieces and allow several different flavors to be part of the same bite. Large pieces will retain a more recognizable flavor and rustic texture.

Using the right knife cut will get all of the pieces to be the same size so they cook evenly.

Ready to level up in the kitchen? Use this guide to help you master 10 different knife cuts.

A rough chop is exactly what it sounds like. Hack a vegetable into a few pieces and you’ll be on the right track. Just aim to make the pieces approximately the same size — an inch or two in diameter — so that they cook evenly. It’s so easy, you could do it with your eyes closed (but please don’t!).

This knife cut is generally used for vegetables that will flavor stocks or get pureed or mashed, but it can be a game changer for speeding up your time in the kitchen.

Rough chop any and all vegetables for roasting, steaming, stews, and chilies. The pieces will be larger, but heartier, and you’ll shave precious minutes off your meal prep activities.

Smaller than the rough chop, the basic chop is the home cook’s bread and butter, and your go-to knife cut for most recipes. Use it whenever precision, shape, and size don’t matter.

For this knife cut, simply cut the vegetable into small pieces of similar size so that a few pieces can fit together on a spoon.

The trick to better chopping is to let the shape of the vegetable guide how you cut it. If it’s round like a potato, start by cutting the vegetable into slabs of even width. If it’s long and thin like a carrot, cut it into spears first.

If the carrot is thick, cut it lengthwise once more, then cut all the pieces in half. To finish this task quickly and get more uniform pieces, gather the carrot sticks into a bundle and slice them to the desired size.

This straightforward knife cut yields pretty, round vegetable slices that can be steamed, sautéed, roasted, or eaten raw.

The easiest way to cut cylindrical vegetables (like carrots, zucchini, and cucumbers) is to slice them into coins, which in French cuisine is known as a rondelle. (Hence the name of the cut!)

To do this, hold a knife perpendicular to the vegetable and make even slices, usually ⅛- to ½-inch thick.

Ready to take things to the next level? Give your vegetable coins some extra je ne sais quoi by cutting them on a bias, or diagonal.

From a cooking stand point, a bias cut isn’t much different from a rondelle cut. But it does add visual interest, so it’s perfect for when you want to show off a little bit. Plus, it’s pretty easy to do with any cylindrical vegetable. Simply hold the knife at a 45 degree angle to the vegetable and slice. That’s it!

Make your veggie tray a thing of beauty with batonnets. These aren’t your grandma’s carrot sticks… unless granny went to the Cordon Bleu.

Batonnets are uniform ½-inch by ½-inch by 2½-inch sticks. This is the knife cut to practice first if you want to graduate to more advanced cuts like the dice, julienne, and brunoise since it’s the starting point for all of them.

To do this cut, first, remove the top and tail of the vegetable. Then, slice each side to square them off. Finally, cut the vegetable into 2½-inch sticks.

If you’re starting with a larger vegetable, like a potato or jicama, square off the round edges, then slice it into ½-inch thick slabs, and then cut each slab into sticks.

If you run into a recipe that call for diced ingredients, this really just means to cut them into cubes. There are a few different sizes of cubes:

Things get even smaller from there with finest dice, the Brunoise.

To dice, first you want to slice off the round sides of the vegetable to create flat edges. Then, cut that into slabs that are the width you are aiming for. Cut those slabs into batons of the same width, then into cubes.

The size of dice you use will depend on the dish. Large dice is most common for root vegetables and is great for hearty stews. A medium and small dice can be used for most vegetables and will elevate the appearance of any dish from home-cooked to restaurant worthy.

Ooh, now we’re getting fancy. The julienne is an advanced knife skill that will make your dishes look more refined. You can use it in stir-fries, as raw garnish, or when tough vegetables will be mixed with tender vegetables, like the broccoli stems in a kale and broccoli salad.

I’m going to tell you the professional way to julienne, and then recommend you do something completely different.

For a proper julienne, start with a batonnet (remember that from above?) and slice it lengthwise into four ⅛-inch thick planks. Then, cut each plank lengthwise into matchstick-sized pieces that are ⅛-inch wide, leaving you with thin strips that are squared off at the ends and exactly ⅛-inch by ⅛-inch by 2½-inches long.

If you aren’t trying to pass a culinary exam, then we highly recommend another method that will give you slightly less perfect, but perfectly acceptable matchsticks. Plus, it will save boatloads of time and create fewer wasted scraps!

Simply slice whatever vegetable you are using on a slant into ⅛-inch thick rounds that are two to three inches long. Stack those slabs, then slice into ⅛-inch strips. Voila, matchsticks!

When you’re aiming to impress or have unlimited free time on your hands, break out the brunoise.

This fussy, meticulous knife cut takes a lot of time and effort, but those precise — and supremely satisfying — tiny cubes might well be worth your while. You’ll look like a pro, and feel like a culinary superhero.

To achieve this finest dice, start with a batonnet, cut it into a julienne, then stack your matchsticks and cut them into ⅛-inch cubes.

Use brunoise vegetables in sauces, make a delicate vegetable soup, or film your very own tiny food videos.

To the novice cook, delicate herbs can be tricky little leaves to tame. They’re small and flat already… how do you get them even smaller? I once watched a friend chop basil for a caprese salad one leaf at a time — that is not the most efficient way and took what seemed like an eternity.

That’s where the easy-peasy chiffonade cut comes in. Start by gathering or stack the leaves of fresh herbs like basil, parsley, or sage (or even larger leafy greens like kale or mustard greens) and then roll the stack like a cigar. Slice the roll evenly into thin ribbons. That’s it!

If the herbs will be used as garnish, just gently toss them to separate the ribbons before adding them to your dish.

When you want to finely chop a pungent ingredient like garlic, ginger, fresh herbs, or citrus peels so that tiny pieces can be evenly distributed throughout your dish or used as garnish, it’s time to mince.

To mince garlic, for example, lay your knife blade flat on the clove then press down firmly with the heel of your palm and give it a good whack. Slice the smashed garlic clove, then turn those slices perpendicular to the blade and keep chopping until the pieces are very small.

This amount of mincing will usually do, but there is a final step that with make your mince superfine: use both hands.

Grip the knife handle in one hand and use your free hand to press the tip of the blade against the cutting board. Rock the curved blade back and forth until the pieces are as tiny as you can get them. Every so often, use the sides of the knife to scrape the pieces into a pile. If scraps stick to the blade, carefully wipe them back into the pile and keep cutting.

Practice this technique every time you chop garlic or herbs and you’ll look like a culinary wizard in no time.

OK, you got us, this isn’t a knife skill, and you already know how to do it (hopefully). But, shredded vegetables are called for in many BODi recipes, so knowing how to utilize this tool will make recipes even more simple.

The box grater is an underused kitchen tool, and once you discover its many uses, you’ll wonder why you have only been using it for cheese.

Use the largest holes of a box grater or the shredding disc of a food processor to make cauliflower rice, shred carrots and broccoli stems for salads, zucchini for bread (or burgers!), potatoes for latkes and apples for oatmeal or muffins.

Try grating onions instead of chopping them for pasta sauces, or create a fresh topping for toast or a bright salad dressing by slicing a tomato in half and grating the flesh into a bowl. Watch out, Gordon Ramsay!

The post Learn How to Do These 10 Different Knife Cuts and Become a Kitchen Wizard appeared first on BODi.

Think about the last time you grabbed an apple out of the fridge for an afternoon snack. Are you the type of person who bites into it right away? Or do you take it to the sink to soak or scrub it first? Do you remove the peel before slicing it? Perhaps you don’t think much about it.

We’re living in a time when making choices about food isn’t just about nutrition, but also sustainability, safety, and convenience. The decision of whether or not to remove the peel of your favorite produce before eating it has become a topic of debate. 

Furthermore, a company called Apeel has created an extra layer of “skin” for produce that helps keep it fresh for longer. But does this add to the concerns about what’s on our fruits and veggies? According to social media posts that went viral earlier this year (and will probably circulate again), it does.

So, what’s the truth? Is Apeel safe? Should you strip the protective layers of nature’s bounty or embrace the skin and all its nutrients (and potential risks)? We’re diving into the question of whether to peel or not to peel, including how to spot Apeel on fruit and veggies and whether it’s worth worrying about.

Apeel Edipeel is a plant-based coating that was created to lengthen the shelf life of fresh produce. It’s intended to keep moisture in and oxygen out to slow the ripening (and rotting) timeline. The company claims that it can keep produce fresh for twice as long as normal and reduce waste. 

The coating is based on cutin, a waxy barrier against the elements made of fatty acids and naturally exists on fruits and vegetables. Apeel — made from purified monoglycerides and diglycerides — can either be used to spray or dip the plant in which helps it block elements that promote rotting. 

Currently, Apeel is only approved for avocados, limes, mandarins, apples, and cucumbers that are available in select stores (like some Target, Safeway, and Costco locations). Produce that is coated in Apeel bears an oval-shaped, green and white sticker indicating such.

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So, is Apeel Edipeel safe to consume? Well, if you were on social media in April of 2023, you may have noticed viral posts sharing a safety data sheet claiming that Apeel was hazardous and could cause serious damage to your health. But what people sharing the post didn’t realize was that the safety sheet wasn’t for Apeel Edipeel but for an unrelated cleaning product called Apeel. 

The bottom line? Apeel Edipeel, the coating used on certain fresh produce to lengthen shelf life, has not been shown to be dangerous to your health. The ingredients, monoglycerides and diglycerides, fall in the category of Generally Recognized as Safe (GRAS) by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). As of now, experts say that Apeel produce doesn’t seem concerning. 

Now that we’ve got that sorted out, let’s move on to some of the other things to consider when it comes to our produce. First, what are the pros and cons of consuming fruits and veggies with the skin left on?

The aversion to eating the peels of fruits and veggies often forms as a texture issue during childhood, but it can continue into our adult years out of habit. However, learning to leave the edible skin on certain types of produce can enhance the nutritional benefits we get from it. 

Katie Schimmelpfenning, RD tells us, “Eating the skin of produce such as apples and potatoes not only boosts the nutrients you get from the food but the fiber too. Fiber from peels helps to promote fullness.”

Fiber is a critical nutrient for health that many American adults are lacking. In fact, surveys estimate that only 5% of us are meeting the minimum daily requirements for fiber — which is around 30 grams.

Schimmelpfenning explains that beyond fiber, produce skin is a rich source of vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants. She continues, “These can help to reduce inflammation and prevent diseases such as cancer and heart disease.”

In addition to the extra nutritional benefit of eating the skin, leaving it on can help reduce our household food waste and the overall environmental impact of our diet. 

After all, a whopping 30-40% of the food supply in the United States ends up in the landfill. Some of this food loss is due to issues like spoilage at various points along the supply chain, but much of it is also consumer and retail waste. Eating the skin of your produce is one way to keep excess out of the trash. 

While there’s no doubt that produce skin is a good source of nutrients, eating it doesn’t come without potential risks to consider.

Wan Na Chun, MPH, RD, CPT tells us that the skin of fruits and vegetables can be home to harmful chemicals, pesticides, and contaminants. To reduce the risk of consuming them, she says, “It’s recommended to wash and soak the produce, as well as choosing organic [varieties].”

Chun explains that the Environmental Working Group (EWG) publishes an annual analysis called the “Dirty Dozen. This is a list of 12 fruits and vegetables that are found to be most contaminated with pesticides based on the latest testing data from the United States Department of Agriculture and the Food and Drug Administration. 

The 2023 Dirty Dozen list includes strawberries, spinach, kale, collard and mustard greens, peaches, pears, nectarines, apples, grapes, bell and hot peppers, cherries, and blueberries. 

Chun says, “Exposure to harmful chemicals, pesticides, and contaminants found on the skin of some fruits and vegetables can pose potential risks to human health including dermatological, gastrointestinal, neurological, carcinogenic, respiratory, reproductive, and endocrine effects.”

The EWG also published what’s called The Clean 15 list, which includes the produce tested to contain the least amount of pesticides. Those that make the cut typically have a tough outer peel or husk that needs to be removed before eating, therefore protecting it from contamination. 

The latest list includes avocados, sweet corn, pineapple, onions, papaya, frozen peas, asparagus, honeydew, kiwi, cabbage, mushrooms, mango, sweet potatoes, watermelon, and carrots.

Don’t panic — you don’t have to start peeling every fruit and vegetable you purchase. But certain ones may generally be safer to to eat peeled due to their likelihood of housing more pesticide residues, or because the texture of their skin can be difficult to digest. 

Some to consider peeling include:

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Peeling the skin from higher-risk produce is likely to remove some of the harmful substances that may be present, but not all of them. Furthermore, some pesticides are systemic, meaning they are drawn up through the plant’s root system versus being externally applied. In this case, peeling them doesn’t make a huge difference.

In some cases, certain fruits and vegetables may be better off purchased organic versus conventional. Organic produce is less likely to have harmful chemicals on their skin because of the agricultural practice standards that are required to achieve organic certification. 

According to the USDA National Organic Program, “These methods integrate cultural, biological and mechanical practices that foster cycling of resources, promote ecological balance and conserve biodiversity. Synthetic fertilizers, sewage sludge, irradiation, and genetic engineering may not be used [in order for something to be considered organic].”

Consider choosing organic versions of:

Whether or not to peel your produce or purchase organic is a personal choice. Sometimes the risks don’t outweigh the benefits, and vice versa.

For produce you’re not peeling or buying organic, just be sure to wash them well. Experts recommend running them under water. Provide gentle friction with your hands to produce with soft skin. For those with harder or textured skin, use a produce brush to remove dirt and residue.

One 2006 study found that the reduction in surface contamination by soaking leafy greens in lemon juice or vinegar was not significantly different from soaking them in water. Soaking was also more effective for smooth-skinned produce versus lettuce and broccoli. The authors concluded that gently scrubbing produce under a stream of cool water is an adequate at-home produce cleaning method.

A 2017 study compared the effectiveness of plain water, a solution of one ounce of baking soda with 100 ounces of water, and a Clorox bleach solution in removing pesticide residues from apples. The authors declared the baking soda solution the winner, which completely removed the pesticides in under 15 minutes. 

As you explore safety in your produce, it’s also worth supporting sustainable farming practices, which are in place to propel a safer and less environmentally destructive food system as a whole. At the end of the day, aim to have a healthy awareness about the food you eat. What matters most is that you’re eating a wide variety of nutritious plant foods regularly and your choices reflect your personal values.

Chun agrees, saying, “Both organic and conventionally grown produce can contain pesticides, and neither is inherently safer or healthier than the other. The important thing is to get plenty of servings of fruits and vegetables each day, whether you choose to eat the skin or not.”

Fruits and vegetables provide an array of nutrients that are essential to our health. Unfortunately, many of the modern agricultural methods used to grow them result in produce that is contaminated with pesticides. There are also other things to consider when choosing produce, like whether you want to purchase ones that use Apeel. 

One option to reduce your exposure to potentially harmful compounds is to purchase certified organic produce, though this can get expensive and isn’t always necessary. Another option is to make sure you’re washing produce well and removing the peel or skin for some of the higher-risk varieties. 

Make informed choices when it comes to eating fruit and vegetable skin. The best option is the one that works for your lifestyle and aligns with your goals and preferences. 

What have your experiences with peeling produce been like? Have you purchased Apeel produce? Share other tips and advice in the comments, and subscribe to the HUM newsletter for more insights on healthy eating and food safety. 

The post Apeel: To Peel or Not to Peel appeared first on HUM Nutrition Blog.

Have you spotted the latest TikTok food trend? It’s the #Snacklebox, a portable, cleverly organized tackle box filled with snacks. This quick, easy, and convenient snack solution has become a viral sensation on social media. It’s an on-the-go charcuterie board that has taken snacking to a whole new level!

Here we’re going to cover the origins of this viral craze, how to build your own Snacklebox, and give you plenty of ideas to assemble your own Snacklebox using one convenient storage container. Let’s get snacking!

With a staggering 6 million views, the hashtag #SnackleBox has dominated the food TikTok scene since TikTok parents started the trend back in November 2019.

It started with filling a plastic dollar store tackle box with kids’ snacks. Soon parents realized that it wasn’t just for kids and filled it with their own snacks to fulfill their cravings. Since then, TikTok users have prepared intricate snack boxes for road trips, plane rides, and even lakeside bachelorette parties.

The possibilities for customizing your DIY on-the-go snack box are endless! Start with a simple one-layer tackle box or dive into a multi-layered version to store your favorite goodies. Also, don’t limit yourself to just tackle boxes. Check your local craft departments for craft, sewing, and other storage boxes for additional Snacklebox storage ideas.

From there fill it with your favorite snacks, open it up, sit back, and enjoy. We know you’ll be in for a delightful treat!

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A Snacklebox is a personalized snacking experience that’s satisfying, tasty, and enjoyable. But while you’re planning your favorite snacks don’t forget to keep in mind your dietary needs.Choosing snacks packed with nutrients will not only help keep you satisfied but also offer numerous health benefits such as regulating your hormones. And by selecting high-protein snacks you’ll get a quick energy boost that will help you stay full till your next meal.

Here’s a list of snack ideas to help you create a Snacklebox that’s delicious, fun, and healthy.

Mixed nuts are excellent healthy choices providing a good mix of protein, carbs, and healthy fats. Their high content of unsaturated fats helps to reduce inflammation and lower bad cholesterol levels related to heart disease. Containing a variety of nutrients, mixed nuts are also antioxidant powerhouses.

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Greek yogurt, known for its thicker, denser consistency, offers a higher concentration of protein and probiotics compared to its traditional yogurt counterparts. It contains almost twice the amount of protein to help keep you fuller longer. Add berries to create a healthy synergy food combination of antioxidants and probiotics.

Hummus is considered part of a nutritious diet due to its healthy fats and high fiber content. Made out of chickpeas, tahini, oil, and salt, hummus is a basic recipe that anyone can make at home. To make it a balanced, more nutritious snack, pair it with carrot sticks or celery sticks to get a healthy dose of fiber, vitamin A, and potassium.

If you have savory cravings try out whole-grain crackers with avocado. Whole grains offer a rich source of fiber, vitamins, minerals, and other essential nutrients which are great for fighting constipation and for long-term intestinal health. When paired with avocado, rich in healthy fats, fiber, and a variety of vitamins and minerals, you’ve created yet another winning, nutrition-packed combination for your Snacklebox.

Got a sweet tooth instead? Opt for dried fruits. They contain more fiber and antioxidants per ounce compared to fresh fruit. A single serving can supply a substantial portion of the recommended daily intake of numerous vitamins and minerals reducing your risk for developing cancer and heart disease.

Another great option for a sweet tooth is dark chocolate. One of the best sources of antioxidants, quality dark chocolate can positively affect your health by improving symptoms of depression and anxiety. Containing neurochemicals and other phytochemicals, dark chocolate helps to enhance feelings of calmness and contentedness.  

To create a healthy Snacklebox focus on a balanced mix of snacks containing protein, fat, and carbs and a combination of different flavors and textures to keep it fun and interesting. The great thing about a Snacklebox is that the small compartments automatically help with portion control.

Choose a tackle box with adjustable compartments to fit a variety sized foods. The removable dividers create visually appealing displays giving you the option to design a beautiful arrangement of snacks while allowing you to pick and choose what to eat.

Start with our list of suggestions and mix and match to create your customized snack box. Some classic charcuterie items include cured meats, cheese, nuts, dried fruits, pickled vegetables, spreads and dips, chocolates, crackers and breadsticks. 

Snackleboxes have become a viral trend because it’s a smart way to take snacks on the go. Not only can you customize your box with your favorite snacks but you don’t have to throw away extra packaging. Plus, unpacking a neatly arranged box filled with your favorite mini-snacks is incredibly satisfying!

To seamlessly integrate your Snacklebox for a healthier lifestyle, consider enjoying your snacks at designated times and snacking when you’re hungry. Strategizing when to indulge will assist you in maintaining healthy habits so that you stay energized, maintain a healthy weight, and don’t overindulge.

A personalized Snacklebox is the perfect companion for both adults and children. Designed with convenience in mind, you can create a customized storage space for an array of delicious healthy treats to keep hunger at bay.  

When looking for satisfying snacks that provide a quick energy boost and promote fullness, focus on options rich in protein and fiber. Choosing snacks full of nutrients and vitamins will leave you feeling more content with your choice for a healthier snack.

Once you’ve crafted your unique Snacklebox sensation, don’t forget to share your delicious combination with us at #itfeelsgoodtohum. And subscribe to our newsletter to join the Wellnest community for a regular dose of health-conscious snack ideas and the latest trends!

The post TikTok said to snack this way: The Snacklebox!  appeared first on HUM Nutrition Blog.

With so many diet plans and methods available to us, finding a sustainable way to eat nutritiously can sometimes feel a bit dizzying. This is why, when we first learned about the Glucose Goddess method, we were highly intrigued by the simple and effective way the diet supports overall health and well-being by focusing on one key component: glucose.

Created by Jessie Inchauspé (aka @GlucoseGoddess), the Glucose Goddess method is a diet designed to support and maintain glucose levels, which can impact everything from energy levels to inflammation to cravings and more.

Read on to learn more about the Glucose Goddess Diet, how some of our HUM staffers enjoyed the challenge and all about balancing blood sugar through food.

Glucose is a simple sugar and the primary energy source for our bodies. “When we consume carbohydrates, our digestive system breaks them down into glucose, which gets absorbed in the gut and enters our bloodstream,” Ella Davar, a registered dietitian and certified dietitian Nutritionist, explains. “Insulin, a catabolic hormone, is responsible for regulating blood glucose levels and stores excess glucose in glycogen form in the liver and muscles,” she adds. 

Maintaining stable glucose levels is crucial for overall health as high blood glucose levels (which some experience in unmanaged diabetes or high intake of carbohydrate-containing foods) can lead to health complications. According to Davar, some of these health concerns include a loss of insulin sensitivity, diabetes, weight gain, cardiovascular issues, kidney problems, and nerve damage—and diet plays a key role in maintaining glucose levels and keeping these symptoms at bay. 

The Glucose Goddess method focuses on optimizing blood sugar levels through strategic food choices. “By combining foods strategically, it aims to minimize glucose spikes and crashes, leading to more stable energy levels, reduced cravings, and potentially better long-term health outcomes,” says Davar.  

There are several reasons why someone might want to try the Glucose Goddess method. Of course, there’s maintaining glucose levels to prevent diabetes and weight management. However, Roxana Ehsani, a registered dietitian nutritionist and board-certified sports dietitian, says those suffering from poor energy might also be inclined to try it since glucose is directly connected to the body’s energy levels. 

In her book, The Glucose Goddess Method: The 4-Week Guide to Cutting Cravings, Getting Your Energy Back, and Feeling Amazing, Inchauspé shares a four-week and four-step plan centered around the best glucose hacks for maintaining levels through diet—and we put it to the test to see how the diet transforms our energy levels and healthy habits. 

The reason why the Glucose Goddess diet is so intriguing is because it essentially biohacks our diet in order to ensure our meals work more efficiently and effectively for our overall health and well-being. Since glucose is directly connected to blood sugar and food impacts our blood sugar levels, the food we eat can significantly affect energy levels, whether they be low, high, or somewhere in between. 

“Consuming complex carbohydrates, proteins, and healthy fats provides a steady source of energy,” says Davar. “These nutrients release glucose into the bloodstream slowly, maintaining stable energy levels.” On the other side of the spectrum, sugary and highly processed foods “can cause rapid spikes and crashes in blood sugar, leading to fluctuations in energy levels, fatigue, and more cravings,” Davar adds.

So, by maintaining blood sugar levels, you not only protect the body against potential health concerns but also help better maintain balanced energy levels and curb cravings. 

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The Glucose Goddess diet involves a method of food combining that allows you to optimize your food and nutrient intake to balance glucose levels and support overall well-being. “Food combining can impact health and blood sugar levels by influencing how the body processes nutrients,” says Davar. For example, eating more fiber-rich foods (such as salad) before carbohydrates can slow the absorption of glucose and lead to more stable blood sugar levels. “This approach is beneficial for managing blood sugar levels and reducing the risk of energy fluctuations and cravings,” Davar explains. 

When it comes to food combining and the Glucose Goddess diet, the name of the game is consuming protein, healthy fats, and high-fiber foods before carbohydrates, and doing so can balance energy levels and prevent blood sugar levels from spiking. 

Since the Glucose Goddess method is designed to balance glucose and blood sugar levels, it can have an impact on your mood. That, plus more energy from a nutrient-rich diet, can support physical and emotional well-being. 

Experiencing the highs and lows of blood sugar levels can impact every aspect of life, especially when you feel that inevitably sugar crash—which can significantly impact your mood. By supporting blood sugar levels in a way that feels more sustainable for your body, you can start to feel the positive effects on your mood over time. 

After trying the Glucose Goddess method for four weeks, HUM Nutrition team member Cindy noticed some significant changes to her health and well-being. One reason why Cindy was drawn to the Glucose Goddess method is the potential skin benefits. Increased glucose levels can lead to inflammation and spike sebum levels, making skin more susceptible to acne breakouts, eczema flare-ups, and irritation. By the end of the four-week period, Cindy saw changes in her overall skin health. Her eczema still flared up, but wasn’t as severe as previously experienced. Additionally, she didn’t see as much redness on her complexion and experienced fewer breakouts, too. 

Although she didn’t experience noticeable weight loss in this four-week period, Cindy found that her energy levels were excellent, and she felt more awake with no brain fog in the mornings. Additionally, she noticed much less sugar cravings. “If I did want a specific thing, I could look at a sweet and not want it,” she explained at her end-of-the-month check-in. “We consistently had sweets in the house, and if they were sitting there for too long, I would throw them away as I felt having them in the house was unnecessary.”

The Glucose Goddess diet is all about turning glucose hacks into habits for more balanced blood sugar levels. While that doesn’t mean you have to follow the diet strictly for the rest of your life, incorporating some of the habits in a way that feels sustainable can continue to have a lasting impact on health. 

First, you can stick with food combining and ensure you eat greens and fiber first for optimal results. Part of the Glucose Goddess method also involves drinking a glass of water with a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar before eating to prevent blood sugar spikes, which can easily be continued after the four-week period. Going for a walk or moving your body in some way after eating can also keep blood sugar spikes at bay and is beneficial and sustainable from a long-term perspective. 

Overall, the Glucose Goddess diet is worth considering if you experience fluctuating energy and want to support more balanced blood sugar levels for optimal health. We love this diet approach because it focuses on nourishing the body with a variety of whole foods while also teaching you how to biohack your way to improved energy and balanced glucose levels through habits like food combining, drinking vinegar before eating, and moving the body after a meal. While the initial four-week investment can be an adjustment, the diet boasts sustainable parameters that allow you to nourish your body while also living your life. 

The post How The Glucose Goddess Diet Can Get Rid of Brain Fog and Improve Energy Levels appeared first on HUM Nutrition Blog.

The secret behind a balanced breakfast? The answer is simpler than you think: protein. The amount of protein in your morning meal can play a big role in how your day plays out. In fact, starting your day with a high protein breakfast, like protein banana pancakes for example, can set you up for a day full of energy and focus. On the other hand, a low protein breakfast can mark the start of a sluggish day, full of cravings.

In this article, we’ll explore the many benefits of incorporating more protein at breakfast. Plus, three delightful and dietitian-approved pancake and waffle recipes enriched with HUM’s Core Strength plant-based protein powder.

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Starting your morning with protein offers a variety of health benefits that can significantly influence how you feel for the rest of the day. But how? 

The body breaks down foods at different rates which has an effect on blood sugar balance. For instance, meals that are high in protein are digested more slowly, having a minimal effect on blood sugar levels. However, carb heavy meals are digested faster, leading to quick spikes and crashes in blood sugar levels. 

Sudden fluctuations in blood sugar can often lead to mid-day energy slumps, making it difficult to concentrate. Moreover, they can lead to intense food cravings (particularly for sweets), and can have negative effects on your mood. 

Fortunately, eating a high protein breakfast has the opposite effect. Because it takes longer to break down protein, rapid blood sugar changes are far less likely to happen. Instead, you can expect sustained energy that will fuel you throughout the day – plus the added perks of less food cravings and better mood. 

Here are more benefits that you can expect from consuming enough protein:

Most people should aim to consume a minimum of 15 to 25 grams of protein at breakfast. This can be easily achieved by adding high protein foods to your morning dish. 

Here is a quick breakdown of grams of protein in popular breakfast foods:

For those who prefer not to count grams, you can visually estimate that around 25% of your meal should be made up of protein.

In addition, protein powders can easily turn a carb-dense food into a high protein meal. For instance, using a vanilla protein powder, like HUM’s Core Strength, can effortlessly add 20 grams of protein to pancakes, waffles, muffins, oat bakes, and more. 

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Consider protein powder as the ultimate breakfast hack for enjoying breakfast delights, without the energy crash. Here are three dietitian-approved high protein breakfast recipes: 

A vanilla twist on classic pancakes that delivers about 20 grams of protein per two pancakes.*

Makes: 4 pancakes  

What You’ll Need:

How to Prepare:

*the amount of protein will vary depending on the type of milk used in the recipe and pancake size.

Banana protein pancakes are a sweet take on breakfast, all while delivering 15 grams of protein* per pancake. 

Makes: 2 pancakes

What You’ll Need:

How To Prepare: 

Enjoy this flavorful whole wheat lemon poppy waffle packing a powerful 20 grams of protein. 

Makes: 1 waffle

What You’ll Need:

How To Prepare:

As we’ve unpacked, a high protein breakfast goes beyond mere sustenance. It can influence your energy levels, cravings, mood, and more. Fortunately, consuming protein at breakfast is easy to do. Plenty of breakfast foods are high in protein, such as eggs and yogurt. Plus, protein powder like HUM Nutrition’s Core Strength, makes it incredibly simple to boost the protein content of your favorite breakfast foods. 

The post Protein-Packed Pancakes and Waffles: Fueling Your Day The Smart Way appeared first on HUM Nutrition Blog.

Want to give your digestion an extra boost to beat the bloat? Try HUM’s Flatter Me® Extra Strength: A supplement that has 18 digestive enzymes and a triple herb blend that helps break down food and improve digestion.

The HUM Flatter Me® family just got bigger. Welcome our new formulation that is 50% more powerful; Flatter Me® Extra Strength. Get ready to say hello to the foods you have been avoiding and combat the bloat with our latest supplement that supports a flatter stomach, digestion and eases bloating. 

Flatter Me® Extra Strength is HUM’s newest supplement created to combat bloating. With 50% more Flatter Me® enzymes, this formula boasts more digestive enzymes to provide a more powerful boost in digestion, reducing that uncomfortable bloat.

There are various reasons why an Extra Strength version of Flatter Me® is a good option. Some people find themselves still needing relief from bloat with some types of foods or when the indulge. We also produce fewer digestive enzymes as we age. Jennifer Martin-Biggers, PhD, MS, RDN, the VP of scientific affairs and education at HUM Nutrition says, “we are so excited to launch Flatter Me Extra Strength- we know and showed in a clinical study that Flatter Me® is able to help reduce bloating after a meal and Flatter Me Extra Strength provides even more power with 50% more of our 18 digestive enzyme blend to help breakdown macronutrients, supporting digestive processes and reduce bloating.”

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Most of us need a bit of help breaking down our favorite foods. You know that burger you love so much? Those fries you can’t resist? The grain bowl you dream of at the office? No more dreaming, just eating. Flatter Me® Extra Strength will be your best friend for comfort with your meals. This supplement helps:

It’s easy breezy. Take 1 capsule before your 2 main meals!

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The post Extra, Extra! Say hello to Flatter Me® Extra Strength, HUM’s New ultimate debloat supplement appeared first on HUM Nutrition Blog.

Curcumin is a potent antioxidant found in turmeric. This natural supplement is though to be behind many of the health benefits of turmeric, including reduced inflammation, lower levels of oxidative damage, better cognitive function, and a reduction in risk factors for chronic diseases like heart disease.

What’s behind these benefits? Our research team looked into the medical and nutritional research to discover why curcumin is so beneficial, and how you can incorporate it into your supplementation routine.

Many of the benefits of turmeric, including fighting inflammation, improving brain function, reduced risk of heart disease, fighting cancer, preventing Alzheimer’s disease, depression, arthritis, and aging may be due to curcumin.

Research describes how curcumin “scavenges” oxidative stress and aggressively works to reverse it to repair the body (1).

The proactive nature of curcumin is likely what causes most of the positive health benefits seen through turmeric and curcumin use.

Curcumin doesn’t just stop at increasing your general health, it seems to unlock greater health in your liver as well.

One review of the medical effects of curcumin looks at the liver-protecting effects curcumin can have on the body (2). 

In rats given carbon tetrachloride, a mild liver poison, researchers saw their levels raising thiobarbituric acid and lipoperoxide levels (bad things) and their amounts of glutathione, vitamin C and vitamin E (good things) diminishing (3).  Once curcumin is given to the patient, the health markers of liver function seem to go back to normal as the toxin, carbon tetrachloride, is cleared away (4).

Curcumin is also soothing for the digestive tract and can help soothe indigestion, which is why it is found in many probiotic supplements.

One study looked deeper into this and researchers found that supplementing with curcumin helped about half of hospital patients with indigestion feel better (5). 

This was a double-blind study though, so looking more into the numbers and results, researchers found that there was, in fact, a significant difference between the placebo and the curcumin-treated patients when it comes to indigestion.

So, the next time you have an upset stomach definitely take a curcumin pill.

In addition to treating indigestion, curcumin can go further and treat ulcerative colitis (UC).

Ulcerative colitis is a nasty disorder where you have long-term inflammation in your gastrointestinal tract which can lead to a lot of pain.

Curcumin seems like a safe and effective solution to help bring UC patients into remission or reduce symptoms.

First, researchers looked and saw that curcumin in combination with mesalamine, a typical UC drug, significantly shortened time to remission for UC patients (6).

Another study shows that supplementing with curcumin can support and maintain remission for UC patients as well to drastically reduce symptoms (7).  For these results, the studies used 1.5 grams of curcumin twice a day for results.

One of curcumin’s biggest claim to fame is fighting inflammation and treating arthritis.

One group of researchers reviewed all the papers on curcumin and arthritis and found that there is a definite connection that shows curcumin can reduce symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis (8).

Here, the studies used about 1 gram of curcumin per day to see results.  But they also noted that more research needs to be done to establish a stronger link and say that curcumin can treat arthritis because the number of studies they had limited the confidence they have in their findings (9).  Here, researchers used 500 mg of curcumin twice a day.

Not all arthritis is the same. Rheumatoid arthritis is actually an autoimmune disease.  The body is attacking its own joints leading to arthritis symptoms of soreness, pain, and limited range of motion. 

On the other hand, osteoarthritis is due to overusing a joint to the point where you have actual wear and tear on the joint.  This leads to bone-on-bone situations leading to soreness, pain, and limited range of motion as well.

Luckily, whichever version of arthritis you have it seems that curcumin can effectively reduce your symptoms.  Here, researchers supplemented patients with about 1.5 grams per day of curcumin.

Usually, after a training session where you incorporate new exercises or you push yourself harder to get more speed and explosiveness out of your movements, you feel that soreness the next day.

These scientists found that markers of inflammation and muscle damage in the curcumin group were lower than these same markers in the placebo group after both groups performed heavy eccentric exercises (10).

Here, the protocol was to take 500 mg of curcumin twice a day starting two days before exercise and continuing until the day after exercising.

Researchers discovered that curcumin can actually work to improve breathing and reduce inflammation from the nose for those with allergies (11).

So, with a daily curcumin supplement, you may be saying goodbye to seasonal allergies for good with just 500 mg of curcumin a day.

If you’re a prediabetic curcumin might help push you back on track to being healthy.

Curcumin given to prediabetic patients over 9 months was seen to increase insulin sensitivity by improving the function of Beta cells, the ones that produce insulin (12).

Compared to the placebo group, which had about 16% of prediabetics turn into full-blown type 2 diabetics, the curcumin group had NO patients go from prediabetic to diabetic (13).

Here, researchers split 1.5 mg of curcumin into two doses per day.

There are also a few heart-healthy benefits to consuming curcumin regularly.

Especially as you age, the lining of your blood vessels seems to get worse at keeping your blood flowing.  One study looked at women to test the effects of curcumin on their circulation and blood pressure. 

These women were split up into the placebo group, the exercise group, and the curcumin group.  At the end of 8 weeks taking a curcumin pill daily showed the same results as performing aerobic exercise (14)!

In the past, curcumin has been linked to fighting depression.  However, the studies testing this connection were too poor to find any real benefits.

Researchers gave subjects with major depression curcumin supplements over 12 weeks and tested their improvements in mood (15).  They gave patients 500 mg of curcumin twice a day.

The results showed that curcumin had a significant effect on positively changing the recorded scores.

Curcumin has further brain benefits aside from destroying depression.  Research supports that curcumin can actually increase something called BDNF, Brain Derived Neurotrophic Factor (16). 

Basically, curcumin can make your brain bigger and smarter (like a nootropic).

For four weeks of supplementation, these researchers saw an increase in memory, calmness, and stress resilience (17).  In the short term, researchers saw that curcumin significantly increased attention and memory compared with the placebo and they only gave patients 1 gram of curcumin a day (18).

Not only will curcumin dramatically lower inflammation and reduce your risk of disease, but also it seems to radically make you more focused and attentive to get more done.

In the long term, curcumin may even work to fight dementia.

Specifically, researchers looked to see how curcumin would affect Alzheimer’s disease (19).  While researchers are still not sure if curcumin worked by fighting oxidative stress, reducing inflammation, or working on the cell membranes of brain tissue affected the most by Alzheimer’s, there seems to be a lack of cognitive decline over 6 months (20).

For the future, curcumin can be formulated into a pill that may even improve and reverse Alzheimer’s disease.

Black pepper has an ingredient inside called piperine that protects curcumin inside the body (21).

In fact, more and more supplement companies are adding in special piperine blends to their curcumin supplements to drastically increase absorption.  On study showed that piperine can increase curcumin absorption in humans as much as 2000% (22).

One of the health concerns faced by older adults, and particularly older women, is low bone density, which can eventually manifest as full-fledged osteoporosis.

Some exciting new research, both in animal models and in humans, suggests that curcumin could be used to improve bone density and fight osteoporosis.

At the cellular level, evidence from a study published in International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Pathology suggests that curcumin is able to alter the activation of specific genes linked to bone microarchitecture (23).

A paper published in 2017 in the European Review for Medical and Pharmacological Sciences used a curcumin-based supplement in a group of 57 people with low bone density (24).

The subjects were randomly assigned to either a curcumin supplement group or a placebo group, and took their assigned supplement every day for six months. The researchers tracked the bone density of the participants before and after the six-month study period and found that the curcumin group improved their bone density significantly compared to the control group.

While this was still a small preliminary study, the results are very promising and suggest that curcumin’s health benefits could extend significantly beyond its already powerful antioxidant and anti-inflammatory benefits.

Curcumin can amplify the effect of prescription drugs. One of the issues with curcumin is that it is so effective it may amplify the effects of other drugs you are taking.

For example, curcumin decreases inflammation and can reduce blood clotting, but if you’re already on a blood thinning medication it can amplify those effects (25). 

Another example is the curcumin decreases blood sugar and inflammation, so when you take a  drug that already does this, like talinol, you will have enhanced effects that can be unexpected and even dangerous (26).

Low-quality curcumin supplements can be contaminated with manufacturing byproducts. Caution: Despite it being seen as a safe supplement, be sure you purchase curcumin for reputable buyers.

According to consumerlab.com, about 7% of imported turmeric is contaminated with salmonella and 12% of imported turmeric has “filth” (or bug parts) coming with it (27). Getting curcumin from a trusted manufacturer is the best way to avoid this problem.

Aim for 500-1000 mg of curcumin taken twice per day. Curcumin seems safe up to food-level dosages, about 15 grams, but you don’t need to take a dosage that high to see results.

Most research uses 500 mg taken twice per day, though there is quite a wide range of doses used in the scientific literature. 

So, if you’re taking curcumin for general health try starting off with 0.5 grams to 1 gram a day but if you want greater effects to fight a disease then increase your dosages (28).

Because curcumin is rapidly absorbed, you should split up your dosage into at least two daily capsules. Curcumin is absorbed and excreted in under five hours in most people, so to expose your body to higher chronic levels of curcumin, a frequent dosing strategy with smaller doses is better than a single large dose once per day.

Q: What is curcumin?

A: Curcumin is a specific molecule that is found in turmeric, a ginger-like root plant native to Asia. Curcumin is what gives turmeric its characteristic yellow-orange color, and has long been used as a spice, pigment, and traditional herbal medication.

More recently, scientific research has pegged curcumin as the compound in turmeric that could be responsible for many of the health benefits associated with turmeric.

Like other brightly colored molecules, like astaxanthin, curcumin is a powerful antioxidant, which means it fights against damage inside the body caused by free radicals.

Q: What does curcumin do?

A: Curcumin is, at its core, an antioxidant. That means that it can capture free radicals, which are molecules that can cause widespread damage throughout your body.

Other classic examples of antioxidants include vitamin C, vitamin E, and lycopene. The antioxidant effects of curcumin go hand in hand with its ability to fight against systemic inflammation.

Many of the health benefits associated with curcumin are tied to its ability to reduce levels of inflammation, which likely explains why it can exert such broad benefits such as decreasing blood pressure, improving symptoms of depression, and potentially protecting against type two diabetes.

Q: What medications should not be taken with turmeric?

A: According to the Penn State Hershey Medical Center, curcumin (and turmeric generally) interact with three categories of medications: blood thinners such as warfarin, drugs that manipulate stomach acid levels (like nexium), and antidiabetic drugs which interact with blood sugar (29).

In all three cases, turmeric can interact with these prescription medications and either inhibit or amplify their mechanism of action, which can lead to undesirable outcomes.

As with any prescription medication, it’s a good idea to talk with your doctor about whether there is a potential for curcumin to interact with your medications before you start taking it. There are thousands of prescription medications on the market, so it’s possible that certain drug-supplement interactions have not been formally studied yet.

Q: How long does it take for curcumin to work?

A: After being taken in a supplement form, blood levels of curcumin rise rapidly, peaking about one to two hours after ingestion (30).

The rate at which curcumin is eliminated from the body is fairly rapid as well; even after a fairly solid dose, curcumin levels in the body are essentially back to zero within about five hours.

Q: Should you split up your doses of curcumin?

A: Because curcumin is both absorbed and excreted pretty quickly (in five hours or less), it is probably better to split up your daily intake into two doses taken at different times during the day, to maximize the amount of time that there is curcumin in your system.

Generally, dosages delivered from top-quality supplements are compatible with twice-daily or even three times daily dosing, which can maximize the efficacy of a curcumin supplement.

Q: What foods have curcumin?

A: Unlike some other antioxidants, like resveratrol or vitamin C, which are found in many different kinds of foods, turmeric is the only natural source of curcumin.

That means that you’ll only get curcumin if the food that you are eating has turmeric in it as an ingredient. Research has found that pure turmeric powder is high in curcumin, at about three percent curcumin by weight, but beyond this, even turmeric-based ingredients like curry spices are quite low in curcumin.

To ensure that foods you are eating have a solid dose of curcumin, you need to have a hefty dose of pure turmeric powder.

Related: Our best curcumin picks

Curcumin exerts powerful anti-inflammatory effects inside the body. Curcumin’s ability to fight inflammation makes it a potent supplement for a wide range of issues, from joint pain to heart health, as well as cognitive function and mood.

It’s best incorporated into your routine at doses of 500 to 1000 mg per day, split into two doses, and works best when taken alongside black pepper extract to boost absorption.

The post 15 of the wide-ranging health of curcumin appeared first on Body Nutrition.

Vegan protein powder is an excellent way to get key amino acids if you don’t want or can’t have animal-based sources of protein like whey and casein protein.

Especially by combining multiple plant-based sources of protein, you can achieve a full amino acid profile and reap all of the benefits of protein powder, from muscle strength gains to fat oxidation.

Here’s our research team’s deep dive on who benefits from vegan protein powder and why.

Vegan protein is derived entirely from plant sources and is useful not just for vegetarians and vegans, but for people looking for a greater variety in their amino acid profiles.

The primary reasons most people use vegan protein are obvious–they don’t consume animal products, for health, environmental, or ethical reasons. So, most popular protein products like whey and casein protein are out of the question.

There are ancillary benefits associated with vegan protein powders, too: they don’t have the dairy allergens that whey and casein protein powders have, and they also have zero lactose content.

While most people who are lactose intolerant can handle whey protein without any trouble, seeing as it’s less than one percent lactose by weight (1), some people who are exceptionally sensitive, or who want to keep their total lactose consumption as close to zero as possible, can benefit from a vegan protein powder.

In short, consuming a protein supplement on a regular basis can help you gain muscle (2), lose fat (3), preserve lean mass while losing weight (4), and even increase your bone strength (5).

But, beyond that, what do the specific benefits of vegan protein powder look like? One key component to help answer this question is the amino acid profile of a particular protein source.

Amino acids are the basic building blocks of all of the different kinds of proteins in the cells in your body, and foods containing different protein sources have a different ratio of amino acids.

Some amino acids are essential–you can’t live without them, and your body can’t synthesize them from other amino acids. There are a total of twenty different amino acids that your body uses, and nine of these are the essential amino acids (6).

These include pea protein, hemp protein, and chia protein.

Though they contain these proteins in different ratios, combining multiple sources can provide a robust amino acid profile that will fill all your dietary needs.

When it comes to what kind of protein is “best,” animal proteins tend to be superior to vegetable proteins, according to a 2004 scientific article by Jay R. Hoffman and Michael J. Falvo at the College of New Jersey (7).

They reviewed the benefits of a variety of protein sources, and recommended casein, a dairy-derived protein, as the best single source of protein. However, the news isn’t all bad for vegan protein powder lovers. By combining protein from different vegetable sources, you can match the same benefits as an animal-based protein supplement.

So, is there one kind of vegan protein better than another? Fortunately, nutritionists have studied this very intently, and have come up with a metric called the protein digestibility-corrected amino acid score.

This metric uses the digestibility of cow’s milk (which is rapidly and easily digested, as long as you aren’t lactose intolerant) as the reference for protein digestion.

Different protein sources are ranked as a decimal, with 1.0 representing absorption equal to cow’s milk, and smaller numbers representing fractions of that–so 0.5 would mean a protein source is absorbed only half as well as cow’s milk.

Among the best vegan protein sources are soy protein (1.0), pea protein isolate (0.89), with rice protein and hemp protein performing worse, but still above 0.5 (8, 9). Chia seed protein is a pretty new commercial concept, so there isn’t much good info out there its amino acid score.

What this means is that you should shoot to have at least some of your vegan protein come from one of the high quality sources: soy or pea protein.

Protein is pretty safe overall. Protein, as one of the three major macronutrients in your diet, doesn’t have much in the way of side effects. Especially with vegan protein powders–these products avoid the common commercial contaminants that can cause food allergies in some people.

Supplement companies know that many of their vegan protein powder customers are choosing their products to avoid allergenic contaminants like wheat and dairy. Soy is one moderately common allergen that can be associated with food allergies, so do be aware of cross-contamination.

People with soy or gluten allergies or sensitivities should check the ingredients of their protein powder. Labels that claim they are “soy free” or “gluten free” have to pass strict purity standards to make that claim, so if you see that on the label, you’re safe. The thing to watch out for is phrases like “processed in a facility that also processes eggs, dairy, tree nuts…”

This means that the company is using the same equipment to package different products, so there is a decent chance that there will be allergens from the other products that the company produces, so if you have special food sensitivities, you do need to be aware of this.

Very high doses of sugar alcohols (used as a sweetener) could cause GI issues. In some flavored products, there are potential side effects associated with sweetening agents. A few products on the market include sugar alcohols, which can cause gastrointestinal side effects when consumed in high doses (10).

However, it’s unlikely that you’ll ever encounter this problem unless you are extremely sensitive or are consuming a tremendous amount of flavored protein powder on a daily basis.

Aim for 1.3 to 1.8 grams of protein per kg of body mass every day. Protein is an extraordinarily well-studied nutrient, and recommendations for dosage are down to a science. For athletes trying to build muscle, the scientific literature recommends consuming 1.3-1.8 grams of protein per kilogram of body mass per day, divided up into at least three meals of equal protein content.

For aggressive gains, bump it up to 2.0 g/kg per day. People who are restricting their dietary intake to lose weight might even bump this up to 2.0 grams of protein per kilogram of body mass per day in order to maintain lean body mass while dropping fat mass (11).

If you’re an endurance athlete, 1.0 g/kg per day is fine. For endurance athletes and for less active people, protein needs are more on the order of 1.0 grams per kilogram of body mass (12).

Make sure you account for your protein powder’s concentration. One important thing to keep in mind is that even the most highly pure protein powders are not 100% protein. They’re usually more like 80-90%. If the blend includes a lot of flavoring agents, superfood powders, and the like, the protein content may be even lower. Check the nutrition label so you can do the math on your protein powder of choice.

If, for example, you weigh 180 pounds (82 kilograms) and you have a protein powder that contains 20 grams of protein per 24 gram scoop, you can use these numbers to find out how much actual protein you need per day.

For fat loss, higher absolute amounts of protein may be necessary. If you are trying to lose fat mass while maintaining lean body mass, you’d need up to 164 grams of protein per day.

Now, hopefully all of this isn’t going to come from your protein powder, so you’ll have to take the rest of your diet into account. Once you’ve estimated how much protein the rest of your diet contains (you don’t need to be precise, a rough guess will do) perhaps you find you still need 70 grams of protein. This would be 3.5 scoops of your typical protein powder.

Q: Is vegan protein powder good for you?

A: Yes, vegan protein powder offers many of the same benefits as animal protein but without the allergens of dairy. Vegan protein powders can help amplify the strengths and ameliorate some of the classic weaknesses of a vegan diet (namely, the tendency of vegans to have lower than average protein intake).

While not every vegan or vegetarian needs to take a vegan protein powder, you’ll quickly find that they can be incredibly useful if you are an athlete, or if you want to beef up (no pun intended) your daily green drink and turn it into a protein shake. Since vegan diets tend to be lower in protein to begin with, there’s more upside to adding a vegan protein powder to a vegan diet.

Q: What should you mix with vegan protein powder?

A: Some vegan protein powders are made to be mixed with plain water and still taste decent. These tend to be multi-ingredient vegan protein powders that use flavoring agents like stevia and anti-caking ingredients like lecithin to result in a smooth solution that avoids the bland, chalky taste of plain protein.

If pure protein is what you are shooting for, you can mix vegan protein powder with your favorite milk substitute, like almond milk, flax milk (incidentally, a great source of vegan omega 3s), coconut milk, or rice milk.

Q: What vegan foods are high in protein?

A: The most popular vegan foods that are high in protein are all soy or lentil-based. These include tofu, tempeh, edamame, nutritional yeast, lentils, chickpeas, and beans.

Other sources, like some cereal grains, contain relatively high levels of protein, too. The protein content of vegan foods is not enough, though; you need to know the amino acid content.

It takes some careful planning to make sure the vegan foods that you eat contain all nine essential amino acids on a regular basis.

If all you do is eat the same vegan protein source every day, you’ll eventually start to suffer the negative effects of an amino acid imbalance. Hence the need for a constantly rotating selection of sources of vegan foods rich in protein.

Q: How can you make vegan protein powder less gritty?

A: Vegan protein powder can be gritty for a few reasons. The first is simply not mixing up the product enough. Try a wire whisk, or using a blender—sometimes, pure protein powders, by virtue of not containing any emulsifiers, can clump up into a gritty consistency.

If more mixing doesn’t work, you can try a different vegan protein powder. Look for one that uses soy lecithin or another emulsifier to make blending easier.

Alternatively, the problem might be the protein powder itself: certain sources of vegan protein powder are a lot grittier than others. Hemp protein, for example, is very high in fiber (which is great for health), but gives it a gritty consistency. Soy protein, on the other hand, is a lot smoother.

Related: Our best vegan protein powder picks

Vegan protein powder is an excellent way to deliver concentrated amino acids to your body, to help with building muscle, shedding fat, and strengthening bone.

Most people should aim for 1.3 to 1.8 grams of protein per day, after accounting for your other dietary protein and the concentration of your protein powder.

By combining multiple types of vegan protein powder from different plant sources, you can ensure that you’re getting a comprehensive amino acid profile that gives your body all of the building blocks it needs.

The post 5 biggest benefits of vegan protein powder appeared first on Body Nutrition.

Many vegans are on the lookout for the best supplemental sources for vegan protein.

Though it used to be a nightmare to try to find quality vegan protein powder, that’s not the case anymore.

Though whey protein (derived from cows) is still the dominant protein source in protein powder supplements, there are a plethora of great vegan protein powders out there, and they aren’t just for vegans.  

People with milk allergies, severe lactose intolerance, or simply an interest in getting a different amino acid profile might want to look into vegan protein powder too.

Wondering what the best vegan protein powders are? We’ve got you covered. Our research team has reviewed and ranked the top vegan protein powders on the market, plus taken a close-up look at the advantages and disadvantages of vegan protein powder.

Last updated: June 8, 2023
Vegan protein powders considered: 23
Hours of research: 47
Experts reviewed: 6
Scientific papers referenced: 14

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There are plenty of vegan protein powders out there, but they rarely contain the expert sourcing and care we see with Transparent Lab’s Organic Vegan.

Inside Organic Vegan you’ll find USDA certified organic pea and brown rice protein as well as natural flavors and natural sweeteners.

No cheap soy protein. No artificial anything. No shortcuts. Organic Vegan comes in both chocolate and vanilla flavors, providing 24 grams of quality protein per serving. Without a doubt, this is BodyNutrition’s #1 vegan protein powder on the market.

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Ladder plant protein is a vegan friendly powder that is free of lactose and NSF-certified for purity. One of the unique advantages of this vegan protein is that it offers a complete profile of essential amino acids. This ensures your muscles get the nutrition they need to recover and perform.

Each serving also contains probiotics to ensure a healthy gut and optimized digestion.

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Yes, there are other pure pea protein products out there, but can they make the claims that Naked Pea Protein does? It’s non-GMO, sourced from farms in North America, and it proudly advertises its independent lab testing that verifies its purity and its lack of contaminants like heavy metals.

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As is usually the case, Garden of Life puts out a very strong protein product for vegans. Their Raw Protein and Greens blend combines sprouted brown rice protein, pea protein, and chia protein with Garden of Life’s hallmark, their proprietary blend of greens.

Adding more vegetable nutrients to your diet is never a bad thing, and doing it in conjunction with a diverse mix of vegan protein sources is even better.

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If you’re looking for a little something extra, Vega’s got it. It’s a pea and hemp protein based protein powder that has the added benefit of fiber and a blend of vitamins and minerals. To top it off, it’s sweetened with stevia for taste and has fruit concentrates added for antioxidant power.

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Straight and simple, like the rest of BulkSupplements’ products, their pea protein is exceptionally pure and has zero adulterants, fillers, or flavorings.

Purists and minimalists will love this one, but if you want a little more flavor with your protein, there are some better options.

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Orgain includes rice, pea, chia seed, and hemp protein for a robust amino acid profile, and keeps the carb content low with sugar alcohols instead of sucrose or fructose to sweeten the mix.

There isn’t much in the way of additional nutrients, but if you want a protein shake that is creamy and flavored so it doesn’t taste like chalk, Orgain is a solid choice.

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Now Sports is a straight and simple, no-nonsense vegan protein powder. There’s only one ingredient, and it’s non-GMO yellow pea protein isolate, the purest and most concentrated form of protein.

If you know that all you need is pure protein, NOW sports is the way to go.

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VeganSmart takes the crown for the most diverse vegan protein profile. It’s got hemp, pea, chia, potato, and chlorella protein, plus a good vitamin and mineral mix.

Strict paleo and low-carb enthusiasts will scoff at the sugar content (a relatively mild five grams per serving and 14 grams of total carbohydrates), so it’s not for everyone, but if you aren’t on the low carb bandwagon, it’s a good choice.

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Promix is a blend of pea protein and sprouted brown rice protein. Other than that, the only real unique aspect about it is its inclusion of 200% of your daily recommended intake of vitamin B.

However, without the other B complex vitamins, or any larger micronutrient strategy, it feels like more of a gimmick than a selling point.

Best vegan protein overall: Transparent Labs Organic Vegan Protein

Transparent Labs is our top overall pick thanks to its simple but effective formulation. Too many protein powders are bloated with additives—instead, Transparent Labs provides a simple and all-natural vegan protein powder that still tastes great thanks to natural cocoa powder and stevia. 

Best-tasting vegan protein: Ladder Plant Protein

With its combination of cocoa, monk fruit extract, and only a tiny amount of sugar, Ladder Plant Protein has a great taste and texture that doesn’t rely on artificial flavors and additives. With both pea and pumpkin protein, it’s hard to beat if you want a great-tasting and functional vegan protein powder. 

Best vegan protein with a complete amino acid profile: Transparent Labs Organic Vegan Protein

For a full profile of amino acids, we like Transparent Labs. Using both rice and pea protein allows it to cover all of its bases when it comes to the essential amino acids, leaving you with no nutritional disadvantage compared to an animal-based protein.

Best vegan protein for women: Ladder Plant Protein

Ladder uses a great blend of protein sources for comprehensive amino acid coverage, and has barely any sugar. It’s an excellent choice for female athletes, and for women looking to shed fat while maintaining muscle mass.

Best vegan protein for weight loss: Transparent Labs Organic Vegan Protein

For weight loss, you want protein that provides a complete amino acid profile with no added sugar. Transparent Labs knocks it out of the park on this front, delivering a great vegan-friendly protein powder that uses calorie-free stevia as a source of sweetness instead of sugar.

Best vegan protein for athletes: Ladder Plant Protein

Thanks to the combination of pumpkin and pea protein, Ladder boasts an impressive array of amino acids to boost post-workout recovery. On top of that, it keeps the carb content super low, making it great for staying lean while adding strength. 

If you are on a vegan diet, it can be tricky to get enough protein from a variety of sources unless you are a very skilled cook. Unlike animal sources of protein, like beef, chicken, or dairy, vegan foods tend not to have a balanced amino acid profile. Here’s who should consider a vegan protein powder:

People who need high protein intake but eat little or no meat. As such, it can be tough to get all of the essential amino acids on a regular basis, particularly if you have high protein needs, unless you’re constantly rotating your protein sources across foods like corn, beans and legumes, and tofu.

While not all vegan protein powder products contain a full range of all of the essential amino acids, by outsourcing some of your amino acid needs to a consistent source from the protein powder, you can adjust the rest of your diet to cover the few missing amino acids.

Some (though not all) vegan protein powders take care of this for you by using multiple plant-based protein sources to deliver a complete essential amino acid profile.

Vegan and vegetarian athletes who have high protein turnover. Vegan protein powders are nearly essential for athletes and others who have high protein turnover, as a vegan diet can make it tough to get the very concentrated protein delivery that an omnivore could get from eggs, fish, or other protein-dense foods.

Again, while it is possible to eat a protein-focused vegan diet without supplementing, taking a vegan protein powder can make it a lot easier to get the protein you need, for example right after finishing a workout at the gym.

People looking to make vegan-friendly meal replacement shakes. Since traditional ingredients like milk and yogurt are off the table when it comes to making healthy meal replacement shakes for vegans, a protein powder is a great addition to ensure you’re getting quality sources of amino acids.

To rate the best vegan protein powders on the market, we first aggregated a list of all of the options that were 100% vegan. Then, among all the products out there, we narrowed the field by looking at these criteria:

Only sources with high protein concentration. We only included products that used the best plant-based protein sources with the highest concentration of protein (as a percentage of total weight) and the best, broad-spectrum amino acid profile.

The highest-quality vegan protein sources are soy and pea protein, so we eliminated all protein powders that did not contain at least one of these two sources of protein. That left us with two broad categories of protein powders: pure single-ingredient protein powders, like Naked Pea, and blends that included multiple sources of protein, which might include rice protein, hemp protein powder, and chia seeds.

Balance of single-ingredient products and multi-ingredient blends. Depending on your supplementation goals, either one of these categories might be a good fit for you. Pure protein products tend to have a higher concentration of protein per gram, but blends have a better amino acid profile and can offer additional benefits. For these reasons, we rated products from each category with slightly separate criteria.

Purity was of the utmost importance for single-ingredient proteins. For single-source vegan protein products, we used purity as the metric: did the protein come from a non-GMO or organic source? Was there independent lab testing for purity? Is the packaging engineered to keep out oxygen and preserve the integrity of the amino acids?

These were the kinds of questions we asked when rating these protein powders. We had high standards for purity and quality of ingredients, so we picked only the very best from these products.

Supplement design was key for multi-ingredient vegan protein powders. For multi-ingredient vegan protein powders, we looked at the range of protein sources, plus other beneficial ingredients like fiber.

Great taste without too much added sugar. We also kept an eye on flavoring: these protein powders should taste good, but not use too much added sugar. Since using plant-based flavoring is important to many vegans and vegetarians, we had a preference for protein powders that used ingredients like stevia as opposed to artificial sweeteners.

After rating single-source and multi-ingredient protein powders separately, we pooled our results. Most of the products that made the final rankings were from the multi-ingredient category, thanks to the strength of their diverse amino acid profile and the opportunity to provide fiber and other useful extras, but several pure pea protein powders made the list nonetheless.

These protein powders represent the best options out there for vegans, vegetarians, and anyone else who wants a top quality plant-based protein.

Q: Why should you use vegan protein powder?

A: Vegan protein powders are great if you can’t get a good quantity of protein in your diet as a vegetarian or vegan.

They are also surprisingly popular among regular people who eat a normal diet (i.e. omnivores) who have dairy allergies or severe lactose intolerance and can’t consume the most popular forms of protein powder (casein and whey protein), which are both dairy-based.

Rotating through a wide variety of amino acid sources can get tiring for vegans and vegetarians, and many high-protein vegan foods (such as beans) are also high in fiber, which makes them hard to consume in large amounts.

As such, vegan weight lifters, athletes, and bodybuilders tend to rely on protein powder even more heavily than their omnivore counterparts.

Q: What is the healthiest vegan protein powder?

A: If your focus is to get a vegan protein powder that is as healthy as possible, you want to look for a single source plant based protein. In our research team’s rankings, we found that pure pea protein had the best balance of amino acids and purity.

We particularly liked Naked Pea, Bulk Supplements, and Now Sports’ versions of pea protein. These products have a slight edge over the competition, but in the grand scheme of your overall diet, any high quality vegan protein powder is going to be very healthy compared to the kinds of protein sources you’d see in a typical Western diet, like corn-fed, high-fat beef.

Q: Do you need vegan protein powder?

A: Plenty of vegans get along just fine without taking protein powder. However, if you are active, and especially if you are an athlete, you might want to invest in a vegan protein powder.

It is theoretically possible to maintain a high protein diet as a vegan, but the reality is that many vegans aren’t successful at this endeavor without supplementation.

One study, for example, found that a substantial proportion of the male vegans in their study had only “marginally adequate” protein intake (1).

Moreover, their urinary excretion of the amino acid taurine was extremely low compared to non-vegans. While these findings don’t necessarily mean that vegans are worse off, it does suggest that vegans with high protein needs may want to consider a vegan protein powder.

Q: What is a good vegan protein powder for bodybuilding?

A: For bodybuilding, you want an ultra-pure vegan protein source. Balance in amino acids is actually not all that important, since a vegan bodybuilder is likely to be on a very high protein diet to begin with, so meeting minimum amino acid levels across the board is less likely to be an issue.

For this application, we recommend one of the pure pea protein products in our rankings, like Bulk Supplements, Naked Pea, or Now Sports Pea Protein.

These offer the highest amount of protein per unit mass, and are not cut with any flavoring agents, fiber, or other ingredients.

If you are looking for something you can mix up directly with water, try Orgain Organic Plant-Based Protein or the Vega All-In-One Shake. While these products add a marginal amount of carbohydrates and fiber, they have the added benefit of being pretty tasty with nothing but tap water added.

Q: What is a good vegan protein powder for weight loss?

A: For weight loss, you want a vegan protein powder that has a balance of amino acids so you can use it as a meal replacement.

On top of that, some fiber is useful to get an extra appetite suppressant effect from the dietary fiber. Among the products our research team reviewed, some of the best vegan protein powders for weight loss include Battle Ready Fuel, Garden of Life Raw Protein and Greens, and Vega All-In-One Shake.

All of these products include multiple different sources of protein, and thus a wide range of amino acids. They all also include nice bonuses like dietary fiber or vitamins and minerals, making them easily functionable as meal replacement shakes.

Q: Is there a difference between vegan protein powder and plant-based protein powder?

A: Functionally, no, there is no difference between a vegan protein powder and a plant-based protein powder. By definition, all plant-based protein powders must be vegan (after all, if it is not plant based, it has to be animal-based).

Different brands may advertise certain products as either vegan or plant-based to appeal to slightly different markets, but if you look closely, you’ll find that all vegan protein powders are plant based, and vice versa.

Vegan protein doesn’t need to mean suboptimal nutrition. By choosing a vegan protein supplement with a complete amino acid profile and good digestibility, you can get the same benefits as you’d get from a high-quality animal protein.

The best vegan protein sources are soy and pea protein powders, so make sure at least some of your vegan protein intake comes from these sources.

By using scientifically-validated guidelines for selecting your protein dosage per day and selecting the right supplement, you can set yourself up for achieving your personal health goals.

For BodyNutrition‘s #1 vegan protein recommendation, click here.

The post Ranking the best vegan protein powder of 2023 appeared first on Body Nutrition.

Olive oil is one of the healthiest kitchen basics you can have around. Few other simple ingredients have so much scientific evidence backing their efficacy when it comes to long-term health.

No matter what diet you’re on, you should include an ample amount of olive oil in your daily cooking. Olive oil has been proven to improve long-term health by reducing your risk for chronic diseases like heart disease, and its benefits extend to gastrointestinal health and metabolic health too.

Here’s everything we know about the most important health benefits of olive oil.

In a nutritional environment where fats and oils have been blamed for everything from heart disease to obesity, olive oil rises above the fray to the point where it might be labeled as a superfood.

We’re talking about extra virgin olive oil, not the cheap imitators diluted with more refined versions of the real thing; more refining means fewer nutrients, and sometimes chemical residues, so it’s important to buy the good stuff if you want the benefits.

With qualities across the board to protect against common health issues, extra virgin olive oil can even aid in avoiding ulcers by creating an environment discouraging to the bacteria that cause this common problem (1). In fact, it only took 30 grams a day for two weeks in a test group with ulcers to eliminate the bacteria for up to 40% of participants (2).

Olive oil is composed of 26% saturated fats, rich in omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids. Another 73% is oleic acid, a monounsaturated fat known for its anti-inflammatory properties and positive effects on C-Reactive Protein (CRP) readings (3).

After heating olive oil for 36 hours at 350˚F, researchers concluded the oil held its molecular structure and remained safe to consume (4).

When you check out oils for health properties, you may find coconut oil comparably impressive, but extra virgin olive oil is loaded with antioxidants, antibacterial agents, anti-inflammatory properties, and even anti-cancer compounds.

Rich in biologically active antioxidants, olive oil can help fight serious diseases, increasing your chances of staying healthy. At least 30 phenolic compounds help your body protect itself against imbalances that can lead to physical degeneration (5, 6).

Preventing the cholesterol in blood from becoming oxidized may contribute to dropping the risk of developing heart disease. (7) In one trial, young women with high blood pressure lowered the numbers through improving endothelial function in blood vessels, cutting their chances of heart disorders.

Laboratory studies show the compounds in olive oil actually kill cancer cells in test tubes (7), The polyphenols thought to be responsible for offing breast cancer cells in the lab show promise for the development of medication that could be used for women at high risk for the disease (8).

Helicobacter pylori, the bacteria resulting in stomach ulcers that can lead to stomach cancer, backs off in the presence of olive oil, as do other potentially harmful bacteria (9).

The association of chronic inflammation with serious diseases is well known, and the antioxidants in this oil suppress the expression of genes linked to inflammatory response (10).

People following a Mediterranean diet rich in olive oil have historically enjoyed overall good health at much higher rates than those who didn’t use olive oil; to ferret out the reasons for this, many studies have been done.

Reviewing these conclusions from trials and studies will illustrate why extra virgin olive oil could be a wise choice in your diet.

It is effective for lowering blood pressure, which is a reliable predictor for an elevated risk of developing heart disease (11, 12). Another benefit includes the presence of oleocanthol, the component scientists believe keeps the LDL cholesterol in the blood from oxidizing (13, 14).

Results from a randomized clinical trial with subjects consuming a diet high in extra virgin olive oil identified multiple beneficial effects on brain function. (15)

Another study on mice indicated compounds in olive oil help dissolve amyloid plaques that accumulate inside brain cells, and are linked with Alzheimer’s disease. (16) Mice also navigated mazes more efficiently and showed signs of improved memory when fed olive oil. (17)

A diet rich in olive oil has been shown to cut the risk of developing type 2 diabetes by 40% (18). Several studies confirmed positive effects on blood sugar levels, resulting in improved insulin sensitivity (19).

When 7000 Spanish college students ate even more olive oil than usual over 2.5 years, the change in diet could not be correlated with weight gain (20). Another study spanning 3 years with 187 adults showed increased antioxidant levels as well as a drop in weight (21).

Peripheral dietary factors may exert some influence on results in studies like these, but all conclusions were reached with subjects eating generous amounts of extra virgin olive oil.

For centuries, the process for extracting oil from olives has remained reassuringly simple: ripe olives are pressed with mechanical force between stone surfaces, then the oil is separated from vegetable matter and fluids before bottling.

Olive oil has long been suspected to have strong anti-inflammatory properties, because many of the chronic diseases it combats (like heart disease) are linked to long-term systemic inflammation.

Recent work published in the prestigious journal Nature undertook a detailed analysis of the biochemical effects of olive oil as it relates to inflammation (22).

Researchers were able to demonstrate that, although olive oil contains different molecular compounds, the effect is the same: an inhibition of specific enzymes linked to an inflammatory process in the body that might explain part of the anti-inflammatory effects of olive oil.

Of course, you can’t get the same benefits of olive oil by just taking ibuprofen every day, so olive oil clearly offers more than just this specific enzyme inhibition.

One of the biggest health threats from a poor diet is the gradual accumulation of fat in your liver—a condition called nonalcoholic steatohepatitis, also known as fatty liver disease.

But, with the rise of Western diets, doctors began to see the same disease in people who were not alcohol abusers: nutritionists link it to the negative effects of the kind of high-fat, high-sugar, high-refined-carbohydrate diets now common in Western countries.

Emerging research now suggests that olive oil could help protect your liver from the kind of liver damage found in fatty liver disease (23).

Olive oil is safe, but make sure you’re getting pure olive oil. Some modern manufacturing plants use chemicals to extract olive oil, so it’s important to make certain you know what you’re getting. Mixing quality olive oil with inferior oil processed in undesirable manners is one way to increase profits, and in these cases, the end result will not deliver the antioxidants and substances associated with the health benefits listed above.

Even if a product is labeled “Extra Virgin Olive Oil,” it may be diluted with chemically extracted oils, it’s well worth it to spend more time and money, if necessary, and get the right stuff.

Many of the fats and oils available in today’s marketplace deserve a bad rap, including trans fats commonly found in junk food and certain highly processed seed and vegetable oils, like canola oil and grapeseed oil.

Most studies recommend at least one to two fluid ounces per day. From both observational research and from intervention studies, where olive oil is “prescribed” as a treatment to reduce the risk of chronic disease, we have a pretty good idea of the minimum amount of olive oil needed get a benefit for your health.

Studies that have found benefits from olive oil interventions typically use “dosages” of between 25 and 50 mL (about one to two fluid ounces per day) (24). That dosage translates to about two to four servings of olive oil per day.

There is no upper limit on olive oil intake. There doesn’t seem to be an upper limit on olive oil intake; participants in an ongoing study on a Mediterranean diets and heart disease receive a full liter of olive oil every single week, and are instructed to use it “liberally” in cooking and as a salad dressing (25).

Observational research generally suggests that more olive oil consumption is better as well. While it’s less helpful than a specific amount, when it comes to olive oil, more is better. Shoot for at least 40 mL or 1.4 fluid ounces every day.

Q: How much olive oil should you get per day?

A: Scientific research indicates that, at a minimum, you should strive to get 25-50 mL of olive oil per day. That translates to around one to two fluid ounces of olive oil per day.

Critically, this is the minimum amount, not the recommended amount. As there seems to be no upper limit for the health benefits of olive oil, the rule for now should be that more is better.

Q: Is olive oil bad for you?

A: Quite the opposite, actually. Virtually every aspect of olive oil is beneficial, and it’s hard to name a domain of health where there isn’t some evidence that olive oil exerts a positive benefit.

Olive oil is most heavily-studied as a way to reduce the risk of heart disease, but other research has found that it preserves cognitive function in older adults, combats obesity, improves liver health, and reduces inflammation. So far, research has not identified any upper limit to olive oil consumption, so feel free to use it liberally on a regular basis.

Q: How long does olive oil last?

A: Olive oil, when taken care of, can last for at least several months even after being opened. To make sure your olive oil stays as fresh as possible, and retains as much of its antioxidant properties as possible, buy olive oil that comes in an opaque or tinted container, and store it in a cool, dark place.

Q: Can olive oil help digestion?

A: Some of the most exciting frontiers of research on olive oil usage actually related to less-common applications such as addressing digestive problems. A very interesting study published in 2013 used olive oil in combination with probiotics to combat indigestion in a small group of volunteers (26).

The scientists in charge of the study hypothesized that the antioxidant properties of olive oil contributed significantly to the improvements in symptoms, but the interaction with probiotics is the most important takeaway.

Though more research needs to be done, taking olive oil alongside probiotics could be a great way to reduce indigestion without the side effects of some of the more common treatments for indigestion.

Direct sunlight, oxygen, and heat are the main enemies of the antioxidants in olive oil, so avoid exposing the oil to these whenever possible.

Related: Our best olive oil picks

When it comes to long-term health benefits, olive oil is hard to beat. Pretty much any diet can benefit by adding olive oil, and it’s especially useful for swapping out unhealthy fats with the healthy fats in olive oil.

Good scientific evidence indicates olive oil can reduce your risk of heart disease, and it’s also been studied for improving glucose control, sustaining healthy cognitive function, and cutting down on inflammation in your body.
Because of these long-term health benefits, it’s well-worth your time to seek out a high-quality olive oil and incorporate it into your diet on a regular basis.

The post 12 of the biggest health benefits of olive oil appeared first on Body Nutrition.

Olive oil is one of the healthiest cupboard basics of all time.

You probably don’t think about it as a supplement, but just because it’s great on a salad doesn’t mean there aren’t powerful biologically active compounds in it.  Olive oil is great for heart health, fighting inflammation, and even keeping your skin and hair healthy.

Worried about whether your olive oil is legit? We tracked down the best brands so you don’t have to worry about adulterated or impure olive oil masquerading as “extra virgin.”

Last updated: April 12, 2023
Olive oils considered: 23
Hours of research: 40
Experts reviewed: 6
Scientific papers referenced: 28

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The best olive oil out there comes in a metal tin and is produced at a single-source farm in Greece. The label bears a PDO certification, which stands for Protected Designation of Origin: Crete, the region of Greece in which Ellora Farms is located, lays a special claim on its olive oils.  

Just like real champagne is legally required to be produced in the Champagne region of France, according to specific procedures, so too is Ellora’s specific type of olive oil.  Ellora Farms’ oil is great for cooking or for supplement-style uses, like blending into a smoothie; you can’t go wrong with this one.

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Zoe is a Spanish brand of olive oil that’s a rarity among imported olive oils because it carries the North American Olive Oil Association seal for inspected and certified extra virgin olive oil.  

This means it’s a lot more likely to actually live up to the claims of purity on the tin.  This is definitely a foodie’s olive oil; the product is specially blended with several olive varieties to give it a distinctive, spicy taste.  It’d be a bit of a waste to toss an artisan product like this into a smoothie; save that for the bulk brands.

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Can you imagine that Kirkland Signature, the humble purveyor of inexpensive bulk food items, could turn out a pure, reliable extra virgin olive oil?  Well, it’s the truth!

In the infamous University of California study that uncovered numerous major store brands that were peddling olive oil that didn’t actually meet the standards of “Extra Virgin,” Kirkland Signature passed the tests with flying colors.  Your impression of quality olive oils might be tiny, dark glass bottles with exotic labels, but Kirkland Signature shows that this isn’t always the case.  

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Corto is one of the best bulk buys on the market; you might think of it as the olive oil equivalent of great boxed wine.  The olive oil comes in a large three liter bladder inside a cardboard box.  

It’s nothing fancy, and you might guess that its quality would be subpar because of this, but it was one of the popular brands that actually passed the Olive Institute’s testing back in 2015.  It’s a good-quality olive oil that flies under the radar, but if you go through a lot of olive oil, it’s a fantastic choice.

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California Olive is another big brand that does quite well in purity certifications, historically speaking.  As a domestically produced olive oil, inspections and quality standards are likely up to a higher bar.  

The “Chef Size” comes in a 1.4 liter bottle that’s great if you go through a lot of olive oil, but still don’t want to opt for something truly huge, or that comes in a bag instead of a bottle.

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If you are going for an award-winner, this is the olive oil to pick.  PJ Kabos is a perennial ribbon-winner at olive oil competitions, so if you trust the experts, it’s the boutique pick to go with.  

The downside is that you don’t actually get a whole lot of olive oil: just 16.9 fluid ounces per tin, nor does it bear any special purity certifications.  You’ve got to figure, though, that a major award-winning boutique brand like PJ Kabos wouldn’t be cutting corners, seeing how it could affect their reputation.

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Sky Organics produces a gourmet olive oil in Greece and imports it into the United States.  As such, its production methods and purity are certified, but by Greek associations, not the usual North American one.  

It comes in a small, 17 ounce bottle, and though it’s entered (and often done well) in gourmet olive oil competitions, the company also touts its ability to be used as a homemade cosmetic too.  It’s perhaps not the best if you go through a lot of olive oil on a regular basis, but if you are looking for an everyday olive oil from the region of the world where it was invented, go for Sky Organics.

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La Tourangelle is a Spanish brand that’s artisan-made from organic olives. It’s excellent for gourmet cooking and has a great, balanced taste.

The only downside is the relatively small 500 mL package, which makes it not the best choice for heavy users. This might be a great olive oil for fancy cooking, but your “daily driver” should be something else in most cases.

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Colavita is a big seller, and although it failed the Olive Institute’s purity testing back in 2015, Colavita has (allegedly, at least) shaped up: its bottles now bear the label of the North American Olive Oil Association, which is supposed to certify and inspect olive oil for purity and quality standards.  

Still, you’ve got to view the brand with a little lingering suspicion given its history.  It’s a good bulk buy, to its credit, but not the best.

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This is another popular brand that was caught up in the sub-par olive oil scandal a few years back.  Pompeian, like many of the other major brands out there, have cleaned up their act, and are now certified by the North American Olive Oil Association, or NAOOA.  

It’s a popular buy and it comes in a fairly large bottle, though it is an import, not a domestic olive oil (domestic oils have a better track record when it comes to purity and quality).  If you want top quality, you’ll have to look higher up in the rankings.

Best olive oil overall: Ellora Farms Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Ellora Farms is cold-processed, PDO-certified, and traceable right to the very farm that grows the olives. Whether you’re cooking, baking, or just adding a boost of healthy oils to a protein shake, Ellora should be your first choice if you want a top-notch olive oil. 

Best olive oil for skin care: Kirkland Signature Extra Virgin Olive Oil

For cosmetic purposes, it’s hard to beat Kirkland—it’s pure, reliable, and easy to use, allowing you to use the nourishing and moisturizing properties of olive oil to make your skin softer, smoother, and more radiant. 

Best olive oil for tanning: Kirkland Signature Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Olive oil has been used for tanning going all the way back to ancient times. Kirkland Signature Extra Virgin Olive Oil is perfect for soaking up the sun without drying out your skin, thanks to its purity and large, easy to use bottle.

Best olive oil for face care: California Olive Ranch Extra Virgin Olive Oil

For keeping your face clear and moisturized, California Olive is a great option. It’s a smaller, boutique olive oil, but facial care only requires a small amount of olive oil, so you can take advantage of the exceptionally high quality of the oil. 

Best olive oil for hair: Corto Olive Co. 100% Extra Virgin Olive Oil

This simple boxed olive oil is perfect for hair care. Unlike glass bottles, it won’t shatter if you drop it in the bathroom, and it’s economically sized to make things easy even if you have lots of voluminous hair to moisturize.  

Best olive oil for cooking: Ellora Farms Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Ellora Farms is a single-origin olive oil that’s stored in a tin that keeps sunlight and oxygen from damaging the antioxidants. Even if you only use it occasionally, it’s the perfect olive oil for cooking. 

Pretty much everyone should use olive oil. It’s hard to make a case for anybody not to buy olive oil, given its wide benefits for health and the fact that it’s easy to incorporate into pretty much any kind of diet.

Olive oil is particularly important if you’re at risk for heart disease. Including olive oil as a part of your typical routine is particularly important if you have risk factors for heart disease or metabolic disease, like obesity, high cholesterol or blood lipids. Even so, people who are very healthy should still make sure they’re getting a sufficient amount of olive oil in their diet on a regular basis.

Older adults should also take a lot of olive oil. Olive oil not only reduces the risk of common diseases of aging, like heart disease and metabolic syndrome, but also helps preserve cognitive function as you get older. This makes olive oil a particularly good addition for older adults.

Olive oil’s popularity also means there are a ton of options on the market. We applied strict criteria to determine which olive oils deserved to be in our top rankings.

Extra virgin olive oil only. When it comes to olive oil, quality matters most: since many of the health benefits of olive oil can be traced to the antioxidant properties that are contained by its unsaturated fats and related compounds, we only considered extra virgin olive oils.

These oils contain the highest amount of antioxidants and the lowest amount of oxidized fats, as they are minimally processed compared to other plant and vegetable oils.

Third-party data to verify olive oil purity. Comparisons of the best olive oils on the market were completely turned on their heads following a 2015 report by the Olive Center at the University of California-Davis, which uncovered widespread impurities and failure to meet standards among major importers of olive oil sold in the United States (1).

We used data from the Olive Center’s report to inform our rankings, as well as organizations such as the North American Olive Oil Association and Protected Designation of Origin trademarks, which are good benchmarks for purity.

Protective packaging that prevents oxidative damage. As secondary evaluation criteria, we also looked at the construction of the container, as that influences how well olive oil will last on your shelf after being opened.

Opaque containers, or containers that were tinted to reduce the effects of sunlight, both got bonus points in the rankings for helping to preserve the antioxidant properties of the olive oil within.

Thanks to this combination of independent verification of purity and high-quality storage containers, we’re confident that the olive oils in our rankings are your best shot at maximizing the health benefits of olive oil.

Q: What is the healthiest olive oil?

A: Because the benefits of olive oil are linked, at least in part, to its antioxidant properties, you want the purest and least-processed type of olive oil possible.

That means extra virgin olive oil: search for a product that has a certification from an independent agency such as the North American Olive Oil Association, which ensures that products meet official standards for what constitutes “extra virgin.”

As long as your olive oil meets these standards (as do all of the products on our rankings of the best olive oils of the year), it’s hard to go wrong.

Q: Can you cook with olive oil?

A: Yes, olive oil is a good option for cooking, because it does not oxidize quickly under heat. Though uncooked olive oil has the highest possible concentration of antioxidants, cooking with olive oil is far better than cooking with unhealthy fats.

Q: Are there benefits to drinking olive oil before bed?

A: As far as our research team has been able to tell, no scientific studies have directly studied taking olive oil right before bed (as opposed to some other time of day), though we did uncover some fascinating research connecting a Mediterranean diet pattern with better sleep quality (28).

In that study, older adults who adhered to a Mediterranean diet had better sleep quality, and had a lower risk of changes in sleep patterns over time, compared to adults who did not stick to a Mediterranean diet.

Since olive oil is a main constituent of the Mediterranean diet, it’s not hard to see why olive oil might improve sleep quality. However, whether it matters when you take it is still an open question.

Q: What is extra virgin olive oil?

A: “Extra virgin” is a classification of olive oil that applies to products that meet certain criteria for purity. The details are quite technical: they have to do with the levels of molecular indicators of oxidation and freshness, but for a long time, these standards were not enforced.

After the eye-opening study in 2015 from the University of California-Davis that showed that the majority of products labeled “extra virgin” did not actually meet these criteria, olive oil companies have been much more careful to adhere to the labeling requirements.

Even so, it’s still worth getting an extra virgin olive oil that is certified by an independent agency.

The pure and simple version of extra virgin olive oil is a great investment for supporting your health. The health benefits include protecting you from cardiovascular disease, helping improve liver health, and even protect your brain as you get older.

While there’s no upper limit to the amount of olive oil that you should consume, a good minimum is around 40 to 50 mL per day. This is the minimum amount used in most intervention studies and has been demonstrated to generate positive health benefits.

That being said, the most cutting-edge research is encouraging substantially more olive oil consumption (even going as far as providing participating families with a full liter of olive oil for free, every single week).

Based on all of this evidence, olive oil should definitely be a staple in your pantry and as a part of your daily cooking routine.

For BodyNutrition’s #1 olive oil recommendation, click here.

The post Ranking the best olive oils of 2023 appeared first on Body Nutrition.

I am SO excited to reveal my 10th cookbook that is will be published on October 3, 2023 titled, Up Your Veggies: Flexitarian Recipes for the Whole Family. You can read more about the book below and check out some recipe photos from the cookbook. Stay tuned as I will start giving you a sneak peek of some of the recipes and I will also have a release giveaway!

About the Book

Whether you’re a vegetarian, flexitarian or just looking to eat more plants, this book’s for you. Up Your Veggies is designed to help overcome popular barriers like taste, cost and time in order to eat more vegetables, which can help provide your body with the nutrition it needs to thrive and lower the risk of chronic diseases. In this cookbook, you will find 100 delicious plant-forward recipes that can personalized to your liking, making it perfect for families, individuals on a restricted diet, or anyone who wants to eat healthier without overhauling their lifestyle.

A few of the recipes in this cookbook include:

Speedy Vegetable Soup

Kale and Sweet Potato Salad with Shredded Chicken

Photo courtesy of Ashley Lima

Poached Egg Superfood Bowl

Photo courtesy of Ashley Lima

Did you know:

Stay tuned as I will share a few recipes from my new cookbook as we get closer to launch date on October 3rd!

*Note: If you’d like to get in touch with me for book signings or other collaborations, please email me directly toby@tobyamidornutrition.com

The post My New Cookbook- Up Your Veggies: Flexitarian Recipes for the Whole Family first appeared on Toby Amidor Nutrition.

This post is in collaboration with National Dairy Council. All opinions are my own.

Due to the pandemic, there has been increased concern on keeping your immune system healthy. Many folks have turned to supplements or other methods to try to boost their immune system, but many often forget that your first line of defense is a healthy diet. In my book The Family Immunity Cookbook: 101 Easy Recipes to Boost Health, I discuss the importance of eating a well-balanced meal and the role that milk and dairy foods play in keeping your immune system healthy.

About Your Immune System

A healthy immune system is vital to good health. The immune system helps fight off any foreign invaders to the body. If your immune system is healthy, it’s easier to fight bacteria, viruses, or anything else trying to make you sick. When you say you want to increase or boost immunity, what you likely mean is how can I keep my immune system as healthy as possible to lower my risk of getting a cold, the flu, or even COVID-19?

The immune system is rather complex. Your body has a network of tissues, cells, and organs that try to keep out foreign invaders such as bacteria and viruses. This is your immune system. Some of the main players include white blood cells, antibodies, and the lymphatic system. All of these parts, and others, actively fight foreign bodies that enter your body.

What Can You Do to Help Your Immune System?

In my cookbook, I list six habits to help your immune system be the best it can be. These six habits include staying hydrated, getting plenty of sleep, exercising regularly, consuming alcohol in moderation, reducing stress, and lastly, eating a healthy well-balanced diet. Part of having a well-balanced diet is getting your daily recommended servings of all your food groups, including milk and dairy foods, and fruits and vegetables.

Nutrients That Support Immunity

Vitamins A, D, B6 and B12, protein, selenium, zinc, and antioxidants like vitamins C and E are all important to keep your immune system healthy. You can get these nutrients from consuming milk and dairy foods, and by eating plenty of fruits and vegetables. However, only 2 in 10 Americans take in the recommended amounts of these.

Here are specific nutrients you get from foods that can help keep your immune system healthy:

Enjoying Nutrients Together

Nutrition is not just about eating single nutrients or single foods. It’s about how the variety of nutrients in the various foods you eat work together to keep your body healthy. A favorite snack recipe that I share below is my Strawberry Kiwi Almond Yogurt Bark made with Greek yogurt, strawberries, kiwi, and almonds – where you’ll get vitamins A, C, and E, protein, selenium, and zinc to help keep your immune system healthy.

Photo courtesy of Ashley Lima

Strawberry Kiwi Almond Yogurt Bark
Serves: 6
Serving size: 4 pieces

Rimmed baking sheet lined with parchment paper
2 cups (500 g) nonfat vanilla-flavored Greek yogurt
Zest of 1 orange
8 strawberries, stems removed and diced
2 kiwifruit, peeled and diced
1⁄2 cup (125 g) unsalted dry roasted almonds, coarsely chopped

Recipe from The Family Immunity Cookbook by Toby Amidor. Published by Robert Rose Books. Photo courtesy of Ashley Lima. All Rights Reserved.

See You at Today’s Dietitian Symposium!

I will be attending the Today’s Dietitian Symposium in Bonito Springs, Florida where I will be at National Dairy Council’s booth (#46) with some surprises waiting for you on Monday May 23 between 3:00 and 3:45 pm and on Tuesday May 24 between 11 and 11:45 at booth 46. I hope to see you there!

The post The Link Between Dairy’s Nutrients and Immunity first appeared on Toby Amidor Nutrition.

Courtesy of Keith Ayoob

The post 31 Days of Global Flavors: Day 31 first appeared on Toby Amidor Nutrition.

We are at the tail end of this series in honor of National Nutrition Month. Today we are celebrating teriyaki which comes from registered dietitian Amy Gorin.

Teriyaki

My number one favorite global flavor is teriyaki which I love using in my cooking. Teriyaki is so savory and adds a burst of flavor to dishes such as homemade “fried” rice.

Here is my recipe for Green Bean Fried Rice. I make this dish when I’m craving takeout but want something healthier. It’s an easy complete meal—the brown rice and veggies provides fiber, the eggs provide protein, and the almond butter provides healthy fat.

—Amy Gorin, MS, RDN, an inclusive plant-based dietitian and owner of Master the Media in Stamford, CT.

The post 31 Days of Global Flavors for National Nutrition Month: Day 29 first appeared on Toby Amidor Nutrition.

We at the tail end of National Nutrition Month and for day 27 my friend and colleague Frances Largeman-Roth is talking about one of her favorite global flavors, matcha.

Matcha

The post 31 Days of Global Flavors for National Nutrition Month: Day 27 first appeared on Toby Amidor Nutrition.

Categories: Mental Health, Ketogenic Diet, Depression, Bipolar Disorder, Diets & Diseases, Brain Health

In this pioneering study of the ketogenic diet, all patients improved and most were discharged on less medication.

Categories: Mental Health, Diets & Diseases, Brain Health, Other Health Conditions

Treatment and recovery from anorexia is possible using surprisingly logical nutrient-based strategies.

Categories: Diets & Diseases

Understand how nutritional epidemiological studies are performed and why they perpetuate confusion about the relationship between food and health.

Categories: Paleo / Whole Foods Diet

If you are living with a mental health problem of any kind, adopting a paleo diet is an excellent place to start for just about everyone.

Categories: Mental Health, ADHD, Ketogenic Diet, Depression, Bipolar Disorder, Diets & Diseases, Alzheimer’s Disease, Insulin Resistance, Anxiety, Brain Health

Ketogenic diets can have profound effects on mental health. Learn how with these videos, podcasts, and professional services resources.

Categories: Mental Health, Ketogenic Diet, Alzheimer’s Disease, Insulin Resistance, Brain Health

The metabolic similarities underlying Parkinson's and Alzheimer's disease offer hope for lifestyle interventions as potential treatment and prevention.

Categories: Carnivore Diet

Watch my presentation from the Boulder Carnivore conference exploring the nutritional differences between plant and animal foods and the scientific arguments that support all-meat diets for optimal brain health.

Categories: Mental Health, Foods, Plant-based Diet, Fat, Brain Health

A candid conversation with the tragically misunderstood and oft-feared omega-6 fatty acid arachidonic acid. Learn the needs this nutrient fills and how to ensure you get enough of it.

Categories: Insulin Resistance, Diabetes, Carbohydrates, Other Health Conditions

Is your New Year’s resolution to get healthier? The good news is that no matter what approach you choose, you can use this simple, magical, in-home tool to stay motivated and track your progress in real time.

Categories: Mental Health, Dairy, Alzheimer’s Disease, Protein, Brain Health, Carbohydrates

A new study claims a low-protein, high-carb diet may help ward off dementia, despite a growing body of clinical evidence suggesting that low-carb diets can be helpful for brain problems.

Learn to recognize the signs and symptoms your body uses to communicate to you that you aren’t eating enough. 

Stress, busy schedules, illnesses, grief, and the hustle and bustle of everyday life can take a toll on us. More specifically, our appetites and the way our bodies regulate hunger. This can often lead to us not eating enough. Additionally, many people in the pursuit of weight loss often end up unintentionally undereating or restricting to achieve that goal.

Whatever the cause, not eating enough food and depriving your body of important nutrients can manifest in ways that wreak havoc on your metabolism and hormones. Both of which may take longer to notice if you’ve been consistently undereating.

Let’s dive in and take a look at the not-so-subtle signs that your body may not be getting enough vital protein, carbohydrates, and fat, and what you can do to increase your food intake with a balanced diet.

If you’ve been feeling straight-up exhausted for several weeks regardless of how much you snooze or the quality of your sleep, it might be time to re-evaluate your diet. When we’re perpetually undereating, the body isn’t able to fuel itself properly. That may cause you to feel lethargic and sluggish. 

We often see this in the case of low carbohydrate diets specifically. Seeing as though starchy carbohydrates are the body’s primary source of fast energy, it makes sense why restricting them can lead to less-than-ideal energy levels. 

Take a look at your usual intake in regards to both volumes as well as variety. Are you consuming balanced meals that incorporate all of the Foundational Five components? Including starchy carbohydrates? Are you eating when you’re hungry and listening to your body’s cues? Take a moment to reflect here and see if you can make some adjustments. 

Dizziness can be one of the first physical signs of not eating enough. When you’re not eating enough food, your blood sugar levels can plummet and make you feel dizzy or faint. If you’re continually feeling lightheaded and can’t quite figure out why, take a look at your food intake. 

For a quick snack boost, eat something with carbohydrates and protein, like a banana with some almond butter, a handful of berries and nuts, or veggie sticks with some hummus. This combination of carbohydrates and protein will help increase and stabilize your blood sugar levels to help boost your energy.

However, if the dizziness persists after making these changes to your nutrition and your lifestyle, chat with your doctor to rule out possible issues.

Ever have moments of forgetfulness where you say things like, “Where did I put my keys?”? That happens to us all, but frequent brain fog could be your body’s way of telling you to check in with how you’re nourishing yourself (i.e. eat more food)! Brain fog can be a sign of several health challenges, but it’s also one of the key symptoms of not eating enough throughout the day.

Postponing lunches or interrupting your normal meal times to attend meetings or take calls delays the energy your body needs to keep going. So if that 3 p.m. lull hits hard and you realize you haven’t had lunch, that’s your cue to head to the kitchen or grab a snack.

It’s best to fill up on whole foods as best as you can. Go for a hearty salad with plenty of fresh veggies, maybe some sweet potatoes, avocado, grilled chicken, or protein of your choice, and a tasty dressing. Foods rich in B-vitamins, omega-3 fatty acids, folate, and antioxidants can help boost brain function and prevent cognitive decline (1). Bye-bye brain fog.

This may come as a surprise to you, but if you’re not eating enough food or getting enough nutrients, the highest priority organs will take the lead in getting those nutrients. This includes your brain, heart, and lungs, rather than your hair, skin, and nails. Hair, skin, and nail health are closely tied to what you eat along with how many vitamins and minerals your body is absorbing.

It’s normal to lose between 50-100 strands of hair every day. If you’re losing more locks than usual and your nails seem to break easier, you may want to focus on nourishing your hair and nails from the inside out.

Start by eating foods that help produce more keratin, the protein that strengthens your hair and nails. Spinach, beans, oatmeal, salmon, eggs, and berries are all excellent sources of hair- and nail-loving nutrients. Protein, biotin, iron, vitamin B12, and omega-3 fatty acids, in particular, are the best nutrients for helping you maintain the thickness, luster, and growth of your crop.

Hanger is a real emotion! If you’re battling a busy day and rush out the door without breakfast, your blood sugar and your mood can take a real dip. Studies show that low glucose levels can actually cause aggression and violent behavior (2). So when you haven’t had anything to eat, irritability may be one of the first noticeable side effects of not eating enough food. 

The best way to prevent hanger is to eat regular meals and nourishing snacks. Enjoying consistent meal times will help keep your blood sugar stable, so you can stay on track with your positive mood and good energy. When you feel that first sign of hunger coming, don’t push it off! Listen to it and grab either a meal or a snack, depending on the degree of hunger you’re experiencing to keep you feeling like your best self versus the moody, irritable version.

Got the chills, all the time? You need to consume a substantial amount of food to keep your body warm while performing other bodily functions.

If you’re not eating enough, you’re probably not able to efficiently carry out thermogenesis, which is a process that helps your body generate heat. Some research suggests that people who follow a restrictive diet have lower body temperatures than those who don’t (3).

Women who are also underweight or have low body fat might develop “downy” hair (also known as lanugo), as a way for their bodies to cope with heat loss. When your body doesn’t have enough body fat to heat itself up, it can grow lanugo to help trap heat. It’s common in people with anorexia nervosa or people who are extremely thin.

Making sure you eat enough is actually one way you can manage your hydration levels. Many of the electrolytes you get from food affect thirst. These include sodium, potassium, and magnesium. If you still feel thirsty after chugging down a glass of water, it’s a red flag that you may not be consuming enough calories.

Sometimes, your body can also mistake thirst for hunger and misguide you away from the water bottle. Just remember to aim for hydrating beverages such as caffeine-free teas, carbonated unsweetened seltzers, and good ‘ole water. 

Amenorrhea is the scientific term for missing your period. Women may miss their periods for a variety of reasons, including pregnancy, changes in diet, and stress. Sometimes certain medications you take, including contraception, can affect your cycle, too. Specific health conditions like hypothyroidism and polycystic ovarian syndrome can also affect your hormone levels and therefore your period as well.

Amenorrhea can also happen if you don’t eat enough and have low body fat or are underweight (about 10 percent under “normal” weight), which is different for each of us. Being underweight can stop ovulation and cause abnormal changes in your hormones, which is why some women with disordered eating habits or women who are high-performing athletes may often miss their periods. In some cases, their bodies also aren’t getting enough nutrients to carry out normal bodily functions.

The female athlete triad is basically an interrelated cycle that includes low energy intake, amenorrhea, and low bone density. This is most often seen in athletes who are trying to maintain a certain level of “leanness” for a particular sport like figure skating, ballet, gymnastics, or others. 

The biggest takehome from this article is to be aware and in tune with yourself and your body’s ability to show you signs that something may not feel right. Use these 8 signs and symptoms to check in with yourself and determine whether or not you may need to consume a bit more energy. 

Then find your balanced eating type!

Take this 45-second free quiz to find out which balanced eating archetype you are, and what your unique type needs to maintain balance with the way you nourish yourself. That way, you can finally be free from food and diet obsession, maintain a balanced weight, and cultivate a positive relationship with food and your body. 

The post 8 Signs Your Body Says You’re Not Eating Enough appeared first on Nutrition Stripped®.

As a mindfulness-based registered dietitian with a decade of experience, I have seen the transformative power of mindful eating in improving emotional wellness.

Stress, anxiety, and other emotions can often lead to unhealthy eating habits that may exacerbate mental health issues. In this article, I will discuss how mindful eating can help you cope with stress, anxiety, and other emotions. Additionally, I will share specific practices and mental health resources to help you navigate these challenges and find balance in your life.

It is not uncommon for individuals to use food as a coping mechanism during times of stress, anxiety, or emotional turmoil (1). Emotional eating, or eating in response to feelings rather than physical hunger, can lead to overeating, weight gain, weight loss, and negative emotions such as guilt or shame (2). This cycle can perpetuate itself, making it difficult to break free from the grasp of emotional eating.

I often get asked questions about if emotional eating is bad by new Mindful Nutrition Method students in my program, and my answer is always the same! Experiencing emotional eating of any kind is not “bad”, it’s part of our human experience! The goal is to build our mindfulness muscle so we’re better able to understand, observe, and take more aligned action based on the awareness of our emotional eating habits over time.

Mindful eating is an approach that encourages individuals to pay attention to their internal cues, such as hunger and satiety, while also being aware of the emotional and environmental triggers that may influence their eating behaviors (3). By practicing mindfulness, individuals can develop a more compassionate and non-judgmental relationship with food, which can ultimately lead to improved emotional wellness.

Research has shown that practicing mindful eating can result in numerous mental health benefits, including reduced anxiety, depression, and emotional eating (4). In one study, participants who received a mindfulness-based intervention experienced significant improvements in emotional eating behaviors and reported increased feelings of self-compassion (5).

While the ultimate goal is to reduce emotional eating, it’s important to recognize that challenges may occur. During these moments, practicing mindfulness can still be beneficial in mitigating the impact of emotional eating. Instead of judging yourself or feeling guilty, try to observe your thoughts and emotions without judgment, and acknowledge the situations or “triggers” that led to emotional eating.

By doing so, you can gain valuable insights into the underlying causes and develop more effective coping strategies for the future (14). Moreover, incorporating mindfulness during emotional eating episodes can help you remain present, potentially preventing overindulgence and promoting greater self-compassion. Remember that progress is a gradual process, and developing a non-judgmental and compassionate approach towards yourself is crucial for long-term success in achieving emotional wellness.

Developing self-compassion is an essential aspect of mindfulness and can have a profound impact on emotional wellness. Self-compassion involves treating yourself with kindness, understanding, and acceptance, particularly during challenging moments (8). Research has shown that individuals with higher levels of self-compassion tend to have lower levels of anxiety, depression, and emotional eating (9).

In addition to practicing mindful eating and cultivating self-compassion, it’s important to seek additional support when managing stress, anxiety, and other emotions. Consider exploring the following mental health resources:

Mindful eating, self-compassion, and accessing mental health resources can play a significant role in improving emotional wellness and helping individuals cope with stress, anxiety, and other emotions. By adopting these strategies and seeking support, you can cultivate a healthier relationship with food, yourself, and your emotions.

Embrace a Balanced & Peaceful Relationship with Food.

If you’re looking to develop a healthier relationship with food and transform your eating habits, consider joining our online group coaching program, the Mindful Nutrition Method. Our program is designed to help you cultivate a mindful approach to eating and develop a healthier relationship with food and your body.

Get the 3-part system that will help you discover your balance, enjoy food fully, and nourish your relationship with food to feel confident, balanced, and at peace. You’ll learn the skills and strategies you need to make lasting changes to your health and well-being. Don’t wait to start your journey towards a healthier, happier you.

Join the Mindful Nutrition Method today and discover the transformative power of mindful eating.

References:

The post Mindful Eating for Emotional Wellness: How to Use Mindfulness to Cope with Stress, Anxiety, and Other Emotions appeared first on Nutrition Stripped®.

As a mindfulness-based registered dietitian, I’ve worked with countless individuals struggling with disordered eating, body image issues, and a complicated relationship with food. While there’s no single solution that works for everyone, I’ve found that cultivating mindfulness and self-compassion can be powerful tools for healing and supporting your relationship with food.

Mindful eating is the practice of paying attention to your food and your body in a non-judgmental way. It involves being fully present during meals, savoring each bite, and listening to your body’s signals of hunger and fullness. This approach can help you break free from old patterns of emotional or mindless eating and create a more positive relationship with food.

Self-compassion, on the other hand, is the act of treating yourself with kindness and understanding, particularly during difficult times. For those struggling with food and body image issues, it can be all too easy to fall into self-criticism and negative self-talk. However, practicing self-compassion can help you develop a more positive self-image and build resilience against future challenges.

In this guide, I’ll explore the ways in which mindful eating and self-compassion can work together to help you heal your relationship with food and your body.

Mindful eating can have a wide range of benefits for both physical and mental health. Here are just a few of the ways in which it can help:

Self-compassion is an essential component of healing your relationship with food and your body.

The concept of self-compassion was first introduced and established by Dr. Kristin Neff, a professor of psychology at the University of Texas at Austin. In her research, Dr. Neff found that self-compassion is a powerful antidote to self-criticism and negative self-talk, and can be an effective tool for reducing stress, anxiety, and depression. She defined self-compassion as the act of treating oneself with kindness, understanding, and non-judgment during times of difficulty, and outlined three core components of self-compassion: self-kindness, common humanity, and mindfulness. Dr. Neff’s work has been influential in the field of mindfulness and psychology and has inspired countless individuals to develop a more compassionate relationship with themselves.

When speaking about self-compassion as it relates to our relationship with food, I think of one of my MNM students, Kelsey. 

Kelsey used self-compassion as a tool inside the Mindful Nutrition Method to support her transformation and relationship with food. She shared:

“I just feel so much better. I really feel like I am at this point in my life, the healthiest that I’ve ever been. And I used to define health by the number on the scale or how I looked, my weight, and that is not how I define it anymore at all.

It’s — do I have the mental clarity? Do I have the energy to show up in the best way that I can every single day? Can I fulfill the goals that I want to have every single day? Can I work towards creating a better world for myself and my friends and my family and for everybody?

And I feel like I am so much more in tune with what I need, what I need to nourish myself both externally, how does my body look and feel, but also like internally of giving myself the time to really recharge and show up in a way in the world that I’ve always wanted to show up, but I didn’t realize that I could achieve that by just looking inside of myself and being in tune with myself.

So much has changed as far as how I view my health, how I want to take care of myself. It’s much more holistic. It was so much more on external factors and now looking at myself as a whole human being, my health as both physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, all of it. And that’s something I’ve never done before with myself or my health.”

Self-compassion goes a long way when meeting yourself where you’re at with your food experience and creating a new experience around food! 

Here are some tips for incorporating mindful eating and self-compassion into your daily life:

Mindful eating and self-compassion can be powerful tools for healing your relationship with food and your body. By practicing mindfulness and self-compassion, you can reduce stress, improve your digestion and nutrition, and develop a deeper understanding of your body’s needs.

Remember that healing is a journey, and it’s important to be patient and compassionate with yourself along the way. With practice and support, you can develop a healthier and more positive relationship with food and your body.

Embrace a Balanced & Peaceful Relationship with Food.

If you’re looking to develop a healthier relationship with food and transform your eating habits, consider joining our online group coaching program, the Mindful Nutrition Method. Our program is designed to help you cultivate a mindful approach to eating and develop a healthier relationship with food and your body.

Get the 3-part system that will help you discover your balance, enjoy food fully, and nourish your relationship with food to feel confident, balanced, and at peace. You’ll learn the skills and strategies you need to make lasting changes to your health and well-being. Don’t wait to start your journey towards a healthier, happier you.

Join the Mindful Nutrition Method today and discover the transformative power of mindful eating.

The post Using Self-Compassion To Support Your Relationship with Food appeared first on Nutrition Stripped®.

As a mindfulness-based Registered Dietitian and coach, I often talk about “mindful eating” and “mindless eating.” While the two concepts may seem similar, they actually have very different impacts on our health and relationship with food.

In this article, we’ll explore the differences between mindful and mindless eating, and why it’s important to pay attention to how we eat.

Mindful eating is the practice of paying attention to the present moment and being fully present while eating. This includes paying attention to the sensory experiences of food, such as taste, texture, and smell. It also involves being aware of our physical and emotional states while eating, including hunger and fullness cues, as well as any emotional triggers that may influence our eating behaviors.

One of the key principles of mindful eating is the practice of “eating with intention.” This means that we make conscious choices about what we eat, why we eat, and how we eat. We eat when we’re hungry, and we stop when we’re full. We also choose foods that nourish our bodies and provide us with energy and nutrients.

Mindful eating also supports a positive relationship with food where it’s a balance between eating foods we need for physical body nourishment and also eating foods we enjoy without guilt or stress.

Some other key principles of mindful eating include:

There are many benefits to practicing mindful eating. For one, it can help us develop a healthier and more positive relationship with food and our bodies. By being more attuned to our hunger and fullness cues, we can avoid overeating and better regulate our food intake for our unique needs and portions. 

In addition, mindful eating can help us enjoy our food more. By savoring each bite and paying attention to the sensory experiences of food, we can cultivate a deeper appreciation for the foods we eat. This can also help us make more informed food choices, as we learn to recognize which foods truly satisfy us and which don’t.

Enjoyment is so important to our food experience! 

Research has also shown that mindful eating can have positive impacts on our mental health. By being present and aware while eating, we can reduce stress and anxiety related to food and eating.

In contrast to mindful eating, mindless eating is the practice of eating without paying attention to our present-moment experiences. This can take many forms, including eating while distracted (such as watching television or using a phone), eating quickly, or eating in response to emotional triggers rather than physical hunger.

This is a very common experience with food, especially when you’re starting out on your journey to eating more balanced and more mindfully so give yourself some extra self-compassion at this stage.

Mindless eating can lead to overeating or bingeing, as well as other negative health consequences. When we eat without paying attention to our bodies hunger and fullness cues, we’re more likely to eat past the point of fullness and may consume more calories than we need.

When we eat in response to emotions rather than physical hunger, we may be using food as a coping mechanism to deal with stress, anxiety, or other difficult emotions. While emotional eating isn’t a “bad” experience, when we’re only using food as a coping tool for our emotions over time, this brings more challenges for us to deal with said emotions in a more supportive long-term way.

Kim, one of our Mindful Nutrition Method students overcame this very challenge of mindless eating during her time in the program. She utilized all the education, tools, strategies, and support inside our program, she said:

“So much has changed. I feel like it’s night and day. I don’t have a lockbox anymore. My binges happen super-less frequently, and when they do, I have tools now that I can use, and I’m still working on using them all of the time, but tools that I can use to work through them. I just feel like, in general, I have a lot less anxiety around food choices.” 

The most negative impact of mindless eating on our well-being is our relationship with food. When we are disconnected from our bodies and eat out of disconnection or distraction, we’re ignoring our body’s true nourishment needs.

Additionally, research has shown that people who eat while distracted, such as watching television or using a phone, consume more calories than those who eat without distractions. In addition, people who eat quickly tend to consume more calories overall than those who eat slowly. While consuming more food isn’t a “bad” thing, it can lead to a habit of overeating or eating more than our hunger cues are dictating since we’re not tuning in.

In addition, using food as a coping mechanism for emotional distress can also lead to disordered eating behaviors, such as binge eating or emotional eating and undereating, which can have a negative impact on our mental health and well-being.

Practicing mindful eating can take some practice, but it’s a skill that anyone can learn. Here are some tips for getting started:

Mindful eating and mindless eating are two very different approaches to eating that have a significant impact on our health and well-being. By practicing mindful eating, we can learn to pay attention to our present-moment experiences and develop a healthier relationship with food and our bodies. On the other hand, mindless eating can lead to overeating, disordered eating behaviors, and negative health outcomes. By becoming more aware of our eating habits and making conscious choices about what, why, and how we eat, we can cultivate a healthier relationship with food and improve our overall health and well-being.

Embrace a Balanced & Peaceful Relationship with Food.

If you’re looking to develop a healthier relationship with food and transform your eating habits, consider joining our online group coaching program, the Mindful Nutrition Method. Our program is designed to help you cultivate a mindful approach to eating and develop a healthier relationship with food and your body.

Get the 3-part system that will help you discover your balance, enjoy food fully, and nourish your relationship with food to feel confident, balanced, and at peace. You’ll learn the skills and strategies you need to make lasting changes to your health and well-being. Don’t wait to start your journey towards a healthier, happier you.

Join the Mindful Nutrition Method today and discover the transformative power of mindful eating.

Additional resources:

The post The Difference Between Mindful Eating vs. Mindless Eating appeared first on Nutrition Stripped®.

Use these mindful eating journal prompts and reflection questions to assess your current relationship with food.

Mindful eating is all about finding what works for your unique body. It’s about tapping into your body’s cues, your personal wants, likes, and dislikes. It’s about getting to know your habits and tendencies in a compassionate way so you can make adjustments with ease. 

Here at Nutrition Stripped, we believe there are two important aspects of eating well every day: what you eat and how you eat.  The concept of mindful eating is more about how to eat rather than what or how much you are eating. It’s all about putting the focus back on your experience at mealtimes.

Mindful eating is a practice that allows you to be more intentional with your eating habits while also maintaining a healthy relationship with food. Slowing down and bringing more mindful awareness to what you’re eating and how you’re feeling before, during, and after meals is one of the best practices you can have for finding what works for you and creating healthy eating habits. 

The following mindful eating journal prompts will walk you through exactly how to reflect on your relationship with food so you can be more mindful.

You can use these journal prompts and reflection questions to get to know yourself and your relationship with food a bit better. Use this knowledge to help build your mindful eating routines and positive relationship with food. 

While engaging with these mindful eating journal prompts and reflection questions, don’t forget to do so with compassion. Don’t judge yourself or your answers, allow yourself to be candid and honest. This allows for growth and change.

You can engage with all of these prompts in one sitting, or you can pick one or two to engage with at a time. Whatever works best for you! 

(i.e. balanced, imbalanced, negative, forced, easy, restrictive, tumultuous, normal, frustrating, controlling, easeful, fun, etc.)

In this first mindful eating journal prompt, reflect on your relationship with food. What words come to mind when you think about it? How would you describe it? This will help to set the scene for what we’re working with while engaging with the following prompts.

(i.e. I’m able to eat what I enjoy while also physically nourishing myself, I never feel restricted, I don’t feel out of control around food, I enjoy nourishing myself, etc.)

Think through the positive components that you associate with your relationship with food here. What parts of your relationship are enjoyable? What do you like about it? Get really specific here. 

(i.e. I’m not able to eat what I enjoy, I don’t know how to nourish myself, I often feel restricted, I feel out of control around food, I feel stressed about food, etc.)

Now think about what you may not enjoy about your current relationship with food. And remember, self-compassion is key here. No judgment allowed! Just let yourself mindfully reflect and assess. This particular mindful eating journal prompt can help you identify what you would like to change. 

(i.e. My stomach growls, food starts to sound good, I think about food more, I get a little brain fog, my stomach feels empty, my hands get a little shaky, etc.)

Now that we’ve working through some of the overarching themes, let’s work through some of the more specific parts of your relationship with food. While engaging with this journal prompt, it can be helpful to physically picture yourself the last time you felt hungry. Maybe it was earlier today, or last night, or even right now! Then start to walk through the feelings (both physical and mental), that you experience. 

(i.e. When I’m sad I turn to food, when I’m excited I never want to eat, when I’m stressed I eat past my hunger cues, when I’m stressed I ignore my hunger cues, when I’m overwhelmed I overeat, etc.)

Think through how your emotions impact your relationship with food. What kinds of emotions impact your choices? How often does it happen? What happens when you’re feeling that emotion and in need of food? The more awareness you have surrounding your emotions in relation to food, the easier it will be to change or sustain your actions at the moment as needed. 

(i.e. anything and everything you enjoy)

Remember, this is a judgment-free zone. Write down everything and anything you enjoy eating, whether that’s an enjoyment-based food or a more nourishment-based food. If you struggle to think of anything here, that lets you know that this area needs a bit of discovery and exploration! 

(i.e. chocolate, peanut butter, pasta, leafy greens, green juice, candy, potatoes, etc.)

Think about the food items you crave often. Foods you enjoy and foods you crave are slightly different. Cravings are stronger and sometimes may even feel involuntary. By shining a light on your cravings, you can learn a lot about where those cravings are coming from and why you’re experiencing them.

(i.e. I can’t eat past 7 pm, I can only have carbs during the first half of the day, I can’t have chocolate in the house, I have to have vegetables with every single meal, etc.)

You can learn a lot about your relationship with food by identifying any food rules that you abide by. Once you’ve listed out any food rules that you have (as shown in the example above), reflect on whether or not they’re balanced. If the feel strict and rigid rather than flexible and easeful, try and think through how you can remove the rule and change it into something more balanced.

(i.e. whole foods are good, starchy carbs are bad, candy is bad, ice cream is bad, vegetables are good, green juice is good, etc.)

When we label food as good or bad, we allow guilt and shame to come into our relationship with food. By identifying where and why morality plays a part in your relationship with food, you can start to remove it and practice more balance. 

(i.e. yes, I nourish myself in a way that works well for me, no, I don’t know how to nourish myself without feeling overwhelmed, etc.)

Confidence is key for a mindful, balanced relationship with food. But sometimes we forget to check in with this! Take a moment to check in with your confidence level. Get to know where and why you do or don’t feel confident, so you can work to maintain that confidence or make a shift. 

(i.e. I would like to remove morality from food, be more mindful at mealtimes, build my confidence, etc.)

Identify exactly what you would like to change and adjust after engaging with the previous questions in this reflection. Once identified, remember to do so with compassion and without haste. Take your time and remember, the goal is balance not perfection.

Mindful reflection is one of the most powerful tools you can use to develop and maintain a balanced relationship with food. Use these mindful eating reflection questions time and time again to get to know yourself and your relationship with food even better!

Then find your balanced eating type!

Take this 45-second free quiz to find out which balanced eating archetype you are, and what your unique type needs to maintain balance with the way you nourish yourself. That way, you can finally be free from food and diet obsession, maintain a balanced weight, and cultivate a positive relationship with food and your body. 

The post Mindful Eating Journal Prompts appeared first on Nutrition Stripped®.

Cook up this healthy, plant-based whole grain Instant Pot Brown Rice Banana Pudding in minutes, thanks to the power of an Instant Pot! If you don’t have an Instant Pot, no problem—just cook the easy banana pudding in a pot on the stove. I have always loved banana rice pudding, as my mother used to make it for me as a child. That’s what inspired me to create this instant pot rice pudding recipe, which is so nutritious, you can even serve it for breakfast! With only a few whole ingredients—brown rice, coconut milk beverage, cornstarch, spices, agave, ripe bananas, and coconut, you can feel so good about this wholesome banana pudding, which is gluten-free and vegan too. This healthy vegan rice pudding is simply packed with whole grains and fruits, with no added oils or salt, and very minimal added sugars. You can get this no bake banana pudding recipe on the table in no time! Try swapping the mashed bananas for diced peaches or strawberries for a new twist on flavors.

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Make up this classic healthy Instant Pot Vegan Brown Rice Banana Pudding the easy way with just a few whole ingredients, including brown rice, banana, and coconut.

Keywords: banana pudding, easy banana pudding, vegan banana pudding, no bake banana pudding, instant pot rice pudding, vegan rice pudding, coconut rice pudding

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For other plant-based dessert recipes, try these:

Chocolate Sundae Vanilla Cream
Peach Crisp with Rosemary and Olive Oil
Creamy Peach Yogurt Parfait
Summer Fruit Skillet Cobbler
Rhubarb Strawberry Tart with Dark Chocolate
Cinnamon Apple Crumble
Grilled Peaches with Basil
Quince Apple Compote

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Looking for the best Trader Joe’s snacks or light meal options that happen to be vegan, time-saving, and delicious? Check out this list of The 17 Best Trader Joe’s Snacks That Are Vegan and Dietitian-Approved.

If you’ve never been to Trader Joe’s, let this be your sign to jump in the car and head to the nearest hibiscus flower-studded haven right now. Trader Joe’s is no ordinary grocery store. The company has several core values that help them stand apart from the rest, while also helping their customers, community, and the environment. The majority of the products stocked on the shelves are Trader Joe’s store brand products, which makes it an affordable store to stock up on plant-based groceries.  Those products are free from synthetic colors, artificial flavors, GMOs, and 23% of them are organic! The company also has nearly 1,400 non-profit partners, which allows it to donate 100% of the products that are not purchased but remain fit to be enjoyed to people in need as part of the Trader Joe’s Neighborhood Shares Program. Trader Joe’s is also committed to making changes in their stores and supply chain to become more sustainable. 

You may have been inspired to buy your plant-based ingredients by our previous blog post “Top 13 Plant-Based Trader Joe’s Products”, but have you tried their time-saving vegan snack and light meal products? In addition to their staple plant-based ingredients, Trader Joe’s has tons of frozen and grab-n-go options, as well as snacks, vegan dips, and plant-based treats that will make even your quick meals on the go exciting and delicious. We’ve gathered 17 of the best time-saving vegan Trader Joe’s staple products, so you’ll know exactly what to look for next time you go shopping. Some can be paired with some of my favorite plant-based recipes for a healthy easy snack or light meal, while others are indulgent as special treats. 

1. Frooze Balls 

Funny name, seriously plant powered.  These little plant powered energy ball packs are a convenient and delicious way to start your day or keep it going. They come in both Peanut Butter & Jelly and Chocolate Hazelnut flavors which offer a touch of natural sweetness.

2. ABC Bars

If you’re looking for something quick to keep in your pantry for those days when you’re running out the door, try these ABC vegan and gluten free bars. They come in the Almond Butter Cocoa flavor shown here, as well as Peanut Butter Cocoa, and Peanut Butter & Jelly flavors. 

3. Spicy Lentil Wrap

This wrap is great, but the true star is the spicy tahini dipping sauce that goes with it. It’s creamy, spicy and nutty, and makes the perfect wrap to bring to work for a snack or light lunch or to the park for a quick picnic.

4. Vegan Super Spinach Salad

This salad is simply delicious! It makes a perfect on-the-go snack or light lunch and it’s filled with plant protein and topped with a flavorful, bright carrot ginger miso dressing.

5. Vegan Poke

Trader Joe’s Vegan Poke is delicious and can easily be paired with rice or another grain for a snack or light quick meal. Try using some as an additional topping on this recipe for Vegan Poke Bowl with Tofu, Watermelon, and Quinoa. 

6. Taiwanese Green Onion Pancakes

These Green Onion Pancakes make a great addition to any light meal or snack. Serve them as an appetizer, or add to the table to eat with soups, stir fries, or as a side. 

7. Vegetable Bird Nests

These little nests are a great appetizer to keep on hand for when you get invited over at the last minute or end up hosting an impromptu get together. Just pop them in the oven for 20 minutes and they come out crispy and delicious!

8. Trader Joe’s Falafel

Nothing’s better than homemade falafel, but when you don’t have time, Trader Joe’s Falafel is a great choice. Use them to make gyros or pair it with one of their many hummus options, veggies, and pita for a quick Mediterranean snack! You can also add them to this recipe for Double Chickpea Vegetable Pitas or serve with this classic hummus. 

9. Kung Pao Tempura Cauliflower

This cauliflower is perfectly crispy and packs a punch. When you need a quick snack or light meal, try adding this Kung Pao Tempura Cauliflower to a grain bowl with vegetables, or serve it as an appetizer.

10. Sriracha Flavored Baked Tofu

For the times when you’re not sure what seasonings to use, or you don’t have enough time to marinate your tofu, try Trader Joe’s Sriracha Baked Tofu. You can easily add it to grain bowls, roll into a wrap, toss into stir fry, stir into soup, or try it in my Sriracha Sesame Breakfast Tofu Sandwich. 

11. Vegan Spinach & Cashew Ravioli

If you need a quick heat-and-eat snack or light meal, Trader Joe’s offers two varieties of vegan ravioli that cook in just 4 minutes!  In addition to the Spinach & Cashew Ravioli, you may also want to give the Vegan Italian Bolognese Ravioli a try.  Just pick up a tub of vegan pesto or a jar of spaghetti sauce, any toppings you like, and there you have it, dinner in under 5 minutes!  You can also substitute these for the pasta in recipes like Vegan Pasta with Roasted Vegetables.

12. Vegan Kale, Cashew & Basil Pesto

Try this pesto with Trader Joe’s vegan ravioli options, add to your own pasta recipe, or use in my Black Lentil Pesto Salad with Butternut Squash and Brussels Sprouts recipe as a snack or light meal.  

13. Vegan Buffalo Style Dip

Trader Joe’s has several delicious plant based dips, including this Vegan Buffalo Style Dip.  This dip works great as a spread in wraps with roasted cauliflower or chickpeas and lettuce, or as a flavorful dip for fresh vegetables, pita and pretzels.  

14. Vegan Caramelized Onion Dip

Here’s another great dip to pick up for game nights, dinner parties, or camping trips to have with chips, vegetables or crackers. 

15. Crunchy Chili Onion Hummus

Trader Joe’s offers several tasty hummus varieties, but this one has made the top 17 list because it is just that good! The vibrant flavors and subtle crunchy textures are irresistible, and will have you coming back for “one last scoop” again and again! Try it in these Spicy Hummus Veggie Tacos.

16. Oat Non-Dairy Frozen Dessert Sandwiches

Sharing these vegan ice cream sandwiches with your family and friends is the perfect way to beat the heat or enjoy a sweet treat. They’re great for passing out at cookouts, bonfires, and pool parties when your focus should be on having fun with the people around you and not scooping ice cream or finding enough spoons. 

17. Hold The Dairy! Mini Coconut Non-Dairy Frozen Dessert Cones

If you’ve been to the frozen aisle in Trader Joe’s before, you’ve probably seen their famous mini cones, but did you know they have a vegan option too? These cones are the perfect size to satisfy your sweet tooth or chocolate cravings without making yourself feel like you over-indulged.  

Try some of my favorite healthy vegan snack recipes here: 

Learn how to put chickpeas to good use in your kitchen, from dried chickpeas to canned chickpeas, with my Top 5 Ways to Use Chickpeas guide, including cooking tips and healthy chickpeas recipes.

Chickpeas! So much history, nutrition, good taste, and versatility in each tiny pea. I promise, you can come to my kitchen any time of the week and find at least one form of chickpeas. You’ll probably find dried chickpeas, canned chickpeas, hummus, chickpea patties, roasted chickpeas, and even chickpea chips! But chickpeas have been celebrated since the beginning of time, and with good reason. These sustainable pulses are rich in protein, fiber, vitamins, and minerals, and can be a key source of good nutrition in your diet. Eating more chickpeas can provide a multitude of benefits. So, learn more about how to include chickpeas in your diet in this guide. And check out my Instagram video on cooking with chickpeas here.

These earthy, little round pulses date back 10,000 years ago in the Mediterranean basin, and they were one of the original neolithic founder crops. Chickpeas enjoyed huge popularity among ancient Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans before explorers brought them to countries all over the world. It’s easy to see how the beloved chickpea has inspired so many great dishes in so many different cultures, from Chana Masala in Indian cuisine to hummus in Middle Eastern cuisine. The above photo shows fresh chickpeas sold by the bundle at the farmers market in Crete, Greece. On that warm summer day several years ago, I wished that I had a kitchen to bring those lovely “bouquets” back to. Chickpeas can actually be enjoyed green—which means they are picked fresh and have a “greener” taste and texture than when they are dried. When you buy dried chickpeas in the store, they have been harvested and simply sun-dried. All you have to do is rehydrate (soak) and cook them. Canned chickpeas are simply dried chickpeas that have been cooked with water and maybe some salt in the can, so they are a healthy choice too. What’s the deal with garbanzo beans vs chickpeas? These are the same pulse—just different names for it. So feel free to use chickpeas in a garbanzo recipe and garbanzos in a chickpea recipe. There are even different varieties of chickpeas—learn more about black chickpeas here.

There’s a good reason to fall in love with chickpeas, as they are filled with plant protein, fiber, vitamins, minerals, and a host of phytochemicals linked with health protection. Research shows that people who eat chickpeas and/or hummus—the nutrient-dense dip or spread made from chickpeas—have been shown to have higher nutrient intakes of dietary fiber, polyunsaturated fatty acids, vitamin A, vitamin E, vitamin C, folate, magnesium, potassium, and iron, compared to people who don’t eat them. Emerging research also suggests that chickpeas and hummus may be beneficial in weight management, glucose and insulin regulation, and may even have a positive impact on some markers of cardiovascular disease. So, what are my favorite ways to enjoy chickpeas? I’ve got you covered with these Top 5 Ways to Use Chickpeas.

1. Whiz Chickpeas into Hummus

I love that hummus is now a mainstream part of our daily lives. In fact, I recommend that you keep some in your fridge at all times, as it’s a great nutrient-rich spread or topping for sandwiches, salads, whole grain crackers, and wraps. You can make your own classic chickpea hummus so quickly, too. And it’s so fun to get inventive, because you can make hummus with just about anything added to the mix (pumpkin, beets, avocado…the sky’s the limit)! Try my Avocado Cilantro Hummus, for starters. And check out my video on how to make four-way hummus here.

2. Go Global with Chickpeas

These little gems work so well in global, traditional cuisine, including African, Mediterranean, and Indian dishes. Try this Indian-inspired Chana Masala, Vegetable Tagine, and Chickpea Tabbouleh to get going.

3. Save that Liquid!

The leftover liquid from a can of chickpeas—called aquafaba—is all the rage! This liquid can be whipped into a meringue-like texture that can replace eggs in baking. Yes, that’s right! In fact, I made these Magic Banana Nut Pancakes out of chickpea flour and aquafaba—no eggs or gluten in this delicious recipe. Learn more about making aquafaba here.

4. Roast ‘em Up!

I am in love with roasted chickpeas! They are so easy to prepare: just place cooked or canned chickpeas on a baking sheet, drizzle with olive oil and your favorite spices, and roast in the oven until they are slightly crunchy. Then pop them in your mouth as snacks. Check out my recipe for roasting chickpeas in my book Plant-Powered for Life. And try a variety of chickpea products in your supermarket aisle, including roasted chickpeas, chickpea chips, and chickpea pasta.

5. Use Chickpeas as the Base of Meals

The mild flavor and color of chickpeas means they can be the backbone of so many dishes, including falafels, chili, stews, vegan meat balls, grain bowls, and even a faux tuna salad. Try a Moroccan Chickpea Sorghum Bowl, which features chickpeas as the plant protein star in a grain bowl.

Check out some of my favorite chickpea recipes in this collection of Top 10 Plant-Based Chickpea Recipes for even more ideas on cooking with this versatile pulse.

And don’t forget to check out my video for Vegan Chickpea Salad Sandwiches, which features chickpeas.

Get to more about how to use whole plant foods in your diet with some of top Plant Foods 101 Guides:

Health Benefits of Pumpkin Seeds
Top 5 Ways to Use Brown Rice
How to Use Fresh Turmeric Root in the Kitchen
How to Use Blackberries
Guide to Mango Health Benefits
How to Use Sweet Potatoes

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If you’re looking for just the perfect, healthy, light fruit-forward dessert, try a warming fruit compote. What is a compote? It’s basically cooked fruit in a flavorful syrup, making it just so simple and wholesome. Especially when it’s light in sugar, filled with spices, and packed with apples and quince, such as this Spiced Apple Compote with Quince Fruit. This soothing apple compote has a touch of smoky whisky, maple syrup, spicy ginger, cinnamon and cardamom, naturally sweet raisins, and crunchy walnuts. It’s delicious served in a pretty dessert cup, or as a topping for ice cream (plant-based, of course!). And if you don’t have quince, substitute with pears!

Watch me make this recipe on Instagram here.

This recipe is a great way to showcase quince, which is a fruit in the botanical family Rosaceae, related to apples and pears. Historically it’s been called a “golden apple,” but the quince is a lesser-known fruit, though a delicious one nonetheless! It appears throughout history in Greek poetry, the Roman cookbook Apicius, and in a painting by Vincent van Gogh. In the