Nutrition and Recipes
The Editor Cooks: Greens & Beans
Need a quick-and-easy recipe to add to your COVID-19 shelter-at-home cooking repertoire? Try this take on greens and beans. You likely have everything you need in your pantry and may only need to source a dark leafy green for the fresh part.
Sleep Well, Eat Well
Poor sleep has been linked to unhealthy eating habits and weight gain. Now a team of American researchers believes it knows why people may gravitate toward calorie-dense junk food when sleep deprived: Blame it on the nose.
Plant-Based Foods Curb Chronic Disease
Here’s another good reason to embrace the trend of eating more plants: A cohort study in Nature Communications involving 56,048 adults in Denmark found that people who over a 23-year period habitually consumed moderate to high amounts of foods rich in flavonoids—naturally occurring chemical compounds found predominantly in plant-based foods—were less likely to die from cancer or heart disease.
Recipe for Health: Masala Chickpea Stir-Fry
Beyond being uncomfortable, frequent constipation can raise the risk for conditions like hemorrhoids and rectal tears. Plus, the stool is a way to remove toxins from the body. That makes fiber-packed dishes like this quick plant-based stir-fry a great way to keep you more regular.
Insomnia Linked to Refined Carbs
A new study on insomnia in postmenopausal women suggests the consumption of refined carbohydrates may be the cause. The findings were published online in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
Recipe for Health: Orange-Glazed Butternut Squash With Herbed Pecans
We now have even more reasons to go nuts for nuts. Research published in the journal BMJ Nutrition, Prevention & Health found that adding a half-serving of nuts (14 grams) to a daily diet may reduce weight gain and obesity risk in adults (participants were followed over two decades). Consuming calories from nuts in place of calories from less healthy items, such as processed meats and potato chips, was also protective against extra weight.
5 Big Benefits of Plant-Based Diets
People can get caught up in the details of paleo, ketogenic and gluten-free diets, but one of the most buzzworthy eating styles at the moment is also super simple. It’s the plant-based diet—one that places less emphasis on animal-based foods and more on dishes derived from the plant kingdom.
Recipe for Health: Turkey Shepherd’s Pie
’Tis the season of indulgence, and diets can get unsaddled as people face a dizzying array of fatty meats, calorie-bomb dips and tempting sweets. But healthy eating need not wait until New Year’s Day—it’s easy to rustle up meals that taste just as cheery but deliver a bigger nutritional windfall. This nutritious riff on iconic shepherd’s pie is sure to become a new favorite on the holiday table.
Why Kids Need More Water
Nutrition professionals have long known that the beverages our youth choose to drink can hugely affect their diet quality and health. Three new studies drive home the point that the best option comes from the faucet.
Recipe for Health: Blueberry Granola Pudding
They might be blue, but there appears to be nothing sad about the heart-healthy benefits of blueberries. When British researchers provided 138 overweight and obese people, ages 50–75, with 150 grams (about 1 cup) of blueberries daily or a placebo for 6 months, they found participants eating the berries experienced various improvements in cardiovascular health, including a reduction in arterial stiffness and improved endothelial functioning.