Eats « Weekly Gravy

Eating a nutritionally balanced high-quality diet may lower a cancer patient’s risk of dying by as much as 65 percent, new research suggests. The finding that total diet, rather than specific nutritional components, can affect a cancer patient’s prognosis “was particularly surprising to us,” said the study’s lead author, Ashish Deshmukh. Total diet, he explained, was one that appeared to be “balanced” and “nutrient-rich” with a wide variety of vegetables, fruits, whole grains, proteins and dairy. Deshmukh is an assistant professor with the University of Florida’s College of Public Health and Health Professions. To explore the impact of nutrition on cancer, the researchers sifted through data collected between 1988 and 1994 by the Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES III). Almost 34,000 people were included in the survey, which asked all participants to offer up a 24-hour diet diary. The team then used the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) “Dietary Guidelines for Americans” as a yardstick for ranking the nutritional quality of the diets used by 1,200 people who had been diagnosed with cancer. The USDA guidelines specify serving recommendations for fruits, vegetables, whole grains, proteins, dairy, saturated fat, cholesterol and sodium. In turn, all 1,200 patients were then tracked for an average of 17 years, with researchers verifying all subsequent deaths — up to 2011 — through the U.S. National Center for… read on >

Eating fish twice a week reduces your risk of a heart attack or stroke, the American Heart Association says. The AHA recommends eating two 3.5-ounce servings of non-fried fish, or about 3/4 cup of flaked fish, every week. Eating just one serving a week is better than eating none, particularly if it is swapping out a higher-fat meal containing processed foods. The organization advises people to eat a variety of fish with high amounts of omega-3 fatty acids, including: salmon, mackerel, herring, lake trout, sardines or albacore tuna.

If more Americans ate healthier diets, the nation could save tens of billions of dollars in health care costs for major problems such as heart disease, cancer, type 2 diabetes, strokes, hip fractures and Alzheimer’s disease. That’s the conclusion of a new study in which researchers assessed different scenarios and determined that boosting the number of Americans with healthy eating habits could save between $21 billion and $135 billion a year in health care costs. The amounts varied depending on how many more people improved their eating patterns and the type of diet they followed, according to the researchers. The researchers suggested foods such as fish, nuts, fruits and olive oil as components of a healthful diet. The study is scheduled for presentation Sunday at the American Society for Nutrition annual meeting, in Boston. “We found that increasing adherence to healthy dietary patterns by even 20 percent at a population level has the potential to save more than $20 billion in both direct and indirect costs associated with 10 major health outcomes,” said study lead author Carolyn Scrafford, senior managing scientist at Exponent, a scientific consulting firm. “That’s a significant saving from what we believe is a realistic shift in diet quality,” she said in a society news release. “Our results suggest that it’s worthwhile to educate Americans on these dietary patterns and their components,… read on >

Not every food you eat has to be low-calorie when you want to lose weight. There are many nutritious and tasty foods that can help you feel satisfied, rather than deprived, and that’s important when you’re facing calorie restrictions day in and day out. The key to including them is careful portion control. Nuts are heart-healthy, especially almonds, walnuts and hazelnuts, but they come in at about 180 calories per ounce, so make that your daily nut limit. You’ll often see a portion described as a “handful,” but that’s too subjective a way to measure them. Use a food scale. Sweet potatoes have 120 calories per half-cup, but when slow roasted, they don’t need any toppings, especially not butter, which could easily double the calories. These vitamin A powerhouses are filling and loaded with many other nutrients, making them a very worthy vegetable among starches. Yes, olive oil is a fat. However, it’s a mono-unsaturated fat, which won’t raise your cholesterol level — unlike saturated fats like butter and lard. Though it’s 120 calories per tablespoon, all you need is a drizzle of oil for salad dressing or to saute vegetables or a chicken breast. To be very judicious with your use, use an oil sprayer. Avocadoes are rich in a wide variety of nutrients and taste rich, too –important when you’re trying to eat… read on >

(HealthDay News) — Fish is a protein-rich food that may be very nutritious. But it can also harbor dangerous levels of mercury that could add it to the “do not eat” list for some people, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration says. The FDA offers these suggestions for kids and women of child-bearing age: Don’t eat fish more than two or three times per week, especially if you’re pregnant or trying to become pregnant. Eat a variety of fish. Limit children to 1-2 servings of fish a week. Don’t feed fish to infants or toddlers younger than 2. If you eat fish that is caught locally, check for advisories. If there are none, eat one serving and no more fish that week.

Recalls of assorted foods and different brands of ice cream over the past few years have put a spotlight on the germ known as listeria. And though many of these cases happened during manufacturing, the potential for contamination is actually greater for foods after they’ve arrived at supermarkets and other food stores. And one item at particular risk is store-sliced deli meat. One study that tested samples over 6 months in the deli departments of chain supermarkets in three states found listeria in almost 10 percent of samples. Even if surfaces that come into contact with food, such as meat slicers, are cleaned thoroughly, listeria can be transferred unintentionally from moist areas where it hides — even floors and drains. And unlike other types of bacteria, it can live and grow at some refrigerator temperatures. Listeria is a type of bacteria that can cause listeriosis, a serious food-borne infection. An estimated 1,600 Americans get listeriosis each year, and about 260 die. The infection is most likely to sicken pregnant women and their newborns, adults 65 or older, and people with weakened immune systems, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. If you’re healthy, eating contaminated food may cause typical food poisoning symptoms that you’ll recover from. But symptoms of listeriosis include diarrhea, upset stomach, fever, aches and chills, and can take days… read on >

If mindless eating can put on the pounds, it stands to reason that mindful eating can help with diet success. In fact, studies show that “eating-focused” mindfulness can bring significant changes in weight, in how you approach food, and even in psychological well-being. This makes it especially helpful for binge eaters, but it’s also good for anyone whose first reaction to stress or any uncomfortable emotion is to reach for food. The goal of mindfulness is to help you develop a greater awareness of true hunger and the feeling of fullness, and to identify and work through the various triggers that lead to unnecessary eating. One simple way to apply the principles of mindfulness it to keep an eating diary. Whether in a traditional journal or through a food tracking app, you want to write down not just what you’re eating but also why you’re eating — are you hungry or just bored or stressed? To delve deeper into the practice of mindful eating, your options range from books for self-starters to training through mindfulness-based weight loss programs with weekly group meetings. These meetings can include one or more forms of meditation as well as mindful-eating homework so you can put into action what you learn in class. As with any technique designed to change behavior, the more effort you put in between sessions, the… read on >

(HealthDay News) — Eating lots of cruciferous vegetables — such as kale, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cabbage and cauliflower — could lower your risk of developing heart disease, Australian researchers say. Study results published in the Journal of the American Heart Association explored whether there was a link between the thickness of the neck arteries, the severity of plaque buildup, and veggie consumption. The study concluded that older women who ate more cruciferous vegetables had healthier carotid arteries. The exact reasons for the link — including why cruciferous veggies seemed to have a more protective effect — aren’t known, the researchers said. The study focused on older Australian women because the scientists said heart disease is often thought of as a “male” disease. Additional research hopes to establish whether the study results extend to men, as well.

When you fire up the grill for your Memorial Day cookout, beware: Those tantalizing aromas hold an underestimated health risk. Grilling meats at a high temperature can produce cancer-causing compounds called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs). You can be exposed to significant PAH levels simply by breathing in the sweet scent of barbecue. A new study from China suggests letting your skin come into contact with PAHs when you grill food is even more harmful than just savoring the aroma. And clothing won’t fully protect you against them. PAHs can cause lung disease and DNA mutations, the researchers said. Though eating barbecued meats is the most common source of exposure, just standing near a grill and breathing PAH-contaminated air can be risky, previous studies have shown. For the latest study, published May 23 in Environmental Science & Technology, a team led by Eddy Y. Zeng at Jinan University closely examined skin exposure to PAHs from barbecue fumes and particles. The researchers divided volunteers into groups based on various levels of exposure to grilled foods and smoke. Urine samples revealed the greatest PAH exposure came from eating grilled foods, but skin contact was in second place, followed by inhalation of barbecue fumes. Clothes can help protect you from the smoke, but only for a short period, the researchers noted in a journal news release. Once fabrics become… read on >

There’s a danger lurking in rice and you won’t find it by reading labels. It’s the chemical arsenic. And the threat isn’t about immediate poisoning but rather that long-term exposure to small amounts can increase the risk of bladder, lung and skin cancer, heart disease and diabetes. Arsenic naturally finds its way into our soil and water because it’s in the Earth’s crust, but it also accumulates from some pesticides and fertilizers. Rice tends to absorb arsenic more readily than many other plants. Most unfortunate is that brown rice has the highest amounts because the arsenic accumulates in the otherwise healthful outer layers, which are removed to make white rice. You don’t have to eliminate all rice from your diet, but choose it carefully, suggests the watchdog group Consumer Reports. Their testing found that arsenic levels differ depending on the types of rice and where they were cultivated. Here are some tips to limit your rice intake: Choose white basmati and brown basmati rice cultivated in California, India and Pakistan, and sushi rice cultivated in the United States. Vary your whole grains to minimize arsenic exposure — try whole wheat, amaranth, buckwheat, millet, polenta and grits. Carefully read the labels of all food products: Rice, rice flour or brown rice syrup are in everything from gluten-free foods to teething biscuits. High concentrations of arsenic in… read on >