There have been several studies to investigate the effects of diet and exercise on the development of Alzheimer’s. One study performed by Temple University School of Medicine researchers showed that eating high levels of an amino acid found in many protein sources might increase the risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease.

The researchers didn’t stop there, though, according to an article in Medical News Today. A recent follow-up study published in the Journal of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology indicates that even once memory and cognitive function begin to decrease, a change in diet can improve symptoms of the disease. The results indicated that, at least in mice, a positive improvement in diet–in this case, a change from a diet high in the amino acid methionine to one lower in methionine–can slow or reverse changes in memory and cognitive abilities caused by Alzheimer’s.

The take-away message here is that our brains are clearly influenced by our diets. Not only that, but positive changes in our diets can have a positive influence on our brain’s function. Remember, a healthy diet isn’t just about what our body looks like. It is also about how well our mind works. For a healthy mind and body, strive to eat a healthy, well-balanced diet now and in the future.

"Eat well. Live well. Be well."

Here at Feed the Soul, we always encourage readers and clients to eat more whole grains (brown rice, whole wheat breads and pastas, whole grain cereals, etc.) and fewer refined grains (white rice, breads and pastas, etc.). There’s plenty of research to back up this recommendation, because whole grains contain more nutrients and eating more whole grains is associated with a decrease in heart disease risk. And now there’s another study that suggests switching to brown rice and other whole grains can reduce your risk of developing type 2 diabetes.

The study, published in the 14 June online issue of the journal Archives of Internal Medicine, suggests that eating whole grains like brown rice can slow the release of sugar into the bloodstream, making it easier to control blood sugar levels. If you’re at risk for developing diabetes or if you have diabetes now, you may want to consider switching your grains. Try these four simple switches to get more whole grains in your diet:

• Replace white rice with brown rice.
• Try whole wheat pastas.
• Buy bread made from whole wheat flour.
• Replace your morning cereal with oatmeal.

If you’re even more adventurous, you might want to give other whole grains a try:

• Quinoa (pronounced: keen-wah) – A whole grain that is high in protein. Use wherever you might use rice or other grains.
• Sorghum (or milo) – A cereal grain that is gluten-free, sorghum flour can be used in baked goods. You can also make a delicious salad using the whole grain.
• Bulgur – A parboiled grain that is often found in Middle Eastern dishes. Try this tabbouleh recipe for a refreshing summer dish.
• Barley – A very versitile whole grain. Use it in soups or salads, use barley flour in baked goods, or eat it for breakfast like you would oatmeal.

You may need to look in specialty or health food stores to find some of these grains, but more and more grocery stores are beginning to carry a variety of grains. Look in the organic sections or where you would find rice and other grains. Enjoy exploring and experimenting with whole grains. You might find you’re pleasantly surprised by the flavor and texture variety.

"Eat well. Live well. Be well."

I’m diabetic, and have this terrible issue snacking at night. I’ve tried different things like popcorn (sorry, it’s the microwave kind), trail mix, sunflower seeds (without the shells basically a busy snack), and pistachio nuts (found that they contain A LOT of carbs). Do you have any other suggestions?

First, let’s talk about your nighttime snacking. A case of the munchies could mean your blood sugar is low. To address that, try eating smaller, balanced meals throughout the day to keep your blood sugar levels stable. If you find you’re still hungry in the evenings, choose a snack that has a mix of protein, fat and carbohydrates to keep you satisfied. You should also watch portion sizes and eat your snack mindfully so you don’t spend the whole evening munching on empty calories.

Second, while you may be snacking too much, several of your choices are perfect evening snacks if you only choose one and make sure to limit yourself to a single serving. Some good choices are nuts and seeds (their carb content is perfectly acceptable), low-fat cheese with a few whole grain crackers, or vegetables with hummus dip. You should try to avoid snacks that are almost all carbohydrate (like your popcorn), though, and watch out for snacks that might seem like a good balance but are usually full of hidden sugar, like trail mix.

"Eat well. Live well. Be well."

Around here, we hate to talk about diets. Feed the Soul is of the school that diets shouldn’t be restrictive and temporary. They should be about moderation and should be sustainable for a lifetime. Otherwise, they’re pointless. That’s why Intuitive Eating is one of the healthy living strategies we encourage clients to try.

What is Intuitive Eating?

Basically, intuitive eating is the practice of paying close attention to your body’s hunger signals and giving it what it needs. According to the Intuitive Eating website:

Intuitive eating is an approach that teaches you how to create a healthy relationship with your food, mind, and body–where you ultimately become the expert of your own body. You learn how  to distinguish between physical and emotional feelings, and gain a sense of body wisdom. It’s also a process of making peace with food—so that you no longer have constant “food worry” thoughts. It’s knowing that your health and your worth as a person does not change because you ate a so-called “bad” or “fattening” food.

For more information, you can check out the 10 Principles of Intuitive Eating or read Intuitive Eating, by Evelyn Tribole, MS, RD and Elyse Resch, MS, RD, FADA.

What are the benefits?

Intuitive eating allows you to break the cycle of yo-yo dieting, silence the food judges (in your head and in your life), and teach you new ways to approach food and eating. Practiced regularly, it can improve your relationship with food, allow you to ditch your food scales and calorie counters, and still help you to lose weight.

Unlike diets, intuitive eating focuses on connecting with your body and its signals. It takes time to learn to trust what your body is telling you, but eventually, with practice, you can learn to eat when you’re physically hungry and stop when you’re satisfied. Intuitive eating can help you separate emotional eating from eating for physical nourishment.

How can you eat more intuitively?

Learning to eat intuitively will take time and conscious effort, but it will be worth it. To practice eating intuitively, try some of these basic strategies:

• Before eating anything, check in with your body and ask yourself if you are really hungry.
• Use a hunger scale (try this one from MIT) to gauge how hungry you really are before and after you eat.
• Eat mindfully. Put your food on a plate and sit at a table. Look at your food and pay attention to its colors, texture and smell. Chew slowly and really taste each bite.

If you really want to try eating intuitively or learn more about the process, pick up the Intuitive Eating book. Remember, it will take time to overcome your current eating mindset and habits, but learning to eat intuitively will mean saying good-bye to diets. Forever.

"Eat well. Live well. Be well."

It’s time to answer another question in our Ask Your RD series. Thanks to our Twitter friend @KitchenParade, we’ve got another great question. @KitchenParade’s question references the Glycemic Index, so before we get to the answer, let’s start with some background information for those who aren’t familiar with the Glycemic Index (GI).

What is the Glycemic Index?

The Glycemic Index rates foods based on how they affect a person’s blood sugar levels. Foods are rated as High (70 or above), Medium (56 to 69) or Low (55 or below) on the index. The lower a food’s GI rating, the less fluctuation in blood sugar and insulin levels it causes.

What are the benefits of eating according to the Glycemic Index?

Some studies have shown that eating a diet that includes mostly low-GI foods and limits high GI foods as well as foods high in saturated fat can decrease the risk of developing Type 2 diabetes and possibly even heart disease. The basic tenets of GI-based diets (eat more whole grains, high-fiber fruits and vegetables and limit sweet treats, refined grains and high-fat foods) are good healthy living guidelines, whether your aware of the GI value of your foods or not.

And now for the question:

Do steel-cut oats have a lower glycemic impact than old-fashioned rolled oats?

It turns out that the GI rating for steel-cut oats and old-fashioned rolled oats is very similar. Both types of oats fall into the Low to Low-Medium range (about 45-59) on the Glycemic Index, depending on the brand and how they’re prepared. So no matter which type of oats you choose to eat, they’ll probably have a very similar affect on your blood sugar and insulin levels.

"Eat well. Live well. Be well."

You keep hearing about high fructose corn syrup (HFCS). One day you read a report that says it’s linked to weight gain and obesity, and the next there’s one that says it’s no worse than regular sugar. The truth is, no matter what the research says, HFCS should be treated like what it is.

What is HFCS then?

As it’s name suggests, HFCS a sweetener made from corn. Because it is much cheaper to produce than cane sugar, it is extremely common and is used in almost all of the processed foods available today. In fact, HFCS is so common that it’s in foods that you might not even suspect, like salad dressings, breads, processed meats and fast food.

But what’s the big deal?

Sugar is sugar, whether it’s table sugar you put in your coffee or the HFCS in the cereal you eat for breakfast. But because HFCS is often “hiding” in foods you might not suspect, you may be eating more sugar than you think. Whether it’s HFCS or another form of sugar, limiting your sugar intake should be your goal if you want to live a healthy life. And added sugar, no matter where it comes from, can mean added calories–which can mean added pounds in the long run.

So what should you do?

To decrease you HFCS and overall sugar consumption, try to center your diet around natural, whole foods and limit the processed and packaged foods you eat. If you do choose processed or packaged foods, look for products that have fewer total grams of sugar. Read nutrition labels. Check the ingredients for HFCS and note how early it appears in the list. The higher on the list it appears, the more of it is in the product.

Knowing what foods have HFCS in them is important in helping you figure out where your sugar intake is coming from, an positive step toward maintaining or losing weight. And watching HFCS intake is especially important for people who are at risk for or already diagnosed with diabetes, because just like any other sugar, HFCS can seriously impact blood sugar levels.

While HFCS isn’t an evil ingredient, you shoud do your best to be aware of what foods contain it and limit how much of those foods you eat. Just like everything else, moderation is key.

"Eat well. Live well. Be well."

Are you ready to shed those extra pounds once and for all? Are you motivated to feel healthy and be well?

Then it’s time to Cre8 A New You! Join Nicole Garnsey, MA, RD, CDN, CDE and Brigit O’Donnell, MS, RD, CDN of Feed the Soul Nutrition, Inc. as we teach and empower you to meet your nutrition and health goals.

Cre8 A New You© is our unique 8-week program, created to teach you the skills you need to take control of your health and well-being through gradual behavior change.

Sign up for this spring’s session, beginning April 19th and running through June 7th, and for just $199 you’ll receive:

• a baseline health assessment
• eight 1-hour educational and motivational sessions
• weekly weigh-ins
• a follow-up reunion upon completion of the program

Classes will be held Monday evenings from 5:30-6:30pm in two locations:

Feed the Soul Nutrition, Inc.
727 Washington St., Watertown, NY

OR

Northern Physical Therapy
Clayton, NY

If you’re interested, sign up fast! Space is limited and classes start soon!

To sign up for the Watertown class, contact Nicole at (315) 783-6810 or kngarnsey@yahoo.com. To sign up for the Clayton class, contact Brigit at (315) 767-8926 or eathealthy09@hotmail.com.

If you’re still not convinced that the Cre8 A New You program is for you, check out our series of posts highlighting some of the topics covered during the eight week instructional sessions.

"Eat well. Live well. Be well."

March is National Nutrition Month and the American Dietetic Association wants you to focus on “Nutrition from the ground up”.

This theme suggests that when making healthy lifestyle changes, it’s important to start with a solid foundation. This means making small and gradual changes that you can live with. A healthy diet doesn’t have to be all-or-nothing, and it doesn’t have to happen all at once. You can make one healthy change at a time and then build on those changes.

If you need some guidance on where to start building your foundation, try focusing on feeding yourself from the ground up. Center your diet around foods that come directly from the ground–fruits and vegetables, whole grains, beans and nuts. Then add in limited amounts of foods like meat and poultry that grow by eating things that come from the ground. Processed foods should be strictly limited or eliminated. Even if some of their ingredients start out at ground level, by the time they get to the grocery store they’re full of added stuff (chemicals, preservatives, flavors, etc.) that definitely did not come from the ground.

Basically, the further away from the ground a food gets, the less you should include it in your diet. This may seem like an overwhelming thought, but remember that you don’t have to make these changes all at once. Start slowly and build on your successes. Every healthy change you make is another brick in your nutritional foundation.

"Eat well. Live well. Be well."

Are you crazy about all things sweet? Do you have a hard time passing up cake or cookies when they’re around? Do you add sugar or another sweetener to everything from tea to cereal? If so, your sweet tooth may be building up a tolerance to sweet flavors. The more sweet you eat, the more you may crave.

Thankfully, there’s something you can do about your sweet leanings. With a little bit of effort and some gradual changes, you can retrain your sweet tooth, decrease your sweet cravings and reduce your calorie intake, too.

Reduce or eliminate your use of artificial sweeteners. Limit purchases of food and drinks that contain artificial sweeteners and decrease the amount of added sweetener using the technique below. Artificial sweeteners are often sweeter than their natural counterparts, can contribute to sweet cravings, and may even affect how much you eat throughout the day.

Halve the amount of sweetener (sugar or otherwise) that you use in your coffee and tea. It may take a few days to get used to it, but once you do you’ll realize it’s plenty sweet. After a week, try halving the amount again. Keep halving until you reach your limit or until you’ve eliminated the need for sweetener altogether.

Buy unsweetened cereals. If you find they’re not sweet enough for your liking, control the sweetness by adding your own sweetener. Try starting with less sweetener than you think you’ll need. You can also use the technique above to decrease the amount of sweetener you need over time.

When you crave sweets, eat some fruit. It’s still sugar, and it’s still a sweet, but you’re getting fiber and other nutrients, too.

It’s not necessary to completely eliminate sweets from your diet, but the less you eat them, the less you’ll crave them. And that can add up to weight loss and improved health over the long run.

"Eat well. Live well. Be well."

With the cost of meat these days, it may seem impossible to cut your grocery budget without hearing “Where’s the Beef?” when you put dinner on the table. While you might have to reduce your meat purchases to reduce your grocery bill, there are plenty of ways you can get enough protein in your meals without raiding your child’s piggy bank.

Substitute lower priced cuts in your meat dishes. For example, you can substitute skinless chicken legs and thighs (4 oz, raw = 135 cal; 4.5 g fat; 23 g protein*) for skinless chicken breasts (4 oz, raw = 125 cal; 1.5 g fat; 26 g protein) without a major increase in calories or fat. Remember that if you’re willing to skin and de-bone chicken yourself you’ll also pay less–sometimes as little as half.

Trim like a pro. When choosing lower priced cuts of meat, be careful not to sacrifice your health in the process. Cheaper cuts of beef and pork are often much higher in fat and calories. To reduce the impact that has on your health, trim all visible fat before you cook your steaks, roasts or chops.

Trade the meat for beans. Dried beans are a tiny fraction of the cost of meat, and even canned beans are relatively inexpensive. Replace the meat in your chili or soups with beans (1/2 cup serving = 100 calories; 0.5 g fat; 6 g protein) or reduce the amount of meat in a dish and make up for it by adding beans. Not only are the beans cheaper, but they have more fiber, fewer calories and less fat than most meats.

Shop the sales. Buy meat and seafood when it’s on sale and then package it for the freezer. You’ll have it when you need it and won’t have to break the bank to get it. Bonus Tip: Get friendly with the butcher at your favorite grocery store and you might even get tips on when they do mark downs so you can snag the best deals before they’re gone.

*Nutrition information source: CalorieKing.com

"Eat well. Live well. Be well."