This past summer, some 50 years after concerns were first raised about a possible link between trans fats and heart attacks, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) ruled that partially hydrogenated oils, the primary dietary source of trans fats in processed food items, are no longer “generally recognized as safe” in human food. Processed food manufacturers will have three years to reformulate their products or request an exemption. This action is expected to prevent thousands of fatal heart attacks a year. Multiply that by 50 years. Continue reading
YOUR HEALTHY PLATE: Winter Kale and Wild Rice Salad
I’m still collecting recipes for you to make to celebrate the end of football season! I hope you like this one! Many of the ingredients for this recipe have winter written all over them, which I am very happy about, since you can probably guess that I like to eat food in season. Continue reading
YOUR HEALTHY PLATE: Roasted Garlic, Parsnip and White Bean Soup
Here’s a soup to, yes, satisfy your sweet tooth! One thing I really love about certain foods, like garlic, parsnips, and onions (tomatoes, too), is that their sweetness develops rather dramatically when you roast them or leave them to cook slowly. And, frankly, there just aren’t enough parsnip recipes around for my taste. Remember though, that if you want to be able to enjoy the subtle sweetness of foods like these, you will want to moderate your intake of sugar and especially corn syrup, both of which tend to overwhelm your tastebuds and raise your threshold for tasting the lesser (though more complex and satisfying) kinds and amounts of sweetness in fruits and vegetables. Continue reading
Cholesterol: The good, the bad, the ugly
The first thing I’m going to say about cholesterol is that we don’t understand it well enough. On my first day of medical school back in the early 1990’s, Dr. Kirby, our Dean of Students, said that half of what we were about to learn over the next four years would turn out to be false. The problem was that no one knew which half! Here are some of the things I learned in medical school that have turned out to be false: Continue reading
YOUR HEALTHY PLATE: Creamy Homespun Hummus
It’s never too early to start collecting recipes for the upcoming end of football season! A plate of this creamy hummus to share, drizzled with olive oil and sprinkled with spicy paprika, and you will be in seventh heaven, no matter what the score! Continue reading
YOUR HEALTHY PLATE: Sweet Potato & Chickpea Soup
This post will be the third and final of YHIOYP’s one-pot Back to Life recipe series (see the prior two blog posts here and here). This time, I’m back to my old standby, my trusty crockpot, from which so many wonderful meals have come, and I’ve decided to make my own version of Gypsy Soup, originally from Mollie Katzen, the author of the famous Moosewood Cookbook. Through the years I have made so many recipes from that cookbook that it is now ancient and falling apart, even despite having been taped together with leopard-spot-pattern tape somewhere along the way). Continue reading
YOUR HEALTHY PLATE: Yellow Lentil Stew
In this, the second of three one-pot Back to Life recipes (see the introduction in my blog post from this past Sunday, January 3rd), my new #Staub cast-iron Dutch oven made its debut on our kitchen table and was everything I’d dreamed of! My family chose the dark green color, which looks beautiful wherever it sits. Magnificently designed, it is simply a gorgeous pot that squeezes every last molecule of flavor out of its ingredients, and then holds its heat like a brick wrapped in bunting. And, no, I received no compensation of any kind to say that. And, yes, it’s true. Continue reading
YOUR HEALTHY PLATE: Some Moro Bean Soup, please!
Okay, the holidays are over. It’s January. It’s snowing. It will be this way for a while. To quote Helen Hunt in As Good As It Gets, after she has just closed the door on Jack Nicholson’s inappropriate visit, “Okay, back to life.” Here’s a recipe that may help with that. Continue reading
YOUR HEALTHY PLATE: A Salad for the Holidays
Here’s something lovely for your upcoming holiday celebration, and a great addition to a table filled with so many other wonderful, favorite, traditional and distinctly un-salad-like recipes!
Greens are magic, and they fill you up with all kinds of magnificent phytonutrients and vitamins and minerals. That’s because leaves contain a rainbow of yellows, oranges and reds hidden inside the greens. Plus they make you feel so good when you eat them. Continue reading
Sometimes You’ve Gotta Go Slow To Go Fast
I’ve heard that race car drivers have a saying: “Sometimes you’ve gotta go slow to go fast.” If you want to shave seconds off your time, you need to slow down as you head into a curve. If you want to keep up your speed, sometimes you need to back off a little. Continue reading