We were quite taken by this piece by the blogger Kay Svela who writes LittleMissWife.com as she explore the joy of wine consumption, not only from a perspective of giving up “personal house rules” to allow for a little joy but also for the health benefits of wine that she outlines later in the post. Check it out: Wine drinking is good for your health and soul...

Hugh Hefner’s diet is rich with comfort foods. He also practices portion control

A chemical found in red meat helps explain why eating too much beef and bacon is bad for the heart, say scientists. A U.S. study shows carnitine, a compound found in in red meat, is broken down by digestive bacteria and kicks off a chain of events that results in higher levels of cholesterol as well as increased risk of heart disease. (The cholesterol and saturated fat content of lean red meat is not that high.) There has been an abundance of studies suggesting that regularly eating red meat may be damaging to health. Carnitine can be broken down and converted in the liver to a chemical called . The study showed TMAO was strongly linked to development of fatty deposits in blood vessels. Reducing the number of bacteria that feed on carnitine would in theory reduce the health risks of red meat. Vegetarians naturally have fewer bacteria which are able to break down carnitine than meat-eaters. Learn more at the BBC’s...

Long life and good health may be linked to a great cup of boiled Greek coffee, says scientists.

So it’s almost official. Junk food – aka McDonald’s, Burger King, other nasty fast food chains, plus heat and serve groceries, – could be to blame for the rise in auto-immune diseases according to a new study.

by Cheryl Poirer I was having lunch with a friend the other day and as we were going our separate ways we loosely started organizing a party. We spoke about where it should be held and I said “Yes! We’ll have it as his place because he’s got that great balcony and he has a…” I was thinking “ barbecue” but I couldn’t find the word. I started gesturing with my hands saying, “You know a..a..,” what came out was this: “One of those box things with fire in it. You know, for cooking stuff.” “You mean a barbecue?” We started laughing. Memory loss is common and can begin as early as our 20s. We start to lose our noggin, so to speak. Meaning our bodies are losing brain cells faster than we replace them. New York-Presbyterian outlines signs, symptoms of memory loss and what to do about them. One thing we can do is eat right. Antioxidants found in certain foods have been proven to fight memory loss, as well as some foods have been known to increase memory retention!  Read more about this here. With both of these resources in hand I’m off to the grocery store to buy things to fill my cooling box, play mind challenging amusing matches and call my friend on my small, communication device and ask if we can have a party at that large, container where he sleeps that has a great balcony and...

Unilever and Leiden University Medical Centre in the U.K. says determined that people with higher blood sugar levels look older.

Eating less doesn’t only help you stay trim, it also lets you live longer. This has been known for a while, but further science — from the land of pasta — is shoring up the evidence. Italian researchers in Rome at the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart report that a molecule called CREB1, which is activated by drastically lowering calorie intake, can activate genes linked to longevity and proper brain functioning. Studies show that overeating and obesity are not good for the brain because they cause accelerated brain cell aging. This slow down makes it susceptible to diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.   Even more studies link caloric restriction to longevity and other favorable health markers. However, the processes behind these effects has been unknown. “A plausible conclusion could be that overeating causes brain aging and decline, while eating less may help our brain stay young,” say boomer generation health experts Dian Griesel, Ph.D., and Tom Griesel, authors of the new books TurboCharged: Accelerate Your Fat Burning Metabolism, Get Lean Fast and Leave Diet and Exercise Rules in the Dust (April 2011, BSH) and The TurboCharged Mind (January 2012, BSH). “As usual, however, the researchers commented that this discovery will hopefully lead to the creation of a new drug that would activate CREB1 and provide the benefits of caloric restriction without the need for strict dieting.” They say the key to calorie restriction and “enlightened” fasting to trigger the associated benefits is to maximize nutrition yet minimize concentrated carbohydrates and...

Popcorn, already known to be a good source of fiber, has higher levels of healthy antioxidants than some fruits and vegetables, according to new research. “Based on fiber, whole grains, and antioxidant levels, popcorn is the king of snack foods,” says Joe Vinson, PhD, professor of chemistry at the University of Scranton. But he isn’t suggesting that anyone scrap fruits and vegetables in favor of popcorn. It’s not yet clear how much of popcorn’s healthy antioxidants get absorbed by the body. Vinson and Michael Coco, Jr., a chemistry student at the university, analyzed four commercial brands of popcorn, including two air-popped and two microwave varieties. They evaluated antioxidants known as polyphenols. These compounds are found in a wide variety of plants. Antioxidants undo the damage that can be done by unstable molecules known as ”free radicals.” “Everyone knows plant foods have antioxidants,” Vinson tells WebMD. “But nobody has even looked at what is in popcorn with respect to these compounds.” Vinson and Coco ground up the hull and the ”fluffy stuff,” Vinson says, and checked the polyphenol levels. Most of the polyphenols — about 90% — were in the hull, Vinson says. Read the rest of this article at...

Bread and rolls are the No. 1 source of sodium in the American diet, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Salty snacks like chips and pretzels come in at No. 10. The finding seems unlikely, since bread isn’t actually saltier than chips or many of the other foods on the list. But Americans tend to eat more bread and rolls, compared with other foods. Overall, the report found, Americans are over-consuming sodium in a big way. The average American’s daily sodium intake was 3,266 mg a day, which far exceeds the government’s recommended daily limit of 2,300 mg. The limit is set lower, at 1,500 mg a day, for risk groups, including blacks, people over 51, and those with high blood pressure, diabetes or chronic kidney disease — that’s about half the U.S. population. Nearly 90% of all Americans eat too much salt, which increases their chances of developing hypertension, a risk factor for heart disease and stroke. The study found that 10 foods account for 44% of of all the sodium we eat. Broken down, they are: Bread and rolls, 7.4% Cold cuts/cured meats, 5.1% Pizza, 4.9% Fresh and processed poultry, 4.5% Soups, 4.3% Sandwiches like cheeseburgers, 4% Cheese, 3.8% Pasta dishes like spaghetti with meat sauce, 3.3% Meat dishes like meatloaf with tomato sauce, 3.2% Snacks, including chips, pretzels, popcorn and puffs, 3.1% The CDC report was based on food surveys conducted among 7,227 Americans, including more than 2,500 children and teens, in 2007-08. Participants were surveyed twice, about 3 to 10 days apart, and asked each time to recall what they had eaten in the previous 24 hours. The researchers then categorized the various foods and tallied their sodium content. Most participants reported eating foods from one or more...

In case anyone is still wondering why we have so many obese children in our midst, one reason is the huge amount of sugar found in children’s cereals. The Environmental Working Group, a nonprofit based in Oakland, California has just published a comprehensive report on sugary cereals which ranks the best and the worst cereals. To read the complete report, click...

Boozy worms benefit from a double lifespan, says a new UCLA study. During an experiment designed to test reactions to cholesterol,  worms were exposed to small amounts of ethanol, which was used to dissolve the cholesterol in the liquid around the worms. The scientists were surprised to find this doubled the lifespan of worm larvae — from 10 to 15 days to 20 to 30 days (on average). The scientists also discovered that too much alcohol was harmful to the worms leading to neurological effects and death, showing over consumption does not support the longevity benefits. The ideal dose, said the scientists, corresponds to one tablespoon of ethanol in a bathtub of water. Said another way, the alcohol in one bottle of beer mixed with 100 of water. The C elegans worms that were used in the test are often part of human aging experiments because they share half their genes with...

There have been many studies showing the correlation between a healthy brain and high levels of omega-3 fatty acids. Your grandma probably told you, “eat your fish, it is good for your brain.” A new study published in the December 28 issue of Neurology is unique, however, because researchers measure nutrient biomarkers in the blood….testing for omega-3 and other vitamin levels including B, C, D and E. Previous studies have used data from diet questionnaires. The paper’s first author is Dr Gene Bowman from the Departments of Neurology and Public Health and Preventive Medicine at Oregon Health & Science University in Portland, and a member of the American Academy of Neurology. He and his colleagues describe three sets of findings: Elderly people with diets high in several vitamins or omega 3 fatty acids were less likely to have the brain shrinkage that usually accompanies Alzheimer’s disease than people whose diets were low in those nutrients. Those whose diets were high in omega 3 fatty acids and in vitamins C, D, E and the B vitamins were also more likely to score better on tests of mental ability than those whose diets were low in those nutrients. Those whose diets were high in trans fats were more likely to have brain shrinkage and perform less well on thinking and memory tests than those whose diets were low in trans fats. For the study, Bowman and colleagues recruited 104 elderly people of average age 87 who had few risk factors for impaired memory and thinking. From participants’ blood tests the researchers measured 30 different nutrient biomarkers. All the participants also completed tests of memory and thinking, while 42 of them also underwent MRI scans that measured their brain volume. The results showed that overall the participants’...

Compared to every other season of the year, winter is a time for being inside, and especially around the savory smells of a kitchen in full use. Yes, it is colder outside, and we may need extra calories to stay warm. The reason is: warming up! Nothing is more satisfying on a brisk wintry day than a hearty hot bowl of soup. The idea of your oven compartments and stovetop burners being more active in the winter is an idea in keeping with this focus on inner warmth, and we encourage you to think about the winter as a time to celebrate the warmth of eating. At the World’s Healthiest Foods, we do a lot of stovetop steaming and poaching, but winter is the time when you may want to turn more often to baking and roasting in our oven-based recipes. These recipes will draw you up for a longer time against the slow warmth of the oven. You can read the rest of this article at The World’s Healthiest Foods...

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Getting enough choline, a nutrient related to the B vitamins, may be important to keeping your brain sharp as you age. Researchers at Tufts and other Boston-area universities analyzed data on nearly 1,400 participants, ages 36 to 83, in the long-running Framingham study. Participants completed dietary questionnaires and then took memory and cognitive tests and underwent MRI scans. Those with high dietary choline intake did better on the tests and were less likely to show areas of “white-matter hypersensitivity” in the brain, possible signs of blood-vessel damage linked to dementia. Scientists cautioned that the testing differences were small – not enough to notice in day-to-day activities – and that the results don’t prove that choline protects the brain. But people with lower choline intake were more likely to be on a “pathway” toward cognitive decline than those with more dietary choline. Food sources of choline include egg yolks, chicken, milk, fish, peanut butter, potatoes, cauliflower, tomatoes, banana, oranges, some legumes, whole grains, sesame and flax seeds, along with the food additive lecithin. - American Journal of Clinical...

by David Bunnell Guest columnist Dietary supplements, which include vitamins, minerals, fatty acids, amino acids, hormones and herbs can be a powerful addition to a nutritious diet.  They come in pill, capsule, tablet, powder or liquid form and are generally, though not always, consumed after eating a meal.  As much as possible, you should get your nutrients from food, however, used correctly, supplements facilitate your body’s natural defense mechanisms to function better and thereby resist diseases.  There are hundreds of supplements and considerable conflicting information about their effectiveness. Drug companies have a vested interest in you getting sick and therefore they aren’t all that interested in supplements that might keep you well.  On the other hand, supplement companies have a vested interested in you putting too much faith in their products. Supplement studies are sometimes designed to purposely mislead or create unnecessary confusion.  I could write a whole book on this topic.  What is important, however, is finding the right supplements that can help your body reduce free radicals and inflammation, stimulate blood flow, increase production of good hormones, strengthen cell membranes and build your immunity system. Based on my research including interviews with doctors and scientists and my own use of supplements, I have come up with following guidelines which apply in a broad, general sense first to everyone, then to male and female children, young men, young women, middle-aged men and middle-aged women.  Consider middle-age to be 50 and above.  These guidelines reflect my own opinions and should not be the only information you rely on for deciding which supplements you should take.  I encourage you to read all you can about supplements, talk to your friends and your doctor. Keep in mind that you can always make changes.  If a supplement doesn’t seem...

A conference about the benefits of tea revealed that smokers may benefit from drinking the beverage.  Consuming tea may be a preventive measure for smokers who are at the risk of contracting emphysema. Antioxidants in black tea stops cigarette smoke induced oxidants of lung protein. This can help fend off emphysema. Read more on the benefits of black tea for smokers...

A few years back there was lots of talk about how a glass of red wine a day might help you live longer. The magic ingredient: resveratrol. Several studies have shown in the last decade that this substance, found in grape skin and other plants, has the ability to fight diabetes, cancer, heart disease and dementia. Resveratrol has the ability to activate sirtuins, a group of proteins that regulate cell metabolism. And that can lead to longer cell life. But a new study disputes the anti-aging properties of sirtuins. Still what’s interesting is that, “the potential reduction of chronic disease risks associated with red-wine consumption may still help humans live longer through the prevention of ailments.” So keep popping that cork. It might still help after all. See the article in Wine...

Research conducted at Louisiana State University has revealed what happens when low calorie diets are consumed over an extended period of time.  It appears that calorie restriction could slow the breakdown of DNA that occurs due to the effects of aging resulting in extended life. More: Salon’s take on the research The LSU...