KTK-Nutrition

So many of us will be hitting the road as the weather warms up.   A relative is relocating from one state to another and is on a 29-hour road trip.   Other relatives are headed to the beach on a seven-hour road trip.   Too often those on a road trip push their health to the side and stop at Fast Food places for a quick bite to eat.   Even if one had good intentions to eat healthier a road trip can sabotage your efforts.   My husband showed me a good article on “How to Eat Healthy on the Road” in the AAA World magazine.   Many others have written on this topic.   On your next long road trip, how can you eat healthier?   As Wander Wisdom notes, Once I started bringing my own foods and snacks on trips, I felt noticeably better.   My energy levels were high, I was less hungry and I didn’t have to resort to eating the kind of unhealthy meals I’d never eat at home. Men’s Journal recommends avoiding the “feel bad” foods.   Skip the juice drinks, deep-fried foods, refined grains like white

Are you eating some nuts every day?   When teaching nutrition, I often told my students little habits like eating a handful of nuts a day, can be good for your health.   Some people think healthy eating is giving up things like sweets, chips.   But I emphasize adding healthy foods to your day.   It is easy to add a handful of nuts to your day.   In one nutrition class I was teaching, I was talking about eating some nuts every day.   I looked over and a student had a can full of nuts and was munching away on them.   This student could afford the calories in more than a handful of nuts and he always brought to class some nutritious snack.   This week both my sister and my daughter sent me some good articles on nuts and I thought it would be good to discuss how healthy nuts are.    What are some health benefits of eating nuts? Nutrition :   nuts are loaded with vitamins, minerals, are low in carbs and the fat in nuts is a heart healthy fat. Minerals:   Nuts “have an optimal nutrition

Are you getting your daily vitamin C?   Growing up everyone had juice glasses in their homes and almost everyone drank some real, 100% juice for breakfast.   This could be orange juice, tomato juice or grapefruit juice.   Now, juice glasses are a rarity in people’s home.   And, rather than real, 100% juice, the people that do drink “juice” often choose a fake juice or a fruit drink that contains little or no juice.   But you do not have to drink juice to get enough vitamin C.   Many fruits and vegetables are rich in C. What is vitamin C?   Vitamin C is an essential vitamin that is also known as ascorbic acid.   What does “essential” mean?   It means your body does not make vitamin C and you need to “eat it to get it”. Since it is water-soluble vitamin, your body does not store it and you should eat some vitamin C rich foods every day.   How does vitamin C help keep you healthy? Some people hear “vitamin C” and they think of colds.   And vitamin C does help your immune system bu

Go to the grocery store and you will see hundreds of varieties of yogurt to choose from.   For years eating yogurt was a popular fad.   And that was great as yogurt is a great health food.   But lately, my husband says there are less and less varieties of yogurt to choose from.   Many of the flavors we love are getting harder to find.   Sad, as this means people are eating less yogurt and may be substituting yogurt for some foods that are far less nutritious. When students in my class analyze their diet recall there is almost two nutrients they are low in, calcium and vitamin D.   These are two nutrients that most yogurts are a great source of.   If you have been cutting back on your yogurt intake, it would be a great time to add some yogurt back to your day. What is Greek yogurt and how does it differ from regular yogurt? According to WebMD , “Greek yogurt has been strained to remove extra liquid and whey.   The result is a thicker, denser final product with a higher concentration o

Vegetables, just say this word and people have some strong reactions.   Some people love vegetables and others not so much.   Last week I wrote about bananas, such a healthy fruit (See:   Enjoy bananas for good health ).   I always have a banana a day and even bring bananas with us on road trips to be sure I can eat a banana.   What about vegetables?   Some of my nutrition students ate few or no vegetables.   When they did their diet recalls, their “vegetable” was often a slice of lettuce on a burger.   Recently I was in Subway and watching a woman order subs for her kids.   She ordered a 12-foot sub with meat and cheese and a lot of mayonnaise.   When it came time for the vegetables to put on the sub, she stated her son didn’t like vegetables.   Not a one, not even a few slices of lettuce.   Pretty sad as Subway actually offers quite a choice of veggies to put on a sub.   When I go to Subway, I ask for just about every vegetable they have except the hot peppers. Americans are reall