Healthy Eating

This hearty yet refreshing salad is perfect for potlucks, picnics and backyard barbecues. It provides the benefits whole grains and lots of colorful vegetables in one dish and requires no last-minute preparation. The base of the salad is quinoa, which although it is treated like a grain, is actually a seed. It is gluten-free and it supplies complete protein, as well as magnesium and fiber. Quinoa has a delicate, nutty flavor and cooks in less than 20 minutes. You can find it in natural foods stores and many supermarkets.

Tomatoes are so ubiquitous in the American diet, from the fresh tomatoes just now coming into prime season to countless processed products, that its hard to believe they were once commonly avoided as poisonous. Its true that tomatoes, like potatoes and peppers, belong to the nightshade family, and their leaves contain alkaloids that can indeed be toxic to pets. Europeans who saw the plants from the New World thought tomatoes resembled belladonna-deadly nightshade-and gave the fruit the forbidding name wolf peach.

A small clinical trial suggests that green tea could improve the connectivity between parts of the brain involved in tasks of working memory. You might think of working memory as the brains sticky notes, where bits of information are temporarily held for manipulation before forgetting or transferring to long-term memory.

A robust chili is an excellent candidate for a vegetarian entre because the beans provide both protein and fiber, while the spice blend contributes a complex flavor. We serve this hearty chili in an edible bowl of roasted squash. Not only does this make an attractive presentation, the squash tastes great with the chili and packs even more nutrient-rich produce into your dinner. (If you are pressed for time, omit the squash; the chili makes a satisfying meal all on its own and leftovers taste even better the next day.)

If these thirsty, sweaty summer days have you worrying whether youre getting eight glasses of water a day-as conventional wisdom says you should-you need to take a closer look at the facts versus the fictions about hydration.

A new survey finds 84% of US consumers say they sometimes buy organic foods, and 45% buy organic at least once a month. But the survey of 1,016 adults, conducted by Opinion Research Corp. for Consumer Reports, also turned up some consumer confusion over what exactly that USDA organic certification means. Fewer than half, for example, knew that the organic seal on poultry or eggs means that the chickens went outdoors and had a certain minimum amount of living space. (Nearly two-thirds, however, thought organic should signify such requirements.) And 20% reported buying organic fish, even though the USDA has no such standard; nearly all (92%) said the agency should have guidelines for organic fish.

Were not exactly winning the war on foodborne illnesses, but at least last year we battled to a draw. According to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), rates for illness and hospital admissions in 2013 were down marginally from 2012. Deaths were up slightly, based on laboratory-confirmed infections caused by nine pathogens at 10 US sampling sites. Looking at specific pathogens, salmonella cases were down but still accounted for the most infections; only campylobacter, mostly from poultry and raw milk, came close. The sharpest increase, though still a small percentage of total cases, came from vibrio, a bacterium found in raw shellfish such as oysters; warmer coastal waters may be to blame, CDC experts said.

Even as larger restaurant chains are adding calorie labels to their menus, as required by the Affordable Care Act, a review of the evidence cautions that those numbers alone may not change consumer behavior. The review of 31 studies, published in the Journal of Community Health, concluded that the best-designed studies show that calorie labels do not have the desired effect in reducing total calories ordered. Women, dieters and upper-income diners paid the most attention to restaurant calorie numbers, but overall the impact was negligible. It may be the case that calorie labeling alone is not sufficient to modify consumer behavior in the desired direction, researchers wrote. Other presentation formats, including color coding, physical activity equivalents and healthy logos or traffic lights, might prove more successful, they added.

Its true of ice cream and rice cakes, but people tend to generalize such associations of mouthfeel and calories to all foods: Soft and creamy foods that melt in your mouth have more calories than foods that are crunchy and rough-or so we assume, according to a new study. Researchers reported the results of five laboratory studies in the Journal of Consumer Research, comparing, for example, how many calories subjects estimated were in hard versus soft brownies. Foods that were hard, crunchy or had a rough texture were generally rated as lower in calories than choices that were smooth and required less chewing. Surprisingly, participants overestimated calorie counts of all the foods, but guesses for soft and creamy foods were even further inflated.

Q. Does including calcium improve absorption of Vitamin D? I eat sardines two to three times a week, and wonder if including a calcium supplement at the same time would be a wise move? (Im middle-aged and averagely active with no known deficiencies in either vitamin.)