The final version of a spending bill released late Monday would unravel school lunch standards the Agriculture Department proposed earlier this year, which included limiting the use of potatoes on the lunch line and delaying limits on sodium and delaying a requirement to boost whole grains.

The bill also would allow tomato paste on pizzas to be counted as a vegetable, as it is now. USDA had wanted to prevent that.

Food companies that produce frozen pizzas for schools, the salt industry and potato growers requested the changes, and some conservatives in Congress say the federal government shouldn’t be telling children what to eat.

Source/Read More: WOWT.com

“There is a widely held belief that snacking cannot be a part of a healthy diet,” said study researcher Claire A. Zizza, an associate professor of nutrition at Auburn University in Alabama.

But the study showed that the more a person snacked, the more likely he or she was to eat both healthy snacks and healthy meals, Zizza said. “The increase was slight, but was still apparent.”

Source/Read More: MSNBC.com

Researchers from the University of Minnesota examined data from more than 38,000 women taking part in the Iowa Women’s Health Study, an ongoing study with women who were around age 62 at its start in 1986. The researchers collected data on the women’s supplement use in 1986, 1997 and 2004.

Women who took supplements had, on average, a 2.4 percent increased risk of dying over the course of the 19-year study, compared with women who didn’t take supplements, after the researchers adjusted for factors including the women’s age and calorie intake.

One possible reason, according to the researchers: some supplements contain high concentrations of minerals that can build up in the body to toxic levels.

Source: MSNBC.com

The study began as a 15-month look at parents’ use of time and how that impacted meal choices. It aimed at the difference between fast food and full-service restaurants because numerous studies have shown a correlation between fast food consumption and weight gain.

Of particular interest for the research, funded by the US Department of Agriculture, was parental choice of restaurants as a connection to childhood obesity, McIntosh said.

Source: Khaleej Times

This is according to a University of Alabama study published recently online by the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.

In this study, 69 healthy, overweight people who did not have diabetes — but were at risk for it — were placed on diets with modest reductions in either fat or carbohydrate for eight weeks.

“At eight weeks, the group on the lower fat diet had significantly higher insulin secretion and better glucose tolerance and tended to have higher insulin sensitivity,” said Barbara Gower, Ph.D., professor in the Department of Nutrition Sciences at UAB and lead author of the study. “These improvements indicate a decreased risk for diabetes.”

Gower says the unique aspect of this study is that the results were independent of weight loss.

Source: UAB News

Number one on the list is particularly important for those who wholly or mostly eat a vegetarian diet:

Mistake #1: You avoid all animal protein.
Why it’s aging you: You may lack of vitamin B12. which is essential for energy.

Found only in foods that are derived from animals, this nutrient helps regulate your metabolism and energy production and is key to maintaining a healthy brain and nervous system. “Fatigue is a classic sign of B12 deficiency, which usually occurs in people who don’t eat very much animal protein,” says Danine Fruge, MD, associate medical director of the Pritikin Longevity Center & Spa in Miami. Chewing a lot of antacids to relieve heartburn can also lead to B12 deficiency because antacids interfere with B12 absorption.

Check out the entire article at Yahoo.com for ways to fix this problem (ex. foods rich in B12, supplements), as well as other mistakes you might be making in your diet.

Research is showing that increased levels of insulin in the body causes increased release of amyloid into the brain. Amyloid is very sticky and forms plaques in the brain which is what researchers look for as the hallmark sign of Alzheimer’s disease.

“Some amyloid is always released in our brains, but there are mechanisms that out brain uses to destroy the amyloid,” says Dr. Sauer. “Higher levels of insulin not only cause more release of amyloid, but also prevent the brain from eliminating this toxic substance. There are studies that have shown increased amyloid in the fluid of the brain in people who are given insulin but are not diabetic.”

Source/Read More: todaysthv.com

Fooducate (free; runs on iPhone): If reading labels at the grocery store gets to be overwhelming (and doesn’t it always?), scan bar codes on products with your phone’s camera to see the highlights of what’s inside, including calorie and sugar content. You can compare items and even find healthier alternatives.

Check out all the apps, and where you can find them, here.

And the areas probably don’t come as a huge surprise: omega-3s and vitamin B12.

Vegetarians have a reputation for being ”heart healthy.” However, a new report says some vegetarians may be increasing their risk of heart problems from nutritional deficiencies in their diets.

Overall, meat eaters are still at higher risk of heart attacks and strokes compared to vegetarians, says researcher Duo Li, a professor of nutrition at Zhejiang University in Hangzhou, China.

But in his review of published articles from medical journals, he found that vegetarian diets are often lacking in some key nutrients. These include vitamin B12 and omega-3 fatty acids. The deficiencies were especially evident, he says, in vegans. Vegans don’t eat meat, fish, or any kind of animal product, including eggs and milk.

Source: WebMD

Hill writes that microgreens “are larger than sprouts and smaller than ‘baby’ salad greens. Microgreens are so termed after they have produced at least two ‘true’ leaves after the cotyledons appear. True leaves, by contrast, develop from the plant stems.”

Hill tells us how to grow broccoli microgreens and adds, “Young broccoli has been shown to have up to 20 to 50 times as much sulphoraphane as fully grown broccoli.” She’s definitely in line with the Illinois data, and also adds background from Johns Hopkins.

The beauty of microgreens is that you can grow all you want in a sunny porch or window, or even under artificial lighting all winter long.

Source: The Nashua Telegraph