4 Weight Loss Tips for the Family

As a parent or grandparent, setting a good example is important. This is especially true around the dinner table, since children tend to pick up eating habits from the family routine. Try the following - your family may not even know they are eating more healthful meals

1. Incorporate a vegetable into every meal. Peas, broccoli, asparagus, red, yellow or green bell peppers, spinach - you name it, vegetables provide nutrients and fiber.
2. Use more beans and legumes, and less meat. Chickpeas, lentils and beans of all types are good sources of fiber and protein. Use the Anti-Inflammatory Food Pyramid below.
3. Serve up whole grains. Brown rice and bulgur wheat provide a delicious, grainy taste and texture - and have more fiber and protein than their white counterparts. Choose true, relatively intact whole grains like these over grains that have been ground into flour.
4. Switch sweets. Instead of soda, stock the pantry with sparkling waters. Pour fruit juice into a pitcher and dilute it to lessen the sugar content. Stock your kitchen with fresh, whole fruits, and leave the cookies in the store.

3 Reasons to Eat Tomatoes

This fruit, which many still consider to be a vegetable due to its lack of sweetness, is a seasonal staple. Chopped in salads, sliced with fresh buffalo mozzarella, pureed for gazpacho or eaten fresh off the vine, a ripe tomato in summertime is a delicious and healthful treat. Tomatoes are:

1. Low in calories.
2. Excellent sources of vitamin C, and provide vitamins A and K, potassium, manganese and fiber.
3. A source of lycopene - researchers have linked the lycopene (a carotenoid that gives tomatoes their color) with a lowered risk of heart disease and cancer (including prostate, breast, colorectal and lung), as well as being helpful in lowering high cholesterol.

To get the full health benefit of tomatoes, including their anti-cancer potential, remember that carotenoids are fat-soluble and are better absorbed when eaten lightly cooked and paired with fats such as extra-virgin olive oil.

What items should you throw out when cleaning your Kitchen.

An important step in creating a healthy kitchen is to read and understand food labels. When you begin restocking your pantry, food labels are your best resource to assess what to keep and what to toss. This practice will also give you an overview of your choices in the supermarket, and is a good starting point to modify your shopping habits. Use the list below to determine which items to discard. Many of these ingredients are considered pro-inflammatory and therefore unfavorable to healthy aging. If the list of ingredients contains one or more of these undesirables, toss and don't buy again!

1. Animal fat, such as lard
2. Artificial sweeteners or non-nutritive sweeteners
3. Coconut oil
4. Corn oil
5. Cottonseed oil
6. Fractionated oil
7. High fructose corn syrup (HFCS)
8. Hydrogenated or partially hydrogenated oil or vegetable shortening
9. Margarine
10. Palm or palm kernel oil
11. Blended vegetable oils
12. Safflower oil
13. Soybean oil
14. Sunflower oil

Note that high-oleic versions of sunflower or safflower oils are acceptable, as they have fatty acid profiles closer to that of olive oil.

Supplementing Your Diet
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How to Avoid Transfats!

Trans fats have been linked to many health issues, especially heart disease. If you want to avoid trans fats when dining out or cooking at home, follow these simple rules:

• Avoid margarines. Most contain trans fats. Good Alternative Butters are Earth's Balance or Smart Balance with Omega 3.

• Read snack food labels carefully. Stay away from items that list "partially hydrogenated oil" or " partially hydrogenated soy bean oil" on the label, and opt for baked or air-popped versions instead.

• Limit heavily processed foods and focus on fresh, whole foods.

I recommend using extra virgin olive oil as your main cooking oil or Grapeseed oil. For a neutral-tasting oil, use expeller pressed, organic canola oil.