FitSugar

What Counts Toward Your Daily Fruit and Vegetable Intake?

FitSugar — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 04:30:00 -0700

Several fruits and vegetables come into their prime during the Spring and Summer seasons, making it cheaper and easier for us to reach our daily requirements. Striving to eat five colors a day is a fun way to meet your nutritional needs, but do you know what size portions you should be eating to fulfill your daily five? Take the quiz to find out!

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Healthy Eating Tip: Add Up Your Fruits and Veggies First

FitSugar — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 16:00:00 -0800

It is National Nutrition Month and time for us all to rededicate ourselves to eating right. One simple way to improve your diet is to make sure you're eating five or more servings of fruits and veggies a day.

Before eating, I like to add up how many servings of fruits and veggies I have eaten already for the day. This tally inspires me to eat more produce. If I am out for dinner, taking inventory of my earlier meals reminds me to order a salad. If I am in a veggie deficit, when at home, I might make a stir-fry for dinner. A couple of Cuties clementines, my favorite mandarin oranges, make a tasty dessert and often push me over my daily quota of fruit and veg.

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Healthy Eating Tip: Add Fruit to Your Cereal

FitSugar — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 10:00:00 -0700

I've been working really hard to get in my five-a-day and one of the easiest ways for me is with breakfast. Usually, I like to have a big bowl of cereal in the mornings and lately I've been buying tasty blueberries and raspberries and tossing them into my cereal. They're both in season and cheaper than usual. I know that a lot of people may already do this strictly for taste, but it's also a fabulous way to sneak in another serving (or two) of fruit into your day.

Do you have any sneaky ways to get in a few more servings of fruits and vegetables into your day?

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Get Your Five-a-Day In-Season

FitSugar — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 08:00:00 -0700

I usually figure out what fruits and veggies are in season when I shop at the farmers market. Unfortunately, that is not the only place I buy food. Since I prefer eating locally grown and seasonal produce it is a little problematic when I am trying to eat my five a day. You can imagine my excitement when I recently stumbled across the Seasonal Ingredient Map from Epicurious that makes figuring out which fruits and vegetables are in season each month for each state painless. It's easy to use, very helpful, and not to mention fun, so check it out here.

Five-a-Day Lowers Risk of Lung Cancer

FitSugar — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 03:00:00 -0700

If you're not already eating your five servings of fruits and vegetables a day then you may want to start, especially if you're a smoker.

New research has found that people who ate three servings of vegetables a day were 1.6 times less likely to develop lung cancer than those who didn't eat three servings. People who ate three or more servings of fruit were one-fold less likely to develop lung cancer. Researchers think that this is due to the fact that fruits and vegetables contain flavonoids, which have antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties that stop the development of blood vessels that feed tumors.

Now that's not to say that if you are a smoker that eating fruits and vegetables can enable you to continue smoking and still be protected against lung cancer. The absolute best defense against lung cancer (not to mention a whole slough of other health risks associated with smoking) is to quit smoking altogether.

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Fruit & Vegetable of the Month Club: Cactus

FitSugar — Thu, 30 Aug 2007 08:45:00 -0700

If you are getting bored with the same old fruits and veggies you're eating with your five-a-day plan, then you may want to start learning about some more unusual items that you may want to add to your diet now and again.

The FDC's Fruit & Vegetable of the Month Club is a great reference for trying out new stuff. There is a new featured fruit or vegetable each month complete with a recipe. One of this month's featured veggies is cactus, something I would have never thought to add to my diet. However cactus pads actually contain beta carotene, iron, some B vitamins, and are good sources of both vitamin C and calcium.

Want to learn an easy recipe for making cactus? Then read more

Sautèed Nopales, Peppers and Corn
Makes 4 servings
Each serving equals 2 cups of fruit or vegetables

Ingredients

1 large red bell pepper
1 large green bell pepper
1 large onion
1 Tbsp trans-fat free butter
4 small ears of small summer corn
½ lb fresh, firm edible cactus, deprickered, cut in ¼ to ½-inch dice
finely minced cilantro or parsley

Halve peppers, then remove seeds and stems. Cut into ¼–½ inch squares. Cut onions the same size. Cook both vegetables in butter in a heavy pan over moderate heat until just softened.

Shuck corn, than cut from cob. Add edible cactus and corn to peppers and onion; stir over high heat until vegetables are cooked through, but firm-tender, about 5 minutes. Sprinkle with herbs and serve hot.

Nutritional analysis per serving: Calories 184, Protein 6g, Fat 4g, Calories From Fat 20%, Cholesterol 8mg, Carbohydrates 32g, Fiber 4g, Sodium 29mg.

(via FruitsandVeggiesMatter.com)

Print recipe with images | without images

Now I'm going to have to go ask YumSugar where the heck I need to go to buy edible cactus...

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To Refrigerate or Not: That is The Question

FitSugar — Wed, 18 Jul 2007 03:00:00 -0700

Maybe you're on a quest to get your five fruits and vegetables in a day, but the darn things go bad before you even get a chance to enjoy them. What gives?

According to VegetarianTimes.com, some fruits emit ethylene, an odorless, colorless gas that speeds ripening and can lead to the premature decay of nearby ethylene-sensitive vegetables. So the first trick to keeping produce fresh is to separate produce that emits ethylene from produce that's sensitive to it and know which to refrigerate and which not to refrigerate.

REFRIGERATE these gas releasers
Apples
Apricots
Cantaloupe
Figs
Honeydew

What shouldn't you refrigerate and what shouldn't be kept in contact with others? Then read more

DON'T REFRIGERATE these gas releasers
Avocados
Bananas, unripe
Nectarines
Peaches
Pears
Plums
Tomatoes

KEEP THESE AWAY from all gas releasers
Bananas, ripe
Broccoli
Brussels sprouts
Cabbage
Carrots
Cauliflower
Cucumbers
Eggplant
Lettuce and other leafy greens
Parsley
Peas
Peppers
Squash
Sweet potatoes
Watermelon

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Healthy Eating Tip: Eat Five Colors a Day

FitSugar — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 08:00:00 -0700

We are more than halfway through March, which is also National Nutrition Month, so hopefully, you all are working hard to eat at least five servings of fruits and veggies daily. Well, I am going to up the ante: Try to eat five different colors fruits and veggies daily.

It is important to eat a rainbow since disease fighting antioxidants also give foods their color. The wider color palate you eat the wider the spectrum of antioxidants, vitamins, and minerals you will be eating. Yep, downing just goji berries or drinking pomegranate juice is really not enough to be considered healthy eating.

To see how I have worked five colors into my meals, read more.

Breakfast: Blue - I throw a half of cup of frozen blueberries onto my morning oatmeal, and while the oatmeal cools the berries thaw.
Snack: Yellow - I like a little tropical fruit salad to get me through until lunch and mix sliced banana with sliced mango.
Lunch: Green - Spinach and arugula salad surely covers me for green.
Dinner: Orange - Roasted yams certainly cover the color orange.
Dessert: Red - Strawberries are at the beginning of their season and sliced or whole they make a wonderful dessert.

It is super easy to add a variety of color to your daily diet, but might require a little planning ahead and thinking back. You can substitute purple cabbage for green, red pepper for green, broccoli for cauliflower, yams for regular spuds . . . you get the point. Tell me below how you work color into your daily diet?

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Healthy Dose Link Time

FitSugar — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 12:00:00 -0800

Seems like Demi Moore has lost her hip on the cover of W - Never Say Diet
Meet Gwen Stafani's trainer Mike Heatlie - Fit Bottomed Girls
Going for the fastest marathon time . . . pushing a jog stroller - That's Fit
A little blue pill for the ladies is on the way - Vitamin G
Workout starved? Try the kitchen boogie workout - Fresh Fitness Tips
A 500 calorie Thanksgiving Day meal. How can that be? - Daily Spark
Tame your hunger with these five healthy snacks - Health

7 Steps to a Healthier Sandwich

FitSugar — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 08:00:04 -0800

Whether it's the recession or our increasing need for simplicity, sandwiches are having a moment. They're one of my favorite easy lunches and very healthy if you make them right. But it's important not to get stuck in an unhealthy or unimaginative sandwich rut.

Some healthy-sandwich strategies are obvious: avoid fried foods and super-oily sauces, opt for whole-grain bread instead of sliced white. But that's only the beginning. For my seven tips on making sandwiches that are both delicious and nutritious, read more.

Open it up! An open-faced sandwich made with one slice of wheat bread instead of two can save around 70 calories.
Go green. In place of empty iceberg lettuce, opt for iron-rich greens like spinach or romaine. Try pressing a cup of raw spinach into a hot panini.
Load up on veggies. Sneaking veggies into sandwiches is a great way to get your five a day. Think beyond tomatoes and add everything from roasted beets to cucumbers to carrots.
And don't forget fruit! Similarly, you can increase your fruit intake through your sandwiches. I suggest sliced apples and cheese or figs and nut butter.
Hold the mayo. I'm sure you know this, but here's a reminder: mustard is a much better choice. One ounce of yellow mustard has just 19 calories and one gram of fat, while the same amount of mayo packs 210 calories and 21 grams of fat.
Speaking of mayo, try swapping it out for nonfat yogurt to make a healthier tuna or chicken salad.
Don't say cheese. Rather than eliminating the creamy texture of cheese, replace it with sliced avocado. One ounce has just 45 calories and loads of healthy fat.