Pomegranates may be full of healthful antioxidants, but there’s no evidence that POM Wonderful’s pomegranate products prevent heart disease, prostate cancer or erectile dysfunction, according to the U.S. government.
Nutrition
Which School Lunch Bill Is Best?
Congress may decide this week between two bills aimed at improving school lunch nutrition. Everyone from Alice Waters to Jamie Oliver to Michelle Obama has gotten on the school-lunch bandwagon — a key target in the battle …
‘Caffeine Intoxication’ as Mental Disorder and Legal Defense
On Monday, a lawyer for a 33 year-old Kentucky man who allegedly strangled his wife with an extension cord used “caffeine intoxication” as his client’s defense.
6 Genetically Modified Foods That Changed the World
As the FDA gets ready to vote on an application to bring the first genetically modified (GM) food animal — a salmon — to market, Healthland pauses to consider the social contribution of genetically modified crops throughout …
Study: Imbalanced Metabolism Linked to Childhood Asthma
Doctors have long suspected a link between obesity and asthma, but it may be an underlying cause of obesity — poor metabolism due to inactivity or an unhealthy diet — that is actually related to the respiratory condition. New …
The ‘Other’ Salt: 5 Foods Rich in Potassium
A recent report shows that consuming just 4.7 grams of “good salt” (potassium) is the equivalent of cutting out 4 grams of “bad salt” (sodium) in terms of reducing blood pressure.
But there are only so many bananas (.5g each) …
Better-Nourished Babies Grow Up to Be Haler, Heartier Don Juans
Who knew that the first six months of life could be so, well, weighty? A new study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences tracked 800 young Filipino men since birth. They found that those who grew quickest from …
Why Can’t Americans Eat Their Fruits and Veggies?
A large and undisputed body of evidence suggests that eating fruits and vegetables is a preventive measure against cancer, cardiovascular disease, obesity and diabetes. But the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recently found that only 32.5% of American adults ate two daily servings of fruit in 2009, a slight decline from …
Coming Soon to a Restaurant Near You: Calorie Counts
They knew it was coming. Last March, the federal health-care reform bill warned all U.S. chain restaurants that, before long, they would need to start posting calorie counts for each of their menu items. Yesterday the Food and …
Can Zapping Potatoes Make Them More Nutritious?
Giving potatoes a good soak in a salt water solution doesn’t seem that unusual. But dunking them in such a bath and then zapping them with a jolt of electricity is hardly a conventional culinary trick—even in the name of …
Leafy Greens May Cut Diabetes Risk
In a study of the effects of fruit and veggie intake on diabetes risk, kale and cabbage seem unusually protective.
Researchers writing today in the British Medical Journal found that — in data from six previous studies …
Making Meat in the Lab
Sat in on an interesting session on meat substitutes at the Institute of Food Technologists meeting. So here’s the argument, which you’ve no doubt heard before – most of the western world, including North and South America and Europe is a carnivorous group. We love our meat. Since the 1960s, our consumption of animal-based protein …
What’s in Your Fruit Juice?
More news from the Institute of Food Technologists meeting.
It’s always disturbing to hear about intentional cases of food adulteration – the melamine in infant formula, for example, because it represents a concerted effort to deceive, and in many cases, harm the public. But how common is such nefarious manipulation of our food?