Teff, a native Ethiopian grain, has been cultivated there for at least 4,000 years. Its seeds are smaller than pinheads, and can be easily scattered. Many Ethiopians eat it two to three times a day in injera bread, porridge or, of course, alcohol (pages 3-4). The grain is gluten-free and is full of essential amino acids, calcium, and other vitamins and minerals. It has a short growing season and tolerance for marginal soils and drought or flood conditions, but its low comparative yield optimal sunlight conditions, and labor intensive harvest may limit the spread of the grain.
posted on Jan 6, 2008 - View this thread

Death by Veganism. "I was once a vegan. But well before I became pregnant, I concluded that a vegan pregnancy was irresponsible. You cannot create and nourish a robust baby merely on foods from plants.

Indigenous cuisines offer clues about what humans, naturally omnivorous, need to survive, reproduce and grow: traditional vegetarian diets, as in India, invariably include dairy and eggs for complete protein, essential fats and vitamins. There are no vegan societies for a simple reason: a vegan diet is not adequate in the long run."
posted on May 21, 2007 - View this thread

Obesity and the Farm Bill. Michael Pollan continues his series of articles on the state of the American food supply by looking at the connection between the obesity epidemic and the federal farm bill (NYT, reg. required, blah blah blah). Previously.
posted on Apr 23, 2007 - View this thread

One burger, double neutrons, hold the quarks. Mikhail Shchepinov believes that eating food enhanced with more isotopes can lead to longer lives. What could go wrong?
posted on Mar 26, 2007 - View this thread

Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.
posted on Jan 28, 2007 - View this thread

What does 200 calories look like? (via)
posted on Jan 16, 2007 - View this thread

NATS is an online personal nutritional analysis tool. It has a database of common foods, and an interface for entering nutritional data about foods that aren't listed. You can also calculate how much energy you burn in a day, and search for foods by nutrient. Registration is required to if you want to save your diet information.
posted on Oct 28, 2006 - View this thread

No running in PE. I was talking to my kids about school the other day. We were discussing what they do in their different classes and the conversation came around to physical education (PE). I was shocked when they told me that their gym teacher forbids running in PE class. What?! No running in PE? It’s true.
posted on Oct 7, 2006 - View this thread

An official comic book adaptation of the 9/11 commission report is due to hit bookstores this month. The U.S. Army seeks an Arabic-speaking comic book creator. Meanwhile, an Israeli blogger suspects a Kuwaiti company of misusing Marvel and DC comics. These are just the latest incidents in a long-running history of using comic books for propaganda purposes, ranging from Mussolini and Hitler to Captain America vs. the Nazi-affiliated Red Skull to anticommunist comics for Catholic parochial schools to a phony Black Panther comic book created by COINTELPRO to a comic book of the American invasion of Grenada. However, my favorite site of comic book propaganda tends to focus on more innocuous domestic issues such as bicycle safety, USDA nutrition standards, and fighting crack cocaine. (OK, that last issue isn't so innocuous, but comic book propaganda about health & safety issues still generally blows.)
posted on Aug 4, 2006 - View this thread

Rice cakes are one of the most fattening foods known to man, while ice cream is one of the least fattening. Though this appears illogical, it makes perfect Anthropological sense. Education is the key to controlling body fat. If we know which foods store in the fat cells and which ones do not, we can make educated food choices.

The glycemic index (GI) is a ranking of carbohydrates on a scale from 0 to 100 according to the extent to which they raise blood sugar levels after eating. Foods with a high GI are those which are rapidly digested and absorbed and result in marked fluctuations in blood sugar levels. Low-GI foods, by virtue of their slow digestion and absorption, produce gradual rises in blood sugar and insulin levels, and have proven benefits for health. There has been an explosion of books and diet plans based on the glycemic index, But while many popular diet books make it sound as if the glycemic index is an accepted theory, in truth, there are very real problems with this system. Some dieticians believe that a Satiety Index may be a better approach to reducing caloric intake whilst minimising cravings.
posted on May 25, 2006 - View this thread

Ascaris lumbricoides. According to estimates, about 1.5 billion people--about a quarter of the earth's population--are hosts to the Ascaris lumbricoides parasitic worm. Ascaris worms can grow to be 18 inches in length, and use their host's windpipe and esophagus to migrate between the small intestine and the lungs. A single human host may support dozen of large worms, which can be contracted by contact with fecal matter, animals, or undercooked pork. Under some circumstances (the worms dislike anesthesia, for example) one or more worms may exit from the mouth (a horrifying image), or the anus (one of the most disgusting images I have ever seen, and not safe for work, obviously). Here, the removal of a worm is caught on video (Realplayer). Too disgusting to post? Almost. But 1.5 billion people have got these in their bodies right now. That's what's grosser than gross.
posted on Mar 4, 2006 - View this thread

Feeding Minds - the impact of food on mental health
posted on Jan 15, 2006 - View this thread

Obesity: Epidemic or Myth?
posted on Nov 16, 2005 - View this thread

Cereal + Milk = Liquid Cereal.
posted on Nov 12, 2005 - View this thread

Diet and behavior.
posted on Sep 30, 2005 - View this thread

The World's Healthiest Foods
posted on Jun 24, 2005 - View this thread

USDA releases new food pyramid(s). Instead of one cogent nutritional guideline for all Americans, the USDA has released a dozen because "one size doesn't fit all." Dietitians have advocated revision for a while now but change has been slow. According to author Marion Nestle, the nutritional guidelines have become highly politized by industry lobbyists: "My first day on the job, I was given the rules: No matter what the research indicated, the report could not recommend 'eat less meat' as a way to reduce intake of saturated fat." Newspeak for sweets appears to be discretionary calories; are we doing any better?
posted on Apr 19, 2005 - View this thread

Supersized in the NFL Analyzing data from the 2003-2004 season, researchers say "more than a quarter of NFL players had a body mass index that qualified them as class 2 obesity" -- equivalent to a 6-foot man weighing between 260 and 300 pounds. Even those players weren't the biggest ones: the study counted more than 60 players -- 3 percent -- with body mass indexes placing them into class 3 obesity, with individual weights approaching 400 pounds. "I don't know what's going on in the minds of coaches", said lead researcher Dr. Joyce Harp, an assistant professor of nutrition and medicine at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Players' growing girth "is a major concern," said Dr. Arthur Roberts, a former NFL quarterback and retired heart surgeon (.pdf file) whose Living Heart Foundation works with the players' union to evaluate heart-related health risks faced by current and retired players. More inside.
posted on Mar 1, 2005 - View this thread

NutritionData.com is a free and very useful website for detailed nutrition information, including the in-vogue Glycemic Index; their own Fullness Factor, a measure of how filling foods are per calorie; and others. Their Better Choices Diet makes use of the Fullness Factor to make consuming less energy than you use easier to do without going hungry. Previously mentioned in response to this AskMe question.
posted on Jan 19, 2005 - View this thread

Portion Distortion Quiz. Just in time for T-day, our helpful friends at NIH have updated last year's quiz with Portion Distortion II. Caution: pictures of food are bigger today than they were 20 years ago.
posted on Nov 24, 2004 - View this thread

Coffee is Good, Good, Good. Coffee is Bad, Bad, Bad. Seems like the experts just don’t know if our most common addiction is, well, good for us, or bad for us.
posted on Nov 16, 2004 - View this thread

There are numerous reasons proffered to drink juice. It's easier to drink a small serving of juice than to eat a large serving of fruits and vegetables; that much is intuitive. An oft-plagiarized article claims that juicing frees nutrients that otherwise could not be absorbed, cites 1940s research that chlorophyll can aid in hemoglobin synthesis, and claims that 1 cup of carrot juice has the nutritional content of 4 cups of chopped carrots (although cranking the numbers [pdf] gives an answer closer to 2 cups.) Skeptics argue that much of this talk is hype, correctly noting that juice is not a miracle disease cure as some hucksters claim, and that by juicing you are discarding beneficial fiber. But absurd juicing claims aside, is there any reason needed beyond the great taste? [more inside]
posted on Apr 19, 2004 - View this thread

Interesting info for even the ardent salad dodgers (via bifurcated rivets)
posted on Feb 23, 2004 - View this thread

The food pyramid has been updated again, apparently. According to Frito-Lay, your major food groups now consist of fruits, vegetables, protein, dairy, and Doritos. (via Calpundit)
posted on Jan 24, 2004 - View this thread

Create-a-meal [note: flash] ... comes in mcdonalds, subway, barbeque, and pizza hut flavors.
posted on Nov 22, 2003 - View this thread

What's on the menu? Perhaps fat and calories. "Five states have taken up similar bills this year, with none being passed so far." Will bills like these ever get passed? Will we ever see nutrition facts on fast food wrappers? Will consumers ever bother to read them?
posted on Jul 15, 2003 - View this thread

Yesterday the World Health Organization launched a report on diet and nutrition, saying that sugar should be restricted to 10% of caloric intake. Predictably, the sugar industry (press releases) threw fits and called on their cronies in Congress to cut off WHO funding. Apparently they're fighting and clawing even more than the tobacco industry in similar circusmtances, and WHO fears that lobbyists have more power with the Bush administration. The SA believes that inactivity, not our increased sugar consumption, is the primary cause of the obesity epidemic. Are we in for another few years of declarations of junk science and endless gov't investigations into what seems obvious, a la most environmental and health concerns?
posted on Apr 24, 2003 - View this thread

The vegan diet can be a killer, at least that's what the State of New York thinks. Was a "strict vegan diet" the cause of a 15-month-old's demise or did New York health officials have a hand in the death?
posted on Mar 30, 2003 - View this thread

"64 grams of fat, 2,090 milligrams of sodium, and enough cholesterol to kill anything that's ever lived." 104% of your USDA daily requirements of saturated fat. 231% of your daily intake of cholesterol. Swanson's Hungry-Man All-Day Breakfast! (Pancakes included.)
posted on Feb 25, 2003 - View this thread

Happy Meals No Longer Bringing Smiles To McDonalds. Best news I've heard since December. And to bring Mom ("very important to us") back into the fold, McD may begin including Mom-toys with the HMs. No, no. More like...lip gloss, or sweepstakes entries for spa visits. Stuff that would tip any conscientious mother over into the crap-for-food camp.Other ideas? Fact is, EVERY McDonalds customer should be eating the happy meal. (last link possibly NSFW)
posted on Jan 31, 2003 - View this thread

Not the Italian dunkers again! Suffer the little children. School lunches are awful anywhere in the world but this is just sad. Shouldn't education include food? Why are obesity, gastronomic ignorance and downright bad taste (including the ersatz "foreign" dishes) inculcated at such an early age in America?
posted on Dec 4, 2002 - View this thread

Keys of Nutrition You may not be familiar with Ancel Keys, but his discoveries about nutrition and health are behind much of the dietary advice people now receive. Have you ever wondered who proved that the amount of cholesterol in food did not influence the amount of cholesterol in the blood? Do you know what causes high cholesterol? Do you like olive oil but need a good rationalization to keep using it? (hint: there is one) What dietary advice has most fascinated you, or helped you the most?
posted on Oct 22, 2002 - View this thread

"We think of an orange as a constant, but in reality it's not." Canadian study finds that fruits and vegetables have lost much of their nutritional value in the last decades--potatoes, for example, have lost 100% of their Vitamin A. The reason, it appears, is mass production and a market that values appearance over substance. Is this symptomatic of deeper problems within a system where produce travels so far before reaching the consumer? Here in B.C., for example, the stores are full of California produce, despite the fact that we grow much the same fruits and vegetables locally.
posted on Jul 6, 2002 - View this thread

With enemas like you, who needs friends? Ian and Tony take a trip to Kamp Kolon, and Tony loses his marble.
posted on Mar 16, 2002 - View this thread

Why take vitamins, when you can wear them? A Japanese company says people will soon be able to get their daily dose of Vitamin C simply by wearing a T-shirt. A T-shirt made out of fibre - called V-up - would have the equivalent vitamin content of two lemons and remain effective after 30 washes.
posted on Jul 17, 2001 - View this thread

Mmmm, stickers in my colon. Next time I'll be sure to wash the apple, doc. (see bottom pick).
posted on Apr 11, 2001 - View this thread

Coca-Cola stays ahead of the curve. [NY Times, requires free subscription.] Facing increased criticism over commercialism in public schools, Coke vows to change its policies away from blatant advertising and strictly offering sugar-sweetened drinks. Most notable is a potential end to the "Cola Wars" of exclusive contracts with school districts. But with Pepsi following close behind [see end of Post article], is this really a landmark moment, or an attempt to stave off criticism while still branding the available target audience of teenagers?
posted on Mar 15, 2001 - View this thread

Got (human) milk? Mother's milk saves 16 lost at sea on a 12-day journey, during an attempted crossing from the Dominican Republic to Puerto Rico. Human breasts can do a hell of a lot more than just sitting there and looking pretty...
posted on Feb 7, 2001 - View this thread

"GMO free" labelling set to become illegal in the US? "The U.S. regulatory system is a model around the world because it is grounded in science, not superstition or uninformed emotion." So says the president of a biotech lobby group. Ahem.
posted on Jan 18, 2001 - View this thread

One of the holy grails of the infosaturated overworking computer professionals like myself is a single food capable of giving all the nutrients you'd need for a meal, and be as easy as possible to prepare and eat. Some friends used to call this dream creation "food paste" or "foodstuff capsules" or most simply "fuel." I never thought my Jetsonian dream would ever come true, but now there's the Dilberito, with 100% of 23 vitamins and Jamba Juice's Smoothies. Why do I mention Jamba? Because I saw this poster in the SFO airport last night, and they even go so far as to answer the question "can I get too much Jamba?"
posted on Mar 6, 2000 - View this thread