Diet Quotes

Try to buy foods with fewer milligrams of sodium on the label than there are grams in the serving size. For example, if it's a 100 g serving size, the product should have less than 100 mg of sodium. Alternatively, you can shoot for fewer milligrams of sodium per serving than there are calories. Most people get around 2,200 calories a day, so if everything you ate had more calories than sodium, you would probably make it at least under the Dietary Guidelines for Americans' upper limit of 2,300 mg of sodium a day. Ideally, though, you'd buy mostly food without any labels at all. It's considered almost impossible to come up with a diet consisting of unprocessed natural foods that exceeds the strict 1,500 mg a day American Heart Association guidelines for sodium reduction. [2015] - Michael Greger

Here is a simple recipe for a whole-food version of a tasty cranberry beverage, what I call my Pink Juice: Place 1 handful fresh or frozen cranberries, 2 cups water and 8 teaspoons erythritol (a naturally derived low-calorie sweetener) in a blender and blend at high speed. Pour over ice and serve. This recipe has 25 times fewer calories and at least 8 times more phytonutrients than typical cranberry juice drinks. For extra boost, blend in some fresh mint leaves. You'll get a weird-looking green foam on top, but you're chugging down berries and dark, leafy greens, two of the healthiest foods on the planet. [2015] - Michael Greger

Flaxseed is a safe, low-cost source of nutrition and may reduce tumor-proliferation rates. Make sure to grind the flaxseeds first if you don't buy them preground--otherwise, the seeds may pass right through your body undigested. [2015] - Michael Greger

Research has found that flaxseed can be used to treat benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH). Eating garlic and onions has been associated with significantly lower risk of BPH. In general, cooked vegetables may work better than raw ones, and legumes--beans, chickpeas, split peas, and lentils--have also been associated with lower risk. [2015] - Michael Greger

As you age, your risk of developing and dying from cancer grows every year--until you hit eighty-five or ninety, when, interestingly, your cancer risk begins to drop. In deed, if you don't get cancer by a certain age, you may never get it. What accounts for this relative resistance to cancer among centenarians? It may have to do with a cancer-promoting growth hormone called insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1). The release of IGF-1 appears to be triggered by the consumption of animal protein. Vegetarians who include eggs and dairy in their diets don't seem to achieve a significant reduction in IGF-1. Only men and women who limit their intake of all animal proteins appear able to significantly drop their levels of the cancer-promoting hormone and raise their levels of the protective binding proteins. [2015] - Michael Greger

Just one round-trip, cross-country flight may subject you to about the same level of radiation as a chest x-ray. The research team found that green, leafy vegetables like spinach and kale appear to have an edge over other vegetables and fruits when it comes to radiation protection. Other common foods that may be protective against radiation damage include garlic, turmeric, goji berries, and mint leaves, but none of these has been tested in clinical studies. [2015] - Michael Greger

Aspirin may lower the risk of cancer. Its active ingredient, salicylic acid, is widely found in many of the fruits and vegetables in the plant kingdom. Herbs and spices contain the highest concentrations. Chili powder, paprika, and turmeric are rich in the compound, but cumin has the most per serving. Indeed, just one teaspoon of ground cumin may be about the equivalent of a baby aspirin. This may help explain why India, with its spice-rich diets, has among the lowest worldwide rates of colorectal cancer--the cancer that appears most sensitive to the effects of aspirin. And the spicier, the better! [2015] - Michael Greger

Sometimes, processing can make foods healthier. For example, tomato juice appears to be the one common juice that may actually be healthier than the whole fruit. the processing of tomato products boosts the availability of the antioxidant red pigment lycopene by as much as fivefold. Similarly, the removal of fat from cacao beans to make cocoa powder improves the nutritional profile. Using my definition of "nothing bad added, nothing good taken away", steel-cut oats, rolled oats, and even (plain) instant oatmeal can be considered unprocessed. [2015] - Michael Greger

If you have to cook and just want the cheapest, easiest way to make healthy meals, I highly recommend dietitian Jeff Novick's Fast Food DVD series. Using common staples like canned beans, frozen vegetables, quick-cook whole grains, and spice mixes, Jeff shows you how you can feed your family healthfully in no time for about four dollars a day per person. The DVDs also include grocery store walk-throughs, shopping tips, and information on how to decipher nutrition labels. Check out this cooking series at jeffnovick.com/RD/DVDs.html. [2015] - Michael Greger

Everyone should try to incorporate one tablespoon of ground flaxseeds into his or her daily diet, in addition to a serving of nuts or other seeds. A quarter cup of nuts is considered a serving, or two tablespoons of nut or seed butters, including peanut butter. (Chestnuts and coconuts don't nutritionally count as nuts.) I also recommend one-quarter teaspoon a day of the spice turmeric, along with any other (salt-free) herbs and spices you may enjoy. [2015] - Michael Greger

Edamame is about as whole a soy food as you can get. After all, these are soybeans still in their pods. You can buy them frozen and just throw a handful into some boiling water anytime you want a healthy snack. They cook in about 5 minutes. All you need to do is strain them and, if you're like me, crack lots of fresh pepper onto the pods and nibble the beans right out. (You can also buy them pre-shelled, but then they're not as fun to eat.) [2015] - Michael Greger

Canned beans are as healthy as boiled beans--with one exception: sodium. Salt is often added to canned beans, resulting in sodium levels up to 100 times more than if you cooked them without any salt. I recommend purchasing the no-salt-added varieties and cooking with the bean liquid in whatever dish you're whipping up. The only legumes I have the patience to cook from scratch are lentils. They cook quickly and don't need to be presoaked. You can just simmer them as you would pasta, in a pot with an abundance of water, for about half an hour. [2015] - Michael Greger

Antioxidant content is one of the reasons I've singled out berries for special treatment. They are second only to herbs and spices as the most antioxidant-packed food category. As a group, they average nearly ten times more antioxidants than other fruits and vegetables. Shop for the reddest of strawberries, the blackest of blackberries, the most scarlet tomato, the darkest green broccoli you can find. The colors are the antiaging, anticancer antioxidants. [2015] - Michael Greger

America's favorite fruits are apples and bananas, with antioxidant power of about 60 units and 40 units, respectively. Mangos, the preferred fruit around the world outside of the United States, have even more antioxidant punch at 110 units. But none of these fruits are a match for berries. Strawberries weigh in at about 310 units per cup, cranberries at 330, raspberries at 350, blueberries at 380, and blackberries at a whopping 650 units. Are frozen berries as nutritious as fresh ones? Studies on cherries, raspberries, and strawberries suggest that most of their nutrition is retained even when frozen. [2015] - Michael Greger

My favorite way to incorporate turmeric is to use fresh turmeric root. Any large Asian market should carry it in the produce aisle. My quarter teaspoon of dried turmeric recommendation translates into about a quarter inch of fresh turmeric root. I use a grater to add my daily quarter inch into whatever I may be cooking (or right onto a cooked sweet potato), or I throw a raw slice into a smoothie. You probably won't even taste it. Fresh turmeric has a much more subtle flavor than dried. Be careful--it can stain clothing and surfaces. Consuming turmeric with soy may offer a double benefit for osteoarthritis sufferers. [2015] - Michael Greger

Some of my favorite spice mixes are pumpkin pie spice, curry powder, chili powder, Chinese five-spice powder, a savory Indian spice blend called garam masala, an Ethiopian blend called berbere, Italian seasoning, poultry seasoning, and a Middle Eastern blend called za'atar. Spice mixes are a convenient way to provide a balance of flavors while boosting the variety of your spice intake, but make sure to check that the mixes are salt-free. [2015] - Michael Greger

There are two main types of cinnamon: Ceylon cinnamon and cassia cinnamon (also known as Chinese cinnamon). In the United States, anything simply labeled "cinnamon" is probably cassia, since it's cheaper. This is unfortunate, because cassia contains a compound called coumarin, which may be toxic to the liver at high doses. Unless it's specifically labeled Ceylon cinnamon, a daily teaspoon would exceed the tolerable upper safety limit for adults. [2015] - Michael Greger

There is a wonderful universe of whole grains out there. You may have tried quinoa, but what about kaniwa or fonio? Even wild rice (which is not actually even rice) may not sound as wild as the grain called freekeh. Have fun and try some amaranth, millet, sorghum, or teff or expand the amber waves of your horizon. If you have a choice, pick red quinoa over white quinoa, blue corn over yellow, and yellow corn over white. Pigmented rice--red, purple, or black--has benefits over brown. Whole-wheat pasta cooks in about 10 minutes. My favorite brand is Bionaturae because of its deliciously nutty taste. [2015] - Michael Greger

Popcorn is a whole grain that takes less than 5 minutes to prepare. A hot-air popper is another inexpensive, useful appliance. There's an endless variety of savory, sweet, and spicy toppings you can use. I like the combination of chlorella and nutritional yeast. There are even one-minute whole-grain options: fully precooked bowls and pouches of brown rice and quinoa that can be microwaved and don't even need to be refrigerated--just heat and eat. [2015] - Michael Greger

If you buy packaged grain products, anything labeled on the front with words like "multigrain," "stone-ground," "100% wheat," "cracked wheat," "seven-grain," or "bran" is usually NOT a whole-grain product. Even if the first word in the ingredients list is "whole," the rest of the ingredients could be junk. I suggest using the Five-to-One Rule. Look at the Nutrition Facts label on the package and see if the ratio of grams of carbohydrates to grams of dietary fiber is five or less. For example, Ezekiel bread has 15 grams of carbohydrates and 3 grams of fiber and passes the test. [2015] - Michael Greger