“I eat yogurt pretty regularly as a mid-day lunch/snack. I usually add nuts, hemp seeds, a bit of granola and cinnamon. My ideal choice would be full fat plain Greek yogurt but my local store only has fat-free Greek. If I have to choose between fat free Greek and full fat regular yogurt, which would you recommend?”
Here’s the salient nutrition info on both options (for an 8 ounce serving) followed by some considerations for each point.
Calories: We shouldn’t always assume that fewer calories better! If you eat small frequent meals, for example, or you’re trying to lose weight, you might be looking for lower calorie options. But if you eat fewer, more widely spaced meals, or you’re extremely active, a higher-calorie meal may be preferable. Either way, however, a difference of 35 calories is pretty trivial in the context of your total daily intake (much less in the context of a yogurt, nut, hemp seed, and granola snack). So I think I’d have to call a draw for this criterion. Continue reading “Whole milk yogurt vs. fat free Greek”>
This week’s round-up is turbo-charged with two weeks’ worth of nutrition advice and commentary (due to the fact that I failed to post a round-up last week)!
Let’s start with the headliners: In last week’s Nutrition Diva podcast, I took a closer look at all the media buzz around the latest study on carbs and weight gain. As usual, there’s a little more to the story than the sound-bytes would suggest. Also in the news, almonds turn out to be less caloric than we thought.
Speaking of nuts (and no, I am not referring to my dear readers!), a fan wrote in with a question about PB2, the new low-fat peanut butter(like) product taking calorie-counters by storm. Sometimes, less really is less. While we’re on the subject of calories, here’s a quick and dirty tip for a reader who wondered whether it makes more sense to focus on fat or calories when selecting non-dairy milk.
Wondering about the difference between prebiotics and probiotics? Check out this recent episode of the Nutrition Diva podcast (which features a special guest appearance from Everyday Einstein!). I got to pull out more fancy scientific terminology–words like ‘convective’ and ‘evaporative’–in this post on whether drinking hot tea cools you down faster than a cold beverage.
Pickling is a time honored way to preserve foods with no refrigeration. But what happens to the nutritional quality of vegetables when you pickle them? It depends on the method. Find out which kinds of pickles are super good for you and which aren’t in this week’s episode of the Nutrition Diva Podcast.
Q. I tend to get food poisoning about once a year. Often, however, I am the only person in a group that gets it. Is there anything I can eat that would make my GI tract more resistant? Would probiotics help?
A new recipe? No, a round-up of questions from the Nutrition Over Easy mailbag:
Should You Avoid Peanuts Because of Aflatoxins?
Q. I enjoy peanut butter and peanuts. I recently heard that it is not healthy to consume peanut & peanut butter because of aflatoxin. Is this accurate information or just a myth? Continue reading “Peanuts, Yogurt, Spinach, Graham Flour”>
Last week, I answered a question from a reader who had seen a study showing that probiotic supplements reduced cold and flu symptoms in children. He reasoned that eating yogurt every day might be a good step and wondered how much he’d have to eat to get a similar “dose” of probiotics. To answer his question, I compared the number of active cultures in a typical probiotic supplement to the number of active cultures in a typical yogurt.
But I missed an opportunity to clarify what I think is a widespread misunderstanding about probiotics. Many people think of all probiotic supplements and foods as being somewhat interchangeable. They’re not.
Probiotics: an umbrella term for thousands of different bacteria
In terms of labeling foods and supplements, the FAO/WHO defines probiotics as “Live microorganisms which when administered in adequate amounts confer a health benefit on the host.” That’s any health benefit.
There are hundreds of different strains of lactobacillus bacteria and they offer a variety of potential health benefits to humans. Some colonize the large intestine, others live in the lining of the stomach, still others have an affinity for the mucus membranes in the nose. Of the many strains likely to colonize the large intestine, for example, some may improve gut immune function, others digest complex sugars, others may benefit the host by producing vitamin K.
There are also lactobacillus bacteria that don’t do much of anything to improve or defend your health. These, while harmless, would technically not be classified as probiotics–although they might still be considered “live and active cultures.”
Foods versus supplements
Most probiotic foods contain a variety of bacterial strains–your average supermarket yogurt might contain six different bacterial strains. And the lactobacillus bacteria found in yogurt are not necessarily the same as those found in other fermented foods like kefir or kim-chi.
Many of the studies you read about use “boutique” strains that are not likely to be found in any traditionally-fermented foods. In the case of the study I mentioned above, for example, they used two trademarked strains called Lactobacillus acidophilus NCFM and Bifidobacterium lactis Bi-07.
Is there any point to consuming probiotic foods?
I still think there are general health benefits to eating traditionally-fermented foods like yogurt, kefir, kim-chi, kombucha, sauerkraut, and miso. Eating a variety of fermented foods, which provides a wider variety of bacterial strains, might offer a wider range of benefits.
But we need to be careful about assuming that the findings on a particular strain apply to all probiotics and probiotic foods. If you’re going for a specific therapeutic benefit, such as protecting against side effects while taking antibiotics or improving flu resistance, there’s no guarantee that yogurt or any other fermented food will contain the same bacteria as were used in a particular study.
Similarly, when shopping for probiotic supplements, pay attention to the individual strains in that supplement and how they compare with the strains used in various studies you might be responding to.
Q. I recently read about a study showing that probiotics protected kids from getting the flu. It seemed like a pretty powerful study in favor of the health benefits of yogurt, at least in kids. Do you have any recommendations for a reasonable “dose” of yogurt would be for an adult?
A. Yes, I noted that study with interest as well. The kids (about 300 of them, aged 3 to 5) were taking probiotic supplements or placebo pills twice a day. The kids getting the probiotics had about half as many fevers, coughs, and runny noses, took fewer prescriptions and missed fewer days of school.
We should note that the study was funded by a company that makes probiotic products. That said, the results were published in a peer-reviewed journal (Pediatrics) so the study design apparently passed muster.
There’s no RDA for probiotics for kids or adults so it’s hard to say what a good”dose” might be. Most probiotic supplements contain 10 to 20 billion active cultures per dose at the time of manufacture. Yogurt that carries the “Live and Active Cultures” seal is certified to contain at least 100 million cultures per gram at the time of manufacture, which translates into about 22 billion live cultures in an eight ounce cup of yogurt.
So, I’m thinking that a single serving of yogurt every day would be a reasonable start for kids and adults. But the amount of sugar (often high fructose corn syrup) in sweetened yogurts is shocking. I’d advise you to steer clear of sweetened (and artificially-sweetened) yogurts and go for the plain yogurt. Sweeten (if you must) with fruit or a drizzle of honey.
Can yogurt protect you (or your kids) from getting the flu this season? Might help and can’t hurt (unless you’re lactose intolerant).
Larry writes with an interesting dilemma:
Q. I tend to get food poisoning about once a year. Often, however, I am the only person in a group that gets it. Is there anything I can eat that would make my GI tract more resistant? Would probiotics help?