Who knows, you may even like your finished dish better with a few substitutions (and we know you’ll love not having to make an extra trip to the store)! 

Pantry 

All-purpose flour: For baking, use equal parts cake flour and bread flour. 

Baking powder: Mix baking soda with a pinch of cream of tartar or a squeeze of lemon juice. 

Brown sugar: For baking, beat granulated sugar with honey (roughly 1 tablespoon of honey per cup of sugar). 

Eggs: Replace 1 whole egg with ¼ cup of commercial egg substitute. 

Oils: Neutral oils like canola, coconut, corn, peanut, and vegetable are all interchangeable. For olive oil, you can substitute avocado or sunflower oils.  

Rice: 1 cup of cooked rice in a recipe can be replaced with equal portions of barley, bulgur, brown or wild rice. 

Stock: Water seasoned with orange or apple juice, melted butter, milk, miso paste, mushroom stock, olive oil, soy sauce, and even tea (depending on the recipe’s flavor profile). 

Vanilla extract: For baking, use equal amounts of maple syrup. 

Wine: For every cup of water, mix in 2 teaspoons of lemon juice. 

Dairy 

Butter: Applesauce or pureed avocado for recipes for baked goods (the final result will be slightly denser, but still delicious). If pan-frying, use olive oil or another fat.  

Buttermilk: For baking, mix whole milk with a splash of lemon juice or white vinegar.  

Cream: For giving soups a creamy texture, boil sweet onions or cook white beans until completely tender, then puree until completely smooth. 

Milk: Replace half the amount called for in the recipe with heavy cream, diluted with water until it reaches the recipe amount.    

Parmesan: Sprinkle toasted breadcrumbs for a salty garnish. 

Sour cream: For baking, use strained Greek yogurt in equal parts.  

Produce 

Alliums: Onions (red, white, yellow), leeks, scallions, and shallots can easily substitute for each other.  

1 garlic clove: Replace with 1/8 teaspoon garlic powder. 

1 tbsp. raw ginger: Replace with 1/8 teaspoon ground ginger. 

• 1 medium onion: Replace with 1 tablespoon onion powder. 

Greens: Depending on how greens are being cooked in a recipe, these are the more common substitutes. 

• Tender: chard, lettuce, spinach, tatsoi 
• Bitter: arugula, endive, frisee, radicchio, radish greens, watercress 
• Sturdy: kale, mustard greens, turnip greens, escarole 

Potatoes: Choose firm vegetables like parsnips, turnips, butternut squash, or sweet potatoes. 

Tomatoes: 1 1/3 cups diced fresh tomatoes can be replaced with 1 cup of canned tomatoes.  

Meats & Seafood 

Chicken: If substituting bone-in, skin-on thighs for chicken breasts, increase the cook time until meat reaches an internal temperature of 165 degrees. Decrease cook time if replacing chicken thighs with chicken breasts. 

Fish: Substitute lean fish for other lean fish (cod, halibut, sole, tilapia), and fattier fish for other fatty fish (salmon, swordfish, tuna, char). Do not substitute lean fish for fatty fish, and vice versa. 

Can’t find an ingredient substitution you were looking for? Please comment below or contact us and we’ll get it added to the guide! 

The post Ingredient Substitution Guide appeared first on Cook for Your Life.

Sugar (glucose) comes from all carbohydrate foods. As with fats and protein, we need glucose to survive. Our bodies don’t control which cells use glucose – all our cells use glucose – both healthy and cancer cells. Reducing or removing glucose from a healthy, well-balanced diet will not slow the growth of tumors. The best thing to do? Focus on a whole foods, plant-focused diet (including carbohydrates) to support your immune system.

Where and when did the cancer plus sugar connection start?

The idea that sugar feeds cancer has been circulating in mainstream media for decades. Its origins go back to a paper published in the 1920s by Otto Warburg, a German chemist who, along with his colleagues, found that tumors take up large amounts of glucose, which is then converted into lactate rather than going into the mitochondria and converted into energy and carbon dioxide.

His ideas would come to be known as the Warburg effect in the 1970s. So the theory goes that if we “starve” the cancer cells of glucose we can stop the growth of the tumor and potentially destroy the tumor. We have learned a lot since then about how cancer cells get and use energy for growth and, looking at more recent evidence, we can say it’s not as simple as “starving” the cancer cell of glucose.

Healthy bodies need energy to function properly. Without energy, we can’t produce new cells, repair damaged cells, maintain our organ systems, and support a robust immune system. Unlike plants that use sunlight to make energy (glucose), humans have to eat food to consume energy in the form of macronutrients such as fats, proteins, and carbohydrates to then be used to produce energy.

Humans can use all three of these macronutrients to produce energy, but our bodies prefer glucose as its main energy source under normal, healthy conditions. Cancer cells are no different in that in order for them to grow and reproduce, they also need glucose to supply their energy needs. If we avoid consuming sugar from carbohydrates, our stores of glucose will drop to critical levels and so our bodies will begin breaking down more protein and fat to ensure our blood glucose remains stable. This increased breakdown of protein results in muscle loss and a weakened immune system.

In the absence of glucose, the breakdown of protein and fat in a healthy body and in a body that has cancer. So, if we reduce or eliminate glucose from a healthy well-balanced diet, this impairs our own healthy cells from getting the energy they need to survive and thrive.

Studies have shown that this elimination of glucose from the diet will not slow the growth of tumors. More scientific evidence is needed to better understand if and how a ketogenic diet helps slow tumor growth, we currently do not have enough evidence to support eliminating carbohydrates from our diets in hopes of reducing or slowing the growth of tumor cells.

So, is there a sugar and cancer connection?

When we eat, our glucose levels rise which triggers the pancreas to produce insulin. Insulin is a hormone that helps glucose move from our blood into our cells, bringing our blood sugar levels back to a normal range.

When we consume large quantities of simple sugars (i.e., the form that is closest to what our bodies absorb), blood glucose levels spike, and more insulin is released to account for it. If a person consumes a diet that is high in simple sugars for several decades, our insulin levels can be abnormally high and, over time, our cells don’t respond to the insulin as well and the glucose remains above normal levels in our blood. This can lead to a syndrome called hyperinsulinemia (high circulating insulin levels) and eventually insulin resistance and Type 2 Diabetes, both of which are pro-inflammatory diseases – a potential driver for cancer progression.

Insulin resistance can alter your body’s production of certain proteins, which subsequently increases levels of free estrogens and androgens in the body, and can increase the risk of some cancers like breast cancer.

Another way sugar is connected to cancer is through obesity. A highly processed diet is often high in added sugars, resulting in weight gain. Obesity is considered a low-grade inflammatory state and one of the hallmarks of cancer is chronic inflammation. A 2014 policy paper by the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) noted that “obesity is a major under-recognized contributor to the nation’s cancer toll and is quickly overtaking tobacco as the leading preventable cause of cancer.”

Angelea Bruce, RD, CSO, CNSC, oncology dietitian for Sharp Healthcare in San Diego, uses this analogy for helping her patients better understand the role of sugar and cancer.

“Every cell in the body requires glucose for fuel, including cancer cells.

We get glucose from all carbohydrate foods. If we don’t eat enough carbohydrates, the cells (normal and cancer) still demand a source of glucose and the body makes it by breaking down protein from our muscles and immune system. In order to minimize muscle loss and immune compromise, we need to provide a consistent source of carbohydrates through the diet whenever possible.

Cells use glucose the way cars use gas. With normal driving, our car uses varying amounts of gas depending on whether we are idling or accelerating. Normal cells divide at varying rates, some every three days and some every three months, or more. During cell division, more glucose is used, much like an accelerating car uses more gas. But after cell division, it returns to more of an idling state, using less glucose.

Cancer cells are like cars with the accelerator stuck to the floor, using glucose at high rates, because they are dividing at much faster rates than normal cells. If you still want to be able to drive your car, you cannot fix it if it has the accelerator stuck down simply by letting it run out of gas. For the same reason, you cannot starve cancer cells of glucose because you will also be depriving your healthy cells of fuel. The cancer cells are much more tenacious than the normal ones and will persist at the expense of the rest of the body.”

Bottom Line

Sugar (glucose) comes from all carbohydrate foods. Our bodies don’t control which cells get glucose. Our recommendation is to consume a mostly whole food diet that is abundant in plant foods such as fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and legumes. Minimize the amount of highly processed foods as possible and maintain a regular schedule of physical activity.

Eat Mostly Plants, Most of the Time

Get our top tips, advice, and recipes for following an anti-Inflammatory, immune-boosting diet.

Learn More

Kate Ueland, MS, RD, specializes in oncology nutrition, primarily working with breast, ovarian, renal, and melanoma cancer patients throughout all stages of the cancer journey at Seattle Cancer Care Alliance (SCCA) in Seattle, WA. As Cook for Your Life’s nutrition advisor and editor, Kate ensures all culinary content adheres to the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics and follows science-based guidelines.

The post Does Sugar Feed Cancer? appeared first on Cook for Your Life.

In 2010, the USDA created MyPlate to replace the food pyramid as part of the Dietary Guidelines for Americans. While this replacement for the outdated carb-heavy food pyramid is a major improvement, it was not designed with cancer prevention in mind.

This is where The New American Plate comes in. The American Institute of Cancer Research (AICR) created The New American Plate, a scientifically-sound eating philosophy, to help you enjoy your meals while emphasizing foods that promote health and reduce your risk for cancer and other chronic diseases. Healthy eating is paramount for individuals touched by cancer because it fuels the body with nutrients that people need to heal, grow, and thrive.

Both the AICR and the American Cancer Society (ACS) recommend that people with cancer get frequent physical activity and eat a balanced diet rich in fruits, vegetables, and whole grains with limited meat and alcohol consumption. These guidelines focus on getting nutrients directly from foods rather than from supplements.

What does the plate look like?

AICR’s New American Plate designates two-thirds of the plate as fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and legumes (beans) with the other third of the plate as animal protein. In other words, the diet should be highly focused on plant sources rather than animal sources. If you are vegetarian or vegan, make sure to include plant-based sources of protein as part of your plate.

Fruits, Vegetables, Whole Grains, Legumes, & Nuts

The current recommendation is to eat at least five servings of non-starchy vegetables and fruits per day. Fruits and vegetables contain phytonutrients, or phytochemicals, which are help to promote health. Some examples of phytonutrients are carotenoids, lycopene, glucosinolates, and phytosterols. These phytonutrients in fruits and vegetables account for the different colors in these foods, so creating a colorful plate will increase the number of phytonutrients consumed.

Fiber is another a key component in fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and legumes. Fiber helps to regulate bowel movements and provides fuel for the microorganisms that live in our gut. This helps maintain a healthy gut and helps to protect against the growth of cancer cells.

Whole grains are an important component of the plate, as opposed to processed, refined grains. Whole grains contain all parts of the grain seed, as well as naturally-occurring B vitamins, minerals, and fiber. Some examples of whole grains include quinoa, brown rice, barley, farro, and millet. When shopping for groceries, whole grains can be identified by looking at the ingredients. A whole-grain product will have “whole-wheat,” “whole-oat,” “stone-ground,” “whole-ground” as the first ingredient on the label. Additionally, you may see labels provided by the U.S.-based Whole Grain Council to let customers know how much of a company’s product contains whole grains.

Animal Protein

Good sources of animal protein include poultry, fish, lean meats, and low-fat dairy. The type of protein that should be limited to 18 ounces per week is red meat, such as beef, pork, and lamb. Cancer survivors are more susceptible to heart disease, and consuming high amounts of red meat increases the risk of heart disease. We at CFYL encourage all our readers to try and aim for several meatless meals throughout the week, substituting beans, soy, and nuts for animal protein. Including plant-based proteins in a meal will help increase daily fiber intake, as well as provide healthy sources of protein in the diet.

Physical Activity

Although fatigue is often a common side effect of cancer treatments that can linger into survivorship, increasing physical activity has shown to increase energy levels and actually reduce fatigue. Physical activity can also help to maintain bone health, muscle strength, and body weight. According to the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, adults should aim for 30 minutes of moderate activity per day, such as brisk walking, and then increase to 60 minutes of moderate activity or 30 minutes of vigorous activity daily.

One study of breast cancer patients even showed that consumption of five servings of fruits and vegetables daily, combined with 30 minutes of walking 6 days a week, resulted in a 50% decrease in mortality after 7 years. Authors of this study concluded that fruit and vegetable consumption + exercise are an unbeatable combination for survivorship!

Fluids

Water is extremely important for health, as all our cells need water to function properly, regulate our body temperature, act as a cushion for our internal organs, and protect our brains from sudden impacts. Sugary beverages such as sodas should be avoided; even fruit juices should be limited. A good alternative to fruit juices and soda is putting fruit, vegetable slices, and herbs into sparkling or still water to give it flavor.

It is also recommended that alcohol be avoided or kept to a minimum, as there is a consistent link between increased cancer risk and alcohol, regardless of whether it’s beer, wine, or distilled liquor.

Other Recommendations

Any kind of tobacco use is associated with increased cancer risk as well. In addition, it is important to try and limit salt intake, especially from processed meats and foods such as canned, frozen, or fast food items. An alternative would be to look for reduced-sodium canned goods and frozen items without any added salt or sugars. Fast foods, including hamburgers, hot dogs, chips, and french fries, along with other processed foods are high in calories but low in nutrients, which is why they should be avoided or consumed only in limited amounts.

The post Healthy Living for Cancer Survivorship appeared first on Cook for Your Life.

Like all women, I’ve lived with the vagaries of my reproductive and urinary systems. And until menopause hit, I dealt with all the usual yeast and urinary (UTI) infections that we women take in stride. We don’t bother the doctor but run out to the pharmacy to get over-the-counter remedies for problems we’re so used to having that we don’t pay attention to them. 

Well, I’m here to tell you that we should always pay attention. 

Last spring I catered a dinner I donated to our yearly fundraiser. When it was over, I sat down with the hosts and had a glass (or two) of pink champagne before getting into the car they’d arranged for me. When I got home, I was bushed. I chatted with my husband for a while to decompress and then got ready for bed.

Like most of us, I need to pee before settling down for the night and, when I did that night, I noticed that my pee was pink – just like the champagne I’d been drinking. I’d served some very red California strawberries and wondered if, as with beets, their color had made its way into my system. I didn’t think anything of it. But the next morning my pee was still pink. It was Sunday, so I thought I’d wait and see. I had no pain or irritation, just champagne-pink urine.

By Monday morning everything was back to normal, but I was now on alert. I wasn’t convinced the strawberries had caused this. And that kind of food discoloration is usually a one-off affair and this lasted for 36 hours. I was scheduled to leave for a business trip later that week and as someone who has already had cancer twice, I decided not to wait until after I got back to deal with it. I called my Primary Care Physician to tell her what happened, starting with, “It’s probably nothing, but…”

Long story short, my physician fit me in for a urine test. I actually stopped on the way to the airport – and thank god I did.

The pink wasn’t caused by strawberries or champagne or a UTI, but by blood. As it turned out, it started from an aggressive form of papillary bladder cancer. But we’d caught it early. It hadn’t progressed into the muscle of the bladder wall. This meant that after a small non-invasive surgery to remove the tumor, I was a candidate to have BCG treatment of six weekly injections directly into my bladder followed by four rounds of maintenance BCG injections over a year to help prevent recurrence, and then I wouldn’t have to undergo systemic chemo. I had months of chemo for my breast cancer and was very grateful not to have to go through it again.

I’m telling you this story as my very own public service announcement. Without my personal history of cancer, it would have been too easy for me to brush off this tell-tale symptom as normal women’s UTI woes, and not bothered to see my doctor. But I have had previous cancers so I did go see her and, because of that, my cancer was caught early.

As of writing this, everything looks clear. I am about to start my second round of maintenance and I should be finished with treatment before the end of the year.  

I’m lucky to have this good prognosis. Sadly, the data shows that this isn’t always the case for women with bladder cancer. Unlike men, women tend to ignore symptoms like blood in the urine as the normal UTI problems we’re used to, and unfortunately, many doctors tend to assume the same in their women patients. This causes delay and as a result, we’re diagnosed with bladder cancer much later than men, leaving us with the burden of more advanced cancers with more invasive treatments.

But it doesn’t have to be this way. Old or young, we women must always remember that blood in the urine is never normal.

Bladder cancer can strike women at any age. Ex-smokers are at particular risk. If you have pink or dark tea-colored urine or find any traces of blood after peeing, see your doctor. If you feel persistent painful irritation when you pee, see your doctor. They can test your urine to see if you have a UTI infection and for traces of blood. If it’s not a UTI, but blood is present or your pain symptoms persist, push for a referral to a urologist, whether your doctor suggests it or not. The urologist will be able to look and see what’s causing it. Hopefully, they will find nothing serious, but if they do, you’ll have caught it sooner rather than later.

Please, take it from me and don’t ignore the signs. Make sure you know what to look for. And, don’t wait to see your doctor.   

After her second cancer treatment, Ann Ogden Gaffney decided to leave her career in fashion to dedicate her life to teaching healthy cooking to people touched by cancer. In 2007, the nonprofit organization Cook for Your Life was born. Cook for Your Life has touched hundreds of thousands of lives. In 2015, Gaffney delivered her very first highly anticipated cookbook, based on Cook for Your Life’s classes, which was nominated for a James Beard Award.

The post Blind to Bladder Cancer? It’s a Woman Thing appeared first on Cook for Your Life.

Fear not: Unless it looks like a science experiment gone wrong, there are ways to save many foods so you can eat more, spend less, and waste less.  

Here are a few tips for saving and making the most of common ingredients. Already a member of the #NoWasteBrigade club? We’d love to know your tricks in the comments below! 

Fresh herbs  

If we had $1 for every time we heard someone say “fresh herbs go bad so I don’t buy them,” we’d be retired on a beach in Mexico right now. Herbs liven up our dishes in endless ways. If you prepare your leftover herbs the right way, they continue to bless your dishes with flavor for several months.  

Recipes may call for two tablespoons of parsley, but you have to buy it by the bunch. When you’ve used what you needed for a recipe, chop the remaining parsley in with garlic and lemon, top off with olive oil and you’ve got a versatile green herb sauce that livens up everything from potatoes to fish for a couple weeks.  You can also incorporate leftovers into a basic pesto recipe.  

Herbs like parsley, cilantro, mint, and basil don’t freeze well on their own. The important step here is to chop them up and store in fat, like olive oil or butter. Once they’re prepared and stored properly, you can add to soups, thaw and use as a spread for sandwiches, or on top of any roast vegetables. 

Leafy Greens

Kale and chard are the kinds of cancer-busting vegetables we could all stand to have more of in our fridges. If time in the kitchen is not on your side, remove the stems (but don’t throw them out – see below!) and add to any pasta dish to amp up the fiber content. 

Instead of throwing out the stems, which can taste fibrous and inedible, cut up into ½” – 1” pieces and saute in a hot pan until tender before adding to a pasta dish or fill out scrambled eggs for breakfast. 

When in doubt, bag everything up and toss into the freezer to use in a vegan vegetable stock. Keeping a bag of vegetable trim in the freezer for stock is the most economical and nutritious way to ensure you always have some available.  

Root Vegetables  

Ah yes, the true work-horse of the vegetable group – carrots, turnips, beets, rutabaga, parsnips, and many more. Maybe you purchased a few of these because they were irresistible at the market, you were feeling ambitious. But they managed to fly under the radar, and they’ve now become a tad gnarly looking.  

Unless you start to see mold, they’re still perfectly okay to eat. Prepare your vegetables to roast them in an oven until golden brown, and keep these covered in your fridge for up to a week. Or, make this Sopa Verde with Parsnips or Turnip & Sweet Potato Soup for dinner and freeze the leftovers. With the exception of soups with cream in them, most soups freeze well and can be enjoyed whenever you want them. 

Bread

Stale bread and bread heels are not the most appealing. But, they’re perfect for making your own breadcrumbs and croutons.  

Cut the bread into cubes, bag, and freeze. Pull them out and warm up until crunchy in an oven when you’re ready to garnish a soup or salad, or use them in savory breakfast stratas or sweet bread puddings.  

For breadcrumbs, we recommend drying out cubed bread in a low-temperature oven before pulsing in a food processor until fine.  

And if you bought a baguette or sourdough loaf but couldn’t break into it the day you bought it, wrap it up tight and store in your freezer. When you want bread to eat with a meal, pull the bread out with enough time to thaw, and warm up in a 350F oven for approximately 10 to 15 minutes. You can also pre-slice your bread before freezing, so you’re able to take only what you need. 

Rice

By now, you can guess what you can do with leftover cooked rice. If you’ve ordered takeout and have more rice than you needed for your meal, simply bag it up and freeze it. Or if you get into a habit of making larger batches of brown rice or quinoa, having these healthy carbs available to you from your freezer whenever you need them is a treat. 

Mix in your thawed rice to this delicious weeknight fried rice, make a veggie paella, bulk up your soups, or simply re-steam and eat plain. Cooked quinoa makes a fabulous morning porridge and even muffins. 

What other #NoWasteBrigade tips and tricks do you have for saving food in your fridge? Let us know in the comments! 

The post Use It, Don’t Lose It appeared first on Cook for Your Life.

One large egg contains six grams of protein with less than 100 calories and provides a number of vitamins and minerals including riboflavin, vitamin B12, phosphorus, selenium, and choline.

Eggs are also a rich source of lutein and zeaxanthin, classified as carotenoids and known antioxidants, that have been shown to protect against CVD disease and may help protect against the development of breast cancer.

Chef Tips

The way to test an egg’s freshness is to break it open and observe the shape and consistency of its yolk and whites. If the whites are firm and domed around the yolk then it is fresher; the whites are flat and runny, then it’s older.

Egg yolks can range in color from pale yellow to deep orange. The deeper the color, the more varied the hen’s diet was (and potentially a tastier egg).

Hard-boiled eggs are a delicious, easy snack, and can add a protein boost to salads. If you are in treatment and like your eggs fried or poached, it’s a good idea to cook them longer to harden the yolk. They will still be great with a piece of whole-grain toast.

The easiest way to eat more eggs is to live by the phrase, “Put an Egg on It.” The list of recipes is endless!

For tips on basic egg cookery, watch Ann’s videos on how to make the perfect poached, scrambled, and hard-boiled eggs.

The post Eggs appeared first on Cook for Your Life.

It’s hard to grasp just how much has changed in such a short time. To say it’s stressful would be an understatement. In many ways, I feel lucky that my cancer diagnoses have already taught me how from one day to the next our lives can change on a dime. I also realize how lucky I am that I know where I can find comfort in difficult times: my kitchen.

I find the act of cooking really helps me chill out when life can seem out of control when it’s going to hell in the proverbial handbasket. Sound familiar? This habit of cooking to bust stress started years earlier when I worked in the fashion industry. Glamorous as it may seem from the outside, it’s a tough business. I had a top-level design director job at a huge multinational designer clothing company where the work environment was super stressful — in fact, it was toxic!

On Sundays, I’d settle in to bake for the week ahead, simple things like muffins and tea breads. I didn’t actually need them, but cooking requires you to be present. So for a few hours, I would lose myself in the simple manual tasks of baking them. As I worked, my professional anxieties simply vanished. And as I pulled what I’d made out of the oven, the sense of pleasure and achievement eclipsed that horrible sense of being stymied at work earlier in the day. I felt wonderful.

I have cooked my way through three cancer diagnoses and now out of nowhere comes the coronavirus and, like me, more of us are being forced to stay at home. I’m no stranger to working all day and having to get food on the table in a hurry, so being home seemed like a holiday at first, but after a few days of ordering in and binge-watching, I realized I wanted — no, needed — to cook. I felt drawn more and more to my kitchen. Not just to feel soothed and grounded, but to make lemonade in a time of lemons, to cook for the fun and pleasure of it again now that I had the time.

With this newfound freedom, I plan to:

• Lose myself in vegetable prep as I finally get around to new recipes I’ve been meaning to make or test
• Use those exotic looking beans I’d bought
• Indulge in baking bread instead of going to the store for it
• Find new ways to cook with greens
• Make classic British comfort foods

In short, to have fun and lose myself in cooking.

There is meditative pleasure in the actual labor of cooking, and relaxation in its repetitive actions. It is wonderful to stay present and work mindfully in an activity that results in instant gratification, and the pleasure of being able to eat what you’ve made and to nourish those you love. Although you may start out doing it for your own well-being, when you cook to ease your stress, you ultimately create tasty, nutritious food that feeds others too.

The post Cooking for Comfort appeared first on Cook for Your Life.

Stuff a few raw leaves into a sandwich or fold them into an omelet. If you are on chemo, add spinach to a soup, or add to a salad.

This grand green is high in folate, vitamin C, and also contains lutein and zeaxanthin, two carotenoids that support a healthy and robust immune system. On top of all that, it has substantial levels of vitamin A, iron, fiber, and magnesium.

Chef Tips

Spinach is delicious and beneficial when bought fresh but frozen spinach is also packed with many beneficial nutrients. Select leaves from the loose spinach bin, if possible, over the packaged varieties, which cost more and may not be as fresh. Look for thin stems, since this is a sign of younger leaves, and look for a crisp, springy texture, rich color, and a fresh, slightly sweet scent. Store it in a plastic bag in the crisper drawer. Before cooking or eating, wash thoroughly to be sure to remove any grit, especially with curly-leaf varieties.

For a side dish, sauté spinach in some olive oil and finish it with a squeeze of lemon and a little salt and pepper. Cooked spinach is an easy vegetable to add to dishes – for example, it’s a delicious topping on a pizza. Or try it as the starring ingredient in our Sauteed Spinach With Raisins & Pine Nuts.

Pureed spinach can be added to soups, stuffed into pasta shells, or added as an ingredient of pesto.

Our Top Spinach Recipes

Spinach is one of our favorite green superheroes when it comes to healthy eating. It is readily available year-round in grocery stores and easily added to virtually any dish.

Browse Recipes

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Like all plants in the brassica family, collard greens contain indole-3-carbinol, and sulfur compounds, which have been shown to help protect against some types of cancers.

Collards are traditionally slow-cooked with ham hocks for flavor, but we think they taste great with less cooking, and with garlic and herbs instead of ham. Collard greens are available year-round, but taste best in winter after being nipped by the first frost. For freshness and extra nutritional value, purchase collard greens that are grown locally if you can.

Chef Tips

At the market, look for bunches of collards with small, bluish-green leaves rather than giant ones. The leaves should be crisp, without any wilting or yellow patches,. The woody stems of collards are inedible, so before cooking, strip the green leaves off and discard the stems.

The trick to maintaining the nutritional value of greens is to not overcook them. Sprinkle the greens with salt and steam them until water clings to their leaves and they are just tender. Drain and squeeze out the excess water. Roll up the leaves and chop into 1-inch thick slices. They will then be ready to sauté or freeze.

Collard greens prepared this way can be added to a number of dishes. For collards with a kick, try our Sautéed Collard Greens with a hit of jalapeno or miso lime sauce.

For a tasty, vitamin-packed supper, try our Greens & White Bean soup with a slice of hearty whole-grain bread.

The post Collard Greens appeared first on Cook for Your Life.

Chef Tips

There are three types of kale: curly (most common), purple-tinged Russian kale, and the dark green slender-leaved Lacinato kale (also known as dinosaur or Tuscan). Look for strong stems and dark-colored tops when shopping for kale. Check the leaves for wilting or discoloration. Do not wash the leaves until you are ready to cook them. Store in a sealed plastic bag in one of the crisper drawers of your fridge and it should keep for about five days.

When cooking your kale, there is no need to massage it first. Heat 1 to 2 tablespoons olive oil in a pan, saute some sliced garlic, add the kale, and stir-fry for 2-3 minutes. Add a squeeze of lemon at the end to enhance the flavor and the absorption of vitamin C from the kale.

Try cooking kale in our Sauteed Kale with Sweet Potatoes. 

To enjoy your kale uncooked, like in a salad or slaw,  it is best to prepare the kale by massaging it. This will help breakdown the toughness of the leaves and remove any bitterness you might encounter. Start by rinsing the leaves well in cold water. Cut or strip the leaves away from the hard stems. Discard the stems. To massage your kale, place it in a large bowl and pour over a few glugs of olive oil plus a pinch or two of salt, then gently rub into the leaves so that they are all thoroughly coated. Let rest for about 5-10 minutes. The massaged kale is now ready for the next steps in your recipe.

We suggest trying our Kale Caesar Salad With Chickpea Croutons— it’s delicious!

The post Kale appeared first on Cook for Your Life.

Starchy versus non-starchy vegetable classification is broadly based on the parts of a plant that are consumed. Separating vegetables into these two categories also highlights differences in nutrient content and how each contributes to a healthy diet.

Non-starchy vegetables are generally thought of in three categories:

• Green, leafy vegetables — spinach, kale, chard, and lettuces
• Brassica vegetables – broccoli, cauliflower, bok choy, cabbage, etc.
• Allium vegetables — onions, garlic, and leeks

Starchy vegetables, on the other hand, have a higher starch (or sugar) content and are considered dietary staples similar to rice or other grains. Starchy vegetables include some tubers and roots, such as potatoes and sweet potatoes (yams), cassava, sago yams, and taro. Although botanically they are classified as fruit, plantains are also classified as starchy vegetables.

While starchy vegetables are concentrated sources of starch, they are less starchy than grains. Other root vegetables like carrots, beets, parsnips, turnips, and rutabagas are classified as non-starchy vegetables.

Together, starchy and non-starchy vegetables provide excellent sources of fiber, vitamins, and nutrients. In addition to all these great nutrients, vegetables also contain phytonutrients that provide potential additional health benefits such as reducing chronic inflammation — a known driver of cancer progression.

If a person is at risk for or has diabetes, a high intake of starchy vegetables has the potential to raise blood glucose levels. This can be offset by consuming this group of vegetables in their whole food form and leaving the skins on the vegetables to increase the overall fiber content in these foods.

Non-starchy vegetables don’t increase blood glucose in the same way that starchy vegetables do and are often suggested as good choices for people who are actively managing their blood sugar levels.

While there are differences between non-starchy and starchy vegetables, all vegetables consumed in their whole form are good choices for a cancer-protective diet. We recommend people aim for 3 cups of non-starchy vegetables per day and vary the types of non-starchy vegetables to include the rainbow of color to ensure you are getting the spectrum of phytonutrients along with vitamins and minerals.

We recommend including starchy vegetables as you would a grain and vary the types of starchy vegetables, grains, and legumes you consume daily. A general recommendation is to aim for ½ to 1 cup of starchy vegetables or grains per day.

Veggie Sides to Pump Up the Fiber

These filling sides will help break you out of your meat-and-potatoes only mindset.

Learn More

The post The Who’s Who of Starchy & Non-Starchy Veggies appeared first on Cook for Your Life.

Even on our site, we frequently tell you about the antioxidants contained in our favorite healthy ingredients, and how they are good for fighting against free radicals.

Antioxidants are chemical compounds found in foods, which help to stop damage to your body caused by free radicals. Free radicals are very reactive molecules that cause damage to polyunsaturated fats proteins, and DNA. They are formed by normal bodily functions such as exercise or energy metabolism, and other lifestyle habits (for example smoking, pollution, etc). Free radicals will bind to, and eventually damage, healthy cells and DNA. Antioxidants counter this by binding to the free radicals, which stops them from damaging healthy cells.

Free radicals aren’t all bad- for example, the immune system uses free radicals to attack foreign invaders and prevent disease and as noted above are formed from normal processes like exercise and energy metabolism. However, too many free radicals (caused by things like smoking, and a poor diet) can cause issues.
When free radicals exceed our antioxidant levels, this results in oxidative stress. Prolonged oxidative stress is thought to increase the risk of many diseases such as cancer and heart disease.

Some common antioxidants that we know of which the body uses to stop free radicals include carotenoids like beta-carotene and lycopene, and vitamins such as vitamins A, C, and E. Minerals such as selenium and copper are also important for the role they play in antioxidant activity- for example, copper is used by enzymes that help in antioxidant defense.

While antioxidants help in defending the body from damage, too many may cause issues, as it tips the natural balance within the body. Many people take antioxidant supplements, however, this is unnecessary as you can get all the antioxidants you need from eating a wide variety of plant foods, whole grains, pulses, nuts, seeds, and healthy oils.

Getting your antioxidants from your diet will provide you with a wider range of antioxidants than you would get in a single supplement, which helps as many antioxidants work together to provide their health effects.

Taking high doses of supplements is common among cancer patients or survivors who believe these supplements could help to improve their outcomes. Scientific studies on antioxidant supplementation and outcomes have been mixed, and have been shown to have negative outcomes in some instances. For example, in one study, heavy smokers who took high-dose beta-carotene were more likely to get lung cancer.

There are also concerns for cancer patients that taking antioxidant supplements can interact with cancer treatments, reducing their effectiveness. This is because many chemotherapies use targeted oxidative damage to kill cancer cells. High doses of antioxidants may interact with the free radicals caused by cancer treatment, and stop them from working on the tumor.

To help get your antioxidants from your diet, check out this menu of Mediterranean Diet meals.

The post What Are Antioxidants? appeared first on Cook for Your Life.