The Hemp Connection:
pistachios

Just a few weeks ago, I was talking with my husband about the amount of money I spend buying healthy food every month. I often wonder why the foods that are the most damaging to our nutrition are so much less expensive than foods that protect and nourish our bodies in so many different beneficial ways. Then again, when I wander through specialty organic grocery stores, I wonder why some of the prices are so outrageous; however, every once in a while you stumble upon a food item that you just can’t resist trying, even if it more than you usually spend on good nutrition.

Since watching my weight is my third “full time job,” I’m always looking for foods to add to my list of staples, as well as adding some variety to my vegetable and protein intake. I’ve never been one to experiment with exotic foods, but in the last two months, I’ve found myself drawn to organic nut, seed, and coconut oil based products. With this new quest, I came across a wonderful product, Pistachio Pesto, made by Living Tree Community Foods. You’ve probably read on this very blog about the health benefits of pistachios, a powerful and protective nut that is a great addition to your diet. Check out the following link if you want to read up on the pistachio. http://www.incyst.com/2009/04/food-of-week-pistachio-nuts.html

While I’ve never been a fan of pesto, I couldn’t resist giving the Pistachio Pesto a try, particularly after reading the list of all organic ingredients, which includes sun-dried tomatoes, sun-dried black olives, raw sesame, and olive oil. So far I have tried the pesto on a high fiber cracker, which was delicious, and I’m sure I’ll experiment with this as a topping for vegetables very soon. If you would like more information on this product, you can visit http://www.livingtreecommunity.com/.

Stacey Frattinger, RD, CHFS
Owner of Formula FUEL
http://www.formulafitt.com/
Contact me @ formulafuel@hotmail.com

Happy Monday to all of you!

Sorry for the silence, I was in Boston for a sports nutrition conference, promoting the Nordic Naturals line of fish oils. I've been sidelined from my half marathon training with a cranky knee, and it was so nice to get off of the elliptical trainer, get outside, and walk along the Charles River to and from my hotel and the conference!

Something I was very happy to see, throughout the conference, was the emphasis on nuts in general as a healthy food. I've been frustrated for a long, long time that the walnut people seemed to be the only nut commodity board with media contacts. Not that I don't like walnuts, but there's nothing wrong with other nuts as well.

I did an analysis for an article a few years ago, in which I compared the ratios of beneficial fats (omega-3's and monounsaturated) to potentially detrimental fats (omega-6's and polyunsaturated). And when they were all lined up in terms of most beneficial to least beneficial…walnuts actually turned up at the bottom of the list. Macadamias came out on top!

I use that analysis in my trainings, and dietitians will always immediately say,"But macadamias are so high in fat." Precisely. But it's the kind of fat that keeps us healthy. Lucky for me…my very favorite way to have nuts is macadamia nuts roasted in coffee, the way they fix them in Hawaii.

Anyway…(I tend to get distracted in this blog, don't I?)…

…one of the presentations showed data for macadamias, pecans, and pistachios, suggesting that they, too, are good foods to include in an anti-inflammatory (aka anti-PCOS and pro-fertility) diet. Nuts, in addition to good fats, have a variety of antioxidants that can delay and prevent aging and help fight stress. I even learned that the green part of pistachios contains lutein, which makes them good for eye health. Who knew a food so fun to eat would also be so helpful to my health?

Of course, there's a limit to how many nuts can be healthy, and fat has calories, no matter where it comes from. But if you're reaching for a handful of pistachios instead of a bag of Fritos, it's nice to know you're also reaching for better health.

So this week…go nuts!

The day after the FDA warning about pistachio nuts came out, I was in a local grocery store. As I walked through the produce aisle, I noticed the produce manager and his clerk with a huge bin; they were emptying out their inventory of pistachio nuts into a huge garbage bin. They had no idea where their pistachios had come from, and they had to throw them away.

I felt sad that so much food had to be wasted.

The day that the FDA warning about pistachio nuts came out, I received a note from Whole Foods Market. They were working to source where all their pistachio nuts came from. A detailed memo was released later in the week regarding the safety of pistachios in their many stores.

Please read this blog post and make your own decisions. But do consider the value in being an informed consumer. If you are judicious about where you shop, it may be worth a little extra investment. If you make a choice to purchase locally grown products at your farmer's market, you're not only supporting a local small business, you know exactly what hands your food passed through before it fell into yours.

There will come a time when pistachios will be considered generally healthy to eat, no matter what the source. And when that comes, keep these pistachio fun facts in mind:

--a one ounce serving of pistachio nuts scores higher on the USDA's antioxidant scorecard than a cup of green tea.
--pistachio nuts can help to reduce bad cholesterol and raise good cholesterol
--pistachio nuts are high in lutein and can help prevent macular degeneration, a leading cause of blindness
--pistachio nuts are a good source of many vitamins and minerals, including: thiamin, vitamin B6, copper, manganese, potassium, dietary fiber, phosphorus and magnesium
--pistachio nuts are a good source of healthy fats, including omega-3's

My point is…I hope you don't eliminate pistachios completely from your diet because of what you've heard in the news. The pistachio recall was specifically for pistachios from Setton Farms. If you can shop at a store or farmer's market where you can be assured pistachios did not pass through this processing plant, they can be a wonderful addition to your PCOS eating plan.

Here's a recipe for white bean pistachio chili to get you started!

I just walked over to Fresh and Easy on my break, and noticed a line of snacks called"nut squares". I brought home the cashew, almond, pistachio variety for a closer look.

The product does have a little bit of added sugar, but on the whole, for someone who's looking to reduce their carbohydrate intake, this may be a nice option.

The fat is nut fat, balanced between three types of nuts, and for a serving size (5 pieces), you only get 150 calories. I posted a serving size below.

I really enjoyed the taste, a perfect balance of sweet and salty, as the label says.

There are other varieties available, I just went for this one because I happen to love pistachios.

I'm thinking that in addition to on their own, they'd be really tasty crumbled into some Greek yogurt or on top of oatmeal.

Enjoy!

Over the weekend, I had the honor and pleasure of training the newest members of the inCYST network. I'll share more about them in another post!

I realized while doing that training that there is something I always share in professional presentations, that I have yet to post on this blog. It has to do with my perspective about the fact that walnuts consistently show up on every blog post and in every interview about increasing the omega-3's in your diet…and when you do the math…it turns out there may be some other great choices, potentially even better choices, than walnuts for doing this job.

TRUE Walnuts have the highest amount of omega-3 fatty acids per gram of nut than any other nut, about 2.5 grams per ounce.

TRUE Walnuts also have a very high amount of omega-6 fatty acids per gram of nut, about 10 grams per ounce.

TRUE Walnuts have an omega-6 to omega-3 ratio of 4 to 1. If this was the only food we ever ate, this is actually a decent ratio.

HOWEVER…The problem is, when people are trying to use diet for help with inflammatory diseases like PCOS, their ultimate goal is to simultaneously reduce omega-6 intake and increase omega-3 intake. Every time you eat walnuts, you increase both omega-3 and omega-6 intake.

NUTTY STRATEGIES FOR BALANCING OMEGA-3'S AND OMEGA-6'S
1. Don't eliminate walnuts! They still, in moderation, have a lot of great health benefits.

2. Eat a variety of nuts. I like to shop at a store that has bulk food bins. Every week they have a different nut on sale. I went to IKEA and bought a bunch of see-through canisters. Every week I purchase a pound of whatever is on sale and add it to my collection. That way I can snack on almonds, cashews, macadamias, pecans…and always have them on hand for cooking or salads. That way I get the best each nut has to offer, while minimizing potential problems that might arise from getting too much of one kind of nut.

3. Know your anti-inflammatory nuts. If correcting your omega-6 to omega-3 ratio is your current most important goal, get friendly with the following nuts: macadamia, hazelnut, pecan, pine, pistachio. I ranked them in order of which ones have the highest ratio of omega-3 and monounsaturated fats compared to omega-6 and saturated fats. (Thanks to friend and colleague Johanna Roth for helping with that analysis).

Each of these types of nuts, has an anti-inflammmatory benefit related to its fat profile. Peanuts, peanut oil, and old-fashioned style (no trans fat) peanut butter are pretty neutral, won't hurt your ratio, but won't really improve it. (Peanut butter is a great and inexpensive choice, and is perfect when eaten in an overall diet that also includes fish, flax, and other omega-3 balancing choices.)

(Monounsaturated fats are mathematically neutral and healthfully beneficial. They are the type of fats also found in olive oil and avocados).

Most people who recommend walnuts as part of their Top Ten List of Foods have not taken the time to do all of the math. They simply stopped at the basic analysis.

Hazelnut-encrusted halibut, anyone?

Way back in the early 80's when I was a brand-new dietitian, we were taught to teach our clients to avoid nuts because of their high fat content. Today, nuts are the new health food. But research is often written up in ways that place a specific nut in the spotlight, without a big-picture perspective.

For example: Walnuts are routinely listed as"the" nut to eat because of their high omega-3 content. Most people do not realize that the omega-6 content of walnuts is so high that it is mathematically impossible to improve your dietary omega-6 to omega-3 ratio by eating only walnuts and no other nuts. Does that mean you shouldn't eat walnuts? Absolutely not! In all honesty, it is mathematically impossible to improve your omega-6 to omega-3 ratio with any nut. It is, however, yet another example of the imbalances we create when we focus on a handful of"super foods" and don't pursue variety.

Being the statistics nerd that I am, I spent the other afternoon looking at 10 different nuts in several different ways. I came to some interesting conclusions. Let me work you through what I did. I don't mean to be tedious, I just want to be transparent so anyone else can work through the analysis just as I did. If you're just looking for what nuts are best to eat,simply skip to the bottom of this post.

1. Analysis one: Best anti-inflammatory index (potential for a food to prevent or promote inflammation, as indexed at http://www.nutritiondata.com/), ranked in order of best to worst:
macadamia hazelnut almond cashew peanut pistachio Brazil pecan walnut pine
2. Analysis two: Omega-3 fatty acid content, ranked from highest to lowest per ounce of nuts: walnut pecan pine pistachio macadamia cashew hazelnut Brazil peanut almond Important point of interest: almonds are the only nut that contain absolutely NO omega-3 fatty acids.
3. Analysis 3: Omega-6 to omega-3 ratio, ranked from lowest (most beneficial) to highest (least beneficial) walnut macadamia Brazil pecan cashew pistachio hazelnut pine peanut almond
4. Analysis 4: Total omega-3 and monounsaturated fat content, ranked from highest (most beneficial) to lowest macadamia hazelnut pecan almond cashew brazil peanut pistachio pine walnut
5. Analysis 5: Total saturated fat content, ranked from lowest (most beneficial) to highest walnut almond hazelnut pine pistachio pecan peanut cashew macadamia Brazil
SUMMARY ANALYSIS: In each list, I placed a number"1" next to the top item, and numbered each nut below it in numerical order. Then I added up the scores for each nut based on their rank in each category. The lowest score shows the overall rank. This helps nuts that many not have one outstanding quality still receive a decent ranking--it gets credit, in other words, for being all-around pretty good without being written off for having one quality that is considered"bad" striking it off as"unhealthy". It also keeps a nut with one outstanding quality for getting too much credit when there may be nutritional aspects that truly keep it from being a superfood.
The final rankings, with the most potentially beneficial at the top: macadamia hazelnut walnut pecan cashew almond/pistachio (tied) Brazil/pine (tied) peanut
I guess you could say…just like people, all nuts have their good and not-so-great qualities. By spending too much time with one, you'll miss out on the benefits of the others. Diversify your interests, and you'll get the best benefit.