Two years ago, I never would have imagined that I'd actually be enjoying sardines, quinoa, and kale in my diet. I didn't know what quinoa was, I probably couldn't have picked out kale from the other greens in the market, and well, sardines, forget it—I knew what those were and they held no appeal. Fast forward to two years later... I just got back from Trader Joe's with 10 boxes of sardines, I always have quinoa in the house, and kale is a weekly staple from the Farmer's Market. If any of these foods are not yet in your diet, I encourage you to try them because they are packed with nutrients and can be quite tasty.

Sardines are a great source of omega-3s. Perhaps you have heard about omega-3s, as they have been in the press lately. The American diet tends to be high in omega-6s (e.g. meats, dairy, fried foods, processed foods containing partially-hydrogenated oils, and many cooking oils), but not high in omega-3s. The recommended ratio of omega-6s to omega-3s is no more than 4:1, but most Americans have a 10:1 or 20:1 ratio in their diet. Omega-3s are most known for their ability to reduce the inflammation associated with many chronic diseases, such as cancer, heart disease, autoimmune disease, and arthritis. Sardines are a healthy fat with lots of omega-3s. (For more information on omega-3s and healthy fats, see Say Yes to Fat (and Omega-3s)). Sardines are also known to lower blood pressure by inhibiting ACE (angiotensin-converting enzyme). They are a good source of vitamin D, vitamin B12, and calcium. And surprisingly, they are quite tasty! I first tried sardines by grilling them with a little lemon and serving them as an appetizer on whole wheat crackers or bread. This was actually very good. I then decided to put them in a "salad" similar to how I eat my canned tuna and salmon, resulting in my Sardine Salad recipe. This sardine salad is now a regular staple in my lunch rotation and I actually look forward to it. Believe me, I never would have imagined that I would be blogging about the tastiness of sardines. If I have come around to these nutrient-packed fish, you might too!

Quinoa is a great option for those who are allergic to gluten because it is naturally gluten-free. Quinoa is an ancient “grain” native to South America and was once called “the gold of the Incas”, recognized for its value in increasing the stamina of their warriors. Quinoa is cooked and eaten like a grain, but is technically a seed. It is actually related to the beet, chard, and spinach plants. Quinoa is described as having a light, nutty flavor. It is unique in that it is a complete protein (i.e. it has all of the essential amino acids). Complete proteins are typically found in foods like meat and dairy. Quinoa also has iron, magnesium, calcium, B vitamins, and other minerals. It is necessary to rinse quinoa well before cooking because of its natural coating called saponin. While this coating is good for repelling insects and birds, it creates a bitter taste unless rinsed well. Quinoa is good for breakfast, lunch, or dinner. You can add beans and vegetables to quinoa for a great lunch or add nuts and fruits to it for a good breakfast. You can also try my Pomegranate Quinoa Salad recipe.

Kale is a green, leafy vegetable that is a member of the cruciferous or cabbage family. Other greens of the cabbage family that offer similar benefits are mustard greens, turnip greens, collard greens, kohlrabi, and watercress. Kale is among the most highly nutritious vegetables. It is a great source of carotenes, vitamins C and B (1,2 and 6), manganese, iron, and calcium. Kale is one of the top 12 foods with the highest pesticides, so try to buy organic if you can. (For more information on which fruits and vegetables to buy organic see Buy (Some) Organic). Kale is available throughout the year, although it is most widely available from the middle of winter through the beginning of spring. Kale can be used in salads, soups, or sauteed with garlic and lemon juice. For me, kale is just okay in soups and salads in terms of taste. The only way I truly look forward to eating kale is as "chips", as detailed in my Kale Chips recipe. Kale cooked this way gives the crunch of a potato chip and tastes good enough to go back for seconds.

This week, are you up for trying one of these foods if they are new to you? The worst that can happen is that you don't like it and then you never eat it again. The best that can happen is that you have a new food in your diet that is packed with nutrients. Kale chips are a great alternative to potato chips. A quinoa salad is perfect for you to bring to the next potluck. And a sardine pita is a great lunch option. If none of these appeal to you or are not new to you, how about going to the Farmer's Market (or grocery store) this week and trying a food that is new to you—real foods only, processed foods don't count! (For more information on what counts as a real food, see Eat This Way). I've recently discovered figs and persimmons from the Farmer's Market, both of which I now buy regularly when they are in season. Let us know what new food you try this week.

Just as the food we eat, the thoughts we have, and the air we breathe can be toxic, so can the "friends" we have. The quality of our relationships impacts our health. Friends who are loving, caring, and supportive are good for your health. Friends who are manipulative, mean, or self-absorbed are not good for your health. There are numerous studies which show that people with a strong social network live longer and are healthier than those without. In fact, the impact of social relationships on life expectancy appears to be at least as influential as variables like cigarette smoking, hypertension, obesity, and exercise. A strong social network is about the quality, not quantity, of our friends.

The good news is that we have the power to choose our relationships. The easy test of whether a certain friend is good for your health is to ask yourself whether you feel better or worse after spending time with this person. I have numerous friends who, after spending time with them, I feel wonderful. I get the feeling that they genuinely like me and want to be with me. They are engaged in the conversation and take a sincere interest in what is going on in my life. Who in your life makes you feel like that? Call them now and schedule a date with them or just tell them how much you appreciate them being in your life. These are the people you want to surround yourself with.

On the flipside, I can identify two people in my life right now who make me feel worse after being with them. With one, I get the feeling that she doesn't really like me. This doesn't make me feel good about myself. With the other, I feel that the relationship is unbalanced where I am the giver (listener) and he is the receiver (talker). After our time together, I feel frustrated, drained, and unfulfilled. Who are the people in your life that make you feel worse about yourself? Do they put you down? Do they talk behind your back? Are they negative? Is it all about them? If you have any dates on the calendar with these "friends", call now to cancel.

It may not be easy, natural, or comfortable to actively manage your friends, but it is necessary for your optimal health. Obviously we have more control over some relationships than others (e.g. it may be more difficult to extricate yourself from co-workers), but the first step is to identify the drains in your life and then take steps to spend less time with these individuals. Relationships are complicated, to be sure.  I'm not talking about removing friends from your life just because you had a disagreement. If there is a genuine bond, you want to try to communicate your feelings and work it out. It is worth putting in the effort for those relationships that fill you up. What I am talking about here is minimizing the time with and energy spent on those people in your life who genuinely are not healthy for you, no matter what effort you put into the relationship. I believe that we know who in our lives fit the bill, if we just take the time to acknowledge it.

Going forward, be mindful of the people you spend time with and think about how they make you feel. Editing your friends takes conscious effort. We have so many demands on our time these days, it is important to consciously decide how and with whom we are spending our time. Life is too short to be surrounding yourself with people who drain your energy and deplete your health. Wouldn't you much rather spend time with those people who think the world of you and support your health?

Today, I am going to mindfully make an effort to surround myself with people who make me feel fabulous and loved. Do you pledge to do the same?

What is free, fun, and good for our health? Laughter. Yet, adults laugh on average only 15 times each day. In comparison, the average child laughs or giggles about 300 times a day. Are we losing our sense of humor as we age? The Dalai Lama says, "In my childhood, I had a religious assistant who always told me, 'If you can really laugh with full abandonment, it’s very good for your health.'” The assistant was right! Here's a birthday dare for you that is sure to have you laughing with full abandonment on your special day.

As my friends and family know, I have a thing about birthday hats. When it is my birthday, I wear a birthday hat no matter what I am doing that day. I have worn hats during races, in movie theaters, at restaurants, walking the streets of San Francisco, running trails, and strolling the Santa Cruz boardwalk. Typically my friends and family who are with me are subjected to wearing hats too. I love seeing other people smile as they go by us. How often are adults out and about wearing birthday hats? Plus, who doesn't love the extra "happy birthday" greetings from complete strangers?

My husband, Dave, who some might say is more on the reserved side, took the birthday hat wearing to a whole new level on his birthday this year. We have been together for 23 years, so perhaps I've rubbed off on him a bit—though he now has me beat! This year on Dave's birthday, he had to travel to Birmingham, Alabama for business. He was traveling all day alone. He wore a birthday hat from the moment he left our house in the morning to the time he went to bed in Birmingham that night. This included wearing the hat through airport security in Oakland, on the plane, during a plane change in Phoenix, in the cab to the hotel, and checking in at the hotel. He was invited into the cockpit on both flights, he was sung to by an entire plane of people, and he got a free beer from the Marriott. The photo below captures the essence of his day.

So, here's the birthday hat dare. On your next birthday, I dare you to wear a birthday hat for at least part of the day. If your birthday is not for another few months, put a reminder on the calendar right now on your special day that says "birthday hat dare". Report back in and let us know your fun stories!

(And, of course, try to find other ways throughout the year to laugh with full abandon like you did when you were a kid. It's good for your health.)



Dave and the birthday hat dare, August 31, 2010

One of my biggest hot buttons when it comes to human consumption and the environment is our indiscriminate use of plastic water bottles. Americans use 2.5 million plastic bottles every hour. Sixty million water bottles are thrown away every day in the U.S. That's crazy. I won't lie‚ I used to buy the cases of bottled water from Costco. It was pretty convenient to just grab a bottle of water and head out the door. It was an adjustment to switch to using a reusable bottle, but now I don't even think twice about it. It is better for the environment and better for my health. There have been many studies which express concerns about the plastic leaching into the water. This is in addition to the questionable quality of the water that is found in these bottles. Opt instead for a stainless steel or aluminum water bottle, get a filter at home, and fill up! At the very least, if you are going to use plastic bottles, recycle them. And, when you are at home or in the office, drink out of a glass and save on the bottles. I cringe every time I see my sister drink bottled water at home and in the office. It may be slightly more convenient, but the impact it has on the environment is worth the extra time and effort to forgo the plastic bottle as often as you can.

Of course, reducing our waste goes well beyond plastic bottles. On average, each of us creates 4.5 pounds of trash every day. This equates to 90,000 pounds of trash for each of us over the course of our lives. Below are a few ways you can reduce your consumption and resulting waste.

• When you are eating at home, use cloth napkins instead of paper. When you eat out, only take the napkins you need. On average, Americans consume an average of over 2,000 napkins a year (about 6 per day). If everyone in the U.S. used one less napkin every day, more than a billion pounds of napkins could be saved from landfills annually! If you don't want to try cloth, how about reusing your paper napkin? My husband gets about five meals out of each paper napkin.
• Be creative with gift wrap. Most wrapping paper and ribbon is bought, used once, and then tossed. Try using newspapers, old calendars, or reusable scarves to wrap presents and forgo the ribbon. If you must use gift wrap, at the very least, try to reuse paper, ribbons, and gift bags and choose wrapping paper with recycled content.
• Set your printer to print on both sides of the paper if that is an option and use "fast draft" to save on ink for when you don't need best quality. (On my computer which has MS Word 2008 for Mac, I find the double-sided printing in MS Word at File/Print/Layout/Two-Sided. On my husband's computer which has MS 2002 for PC, the double-sided printing in MS Word is at File/Print/Properties/Features/Two Sided Printing. Turn two-sided printing from the default "off" to "on"). If you can do this at work or school, you can save even more trees.
• Refill your ink cartridges rather than buying new ones. I take my ink cartridges to Costco for a refill. I pay under $10 for an ink refill, saving 30-70% off buying new. Eighty five percent of ink cartridges are thrown away every year which means 350 million end up in landfill every year in the U.S. If you are not a member of Costco, try to find another place to refill your ink cartridges.
• Bring your own bags when you shop for clothes, groceries, pet food, and office supplies. I leave three reusable bags in the trunk of my car so that they are always with me. At the very least, opt for paper over plastic for bagging. U.S. households dispose of nearly 100 billion plastic bags every year. Millions of these end up littering the environment and harming wildlife. Plastic bags and other plastic garbage thrown into the ocean kill as many as one million sea creatures every year.
• Did you know that you can get books, CDs, and DVDs for free? Just head to your local public library! At some libraries, you can even reserve online and the library will let you know when your item is available. My library even puts the book on a special shelf with my name on it so I can just run in and get it. Approximately 3 billion new books are sold every year, requiring 400,000 trees to be chopped down. That's reason enough to make some changes in your reading habits.

Starting today, I will try to get three uses out of each paper napkin. What change can you make today to reduce your impact on the environment?

A cluttered house is a cluttered mind. We can help clear our mind and reduce our stress by not keeping extra "stuff" around. I keep a pretty clean house without a lot of clutter. However, the other day I decided to clean out my bathroom cupboards and found products that were long since expired: skin care, beauty products, and medications. If I have these items in my house, I am guessing that most of us do. I challenge you to go into your bathroom cupboards and find five expired products to toss. If you can't find five in your bathroom (kudos to you!), head to the kitchen where there are sure to be a few to help make the count. If your bathroom products don't have an expiration date on them, think about how long you have had them. Here are some general guidelines.

• Mascara - 3 to 6 months
• Eye liner - 3 months (liquid) or 2 years (pencil)
• Lipstick - 2 years
• Eye shadow - 6 months (cream) to 2 years (powder)
• Foundation and concealer - 6 to 12 months
• Powder - 6 months to 2 years
• Cleanser and moisturizer - 1 year
• Sunscreen - 1 year

Also, keep in mind that natural beauty and skincare products spoil faster because they use less harmful preservatives. The best way to know if the product is expired is to watch for changes in smell, color, and consistency.

What five products did you find?