Yummy (healthy) salmon patty recipe

Here is a recipe that I adapted from the Chicken of the Sea Salmon Pouch. The kids loved it – they dipped the patties in ketchup.

Ingredients (makes about 10 patties)
2- 7 ounce Pink Salmon pouches (skinless and boneless) or you can used the canned Salmon (skinless and boneless)
¼ cup omega-3 fortified light mayo
2 eggs
1 ½ cups whole wheat bread crumbs (divided)
½ cup wheat germ (divided)
¼ tsp garlic salt
1 tbsp lemon juice
Optional - finely chopped onions 1 cup and finely chopped red bell pepper 1 cup

-- Combine Mayo, optional ingredients, lemon juice, garlic salt and stir in salmon, egg and 1/2 cup of bread crumbs and ¼ cup wheat germ – mix until well blended.
-- Form mixture into balls and roll in remaining bread crumb/wheat germ mix and flatten into cakes about ½ inch thick.
-- Add patties to skillet with 2 tbsp olive oil and cook. Or you can bake at 425, just spray baking sheet with either olive oil or canola or vegetable oil and spray the salmon cakes with the oil as well and cook about 30 minutes.

Let me know what you think.

Smell the coffee to melt away stress

A brand new study in lab rats shows that coffee may help relieve stress from not sleeping. After inhaling the aroma of coffee, more than a dozen stress-relieving genes turned on in the brains of sleep deprived rats. What is interesting, is that the smell of something can have such an effect on our brains, well in this case, rats. These types of studies are useful to set up human studies, but are not necessarily appropriate for making human recommendations. But, for now, it would not hurt to to inhale deeply while enjoying your cup of Java after a rough-night's sleep. Or, for those of you that do not drink coffee, breath deeply while purchasing your yogurt parfaits at Starbucks.

Are diet drinks making you fat?

A study out of the University of Texas Health Science Center, San Antonio found a positive relationship between diet drinks and weight gain. After following 1550 residents of San Antonio for 8 years, they found that for every can (12oz) of diet soda consumed a day a person's risk of becoming obese went up by 41%. Now, this does not mean that diet soda causes obesity, but there does seem to be a link. Some believe that the sweetness in diet soda causes a person to crave more sweet foods. Or, it could be that someone switching to diet soda is already gaining weight and is trying to balance the calories by drinking no calorie drinks. Whatever the answer may be, the best drink to quench your thirst is still water (if you must drink diet soda, try to keep it to no more than one a day). Or, as I just posted, try iced green tea, but brew your own and stay away from the green tea drinks that are full of sugar.

Drink Your Tea

A new study out of Athens Greece shows that drinking 3-4 cups of green tea a day will keep your vascular system healthy. This is extremely important as your vessels impact almost all aspects of your health. Now, I have heard it before -- you do not like green tea. Fortunately, there are flavored green teas that are great for brewing. (Or if you prefer it cold, brew it then add some ice and cool it down). I personally do not like regular green tea, but have found one that I have been able to get used to and now enjoy -- Republic of China Pomegranate Green Tea. I had to try several before I found one that I liked. By the way, there are also studies that show green tea to have a weight loss benefit -- although, the jury is still out on this one. So, schedule in some tea breaks throughout the day, and better yet, add a piece of fruit or some nuts to your tea break.

Junky diet and tv for kids = overweight adults

Imagine yourself looking in a mirror at age 10 catching a glimpse of your 30 or 40 year old body. Would you be horrified or just slightly freaked out? Dr. Oz used this interesting tactic on yesterday's Oprah to drive home the importance of getting kids to eat healthfully from the get go. He showed a 10 year old boy his 400 pound body at 40 if he continued to eat junk and live a sedentary life for the next 30 years.
As a dietitian, I work with children and parents to help families start implementing healthier lifestyle habits. (Having a video depiction to show them the consequences of not making these changes would help tremendously in compliance, I imagine.) I've found the most important key to success is making changes the whole family follows. So, while you're working on getting your own 30 or 40 year old body (or at any age really) into the shape you would've been proud to see in that mirror at age 10, make sure the rest of the family follows suit. And while the choices available to kids -- check out this article in U.S. News and World Report on unhealthy foods available in schools -- is a critical component (read:buy lots of fruits and vegetables), educating your children, no matter how young, that eating nutritious foods make the body strong and healthy is just as important. Even my two year old knows that fruits are good for him, while donuts are only a once-in-a-while dessert.

Does a junky diet in pregnancy mean permanent damage for baby?

According to headlines in Forbes, Science Daily and several other publications on Monday and Tuesday, a new study from the UK came out that showed a diet full of junk food while pregnant can lead to irreversible, long-term health consequences to the child, such as obesity or high cholesterol and blood sugar into adolescence and even adulthood. So, if you're a pregnant woman who's been overindulging in chips and donuts lately, the guilt may be piling on. I'm here to tell you to relax and stop panicking -- headlines can be misleading. First of all, the study was done in rats, so the results may or may not hold true in humans. Secondly, you can absolutely start eating a better diet today --don't worry about what you've done up til now. Commit to eating at least 5 fruits and vegetables each day and making your bread/pasta selections whole grain. These filling foods leave little room for junk. Lastly, even the researchers comment that whether a mom ate poorly or not during pregnancy, a person needs to take responsibility to live a healthy lifestyle -- these health conditions are not inevitable and can be altered by making good diet and exercise choices throughout life.
So, as a dietitian I encourage you to eat a well-rounded, nutritious diet most of the time - allow yourself small treats here and there - and keep exercising (with your doctor's okay) during pregnancy, because it's good for you and for your baby. I didn't really need a study in rats to tell me that!