Kent State Interns

We are right in the middle of national handwashing awareness week! But why is this important for nutrition? Food safety is an important component of nutrition and health. Without it, our nutritious foods could make us sick. Food safety includes good personal hygiene, correct temperature of the food, preventing cross contamination, and many other safe practices for preparing food. Handwashing is one of the cheapest and easiest food safety practices you can follow. Some food-related illnesses are spread by not washing hands correctly. You need soap and clean water to properly wash hands. If soap and water are not available, an alcohol-based hand sanitizer is the next best thing! Sanitizer is not as effective as soap and water, but it is better than nothing. There are five steps to proper handwashing: W et hands first before applying soap L ather soap on the front and back of your hands and underneath your nails S crub for at least 20 seconds (you can recite the ...

VEGGIES Do you have trouble getting a lot of veggies in your diet on the daily? One of my ABSOLUTE favorite snacks is carrots or celery with veggie dip. Normally it is made with sour cream and ranch seasoning powder but to make it healthier and more beneficial I use plain yogurt as the base and then I add ranch seasoning to it! It is so delicious. This is a great snack to have between meals and it is very filling and satisfying. You get an easy serving of veggies in your day without even thinking twice about it… Vegetables are very important, and the daily intake depends on your age, sex, and activity level! According to my age, sex, and activity level, I need 2 and a half cups of veggies everyday in my diet. Having this simple, easy, and healthy dip with veggies helps me reach my total intake for veggies!! AM https://www.choosemyplate.gov/vegetables

Choose Oatmeal Raisin Cookies! Ingredients: -3 cups of old-fashioned rolled oats -1 cup all-purpose flour -2 tablespoons all-purpose flour -1/2 cup toasted wheat germ -1 teaspoon baking soda -1 teaspoon baking powder -1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon -1/2 teaspoon coarse salt -1 cup unsalted butter, softened -1 cup granulated sugar -1 cup packed light-brown sugar -2 large eggs -1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract -1 and a half cup of raisins YUMMY!! Who doesn’t love cookies? Why not eat some with nutritional benefits! This is an amazing oatmeal raisin recipe that you can use to bake over the holiday’s! The oven gets set to 350 degrees. In a large bowl, you start out throwing the oats, flour, cinnamon, baking powder, wheat germ, baking soda, butter, and sugar. Once these are all thrown in you mix them all together until pale. Then you mix in the eggs and vanilla and mix slowly. Mix in the raisins and oat mixture! Grab about one and a half inches of dough ...

With all of the diets in the world today, I believe we tend to overthink the entire concept of eating. We want to follow an extreme diet that’s going to lead to instant results on the scale. When we eat something we consider “unhealthy” it is coined with terms like “cheat meal”. When we put our food into categories of “good” and “bad”, this can adopt unhealthy eating patterns leading to fear of certain foods. We shouldn’t be afraid to eat something. One meal is not going to change the course of our health and weight. We have forgotten the concept of moderation. Why can’t we eat a meal and actually enjoy it? We are human. We are not perfect. And it sure isn’t possible to follow an extremely strict diet 24/7 for the rest of our lives. Eating in moderation is key – everything fits in a moderate amount. When we avoid the foods that we want, we face the possibility of over-restriction, which can lead to an episode of overconsumption down the road....

The Blue Zones      The Blue Zones are five places throughout the world where individuals live the longest and are the healthiest. These five geographical places include: Okinawa, Japan; Sardinia, Italy; Nicoya, Costa Rica; Ikaria, Greece, and Loma Linda, California. For example, females over 70 years of age in Okinawa are the longest-lived population in the world. And the group in Loma Linda, California, known as the Seventh Day Adventists, live about 10 years longer than the rest of the North American population. These groups were discovered by Dan Buettner, a National Geographic Fellow. So why is this important? There are many lessons that we can learn from the lifestyle of these five areas, and nutrition is a key aspect. A team of professionals including anthropologists, medical researchers, demographers, and epidemiologists were used to find the common denominators among these places. One important denominato...

Be a PRO at substituting Protein is so important in our daily nutrient intake. It comes from many different sources. Sometimes if I don’t feel like consuming meat or poultry, I must find my intake from other sources. I gravitate more towards the nuts, quinoa, chickpeas, or beans as my alternative sources. If I am eating any kinds of nuts, I usually eat them as a snack. When I choose quinoa, I enjoy it with some veggies for a meal. I eat carrots with hummus to get my chickpea intake. Finally, if I go for the beans, I will cook a Mexican rice bowl for dinner to get my intake that way. These alternative sources provide a good amount of protein if you can’t get the meat or poultry in your diet. These alternatives are just my favorite there are some other ones I did not include. Nuts- Nut butters without salt or sugars and regular nuts that are unsalted as well. Quinoa- This is a great source of protein! It is prepared just like rice … VERY simple! Greek yogurt- This brand...

Holiday Traditions Holiday’s bring the family together…Every year before the winter holiday’s my family gets together to make homemade hot sausage on a Friday in November. We start at 7 in the morning and go until 3 or 4 in the afternoon. This year we made 480 pounds of sausage.... Normally it is the same family members that take off work every year to make the sausage, listen to holiday music, and drink wine but other family members come and go throughout the day. There are four steps that we go through for each batch that is made. First, someone is stationed at the sink to run water through the casings and then blow them up, so they can hold the sausage together. Second, is the mixing station, this is where the seasonings and spices are mixed in with the meat. Third, after the meat is mixed together with the seasonings and spices it is put into the grinder to go into the casings. Finally, we vacuum seal the sausage into packages so that it can be frozen for later use....

Perfect Christmas Cut-Out Sugar Cookies I am a lover of all things Christmas! From cutting the Christmas tree down, to all the lights, music, shopping and wrapping. My family has many traditions that we take part in ever year but my favorite one is the “baking day” we have. We start early in the morning and bake Christmas cookies ALL DAY! Some of our favorites include snickerdoodles, traditional chocolate chip, snowballs, peanut blossoms and of course, CUT-OUT SUGAR COOKIES! So with the holidays just around the corner, I am going to share with you the  CUT-OUT SUGAR COOKIE recipe   that has been in my family since before I was born and even the FROSTING  recipe to top it off! Cut-Out Sugar Cookies Ingredients: ½ cup butter (stick) ½ cup Crisco 1 cup granulated sugar 3 eggs 1 ½ tsp. vanilla 3 ½ cups flour (may not need to use all of the flour) 1 tsp. baking soda 2 tsp. cream of tartar Directions: Beat toget...

About 4 times a year my mom, grandmother, sister, and I all get together and make homemade meatballs. It has been a tradition ever since I can remember.  Being part of an Italian family means we have pasta and meatballs a lot!  I can’t say I’m mad about that because I really enjoy them! We make our own sauce and meatballs, however, the meatballs are definitely everyone’s favorite part!  The recipe I am going to share with you comes from my great grandmother, who is actually from Italy.  She came up with the recipe many, many years ago and it has since been modified over the years by my grandmother and mom. Ingredients: 5 pounds ground meat  4 eggs 6 tablespoons dried parsley 5 ½ cups whole milk 5 tablespoons salt 3-4 tablespoons crushed garlic (depending on how much garlic you like) 4 cups plain bread crumbs Directions: -Preheat oven to 400 degrees -Wipe olive oil on bottom of baking sheet, just enough...

You might want to consider these nutrition recommendations I never thought much about gastroesophageal reflux (GER) or gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) until someone close to me became diagnosed with Barrett’s esophagus (BE).                         BE is a precancerous condition in which the normal squamous epithelium of             the esophagus is replaced by an abnormal columnar-lined epithelium. There             is no exact cause of BE, but we do know that GERD is a risk factor for the               condition.             GER is considered a normal physiologic process that occurs several times a             day in healthy infants, children, and adults. It is ass...