Get Inspired – You are what you THINK you are.
Romantic (and Healthy!) Meals for Valentine’s Day
Choosing healthful options for Valentine's Day can still be delicious and enjoyable. Here are some ideas for health-conscious Valentine's Day foods: Dark Chocolate: Choose dark chocolate with a high cocoa content (70% or more). Dark chocolate contains antioxidants and...
Elderberry: Help or Hype?
As we head deeper into cold, flu, and COVID season, people may be tempted to turn to anything that will prevent, cure, or reduce symptoms of their condition. Sales for all sorts of supplements are up, including elderberry syrup. Elderberry syrup, made from the dark...
Cacao, Cocoa, Chocolate, and Your Health
At first glance, cacao and cocoa almost seem like the same word, but technically they describe two different products. All chocolate comes from the cacao plant, an evergreen tree that grows to 15 to 25’ feet tall and which is found in countries near the equator (such...
Keen on Quinoa
Truth be told, I mispronounced quinoa for years as que-noah. This powerhouse of a grain is considered a ‘pseudocereal’ related to spinach and amaranth and deserves more respect. Its correct pronunciation is keen-wah and it’s worth getting to know its health benefits....
WHO’s Advice on Non-nutritive Sweeteners
From saccharine to stevia, artificial sweeteners (AKA non-nutritive sweeteners or NNS) have been around for decades and used by many to control calorie intake or blood sugar. For the most part, artificial sweeteners are on the FDA’s GRAS (generally recognized as safe)...
Digestive Diseases 101
May is Digestive Diseases Awareness Month. What do you know about digestive diseases? For a comprehensive rundown of digestive diseases, check out this A-Z list from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases. To help raise awareness of...
Take Healthy Steps at The Arc Employee Wellness Fair on 6/23
Please join us for our annual Arc Employee Wellness Fair on Friday, June 23. Visit with local vendors, find out information about your health, check out the demonstrations, and enter prize drawings for gift cards, a gym membership, nutrition and fitness equipment,...
How to Incorporate Prebiotics Into Your Eating Pattern
Now that you know what prebiotics are (and the positive impact they can have on your health) it's time to talk about incorporating them into your eating pattern. Here are some ideas: Build your meals and snacks around plants, filling 75% of your plate with fruit,...
What’s Your Veggie IQ?
If you carrot all about your health, take this quick quiz and see if you can squash the competition with your knowledge of the vegetable group.
Do Foods Need to be Colorful to be Healthful?
While choosing a rainbow of colors of fruits and vegetables provides a wide variety of phytonutrients that the plants make to protect themselves (and which also benefit our overall health), many people forget that white foods fit into a rainbow of color too! Onion,...
What Are Prebiotics?
We’re learning more about the important role of the gut microbiome –- the millions of bacteria that populate our intestines, a.k.a. "guts" –- in promoting good health. The gut microbiome contains both helpful and potentially harmful bacteria, and when the healthy...
A New Health Claim for Magnesium
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently approved a new health claim for magnesium and its role in reducing the risk of high blood pressure. A health claim can be used on food and supplement label packaging to characterize the relationship between a substance...
Soup’s On!
The beauty of soup is that it’s one of the most versatile, inexpensive meals you can make. All you really need is a handful of ingredients, a pot, and a little imagination. Even if you’re not a whiz in the kitchen, soup is simple to prepare and always appreciated on...
Now that Open Enrollment is over….
For employees of The Arc of Washington County and their eligible family members: Thank you for helping to keep everything on track during our Open Enrollment for the 2023 employee benefits plan year. Now that you’ve made your benefit elections, what happens next?...
How Much Vitamin A Do I Need?
The Recommended Dietary Allowance (RDA) for vitamin A is in retinol activity equivalents (RAE) to account for the different bioactivities of retinol and provitamin A carotenoids, all of which are converted by the body into retinol. The RDA is set to provide the...
Tips to Rethink Your Drink
The next time you go grocery shopping, read the nutrition labels on the items in your cart to see which ones have the most added sugars. You may be surprised to see the amount of added sugars in some drinks. Sugary drinks are the leading source of added sugars in the...
6 Ways to Make Half Your Grains Whole Grains
Healthy eating is important at every age. Eat a variety of fruits, vegetables, grains, protein foods, and dairy or fortified soy alternatives. When deciding what grains to eat, choose options that are full of nutrients and limited in added sugars, saturated fat, and...
Want to Eat More Produce?
Want to Eat More Produce? Consider Where You Put It In our house, we use the phrase, “Food is for eating.” I can hardly be irritated when someone eats the last apple, banana, or pepper, because if my family sees the food on the counter, I want them to eat it! And...
What is Vitamin A and What Does It Do?
Our immune system relies on a wide network of actions to protect our body from disease and help promote healing. Several nutrients play important roles in immune function, and one of these essential players is Vitamin A. What is Vitamin A? Vitamin A is most widely...
6 Tips for Healthy Food Preparation
Healthy eating is important at every age. Eat a variety of fruits, vegetables, grains, protein foods, and dairy or fortified soy alternatives. When deciding what to eat or drink, choose options that are full of nutrients and limited in added sugars, saturated fat, and...