By Lorraine Miano, for the NABBW The information in this article is provided for educational purposes only. If you have a health concern, please contact your healthcare provider.   “Oh, I’m past that.” When a woman asks me what I do, and this is her response. The thing is, as a post-menopausal woman, you are far from “past that.” Let me explain. As a certified health and hormone coach specializing in menopause, I hear from women in all stages of this natural phase of our reproductive years. Perimenopausal women often don’t even realize they have entered this phase and... Read More

By Dr. Janet Brill, Ph.D., RDN, FAND, LDN NABBW’s Associate for Healthy Heart Lifestyle You know that you should be eating vegetables every day, but did you know that you should try and get in allium vegetables on a regular basis? The allium family of veggies include onions, leeks, chives and garlic. What’s so awesome about allium veggies? Allium vegetables house a unique combination of polyphenols and sulfur-containing nutrients that have been shown to decrease the risk of developing cardiovascular disease and certain cancers. They also reduce inflammation and prevent loss of bone and... Read More

Green Bean Casserole: A Classic Thanksgiving Dish — Now You Can Make It Over to Be Low Fat, Low Cholesterol — And Still Delightfully Yummy. Here\’s How! By Janet Brill, Ph.D., R.D., LDN NABBW’s Healthy Heart Lifestyle Associate What is one of the most popular Thanksgiving dinner side dishes? Green bean casserole has become a staple at most everyone’s traditional Thanksgiving dinner. Unfortunately, the traditional version tends to be loaded with bad fat, salt and calories and is often far from a light and healthy dish. Why not lighten up this Thanksgiving classic and... Read More

Bananas and Chocolate: Two Blood-Pressure Lowering Superfoods That Are a Healthy, Indulgent Prescription For You and Your Family!! Plus Brill Offers a Healthy Cake Recipe By Janet Brill, Ph.D., R.D., LDN NABBW’s Healthy Heart Lifestyle Associate   Half of all American women over the age of 45 have high blood pressure. Considering that high blood pressure is a dangerous condition—a treacherous and silent killer that wreaks havoc on your arteries, predisposing you to stroke, a heart attack, kidney failure and blindness—it would behoove all of us to get those millimeters of mercury down... Read More

SALT! A Recipe to Help Lower Your Intake In Order to Reduce Blood Pressure And Prevent Heart Disease By Janet Brill, Ph.D., R.D., LDN NABBW’s Healthy Heart Lifestyle Associate   Recently I posted an article here on some new recommendations for our salt intake, “The New Salt Message: A Smoking Gun.“ In it, I dealt with a somewhat controversial newly published recommendation on the dietary intake of salt. More importantly, I outlined why I continue to believe it is so crucial for all of us to reduce our salt intake in order to lower blood pressure and prevent heart disease. It’s... Read More

Blood Pressure Lowering Medicine Chest: Your Local Farmer’s Market! By Janet Brill, Ph.D., R.D., LDN NABBW’s Healthy Heart Lifestyle Expert Spring is in the air, the flowers are blooming, the birds are chirping, and the grass is getting green, green, green… all signs that summer is right around the corner. The warm weather is also a signal that the cornucopia of locally grown fruits and vegetables is also just around the corner at the nearest farmer’s market. Why favor farmers\’ markets over the grocery store? There are several main reasons: The food is fresher (healthier)... Read More

The New Salt Message: A Smoking Gun By Janet Brill, Ph.D., R.D., LDN NABBW’s Healthy Heart Lifestyle Associate (Originally published in HealthNewsDigest.com, this article as published here was updated May 15, 2019 to correct hyperlinks which had evolved) – A recent expert committee report from the esteemed Institute of Medicine (Note: IOM is now a part of the Medicine Division of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine) claimed that there was no reason for anyone to keep their sodium intake below 2,300 milligrams a day. These new recommendations, which hit... Read More

The Perfect Vinaigrette By Janet Brill, Ph.D., R.D., LDN NABBW’s Healthy Heart Lifestyle Expert Why is it that when you eat out, the salad dressing tastes so much better? It’s all in the proportions and ingredients… Start with a good extra virgin olive oil (EVOO) to ensure that the oil base is comprised of the healthiest oil there is. Olive oil, called “liquid gold” by Homer, is the main fat used in Mediterranean diets—the pattern of eating proven to decrease the risk of such diseases and disorders as heart attacks, stroke, type 2 diabetes and metabolic syndrome. EVOO contains... Read More

Fresh Veggie Pita Pocket Sandwich (With Hummus — The Perfect Sandwich Filler To Jazz Up Those Veggies) By Janet Brill, Ph.D., R.D., LDN NABBW’s Healthy Heart Lifestyle Expert It’s Monday and you plan on participating in the National movement to go meatless on Mondays. (Meatless Monday is an international campaign—started by Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health—that encourages people to not eat meat on Mondays to improve their health and the health of the planet.) You’re short on time, need a quick and tasty vegetarian sandwich filler—so you reach for the prepared... Read More

Salsa – The Perfect Nutrition Choice By Janet Brill, Ph.D., R.D., LDN NABBW’s Healthy Heart Lifestyle Expert Celebrate the beauty of the season by eating from Mother Nature’s glorious palette of fruit colors. Salsa is always a perfect nutrition choice for seasoning anything and everything … light, healthy and packed with disease-fighting plant chemicals called polyphenols — this is one condiment that should be a staple in your heart-healthy eating regimen. Grilled Grouper with Fruit Salsa Yield: 4 servings (serving size: one grouper filet with ~ 1 cup salsa) 2 ripe mangoes, peeled,... Read More