My New Daily Drink!

It's not too often I get excited about the addition of a new product to the vitamin store, but this one is worth getting excited about.

Innate Response has come out with one of the best tasting drink mixes I've ever sampled, but the real news is what's in it. Each 100 calorie serving contains:

• 15 grams of fiber (in an almost unheard of perfect mix of 8 grams soluble and 7 grams insoluble)
  
• 5 grams of protein
  
• 3 billion probiotics
  
• over a gram of plant-based omegas.
  
• Not only that, it's only 100 calories.
  

Here are some of the reasons why I'm so excited about Clinical Metacore:

Number 1: Most of us don't get nearly enough fiber. The average American gets between 4-11 grams a day and every major health organization recommends between 25-38 grams. Our Paleolithic ancestors got at least 50 or more. In virtually every study, high fiber diets are associated with better health outcomes. Fiber helps control blood sugar, makes you feel full so you don't overeat, and helps protect against colon cancer. Clinical Metacore offers a remarkably easy (and tasty!) way to get a whopping 15 grams of healthy fiber into your diet on a daily basis.

Number 2: More and more nutritionists are putting "probiotics" on their short list of the most important health-promoting supplements you can take. Probiotics help support a healthy gut, contributing to better digestion, assimilation of nutrients, and a stronger immune system. Clinical Metacore contains a whopping 3 billion probiotics from the important families of lactobacillus and bifidobacterium.

Number 3:
Clinical Metacore also contains over a gram of plant-based omegas, not to mention 5 grams of protein. And because of all the fiber, it's as low glycemic as you can get. Plus it only has 100 calories.

Number 4: Best of all Clinical Metacore tastes great. It comes in four flavors. The cacao bean and cinnamon chai are out of this world. And while I'm personally not a huge fan of the berry vanilla, thers love it. (I'm looking forward to trying the vanilla bean as well- I'll let you know what I think.)

You can try these in single serving sizes, which are also terrific for travel. Try a few and see which you like best then get the large size of that flavor. Or trust me- you can't go wrong with the Chai or the Cacao!

Along with Barlean's Greens, this is my new "daily drink." When you try it, you'll see why."

Try Clinical Metacore »

Coconut Water

If you've ever vacationed in the tropics, you've probably seen people carrying around what looks like a peeled coconut with a straw inserted, drinking the liquid. Now I'm seeing more and more grocery stores carry skinned coconuts in the fruit and vegetable section. You chop off the top, insert a straw, and drink up. In fact coconut water is becoming so popular there are now a whole bunch of canned coconut water drinks on the market.

So what's the deal with coconut water?

Well, I can't speak to the dozens of prepackaged products that are showing up (usually sold in cans) but I can speak to what's found inside the actual coconut. And it's a nutritional bonanza that could easily be a boon to people trying to control their weight.

I cup of coconut water contains a measly 46 calories. (Remember, I'm talking about the liquid that occurs naturally inside the coconut, not some "coconut milk" sweetened product that is a whole different animal.) Not only that, it contains a surprisingly high 3 grams of dietary fiber and 2 grams of protein. Best of all, it's a fabulous source of potassium- way better than a banana.

Lots of nutrients for a very small number of calories- That profile definitely makes coconut water a great drink as part of a weight management program.

Low-Glycemic Diet and Diabetes

Low-glycemic foods - beans, peas, lentils, pasta, rice boiled briefly and breads like pumpernickel and flaxseed - do a better job of managing glycemic control for Type-2 diabetes and risk factors for coronary heart disease than diets based around the "traditional" high-fiber foods such as whole grain breads, crackers and breakfast cereals.

That's the finding of a new study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. And it doesn't surprise me one bit.

Although the god-awful American Dietetic Association continues to mindlessly parrot the "conventional" wisdom about whole grain breads and cereals, truth is that most of these whole grain products are fiber lightweights. (Read the label- typically 1-2 grams of fiber at best compared to say, 11-17 in a cup of beans.) And if you check the glycemic index/ glycemic load tables, you find that the difference between a processed grain like white rice and its whole grain counterpart (brown rice) is- from a blood sugar point of view- almost negligible.

Obviously whole grains are better than white junk, but only because they contain slightly more vitamins and other nutrients. From a blood sugar point of view- and from a food sensitivity or allergy point of view- they're not that much of an improvement. If you've got gluten sensitivity- which is way more common than you might think- whole grains are just as much a problem for you as the processed kind.

In the JAMA study, researchers found that hemoglobin A1C- a very important marker for diabetes- decreased significantly more in subjects on the low-glycemic diet than it did for people eating the "traditional high-fiber" choices with cereal fiber. The low-glycemic group also saw a significant increase in HDL (the so-called "good" cholesterol) as well as a significant reduction in LDL (the so-called "bad" cholesterol).

The low-glycemic diet group did eat some breads- like pumpernickel, rye pita and quinoa bread with flaxseed- and some cereals- like real oatmeal- but they were all low-glycemic.

Bottom line: just because a cereal or bread product says "made with whole grains" doesn't mean it's the best food for you. Many of these products raise your blood sugar way too high, and manufacturers are notorious at trading on the "whole grain" buzz to create ridiculous products like "whole grain Cocoa Captain Sugar Krispies" (I made that one up, but you know what I'm talking about).

Glycemic impact is very important and should be paid attention to by anyone interested in his or her health. And you don't have to walk around with a bunch of scientific formulas to figure out whether a food has high or low glycemic impact. Just look for foods that have minimum processing, maximum color (exception is oatmeal and cauliflower) and as much fiber as possible.