The Best Breakfast Cereals

MSN's "fitbie" listed the top 7 breakfast cereals based on protecting your heart, losing weight, calories, and staving off hunger.

Here's the list they came up with in no particular order:

1. Bear Naked 100% All Natural Granola, Maple Pecan
2. Kashi GoLean Crisp! Toasted Berry Crumble
3. Nature's Path Organic Crunchy Vanilla Sunrise
4. Kashi Whole Wheat Biscuits, Cinnamon Harvest
5. Quaker Weight Control Instant Oatmeal (one of my personal favorites!)
6. Arrowhead Mills Organic Steel Cut Oats Hot Cereal
7. Nature's Path Organic Pomegran Plus Granola with Cherries

To see why these cereals were selected go HERE. Also you'll find the number of calories/serving, grams of protein, and grams of fiber!

New Gadget on the Market

Have you seen this before??

One of our patients in Indiana just recently purchased this "Xpress Redi-Set-Go Cooker" to help her quickly make her Health One Meal Replacements. She claims the Health One Potato Soup Pizza Crust recipe is wonderful in this gadget and she has been using it daily to make a 2-4 minute pizza!

It's sort of like a waffle iron, but it has different plates to help you make different foods/shapes/etc. It retails for ~$40.00 and is only available online (I think). For more details go HERE!

If you love gadgets, this might be the next best thing for you!

Love yourself on Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day!

Even if you don't have a Valentine, you can focus on how to love yourself more. Because we are humans and negative in nature loving yourself can be difficult. Staying positive and finding more ways to love you will help with all other areas of your life-including weight loss.

To start off, take a look at the LIVESTRONG website for tips on how to love and accept yourself for who you are!

American Heart Month

February is not just Valentine's Day it's American Heart Month-a month dedicated to raising awareness to the leading cause of death in the U.S.-cardiovascular disease! Many deaths and risk factors that are associated with cardiovascular disease are preventable. Food choices have a huge impact on your heart health. To help prevent yourself from becoming one of the one in three adults who have some form of cardiovascular disease, here are some dietary intake tips:

• Limit foods high in saturated or trans fats which both raise your 'bad' cholesterol (LDL)


• Limit salt intake can help manage blood pressure to lower risks of a stroke or heart disease


• Include foods high in Omega-3's like fish or olive oil


• Include foods that are high in fiber which helps to lower the 'bad' cholesterol (LDL)


• Include at least 30 minutes of physical activity in your daily routine

To find out where you stand go to the American Heart Association's website and "Get your Life Check" to see what you can do to improve your heart health!

Kyle's HNT Success Story

Kyle had thought about losing weight for years and he had been successful at losing the weight, but he never learned how to manage the weight loss so it always ended up coming back on. After years of visiting his doctor and seeing his health decline because of obesity, he knew he had to lose weight.

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The statistics given after weight loss in the first 20 weeks, 1 year, and 3 years and maintenance statistics were what caught Kyles attention about the program. That is the reason he signed up. He liked seeing results each week through weight loss, but liked that he was learning about how to keep it off. Now, Kyle has been in the program for over 21 weeks and has lost over 80 pounds.

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The biggest reward that Kyle has received since joining HNT has been his doctor taking him off of his blood pressure medications. His favorite part about HNT is learning how to maintain my weight and seeing how HNT is changing the lives of everyone I meet in the program.

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Counting every calorie and making a choice to stay away from toxic environments are two key strategies that Kyle implements daily to keep the weight off. The biggest lifestyle change that he has made is that he "is eating to live not living to eat". "HNT has given me the foundation to maintain a healthy lifestyle."

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Kyle's encouraging words for people who would like to work on their health and weight: "Wanting to start working on your health and weight management is a good first step, now all you need to do is make a commitment to yourself to work on your health and weight and HNT will be there every step of the way."

Kyle: Before HNT

Kyle: NOW!

(photos courtesy of: Kyle, please do not reproduce)

2010 Dietary Guidelines for Americans Released

The first year that the USDA and HHS released the publication "The Dietary Guidelines for Americans" was in 1980. The guidelines reflected emerging scientific evidence about diet and health. The ultimate goal is to improve the health of our Nation's current and future generations by facilitating and promoting healthy eating and physical activity choices so that these behaviors become the norm amount all individuals. By law, the Dietary Guidelines are reviewed, updated if needed, and published every 5 years.

The most recent data indicate that 72% of men and 64% of women are overweight or obese, with about 1/3 of adults being obese. (1) Approximately 32% of children and adolescents ages 2-19 are overweight or obese, with 17% of children being obese. (2)

Because of these staggering statistics found in the most recent research, the focus in 2010 is on health promotion and disease risk reduction to hit these diet-related chronic diseases: Cardiovascular Disease, Hypertension, Diabetes, Cancer, and Osteoporosis.

'Balancing Calories to Manage Weight', 'Foods and Food Components to Reduce', 'Foods and Nutrients to Increase', 'Building Healthy Eating Patterns', 'Helping Americans Make Healthy Choices' are the chapters covered in this edition of the Dietary Guidelines. For a full report on the USDA's 2010 Dietary Guidelines click here.

The American Dietetic Association (ADA) states that it supports the Dietary Guidelines "healthy balance" approach to weight management. For more on the position of ADA, click here.

(1) Flegal KM, Carroll MD, Ogden CL, Curtin LR. Prevalence and trends in obesity among U.S. adults, 199-2008. JAMA. 2010; 303(3): 235-241.

(2) Ogden CL, Carroll MD, Curtin LR, Lamb MM, Flegal KM. Prevalence of high body mass index in U.S. children and adolescents, 2007-2008. JAMA. 2010; 303(3): 242-249.