By Mary Kearl
As if your plate isn't full enough when it comes to making your BBQ a success -- latest research indicates how you prepare your food could endanger your health. Read the full article about grilling precautions below the grill-smart tips.
Barbecued foods have a pretty bad rap for being diet- and health-disasters, but you don't have to prepare them that way. There are easy, safe ways to cook classic BBQ foods and plenty of new, healthy alternative dishes to try as well. So make room for our nutritious, mouthwatering healthy grilling guidelines!
Guilt-Free Grilling
Marinating is best because it cooks your meat faster at safer temperatures, and keeps your meat fresh longer than other outdoor cooking methods, saving you from food poisoning, advises Tara Miller, a Registered Dietician at NYU Medical Center. Her advice: Try marinating grill-friendly swordfish, shark, salmon, tofu or lean chicken, and add a little lemon juice or vinegar to kill bacteria.
Rare Delights
Try a dairy-free, meat-free rib replacement, Garden Burger's Veggie Riblets, made with the same great BBQ sauce you love and only 230 calories. A recent American Journal of Clinical Nutrition Review (AJCNR) study shows protein from soy products significantly reduced participants' LDL cholesterol, especially those who had high cholesterol.
Ditch the Meat-kebab
Experiment with flavors that will excite your taste buds! Miller recommends grilling fish with mango or tofu with colorful fresh vegetables like mushrooms and bell peppers: Go for all colors -- red, orange, yellow and green. "The more colorful the variety of vegetables or fruit the more nutritional value it has," Miller explains. Varying your vegetable intake increases the amount and effects of polyphenols -- micronutrients that help prevent degenerative diseases such as cancer and cardiovascular diseases -- found in fruits and vegetables, according to an AJCNR study from 2004.
Steamy Dish
Choose dishes with more veggies than carbs -- these don't have to taste bland. "If you steam anything in its own juice it adds a lot of flavor," Miller says. Try a toxin-reducing method of vegetables -- steam bell peppers, green beans, asparagus or mushrooms with a little garlic in a tinfoil tent. One cup of mushrooms provides about one-third of the recommended daily intake of copper, which helps the produce red blood cells, plus mushrooms are also a good source of potassium a USDA study in 2006 showed.
Get Saucy
Mayo and salad dressings are high in calories and full of artery-clogging fats, plus they need refrigeration. The fix? "It's as easy as chopping chipotle chilis and mixing them into ketchup," explains 'Campfire Cuisines,' author Robin Donovan. "Or try mashing a ripe avocado or prepared guacamole which both contain healthy fats and don't spoil easily, Donovan adds.
Spicy Grills
Donovan recommends spicing up healthful sides like grilled eggplant, zucchini, squash, cauliflower and mushrooms with fresh rosemary, thyme, oregano and basil to turn them into a main course. Plus, you will be helping your heart. For every extra serving of fruits and vegetables that participants ate as a part of a recent Harvard, their risk of heart disease dropped by four percent.
Tater Temptation
Nothing says summer barbeque like your old-fashioned baked potato, but steam it, don't boil! Potato skins contain abundant nutrients so keep the skins when preparing, recommends The Idaho Potato Commission. It suggest adding a squeeze of lemon, some salt and pepper, and topping it with salsa to keep it healthful.
Skip the Soda
What about fruit juices? They contain highly concentrated fructose but lack beneficial fiber of whole fruits, Miller told us. For diluting, pair fresh fruit juice with a calorie-free sparkling soda and mix in fresh chopped fruit like melons or grapes. Plus, have plenty of cold water or flavored iced teas. As Miller says, everyone will appreciate refreshing green tea's antioxidant value.
Frozen Dessert Delite!
Take a twist on traditional fat-free Popsicle desserts that are usually overloaded with sugary fruit juices and substitute fruit purees. This keeps the fiber, the healthy content, Miller explains. Add fat-free vanilla yogurt and fresh cubed pineapples, cantaloupe, kiwi or other flavorful fruit, place in plastic cups with popsicle sticks, freeze, serve and enjoy!
The Bottom Line: Improper food preparation, especially while barbecuing, could increase your intake of toxins linked to diabetes, vascular, kidney, heart disease and Alzheimer’s diseases, according to recent research conducted by the Mount Sinai School of Medicine and The National Institute of Health’s National Institute on Aging (NIA).
How Does Barbecuing Increase Toxic Exposure?
How much heat the food gets exposed to, and the amount of water it loses, greatly affects the content of these toxins, or advanced glycation enzymes (AGEs). So barbecuing and grilling, as well as frying and broiling your foods, increases AGE content, compared to boiling and steaming. Major sources of dietary AGEs come from heat-treated grilled, fried or broiled animal products, such as meats and cheeses – all BBQ favorites.
The Link Between AGEs and Disease
AGEs exist naturally within human serum, urine and tissues. Typically, your kidneys excrete AGEs accumulated from dietary sources -- however, as AGE intake increases, your kidneys’ capacity to excrete AGEs diminishes. This can lead to increased oxidative stress and inflammation which can cause
cardio vascular disease, kidney failure, and diabetes, according to the study published by Mount Sinai and NIA in a 2007 issue of the Journal of Gerontology: Medical Sciences.
“All the ailments that occur in the body are the result of oxidative stress, including every kind of chronic disease,” explains Dr. Jaime Uribarri, a co-author of the Mt. Sinai School of Medicine study. “Cells and tissues require a certain amount of oxygen to function well. Whenever you modify that and go beyond those limits you have oxidative stress and that’s harmful.”
In the study done at Mount Sinai laboratory, a direct correlation was shown between AGEs and oxidative stress. Although oxidative stress is known to increase with age, the study holds that reduced consumption of these toxins during your lifetime can help prevent age-related diseases, especially in aging populations.
Tips for Minimizing Your AGE Intake While Cooking, Grilling and Eating:
Your new barbecue game plan should include a combination of minimizing cooking duration and temperature, while increasing water retention, explains Dr. Uribarri.
Go Lean. When cooking meats, it's safe to choose leaner items, like fish, chicken, or vegetables over fatty meats, like hamburgers or beefsteaks.
Marinate Less. You can make a difference just marinating with vinegar or lemon juice. This cooks the food faster, allowing you to lower the temperature, Miller explains, adding that the antioxidant "acids mitigate the process of transfer of AGEs."
Keep Clean. Make sure your grill is clean. Using a charred grill increases your food’s access to any kind of toxin, says Tara Miller, Registered Dietician and Program Manager for the Center for Corporate Wellness at NYU Medical Center.
Boil, Steam or Stew. You can skip the grill altogether by steaming, boiling or stewing your foods. Try cooking fish, seafood, chicken or vegetables in sealed aluminum foil pouches, recommends Susan Goodman, a dietician at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine and member of the AGE study. She says this process will “in effect, steam the contents on the grill. Potatoes, vegetables, and fresh herbs can be included in these pouches for a tasty, quick meal.”
What Other Toxins Should I Avoid When Barbecuing?
When you cook the muscle meats from beef, pork, fowl and fish, carcinogenic chemicals called heterocyclic amines (HCAs) form. Amino acids and creatine, a chemical found within these muscles, react at high cooking temperatures. The National Cancer Institute, as well as Japanese and European researchers, have identified 17 HCAs from cooking muscle meats that may raise cancer risk, particularly stomach cancer. Turning your meat often and adding flavors like soy sauce, garlic or fruit are some of the ways you can reduce your HCA exposure. Read the American Cancer Society's tips for more ifnormation on limiting your exposure to this carcinogen.
Animal fat often leaks onto barbecue coals and when this happens there is the potential for the flames to deposit the burnt fat, or the now carcinogenic residue -- a polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon -- back on the meat.
Click here for advice from Purdue University Animal Science's Meat Quality and Safety to minimize your barbecuing risk.
A 2003 study conducted by a French environmental campaigning group Robin des Bois found that the average two-hour barbecue can release about the same level of dioxins, a group of chemicals linked to the increased risk of cancer, as 220,000 cigarettes. Cooking on an elevated rack to allow fat to drip away helps further reduce exposure to dioxins, suggests the Illinois Department of Public Health.
Eat well and improve the quality of your life.
TheFabulousRon 04:40:10 AM Jul 12 2009
EAT HEALTHY FOODS GRILL CHICKENS OR FISH AND AVOID KETCHUP OR MUSTARD HAVE A SALAD WITH YOUR MEAL
