Recipes: Veggie Pizzas and Pancakes

Like most moms who want their child(ren) to eat vegetables and other healthy foods that aren't always so pleasing to a young palate, I have become a little creative with working veggies into Eli's meals. What I end up doing a lot is adding vegetables to one of two foods that almost all kids like: pizza and pancakes. Both can be made nutritiously and quickly. Here are the "recipes" I use for each:

Veggie Pizzas


Ingredients:
1 whole wheat pita
1/4 cup tomato sauce
1/2 cup chopped cooked veggies (I like to use spinach, broccoli, or broccoli rabe)
1/4 cup shredded mozzarella cheese

This really couldn't be much simpler. I like to use Best Pitas because they are very thin, are 100% whole wheat, and have very few other ingredients, but any brand will do. For tomato sauce, I usually use a very simple sauce I make (which is so easy- canned diced or crushed tomatoes, tomato paste, olive oil, salt, and pepper), but I've also sautéed fresh chopped tomatoes with olive oil if I happen to have some hanging around. You could certainly use a canned or jarred sauce too, but opt for one without a lot of added salt or sugar. You can also use any vegetable. I happen to like the dark green vegetables because they have the most nutrition packed into each serving.

Assemble the pizza, as you imagine you might assemble a pizza. Put it on a cookie sheet, lined with tin foil if you're like me and don't want to have to wash the cookie sheet afterwards, and bake at 375 degrees until the cheese is melted and the pita is getting a little browned around the edges. It usually takes 5 minutes or so.

Veggie Pancakes

Ingredients:
1/4 cup white whole wheat flour (I like King Arthur White Whole Wheat Flour)
1 egg
1/4 cup 1% milk
1 cup cooked, finely chopped or shredded vegetables
1 oz. strongly flavored cheese (I like Cabot Extra Light Sharp Cheddar), finely diced or shredded
Salt, pepper to taste
1/2 tbs canola oil or oil spray

Whisk the flour, egg, milk, salt, and pepper together. Stir in cheese, veggies, salt and pepper. Cook in a frying pan coated with oil spray or canola oil, like you would pancakes. A few minutes on each side on medium-high heat should do it. This recipe is very versatile because you can use virtually any vegetable. I can see this working well with shredded zucchini, carrots, sweet potato, cabbage, or mashed cauliflower. I've also added cooked chicken breast. You could add herbs or spices, and experiment with different kinds of cheeses. You can be really creative!


Here are some broccoli/cheese pancakes I made:

 
And these are some I made with broccoli slaw, which I sautéed for a few minutes to soften before adding to the pancake batter:

 

 

 

And Eli enjoying them (okay so he's actually eating a tomato here, but he did eat the pancake!)

 

 


















I want to qualify this post with an admission: there are times when Eli just doesn't want to eat whatever culinary masterpiece I've created, no matter how masterfully I've worked the veggies in with flavors he likes. This is bound to happen with toddlers. I don't get upset about it. I just try again another time. And usually, the next time he devours them!

Just because a child doesn't eat something one day, doesn't mean he or she won't eat it the next. Don't get discouraged. Keep offering healthy foods, even if they get turned down from time to time (or all the time!). It can take many, many exposures for kids to develop a taste for foods that aren't intrinsically hyperpalatable, like chicken nuggets or French fries.

Baby junk food

Eli, Smurf-faced after eating some
blueberry puree at around 6 months

After more than 2 years, I've decided to resurrect this blog. Getting pregnant, having a baby, and continuing to raise that baby-turned-toddler has taken my attention away from blogging. Add to that the giant thundercloud of my PhD dissertation hanging over my head, and you can understand why it's been difficult for me to devote time to writing anything that isn't going to get me closer to that finish line. I've felt that it's almost indulgent to spend precious time writing for the sake of it. But I've also come to the conclusion that any writing is good practice, and therefore a sanctionable activity. Not that you needed to understand my rationale. Moving on...

Today I'd like to talk about something that's been bothering me for the last 19 months or so: food produced specifically for babies and toddlers is AWFUL. At least, a lot of it is. My boss (side note: is there a less crass word for "boss"? "Colleague" sounds nice but seems to suggest equal professional standing), Dr. David Katz has written previously and much more eloquently than I could about the perils of "kid food" and has even called for a boycott. But I will be more specific, pointing to products that especially grind my gears. All are popular by my own observation and presumably nutritious, but actually just junk food in sheep's clothing. Here are the "winners," in no particular order.

1. Gerber Graduates "Puffs." Often, these little bite-sized cereal snacks are one of the first foods a parent might give to a baby just learning to eat solids. Like the traditionally popular Cheerios, they are easy to pick up and just the right size for a baby's little hands and mouth. A glance at the front of the package might confer the impression that these are also highly nutritious. There's a logo touting the product's whole grain content, and large images of apples, sweet potatoes, etc., depending on the flavor. One might understandably assume that these snacks are just like Cheerios, but better because they also contain fruits or vegetables. Even a look at the Nutrition Facts Panel is deceiving. Puffs are a good source of several B vitamins, vitamin E, as well as iron and zinc. What could be wrong?!

The ingredients list tells the true story. Although the second ingredient is whole wheat flour, the first is rice flour. Although there's nothing inherently unsavory about rice flour, there's nothing particularly good about it either. It's pure starch, and starch is metabolized essentially the same way as sugar in the body. Because this is refined rice flour, all of the beneficial micronutrients and fiber have been stripped away, so all it provides is calories. Dried apple puree does appear as the 6th ingredient in the list, but the quantity here is undoubtedly miniscule. Sugar is the 4th ingredient on the list, and yet there is only 1g of sugar per serving. This is a good thing, but it means that there is even less apple puree per serving. So what about all those vitamins and minerals Puffs contain? They have all been added. It appears that none occur naturally in the main ingredients. You can think of these snacks as little bites of starch with a teeny bit of fiber and a small multivitamin thrown in. Personally, I think you're better off with Cheerios. At least they are 100% whole grain, not 50%. When my son was first learning to eat finger foods, I gave him plain puffed barley and puffed wheat cereals. Not only are they cheap, portable, and just as quickly-dissolving (if not more so) than Gerber Puffs, but they are single-ingredient, minimally processed foods.

2. Baby yogurts. This one is simpler to explain. The problem, as with all flavored yogurts, is added sugar. Based on a comparison of sugar content between the plain and flavored varieties of Stonyfield YoBaby yogurts, it looks like there are 6 grams of added sugar in each tiny 4 oz. cup. My preference: plain yogurt mixed with a little real fruit puree. I usually use a tablespoon or two of unsweetened applesauce for each 3/4 cup of plain yogurt. It's true that babies naturally like sweet foods, but it's untrue that they won't tolerate anything that isn't sweet; especially if they have not already been introduced to foods with a lot of sweetness.

3. Gerber yogurt melts. These are kind of like yogurt in puff form. The second ingredient is sugar. WHY? Just why? A better choice is Happy Family brand "happy creamies" (how cute is that name?). The concept is similar, and these treats do contain apple puree concentrate and other juice concentrates which are still glorified sources of sugar, but at least these also contain significant amounts of fruit or vegetable purees; enough that 1/4 cup provides 25% of the RDA for vitamin A for an infant from natural sources (sweet potato mostly).

4. "Stage 1" purees. These aren't so much unhealthy as they are overrated. The stage 1 purees are the ones advertised for infants "4+ months" of age. Nevermind that the AAP recommends waiting until 6 months to introduce any solid foods. These purees are very smooth and thin so that babies new to solids won't choke. I don't have solid evidence to back this up, but my somewhat-educated guess is that 6-month olds can tolerate a bit more texture than this and that texture is good for them. Many families are now using the baby-led weaning approach, which skips purees altogether. I think that makes sense. Personally, I tried BLW and got a little tired of the cleanup and the occasional gag/puke routine. I was not worried about choking because I gave soft foods and everything I read seemed to be true: if my son got too much food in the back of his throat he would gag to push it forward, as he was meant to do. However, I did end up giving him some purees, but I always sought out the more textured ones, or made my own mashed foods or regular applesauce (baby food apples are more expensive and for what?). I think that providing foods with more texture may encourage babies to get accustomed to eating foods that they have to manipulate a bit and foods that are not perfectly smooth. I think it may make them more receptive to new foods and new textures later on. Again, I don't have hard evidence for this (I haven't really looked), but it's a hypothesis.

There is more I can add to this list, and maybe I will in a later post. Thanks for reading!

**Disclaimer: This post is not meant to be a judgment of parents who choose to feed their children any of the above-mentioned foods. It is, however, a judgment of the companies who make them and promote them in a misleading way. It is also a judgment on healthcare professionals who may recommend these products because they are not adequately educated about infant and child nutrition.

 

Eating Well When Eating for Two

Nutrition is indisputably important at all stages of life, and each stage has its own nutritional challenges. But I have believed for a while now that good nutrition is probably most crucial during pregnancy. So much so that I have chosen maternal diet and nutritional status as the focus of my dissertation. Research is beginning to show that what a woman eats during her pregnancy may have profound effects on her risk of pregnancy complications as well as her child's health at birth and throughout life. In fact, there is even some evidence to suggest that a pregnant woman can even influence her grandchildren's health through what she chooses to eat.

Despite the scientific evidence-- and I might add, common sense-- that implies that a healthful diet is best in pregnancy, convention and popular belief have not quite caught up. Indeed, pregnancy has become practically synonymous with gastronomic indulgence. One reason for this is that the results of research studies aren't disseminated to the general public very effectively. As a result, many pregnant women may simply be oblivious to the effects their diets can have on their own health and that of their babies.

Aside from lack of knowledge, there are other issues unique to pregnant women that may hinder even the most educated and well-intentioned of mothers-to-be. The nausea and vomiting and food aversions that often occur in early (and sometimes middle and late!) pregnancy can make eating nutrient-packed foods like vegetables and whole grains nearly impossible. Secondly, the cravings that occur during pregnancy can be very strong and difficult to resist-- even for the most self-disciplined.

I have a new appreciation for these important issues, now that I have experienced them firsthand. Now almost 10 weeks into my first pregnancy, I can say that my diet bears little resemblance to the nutritious one I ate consistently for years. Although I don't think I'm doing a horrible job of eating healthfully, it has been a much greater challenge than I ever anticipated. In the remainder of this post, I'll explain: 1) why I refuse to simply "give in" to every craving, and 2) how I strive to find a balance between what I want and what I think my body (and my baby) needs.

I vaguely cited "research" that suggests that a mother's diet can influence the health of her baby in the long-term. Let me give some more concrete examples. Studies in animals (including this one and this one) have found that mothers who were fed high-fat diets during pregnancy had offspring with higher rates of obesity and diabetes. This study found that pregnant mice who ate a diet supplemented with antioxidants had offspring with reduced risks of obesity and glucose intolerance. Another study reported that a high-fat diet, such as the typical American diet, may reduce blood flow to the placenta and increase the risk of stillbirth. One observational study in humans found that women who frequently ate vegetables, fish, and legumes during pregnancy had children who were less likely to develop asthma or allergies.

The research I've listed here represents the tip of the iceberg. I was able to pull these from a quick search on ScienceDaily.com. Hopefully I've adequately convinced you that it might be unwise for pregnant women to subsist on a diet of ice cream, macaroni and cheese, and whatever other combinations of sugar, starch, and saturated fat might sound good. Now I'll discuss the bigger challenge: putting knowledge into practice.

When my "morning" (i.e. all-day) sickness first set in, my main concern was getting any nutrition at all. Everything sounded disgusting to me. So, I got calories wherever I could. I drank Gatorade and non-diet soda, ate Italian ice and popsicles, and popped sour candies all day in an attempt to keep the nausea at bay. In short, my diet was full of sugar and little else. Slowly, I felt a little better and started incorporating more normal foods, but many were still severely lacking in nutrients.

Then, the cravings struck. And they're still alive and well. The ones I've given into include frosted flakes cereal (daily, sometimes 2 or 3 bowls a day),  macaroni and cheese, pancakes, banana bread, toaster waffles with peanut butter, peaches & cream flavored instant oatmeal, bagels with cream cheese, and baked potatoes with far too much sour cream. The cravings I've only dreamt about are worse: fast food cheeseburgers, donuts, Pop Tarts, and Hostess cupcakes (the orange ones!), among other things. Thankfully, I have had some cravings for healthful foods too: sauteed spinach with lemon, canned artichokes with red wine vinegar (at least a can a day; it's getting ridiculous), low-fat sharp cheddar cheese, and fruit, fruit, and more fruit.

I've realized that there are 3 strategies I use to keep my diet as nutritious as I can, without depriving myself of what I really want. The first is to avoid foods that are really bad and to try to eat the most healthful version of whatever food I'm craving. This means not eating anything with trans fat or an ingredient list a mile long. It also means getting "processed" foods from manufacturers that tend to use fewer and more natural ingredients, and making my own food when I can. For example, when I wanted banana bread, I baked it myself and used canola oil instead of butter and substituted applesauce for some of the oil.

The second strategy is to minimize the portion size of the unhealthful food. If I'm making pasta, I only cook one serving at a time so that I'm not tempted to eat a pound of pasta in one sitting. Unless its a fruit or vegetable, I usually have just one serving at a time. Finally, I try to maintain a balance between the less-healthful and more-healthful foods that I eat at any particular meal. Typically, this means having a fruit or vegetable with most meals.

My diet is still far from perfect, but it's better than it could be. My hope is that the strategies I've described here can offer some support to anyone who is experiencing a craving, whether it's pregnancy-related or not.

Spiced Butternut Squash

I know a thoughtful, substantive blog post is well overdue, but for now, a brief recipe will have to do. Unfortunately, it's mid-semester which means that I am studying, reading, or grading assignments pretty much all the time. And when I finally have a minute to myself, the last thing I want to do is think!

Hopefully I'll have something better to post soon, but I am really excited to share this "recipe" nonetheless. I use the term loosely because I don't usually follow recipes, per se. They're more like suggestions for cooking vague quantities of ingredients. This one is something that I decided to try on a whim and really loved.

I was inspired by a couple of butternut squash dishes I've had. My aunt makes  a delicious mashed butternut squash on holidays, but the hefty measures of butter and brown sugar that make it taste so delicious, also add a ton of empty calories and saturated fat. I have also enjoyed some unique salads that included chunks of cooled roasted butternut squash. I thought maybe I could combine these two techniques for preparing the squash to come up with something that was seasoned with fall spices and slightly sweet- reminiscent of pumpkin pie- while retaining its best nutritional qualities. What I love about butternut squash is that it has all of the nutritional benefits of a vegetable- lots of fiber, loads of vitamin A, and low calorie content- with the satisfying texture and weight of something starchier (like its flavor cousin, the sweet potato).

I discovered that I also love cold, roasted sweet potatoes after trying them at aWhole Foods Market salad bar a few months ago. But when I tried to replicate them at home and realized that even a generous 200-calorie portion looked like what one might feed a 2-year old, I was discouraged. But butternut squash tastes similar to sweet potatoes, but has about half the calories! One cup of cooked sweet potato has 180 calories, but a cup of butternut squash only has 80. So, this leads me (finally) to the recipe...

1. Start with a 20 oz. package of pre-cut butternut squash, or a whole one if you're masochistic and want to chop it up and remove the seeds yourself. Place the squash in a large bowl and cover it with plastic wrap, leaving a small part open to vent the steam.

2. Microwave the squash for 5 minutes, stir, and microwave for 2 another two minutes. Repeat until the squash is tender but not falling apart.

3. Spray a large sautee pan with an oil spray, get it warm, and add the squash to it being careful not to add any water from the bottom of the microwave bowl.

4. Add 2 teaspoons of brown sugar, 2 tsp of butter or butter substitute (optional), and a few sprinkles of pumpkin pie spice (to taste).

5. Sautee until the squash is browned.

At this point, the squash is done. You have multiple options for serving it. I prefer it chilled or at room temperature. It just so happens that this also makes it easy for me to take it with me to classes and eat it where I may not have a microwave available. But, it is also good warm.



Enjoy!

How to resist temptation in 3 easy steps

I am always a bit skeptical when I hear people talk about the importance of nutrition education. Sure, there is plenty of misinformation out there and many people really do lack basic knowledge about nutrition. But I think there is a bigger, more prevalent problem. As humans, we all have an innate drive to consume foods that are high in calories, fat, and sugar. In our modern environment, these foods are ubiquitous and very hard to resist. Despite the knowledge that most of us have about what we should and shouldn't be eating, we continue to eat the foods we know we shouldn't. So how do we translate our knowledge into behavior change? Well, I don't claim to have the answer; but I do have some suggestions that I believe can help.

1. Make tempting foods less convenient to obtain. Research has shown that when food is in closer proximity to us, we will eat more of it. So don't keep bowls of candy on your desk at work, for example. When you're at a party, don't sit or mill around near the buffet table. Instead, take a plate of food with you to the other side of the room to eat and mingle. These may seem like insignificant changes, but they can really make a difference. Perhaps the best thing you can do to improve your diet is to rid your home of the foods that you know you need to eat less of. This doesn't mean you have to vow never to eat them again. If you want an ice cream sundae, you can allow yourself to go out and buy one at an ice cream shop. But keeping a half gallon in the freezer when you know you can't resist it is just foolish. The same goes for cookies, chips, soda, etc.

"Everything in moderation" is a popular platitude, but few seem to grasp its meaning. If you claim to only eat desserts occasionally, then there is no need to stock them in your pantry. The healthy staples of your diet should be the only foods you keep in your home. You will have plenty of opportunities to eat those other things at restaurants, social events, holiday gatherings, and other places where you have little or no control over the menu.

2. Cope with temptation in the moment. If you follow my advice above, you will minimize the frequency with which you have to face temptation from food. However, there will of course be times when you can't avoid it. The key to getting through these times with your waistline unscathed is having strategies to lessen the pull of the offending food. Let's take a sample scenario-- an office birthday party. Everyone else is eating cake and talking about how delicious it is. You're trying to eat healthier, and know that eating a highly caloric, dense combination of fat and sugar will not help you achieve your goals. But it looks enticing, and aromas of vanilla-scented cake and chocolate buttercream frosting are invading your nostrils and evoking pleasant childhood memories. How do you decline when you're offered a slice?

There are a few things you can do: a) remove yourself from the situation. Give your well wishes to the birthday girl and excuse yourself to work on some project back at your desk. b) Distract yourself by consuming something else. If there is a healthier option available, like fruit, have that. If not, try a cup of coffee, a diet soda, or a piece of gum. If you have another flavor in your mouth, it will be easier to forget about the cake. c) Remind yourself how you will feel after eating the cake (regretful) and after not eating it(proud, victorious).

3. Give in, sometimes. Although I don't agree with the blind acceptance of all foods as healthy "in moderation," I acknowledge that striving for perfection in eating is unrealistic at best and pathological at worst. Indulgences that are truly occasional may help you maintain an overall healthy eating pattern in the long-term and keep you from reaching a point where you burn out and simply lose the mental energy required to restrict your diet. But, there is a right way and a wrong way to give in to temptation. The wrong way is to wait until it happens by accident and then feel guilty about it. If you take this approach, then every day carries with it a possibility of straying from your plan. This, I think, makes it more difficult to stay on track because your brain is primed for giving in; every tempting food can potentially be eaten.

The better approach is to take a planned vacation from your usual, healthy diet. Once or twice per week, give yourself the freedom to eat something you normally wouldn't. Ideally, plan it ahead of time. Decide when you would most like to treat yourself, and for that one occasion, leave your concerns about nutrition at home. When you decide ahead of time to indulge, you remain in control. Rather than deviating from your plan, you adhere to it. It is not a failure, but rather a deserved  and necessary pit-stop on the road to success. Cheesy metaphor or not, it's true.

How to make a salad that actually tastes good

I don't know about you, but for the better part of my life, I wasn't really a fan of salads. I was a fan of salad dressings, but not actually salads per se. Lettuces were merely vehicles for dressing. I ate them only because it wasn't socially acceptable to eat the dressing with a spoon. If for some reason I didn't like the salad dressing that was available, I didn't eat the salad. It was as simple as that.

Over the course of my palate's evolution, shaped in part by my expanding knowledge of the  immediate and long-term consequences of my dietary habits (weight gain and chronic disease, respectively), I have come to enjoy salads for what they are and not for what I put on top of them. But, I am pretty confident that many adults and certainly the majority of children share my former viewpoint. Evidence supporting my theory abounds. Think about how many times have you been to a restaurant that had all of 3 salads but 15 choices for dressing. Or had a salad served to you that was so drowned in dressing you couldn't tell there was anything green underneath. The problem with these practices is that most salad dressings contain 70-100 calories per tablespoon. They also are typically high in sodium and/or sugar.

So why do people use so much dressing in the first place? My guess is because the salads we buy or make for ourselves tend to include only bland, low-quality ingredients; think iceberg lettuce, underripe tomatoes, and commercial croutons. I'm bored just typing it. I think the key to enjoying salads without turning them into disguised junk food lies in careful selection of ingredients. Here are some simple strategies you can use to make a low-calorie salad you'll actually look forward to eating.

Step 1: Keep it simple
Whether you're at a salad bar or making a salad yourself, it can be tempting to throw everything you like in the bowl. The problem with this approach is twofold. For one, the more ingredients you put in the salad, the more likely it is that you're adding multiple high-calorie items-some nuts here, cranberries there, a little cheese, etc.- and before you know it your "light" meal has more calories than a burger and fries.

Secondly, by mixing so many flavors together, you may create an inefficient salad; that is, one that is unable to satisfy both the stomach and the brain without providing excess calories. This is because appetite-- the desire to eat food, not to be confused with physiological hunger-- is stimulated by variety. The more flavors we have in a meal, the more we tend to eat. Food manufacturers often use knowledge of this phenomenon to their advantage, combining sweet and salty flavors to enhance our liking and consumption of products. I think the best salads are those that contain only 3-5 components. Such simple salads allow you to taste each ingredient fully and become satisfied more quickly. They are also less expensive and time-consuming to prepare.

Step 2: Use herbs and salt

This part is easy to explain. Fresh herbs are virtually calorie-free yet contribute a great depth of flavor to salads. Adding some chopped dill, chives, or basil can completely transform a ho-hum salad into something that tastes complex and expensive. Although salt isn't exactly known for its nutritional value, it can be used judiciously to greatly improve the flavor of healthy foods. Sprinkling a few dashes of salt on a salad will add relatively little sodium to the meal but will really help bring out the natural flavors of the vegetables. Just think of what salt does for a ripe slice of tomato. It can do the same for greens. 
Step 3: Add *a little* fat
If you are trying to create a healthy salad, you may assume that certain foods with less than stellar nutritional reputations are off limits. Cheese, bacon and other meats might come to mind, and maybe even healthy but high-fat foods like avocado, nuts, and seeds. The popularity of low-fat and fat-free salad dressings attest to a widespread fear of full-fat salad dressings as well. But avoiding these foods completely can make your salads bland, boring, and utterly incapable of satisfying your stomach or your brain. Instead, use these items in small quantities to enhance, rather than overpower, the other salad ingredients. And, in keeping with my first bit of advice about simplicity, choose only one high-fat food to include. What constitutes a small quantity? I would suggest 50-100 calories. This amounts to about 2-4 tablespoons of cheese or nuts, 2-3 slices of bacon, or a quarter to half of an avocado. Aim for the lower end of the range for the less-healthy items or for an appetizer or side salad, and the higher end for the healthier items or when making an entree-sized salad.
Step 4: Make your own dressing
If you follow steps 1-3, you may find that you don't even need dressing or that you need very little. But if you do, I recommend making your own dressing. It can be a simple mixture of oil and vinegar or oil and lemon juice; use a 1:1 ratio if you can tolerate more acidity or a 2:1 ratio for a more traditional vinaigrette. Alternatively, you can try a homemade yogurt dressing like this one. If you must use a bottled dressing, choose one that is made with olive oil or canola oil. Whether you use your own dressing or one from a bottle, try not to use more than you need. Add it to the salad little by little as you need it rather than dousing it all at once. Or, dip your fork in the dressing before each bite. Minimizing your use of salad dressing is important if you are trying to lose weight. If you are one of the lucky few who want to gain weight, you can disregard this part.
If you're wondering what a salad that meets these guidelines might look like, it could be a slighlty modified caprese (tomato, mozzarella, and basil) salad. Typically, a caprese salad might contain half a tomato, a few shreds of basil, and several large slices of cheese. It is often topped with a liberal drizzle of olive oil. It's not junk food by any means, but it's not the most nutritious of salads either. It is a lot of cheese with a little vegetables. To maintain the salad's flavor but improve its nutrition profile, I would add a generous handful of mesclun greens and substitute mini fresh mozzarella balls for the thick cheese slices so that I could use less but still have some mozzarella in every bite. If I wanted dressing, a small amount of balsamic vinegar and olive oil would suffice. A recipe for another one of my favorite salads can be found here.

What's the deal with agave nectar?

It seems that agave nectar is the new darling of the sweetener market, cropping up in everything from cocktails to smoothies to snack foods. Last week, I was at a bar and ordered my favorite drink- a caipirinha- and asked the bartender to use very little simple syrup. He obliged, but later suggested I try the drink with agave nectar instead of simple syrup. He said that not only does it complement the flavor of the rum in the drink, but it is also all-natural. I gave him the skeptical look I give anyone who tries to "sell" me on a health food, but said I'd consider it. No use wasting my happy hour debating nutrition with someone who probably didn't know the difference between a monosaccharide and a polysaccharide.

But his suggestion, along with the increasing ubiquity of agave nectar and an inquiry from a facebook friend, has prompted me to look further into the health claims surrounding this product. Agave nectar, or agave syrup, is a sweetener that is made by filtering and heating the juice from agave plants. Thus, although it is natural, it is not entirely unprocessed. The syrup is comprised primarily of fructose (84%). Like table sugar (sucrose), agave nectar has 16 calories per teaspoon, but because it is sweeter than sugar, less of it may be needed to achieve the same level of sweetness. This, I would argue, is one possible benefit of agave nectar. The other is one of its most touted characteristics: its low glycemic index (GI), which is between 20 and 30 on a scale of 1-100. Foods with low GIs do not elicit as great a rise in blood sugar as foods with higher GIs. Therefore, if agave nectar has a lower GI than other sweeteners (honey's GI is 55 and table sugar's is 68), then it would make sense to think that it would be preferable, especially for people with diabetes or glucose intolerance.

To investigate whether the purported benefits of agave nectar are supported by scientific studies, I logged on to PubMed to do an initial search, using only "agave nectar" as my search term. Given that agave nectar is becoming so widespread in grocery stores and restaurants, I expected to get loads of results that I would have to narrow down with more refined searches. Imagine my surprise when this search returned only 9 results, none of which had anything to do with the effects of agave nectar consumption on the human body. In light of the dearth of research on the topic, my opinion on it must necessarily be based solely on deductive reasoning.

So, we don't know exactly what impact agave nectar has on human metabolism. We do, however, know a little about the impact of its component sugars--primarily fructose, and to a lesser extent glucose and sucrose. I had mentioned that agave nectar is 84% fructose. Glucose and sucrose represent approximately 8% each. In comparison, table sugar is 50% fructose and 50% glucose. The much-demonized high-fructose corn syrup typically contains 55% fructose and 45% glucose. Honey has similar ratios: 50% fructose, 44% glucose, 1% sucrose.

There is some evidence to suggest that pure fructose may have some adverse metabolic effects; namely, increasing the amount of hazardous abdominal fat, and raising blood triglyceride levels. This is because fructose is metabolized differently from glucose and in a way that may encourage the liver to produce fat in the form of triglycerides and release them into the bloodstream. The other side of this coin is that fructose doesn't increase blood glucose levels the way glucose does. So, we have something of a paradox in fructose: it doesn't raise blood sugar (Good), but it may promote fat storage and high triglycerides (Bad). Because agave nectar contains a higher proportion of fructose than most, if not all, other sweeteners on the market, the concerns about fructose could reasonably apply to agave nectar as well.

So, as to the benefit of agave nectar's low glycemic index, I would say this is a wash. It does in fact have a low GI, but the other possible negative effects of fructose may very well negate this positive quality. As to the other possible benefit of agave nectar- that it is sweeter than sugar and can be used in smaller quantities- I cannot make a conclusion. Unless and until there are studies that demonstrate that people actually use less agave nectar than they would sugar, and therefore consume fewer empty calories, I remain unconvinced. My guess is that people are more likely to misconstrue the healthy halo around agave nectar as license to use it with reckless abandon. But this, of course, is just a hypothesis.

The bottom line on agave nectar, as I see it, is the same as it is for all other forms of sugar: it provides no nutritional benefit other than calories and is still essentially sugar, albeit much more expensive sugar! If you like the flavor of it, or if you find that you can replace larger amounts of table sugar with smaller amounts of agave nectar, then by  means use it. It's probably not going to hurt you. But you should not be fooled into thinking that it is a health food.

References
Leibman B. Sugar overload: Curbing America's sweet tooth. Nutrition Action Health Letter. January/February 2010.
Agave nectar is in demand, but is it better for you than ordinary sugar? Environmental Nutrition. April 2010.