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Combining a low dose of blood pressure medication with a higher intake of dietary-resistant starch might help stave off diabetic kidney disease, according to results from a new animal study. "Our study suggests that combining dietary interventions with a low dose of established medications for diabetic kidney disease management can provide a more feasible and lower side-effect alternative for patients to implement and improve their health outcomes by helping maintain their kidney integrity," said Claudia Carrillo. Dietary-resistant starch is found in unripe bananas, cooked and cooled potatoes, legumes and whole grains. This type of carbohydrate ferments in the large intestine,...

Gut bacteria and a diet rich in the amino acid tryptophan can play a protective role against pathogenic E. coli, which can cause severe stomach upset, cramps, fever, intestinal bleeding and renal failure, according to a study. The research reveals how dietary tryptophan—an amino acid found mostly in animal products, nuts, seeds, whole grains and legumes—can be broken down by gut bacteria into small molecules called metabolites. It turns out a few of these metabolites can bind to a receptor on gut epithelial (surface) cells, triggering a pathway that ultimately reduces the production of proteins that E. coli use to...

Beans aren't inherently gassy, it is damaged protein from over-cooking that causes the unintended effects. Minimize cooking damage by most efficiently processing beans. It takes a cheap "corn mill" and a pressure-cooker. Cracking un-washed beans in a kind of dry grain mill for "meal" not "flour", then washing them after cracking, soaking in hot water for a short time, then pressure cooking. The taste is like potatoes, the most gas-prone person won't experience the unpleasant effects. The cheapest, steel-plate (vs. stone), "meal" (vs. "flour") mill, that will process whole corn, dried whole hominy (softer than corn), and brown-rice-meal (great for...

People who follow the Paleo diet often do so for health reasons, eschewing many carbs, especially grains, in favor of lean meats and vegetables. Now, research indicates that this “caveman” style of eating may have hidden dangers to your heart health. The Paleo diet, which draws nutritional guidelines from the diets of our human ancestors, advocates eating like a hunter and gatherer—consuming lots of meat, vegetables, nuts, and some fruits—while excluding agriculturally-based foods such as grains, legumes, and dairy, along with refined sugar and processed oils. Though no one would argue the nutritional merits of vegetables and lean protein, pulling...

Studies of ancient preserved plant remains from a medieval archaeological site in the Pamir Mountains of Uzbekistan have shown that fruits, such as apples, peaches, apricots, and melons, were cultivated in the foothills of Inner Asia. The archaeobotanical study, conducted by Robert Spengler of the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, is among the first systematic analyses of medieval agricultural crops in the heart of the ancient Silk Road. Spengler identified a rich assemblage of fruit and nut crops, showing that many of the crops we are all familiar with today were cultivated along the ancient trade...

Many wheat farmers facing low prices have turned this year to other crops, including chickpeas and lentils, in hopes of turning a profit. This year’s wheat crop of 45.7 million acres (18.49 million hectares) is the smallest since 1919 and it comes after a 2016 crop that was the least profitable in 30 years. North Dakota, Montana and Nebraska are among the states with significantly fewer wheat acres. …

Researchers from George Washington University and the Smithsonian Institution have discovered evidence to debunk the theory that Neandertals' disappearance was caused in part by a deficient diet -- one that lacked variety and was overly reliant on meat. After discovering starch granules from plant food trapped in the dental calculus on 40-thousand-year-old Neandertal teeth, the scientists believe that Neandertals ate a wide variety of plants and included cooked grains as part of a more sophisticated, diverse diet similar to early modern humans... The discovery of starch granules in the calculus on Neandertal teeth provides direct evidence that they made sophisticated,...

My family is on a pinto bean diet, i'll call it that because money tight and this is all we have to eat, well rice, and homemade tortillas, but even those few inbetween times we can have eggs, cheese, fruit, vegtables, it's mostly beans, i make plain, and chili version, leftovers become soup, my kids think we are going to die, what i'd like to hear is what someone else thinks?