Keen-wah: And Other Foods That Are Very Good for You

When I was a kid growing up in my little hometown of 800, there was one local grocery store.  And fortunately it was a time when kids could still ride their bikes up and down the streets or walk to the local grocery without fear of being abducted.  At this local grocery store, there was one food that my sister and I loved to go get.  Ice cream? No. Candy? No.  Ok then, how about Big Red (for you yankees that’s a local  red colored cola that’s great over ice cream and one hell of a hangover cure)?  No.  The lady who owned the store had a big vat of pickled herring.  I can just hear the groans now.  Pickled herring?  Are you nuts?  For some reason or another my sister (not my younger sister, she won’t eat fish) and I took a great liking to these little fishes and to this day, I still find them delicious. And on top of that, low these many years later, I find that they’re also very good for you.  Now my father, on the other hand, loved canned sardines.  I think he ate a tin of sardines in olive oil everyday of his adult life.  Why this reminiscing about herring and sardines?  (Are you still with me or have you X’d me out?)  Because I saw this list in Real Simple magazine about the 30 best foods to keep you healthy and sardines is on the list.  So, to keep you from having to go out and buy the magazine, here are the top 30 foods you need to eat to keep you healthy: 

almonds, avocadoes, barley, black beans, blueberries, broccoli, bulgur, chard, boneless, skinless chicken breasts, edamame, eggs!, extra virgin olive oil, kale, kidney beans, kiwi, lentils, mushrooms, oatmeal (steel cut or old fashioned), oranges, peanut and almond butters (all natural), pumpkin, quinoa (pronounced keen wah), SARDINES, skim milk, spinach, sweet potatoes, walnuts, whole grain pasta, wild salmon, nonfat Greek yogurt.

Now, with that being said, don’t sit down and eat as a meal almonds, avocadoes, peanut and almond butter, sardines and salmon.  Sounds like the ingredients you might find in “the basket” on Chopped…Although very good for you, you would have eaten a meal way beyond any normal calorie allotment for the day.  Mix and match the low cal with the other “good” fat foods…

Stay healthy in 2011 and beyond!