Has America gone latte crazy? If not, why would Burger King add a 12-ounce “coffeehouse latte” to its menu?

Enough with the questions:

Starting today, you can kick-start your morning or take your coffee break at Burger King. The menu includes caramel, mocha, plain and vanilla lattes in regular and nonfat varieties. The lattes are brewed with 100% Latin American arabica espresso from Seattle’s Best Coffee.

The suggested retail price starts at $2.29, but for a limited time, you can try them for just $1.00.
It’s time to round up the gang and head to BK for your coffee break!

Coffeehouse lattes are now on the menu at Burger King. Photo courtesy Burger King.

WHAT’S A LATTE?

Caffe latte, called latte (LAH-tay) for short, is a shot of espresso with steamed milk in a 3:1 ratio of milk to espresso. In France and Italy, it is a breakfast drink. In America it also serves as the base for flavored lattes, where a sweet syrup is added in any variety of flavors—caramel, hazelnut, mocha, vanilla and a long list of specialty flavors.

See all the different types of espresso drinks in our Espresso Glossary.
COFFEE 101: COFFEE CHERRIES

The fruits of the coffee tree are called cherries, and you can see why in the photo: They look just like Queen Anne cherries. Other varieties can be solid red or burgundy.

Inside the fruit are two seeds: the coffee beans. The seeds are a pale green color, and turn brown when they are roasted.

There’s a sweet, sticky pulp surrounding the seeds that tastes like a delicate blend of watermelon and hibiscus. But this is not an eating fruit: Most of the cherry interior is taken up by the seeds.

Thank goodness: Otherwise, we’d need to buy even more tiny beans to make a cup of coffee.
  

It’s National Nutrition Month, so we’re giving some credit to a food that’s often on the “avoid” list: pasta.

Jackie Newgent, RD, CDN and a consultant to Barilla pasta, has pointed out a few facts that should be of interest to any pasta lover. The good news is, you can and should incorporate pasta into your diet regularly. The only trick is to be sure that the recipe and the portion size confirm to approved guidelines for “healthy pasta.”

PASTA ALONE DOES NOT ADD POUNDS

Excess calories create excess fat, not healthy portions of pasta. Pasta is a good complex carbohydrate food. Several studies have shown that a balance of carbohydrates, protein and fat are crucial for maintaining a healthy weight and reducing risk of diseases. A 2009 study from Harvard School of Public Health and Pennington Biomedical Research Center found that reduced calorie diets with carbohydrates ranging from 35%-65% of the diet were equally effective for weight loss as other diet options.*

 
PORTION SIZE = 2 BASEBALLS

The other key to a healthy pasta meal is keeping portions right-sized. A healthy portion is one to two cups of cooked pasta, the size of up to two baseballs. Use these two tricks:

 
PASTA IS LOW SODIUM & CALORIE FRIENDLY

A one- to two-cup serving of cooked pasta is calorie friendly (about 200 calories), low in fat (about 1 gram, with no saturated or trans fats), cholesterol free and low in sodium (unless you add salt to the cooking water).

You can build toward your recommended daily 47g of whole grains with whole grain pasta. Whole wheat pasta has 4g or more fiber per two-ounces of dry pasta. Check the label: Some brands, enriched with flax seeds, have double that.

Pasta is a cornerstone of one of the world’s healthiest diets, the “Mediterranean Diet” of Italy, which nutritionists consider to be one of the world’s best ways to eat.

AL DENTE PASTA KEEPS YOU FULLER LONGER

According to Oldways, a non-profit organization that promotes healthy eating, and the International Pasta Organization, there’s a reason not to overcook pasta: Cooking pasta to al dente, still slightly firm, allows you to reap the full benefits of pasta’s already strong ability to increase satiety, delaying hunger pangs and providing fuel for working muscles long after meals.

Due to the special protein structure of traditional pasta dough, pasta has a low to medium glycemic index (GI) value depending on cut, which means that the body digests it more slowly than most other carbohydrates. That’s true for pasta that’s made from either soft or hard wheat.†
PASTA IS A SUSTAINABLE FOOD

Plant based foods, including fruits, vegetables, grains and pasta, are beneficial for our bodies while also providing the smallest environmental impact.‡

So you know what you’ve got to do: Use a dairy-free sauce, add lots of veggies and measure your pasta portion size. And enjoy pasta as often as you like.

*Source: New England Journal of Medicine, 26 February 2009; 360(9):859-73.

†Source: Oldways.org.

‡Source: Barilla Center for Food and Nutrition, Enabling Sustainable Food Choices The Double Pyramid.

If you’ve been too busy to prep for St. Patrick’s Day, you can still toast with something special. Depending on what you have at home, you can serve a bright green:

 
IRISH COFFEE & IRISH HOT CHOCOLATE

They aren’t green, but they sure taste good. Here are the recipes.
 
Sláinte!

There’s a lot of press about avoiding GMOs, genetically modified (GM) organisms. You may have been eating genetically modified food for years without knowing it. The Environmental Working Group conservatively estimates that each American consumes about 190 pounds of GM foods every year. The U.S. regulatory system is set up to deal with GM-related problems only after they occur.

GMOs refer to any living thing—animal or plant—that has had its genetic material altered in some way by science (it’s called biotechnology). This is different from selective breeding, a time-honored practice where crops or livestock are selectively bred by horticulturists to improve the variety (to withstand heat, for instance).

Instead, GMOs are the result of manipulation in a laboratory whereby segments of DNA are spliced, rearranged or removed altogether. It can create what are called “Franken-foods”: fish genes can be spliced into fruit, for example.

Some of this article is adapted from one written by Shelley Stonebrook for Care2.com. Here is the original article.

Chances are, your supermarket tomatoes have been genetically modified. Photo courtesy Domain-Image.com.

From cereal and crackers to baking mixes, veggie burgers, milk and cheese, GMOs have been appearing, unannounced, in supermarkets—without much study into their long-term health effects on humans. Included on the list of top 20 genetically modified foods are bananas, corn, potatoes, rice, soy, squash, sugar beets and tomatoes.

The leading GMO crops in America: beets, canola, corn, papaya, soy and zucchini are likely to be GMO.(Olive and safflower oils are moist likely to be non-GMO.)

And now, the world’s first GMO animal—farmed salmon—is ready for market. It is now awaiting approval from the FDA, which concluded in December that the fish it would be as safe to eat as conventional salmon. Read the full article in the New York Times.

Here are four issues that can impact your family’s health:

WHAT CAN YOU DO ABOUT IT?

 
Hopefully, soon we’ll see products stamped with the Non-GMO Project Verified logo.

Like guacamole? Like potato salad?

Combine the two concepts in this Hass Avocado and Red Potato Salad Recipe from Avocado Central. The green accents are festive for St. Patrick’s Day, although this recipe rocks from Super Bowl Sunday through Christmas (when you can add sliced red cherry tomatoes for a red-and-green effect).

As we showed yesterday in the Corned Beef & Cabbage Potato Salad recipe, you can add a tantalizing twist to traditional potato salad by incorporating non-traditional ingredients. If you have a favorite unusual potato salad recipe, let us know!
Prep Time: 15 minutes
Serves: 8

Ingredients

 
*A large avocado averages about 8 ounces. If using smaller or larger size avocados adjust the quantity accordingly.

 
Preparation

1. PLACE potatoes in a medium pan and cover with water. Bring water to a boil and cook potatoes for about 15 minutes or until just tender when pierced with a fork. Drain well and transfer to a bowl.

2. COMBINE mayonnaise, vinegar, mustard, salt and pepper. Add dressing and green onions to potatoes and gently toss. Stir in avocados.

3. REFRIGERATE for 4 hours or overnight to allow flavors to blend.