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The skinny on how pasta affects your weight
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Italian researchers say that pasta eating is linked to healthy body weight. But use your noodle before you ramp up the linguini, and follow this advice to make pasta a healthier dish for your family. - photo by Jennifer Graham
Italian researchers say pasta eating is linked to a healthy body weight. Before you roll your eyes, know that an older study in the U.S. said much the same.

The first study, led by researchers at the University of Chicago in 2012, found that people who ate more fruit, pasta and rice had less body fat than people who ate more animal protein.

The latest research, published July 4 in the journal Nutrition & Diabetes, found that people who ate reasonable amounts of pasta had better body-mass indices and smaller waists.

Pasta eating, the report said, was associated with the healthful Mediterranean style of eating, which is one of three styles promoted by the U.S. dietary guidelines. People who ate pasta were more likely to eat other staples of a Mediterranean diet, such as onions, garlic, olive oil and cooked tomatoes, the researchers said. (Like asparagus and carrots, tomatoes are better for us when they're cooked, because more nutrients are released.)

In a report on the study, CNN noted that pasta, long a staple of long-distance runners on the eve of a race, has fallen out of favor in America in recent years. Many Americans see pasta as nutritionally vacant, but Italians still view it as the foundation of their food pyramid, CNN said.

In fact, a typical cup of regular pasta provides 6.7 grams of protein and small amounts of calcium and potassium. Whole-wheat, enriched pasta also has iron, B vitamins and fiber, CNN said.

Another pasta myth is that its origins are Italian. Many people think it originated in China; others claim the Etruscans created it in 400 BC.

Regardless, credit Thomas Jefferson for its popularity in America. While serving as the ambassador to France, Jefferson became enamoured of pasta which he called macaroni and ordered crates of it and a pasta maker sent to his home in the U.S. He later served it in the White House when he was president.

Of course, Jefferson and the other founding fathers didn't worry much about their weight, unlike the third of contemporary Americans who are obese. And the trim Italians eating pasta are likely dabbing it with olive oil, not coating it in butter and cheese.

There is one sure-fire thing you can do to make your family's pasta dinner even healthier and no, it's not serving it cold.

The British TV show "Trust Me I'm a Doctor" got lots of publicity in 2014 when it tested blood glucose levels of 10 people who ate fresh, cold or reheated pasta. Glucose levels were lower when people ate pasta that had been cooled, then reheated, leading researchers to conclude that less of it is digested.

But until there's a study of 10,000 people, not 10, there's an even more reliable route: Buy pasta that is 100 percent whole wheat and cook it al dente (firm, not mushy). As James Hamblin wrote recently in The Atlantic: "Eat whole grains instead of just their starchy white endosperm whenever possible, and a persons odds of health increase."
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From the book 'Outliers' comes proof that good health is more than just genetics
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Friends Jim Young, left, Mike Natale, Jeff Natale and Ryan Kiernan were on Greenwich High School football team together and Jim and Mike were captains. Jim, who was the youngest in Sherry Young's family, was welcome in the homes of the other three boys who still had siblings around and grandparents near. - photo by Sherry Young
As I look back on my life and the lives of others, both personally and in the reading I have done, I am convinced of the necessity of positive human contact in our lives. We are doubly blessed when we are able to make good friends or are a part of a family where we are accepted and loved.

Malcolm Gladwell in his book Outliers tells of a time in the 1950s when Dr. Stewart Wolf met a physician who practiced in the area of Roseto, Pennsylvania. Roseto was settled by a group of Italian families from Roseto, Italy, who re-created their life again in America.

This was in the 1950s before drugs and measures to prevent heart disease became important. In their conversation the physician said, You know, Ive been practicing for 17 years. I get patients from all over, and I rarely find anyone from Roseto under the age of 65 with heart disease.

Wolf was surprised by these words as, It was impossible to be a doctor, common sense said, and not see heart disease.

Wolf enlisted the aid of a sociologist and friend John Bruhn to help him. They found, There was no suicide, no alcoholism, no drug addiction, and very little crime. They didnt have anyone on welfare. Then we looked at peptic ulcers. They didnt have any of those either. These people were dying of old age. Thats it.

They checked into diet, genetics and possibilities of something in the foothills of eastern Pennsylvania but nothing made sense.

What they found was that Rosetans visited one another, stopping to chat in Italian on the street, say, or cooking for one another in their backyards. (Researchers) learned about the extended family clans that underlay the towns social structure. They saw how many homes had three generations living under one roof and how much respect grandparents commanded. They went to Mass at Our Lady of Mount Carmel and saw the unifying and calming effect of the church. They counted 22 separate civic organizations in a town of just under 2,000 people. They picked up on the particular egalitarian ethos of the community, which discouraged the wealthy from flaunting their success and helped the unsuccessful obscure their failures.

What they found eventually convinced the medical establishment to look beyond the individual and understand the culture people are part of their friends, families and town they came from. They determined that the people we surround ourselves with and the values of the world we inhabit have a profound effect on who we are.

Likely, this study could have been done with other ethnicities. However, my family's experiences with the Italian families in Connecticut ring true to the study. Our hungry and growing sons, especially our youngest son, Jim, who was left home alone with two beady-eyed parents, all had some memorable experiences being fed and loved in the Cos Cob multigenerational families. Proof of the African proverb, It takes a village to raise a child.

We live in an age when the contact we have with people often is on the internet, and many of us live among strangers. Unless we make the effort to reach out, we will become isolated, especially as we age. The Rosetan study is proof that reaching out and communicating may be good for our health.
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