If you are stressed you don’t sleep and when you are tired you don’t always make good food choices. Where do those bad food choices lead you? You got it, back to the stress and sleep issues. There are several places to break the chain that keeps you stuck in this circuitous pathway. >>>

Frugal foodies, this one's for you. Freezing foods is a great way to stretch your grocery dollar and prepare great meals on the fly. >>>

Do you know mate? No, it's not some new Australian dish! Mate is a traditional tea-like beverage, popular and traditional in South America. But now, mate is gaining worldwide popularity and rapidly penetrating global markets including the United States. >>>

One of the most common complaints I get from my husband, Dario, in regards to my cooking, is that I don’t re-make any of my dishes. They don’t get “put into rotation,” as he says. We have them once and then I’m on to something new and exciting. Unless I’m craving a specific dish or I get a request from Dario, I’m always set on trying out a new recipe or cooking with a new ingredient. So even some of my best dishes don’t get prepared on a regular basis. Except for this one. >>>

Fast food is tasty, convenient and usually pretty cheap — unfortunately, it’s also kind of terrible for us. Besides the fact that each mouthful carries with it a lot of calories, fat and sodium, there are a few other reasons why it’s best to minimize your trips through the standard drive-thru. Let’s break down the typical convenience meal into its three component parts. >>>

I do not have to convince anyone that a good night’s sleep will help you achieve good health. The problem? How to build those seven to eight hours a day into your lifestyle. The secret to keeping your weight down and staying heart healthy may be in training like an athlete and keeping to a sleep schedule. >>>

Health experts have long insisted that improving our public health requires improving the environment we live in. This, of course, includes environmental protection measures such as pollution control and management of resources but also attention to housing and living conditions. Part of the latter is a better understanding of how land use, residential development and architectural design impact our health and well-being. >>>

Warning: Freezing fruit is one of my all-time favorite dietitian soapboxes. I talk about it multiple times a day when counseling clients. I hear the excuse all the time: “I can’t buy bananas or strawberries or [insert other fruit here] because they will go bad.” I agree. I don’t think fruit — or veggies — should ever go to waste. >>>

If there’s a way to cut the unnecessary ingredients out of my food, I’m going to do it. But when I first heard you can make almond milk at home, I’ll admit I was skeptical. While I do love the nutty flavor it can add to my iced coffee, it didn't seem worth the trouble. Well, I tried it, and it is! >>>

Most of us are familiar with MyPlate, the USDA's healthy eating guide. For the first time in nearly 20 years, this food guide is not in the shape of a pyramid. I completed my dietetic internship at the height of MyPlate’s predecessor, MyPyramid, and let me tell you: MyPyramid had a lot of critics. >>>

A basic lack of sleep can affect a sufferer's future food choices and therefore can induce anxiety. Those that do not get enough sleep tend to make poor choices and experience high anxiety as a result- therefore linking stress-diet-sleep together. It seems to be a vicious cycle of poor food choices and anxiety causing poor sleep which then results in future poor food choices and anxiety. Did you catch all that? >>>

Chicken breasts can get a little boring if you don't watch out. It's a good source of lean protein, but can get old if you don't change it up a bit every now and then. You can always change the cooking method — baking, roasting, sauteing and grilling are all great ways to cook chicken. Or you can try adding different marinades or sauces, or stuffing it. One way you might not have considered to prevent "chicken breast burnout" is coating it in something new. >>>