Live By Nutrients everyone over 50 should consider adding to their diets BY TONY PALLONE
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healthy diet is important at any age, but it’s especially important at transitional periods in our lives. Newborns need extra fats to support brain development, kids need protein to build muscle mass, and young adults that stick to high-nutrient foods may find it easier to juggle the many stresses of their early careers. But what about the over-50 crowd? If we’ve settled into diets that served us well throughout our middle years, is there any reason to make changes now? The short answer is yes. Decreasing bone and muscle mass, an increased risk of chronic conditions and changes in metabolism that translate to decreased calorie requirements are all part of the picture of aging. Yet what we eat today does not have to be radically different from what we ate when we were younger. What’s most important is making informed choices that allow us to optimize our internal engines. EAT A RAINBOW Raya Ioffe, a functional nutrition and lifestyle practitioner based in Latham, offers some simple advice: “The more colorful we can make our plates and the more variety, the better.” Ioffe notes that the colors of plant-based foods offer a key to the types of nutrients they contain. In particular, she’s talking about phytonutrients: substances that plants use to protect themselves from environmental hazards. These can stabilize the free radicals formed by
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55+ LIFE MAGAZINE | SPRING 2022
stressful conditions, and when consumed they can offer the same kinds of protections to us. One example is lycopene, a carotenoid that gives tomatoes their red color and offers cardiovascular benefits and cancer-fighting properties. Orange foods like carrots contain alpha- and beta-carotene that can be converted into vitamin A for immune system support. Leafy greens such as spinach and kale also contain carotenoids that may help protect from cataracts and age-related macular degeneration. This is just scratching the surface. There are literally thousands of phytonutrient types, and antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and other beneficial properties are evident in the handful that have so far been isolated and studied. Sources like the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs suggest eating aiming for one daily serving from each color group, while Healthline suggests incorporating two or three different colors at each meal. Ioffe doesn’t have a specific formula, but says that it’s important to add variety if possible. The general advice from all corners is “eat a rainbow.” FIND WHAT WORKS FOR YOU It’s not surprising that the immune system stars of the plant world are beneficial for human health: Ioffe says that 75% of our own immune systems reside in and around the gut. Cleaning the gut, she says, is the place to start addressing immune problems, for which she takes a very individualized
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foods to
