The food in your refrigerator may be causing cognitive decline

Skittles may have coined the phrase, “Taste the Rainbow,” but nutritionists, doctors, dementia specialists, and tastebuds everywhere are reclaiming it!   This rainbow represents medicine for our body and mind.  The risk of dementia, including Alzheimers, depression, anxiety, and cognitive decline, were found to be significantly reduced in seniors who ate primarily healthy colorful diets.

Let me set the stage, or plate, to explain what I mean. Imagine being out for dinner, walking into a nice restaurant, and seeing the table set with crisp white linen tablecloth, silver chargers, and a perfectly folded white napkin perched on top of it. The silverware has been polished to a shine, the stemware is clear and sparkling, and the candles are flickering. You pull out your chair, sit down, and enjoy a refreshment while engaging in conversation with your friends. The din of conversation slows as the server nears your table. As the plate is placed in front of you, your eyes widen, feasting on the colorful array in full display. 

Mouth watering, you take in the the full rainbow in front of you: The deep green blend of spinach and arugula topped with blistered bright red cherry tomatoes, sliced yellow bell peppers, shredded purple cabbage, minced red onion, topped with vibrant orange curls of carrot, buttery green slices of avocado, and a bright clean vinaigrette, make the perfect colorful bed for the thick juicy salmon filet, pink and flakey. Your brain registers all the colors and anticipated flavors, understanding the visual signal that dinner has arrived. Your mouth waters in anticipation, ready for the mixture of refreshing, savory, sweet, and tangy. As it turns out, your brain is on to something. It needs this rainbow of nutrients, vitamins, minerals, and phytochemicals, including plenty of antioxidants and micronutrients like vitamins A, C, K, iron, calcium, potassium, and more, to improve upon and maintain your overall health.

While ‘Taste the Rainbow’ became synonymous with the fruity tastes in each Skittle candy having a different fruit flavor, the medical, nutrition, and geriatric-treatment community continued to connect the dots on how essential it truly is that we eat across all colors of foods, ensuring that we maximize the preventative and restorative effects. Believe it or not, FOOD IS MEDICINE! 

Eating a diet rich in colorful fruits and veggies, lean proteins, and complex carbs is linked to a longer, healthier, and more active life. It supports optimal brain health, higher levels of immunity, muscle repair and retention, strong bones, skin, and teeth, healthy gut bacteria, and achieving and maintaining a healthy weight, which combats a host of other health challenges such as heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and some cancers. This is important during all stages of life, and becomes even more critical as we age. The effects of eating healthy, including a variety of fruits, vegetables, legumes, whole grains, and lean proteins, on the brain are mind-blowing. The risk of dementia, including Alzheimers, depression, anxiety, and cognitive decline, were found to be significantly reduced in seniors who ate primarily healthy colorful diets. It is never too late to make the changes that help us keep our body, and our brain, healthy and serve us well. 

Making these changes does not have to be difficult. Having nice food storage containers that shut tightly helps keep your produce fresh longer. Mason jars work great for vegetables and fruits, helping them stay fresh for days longer than usual. Prepping all of the weekly produce at once helps to make those grab-and-go snacks or ‘what’s for dinner’ conundrums much easier. Having containers that close tightly means that food preparation can happen just once or twice a week, so that you always have healthy fresh food ready to eat. 

Once a week, taking an hour to chop up vegetables for the week and do any other preparations that may be helpful, can save you time, and turning to takeout, later in the week.

Chopping peppers, carrots, celery, mushrooms, squash, onion, cucumbers, etc, and putting them in containers in the fridge is a big time-saver. Most of these can be purchased already sliced and diced as well. It is also helpful to wash fruits, prepare lean protein, and make a menu of healthy foods that are ready to eat and put it on the front of the fridge. This makes mealtimes a breeze. For breakfast, heat a little olive oil in a pan.  Add pre-diced onions, spinach, tomato, peppers, and mushrooms, and cook for a few minutes.  Add an egg and some liquid egg whites, and this makes omelet preparation as easy as can be.  For lunch, tossing together a salad becomes a quick task, with spinach, blueberries, strawberries, walnuts, and sliced red onion, topped with a quick vinaigrette. Dinner preparation becomes quicker and much less stressful when there are containers of lean protein, clean and cut vegetables and a list of meal options at the ready. By the end of the week, you can make a healthy and delicious soup with leftover vegetables, meats, legumes, and grains.

There are many different ‘whys’ and ways to eat healthier. Making one healthy change at a time, setting yourself up for success by having nutritious foods on hand, and being more conscious about what you're eating can have an enormous effect on your health and happiness. When you focus on the different foods you and your senior loved ones are eating, think of the rainbow and mix it up. It may take a little bit more work and a little bit more thought before it becomes second nature. 

You can quickly turn a visit with a senior or a loved one into a food prep get-together while you chat, cutting things up, and setting your loved one up for nutritional success. Within no time, you will have made positive changes that could help keep you, and the seniors in your life, healthy for years to come. One last note: I have to admit I am a coffee lover. I've been trying to make an effort to cut back to one and a half cups of coffee per day to minimize the amount of caffeine that I'm pushing through my system. I’ve found that I am not missing out and I am drinking more water than ever before.