I talk to my clients about reducing the chemicals they take in,from a variety of ways: air pollution, chemicals (like fungicides, pesticides and herbicides) on our lawns and in our food, chlorine, fluoride and other compounds in our water, even BPA in our cans and...

This past Friday night, Revive Consignment in Rogers Park, Chicago, hosted me for a discussion about cravings and how to implement healthy eating habits. The women in attendance opened up and were vulnerable, sharing their struggles, thoughts and ideas about emotional...

“There is something evanescent, temporary and fragile about food. You make it, it goes, and what remains are memories.” –Jacques Pepin At a lecture, one of my psychology professors in college discussed the importance of creating memorable memories...

This is a guest post from Berkeley, California-based psychotherapist Ben Ringler (who also happens to be my brother): If you’ve been in a silent struggle for a long time with overeating, desperately hoping that the NEXT meal will leave you pleasantly full rather than...

I’m currently on a gut-healing protocol that restricts many foods while the healing process is doing its thing, and sugar is one of the no-nos during this time…that includes natural sweeteners, like honey, maple syrup and stevia. So I’ve been on the...

My mom used to make spinach balls as an appetizer for special occasions and gatherings, and I loved them! It was always hard to save enough for the company. This is a clean eating version that’s too good to save for parties only. Try it as a savory breakfast or...

I attended the Good Food Festival last weekend at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and discovered that many Midwesterners are hard at work, creating delicious specialty food items to make our lives easier, happier and healthier. A couple of them are likely to be...

Growing up in New York, we had high-quality seafood stores nearby. My mom would come home with amazingly fresh fish for dinner like white salmon, flavorful and hearty shrimp, and other buttery, flaky cuts of various fish that tasted super fresh. Now that I live smack...

Spring is here, the weather is getting warmer, and that means…ice cream season is arriving. I love this cold, creamy indulgence as much as the next girl, but don’t want to load up with sugar, milk, cream as often as I’d like to be able to enjoy this...

Energy bars are convenient little doses of fuel that can come in super handy when we need to eat something on the go. Unfortunately, many are packed with ingredients that I recommend avoiding, like soy protein isolate, too much sugar or artificial sugars, and other...

Did you know the average American household tosses at least $640 worth of food a year? Trim your waste and your waist, AND satisfy your taste buds with some of these tips, in honor of yesterday’s Earth Day. As you’re grocery shopping:  Don’t go to...

70% of women are unhappy with their bodies. Other surprising (or not?) statistics: 45% of women with normal BMIs (normal, healthy weight range) consider themselves to be overweight. 90% of people with anorexia and bulimia are female. Millions of dollars are spent...

When I was at FNCE (the Food & Nutrition Conference & Expo, the annual conference for dietitians) a few years ago, I went to a seminar that had volunteers from the audience (all dietitians) get up on stage and step on a scale in front of the audience. The...

If you’re active on social media and scout around for recipes, you have probably heard about the cauliflower crust craze. And if you’ve ever tried making it yourself, you know how intensive a process it is. And I don’t know about yours, but mine came...

In Atlanta, where I lived for 7 years before moving to Chicago, there was a super popular popsicle company that grew from a pop-up concept (think ice cream carts on street corners) to a large-scale pop culture phenomenon (just wanted to see how many times I could use...

“To enjoy the flavor of life, take big bites.” –Robert Heinlein Hi foodie friends, I apologize for being MIA for a while. I have some news…I’m moving to the Bay Area in California! I’m looking forward to year-round farmers markets,...

Do you ever feel like staying on top of your health is a full-time job? We need to walk 10,000 steps, drink  8 glasses of water, and eat at least 5 servings of vegetables a day–not to mention all the other stuff we have to do…phew! I’ve recently...

I’m reading a new health-focused book with an interesting title: How Not to Die, by Michael Greger, MD. It promotes a vegan diet, which I’m not tied to, but presents some worthy information and useful tips either way. I’ve been enjoying reading it,...

The average American only eats half the recommended servings of vegetables per day (and we should be getting in 2.5 cups minimum, but more is even better!). As Marion Nestle, a professor of nutrition, food studies and public health at NYU, says, “Experiment!...

I hope that in this year to come, you make mistakes. Because if you are making mistakes, then you are making new things, trying new things, learning, living, pushing yourself, changing yourself, changing your world. You’re doing things you’ve never done...