Acorns vs Chestnuts – Which is Healthier?
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Our Verdict
When comparing acorns to chestnuts, we picked the acorns.
Why?
In terms of macros, chestnuts are mostly water, so it’s not surprising that acorns have a lot more carbs, fat, protein, and fiber. Thus, unless you have personal reasons for any of those to be a problem, acorns are the better choice, offering a lot more nutritional value.
In the category of vitamins, acorns lead with a lot more of vitamins A, B2, B3, B5, B6, and B9, while chestnuts have more of vitamins B1 and C. However, that vitamin C is useless to us, because it is destroyed in the cooking process (by boiling or roasting), and both of these nuts can be harmful if consumed raw, so that cooking does need to be done. That leaves acorns with a 6:1 lead.
When it comes to minerals, things are more even; acorns have more copper, magnesium, manganese, and zinc, while chestnuts have more calcium, iron, phosphorus, and potassium. Thus, a 4:4 tie (and yes, the margins of difference are approximately equal too).
We mentioned “both of these nuts can be harmful if consumed raw”, so a note on that: it’s because, while both contain an assortment of beneficial phytochemicals, they also both contain tannins that, if consumed raw, chelate with iron, essentially taking it out of our diet and potentially creating an iron deficiency. Cooking tannins stops this from being an issue, and the same cooking process renders the tannins actively beneficial to the health, for their antioxidant powers.
You may have heard that acorns are poisonous; that’s not strictly speaking true, except insofar as anything could be deemed poisonous in excess (including such things as water, and oxygen). Rather, it’s simply the above-described matter of the uncooked tannins and iron chelation. Even then, you’re unlikely to suffer ill effects unless you consume them raw in a fair quantity. While acorns have fallen from popular favor sufficient that one doesn’t see them in supermarkets, the fact is they’ve been enjoyed as an important traditional part of the diet by various indigenous peoples of N. America for centuries*, and provided they are cooked first, they are a good healthy food for most people.
*(going so far as to cultivate natural oak savannah areas, by burning out young oaks to leave the old ones to flourish without competition, to maximize acorn production, and then store dried acorns in bulk sufficient to cover the next year or so in case of a bad harvest later—so these was not just an incidental food, but very important “our life may depend on this” food. Much like grain in many places—and yes, acorns can be ground into flour and used to make bread etc too)
Do note: they are both still tree nuts though, so if you have a tree nut allergy, these ones aren’t for you.
Otherwise, enjoy both; just cook them first!
Want to learn more?
You might like to read:
Why You Should Diversify Your Nuts
Take care!
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Sunflower Seeds vs Pumpkin Seeds – Which is Healthier?
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Our Verdict
When comparing sunflower seeds to pumpkin seeds, we picked the pumpkin seeds.
Why?
Both seeds have a good spread of vitamins and minerals, but pumpkin seeds have more. Sunflower seeds come out on top for copper and manganese, but everything else that’s present in either of them (in the category of vitamins and minerals, anyway), pumpkin seeds have more.
There is one other thing that sunflower seeds have more of than pumpkin seeds, and that’s fat. The fat is mostly of healthy varieties, so it’s not a negative factor, but it does mean that if you’re eating a calorie-controlled diet, you’ll get more bang for your buck (i.e. better micronutrient-to-calorie ratio) if you pick pumpkin seeds.
If you’re not concerned about fat/calories, and/or you actively want to consume more of those, then sunflower seeds are still a fine choice.
When it comes down to it, a diverse diet is best, so enjoying both might be the best option of all.
Want to get some?
We don’t sell them, but here for your convenience are example products on Amazon:
Sunflower Seeds | Pumpkin Seeds
Enjoy!
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Hazelnuts vs Pecans – Which is Healthier?
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Our Verdict
When comparing hazelnuts to pecans, we picked the hazelnuts.
Why?
In terms of macros, hazelnuts have more protein, carbs, and fiber, though the difference is not big in the latter two cases, and the glycemic indices are resultantly about the same. Meanwhile, pecans have a little more fat, but the fat is healthy in both cases. Everything taken into account, we’re calling it a tie on macros.
When it comes to vitamins, hazelnuts have more of vitamins B3, B5, B6, B7, B9, C, E, K, and choline, while pecans have more of vitamins A, B1, and B2. An easy win for hazelnuts here.
In the category of minerals, hazelnuts have more calcium, copper, iron, magnesium, manganese, phosphorus, and potassium, while pecans have more selenium and zinc. Another clear win for hazelnuts.
In short, enjoy either or both (unless you’re allergic, in which case, don’t), but hazelnuts are ultimately the more nutritionally dense of the two.
Want to learn more?
You might like to read:
Why You Should Diversify Your Nuts
Take care!
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Put Your Feet Up! (Against A Wall, For 20 Minutes)
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Feel free to browse our articles while you do
Here are 10 good reasons to give it a try; there are another 10 in the short (3:18) video:
- Improves blood circulation
- Improves blood pressure
- Relaxes the body as a whole
- Alleviates lower back tension
- Eases headaches and migraines
- Reduces knee pain
- Relieves swelling in feet and ankles
- Improves lymphatic flow
- Stretches the hamstrings (and hip flexors, if you do it wide)
- Helps quiet the mind
As for the rest…
Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically
PS: about that circulation… As a general rule of thumb, anything that slightly confuses the heart (anatomically, not romantically) will tend to have a beneficial effect, in moderation. This goes for being upside-down (as is partly the case here), and also for high-intensity interval training (HIIT):
How To Do HIIT (Without Wrecking Your Body)
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Science-backed ways to take care of your mental health this winter
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The colder, darker months can take a toll on well-being. Two out of five U.S. adults say their mental health worsens in the winter. Plus, about five percent of U.S. adults experience seasonal affective disorder (SAD), a type of depression induced by seasonal changes that typically begins when the weather gets colder and there’s less daylight.
Fortunately, there are science-backed lifestyle changes that can make this time of year more tolerable. Here’s how to take care of your mental health this winter.
Exercise regularly
When you exercise, your body releases endorphins, or “feel-good” chemicals that can improve your mood. A 2024 review of studies found that exercise—particularly walking, jogging, yoga, and strength training—can reduce symptoms of depression.
Before starting a new exercise routine, talk to your health care provider about the types of exercise that may work best for you.
Get outside
While getting outside during the colder months may feel challenging, time outdoors—especially in nature—has been shown to decrease stress, depression, and anxiety. Plus, sunlight helps your body make vitamin D, which may improve your energy and mood.
You can reap the benefits of nature no matter where you live.
“Cities can be very energetic and exciting but also can contribute to both conscious and unconscious stress from the sensory overload and challenges of maneuvering in those spaces,” said Jodie M. Smith, a Mayo Clinic nurse practitioner, in a 2024 Mayo Clinic article. “If you live in an urban environment, exploring to find even a small natural reprieve can be extremely beneficial.”
Prioritize sleep
Inadequate sleep has been linked to depression and anxiety. Taking steps to improve the quality and duration of your sleep can help you become more resilient against stressors.
You can improve your sleep by going to bed and waking up at the same time every day; avoiding caffeine, alcohol, and large meals before bed; keeping your bedroom cool and dark; and limiting exposure to distressing media in the evening.
Practice gratitude
Research suggests that people who practice gratitude are less likely to experience depression. It can also help you make lifestyle changes that improve your well-being overall.
“Practicing gratitude may also make someone a bit more motivated to take care of their health,” said Tyler VanderWeele, co-director of the Initiative on Health, Spirituality, and Religion at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, in a 2024 Harvard Health Publishing article. “Maybe they’re more likely to show up for medical appointments or exercise. It may also help with relationships and social support, which we know contribute to health.”
Add more gratitude to your life by sharing what you’re grateful for with others or keeping a gratitude journal.
Spend quality time with loved ones
“Social isolation and loneliness have a serious impact on physical and mental health, quality of life, and longevity,” according to the World Health Organization, with effects comparable to other risk factors like smoking.
Research shows that people who have close confidants are more satisfied with their lives and less likely to experience depression. Even after holiday gatherings have ended, schedule time with friends and family to stay positive and feel supported.
Limit cell phone use
Social media use and “doomscrolling” inflammatory news headlines are both associated with anxiety and depression across age groups, especially in teens.
“Excessive social media use is associated with behaviors, such as poor sleep, increased social comparisons, impact on learning, and exposure to cyberbullying and negative content, that could contribute to the worsening of depressive symptoms,” Dr. Carol Vidal, an assistant professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, said in a Hopkins Medicine article.
Minimize the time you and your family members spend on your phones by pausing notifications, keeping your phone out of reach when you’re preparing for sleep, using a “grayscale” setting to make scrolling less enticing, and finding phone-free hobbies to enjoy.
Light therapy
Light therapy is one treatment for people who have been diagnosed with SAD. It involves sitting in front of a bright light box for 30 to 45 minutes per day to increase light exposure.
This treatment may not be right for people who take certain medications or have eye diseases. Talk to your health care provider about whether light therapy is right for you and what type of light box you should use.
Seek professional support
If your mental health over the winter interferes with your daily functioning, seek help from a therapist, support group, or mental health hotline. Find resources here.
This article first appeared on Public Good News and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
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We Are Such Stuff As Fish Are Made Of
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Research Review: Collagen
For something that’s a very popular supplement, not many people understand what collagen is, where it comes from, or what it does.
In a nutshell:
Collagen is a kind of protein. Our bodies make it naturally, and we can also get more in our diet and/or take extra as a supplement.
Our bodies use collagen in connective tissue, skin, tendon, bone, and cartilage. It has many functions, but a broad description would be “holding things together”.
As we get older, our bodies produce less collagen. Signs of this include wrinkles, loss of skin hydration, and joint pain.
Quick test: pinch the skin on the middle of the back of one of your hands, and then watch what happens when you get low. How quickly and easily did your skin returns to its original shape?
If it was pretty much instantanous and flawless, congratulations, you have plenty of collagen (and also elastin). If you didn’t, you are probably low on both!
(they are quite similar proteins and are made from the same base “stuff”, so if you’re low on one, you’ll usually be low on both)
Quick note: A lot of research out there has been funded by beauty companies, so we had our work cut out for us today, and have highlighted where any research may be biased.
More than skin deep
While marketing for collagen is almost exclusively aimed at “reduce wrinkles and other signs of aging”, it does a lot more than that.
You remember we mentioned that many things from the bones outward are held together by collagen? We weren’t kidding…
Read: Osteoporosis, like skin ageing, is caused by collagen loss which is reversible
Taking extra collagen isn’t the only way
We can’t (yet!) completely halt the age-related loss of collagen, but we can slow it, with our lifestyle choices:
- Don’t smoke tobacco
- Drink only in moderation (or not at all)
- Avoid foods with added sugar, and high-processed foods in general
- Wear sunscreen when appropriate
Can I get collagen from food?
Yep! Just as collagen holds our bodies together, it holds the bodies of other animals together. And, just like collagen is found in most parts of our body but most plentifully in our skin and bones, that’s what to eat to get collagen from other animals, e.g:
- Chicken skin
- Fish skin
- Bone broth ← health benefits and recipes at this link!
What about vegans?
Yes, vegans are also held together by collagen! We do not, however, recommend eating their skin or boiling their bones into broth. Ethical considerations aside, cannibalism can give you CJD!
More seriously, if you’re vegan, you can’t get collagen from a plant-based diet, but you can get the stuff your body uses to make collagen. Basically, you want to make sure you get plenty of:
- Protein (beans, pulses, nuts, etc are all fine; it’s hard to go wrong with this)
- Vitamin C
- Vitamin D
- and Zinc
Just be sure to continue to remember to avoid highly-processed foods. So:
- Soy mince/chunks whose ingredients list reads: “soya”? Yes!
- The Incredible Burger or Linda McCartney’s Sausages? Sadly less healthy
Read: Advanced Glycation End Products in Foods and a Practical Guide to Their Reduction in the Diet
Meat-eaters might want to read that one too. By far the worst offenders for AGEs (Advanced Glycation End Products, which can not only cause collagen to stiffen, but also inactivate proteins responsible for collagen repair, along with doing much more serious damage to your body’s natural functions) include:
- Hot dogs
- Bacon
- Fried/roasted/grilled meats
Is it worth it as a supplement?
That depends on you, your age, and your lifestyle, but it’s generally considered safe*
*if you have a seafood allergy, be careful though, as many supplements are from fish or shellfish—you will need to find one that’s free from your allergen
Also, all collagen is animal-derived. So if you’re a vegan, decide for yourself whether this constitutes medicine and if so, whether that makes it ethically permissible to you.
With that out of the way:
What the science says on collagen supplementation
Collagen for skin
Read: Effects of collagen supplementation on skin aging (systematic review and meta-analysis)
The short version is that they selected 19 studies with over a thousand participants in total, and they found:
In the meta-analysis, a grouped analysis of studies showed favorable results of hydrolyzed collagen supplementation compared with placebo in terms of skin hydration, elasticity, and wrinkles.
The findings of improved hydration and elasticity were also confirmed in the subgroup meta-analysis.
Based on results, ingestion of hydrolyzed collagen for 90 days is effective in reducing skin aging, as it reduces wrinkles and improves skin elasticity and hydration.
Caveat: while that systematic review had no conflicts of interests, at least some of the 19 studies will have been funded by beauty companies. Here are two, so that you know what that looks like:
Funded by Quiris to investigate their own supplement, Elasten®:
A Collagen Supplement Improves Skin Hydration, Elasticity, Roughness, and Density
Funded by BioCell to investigate their own supplement, BioCell Collagen:
The Effects of Skin Aging Associated with the Use of BioCell Collagen
A note on funding bias: to be clear, the issue is not that the researchers might be corrupt (though that could happen).
The issue is more that sometimes companies will hire ten labs to do ten research studies… and then pull funding from ones whose results aren’t going the way they’d like.
So the “best” (for them) study is the one that gets published.
Here’s another systematic review—like the one at the top of this section—that found the same, with doses ranging from 2.5g–15g per day for 8 weeks or longer:
Read: Oral Collagen Supplementation: A Systematic Review of Dermatological Applications
Again, some of those studies will have been funded by beauty companies. The general weight of evidence does seem clear and favorable, though.
Collagen for bones
Here, we encountered a lot less in the way of potential bias, because this is simply marketed a lot less. Despite being arguably far more important!
We found a high quality multi-vector randomized controlled study with a sample size of 131 postmenopausal women. They had these women take 5g collagen supplement (or placebo), and studied the results over the course of a year.
They found:
- The intake of the supplement increased bone mineral density (BMD)
- Supplementation was also associated with a favorable shift in bone markers, indicating:
- increased bone formation
- reduced bone degradation
Read: Specific Collagen Peptides Improve Bone Mineral Density and Bone Markers in Postmenopausal Wome
A follow-up study with 31 of these women found that taking 5 grams of collagen daily for a total of 4 years was associated with a progressive increase in BMD.
You might be wondering if collagen also helps against osteoarthritis.
The answer is: yes, it does (at least, it significantly reduces the symptoms)
Read: Effect of collagen supplementation on osteoarthritis symptoms
In summary:
- You need collagen for health skin, bones, joints, and more
- Your body makes collagen from your food
- You can help it by getting plenty of protein, vitamins, and minerals
- You can also help it by not doing the usual Bad Things™ (smoking, drinking, eating processed foods, especially processed meats)
- You can also eat collagen directly in the form of other animals’ skin and bones
- You can also buy collagen supplements (but watch out for allergens)
Want to try collagen supplementation?
We don’t sell it (or anything else), but for your convenience…
Check it out: Hydrolyzed Collagen Peptides (the same as in most of the above studies), 90 days supply at 5g/day
We selected this one because it’s the same kind used in many of the studies, and it doesn’t contain any known allergens.
It’s bovine collagen, meaning it’s from cows, so it’s not vegan, and also some subscribers may want to abstain for religious reasons. We respect that, and/but make our recommendations based solely on the science of health and productivity.
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Peanuts vs Hazelnuts – Which is Healthier?
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
Our Verdict
When comparing peanuts to hazelnuts, we picked the hazelnuts.
Why?
It was close!
In terms of macros, peanuts have more protein while hazelnuts have more fiber and fat; the fat is healthy (mostly monounsaturated, some polyunsaturated, and very little saturated; less saturated fat than peanuts), so all in all, we’ll call this category a modest, subjective win for hazelnuts (since it depends on what we consider most important).
In the category of vitamins, peanuts have more of vitamins B2, B3, B5, B9, and choline, while hazelnuts have more of vitamins A, B1, B6, C, E, and K, making this one a marginal win for hazelnuts.
When it comes to minerals, peanuts have more magnesium, phosphorus, selenium, and zinc, while hazelnuts have more calcium, copper, iron, and manganese, so we’re calling it a tie on minerals.
Adding up the sections makes for a very close win for hazelnuts, but by all means enjoy both (unless you are allergic, of course)!
Want to learn more?
You might like to read:
Why You Should Diversify Your Nuts!
Enjoy!
Don’t Forget…
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