Brazil Nuts vs Cashews – Which is Healthier?

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Our Verdict

When comparing Brazil nuts to cashews, we picked the cashews.

Why?

Looking at the macros first, Brazil nuts have more fat and fiber, while cashews have more carbs and protein. So, it really comes down to what you want to prioritize. We’d generally consider fiber the tie-breaker, making this category a subjective marginal win for Brazil nuts—and especially marginal since they are both low glycemic index foods in any case.

When it comes to vitamins, Brazil nuts have more of vitamins C, E, and choline, while cashews have more of vitamins B2, B3, B5, B6, B7, B9, and K, so while both are great, this category is a clear by-the-numbers win for cashews.

The category of minerals is an interesting one. Brazil nuts have more calcium, magnesium, phosphorus, and selenium, while cashews have more copper, iron, manganese, and zinc. That would be a 4:4 tie, but let’s take a closer look at those selenium levels:

  • A cup of cashews contains 109% of the RDA of selenium. Your hair will be luscious and shiny.
  • A cup of Brazil nuts contains 10,456% of the RDA of selenium. This is way past the point of selenium toxicity, and your (luscious, shiny) hair will fall out.

For this reason, it’s recommended to eat no more than 3–4 Brazil nuts per day.

We consider that a point against Brazil nuts.

Adding up the section makes for a win for cashews. Of course, enjoy Brazil nuts too if you will, but in careful moderation please!

Want to learn more?

You might like to read:

Why You Should Diversify Your Nuts

Take care!

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  • Superfood Pesto Pizza

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    Not only is this pizza full of foods that punch above their weight healthwise, there’s no kneading and no waiting when it comes to the base, either. Homemade pizzas made easy!

    You will need

    For the topping:

    • 1 zucchini, sliced
    • 1 red bell pepper, cut into strips
    • 3 oz mushrooms, sliced
    • 3 shallots, cut into quarters
    • 6 sun-dried tomatoes, roughly chopped
    • ½ bulb garlic (paperwork done, but cloves left intact, unless they are very large, in which case halve them)
    • 1 oz pitted black olives, halved
    • 1 handful arugula
    • 1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
    • 2 tsp black pepper, coarse ground
    • ½ tsp MSG or 1 tsp low-sodium salt

    For the base:

    • ½ cup chickpea flour (also called besan or gram flour)
    • 2 tsp extra virgin olive oil
    • ½ tsp baking powder
    • ⅛ tsp MSG or ¼ tsp low-sodium salt

    For the pesto sauce:

    • 1 large bunch basil, chopped
    • ½ avocado, pitted and peeled
    • 1 oz pine nuts
    • ¼ bulb garlic, crushed
    • 2 tbsp nutritional yeast
    • 1 tsp black pepper
    • Juice of ½ lemon

    Method

    (we suggest you read everything at least once before doing anything)

    1) Preheat the oven to 400℉ / 200℃.

    2) Toss the zucchini, bell pepper, mushrooms, shallots, and garlic cloves in 1 tbsp olive oil, ensuring an even coating. Season with the black pepper and MSG/salt, and put on a baking tray lined with baking paper, to roast for about 20 minutes, until they are slightly charred.

    3) When the vegetables are in the oven, make the pizza base by combining the dry ingredients in a bowl, making a pit in the middle of it, adding the olive oil and whisking it in, and then slowly (i.e., a little bit at a time) whisking in 1 cup cold water. This should take under 5 minutes.

    4) Don’t panic when this doesn’t become a dough; it is supposed to be a thick batter, so that’s fine. Pour it into a 9″ pizza pan, and bake for about 15 minutes, until firm. Rotate it if necessary partway through; whether it needs this or not will depend on your oven.

    5) While the pizza base is in the oven, make the pesto sauce by blending all the pesto sauce ingredients in a high-speed blender until smooth.

    6) When the base and vegetables are ready (these should be finished around the same time), spread the pesto sauce on the base, scatter the arugula over it followed by the vegetables and then the olives and sun-dried tomatoes.

    7) Serve, adding any garnish or other final touches that take your fancy.

    Enjoy!

    Want to learn more?

    For those interested in some of the science of what we have going on today:

    Take care!

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  • Hoisin Sauce vs Teriyaki Sauce – Which is Healthier?

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    Our Verdict

    When comparing hoisin sauce to teriyaki sauce, we picked the teriyaki sauce.

    Why?

    Neither are great! But spoonful for spoonful, the hoisin sauce has about 5x as much sugar.

    Of course, exact amounts will vary by brand, but the hoisin will invariably be much more sugary than the teriyaki.

    On the flipside, the teriyaki sauce may sometimes have slightly more salt, but they are usually in approximately the same ballpark of saltiness, so this is not a big deciding factor.

    As a general rule of thumb, the first few ingredients will look like this for each, respectively:

    Hoisin:

    • Sugar
    • Water
    • Soybeans

    Teriyaki:

    • Soy sauce (water, soybeans, salt)
    • Rice wine
    • Sugar

    In essence: hoisin is a soy-flavored syrup, while teriyaki is a sweetened soy sauce

    Wondering about that rice wine? The alcohol content is negligible, sufficiently so that teriyaki sauce is not considered alcoholic. For health purposes, it is well under the 0.05% required to be considered alcohol-free.

    For religious purposes, we are not your rabbi or imam, but to our best understanding, teriyaki sauce is generally considered kosher* (the rice wine being made from rice) and halal (the rice wine being de-alcoholized by the processing, making the sauce non-intoxicating).

    *Except during passover

    Want to try some?

    You can compare these examples side-by-side yourself:

    Hoisin sauce | Teriyaki sauce

    Enjoy!

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  • What are plyometric exercises? How all that hopping and jumping builds strength, speed and power

    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.

    If you’ve ever seen people at the gym or the park jumping, hopping or hurling weighted balls to the ground, chances are they were doing plyometric exercises.

    Examples include:

    • box jumps, where you repeatedly leap quickly on and off a box
    • lateral skater hops, where you bound from side to side like a speeding ice skater
    • rapidly throwing a heavy medicine ball against a wall, or to the ground
    • single leg hops, which may involve hopping on the spot or through an obstacle course
    • squat jumps, where you repeatedly squat and then launch yourself into the air.
    Photo by cottonbro studio/Pexels

    There are many more examples of plyometric exercises.

    What ties all these moves together is that they use what’s known as the “stretch shortening cycle”. This is where your muscles rapidly stretch and then contract.

    A runner skips over an obstacle course in a field.
    Runners routinely practise plyometric exercises to improve explosive leg strength. WoodysPhotos/Shutterstock

    Potential benefits

    Research shows incorporating plyometric exercise into your routine can help you:

    Studies have found plyometric exercises can help:

    • older people who want to retain and build muscle strength, boost bone health, improve posture and reduce the risk of falls
    • adolescent athletes who want to build the explosive strength needed to excel in sports such as athletics, tennis, soccer, basketball and football
    • female athletes who want to jump higher or change direction quickly (a useful skill in many sports)
    • endurance runners who want to boost physical fitness, run time and athletic performance.

    And when it comes to plyometric exercises, you get out what you put in.

    Research has found the benefits of plyometrics are significantly greater when every jump was performed with maximum effort.

    Women jump on and off boxes.
    Jumping can help boost bone strength. WoodysPhotos/Shutterstock

    Potential risks

    All exercise comes with risk (as does not doing enough exercise!)

    Plyometrics are high-intensity activities that require the body to absorb a lot of impact when landing on the ground or catching medicine balls.

    That means there is some risk of musculoskeletal injury, particularly if the combination of intensity, frequency and volume is too high.

    You might miss a landing and fall, land in a weird way and crunch your ankle, or get a muscle tear if you’re overdoing it.

    The National Strength and Conditioning Association, a US educational nonprofit that uses research to support coaches and athletes, recommends:

    • a maximum of one to three plyometric sessions per week
    • five to ten repetitions per set and
    • rest periods of one to three minutes between sets to ensure complete muscle recovery.
    An older person does jumps on a race track.
    With the right guidance, jumps can be safe for older people and may help reduce the risk of falls as you age. Realstock/Shutterstock

    One meta-analysis, where researchers looked at many studies, found plyometric training was feasible and safe, and could improve older people’s performance, function and health.

    Overall, with appropriate programming and supervision, plyometric exercise can be a safe and effective way to boost your health and athletic performance.

    Justin Keogh, Associate Dean of Research, Faculty of Health Sciences and Medicine, Bond University and Mandy Hagstrom, Senior Lecturer, Exercise Physiology. School of Health Sciences, UNSW Sydney

    This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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    The subtitle here, “a journey into the science of mind over body”, prompts an immediate question: is this book actually about science?

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    The author’s PhD is in genetics and medical microbiology, not metaphysics or something.

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  • How To Recognize Perfectly Hidden Depression

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    Dr. Margaret Rutherford shares her insights from 30 years of professional experience:

    There’s only one way to know

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    For more on all of this, here’s Dr. Rutherford herself:

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  • The Seven-Day Sleep Prescription – by Dr. Aric Prather

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