In my bookHow Not to Die, I center my recommendations around aDaily Dozen checklistofeverythingI try to fit into my daily routine.
In my bookHow Not to Die, I suggest we trytocenterour diets around whole plant foods. Some plants are healthier than others, though.Apparently, you can live for extended periodseatingpractically nothing but white potatoes, for example, and, by definition, that would be a whole food, plant-based diet—but not a very healthy one. All plant foods are not created equal.
The more I’ve researched over the years, the more I’ve come to realize that healthy foods are not necessarily interchangeable. Some foods and food groups have special nutrients not found in abundance elsewhere. For example, sulforaphane, the amazing liver-enzyme detox-boosting compound, is derived nearly exclusively from cruciferous vegetables. You could eat tons of other kinds of greens and vegetables on a given day and getnoappreciable sulforaphane if you didn’t eat something cruciferous.Same with flaxseeds and the anticancer lignan compounds:Flax may averagea hundredtimes more lignans than other foods. And mushrooms? Well, mushroomsaren’t even plants. They belong to an entirely different biological classification and containsomenutrientslikeergothioneinethatmaynotbemadeanywherein the plant kingdom. So,technically, maybe I should be referring to a whole food, plant-and fungus-based diet…but that soundsa littlegross.
It seems like every time I come home from the medical library buzzing with some exciting new data, my family rolls their eyes, sighs, and asks,Whatcan’t we eat now?Or they’ll say,Wait a second. Why does everything seem to have parsley in it all of a sudden?They’re very tolerant!
As the list offoodsI tried to fit into my daily diet grew, I made a checklist andputit up on a little dry-erase board on the fridge, and we made a game out of ticking off the boxes. This evolved into my Daily Dozen, the checklistofeverythingI try to fit into my daily routine. In my videoDr. Greger’s Daily Dozen Checklist, you can see the list, the daily minimum servings I recommend,and examples of foods that go into each category. My Daily Dozen includes Beans, Berries, Other Fruits, Cruciferous Vegetables, Greens, Other Vegetables, Flaxseeds, Nuts and Seeds, Herbs and Spices, Whole Grains, Beverages, and Exercise.
ByBeans, I mean legumes, which also include split peas, chickpeas, and lentils.It may not seem like you’re eating beans when you havea bowl of pea soup, for example,or dip carrots into hummus, but you are. We should try to getat leastthree servings a day. A serving is defined as a quarter cup of hummus or bean dip;a half cup of cooked beans, split peas, lentils, tofu, or tempeh;or a full cup of fresh peas or sprouted lentils.Technically, peanuts are legumes, but,nutritionally, Iputthem inmy Daily DozenNutsandSeedscategory.Similarly,I put green beans, snap peas, and string beans into the Other Vegetables category.
My Daily Dozen includes at least one serving ofBerries a day, whichis ahalf cupoffresh or frozen, or a quarter cup of dried. Biologically speaking, avocados, bananas, and even watermelons aretechnicallyberries, but to simplify things, I use the colloquial term for any small edible fruit. So,this category includeskumquats, grapes,raisins,and fruits that are typically thought of as berrieseven though they technicallyaren’t, like blackberries, cherries, mulberries, raspberries, and strawberries.
ForOtherFruits, a serving is a medium-sized fruit, a cup of cut-up fruit, or a quarter cup of dried fruit, and I recommend at least three daily servings. Again, I’m using the colloquial rather than the botanical definition, which is whyI puttomatoes in the Other Vegetables group.
CruciferousVegetables include broccoli, cabbage,cauliflower,Brussels sprouts,collards, and kale, andI recommend at least onehalf-cupserving a day. My Daily Dozen also calls forat least two additionaldailyservings ofGreens, cruciferous or otherwise, and two servingof OtherVegetables, with a serving beinga cupofraw leafy vegetables, a half cup for raw or cookednon-leafy vegetables, and a quarter cupofdried mushrooms.
Everyone should try to incorporate one tablespoon of groundFlaxseeds into their daily diet, in addition tooneserving ofNutsand Seeds. A quarter cup of nuts is considered a serving, oryou can havetwo tablespoons of nut or seed butters, including peanut butter. Chestnuts and coconuts don’t countnutritionallyas nuts.
For my Herbs and Spices category,I recommendaquarter teaspoon a day of the spice turmeric, along with any other salt-free herbs and spices you may enjoy.
To meet my Daily Dozen, you need at least three servings of Whole Grains, and aserving can be a half cup of hot cereal(likeoatmeal), cooked whole grains or so-calledpseudograins(like amaranth, buckwheat, and quinoa),cooked pasta,or corn kernels;a cup of ready-to-eat cold cereal;one tortilla or slice of bread;half a bagel orenglishmuffin, or three cups of air-popped popcorn.
The serving size in theBeverage category is one 12-ounce glass, and I recommendat leastfiveservingsa day in addition to the water you get naturally from the foods in your diet. If you’re curious, Iexplainmyrationale inmyHow Many Glasses of Water Should We Drink a Day?video.
Finally,my Daily Dozen calls for at leastone daily “serving” of exercise, which can be split up over the day. I recommend 90 minutes of moderate-intensity activity, such aswalkingbriskly(for instance, ata pace offour miles per hour),or40 minutes of vigorous activity,like jogging or active sports.Seemy videoHow Much Should You Exercise?if you’d like more information.
This may sound like a lot of boxes to check, but it’s easy to knock off a bunch at a time. One simple peanut butterandbanana sandwichon whole-grain breadcan check off four boxes, andimaginehow many Daily Dozen boxes you could tick off when yousit down to a big saladoftwo cups of spinach, a handful ofarugula, a handful of walnuts, a half cup of chickpeas, a half cup of red bell pepper, and a small tomato.That’ssevenboxes injustonesalad!Sprinkle on your flaxseeds, add a handful of goji berries, enjoy it with a glass of water, and endwith somefruit for dessert, and you justmetnearly halfofthe DailyDozenin a single meal! And,if you just ate it on your treadmill…just kidding!
Do I check off each glass of water I drink? No. In fact, I don’t even use the checklist anymore. I just used it initially as a tool to get me into a routine. Whenever Isatdown to a meal, Ichallenged myself by asking,Could I add greens to this? Could I add beans to this? Can I sprinkle on some flax or pumpkin seeds? What aboutsome dried fruit?The checklist just got me into the habit ofwondering howIcanmakeeachmeal even healthier.
The checklistalsohelped with grocery shopping. Although I always keep bags of frozen berries and greens in the freezer, if I’m at the store and want to buy fresh produce for the week, it helps me figure out how much kale orblueberriesI need.
In fact, the checklistevenhelpedme picture what a meal might look like.When you look over the Daily Dozen, as you can see at 6:44 inmyvideo, you see that it includes three servings each ofBeans,Other Fruits, andWholeGrains, and about twice as many vegetables in total than any other component, when you add up the Cruciferous Vegetables, Greens, and Other Vegetables. So,glancing at my plate, I can imagine one quarter of it filled with grains, one quarter with legumes, and vegetablestaking up the other half, along with a side salad and fruit for dessert, for instance. Ireallylike one-bowl meals where everything’s mixed together,andeventhenthe checklist helps me visualize. Instead of a big bowl of spaghetti with some veggies and lentils on top, I think of a big bowl of vegetables with some pasta and lentils mixed in. Instead of a big plate of quinoa with some stir-fried vegetables, I picture a meal that’s mostly vegetables with some quinoa and beansaddedin there,too.
There’s no need to be obsessive about the Daily Dozen. On hectic travel days, when I’ve burned through my snacks andfind myselfstuck in some airport food court, I’m lucky if I hitevena quarter of my goals.
If you eat poorly one day, just try to eat better the next.
To help track your progress, volunteers created Dr. Greger’s Daily Dozen apps for both iPhone and Android. You can download and use them both for free withnoadsandnocost.
My hope is that the checklist will serve as a helpful reminder to try to eat a variety of some the healthiest foods every day.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
- All plant foods are not created equal, so although we should try to center our diets around whole plant foods, we should be sure to incorporate the most healthful ones.
- Some of the most special and important nutrients are sulforaphane, which is found almost exclusively in cruciferous vegetables, and flaxseeds with their anticancer lignan compounds.
- The Daily Dozen checklist is the synopsis of recommendations I make in my book How Not to Die, incorporating everything I try to fit into my daily routine and lists categories and minimum servings.
- My Daily Dozen includes Beans (and legumes, including split peas, chickpeas, and lentils), Berries, Other Fruits, Cruciferous Vegetables, Greens, Other Vegetables, Flaxseeds, Nuts and Seeds, Herbs and Spices, Whole Grains, Beverages, and Exercise.
- The Daily Dozen is intended to inspire you to eat more healthful options and look at each eating experience as an opportunity to maximize nutrition.
- To help you tick the Daily Dozen boxes, volunteers created Dr. Greger’s Daily Dozen app, completely free to download and use, and available for both iPhone and Android.
Thiswasquite the departure from our regular blogs! Normally,we justsharethe science from the primary sources in the peer-reviewed medical literature, but I want NutritionFacts.org to be more than just a reference site. I want it to be a practical guide on translating this mountain of data into day-to-day decisions, which iswhere my Daily Dozenappslips into the mix. It’s available for free oniTunesandas anAndroid app,thanks to an amazing group of volunteers throughourOpen Source Initiative.
For more introductory-type videos,check out:
- How Not to Die from Heart Disease
- How Not to Die from Cancer
- How Not to Die from Diabetes
- How Not to Die from Kidney Disease
- HowNottoDiefromHighBloodPressure
- What Is the Healthiest Diet?
- Dining by Traffic Light: Green Is for Go, Red Is for Stop
- What Are the Best Foods?
Howcanyou actually incorporate those Daily Dozen foods into your diet? Check outmyHow Not to Die Cookbook.If you didn’t already know, all the proceeds I receive from that—and all my books, in fact—go tocharity.
In health,
Michael Greger, M.D.
PS: If you haven’t yet, you can subscribe to my free videoshereand watch my live presentations:
- 2019:Evidence-Based Weight Loss
- 2016:How Not To Die: The Role of Diet in Preventing, Arresting, and Reversing Our Top 15 Killers
- 2015:Food as Medicine: Preventing and Treating the Most Dreaded Diseases with Diet
- 2014:From Table to Able: Combating Disabling Diseases with Food
- 2013:More Than an Apple a Day
- 2012:Uprooting the Leading Causes of Death
