Survey: America's Getting Fatter (But There's Good News!)

DailySpark readers, we have an emergency on our hands. It's time to Spread the Spark, stat!

This year's state-by-state obesity statistics are in, and the news isn't good.
Here are some of the highlights of the report, published by the research group Trust for America's Health:

• Adult obesity rates increased in 23 states and did not decrease in a single state in the past year
  
  
• The percentage of obese or overweight children is at or above 30 percent in 30 states.
  
  
• Mississippi had the highest rate of adult obesity at 32.5 percent, making it the fifth year in a row that the state topped the list.
  
  
• Four states now have rates above 30 percent, including Mississippi, Alabama (31.2 percent), West Virginia (31.1 percent), and Tennessee (30.2 percent).
  
  
• Eight of the 10 states with the highest percentage of obese adults and the highest rates of obese and overweight children are in the South.

  Posted 7/2/2009  1:00:11 PM By:   : 105 comments   23,080 views

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Your Summer Party Survival Guide

Today is Canada Day and Fourth of July is Saturday, which means plenty of celebrating across the continent. While a family cookout or a neighborhood barbecue is supposed to be a time to eat, drink and be merry, those of us trying to follow a healthy path can find such events to be more trying than entertaining.

The endless platters of grilled meats.

The bottomless bowls of mayo-laden salads.

The ceaseless parade of refined carbs.

A typical meal from a cookout can have more than 1,500 calories and almost as much fat as you should eat for an entire day. You can cut the calories in half and boost the flavor with a few simple tricks!

'So You Think You Can Dance' Meets 'The Biggest Loser': Will You Tune In?

The Biggest Loser, NBC's weight-loss reality show, is a hit.
So is FOX's dance show, So You Think You Can Dance?

Now Oxygen has a show that seems to combine them both. Contestants compete in both dance and weight-loss challenges each week on the show Dance Your A** Off. The winner will take home $100,000!
I just watched a sneak peek on the Oxygen website:

Trice shows her new, professional dance partner what she can do. The 23-year-old breaks out into the splits and busts moves I've only seen in music videos! Did I mention that she weighs 274 pounds? She's impressive! I can't wait to see more.

Will you tune in?

Weekly Links: Operation Beautiful Grows and How to Get a Workout in the Kitchen!

It's Friday and time for a roundup of the week's most interesting, educational and entertaining links. Our first link is an update on last week's link roundup. Read on!

UPDATE: Operation Beautiful
Caitlin had such a tremendous response from all of you dailySpark readers and others that she expanded Operation Beautiful into its own site! Check out all the happy, feel-good notes. (I posted three and sent her photos!)

Check out Operation Beautiful!

Speedy Suppers: Baked Salmon Dijon

Fast, easy, tasty.

That's what dinner should be.

This week's Speedy Supper is ready in 20 minutes and requires little work on your end. Whisk together a quick Dijon mustard sauce, spread it over salmon fillets and pop them in the oven. While the fish is cooking (and you can swap the salmon for any kind of fish you like or even chicken breasts), cook up a bag of frozen broccoli and some whole-wheat couscous or brown rice. Pour everyone a glass of milk and serve some grapes or fresh melon on the side and relax for a couple of minutes until the oven timer goes off.
Eat and enjoy.

Get the recipe for Baked Salmon Dijon now.

CONTEST CLOSED: Better-for-You Chips for Your July 4 BBQ

Fourth of July is fast approaching, and that means fireworks, sparklers--and cookouts! And what's a backyard barbecue without a few tasty sides?
In honor of our nation's birthday and in the spirit of eating more healthful foods, the folks at popchips reached out to us.

We tried their popped (not baked or fried, but popped!) chips last year and liked them. They wanted to make your backyard BBQ even more festive with a fun giveaway.

They're going to give 2 lucky readers a variety of the single-serving bags of these chips. This giveaway is worth more than $50--you'll get 48 bags to share at your party. (No need to worry about raiding the chip bowl too many times if you stick with just one bag per person!)

They're portion-controlled, 100 calories a pack and available in plenty of flavors.

We Share Our Favorite 100-Calorie Ice Cream Treats

When the mercury started rising, we hit the supermarkets, scouring the freezer section for the tastiest low-calorie ice cream treats. We tried a few, and we selected three 100-calorie treats to share with you. (There were a few higher-calorie runner-ups, too!)
Read on to find out what we thought!


Skinny Cow Chocolate Truffle bars
They say: "My divinely decadent chocolate ice cream bar, drizzled with chocolatey ribbons, is surprisingly skinny."

We say: "The Skinny Cow Truffle Bars are delicious, amazing, fantastic. Seriously, I love these. They're creamy and chocolatey."

"I tried the truffle and it was very good for 100 calories. I would consider buying them.
I usually buy Skinny Cow at home. This would just be another lighter ice cream option."

"One word: Ahhh…"

Weekly Links: No Jobs for Smokers, Operation Beautiful and Zicam Warning Issued

It's bad enough that you lose your sense of smell when you get a cold, but the U.S. Food and Drug Administration says that a popular homeopathic remedy might leave without olfactory abilities long after your sniffles stop.

And to add more bad news to an already dour economic outlook, if you're looking for a job, you might want to give up the smokes, as at least one company--a large insurer--is requiring that new employees kick the habit.

This week's popular links have my mind racing, especially the final one. Read on for more info, and share your thoughts on the week's top headlines.

Humana: We won't hire smokers
"Humana of Ohio will require all new employees who smoke to quit the habit.
The insurer, which employs more than 1,200 people at its new headquarters in Walnut Hills and hundreds more at a distribution center in West Chester, said Monday it would give all new employees a questionnaire.

If the workers use tobacco, they will have 31 days to enroll in a program called Breathe."

Should smokers be required to quit or risk losing a job? The story is hazy on details, but do you think not hiring smokers is a fair practice?
From Cincinnati.com

Healthy Salad Dressings
"Spice up a boring salad without adding tons of calories using these healthy salad dressings."

How do you top your salads? Do you reach for a bottle or make your own? (Personally, I'm keen on salsa, guacamole, hummus or light sour cream with fresh herbs!)
From Fitness Magazine

Speedy Suppers: Coach Nicole's Mini Frittatas

Judging from last week's response, you like the new Speedy Suppers blog series we've started.

Our Skillet Lasagna was last week's most viewed post.

We're going to continue to bring you Speedy Suppers each Thursday, and we need your help. Post your suggestions in the comment section below. Your recipe must be on SparkRecipes.com, so if it's not already, upload it soon!

This week's Speedy Supper comes from our very own Coach Nicole, who has been making these mini frittatas for years. The recipe calls for tomatoes, goat cheese and broccoli, but you can use any cheese or vegetables you'd like.

I know she shakes up the recipe from time to time, and I've made it myself a few times. I swapped red peppers for tomatoes, feta for the goat cheese and spinach for the broccoli. You really can't go wrong!
While she usually makes them for breakfast, I thought they'd make a great dinner.

Each frittata has just 71 calories (I usually eat two), and it's great paired with salsa or a green salad and whole-grain toast.

Does SPF 100 = 100% Sun Protection?

I've become a sunscreen connoisseur by necessity.

I should have been born during the Victorian era. With my incredibly pale skin and inability to withstand hot weather (I've passed out on more than one outing to amusement parks or outdoor festivals despite proper shade and hydration), I am better suited to recline on a chaise lounge, one hand clutching a cool drink or silk fan and the other pressed to my forehead in melodramatic fashion.

But while a cultural anachronism I might be, I'm no wilting flower and love being active outdoors during nice weather. That means that before I think about heading outside any time of year, I'm quick to slather myself in sunscreen.

I wear Neutrogena Healthy Defense (SPF 45) on my face year-round, and since junior high, I reach for the highest SPF on the shelf for the rest of my body.

A decade or so ago, the highest SPF was 25 or 30. Then 45 was tops for a few years, soon followed by 55, 60, and in 2008, Coppertone's 70+--the highest ever. This year, Neutrogena's 100+ hit the market.

All those numbers can be confusing. Is higher always better? What should you know about sunscreen?

Could You Give It All Up to Follow Your Dream?

Eustace Conway is a man who never accepted the word no, who never worried about how others perceived his life, who never gave up on his dream.

Who is Eustace Conway?

"By the time Eustace Conway was seven years old, he could throw a knife accurately enough to nail a chipmunk to a tree. By the time he was ten, he could hit a running squirrel at fifty feet with a bow and arrow. When he turned twelve, he went out into the woods, alone and empty-handed, built himself a shelter, and survived off the land for a week. When he turned seventeen, he moved out of his family's home altogether and headed into the mountains, where he lived in a teepee of his own design, made fire by rubbing two sticks together, bathed in icy streams, and dressed in the skins of the animals he had hunted and eaten."

Author Elizabeth Gilbert called him "The Last American Man" (in the biography of the same name, excerpted above); others have named him a modern-day Daniel Boone.

More simply--and more importantly--he's a man who's following his dream.

What Fat-Free Flavor Booster is the Nation's Top Topping?

What is the country's favorite condiment? Hint: It's red and comes in a bottle. It goes with almost every food imaginable and is fat free!

It's salsa, which in 1992 outsold our other favorite tomato product, ketchup, for the very first time. Since then, the former shares a razor-thin margin of victory that sometimes, depending on the source and the survey, falls to second place behind the latter.

Regardless of its gold or silver status, there's no doubting salsa's appeal. Whereas a decade ago, you might find three varieties of salsa: mild, medium and hot, today salsas fill row upon row at the supermarket.

Pico de gallo, salsa verde, peach salsa, mango salsa, avocado salsa, black bean salsa--the varieties are endless. Salsa means "sauce" in Spanish, but the traditional pico de gallo, a chunky mix of tomatoes, onion, and chili peppers, is ubiquitous. I'm sure hard-core salsa aficionados would argue otherwise, but any (usually) raw sauce made from vegetables and fruit can be called "salsa."

Speedy Suppers: Skillet Lasagna

Mmm, Italian food.

Cheesy, rich and delicious.

Whether it's covered in red sauce, white sauce or anything in between, we're fans of all fare from the boot-shaped country. My boyfriend, Fred, lived in Naples as a kid and his mom cooks some really delicious, authentic meals. When he makes dinner, it's usually some sort of pasta dish.
Unfortunately, Italian favorites like spaghetti and meatballs or lasagna are fairly time-consuming for a weeknight meal. They're pretty heavy, too!

I came across this popular dish on SparkRecipes: Skillet Lasagna. It takes just under half an hour, instead of an hour or more like regular lasagna. A perfect addition to our Speedy Suppers blog series. Seems like a keeper to me! Plus, it has only 336.5 calories and 10.6 g fat and serves six. Leftovers--yeah!

We'll be making some modifications to this recipe in our flexitarian household, but the versatility is one of the advantages of this dish. Here are some tips to modify this recipe for your family.

How to Do Alternate Nostril Breathing in Yoga

I don't relax very easily. I am naturally a nervous, anxious, fidgety person. (Just ask my boyfriend how distracting it can be to watch a movie with me--I'm up every 30 minutes or so and constantly readjust on the couch.)

When I started practicing yoga a couple of years ago, I dreaded the final pose--savasana, or corpse pose. It's meant to help you rejuvenate your body and reduce stress and tension. Well, this pose caused anxiety and tension in me! Lying on the floor for who knows how long, just breathing and letting go! That's hard!

Eventually, as I practiced, I grew more comfortable in savasana. I actually like it now--most of the time. And in addition, I've embraced some of the other relaxation techniques my yoga teachers have taught me, which I hope to share with you.

The first one I want to share with you is a breathing exercise that helps me feel more balanced.

Wednesday was one of those days.

There was an error on one of my bills, and I spent 30 minutes on the phone trying to straighten it out. I forgot to mail an important letter and had to turn around to get it. It was rainy, and the sun was nowhere to be seen. I was tired and overall just didn't feel my best.

By noon, I was ready for a break but had too much to do to get away to the gym just then. Instead, I closed my eyes and practiced a balanced breathing exercise. Two minutes later, I opened my eyes and felt instantly more relaxed.

It's about 3 o'clock right now, which means you're probably scrambling to finish all the tasks you need to accomplish today, the afternoon munchies are setting in, and you're wondering how you'll keep your cool.

Perfect timing.

So what is this two-minute wonder, and how does it work?