New Bread of Pompadour in Japan

Korean-style Chicken Sandwich

Chicken Curry Bun

Peanut Cream Sandwich

Whipped Cream and Rum Raisin Sandwiches

The prices are from 237 yen to 378 yen each (tax included).

 

 

 

 

Large Study: Vitamin D Supplements Won’t Help Your Bones

Dennis Thompson wrote . . . . . . . . .

Seniors who take vitamin D supplements to improve their bone health and ward off fractures are just wasting their time and money, a major new study has found.

These supplements did nothing to reduce their average risk of bone fractures, researchers found in a randomized trial testing vitamin D against a placebo.

“In generally healthy adults, these results do not support the use of vitamin D supplements to reduce fracture risk,” said lead researcher Dr. Meryl LeBoff, chief of the Calcium and Bone Section at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. “We found that supplemental vitamin D did not reduce fractures in U.S. participants.”

In the study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, more than 25,000 older adults were randomly assigned to take either 2,000 units of vitamin D daily or a placebo, and then followed for an average of five years. The average age of participants was 67.

Nearly 2,000 bone fractures occurred among more than 1,500 participants during the study period. However, taking vitamin D appears to have had no bearing on who suffered a fracture and who didn’t.

Nearly 20% of U.S. adults currently take vitamin D supplements, researchers said in background notes, often based on blood tests that find they have “insufficient” or “deficient” levels of vitamin D.

These new results should cause both doctors and patients to question the value of routine vitamin D testing, said Dr. Steven Cummings, a professor emeritus at the University of California, San Francisco.

“Doctors routinely order vitamin D levels, and many patients hear that they are low, they’re below some level,” said Cummings, co-author of an editorial accompanying the findings. “What we needed to know is whether those people who have low levels benefit from taking vitamin D. And the answer to that is no.”

The clinical trial could shake the vitamin D market, which is worth more than $1 billion globally according to market watchers.

Vitamin D had been thought to help improve bone health because it is essential to your body’s absorption of calcium, LeBoff said.

“Mechanistically, vitamin D may support bone health and improve mineralization of bone because it increases the absorption of calcium, and 99% of calcium is stored in bone,” LeBoff said, adding that studies had also shown that the vitamin could affect bone turnover and bone formation.

In addition, some bone diseases such as rickets have been linked to a severe vitamin D deficiency in people, Cummings noted.

Most people get enough vitamin D naturally via their skin, which produces it when exposed to sunlight, LeBoff said.

It’s also found in vitamin D-supplemented milk, eggs and cereal, as well in fish like salmon, trout and tuna, she said.

Cummings believes there’s a fundamental misunderstanding of vitamin D that’s likely driving all this testing for vitamin D deficiency.

His editorial noted that more than 10 million blood tests for vitamin D levels are performed every year in the United States.

“There’s a system in your body that’s kept in balance by vitamin D that you take in, the vitamin D from your skin and the enzymes that turn it into an active form of vitamin D called D125. That system is kept in balance naturally by your body,” Cummings said.

“I think what we’re learning is that vitamin D is not a vitamin, it’s a hormone, and it’s hard to perturb that balance, to change that balance in a beneficial way,” he said.

LeBoff noted that this study did not include people with osteoporosis, a genetically driven vitamin D deficiency, or very elderly people living in residential communities.

For people in these groups, supplemental vitamin D could be helpful or essential in maintaining their bone health.

“Don’t stop your grandfather’s vitamin D, because these findings really are found in mid-life and older adults,” LeBoff said.

Source: HealthDay

 

 

 

 

Afternoon Tea of The New Otani Hotel in Japan

The price is 7,150 yen (plus service charges) per person.

Garden Lounge

 

 

 

 

Chart: Egg Prices Sky-High As Breakfast Inflation Pressures American Households

Source: Bloomberg and AFP

 

 

 

 

Spinach and Mushroom Roulade

Ingredients

8 oz frozen spinach or 1 lb fresh spinach
knob of butter
4 eggs, separated
salt
freshly ground black pepper
1 oz Parmesan cheese, grated

Filling

1/2 oz butter
6 oz mushrooms, sliced
1 tablespoon plain flour
1/2 cup milk
pinch of nutmeg

Method

1. Line a 12 x 8 inch Swiss roll tin with greaseproof paper and oil lightly, or make a case of the same measurements with aluminium foil.
2. Cook the spinach with a knob of butter until completely softened. Drain the spinach well, chop if fresh and place in a large bowl.
3. Add the egg yolks and beat them well into the spinach. Season with salt and pepper.
4. Whisk the egg whites in a large bowl until just holding their shape.
5. Using a metal spoon, quickly fold these into the spinach mixture.
6. Turn the mixture into the prepared tin, sprinkle the Parmesan cheese over the surface, and bake in a preheated oven at 200°C/400°F for 10 minutes.
7. Make the filling. Heat the butter in a saucepan and gently fry the mushrooms until softened.
8. Stir in the flour and cook for a further 1 minute.
9. Slowly stir in the milk and cook until thickened.
10. Stir in the nutmeg, salt and pepper to taste.
11. Remove the roulade from the oven and turn out on to a sheet of greaseproof paper.
12. Spread the mushroom filling over the surface and gently roll the roulade up.
13. Serve immediately

Makes 3 to 4 servings.

Source: The Encyclopedia of Creative Cookery

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