Waist whittler

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

You'll reduce your waist size as well as your risk of diabetes and heart disease by increasing your intake of whole grains, suggests research in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. In a study of obese adults with metabolic syndrome, those who met their daily requirement of grain servings exclusively with whole grains lost significantly more weight in the abdominal region than those who ate only refined grains. Also, the whole-grain group showed a 38 percent decrease in blood levels of C-reactive protein, an inflammatory marker implicated in a higher risk for diabetes, hypertension, and cardiovascular disease. Study coauthor Penny Kris-Etherton, professor of nutritional sciences at Penn State, recommends choosing foods with at least 51 percent of the grain coming from whole grain, such as oatmeal, brown rice, whole-wheat pasta, and whole-grain cereal.

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