7 Worst Pizzas in America

By David Zinczenko
Sep 20, 2010

When pizza was first invented, back in some long forgotten Italian village, it was a nearly perfect slice of nutrition: A thin crust of carbohydrates for energy, slathered with tomato sauce for vitamins and minerals, and topped with calcium-rich, protein-boosting mozzarella. It was like a food pyramid in pie form!

So what happened? How did this healthy Italian invention acquire a reputation for being so terribly unhealthy? Well, to start, American food manufacturers got their greedy little hands on it. As we began researching the Eat This, Not That! book series, we discovered marketers were up to all sorts of mischief that has made it easier for Americans to gain weight—doing creepy things like loading the top up with fatty meats, infusing the crust with hidden cheeses, and otherwise turning the healthy pizza pie into a Big Mac with crust. Mama Mia!

It’s too bad, too, because pizza is a staple of American life. During last year’s Super Bowl, Papa Johns sold more pies than there are people in Delaware. And it’s only the third-biggest pizza chain (Papa Johns, not Delaware). So if you want the best of both worlds—the health benefits of the Italian style and the football-rooting fun of the American way of life, then you need to know which pizzas should be showing up at your door at halftime—and which should get called for a 15-pound penalty.

#7: Worst Supermarket Pizza
DiGiorno For One Traditional Crust Supreme Pizza
790 calories
36 g fat (14 g saturated fat, 3 g trans fats)
1,460 mg sodium

No, it’s not delivery, but it is dangerous. This is how DiGiorno handles the personal pie: with 60 percent of your day’s sodium, 70 percent of your saturated fat, and more trans fat than you should consume in an entire day. If your heart had a voice box, it would be screaming in outrage.

Eat This Instead!
Stouffer’s French Bread Deluxe Pizza (1 pizza)
430 calories
21 g fat (7 g saturated)
820 mg sodium

#6: Worst Multi-National Pizza
California Pizza Kitchen Tostada Pizza with Grilled Steak (1/2 pie)
840 calories
16 g saturated fat
1,649 mg sodium

With a caloric heft like this, you’d expect this Tex-Mex pie to be massively portioned. It’s not. The big fatty price tag draws not from size, but from the combo effect of tortilla chips and ranch dressing. Switch to the equally interesting Four Seasons Pizza, which carries artichoke hearts, salami, mushroom, tomatoes, onions, and two cheeses, and you drop nearly 400 calories per half-pie serving.

Eat This Instead!
Thin Crust Four Seasons Pizza
480 calories
9 g saturated fat
1,567 mg sodium

#5: Worst Single Slice
Sbarro Stuffed Pepperoni Pizza
960 calories
42 g fat
3,200 mg sodium

Sbarro serves up elephantine slices, so you should know better than to order one that essentially consists of two of those slices folded one atop another. In this one wedge of pizza, Sbarro manages to pack in nearly as many calories as you’d find in four pepperoni slices from Pizza Hut! You want to survive the Sbarro super-slice challenge? Stick to a regular pie, nix the pepperoni and sausage, and limit yourself to one slice.

Eat This Instead!
Fresh Tomato Pizza
450 calories
14 g fat
1,040 mg sodium

#4: Worst Specialty Crust Pizza
Pizza Hut Stuffed Crust Meat Lover’s Pizza (2 slices, 14” pie)
960 calories
52 g fat (24 g saturated, 1 g trans)
2,780 mg sodium

Around the perimeter of this pie is what essentially amounts to a hula-hoop ring of cheese. Gross, right? But it's not just cheese. Also inside that ring: two types of sausage, ham, beef, and bacon. The impact of all those salt-cured meats is more than a day’s worth of sodium in each two-slice serving—oh, and as much saturated fat as a dozen Extra Crispy Drumsticks from KFC! Here’s a simple mnemonic device: Stuffed pizza = stuffed potbelly. Stick to thin crust and lean meats and you’ll live to eat well another day.

Eat This Instead!
2 Slices Thin ‘N Crispy Ham & Pineapple Pizza (2 slices, 12'' pie)
360 calories
12 g fat (6 g saturated)
1,080 mg sodium

#3: Worst Flatbread
Cosi Chicken Gorgonzola with Fig Flatbread with Traditional Crust
1,073 calories
41 g fat (9 g saturated)
1,057 mg sodium

At first blush, flatbread seems like a healthy version of pizza—especially when it comes adorned with fanciful toppings like Gorgonzola and figs. But let this be a lesson: Just because it’s fancy doesn’t mean it’s healthy. Cosi’s traditional crust is essentially the same carpet of bread you might find underneath a circular pie. The rules of pizza selection apply to flatbreads as well: Lean toppings, light cheese, and thin crust.

Eat This Instead!
Margherita Flatbread with Thin Crust
451 calories
26 g fat (13 g saturated)
328 mg sodium

#2: Worst Thin Crust Pizza
Domino’s Brooklyn Style ExtravaganZZa Feast Pizza (2 slices 16” pie)
1,180 calories
60 g fat (27 g saturated)
3,420 mg sodium

To be fair, Domino’s Brooklyn Style isn’t promoted as thin crust, but it was created with fold-ability in mind. That requires slices that are soft, thin, and—in Domino’s case—massive. The typical Domino’s pie comes sliced into eighths, but order the Brooklyn-inspired pie and you’ll get only six slices. What happened to the other two slices? They were absorbed—along with their calories, fat, and sodium—into the other slices. Your better option is to build your own pie on a legitimate thin crust. Top that pie chicken and chorizo and you cut out 730 calories. Do that a couple times a week and you’ll cut close to two pounds of flab per month.

#1: Worst Pizza in America
Uno Chicago Grill Chicago Classic Deep Dish Pizza (Individual)
2,310 calories
162 g fat (54 g saturated fat)
4,920 mg sodium

Wait, wait, wait. This is a one-person pizza? Yup. All 2,310 calories are destined for one soon-to-be expanding belly. This pie has been a perennial pick for us over the past three years, and the reason is simple: No other personal pizza in the country even begins to approach these numbers. It breaks every single caloric recommendation on the books, and it does it under the guise of a must-have “classic” dish. With the country being plagued by obesity, Uno should have the decency to banish—or significantly improve—this dish.

Eat This Instead!
Cheese and Tomato Thin Crust Pizza (Individual)
840 calories
33 g fat (15 g saturated fat)
1,770 mg sodium

High Cholesterol Linked to Cookware Chemicals

Study Shows Possible Health Risks in Kids From Chemicals Used to Make Nonstick Cookware
By Salynn Boyles,
WebMD Health News.

Exposure to chemicals used in the manufacture of nonstick cookware and waterproof and stain-resistant products could be raising cholesterol levels in children, a new study suggests.

Researchers analyzed blood levels of the chemicals perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluoroctanesulfonate (PFOS) in more than 12,000 kids living in West Virginia and Ohio.

Those with the highest blood levels of the chemicals were also more likely to have abnormally high total cholesterol and LDL "bad" cholesterol, study researcher Stephanie J. Frisbee, MSc, of the West Virginia University School of Medicine tells WebMD.

While the study does not prove exposure to PFOA and PFOS raises cholesterol, the findings warrant further study, Frisbee says.

"These chemicals are in the environment and they are in us," she says. "More than anything this study highlights that we had better figure out how we are being exposed and what this exposure is doing to us."

The chemicals have been used for decades in the production of a wide range of everyday products. PFOA, also known as C8, is mainly used in the manufacture of nonstick cookware, while PFOS is mostly used to make clothing, fabrics, food packaging, and carpeting water-resistant and stain-resistant.

The route of human exposure is not well understood, but recent studies suggest that just about everyone has some PFOA and PFOS in the blood. Identified sources of exposure include drinking water, food packaging, microwave popcorn, and even air.

Cookware containing Teflon, made by DuPont, and similar nonstick surfaces are made using PFOA. But the cookware industry has long maintained that cooking in nonstick pots and pans is not a significant source of exposure to the chemical, and the science appears to back up the claim.

"PFOA is used in the manufacture of the coating used in nonstick cookware, but it does not exist in the coating when the products get to the consumer," Cookware Manufacturing Association Executive Vice President Hugh J. Rushing tells WebMD.

University of Pittsburgh emeritus professor of chemistry Robert L. Wolke, PhD, agrees that nonstick cookware contains little if any PFOA.

"Cooking with nonstick cookware could not possibly be the source of the exposures we are now seeing," he tells WebMD. "PFOA is now found in humans all over the world, including places where they have never heard of a Teflon pan."
High PFOS Linked to High LDL

The newly published study included children and teens enrolled in the C8 Health Project, a study of communities in the mid-Ohio River Valley exposed to high levels of PFOA through contaminated drinking water. The study resulted from a class-action lawsuit settlement against DuPont, which operated the manufacturing plant linked to the water contamination.

Between 2005 and 2006, blood samples from 12,476 children and teens were taken. PFOA concentrations were, on average, around seven times higher than those reported in a nationally representative survey, but PFOS levels were similar.

Compared to children and teens in the study with the lowest blood levels of PFOA, those with the highest levels were 20% and 40%, respectively, more likely to have abnormally high total cholesterol and LDL cholesterol, Frisbee says.

Those with the highest PFOS levels were 60% more likely than those with the lowest levels to have high total and LDL cholesterol.

The study appears in the September issue of the Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine.

Because the health effects of PFOA exposure are still unknown, the Environmental Protection Agency has asked DuPont and other chemical companies to stop using the chemical by 2015. DuPont agreed to the voluntary ban, and the company has pledged to phase out the chemical before the 2015 deadline.

Top 6 Pregnancy Risks Linked to Diet

By Margaret Furtado, M.S., R.D.

Every year in the U.S., an estimated 65 million to 76 million people fall prey to food-borne illnesses, resulting in 325,000 hospitalizations and 5,000 to 9,000 deaths. Because pregnancy challenges the immune system, both mother and fetus are at even greater risk for such infections.

Here are 6 of the most common diet-related risks for pregnant women:

1. Listeria
Listeria is the bacteria responsible for listeriosis, a rare infection that may cause miscarriage. It has a hospitalization rate of 88 percent, with a fatality rate as high as 30 percent. Pregnant women are 20 times more likely to contract Listeria than are non-pregnant individuals. In addition, since Listeria can cross the placenta, newborns are at high risk as well, with life-threatening infection or blood poisoning possible.

Foods to avoid:

* Deli meats. If you can't avoid these meats altogether, make sure you reheat the meat until it's steaming before eating it.
* Smoked seafood. Refrigerated, smoked seafood, such as lox. (Exceptions: Canned or shelf-safe smoked seafood is typically safe to eat. Also, nova style or kippered lox, or jerky-style lox are OK if they are an ingredient in a well-cooked dish, such as a casserole.)
* Soft cheeses. Imported soft cheeses, such as Brie, Camembert, Roquefort, feta, gorgonzola, and Mexican-style cheeses (including queso blanco and queso fresco), unless they clearly state that they are made from pasteurized milk. Soft non-imported cheeses made with pasteurized milk are considered safe to eat.
* Unpasteurized milk
* Refrigerated pâté or meat spreads
* Store-bought hummus

2. Mercury
Mercury is a poisonous heavy metal that, with chronic exposure, can damage the central nervous system and other organ systems like the liver and gastrointestinal tract. In rivers and oceans, bacteria convert mercury to methyl mercury, which then ultimately contaminates fish. According to The National Academy of Sciences, 60,000 infants are born each year with excessive mercury exposure, placing them at risk for irreversible brain damage. The type and degree of symptoms depend on the particular toxin and the dose, as well as the method and duration of the exposure. In 2004, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued a joint consumer advisory report on mercury for pregnant and lactating women, women of childbearing age, and young children.

Foods to avoid:

* Do not eat fish known to contain high levels of mercury. Shark, swordfish, king mackerel, and tilefish have the highest levels of mercury.
* Consume in moderation. The FDA/EPA report recommends limiting consumption of these fish to no more than 12 ounces per week: fresh or canned salmon; fresh or canned chunk light tuna; and pollock. Catfish, although lower in mercury than the other fish named in the previous bullet, should be consumed in moderation.
* Fish from local waters such as albacore tuna and tuna steaks, should be limited to 6 ounces per week. (Avoid, for example, buying fish from California if you live in the Northeast, and always ask your fishmonger where a fish is from.)
* Raw shellfish. Many varieties have high mercury levels; however, even those with low mercury levels (especially raw oysters, clams, and mussels) may increase your risk for seafood-borne illness due to dangerous microbes. Cooking helps to prevent some infections, but not the algae-related kinds linked to red tides.

3. Toxoplasma
Toxoplasmosis is a parasitic disease that can infect most warm-blooded animals, including the household cat (it's found particularly in the feces of the cat). That's why pregnant women are typically advised to avoid cleaning the litter box. Although many women may have had toxoplasmosis without symptoms, toxoplasmosis can harm a fetus and possibly pose risks for miscarriage, as well as for eye or brain injuries, including mental retardation. Sustained high or low temperatures are necessary to kill Toxoplasma gondii in meat.

Foods to avoid:

* Uncooked seafood and rare or undercooked beef and poultry
* Unwashed commercial fruits and vegetables
* Ill-cooked meats (but OK if previously frozen)
* Dried meats and meat from wild game

Things to do

* Carefully wash your hands and all surfaces and utensils after preparing raw meat, poultry, seafood, fruits, and vegetables
* If you have a cat(s) at home, be sure to wipe all tables and surfaces clean prior to eating, to help ensure no fecal residue is present. (I know, not a pleasant thought, especially since I have two cats!)

4. Salmonella
Salmonella is a bacterium that can cause food-borne illness with symptoms that can include fever, nausea, vomiting, and meningitis. This bug can also cause typhoid fever. Thorough cooking and processing effectively kill the Salmonella bacteria.

Foods to avoid

* Uncooked seafood and rare or undercooked beef, poultry, or meat products
Raw or undercooked eggs or egg products
* Unpasteurized milk or other unpasteurized dairy products
* Any homemade foods made with raw eggs: Caesar salad dressing, mayonnaise, ice cream, custards, eggnog, Hollandaise sauces ...
* Raw sprouts

5. Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs)
PCBs, poisonous substances previously used in electrical transformers and capacitors, were banned in the 1970s due to their high toxicity. Unfortunately, PCBs break down very slowly in the environment, so they can still pose a threat today. PCBs are absorbed via the gastrointestinal tract, and tend to accumulate in lipid-rich tissues, such as adipose (fat) tissue and breast milk. The absorption of PCBs from breast milk is alarmingly high-90 to100 percent of PCBs in breast milk find their way into the infant. One 16-year longitudinal study looking at the effects of eating PCB-rich fish by pregnant women revealed lower birth weights, smaller head circumferences, and lower IQs in the children born of those pregnancies, as well as delays in neuromuscular maturity when the children of the contaminated moms were studied 11 years later.

Foods to avoid:

* Any fish taken from contaminated lakes and rivers that may have been exposed to high levels of PCBs
* Fishing in or eating fish from local lakes and streams (e.g., bluefish, striped bass, salmon, trout, and walleye). Contact your local health department or the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to determine which fish caught from the local waters in your area are safe to eat. (Fish from your local grocery store is usually safe.)

6. E.coli
This is yet another possible risk for pregnant women, but avoiding all of the foods listed above should minimize the risk for this bacterial infection.

In general

In addition to taking the above precautions, women who are pregnant or who wish to become pregnant are generally advised to avoid caffeine and alcohol; the former, even in small amounts, may increase the risk for miscarriage, and the latter, especially in higher amounts, can increase the risk of fetal alcohol syndrome or other developmental disorders.

A healthy, balanced diet, free of the items listed above, should help you steer away from possible nutrition-related problems during your pregnancy.

Cheers to a healthy pregnancy and healthy and happy mom and baby!

25 Best Nutrition Secrets

By David Zinczenko

Sarah Palin is on a diet. So is Barack Obama, Glenn Beck, Oprah Winfrey, Lady Gaga, Peyton Manning, the pitching staff of the Texas Rangers, all the judges on America’s Got Talent, and the entire cast of Glee. In fact, from Chris Rock to Kid Rock to The Rock, everyone you can name is on a diet.

And so are you.

How can I be so sure? Because a “diet” isn’t something you go on and go off of, like a prescription. A diet is what you eat, day in and day out, whether you planned to eat that way or not. So when people ask me what kind of “diet” they should follow, I always tell them to follow the one they’re already on—the way you like to eat is the way you should eat. In researching the Eat This, Not That! book series and seeing people lose 10, 20, 30 pounds or more effortlessly, I've learned that if you want to make big changes to your health, forget about following somebody else’s diet. Just make a bunch of little changes to the diet you’re already following. Believe me, it’s the best way to get results. Below, I’ve listed the 25 best new nutritional tweaks you can make that will improve the way you look and feel—fast and forever!

Coffee1. Drink a second cup of coffee. It might lower your risk of adult-onset diabetes, according to a study in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.

2. Keep serving dishes off the table. Researchers have found that when people are served individual plates, as opposed to empty plates with a platter of food in the middle of the table, they eat up to 35 percent less!

3. Think before you drink. The average person drinks more than 400 calories a day--double what he or she used to--and alone gets around 10 teaspoons of added sugar every single day from soft drinks. Swap out sweetened teas and sodas for no-cal drinks and you could lose up to 40 pounds in a single year! (To see more proof of how wayward beverages can utterly destroy your diet, check out the 20 Worst Drinks in America. Many of these drinks contain more than a day's worth of calories, sugar and fat!)

4. Practice total recall. British scientists found that people who thought about their last meal before snacking ate 30 percent fewer calories that those who didn't stop to think. The theory: Remembering what you had for lunch might remind you of how satiating the food was, which then makes you less likely to binge on your afternoon snack.

5. Eat protein at every meal. Dieters who eat the most protein tend to lose more weight while feeling less deprived than those who eat the least protein. It appears that protein is the best nutrient for jumpstarting your metabolism, squashing your appetite, and helping you eat less at subsequent meals.

Protein

6. Choose whole-grain bread. Eating whole grains (versus refined-grain or white bread) has been linked to lower risks of cancer and heart disease.

7. Think fish. Consuming two 4- to 6-ounce servings of oily fish a week will sharpen your mind. Among the best: salmon, tuna, herring, mackerel, and trout. They're high in docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), which may reduce your risk of Alzheimer's. Study participants who had high blood levels of DHA also performed better on noverbal reasoning tests and showed better mental flexibility, working memory, and vocabulary than those with lower levels.

8. Sign up for weight-loss e-mails. Daily e-mails (or tweets) that contain weight-loss advice remind you of your goals and help you drop pounds, researchers from Canada found. We're partial to our own Eat This, Not That! newsletter, and to the instant weight-loss secrets you'll get when you follow me on Twitter here.

9. Cut portions by a quarter. Pennsylvania State University researchers discovered that by simply reducing meal portions 25 percent, people ate 10 percent fewer calories—without feeling any hungrier. Serving yourself? Think about what looks like a reasonable portion, then take at least one-quarter less than that. (By the way, studies show today's restaurant servings are 2 to 5 times bigger than what the government recommends!)

10. Turn off the TV. Scientists at the University of Massachusetts found that people who watch TV during a meal consume, on average, 288 more calories than those who don't eat with the tube on.

11. Put your fork down when you chew. Or take a sip of water between each bite—eating slowly can boost levels of two hormones that make you feel fuller, Greek researchers found.

12. Choose rye (not wheat) bread for breakfast toast. Swedish researchers found that rye eaters were more full 8 hours after breakfast than wheat-bread eaters, thanks to rye's high fiber content and minimal effect on blood sugar. As a result you'll want to snack less and eat less for lunch.Veggies

13. Eat a handful of fruit and vegetables a day. In one study, people who ate four or five servings scored higher on cognitive tests than those who consumed less than one serving. (Remember: Salad isn't always the healthy choice. Check out 20 Salads Worse Than a Whopper to see what I mean. You'll be shocked.)

14. Sip green tea. It might help you build a strong skeleton, say researchers in China, and help protect you from broken bones when you're older. And one study found that it helps fight bad breath, too.

15. Work out before lunch or dinner. Doing so will make the meals you eat right afterward more filling, according to British researchers—meaning you'll eat fewer calories throughout the day.

16. Hung over? Choose asparagus. When South Korean researchers exposed a group of human liver cells to asparagus extract, it suppressed free radicals and more than doubled the activity of two enzymes that metabolize alcohol. That means you'll feel like yourself again twice as quickly.

17. Sleep 8 hours a night. Too much or too little shut-eye can add extra pounds, say Wake Forest University researchers. Not there yet? Try these 7 simple strategies for longer, deeper sleep.

Miso Soup18 Discover miso soup. Brown wakame seaweed (used in miso soup) can help lower your blood pressure, especially if your levels are already high, say researchers at the University of North Carolina.

19. Drink two glasses of milk daily. People who drink the most milk have about a 16 percent lower risk of heart disease than people who drink the least. (I recommend nonfat or 1 percent milk.)

20. Take a zinc supplement. Just 15 milligrams of zinc a day (the amount found in a Centrum Ultra multivitamin, for example) will motivate your immune cells to produce more of a protein that fights off bacterial infections.

21. Go ahead, eat your favorite foods. Good eating doesn't need to be about deprivation—it's about making smart choices. Why eat a 1,000-calorie cheeseburger if a 500-calorie burger will satisfy you just the same? The bottom line: Eat foods that you enjoy, just not too much of them.

22. Choose foods with the fewest ingredients. There are now more than 3,000 ingredients on the FDA's list of safe food additives—and any of these preservatives, artificial sweeteners and colorings and flavor enhancers could end up on your plate. Do you really know what these chemicals will do to your waistline or health? Of course not. Here's a rule of thumb: If a 7-year-old can't pronounce it, you don't want to eat it.

23. Snack on popcorn. In a 2009 study, people who ate 1 cup of microwave popcorn 30 minutes before lunch consumed 105 fewer calories at the meal. Just choose the kind without butter.

24. Or snack on walnuts. Eating a handful of walnuts each day may boost your HDL (good) cholesterol fastest, while lowering your LDL (bad) cholesterol.

25. ScrambleEggs your breakfast. People who ate eggs in the morning instead of a bagel consumed 264 fewer calories the rest of the day, according to a Saint Louis University study. That’s because protein is more filling than carbs.

Good Dancing may be Sign of Male Health

By Pallab Ghosh
Science correspondent, BBC News.

Dr Nick Neave looks at the difference between "good" and "bad" dancing

Scientists say they've carried out the first rigorous analysis of dance moves that make men attractive to women.

The researchers say that movements associated with good dancing may be indicative of good health and reproductive potential.

Their findings are published in the Royal Society journal Biology Letters.

"When you go out to clubs people have an intuitive understanding of what makes a good and bad dancer," said co-author Dr Nick Neave, an evolutionary psychologist at Northumbria University, UK.

"What we've done for the very first time is put those things together with a biometric analysis so we can actually calculate very precisely the kinds of movements people focus on and associate them with women's ratings of male dancers."

Dr Neave asked young men who were not professional dancers, to dance in a laboratory to a very basic drum rhythm and their movements with 12 cameras.

These movements were then converted into a computer-generated cartoon - an avatar - which women rated on a scale of one to seven. He was surprised by the results.

"We thought that people's arms and legs would be really important. The kind of expressive gestures the hands [make], for example. But in fact this was not the case," he said.

"We found that (women paid more attention to) the core body region: the torso, the neck, the head. It was not just the speed of the movements, it was also the variability of the movement. So someone who is twisting, bending, moving, nodding."

Movements that went down terribly were twitchy and repetitive - so called "Dad dancing".

Dr Neave's aim was to establish whether young men exhibited the same courtship movement rituals in night clubs as animals do in the wild. In the case of animals, these movements give information about their health, age, their reproductive potential and their hormone status.

"People go to night clubs to show off and attract the opposite sex so I think it's a valid way of doing this," Dr Neave explained.

"In animals, the male has to be in good physical quality to carry out these movements. We think the same is happening in humans and certainly the guys that can put these movements together are going to be young and fit and healthy."

Dr Neave also took blood samples from the volunteers. Early indications from biochemical tests suggest that the men who were better dancers were also more healthy.