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This week's recipe is Zesty Lentil Salad. If you make it, tell us how it was and post your pictures on our Facebook page.

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Scot: Tasty and easy-to-make man meals you can eat all week. Today, it's a very manly review of last week's recipes, stuffed spaghetti squash and the other optional recipe, the no-bake chewy granola bars. Then we'll also have a recipe for next week as well.

And by the way, hit the kitchen with us and share your story and photos at facebook.com/whocaresmenshealth. These recipes are there. You can find links to them. Get in the kitchen, see what you think, see if you like them, see what we can do to improve them. That would be awesome.

I'm Scot Singpiel from thescoperadio.com. I'm learning I enjoy making food, so that's cool. Here's today's crew. We've got co-host, Dr. Troy Madsen. He's the MD to my BS.

Troy: That's right.

Scot: And the guy my wife told me that he should talk more on the podcast, it's Producer Mitch in the mix.

Mitch: I'm here.

Troy: Just keep talking, Mitch. Just keep talking.

Mitch: All right.

Scot: And both of our guests today are from the Department of Nutrition and Integrative Physiology at University of Utah's College of Health. We've got kitchen daredevil Thunder Jalili.

Thunder: Hi, everyone.

Scot: And the person who has the hardest job on the show teaching the rest of us how to cook, it's registered dietician and culinary coach Theresa D.

Theresa: Hello, hello.

Scot: You have just a cool last name. Now, it's just an initial. It's not even your whole name. That's how you know you've made it.

Theresa: I just read an article too about cooking therapists, and I think I should be a cooking therapist. I think that would work with this group.

Troy: Does this mean you are therapy for those who do not know how to cook, or use cooking to provide therapy for other things?

Theresa: I think it could go both ways, but mostly anxiety in the kitchen.

Troy: Oh, sign me up. Since you brought that up, Theresa.

Theresa: I'll call you later.

Troy: I hope you don't mind me starting this out with an analogy. My wife once invited me to a Zumba class, and I went to the Zumba class.

Thunder: I can just picture it now.

Troy: I had never been to a Zumba class before. We were on the back row, but there was a mirror on the front so people could see other people. At the end of the class when it was over, my wife asked me, "Were you making fun of the class, or were you actually trying?"

And I will say that is how I felt last week talking about my experience in the kitchen. Everyone here knows what they're doing. I am clueless. And that's how I felt in the Zumba class. I did not go back to Zumba after that. I have come back here.

Theresa: Yes.

Troy: So I'm still with you.

Theresa: Win.

Troy: I came for my second Zumba class. I'm still here.

Scot: All right. I think you're going to find though, Troy, the more you do this, the better it's going to feel. I think you are.

Troy: I will say that's the case already. Yeah.

Thunder: It couldn't get worse.

Troy: It could not get worse. You're right. Technically, it could. This whole parchment paper thing, as I'm putting this in the oven, I'm like, "Is this going to catch on fire? Is this going to be the next episode about my oven fire?" It could get worse, but it didn't.

Theresa: That's great.

Scot: Thunder is always there for some support.

Troy: Exactly.

Scot: Back-handed support in a way.

Thunder: I'm here for you.

Troy: Thanks, man.

Scot: All right. So let's go ahead and we'll start with a review of the stuffed spaghetti squash. We'll go ahead and start with Mitch. Any thoughts on that? Did you like it?

Mitch: I did. And I think the thing that I was the most surprised about was just how much food it actually made. The spaghetti squash looks small, but when you start to scoop things up and fill it up, I think we ended up getting almost six meals out of the recipe.

Scot: Wow. It's cool too because the spaghetti squash, you can scrape that thing to the shell. You can use every little bit in there. That's pretty awesome.

Troy, how'd it go for you?

Troy: It was great. I am now a fan of spaghetti squash. And this, again, pushed me a little bit. I had to find someone in the store and ask them, "What is a spaghetti squash?"

Theresa: Yes. I love it.

Troy: I did. I had to.

Thunder: Is it in the pasta section?

Troy: "Is it next to the pasta?" So this nice lady in the store then, who works there, of course, she had a couple of smaller ones. She's like, "Oh, let me go get you a good one." So she went to the back room and brought a nice big spaghetti squash out for me. And it's cool. This is cool. It's fun to eat.

Scot: Wow. Special treatment there. I like that.

Troy: Yeah.

Theresa: Troy, did you find the olive bar?

Troy: I did. Our olive bar, though, it's still not an open olive bar. They have an olive bar with everything packaged so they don't have it all exposed, but I did find the olive bar.

I'll tell you the way this happened if you're interested. I went to the store for something else and then I said to myself, "I am really overthinking this cooking stuff. Why am I doing this?" And so I tried to pull up the recipe on my phone and I couldn't get a connection in the store, and I'm like, "I remember what to get." I remember Thunder talking about the olive bar. So I went there. I found olives. They did not have sun-dried tomatoes, but I remembered that. I found that. I remembered the spaghetti squash, so I'm like, "Hey, I can do this."

And so I found most of the stuff. Just remembered what we talked about. I tried not to overthink it and got everything together, and it was much less stressful. It was like, "I can do this." I got the nice spaghetti squash. It was not the cheap stuff. It was in a glass bottle, and so . . .

Scot: The spaghetti squash was in a glass bottle?

Theresa: The sauce.

Troy: I wish the spaghetti squash was in a glass bottle. I just gave it away. No, the spaghetti sauce was in a glass bottle.

Scot: Got it. Sorry.

Troy: Yeah. I think in multiple levels I was just like, "I'm just going to do this. I'm overthinking it." And overall, it was a good experience in that sense. Just not stressing about it, just like, "Hey, I can do this. I remember what I need. I can make this happen." And found the stuff and it all worked out.

Theresa: That's great.

Scot: Hey, Theresa, you teach a lot of cooking classes to people probably at all levels. I think what Troy is discovering is it's really hard to screw things up in the kitchen.

Theresa: Yeah. We can try and take a step back, and a lot of this is this analysis paralysis. We're trying to overthink it. We're trying to be that Food Network chef, that Instagram influencer, or what have you. And we really just need to . . . especially when we're starting out, you need to take that step back and remember those basics.

And if we think about some of the basics that these recipes have introduced us to, sautéeing, chopping things, roasting, buying pre-prepared and then adding a bunch of fresh stuff to it, it can be a lot easier than what we're holding ourselves to these unrealistic expectations.

Scot: Yeah. And even if it doesn't turn out, it's still good. I had a little botch story I'll tell here today, but it still turned out good.

Theresa: That's right. And at least you know that, "Most of the time, well, I know that it may not be amazing, it may not be a Michelin restaurant caliber, but all of the ingredients are good. I followed food safety. It's cooked through. I don't have raw beef in here or something of the sort, and it's probably going to taste better the next time I make it." So learning experience.

Scot: The spaghetti squash. So I've got just a few questions here, and then if anybody else has any questions or comments that they want to dive a little more deeply into.

Theresa, these are just rapid fire. Okay? So how does spaghetti squash freeze? It seems like it's really full of a lot of water. Is it going to not be good if I freeze this?

Theresa: No. Don't freeze it. Awful.

Scot: Okay. So this is one of those ones you've got to . . .

Theresa: Yeah.

Scot: Okay.

Theresa: Do it fresh. You can save the squash. You could save it and not prepare it until earlier or think about your different steps, but don't make this dish and then put it in the freezer.

Scot: Okay. And when a recipe says two cups of spinach, chopped, does that mean I take two cups of pre-chopped spinach and then chop that, or am I supposed to chop up the spinach until I get two chopped cups?

Theresa: I love this. This is so what I was going to talk about during this episode. In the recipe that we're going to make, it has some of this recipe jargon that is helpful to know. It's not the end of the world. Again, it's still going to taste really good if you mix it up, but it makes a little bit of a difference in the taste and quality.

So, for example, the recipe today will call for "one cup parsley, chopped," or if the recipe were to say one cup chopped parsley. So it's a matter of when you measure it. If it says "one cup of parsley, chopped," then you start with one cup of loose leaves and chop that up. But if it's saying one cup of chopped parsley, then you want to chop until you fill up a cup.

Scot: Got it.

Theresa: A full cup of parsley.

Mitch: When do you learn that in your life? Is it just right now or is it . . .

Theresa: Right now is when you learn it, Mitch.

Mitch: Because I've cooked for a long time in my life and I'm just like, "Wait, what?"

Theresa: It's just like algebra. What do you do first?

Troy: It's the order it's in.

Theresa: Is it parentheses? Is it addition or multiplication? That's all. There you go.

Scot: All right. Yes. So, in the squash recipe, it's "two cups baby spinach, chopped." So I take two cups of whole leaves and then chop those up.

Theresa: Correct.

Scot: All right. Yeah. We're rocking and rolling.

Theresa: You would just have a little extra spinach. It probably wouldn't equate to all that much extra, but in some things like parsley or herbs that really chop down fine, it would make a strong difference.

Scot: Yeah, it would make a flavor difference. With spinach, it's just kind of . . . It was a really tasty recipe. I got a ton of leftovers. I looked up how many calories and carbs spaghetti squash has. Literally none. I think one cup is nine grams of carbohydrate and one and one-half of that is fiber. The beans in there have more carbohydrates than the spaghetti squash.

So it was really, really filling and really, really good. I ate it cold today from my leftover and it was great cold.

Theresa: I was just going to ask how did you guys think about repurposing it? Or did you just eat it as was for leftovers?

Troy: I ate it for leftovers. I heated it up in the microwave last night. And it's funny, I just left the whole . . . I didn't scrape it all out. I just left the quarter spaghetti squash there. So I've got a couple of those in the fridge. But I heated it up. The outside of the spaghetti squash really heated up. When I touched it, it was really hot, and the inside of it wasn't super warm, but it was still good though. I enjoyed it.

I will ask something that Mitch wanted me to ask but was too embarrassed to ask. Does spaghetti squash give you gas?

Mitch: It's a legitimate question.

Troy: This was on our group text. Mitch brought it up, if anyone else might have experienced a little bit of upset.

Theresa: I would say no, but it's always possible because there's lots of . . . Do you have issues with other carbohydrates?

Mitch: Not typically. No.

Theresa: Okay.

Thunder: Maybe it was just a bigger fiber load than you're used to eating at one time, Mitch.

Mitch: That could have been it. Sure.

Scot: Because those beans . . . the spaghetti squash has fiber, but those beans also have a lot of fiber in them.

Thunder: Yes, they do.

Theresa: It's true.

Troy: I'll admit too . . . I kind of put Mitch on the spot, but I did feel a little bit of stomach unsettling maybe two or three hours afterwards as well. So I wondered if maybe there's just a lot of fiber content in there, but it sounds like there probably is.

Theresa: That would be my guess, is the fiber piece. If you think about . . . the sun-dried tomatoes are really condensed from a fresh tomato.

Troy: That's probably what did it.

Theresa: The olives, similar thing. The beans, the spaghetti squash, certainly. The greens, depending on how much spinach you put in. It's certainly high on the fiber content from your typical roller food.

Troy: Higher than the taquitos.

Theresa: I have to. Every week, I've got to bring it in, Mitch.

Mitch: That's fine.

Troy: That makes sense.

Mitch: So it's not like anything is wrong. It's just fiber is good for you.

Theresa: Yep. And as you get used to higher fiber content in your meals, that should decrease.

Mitch: Okay.

Theresa: You're training your gut.

Mitch: I guess one of the things that I was wondering was . . . it seemed like I had a bit of sticker shock as I was scanning one jar after another. It just seemed like it was a bit pricier than I was used to.

Theresa: Very valid. And this is where looking at where and how we buy our items and then reusing them . . . So this is sometimes challenging when we're trying a recipe for the first time and we don't know if we're going to like it. So if you're buying jars of these items, it's quite possible that you had some left in that jar. You didn't use the entire jar.

And this is where maybe some of those grocery stores that have an olive bar where you can just purchase the amount that you need for the recipe . . . So if you only needed a half a cup, that's all you have to buy instead of needing to buy the one to two cups' worth that's in the jar.

Look at other store options as well. Trader Joe's does some of these items less expensive. Those kinds of things are a great way to look at some of these alternatives.

So certainly, it's a valid question, valid concern with this particular recipe. I would also argue, though, at the same time when you think about the quantity that it made . . . It gave Troy six meals' worth for one or two. That's a significant amount of food that it made. So pricing it out per meal, hopefully, would be considerably less. Yes, the initial purchase can sometimes be a bit of a shock.

Troy: And I will say I priced mine out, because I'm curious about this too. I priced mine at about $20 for everything. And admittedly, I did forget to get the artichoke hearts. I would have liked to have had those and I didn't remember until I got home. I was like, "Ugh, artichoke hearts." So that probably would have added on another $5.

But you're right. I think if you look at $20 and you spread it over four or five meals, it's not crazy high. But it seems like there are variations you could do on that. Maybe you don't do the sun-dried tomatoes and maybe you just do the olives or something. Because I found . . .

Thunder: Oh, sun-dried tomatoes are the best part.

Troy: Okay.

Theresa: Or if you didn't like the olives . . .

Troy: You're right. They are the best part. Maybe you don't do the olives.

Theresa: Or doing canned olives. You could do canned olives. Artichokes, there are frozen artichokes and those are fantastic as well.

Troy is exactly right. You could certainly modify this and make it a little bit less expensive of an initial punch.

Troy: You're right, Thunder. That was my mistake. I would not remove the sun-dried tomatoes. Those were amazing. So maybe the olives . . .

Thunder: I'm glad you're a convert to the tomatoes now.

Troy: Yeah. Big fan.

Scot: All right. Let's move on to the granola bars. The official title . . . what was this?

Theresa: No-bake chewy granola bars.

Scot: All right. Yeah. How did that go for you guys? Let's start with Troy.

Troy: I did not make it to recipe number two, unfortunately.

Scot: I've got to tell you, it was pretty easy. So if you want to try it at some point, it doesn't take that long and it was pretty simple.

Troy: I would like to, yeah.

Scot: How about you, Thunder? Did you do the granola bars?

Thunder: Yeah. So, actually, like the good parent I am, I delegated and had my daughter do it.

Troy: Nice.

Scot: That's not the point. The point is us make them.

Thunder: Well, I was in the kitchen at the time in a supervisory capacity.

Theresa: And what were you drinking, Thunder?

Troy: Love it.

Thunder: We had one modification. We didn't do the brown sugar. I think it actually turned out really, really good. And we used a special kind of chocolate chip that my wife found that I guess are some sort of baking chocolate chip, but that ended up being one of the good parts of the recipe.

So bottom line is I think it was a bit more crumbly because we didn't add the brown sugar, but I thought they tasted great. And as long as we ate them chilled, they were fantastic.

Scot: I've got to say Mitch's picture of his look like it was straight out of a food magazine compared to how mine turned out. Mitch, talk to us about the granola bars.

Mitch: I find these suspiciously delicious. The question I have, because I don't have it readily available . . . We ended up swapping . . . we did some Kashi Go rather than puffed rice to make it a little more protein-rich. What is the caloric density of these things? I've had to run up to the hospital a time or two. I've been grabbing them just as a quick lunch.

Thunder: It's high.

Mitch: They are so tasty, though. I'm just concerned. I'm very concerned.

Theresa: And especially with putting in the Kashi Go, it's certainly upped it from what it was. So if you just made one batch and cut it into the, I believe, nine servings that it was allotted for, which would be a fairly good size bar, they're about 300 calories.

Mitch: Okay. That's like a meal replacement.

Theresa: So then with the Kashi Go, I'd probably add another . . . probably if you did that fully instead of the puffed rice, it's probably another 25 to 50 calories. So it's a very dense snack, yes.

Thunder: Mitch, did you cut them into . . . did you actually make nine bars or did you cut them into smaller bars?

Mitch: I cut them into nine, and I just . . .

Theresa: Portion control on this one.

Thunder: So you didn't have just one big bar.

Mitch: So one of the things I think I run into a lot with my own nutrition is I get into that health food blindness where I'm like, "These are healthy. Theresa told me I could eat as many carbs as I wanted." And then I have two of these and then it's like, "Oh, no."

Scot: I don't think she said you could eat as many carbs as you wanted. I think she said you could eat the rice, but I don't believe she . . .

Mitch: Yes. All right.

Thunder: Well, one thing to think about is we actually made them into smaller pieces when we did them. They're like bite-sized pieces, so maybe about an inch or inch and a half or something.

Theresa: And also, if you're thinking about having it as a snack, but realizing that you're eating a lot of them, certainly think about how many you portion and take with you. Another thing to think about is that I have something else alongside it. So maybe I have a low-fat plain yogurt.

Thunder: Like an exercise bike?

Theresa: An exercise bike. Hopefully, you're walking around work. Or an apple. Something fresh along with it.

Mitch: I have been having an apple with a full-size bar, so I need to re-evaluate my life. Okay. Cool.

Scot: Well, I don't know if . . .

Mitch: Good to know.

Thunder: Nothing wrong with a full-size bar in the right circumstance. But I think if you're just popping them as a snack, it's probably a bit much as a snack. So maybe half a bar, a third of a bar, or something.

Mitch: Okay.

Scot: I'm treating it as a dessert, really. Just a little something afterwards. And mine didn't come out in bar form. I think where I made the mistake was I put the liquid part in the microwave. It came out bubbly and hot. And then I think I waited a little too long and it hardened up, so it didn't mix very well. So I need to work on my kitchen technique, but they were good. This is one of those cases, Troy, where it didn't come out like . . . it wouldn't be something I'd want to take to a party because they look terrible, but they taste great.

Troy: They tasted good.

Scot: So even though it was a little bit of a failure, it was not a failure because they are absolutely delicious. And I could even see maybe taking these and putting these in the bottom of a bowl, just a few of the crumbles, because mine really crumbled up, and put a little ice cream on top of them. That would be a good little dessert.

Theresa: I was thinking yogurt, but yeah, ice cream works too.

Scot: Yogurt is even better because then you get the protein in the yogurt and the fat in yogurt to help slow down the sweetness in the granola bars. That's brilliant.

All right. On to next week's recipe. It looks really, really good. It looks light and summery. I can't wait to learn more about it. Theresa, what are we making next week?

Theresa: Zesty lentil salad.

Scot: What do you think, guys? Zesty lentil salad.

Troy: I'm already intrigued.

Thunder: It sounds great.

Troy: I like all three of those words.

Theresa: Nothing from Mitch.

Mitch: You like lentils?

Theresa: Mitch, hold on to me. Hold on, Mitch.

Mitch: I'm here.

Theresa: Because it's a salad. However, I don't want you to cringe too much because it's not a salad in the sense that lettuce and iceberg is your base.

Mitch: Yeah. Okay.

Theresa: So hold with me. It's a warm salad. And I use salad a bit loosely because we're essentially just mixing things together like you would, say, a fruit salad. Well, there's no lettuce in there, but we still call it a salad. So we're mixing things together in a giant bowl.

So we had talked I believe the first week about wants or goals or desires of this class and something of this conversation was talking about lentils. And so here is an awesome lentil recipe for you guys to try. And talk about having leftovers. This one is going to give you leftovers. So this is going to be a great combination of lentils and bulgur and some nice fresh veggies as well as a homemade dressing that you'll put on the top.

Troy: So you just said a word there I've never heard before. What was that?

Thunder: Bulgur?

Scot: Bulgur.

Theresa: Bulgur?

Scot: Yeah. It sounds like somebody that was in "He-Man and the Masters of the Universe."

Troy: Exactly. Who's Bulgur and where do I find him?

Scot: Bulgur. Bulgur smash.

Troy: Exactly. What is that? I have no idea.

Theresa: So it's wheat. It comes from wheat.

Troy: Okay.

Theresa: And it is considered a whole grain, less processed than if you were to, say, have wheat pasta, or wheat bread, or something of that sort. But you can find quick-cooking bulgur and it'll cook up in about 10 minutes. It's a two-to-one ratio similar to rice, two cups of water to one cup of bulgur. And it's a really great addition to your grain repertoire. A lot of people think about quinoa or rice or couscous. I put pull bulgur in there as well. It has a nice nutty, roast-y flavor to it without adding a whole lot.

Troy: Where does one find bulgur?

Theresa: You'll find it with the other grains. So Bob's Red Mill makes a really great one. So if you're in either the baking aisle or in sometimes the Italian pasta aisle where maybe they have cornmeal or polenta or packaged quinoa, things of that sort, it should be there. It can sometimes be in the cereals, though, too.

Thunder: I was going to mention, don't give Troy any hints. It'd be more entertaining to watch him try to find it.

Troy: I know. I have learned my lesson.

Thunder: All the places you mentioned I don't think he could find anyway.

Troy: Yeah. Well, number one . . .

Theresa: This could be one that you find that produce lady and say, "Hey . . ."

Troy: Yeah, I need to find that nice lady again.

Theresa: Or look at your store app. If you're at a store that does have an app function, this would be a great thing because you can put in bulgur and it'll tell you exactly where in the grocery store it's located.

Troy: Intrigued.

Scot: I bought the ingredients for this while I was buying the ingredients for the spaghetti squash thing and I had a hard time finding the bulgur. One store I went to, I couldn't find it anywhere. The other store, I found it in their . . . not the health food aisle, but the natural foods aisle is where I ended up finding it.

Troy, like Theresa said, look for the Bob's Mill brand and you're going to look around quinoa and that sort of thing. So it could be in two or three different places just depending on your grocery store.

Troy: Sounds like an adventure. We'll see.

Scot: Yeah.

Troy: We'll see how this . . . Are there any alternatives? Let me ask you that first. Are there any alternatives to bulgur? Rice?

Theresa: Sure. You could do rice. I would more so suggest something like quinoa or couscous.

Troy: Okay.

Thunder: I was thinking couscous would be a good alternative.

Theresa: Or if you really want to go out, millet would be a . . . But that'd be probably just as hard for you to find as bulgur.

Troy: So get wheat and . . .

Scot: No, you're not milling anything, Troy. Millet is a thing you buy. You're not going to go down to the creek where the mill is with the big mill wheel.

Troy: I swear you said, "Mill it." But now I understand what you said. I get it. I thought you were just seeing how far I was going to go with this, but I get it.

Scot: So is this going to be a main course then, or is this a side, or what's your recommendation on that, Theresa?

Theresa: It's both. You'll see on the recipe I have that it makes 6 main courses or entrees and 10 sides. So this is a really great one that you can really multipurpose. So it's great the first night that you make it. Maybe eat it warm if that works with your timing, because it's really yummy warm. But then for lunch the next day, it's awesome cold as well, or putting it into a pita and having more of a sandwich-type or a wrap or something like that would be really great too.

Scot: And if you're using it as a side, what would be a good type of food to eat with this then?

Theresa: Oh, I would do grilled chicken. I could do some sockeye salmon. It's summertime, so throw something out on the grill. That would be really awesome with it for sure. Thunder's sautéed tofu would be a good topper. It's nice and zesty and kind of Mediterranean, Eastern, Middle Eastern, and so you could think about any of those poultries. A lighter poultry or fish would be really great.

Scot: Let's go around the room here. Troy, let's start with you because you have the most questions normally, so maybe we'll get everybody else's questions. Do you have any questions? Any concerns? You got the recipe there?

Troy: I think I'm ready to try it.

Scot: Do you know what an English cucumber is?

Troy: I will probably find an American cucumber, but . . .

Scot: Do you know how to tell the difference between English cucumbers and American cucumbers?

Thunder: Is it the accent?

Scot: Well, yeah. You go, "Hello, governor," and if it goes, "Hello, how are you?"

Troy: Yes. That will be me talking to the cucumbers.

Scot: "Mighty cheeky today, aren't you, Dr. Madsen?" Then it's an English cucumber.

Troy: If it's wearing a top hat, I'll purchase it. What am I supposed to look for?

Theresa: If it's wrapped in plastic, long and wrapped in plastic, it's an English cucumber most of the time.

Troy: Okay.

Scot: All right.

Theresa: They tend to have fewer seeds, they have a lower water content, and so they work really well for something like this. If you were using a traditional cucumber, say, that you were harvesting out of your garden maybe, or your typical American cucumber from the grocery store, they tend to be really waxy. So I would suggest peeling it as well as scraping out a lot of the seeds in the middle, or it's going to make the salad really watery. Find that produce lady.

Troy: I will find the lady. I've got to find her.

Theresa. Or gentleman. There are plenty of good produce men as well.

Troy: I'm sure there are.

Thunder: So my question about this recipe . . . when I was looking at it, it looks like it's going to create a massive volume of food, and I'm pretty sure I can't freeze it. Would it be okay to cut everything in half, and could I still mix everything?

Theresa: Yes, certainly. This one fairly easily could go in half, yes.

Thunder: Okay. Good.

Scot: Mitch?

Mitch: We'll see. I have suspicions also about lentils, but we'll see how this comes together. Troy, the thing that I've been doing lately is that I've just been doing the pickup, the grocery pickup. So I don't even need to hunt in the store to find things.

Theresa: Nice.

Troy: Oh, you just put everything on there and someone finds it for you.

Thunder: That's like cheating.

Troy: It is cheating.

Mitch: Yes, her name is Mary. It's been every Wednesday for the last month. I know her. We chitchat. It's great. So she's like, "Oh, getting something different this week." And I'm like, "Yes, I am." So I will . . .

Theresa: You should share the recipes with her.

Mitch: I might have to, but that's just it. So that's how I've been skipping the "Where on earth is this item in the store?" So that's my tip.

Troy: That's a really good strategy. I didn't even think about that. That's actually a good idea. I may do that. I think I can find most of the stuff.

Thunder: Troy, it's part of the adventure.

Troy: I know. It is part of the adventure. I have to say it is, and I have found some new things I hadn't really found before. So this looks pretty straightforward though. The bulgur, that really threw me off, but everything else on here . . . The English cucumber, now that you've described it, I think I can find that. Everything else looks pretty straightforward.

Scot: All right. Can't wait to try zesty lentil salad. We'll talk about it next week along with another brand new recipe from Theresa. And we would love it if you'd join us in the kitchen. Try these recipes out. You can find them at facebook.com/whocaresmenshealth. We're posting the recipes there. You can post your comments and pictures there. We'd love to have you just be a part of this and let us know what you think in the kitchen along with us with "Who Cares About Men's Health."

This week's recipe is Stuffed Spaghetti Squash and homemade No-bake Chewy Granola Bars. If you make it, tell us how it was and post your pictures on our Facebook page.

This content was originally created for audio. Some elements such as tone, sound effects, and music can be hard to translate to text. As such, the following is a summary of the episode and has been edited for clarity. For the full experience, we encourage you to subscribe and listen— it's more fun that way.

Scot: All right. So today on "Who Cares About Men's Health," we're going to find out how it went with the first recipe, easy Thai red curry. Was it tasty? How did it go for cooking newbie Troy? And we're also going to get another easy-to-make man meal that you can eat all week today.

It is "Who Cares About Men's Health," providing information, inspiration, and a different interpretation about men's health.

All right. Today's crew, we've got co-host, Dr. Troy Madsen.

Troy: Hey, Scot.

Scot: I'm Scot Singpiel. I bring the BS and ask the dumb questions so you don't have to. Mitch, looking good from his head to his toes, and now he can breathe through his nose. It's Producer Mitch in the mix.

Mitch: Oh, wow. I'm glad I get an intro now. It's fancy.

Scot: And our guests today from University of Utah's College of Health Department of Nutrition and Integrative Physiology, we have registered dietician and culinary coach Theresa Dvorak. She's got another stack of tasty recipes.

Theresa: Hey, there. How's it going?

Scot: Doing well. And he has a PhD in nutrition, and I also just learned today biochemistry and molecular biology. And he also has a 16-page CV. Thunder Jalili.

Thunder: You must be really bored to be looking up my background.

Scot: All right. Today's easy-to-make-all-at-once man meal we're reviewing was the easy Thai red curry. We're going to go around the table here, see what people thought, get any sort of feedback that might be useful, and then Theresa is going to give us another recipe.

I don't have a ton to say, so I'm just going to jump in first. I thought it was really good. What'd you think, Thunder? Was it good?

Thunder: Yeah, I thought the meal was delicious. It was a little different than the curries I've made before because of the added tomatoes, but I found I actually liked that extra flavor in there.

Scot: Okay. Troy, what'd you think?

Troy: Well, it's clear that I'm the outlier in the group. I think Mitch should go before I do.

Scot: Okay. Well, just in general, was it tasty? Can you at least answer that?

Troy: It was good. I liked it. It was good.

Scot: Okay. All right.

Theresa: Did we get to the end product?

Troy: We did. It was good.

Scot: Yeah, stay tuned for some whining from Troy coming up. That'll be fun. Mitch, was it good or not? What'd you think?

Mitch: I really liked it, but my partner is a bit of a foodie, and it was really surprising when we went to . . . We went down to the Southeast Asian market to get some supplies because I know Theresa on the episode was like, "Get good stuff. Go and get some quality ingredients. It'll make a better product."

I got the pre-prepared curry paste and he was a little snooty about it. He was like, "You know you can make your own curry? You know you can do that." And it turned out better than any curry that we've tried before. I'm just going to throw that out there.

Scot: I have a feeling, Theresa, that in this particular recipe, simplicity trumps authenticity.

Theresa: Well, I would beg to differ on the authenticity piece because I know many Asian/Southeast Asian/Thai individuals who just use paste.

So that brings into a good point of when you use pre-prepared packaged items and when you make them from scratch. And some of the key things that you want to look for are: Are there added chemicals, things like MSG or added alternatives? Is there added sugar? Is there a lot of extra salt in it?"

Those types of pre-prepared packaged things, sauces, mixes, soups, things of that sort, you could probably do better if you did from scratch. Whereas something like the curry paste is really just a blend of spices and peppers and things like that. And across the board, I would say most of them don't have that extra stuff in them that we often want to stay away from.

But if Jonathan wants to make his own, I would be more than willing to taste test for it.

Mitch: That's kind of what I told him too.

Troy: I'm just going to jump in here and say if I had to make my own curry paste, that would have been my breaking point.

Thunder: It would have been back to the bean burrito, Troy.

Troy: No, this is what I would have done. I thought very seriously about going down to a Thai restaurant we had been to a week before and ordering a red curry, and eating it, and saying, "Yes, I had a delicious red curry. I loved it." I was close.

Theresa: And taken a picture like Thunder.

Troy: And taken a picture and said, "Look how great my . . . I made a few modifications. It may not look like yours, but it was delicious." I was close, but like I said, I'm definitely the outlier. I recognize this was not a difficult recipe, but my background is . . . I thought back over the years. I've never made anything that required more than five ingredients, and even that has been a stretch for me. So usually my ingredients are pancake mix, eggs, milk . . .

Theresa: Water.

Troy: And maybe some water. That's been it. I made some cheesy potatoes before. You cut up potatoes. I looked it up to see how many ingredients it was.

Thunder: Wow.

Troy: It's potatoes, cheese, and cream of mushroom soup. That's the extent of my cooking expertise. So this was a stretch.

Theresa: Was it real cheese or Velveeta? No, I'm just joking.

Troy: It was real cheese. It was better than Velveeta. So I'm speaking for all the guys out there who may not have a lot of cooking experience. This was a stretch for me. This was tough.

Scot: Yeah, I want to throw in Troy's wife posted on Facebook and made me laugh out loud. So it says, "Troy's preparing dinner as part of a challenge for the podcast. In 13 years of marriage, he's never made dinner." Here are my favorite comments so far. This is from Troy's wife. "What is a saucepan?"

Troy: I have no idea

Scot: "Are shallots a vegetable? Was I supposed to buy those?"

Troy: Yeah, there were shallots in the recipe. I get down to this point and it says, "Add the shallots to the oil that's already cooking." I was like, "What did I miss? Where are shallots? I missed that."

Scot: That might be a little trip-up in the recipe because it asks for a yellow onion.

Theresa: I apologize. Yes, Troy, that was a typo. Thank you.

Troy: I figured it out later, but I hit that, I was like, "Shallots? Number one, what is a shallot? Number two, I didn't buy one."

Theresa: Well, see, I was thinking of you because I changed it originally from shallots to yellow onions, because I knew . . .

Troy: So you did that for me? Thank you.

Theresa: For all of you, yes.

Troy: For all of us. Me in particular.

Scot: It just sent him into a tailspin, though.

Troy: It did. I was like, "Whoa."

Scot: The third thing, "Do you know coconut milk is a thing?" That was his third comment. And not only is it a thing, it's the thing that makes this so freaking good, I have to say.

Troy: It did make a difference.

Thunder: It's a key ingredient.

Scot: If you don't know anything about coconut milk, know this. It makes things good. "Ginger is crazy-looking," and, "How do I do medium heat?" which is a legitimate kind of question in a way.

Thunder: Isn't that the middle part of the heat dial?

Troy: One would assume, but I honestly had it on medium and I'm like, "This isn't cooking fast enough." I'm supposed to brown everything I chopped up and it was two minutes into it and it wasn't very brown. I'm like, "Okay, I don't think this is medium." So that was throwing me off a little bit.

Scot: It takes time. I think I might have put in a little too much oil because it took a long time for my onions to brown, and I think maybe it was too much oil. I don't know.

So I think what we should focus on here is Troy's story because I think this could be a familiar story. For somebody who doesn't have a lot of experience in the kitchen, can be really kind of intimidated, Theresa, is there anything . . . What would you say to Troy or somebody like that? Because you teach cooking lessons out in the community, so you must run into this.

Theresa: Certainly. First and foremost, I would probably say Troy should join one of our classes.

Let me kind of tease this out a little bit more, Troy. Was it the recipe literacy piece or not knowing what . . . It sounds like there was not knowing what things are. And so just learning that? Or the actual seeing this laundry list of ingredients and multiple paragraphs of instructions, was that the intimidating part that caused a little bit of the shutdown?

Thunder: Or all the above?

Troy: Everything you just said. I went down aisles in the grocery store I have never visited before.

Theresa: Awesome. Love it.

Troy: I'm like, "I have never been in this aisle. Wait." And then I'm looking for the diced tomatoes and I find this aisle that has all the vegetables. I'm like, "Where are diced tomatoes?" There's every other vegetable you can imagine in this aisle. Come to find out diced tomatoes are in the Italian aisle. There are like 400 varieties of diced tomatoes by the spaghetti sauce.

And then the clincher . . . because I found the Thai paste pretty quickly because there is an Asian aisle, but the clincher was the coconut milk. I was like, "Coconut milk? Where in the world am I going to find that?" And I finally found it down on the bottom. They had a couple cans of coconut milk by the condensed milk. And so that part . . .

Theresa: In the baking aisle, yeah, which threw you. Why shouldn't it be by the Asian food?

Troy: I know.

Thunder: Troy, did you start in the dairy section for the coconut milk?

Troy: I might as well have.

Theresa: That's great.

Troy: I didn't go that far with it. I'm like, "I don't think it's going to be refrigerated. So it's not going to be next to a gallon of milk that I would pull out of the thing." But like I said, I was going places I've never been. And I'm glad there weren't a lot of people in the grocery store because it was just me going up and down aisles, up and down aisles multiple times.

Scot: Yeah, your frustration started at the grocery store, and then did it continue?

Troy: It did. Yes, it did continue. That wasn't the end of it. As I'm trying to peel the garlic, I'm like, "How do I peel garlic?" Just simple things. Honestly, I've never done them before, so Laura, my wife, says, "Well, if you put it in the microwave for like seven seconds, it makes it easier to peel." So that kind of helped.

And then the ginger, I kind of figured out how to peel that with the spoon, but again, it's something I'd never done before.

But when I did get into the recipe itself, I'm trying to time this stuff, like, "Okay, I've got this in there. Oh, wait, I need to add this. Oh, wait, I should have chopped those vegetables first. I didn't chop those vegetables. I've got to get those in."

So I think I probably should have read ahead a little bit more and been prepared for what was coming rather than just kind of going step by step, which is what I did. I mean, I got through it and it actually tasted really good. I was happy with the outcome, but it was a process, but I got there.

Theresa: So looking back, was it a good . . . Do you feel a little bit more empowered now . . .

Troy: I don't know if empowered is the best word.

Theresa: . . . for this next week's recipe?

Troy: Maybe a little bit.

Scot: Quite frankly, I'm afraid he's dropping out. I really am.

Troy: I thought about it. I hate to admit it. It was a challenge. Again, the most rewarding part is that, number one, I enjoyed it. It tasted good. Number two, Laura was very impressed. She was like, "Okay, this is really cool you did this." She was very supportive, so that was great. But it was a challenge. It was definitely a stretch.

Thunder: Troy, I have a question for you. How long did it take you to actually cook it?

Troy: The whole process, like once I chopped and cooked everything, was an hour and a half. So I was hoping it would be under an hour. It was an hour and a half.

Thunder: Well, the recipe did say an hour.

Troy: It did.

Thunder: So you blew through that metric.

Troy: Yeah, I did okay there. At the end I was like, "I'm just going to botch this and it's going to taste awful," but it actually tasted good. I will admit, I told you I was going to do minute rice. I did minute rice. I did not do any special kind of rice, but it tasted fine. It was good.

Scot: I just have a feeling . . . I'm not super well versed in the kitchen, but you start to kind of learn when . . . Like, while the onions are doing their thing, if you have an idea that it's going to take five to seven minutes, then you can be chopping your vegetables. I mean, after you do this a couple times, you start figuring that stuff out. So I hope that by the end of this, maybe we see some growth as Chef Madsen puts on his hat.

Theresa: In training.

Scot: Chef-in-training.

Theresa: Yeah, I think that's great. And you bring in a really great point, Troy, that a lot of newbies in the kitchen experience, is that they often don't read through the recipe. And so really reading through the recipe first to know what ingredients you're having. And often in that list, it tells you how it needs to be prepared and you can investigate and research that a little bit if needed.

But then it can also give you an idea of . . . kind of set the agenda almost of where we're starting and where we're going. And so you have that in the back of your mind as to, "Okay, this is the process."

Troy: It's true. And I think having been through this now, if I never cook another dish . . . I will. I will stick with it, but if I never cook another dish, I do feel like I could go back and I can make this and I could actually serve this to people who came to our house and be like, "Hey, I made this." And they'd be like, "Oh, it's pretty good."

So I feel like I now know what to expect and how to do things with this specific dish. And hopefully, that translates into a little more expertise with our next attempt here. We'll see how it goes.

Scot: And if you did this dish four or five times, you would be a master at it. I mean, it's just a matter of . . .

Troy: Yeah, that's true.

Scot: I mean, you'd be able to probably cut that time down. The frustration level would go away. And Thunder wanted to throw in . . . he had a couple of tips for maybe even making it easier to prepare some of the things in here. What did you have, Thunder?

Thunder: Yeah, since the idea is to have easy recipes that men can make that are not too intimidating, here are some ideas to make it more manly. I actually got frozen vegetables out of my freezer and put them in the curry instead of buying and slicing up my own vegetables. I had a powdered turmeric that I used instead of just shaving the root. I used the . . .

Troy: Powdered ginger, you mean?

Thunder: Sorry. Yeah, ginger.

Troy: Yeah, the ginger . . . Okay.

Thunder: And then I also had pre-minced garlic out of the jar. I used that stuff. Actually, the whole recipe didn't take that much time. What took the most time for me is I added my own flair to it. I took tofu and I pressed the water out of it and I stir-fried it and I added it to the curry, but I didn't have to do that.

Scot: They also have a pre-bottled or in a jar chopped ginger-garlic combination, which is what I used. So we have a jar of chopped garlic and then this little deal. Then you don't have to deal with that stuff, Troy, which can kind of take some of the stress and pressure off if you just buy that sort of thing.

Troy: That would have been nice.

Theresa: That piggybacks off of kind of what Mitch was talking about of how do you know what is a decent packaged or pre-prepared type of food versus not. And frozen vegetables, even some canned vegetables, are a great example of that because the chopping and finding it in-season and fresh can sometimes be challenging depending on the time of the year.

And those frozen individual veggies or veggie medleys are really great to have on hand so that you can just grab a couple of handfuls there and throw it in your sauce.

And you could throw it in your spaghetti sauce or your Thai curry sauce or your Alfredo or something like that too if you were venturing in those other directions.

Thunder: Can I ask a group question? I'm curious, what vegetables did you guys put into your curry? Now I'll go ahead and I'll start. I used frozen cauliflower, frozen red peppers and frozen orange peppers, and also some mushrooms I actually had in the freezer that I sautéed like a week before.

Scot: And those mushrooms held up, huh?

Thunder: Oh, they were fabulous.

Scot: Oh, that's cool. I did broccoli and cauliflower, a red bell pepper, and zucchini is what I put in. And then I just threw tofu. I didn't even press the water out of it like Thunder did. Mitch?

Thunder: I try to be fancy.

Mitch: Theresa was mentioning about the droopy vegetables, and I just threw everything in there. I had a parsnip, I had some carrots, I had a broccoli. It was just whatever. A red pepper. Things that were looking a little gross. They were not gross-gross, but they were a little wilty. I threw them in there.

Therese: A little wrinkly.

Mitch: A little wrinkly. Just chopped them up, threw them in there, delicious. I like that kind of thing because we try really hard to minimize our food waste in our house and so it was kind of cool to be like, "Well, this parsnip is not going anywhere. Let's just throw it on in."

Thunder: You've got the adventure award for using a parsnip. Who uses that in cooking?

Theresa: Troy, do you know what a parsnip is?

Troy: I was going to say, please do not put parsnip on the next recipe. It was hard enough to find a ginger root. A parsnip.

Thunder: Troy would be in the grocery for days looking for that.

Troy: You guys are just going to make a missing person's report or something. Seriously. Well, I have to add what I put in. I put in carrots and broccoli. So I get the least adventurous, but I did do tofu as well. Yeah, I did tofu too.

Theresa: Something that I hadn't put on the list, Troy, that I often do, thinking about keeping it meat-free as much as possible, is that I often will put garbanzo beans in it as well. It's another kind of additional protein alternative and good fiber source.

Troy: Nice.

Theresa: That's pretty easy, right? They're usually in cans. You don't have to boil them yourself. You can buy them canned and rinse them.

Troy: That's a great option.

Scot: All right. Well, Troy, this next week's recipe, I'm a little concerned, Theresa, that it's going to put Troy into a tailspin. I'm seeing stuff on here like canneli beans, artichoke hearts.

Theresa: Cannellini.

Scot: Cannellini beans, artichoke hearts.

Troy: Wow.

Scot: Sun-dried tomatoes, quality pasta sauce. You probably could manage that one.

Troy: Ragu?

Thunder: Is that Ragu?

Troy: I was going to say I know Ragu.

Scot: All right. So what's this week's recipe, Theresa? And talk us through this.

Theresa: Sure. So we actually have two recipes. I know that might be a stretch, and whether you make the second one or not, we can cross that bridge next week.

First is a stuffed spaghetti squash. When we think about alternative carbohydrates, spaghetti squash is one of those that tends to check some boxes when we're looking for something like a pasta dinner.

It's going to be nice in the sense that everything is relatively prepared for you. The ingredients are. So you're going to have marinated artichokes, sun-dried tomatoes, Kalamata olives, things that you could all find in . . . If there was an olive bar at the grocery store that you were choosing to go to, you could buy your small quantity there. Or then head down the Italian pasta aisle, and you'll find most of these ingredients.

They should be pretty similar areas of the grocery store, hopefully, Troy, that you're not having to meander all the way around the grocery store multiple times to find your items. But also, the benefit with some of those is that it brings in a lot of savory flavor.

And that's sometimes part of the issue when we're looking at using these large spaghetti squashes. They often need a lot of flavor because it's pretty bland on its own. And so that's why I choose a . . . when I say quality spaghetti sauce, I take it a step up from Ragu or Prego, and look at something that has a little lovelier of a label.

Rao's is a good brand. There are several others. Look for, again, a glass jar. If it's in a glass jar, it's probably a little bit better, and maybe something that's more than, say, a dollar a jar. Shoot for maybe $2 or $3 a jar.

And there are some tips in the recipe about how to cook the spaghetti squash and speed it up. Throw it in the microwave whole for a few minutes. It makes it much easier to cut.

This is also one that you could do in stages if you wanted to depending on how much time you have. You could cook the squash ahead of time, or even the day before, and then prepare it. If you wanted it for Monday night dinner, you could put the rest together, and it's a pretty quick 15 to 20 minutes in the oven that Monday night.

Scot: Any questions on this, Troy? Have you looked the recipe over?

Troy: I did look it over a little bit. I saw roasted red peppers on there. Does that mean I roast the red peppers in advance, or can you buy roasted red peppers?

Thunder: Troy, the olive bar is your friend.

Troy: The olive bar.

Thunder: Yes.

Theresa: And if not, yes, you can buy them jarred.

Troy: Okay, good. Good to know.

Theresa: So they're going to be in this same area that . . . your artichokes, your Kalamata olives, your sun-dried tomatoes are all going to be in that same area in the grocery store.

Troy: Italian aisle? Kind of near the spaghetti? I know pastas. I know spaghettis. As long as it's somewhere in that vicinity, I think I can find it.

Scot: Yeah, the stuffed spaghetti squash looks great. I've had spaghetti squash before and it is really, really tasty. And this looks really gourmet, but it also looks pretty easy to make. Like you said, a lot of the stuff is already kind of in cans, jars, whatnot.

The second one, I think Troy is going to really like this because he loves his protein bars.

Troy: I do love protein bars.

Scot: Yeah, maybe this will be a good substitute for you. It's something you might like. What is your second recipe, Theresa?

Theresa: Chewy granola bars. So from our conversation last week, there was lots of talk about things that are easy to grab and go, needing snacks that you feel good about, whether it's late night coming home from work, or middle of the day and just needing something to kind of take care of that craving in the afternoon, or even that sweet tooth. This one would definitely satisfy that as well. And who doesn't love a nice, crunchy, chewy granola bar that's got chocolate?

And so this one is really pretty easy and you can mix and match with either what you have at your house or what you like to put in it. Essentially, you need a nut butter, some honey, and then some cereal. So puffed rice, puffed kamut, things of that sort to give that crunch.

I like to put in some seeds like chia seeds or flax seeds. You could certainly put in some slivered almonds or things like that if you wanted to.

And then whether it's chocolate chips or a couple of tablespoons of cocoa powder, both work to give that nice chocolate flavor without a ton of extra sugar.

So yeah, the chewy granola bars, I think they'll become a favorite. And they're really easy to make and you can store them in the fridge or the freezer and pop one out as you're ready.

Scot: So one of the things that we want to watch for is added sugar. We've learned that added sugar is not necessarily great. I'm noticing a lot of sugar stuff in this, like light brown sugar, cocoa powder. Maybe that's actually not sugar. Chocolate chips, that's sugar. What makes this better?

Thunder: Partly.

Scot: Yeah. What makes this better than what I might buy in the store?

Theresa: So part of it is the ratio of sugar to your cereal and your nuts and seeds and things of that sort that are mixed into it. And certainly, yes, there is the sugar there. It's going to taste sweet.

We've got to think about portion size. Whether I'm eating a Snickers bar or a protein bar, often when we look at the nutritional content, they're very similar honestly.

And so with this recipe, it's got a significant amount of protein, which is really nice, from the nut butters brought into it. And if you add some nuts and seeds, you're getting a lot of extra fiber there as well.

And when you split up the actual sugar content per serving, it's a bit less than . . . When you see, "Oh, a whole half a cup of honey," you've also got to remember that you're dispersing that throughout all of your servings.

Troy: Are we making both of these then?

Scot: You are. I don't know about the rest of us, but you are.

Thunder: Troy, you make both of them, and we'll give you a couple of weeks to get through it.

Troy: Thanks, guys. Seriously, that's not a bad idea.

Thunder: You might have to take a leave of absence.

Troy: Yeah, can I get a leave of absence? Can one of you guys give me a work note? Seriously. Wow.

Theresa: Focus on the spaghetti squash. And if you've got time to do the granola bars, you can go from there.

Troy: I'm going to focus on spaghetti squash. I'm going to find the olive bar. I will find roasted red peppers and marinated artichoke hearts. I'm going to do this.

Scot: Warning: Put that spaghetti squash in the microwave. I've never heard that trick. They can be really hard to cut. You have to be careful with spaghetti squash.

Troy: Yeah. I do not want to slice a hand.

Theresa: You can always put it in the oven whole. It takes a little longer. It takes more like 45 minutes versus a half an hour in the oven. But yes, you can just put it straight into the oven on a baking sheet if you want, or straight onto the rack, but you can do that. And then how do you know it's done? You can stick a fork in it.

Scot: All right. Well, we're going to stick a fork in this episode right now. Thank you very much for listening, and we hope that you participate. If you do, let us know about it on Facebook. You can go to facebook.com/whocaresmenshealth. Send your pictures to hello@thescoperadio.com, or leave your voice message at 601-55SCOPE. Thanks for listening and thanks for caring about men's health.

Interviewer: What are three things you should pay attention to when you're reading a nutrition label? Registered dietitian, Theresa Dvorak, help us out with this one.

Theresa: Yeah, sure. So the three keys would be serving size, fat content, sodium content. So what is a serving? Is it the entire package? Is it three cookies? So looking at that can help us make smart choices.

Fat content. Often, there's a lot of hidden calories from fat in our packaged foods. So, especially, is it coming from saturated fat or unsaturated fat?

And thirdly, sodium content. To make foods taste better, we put salt in them, but we should only be getting about 2,300 milligrams of salt per day. So there's often way too much in our processed foods. So, again, those three takeaways would be serving size, fat content, sodium content.

updated: July 21, 2021
originally published: April 9, 2019

Interviewer: Three healthy snacks for your desk drawer. Theresa Dvorak's a registered dietitian. What are some healthy things I can put in my snack drawer at work that are probably better than what's already in there?

Theresa: Sure. Some key things that we want to look for with these particular food items is that it's a good source of protein, it's got complex carbohydrates, and it's high in fiber. These things are important because they give us some energy, but also it's sustaining energy, so it's going to help keep us full for a given period of time and not just quick sugars.

My top choices there would be something like a trail mix with some nuts and seeds and dried fruit, a granola bar, preferably not chocolate covered granola bars, those tend to be just like candy bars, and then something fresh like fruit and nuts. Keeping us away from the vending machine and in control of our choices.

updated: February 3, 2021
originally published: April 22, 2019

Announcer: Need reliable health and wellness information? Don't listen to the guy in the cube next to you. Get it from a trusted source, straight from the doctor's mouth. Here's this week's listener question on The Scope.

Interviewer: Today's listener question, I think, is one that a lot of us have struggled with. I know I have. Three big meals versus several smaller meals throughout the day, "grazing," as they call it. Is one better than the other? I'm going to ask our expert right here. She's a registered dietitian, Theresa Dvorak, from the Department of Nutrition and Integrative Physiology at University of Utah College of Health. Three big meals versus several smaller meals, you can go online and find cases for both. What does the research say?

Theresa: The research really supports both, honestly.

Interviewer: Okay.

Theresa: I know. It's one of those, "Well, great, thanks." But there really is . . . we see positive health management, weight management, along with weight loss following multiple food meal plan practices. So whether you're just consuming three meals and breaking your calories into those three or spreading them more, say, through five or six smaller meals throughout the day.

The big take-home for weight management, weight loss, is total caloric intake. So how many calories are you consuming during an entire day? So what we see metabolically as well is that we like to spread those calories evenly throughout the day. But whether that was spread in three even meals or over six relatively even meals, it really doesn't seem to matter.

Some individuals, depending on their own physiology and their own kind of genetic makeup will tend to do better on one versus the other. And that really just takes some trial and error. But research-wise, we see that individuals can successfully maintain weight and then also lose weight on all those different meals plans.

Interviewer: So if I'm only able to get kind of three bigger meals throughout the course of the day because that's all my schedule will allow, I shouldn't stress out about that because I've heard somewhere else that grazing is actually going to help my weight loss?

Theresa: Right. No.

Interviewer: It's those total calories.

Theresa: It is. It is and really trying to manage the length of time in between your meals. So what we find is also . . . is that when we go longer than say about five hours without eating, that we tend to kind of rate higher on a hunger scale. We tend to get really hungry, overly hungry, almost, when we come to that next meal. And then that's what tends to lead to overeating in that particular late meal.

So if I had lunch at, say, 11:30, but I didn't have dinner until, say, 7:00, I'm going to be exactly ravenously hungry and I'm going to have a tendency to eat quickly and consume more calories than if I had eaten a little bit earlier. So if you've got a long span of time, certainly a snack is going to be helpful in managing those hunger cues so that your dinner comes along, you're still hungry, but it's not kind of like that ravenous hunger, that over-hunger where we tend to overeat.

Interviewer: So it sounds like you're not going to be able to give me an answer. I'm going to have to find out what works for me.

Theresa: It is. And maybe it changes from day-to-day.

Interviewer: And that's okay. Sure. Got you.

Theresa: And maybe some days are going to be fairly structured and consistent in my timing of eating. And other days, maybe I have to plan that I've got a late meeting or an early meeting that I'm going to have to maybe plan a snack for because it's not going to fit into my exact schedule.

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