Are you eating enough lentils and beans?
By Wendy Haaf
You could cut your chances of developing Type 2 diabetes by as much as 35% by adopting a diet loaded with lentils, beans, chickpeas, fresh peas, and other pulses, according to a finding published in the journal Clinical Nutrition. Lentils especially were associated with a reduced risk.
The researchers behind a long-term Spanish study analyzed dietary data on 3,349 adults who did not have diabetes at the outset of the study but were considered at high risk of developing cardiovascular disease. A little more than four years later, 266 of the subjects had developed diabetes, but the incidence was 35% lower in the group who had consumed the largest amounts of pulses—about 3.35 servings a week—than among those who had eaten the least—less than half a serving a week. The researchers called for more studies to validate their findings and to look into how and why legumes confer the benefit they appear to.
Photo: iStock/PicturePartners.
