I admit it! Ever since I was a very little boy. I have devoured noodles and cottage (or farmer’s) cheese. Admittedly, my folks weaned me on this staple (give me some liberty, here) because I was a coeliac kid. And, this menu item met the requirements.

(Stop! I know what you are thinking. And, you are wrong. Durum wheat does NOT incite the coeliac response. Durum contains 24 chromosomes- about 1/2 that of the wheat used to make bread. it’s the D-genome that stimulates the autoimmue response of coeliac. But, I digress.)

To this day, I eat noodles and cottage cheese- about once a week. And, my kids learned to (love? hate?) the meal- because they were subjected to such a delicacy. (No, kiddos. This is not a 24 hour diner. What I make is what you eat.)

And, now… it turns out that all those nay-sayers, those telling me that having noodles as part of my diet is bad for me, are dead wrong. There are data indicating that the higher the whole-grain consumption the lower the body-mass index. And, whole grains reduce the incidence of heart disease and cancer. (I admit that it’s been very hard to find whole-grain noodles over the past two decades or so, as the agribusiness interestes went for ‘refined’ flour. But, that’s changing now.)

Drs. G Pounis, A Di Castelnuovo, S Costanzo, M Persichillo, M Bonaccio, A Bonanni, C Cerletti, M B Donati, G de Gaetano and L Iacoviello published the results of their survey in Nutrition and Diabetes. . They analyzed the data from the Moli-sani (Molise region in Italy, in the Southern region) and INHES (Italian Nutrition and Health Study) subjects (some 23000 of them).

Almost all of the subjects did follow the standard Mediterranean diet. And, the data examined covered waist, hip, weight, and height indicators. The goal of the study was to discern if pasta affect BMI, waist-hip ratios, overweight, and obesity factors.

After all, grains are a prime source of fiber, proteins, and nutrients in the Mediterranean diet. But, fruits and vegetables (nine servings a day) are the diet’s foundations. It also is rich in olive oil and fish. The researchers have determined that if 10% of your caloric intake is from pasta, your measurements should be just fine.

And, my diet is about that- I have fish twice a week or so, only use olive oil, and devour apples and pears- plus salad vegetables all the time. And, I generally cook for myself (and others)- so I can avoid these gratuitous meals (like fettucine alfredo that provides some 1500 calories, along with a plethora of saturated fats.)

And, by using non-refined flour pastas, I can also get phosphorus, magnesium, iron, fiber- even some protein. (But, of course, the cottage or farmer’s cheese has plenty of protein.) And, there is a vast difference among the pastas- whole grain pasta [200 calorie serving) has six grams of fiber; the refined flour pasta has but two.

So, if you are in the mood for some healthy pasta meals, let me know. I typically make one Wednesday nights.

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