Tips for upping your calcium intake

When you eat a diet rich in whole foods—vegetables, whole grains, nuts, seeds, and fruits—not only do you get a wonderful variety of tastes on your plate, but you also give your body the different nutrients, including calcium, that it needs. To boost your daily intake, try to include calcium-rich foods in multiple meals or snacks.

Tips for adding more dairy to your diet—even if you don’t like milk

• Use milk instead of water when making oatmeal or other hot breakfast cereals.
• Substitute milk for some of the liquid in soups such as tomato, squash, pumpkin, curries, etc.
• Milk can be added to many sauces or used as the base in sauces such as Alfredo and Béchamel sauce.
• Make whole-wheat pancakes and waffles using milk or yogurt.
• Get creative with plain yogurt. Use it to make a dressing or a dip, or try it on potatoes in place of fattier sour cream.
• Add milk or yogurt to a fruit smoothie. You can even freeze blended smoothies for popsicles.
• Enjoy a small piece of cheese for dessert or as a snack. Try cheddar, mozzarella, Gouda, jack, Parmesan, or a type of cheese you’ve never had before.

Tips for getting your calcium from non-dairy sources

• Greens, herbs and spices can easily be added to soups, casseroles, or stir-fries. Greens that are especially good are: kale, collard greens, and parsley. Also good: turnip greens, dandelion greens, mustard greens, beet greens, broccoli, and cabbage. Spice up these and other dishes with garlic, basil, thyme, oregano, and rosemary to add more nutrients.
• Eat dark green leafy salads with your meals. Try romaine hearts, arugula, butter lettuce, mesclun, watercress, or red leaf lettuce (avoid iceberg lettuce as it has very little nutrient value). You can also add herbs to the salads or the dressings for flavor and nutrients – dill and basil taste especially good in salads.
• Add extra servings of veggies to your meals, i.e. asparagus, fresh green peas, broccoli, cabbage, okra, bok choy.
• Top salads or make a sandwich with canned fish or crustaceans with bones, such as sardines, pink salmon, and shrimp.
• Use beans/legumes as part of your meals. They are wonderful in stews, chili, soup, or as the protein part of a meal. Kinds to try: tofu, tempeh, black-eyed peas, black beans, and other dried beans. You can also snack on edamame.
• Start your day with oats. Steel cut oats or rolled oats make a wonderfully comforting and filling breakfast. For an added punch include cinnamon
• Snack on nuts and seeds such as almonds and sesame seeds. You can also add these to your morning oatmeal.
• Drink tea. Try green tea, which you can substitute for coffee, as well as herbal teas and infusions, such as oatstraw, nettle, and red clover.
• Order or prepare sandwiches on whole grain wheat bread.