When it comes to healthy eating, we’re told to choose our foods by colour. The darker and brighter the colour, the more nutrients and phytochemicals they have.

For many foods that’s good advice. Brown bread has more vitamins and fibre than white bread. Spinach, carrots and other brightly coloured vegetables offer more beta carotene than celery, cucumbers and other pale looking produce.

But dark versus light or brown versus white isn’t always a straightforward choice. In some cases, dark coloured foods don’t offer more nutrients than their white counterparts.

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It’s the chicken-and-egg question of aging: Do we become less active as we get older because our bodies start to break down, or do our bodies start to break down because we allow ourselves to become less active?

For years, it was widely accepted that humans would start getting slower, weaker and more fragile starting in their 30s. But new studies on topics ranging from the cellular mechanisms of aging to the time-defying performances of masters athletes are forcing researchers to question this orthodoxy. It seems increasingly likely that the first signs of decline are more a function of lifestyle than DNA: If you keep using it, you’ll be well into middle age before you start losing it.

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She was crowned Miss Bikini America after losing 80lbs following the birth of her second child.

And today fitness model Jennifer Nicole Lee showed just how she keeps herself in such amazing shape.

Wearing a pair of tiny bikini bottoms with the words ‘Big Fun’ emblazoned across the back and a stomach-baring tank worn over a neon pink bra, the 36-year-old raised temperatures in an already balmy Miami as she worked out at a South Beach park.

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If you want to keep excess snacking at bay, include enough protein in your diet. That’s the take-away message from a new study that investigated how the amount of protein consumed affects calorie intake and hunger.

People who followed a lower protein diet – 10 per cent of daily calories – consumed more calories each day than when they consumed a 15-per-cent protein diet. What’s more, the calorie increase was enough to cause a roughly two-pound weight gain each month.

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If you’re looking for ways to fend off colds and flu this winter, consider stocking your vegetable crisper with broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage.

According to new research findings published this month in the journal Cell, these healthy vegetables – known as cruciferous vegetables – can bolster the immune system.

The immune system is made up of a network of cells, tissues and organs and defends the body every day from bacteria, viruses and other invaders. Special immune cells in the skin and gut – intraepithelial lymphocytes (IELs) – serve as the body’s first line of defence, producing substances harmful to microbes.

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A McDonald’s muffin marketed as a healthier option contains more salt than one of its burgers.

The fast-food chain’s low-fat blueberry muffin has 1.7g of salt – more than in three packets of ready-salted crisps.

The figures come from health campaigners who claim that simple coffee-break snacks are part of the reason the nation is overdosing on salt every day.

Hidden salt in processed foods is said to be fuelling high blood pressure, strokes and heart attacks, leading to thousands of premature deaths.

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From the Dukan Diet to the Caveman Plan, weight-loss regimes instructing us what to eat and what to avoid are big business.

But a number of recent studies have revealed how making several small lifestyle changes could help you lose weight without feeling deprived of the food you love.

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This week marks the start of my new weekly column in Weekend magazine. I’ve been doing bits and pieces for the Mail over the last 12 years but I’ve never been a formal member of staff before, so this is really exciting.

A lot has happened during those 12 years. We’re in a weird climate at the moment, the recession has definitely taken the sparkle off stuff and
Britain has become quite polarised.

On one hand there’s a massive chunk of people that haven’t got a clue where their food comes from, hardly ever cook from scratch and eat prepacked meals or takeaways every night of the week.

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Vitamins and other food supplements taken by millions of women may actually put them at more risk, according to a major study.

Scientists say there is little evidence the pills do any good – and in fact some could be causing serious harm.

A study involving nearly 39,000 women has found multivitamins, vitamin B, folic acid, iron, magnesium and copper all increased the statistical risk of premature death.

Nearly a third of adults in Britain take some form of dietary supplement most days and the industry is worth £675million a year.

Some of the most popular pills include multivitamins, vitamin A, C and E, iron, folic acid and calcium – which are all thought to improve long-term health and ward off illnesses.

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It’s a surprising, subversive and very, very popular idea.

Over the past few years, several studies – including a 2009 analysis of Statistics Canada data – have suggested that being a bit chubby as you get older, far from being a health risk, may actually help you live longer. The extra weight, the thinking goes, could help cushion you from the inevitable slings, arrows and hip fractures of old age.

But the newly published results of a three-decade-long study of clean-living Seventh-Day Adventists in California suggest that you might want to go easy on those early-bird specials after all. When confounding factors such as skinny smokers were removed, the effects of extra weight were clear – and bad – even for those older than 75.

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