Welcome back to the Feed Your Mental Health Nutritional Psychiatry Challenge. This is week number two. We’re doing seven weeks in a row of amazing brain foods. Last week we focused on lentils because they’re easy, they’re so economical, they’re so amazing in terms of the nutrient density. This week, week number two, we’re going to focus on pumpkin seeds. Let’s get into the amazing nutrients because pumpkin seeds have something incredibly special about them very few foods have.
Now, besides this nutrient, what’s the other thing that makes pumpkin seeds so powerful? This often gets missed with brain foods. It’s easy! You can keep pumpkin seeds in your desk. You can add them to all kinds of different things. Your salad, your granola. I’ve put pumpkin seeds in my omelet before. They’re so nutrient dense. And again, easy is a really, powerful aspect of food that gets ignored sometimes. Pumpkin seeds have both lots of nutrients, but also really easy to make into a great nutrient dense habit to help your mental health and your brain health with better nutrition.
So why does your brain love pumpkin seeds? First, mineral density. You’re getting some of our favorite brain minerals, magnesium, zinc, iron in a quarter cup. You’re getting a ton of that, right? 40 to 45% of your magnesium in a quarter cup of pumpkin seeds. You’re getting maybe 20 to 25% of your daily need of zinc. You’re getting a great dose of iron, fiber. And what’s that special nutrient I was mentioning earlier? I’d say it’s tryptophan. Tryptophan is amino acid that we use to make things like serotonin, really regulating molecules. Tryptophan is not in a lot of foods so pumpkin seeds is really one of my favorite prescriptions because I know patients are getting a lot of minerals, you’re getting some fiber, you’re getting tryptophan and one last thing, you’re getting a nice little dose of some of these essential fatty acids. Polyunsaturated fatty acids are absolutely essential, both omega three fats and omega six fats. And then our favorite fat oleic acid, which everybody agrees is great. It’s the fat in olive oil. It’s one of the main fats in pumpkin seeds as well. So healthy fats, great dose of fiber, great dose of minerals, plus some tryptophan. That’s why our Brain Food Challenge leads us right to pumpkin seeds this week.
And that leads us right to our big lesson for week two of the Feed Your Mental Health Nutritional Psychiatry Challenge. We want to make eating for brain health easy. There’s so much that’s complex about mental health and there’s so much new information coming out. And I find a lot of my patients are confused. Sometimes I end up confused and forget that mental health starts with some basics. And there’s a lot that we’re missing in terms of our modern diets when it comes to feeding our mental health. That’s what this challenge is all about.
So a lot of times I’ll meet people and they’re really worried about their macros and they’re really worried about specialty diets, but they’re not eating pumpkin seeds, they’re not eating lentils, they’re not eating some of these foundational foods that give us the nutrient density that we need for our mental health. And we get from pumpkin seeds, wonderful amount of minerals, lots of healthy fats and fiber, and something that’s really easy to drop in just about anywhere.
We often think about changing our diet as something that takes a lot of motivation and willpower. I want you to make it easy. Take those pumpkin seeds. You don’t need them in the back of the cupboard. You’re never going to see them. You’re not going to remember them. Pull them out in the front, put them on the counter. Let’s really focus on them this week so you can get into the habit of using pumpkin seeds. You’ll get all these great nutrients that we’re talking about and you’ll get a new easy food. It’s about changing the food environment that you’re in, making sure that when you reach out for something and you’re hungry, that it’s a snack that’s going to deliver a lot of deliciousness, but also a lot of nutritiousness. That’s what we’re after these days, because so often our food environments get cluttered, our minds get cluttered, and we don’t do the basic things. Because so often we think, again, it’s about willpower and motivation. Really, we just want to set you up for success by creating a food environment that has the right foods for your mental health.
How do I recommend you eat pumpkin seeds? They’re a great snack so you can sprinkle them on just about anything. I like to them on yogurt parfaits. I drop them in my granola. I’ve put them in an omelet before. Pumpkin seeds go great on salads. You can also toast them, put some different spices on there that you like. It’s a really wonderful add to just about any dish. I love it in some of my vegetarian dishes, again, to add some more minerality in there. So I’ll also put this in a kind of bean bowl or grain bowl. There are lots of great ways to use pumpkin seeds. I’d love to see some of what you do.
Part of this challenge is seeing where pumpkin seeds hit you and help you with your dietary pattern. It’s not about a singular superfood. We’re about building your dietary pattern based on all the recent evidence in nutritional psychiatry to help give you more minerals, more fiber, more of the right fats, and more of these foods that are really easy.
Again, the lesson of the challenge this week is make it easy, create this food environment that has the foods that we know deliver the nutrients that so many of us need more of. That’s why we’re focused on pumpkin seeds here in week two.
And so for the Feed Your Mental Health, Nutritional Psychiatry week two challenge, I’d like you to eat some pumpkin seeds as a snack one afternoon this week. That’s it. Just one time. I hope you’ll eat them a little bit more than that. I hope you try some of the fun ways that I’ve recommended. Even better, I’d love you to tell us a way that I didn’t think to use pumpkin seeds that you absolutely love. Here’s one that I love – pesto.
There are lots of great ways to use pumpkin seeds. And we want to know in this challenge, did you try it? Did you like it? Would you try it again? That’s how we build the brain healthy habits in the kitchen and in our lives. That’s how we build mental fitness and how we use Nutritional Psychiatry to create better mental health.
And it’s never too late to join the Feed Your Mental Health Nutritional Psychiatry Challenge. We’re here in week two. Eat some lentils and eat some pumpkin seeds. You’re caught up with this. Please forward this to somebody who needs some more brain food, needs a challenge to really jumpstart their fall. And please save this because, hey, every week could be a week where you eat some more pumpkin seeds. That’s going to be great for your mental health. Everybody, thanks so much for joining the challenge. I’ll see you next week. Week number three is definitely going to surprise you.
