Vitamin D-Rich Foods

Monday, 22 February 2010 11:55

We suspect the readers of BONESENSE are interested in healthy and delicious meals. But most of us are not nutritionists, so this article offers a few guidelines for maximizing your intake of dietary vitamin D. (For in-depth information, check out NutritionData.com, which does a great job of ranking foods in all categories.)

Go for fish. Choose cold-water fish like wild-caught salmon and mackerel, or stock up on canned tuna and sardines. Of course, cod liver oil, at 1,360 IU a tablespoon, is the absolute best source of vitamin D—if you can handle it.

Drink your milk. Both fortified soymilk and dairy milk are good choices, and they come in a nice array of flavors and fat-content options.

Find a couple of breakfast cereals you like. Look for bran cereals and specially fortified oatmeal on your grocer’s shelves.

It likely won’t be possible to meet your vitamin D requirements through diet alone. Most experts agree that the current U.S. RDA of 400 IU for adults is much too low, and many of us would not be willing to drink a quart of milk a day to meet that even that requirement. American Bone Health recommends 1,000 to 2,000 IU of vitamin D, which argues in favor of taking a supplement. Still, there are many delicious foods out there, and it makes sense for our general health and enjoyment of life to add as many of them as we can to our meals.