Avocado: Superfood of the week

As a relatively high-calorie food, 160 calories in half an avocado, they are a food best enjoyed in moderation, but still enjoyed without guilt.

The 15 grams of fat in that avocado are packed with 15 grams of heart-healthy unsaturated digestible fats, which will keep you full for hours or fuel your workout, as well as 14 vitamins and minerals. One avocado provides half the USDA recommended vitamin K and a third of recommended vitamin C.

Plus, these little green gems are downright delicious. This no-cook snack recipe is both nutritious for your body, tasty and includes only three ingredients. As a bonus, the avocado’s own skin paired with a little plastic wrap make the snack incredibly portable.

On other occasions, try adding slices of avocado to your salads. Studies now show that the fats in avocados aid the absorption of antioxidants like lycopene and beta-carotene in your other salad vegetables.

Portable tuna and avocado snacks
Makes two snack-sized portions

• 1 ripe avocado
• 1 6-ounce can of tuna packed in water
• 1/2 cup prepared tomato salsa

Half the avocado and remove the pit and the fruit from one side. Set aside for use in a salad or meal. Mix together the tuna and salsa, and mound the mixture into the empty avocado cavity. Cover tightly with plastic wrap.
Went you are ready to eat the snack, spoon the tuna mixture over the flesh of the second half of the avocado and devour.

 

Kate Jonuska is a freelance writer, photographer, food blogger and tech enthusiast who is also dining critic at The Gazette newspaper in Colorado Springs. (Thus the reason for no headshot here.) On the rare occasions when she's not cooking or eating, you'll find her hiking with her beloved dog, a corgi named Ein.