Egg-citing News About My Favorite Comfort Food

One of my favorite comfort foods is scrambled eggs. I love eggs pretty much any way you can prepare them, but scrambled with toast is what I crave when I’m not feeling well, think I’m not feeling well, or just need to give myself a good dose of food love.

The other day when I went out for brunch with my girlfriends after a long run, I needed some major comfort food for my achy muscles and bruised ego from not being able to keep up for most of the run. After I ordered my scrambled eggs and whole wheat toast, I noticed that most of my friends ordered egg white-only options.

I told them that without the yolk, they were missing out on most of the important vitamins, minerals, and phytonutrients in eggs, like vitamin D, zinc, and lutein. They reminded me that the average yolk packs 210 mg of cholesterol. I shot back that dietary cholesterol is not what raises blood cholesterol, it’s saturated fat, and egg yolks are relatively low in saturated fat. Moreover, studies show that people who eat eggs don’t necessarily have high blood cholesterol levels. 

When I read a major report about eggs and choline being linked to a reduction in breast cancer, I dashed it off to my egg yolk-averse friends.

The study, conducted by researchers at New York’s Mt. Sinai Medical School and Columbia University, as well as University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, looked at the medical records of more than 3,000 women
and calculated their average intake of choline, a B-vitamin-like compound found in concentrated amounts in egg yolks.

The results were that women with the highest intake of choline (455 mg/day) were 24% less likely to develop breast cancer compared to those who got the least choline in their diets (average 196 mg/day). While this study did not prove a cause-and-effect relationship between low choline intake and breast cancer, it suggests choline can be protective. And it’s not the first study to show an egg-cancer prevention connection. A Harvard study using the large Nurse’s Health Study cohort previously reported that eating an egg a day was associated with an 18% reduction in risk for breast cancer.

Choline has also been shown to enhance memory and cognitive function in infants and toddlers and help prevent certain birth defects. Choline, along with folate and the amino acid methionine, are needed to form new genetic material, or DNA. It is the role in DNA that researchers believe is how choline may help protect against breast cancer.

One egg yolk packs in 126 mg of choline, or nearly one-third of the 425 mg I need daily. Compared to many of the other foods rich in choline, I’m happy to stick to my eggs—scrambled or any which way. Some other foods rich in choline include liver, beef, poultry, instant decaf coffee (go figure!), cauliflower, wheat germ, nuts and seeds, and diary products. Here’s a chart to help you get more of this vital nutrient, courtesy of the Linus Pauling Institute at Oregon State University.

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*A three-ounce serving of meat or fish is about the size of a deck of cards.

How much is enough? The National Academy of Sciences Adequate Intakes for choline are as follows:

• 0-6 months: 125 milligrams
• 6-12 months: 150 milligrams
• 1-3 years: 200 milligrams
• 4-8 years: 250 milligrams
• Males 9-13 years: 375 milligrams
• Males 14 years and older: 550 milligrams
• Females 9-13 years: 375 milligrams
• Females 14-18 years: 400 milligrams
• Females 19 years and older: 425 milligrams
• Pregnant females of any age: 450 milligrams
• Lactating females of any age: 550 milligrams