美国国家公共电台 NPR--Back pain shouldn't stop you from cooking at home. Here's how to adapt

Back pain shouldn't stop you from cooking at home. Here's how to adapt

Transcript¹

A new cookbook from America's Test Kitchen offers tips for people with chronic² back pain to minimize bending and standing³ in the kitchen. (Story aired on Weekend Edition Saturday on May 6, 2023.)

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

Cooking is a physical activity. It takes some bending, lifting, twisting even to do something simple like boil a pot of pasta. So America's Test Kitchen has developed a cookbook especially for people with back pain so they can cook without making it worse. Here's NPR's Pien Huang.

PIEN HUANG, BYLINE⁴: It's called "The Healthy Back Kitchen," and it's published by America's Test Kitchen, that cookbook empire. It's for people like Julie Bozzo Cote. She's had back and neck pain for the past 15 years that seriously limits her ability to cook. A typical dinner for her and her family is...

JULIE BOZZO COTE: Frozen pizza. (Laughter) It's a lot of frozen pizza and salad or mac and cheese and salad or angel hair and salad.

HUANG: Cote works for America's Test Kitchen. She wasn't involved with making this book, but she got an early copy to review. She wants to cook more, but with back pain, it seems out of reach.

COTE: Chopping up a chicken for soup, which is something I love to do, or for just a weeknight roast chicken, is very daunting⁵ - thinking about trying to use that knife to get leverage⁶ and standing and pushing.

HUANG: One possible solution is to get a small chicken from the grocery store spatchcocked by the butcher. It's one of many suggestions from the book to reduce the strain that cooking puts on your back. Along with clear recipes and glossy⁷ food photos, there are lessons in spinal⁸ anatomy⁹. It was written with Dr. Griffin Baum, a spine¹⁰ surgeon at Northwell Health in New York City. He says it addresses two realities of life.

GRIFFIN BAUM: All human beings have to eat. So you have to eat. And all human beings will have back pain. That's just, like, part of - like, there's no person who goes their whole life without back pain.

HUANG: The book speaks to people with chronic back pain, often caused by arthritis¹¹ in the neck and spine. That can't be cured, Baum says. It can only be managed.

BAUM: So that's the approach that we have, which is not, like, how do you eat better to cure back pain? No, it's how do you make modifications¹² in the kitchen? How do you approach the act of cooking and the act of eating in order to manage your back pain?

HUANG: You do it by prepping ingredients while seated, using a rolling cart to schlep tools around the kitchen. Baum says they spent weeks figuring out how to load an oven without bending.

BAUM: You know, we ended up coming up with what I think is pretty cool, on, like, you know, how do you pull out the rack when it's, like, searing hot, 350 degrees, and using tongs¹³? And how do you set up a stool, and what's the right size stool, and how do you set something on there?

HUANG: Baum says standing for more than 10 or 15 minutes at a time can aggravate¹⁴ back pain, so the recipes have built-in breaks. On good days, you can chop extra onions and freeze them. On bad days, you can be extra gentle with yourself and even toast nuts in the microwave. This could be useful for people with other conditions. Dr. Linda Xu is a primary care physician who teaches patients to cook at Kaiser Permanente in San Francisco.

LINDA XU: I think the same idea of, OK, let's simplify this recipe. Let's, you know, give you kind of lighter¹⁵, easier-to-use cooking equipment. Those sorts of streamlining things would apply in many cases, actually.

HUANG: Where people are recovering from surgery or dealing¹⁶ with mobility¹⁷ issues - anyone who struggles with the stamina¹⁸ to cook. For Cote, the book offers more than just tips and recipes. It gives her hope that she can cook a healthy meal and still have the energy to do other things.

COTE: So we can have dinner and then go outside and play or be able to go on a bike ride before dinner and then quickly put it together and, again, not just be frozen pizza.

HUANG: Today, her neck pain is pretty bad, but she plans to spend 15 minutes chopping onions and leeks¹⁹ this morning. She'll take a long rest from standing before pulling together a lush, creamy cauliflower soup for dinner.

Pien Huang, NPR News.

1 transcript   

n.抄本，誊本，副本，肄业证书

参考例句：

• A transcript of the tapes was presented as evidence in court.一份录音带的文字本作为证据被呈交法庭。
• They wouldn't let me have a transcript of the interview.他们拒绝给我一份采访的文字整理稿。

2 chronic   

adj.(疾病)长期未愈的，慢性的；极坏的

参考例句：

• Famine differs from chronic malnutrition.饥荒不同于慢性营养不良。
• Chronic poisoning may lead to death from inanition.慢性中毒也可能由虚弱导致死亡。

3 standing   

n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的

参考例句：

• After the earthquake only a few houses were left standing.地震过后只有几幢房屋还立着。
• They're standing out against any change in the law.他们坚决反对对法律做任何修改。

4 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

5 daunting   

adj.使人畏缩的

参考例句：

• They were faced with the daunting task of restoring the house.他们面临着修复房子的艰巨任务。
• Starting a new job can be a daunting prospect.开始一项新工作有时会让人望而却步。

6 leverage   

n.力量，影响；杠杆作用，杠杆的力量

参考例句：

• We'll have to use leverage to move this huge rock.我们不得不借助杠杆之力来移动这块巨石。
• He failed in the project because he could gain no leverage. 因为他没有影响力，他的计划失败了。

7 glossy   

adj.平滑的；有光泽的

参考例句：

• I like these glossy spots.我喜欢这些闪闪发光的花点。
• She had glossy black hair.她长着乌黑发亮的头发。

8 spinal   

adj.针的，尖刺的，尖刺状突起的；adj.脊骨的，脊髓的

参考例句：

• After three days in Japan,the spinal column becomes extraordinarily flexible.在日本三天，就已经使脊椎骨变得富有弹性了。
• Your spinal column is made up of 24 movable vertebrae.你的脊柱由24个活动的脊椎骨构成。

9 anatomy   

n.解剖学，解剖；功能，结构，组织

参考例句：

• He found out a great deal about the anatomy of animals.在动物解剖学方面，他有过许多发现。
• The hurricane's anatomy was powerful and complex.对飓风的剖析是一项庞大而复杂的工作。

10 spine   

n.脊柱，脊椎；(动植物的)刺；书脊

参考例句：

• He broke his spine in a fall from a horse.他从马上跌下摔断了脊梁骨。
• His spine developed a slight curve.他的脊柱有点弯曲。

11 arthritis   

n.关节炎

参考例句：

• Rheumatoid arthritis has also been linked with the virus.风湿性关节炎也与这种病毒有关。
• He spent three months in the hospital with acute rheumatic arthritis.他患急性风湿性关节炎，在医院住了三个月。

12 modifications   

n.缓和( modification的名词复数 )；限制；更改；改变

参考例句：

• The engine was pulled apart for modifications and then reassembled. 发动机被拆开改型，然后再组装起来。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The original plan had undergone fairly extensive modifications. 原计划已经作了相当大的修改。 来自《简明英汉词典》

13 tongs   

n.钳；夹子

参考例句：

• She used tongs to put some more coal on the fire.她用火钳再夹一些煤放进炉子里。
• He picked up the hot metal with a pair of tongs.他用一把钳子夹起这块热金属。

14 aggravate   

vt.加重(剧)，使恶化；激怒，使恼火

参考例句：

• Threats will only aggravate her.恐吓只能激怒她。
• He would only aggravate the injury by rubbing it.他揉擦伤口只会使伤势加重。

15 lighter   

n.打火机，点火器；驳船；v.用驳船运送；light的比较级

参考例句：

• The portrait was touched up so as to make it lighter.这张画经过润色，色调明朗了一些。
• The lighter works off the car battery.引燃器利用汽车蓄电池打火。

16 dealing   

n.经商方法，待人态度

参考例句：

• This store has an excellent reputation for fair dealing.该商店因买卖公道而享有极高的声誉。
• His fair dealing earned our confidence.他的诚实的行为获得我们的信任。

17 mobility   

n.可动性，变动性，情感不定

参考例句：

• The difference in regional house prices acts as an obstacle to mobility of labour.不同地区房价的差异阻碍了劳动力的流动。
• Mobility is very important in guerrilla warfare.机动性在游击战中至关重要。

18 stamina   

n.体力；精力；耐力

参考例句：

• I lacked the stamina to run the whole length of the race.我没有跑完全程的耐力。
• Giving up smoking had a magical effect on his stamina.戒烟神奇地增强了他的体力。

19 leeks   

韭葱( leek的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Leeks and potatoes go well together in a soup. 汤中放韭菜和土豆尝起来很对味。
• When I was young I grew some leeks in a pot. 小时候我曾在花盆里种了些韭葱。