Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Spice Up Your Health With Raw Food Recipes



If you are interested in eating tasty food and still watching your weight then you probably realize that eating fast food everyday is not such a good idea. Stop and think about it for a second. Imagine eating burgers, pizza, pasta, cookies, cakes and pies everyday. They taste great but come on, is it such a good idea? I say that as a joke, but more people than you think actually do it.

Often when people plan out a diet they have to weigh out their food and eat only a prescribed amount of each food, but this is not the case when you are following a raw food diet plan. Not only can you eat as much raw food as you want but you can have foods that are tasty to eat and that will provide your body with plenty of nutrition. You can reduce your weight, improve your health and feel younger within days of starting to eat a raw food diet.

Many people have not considered using a raw food diet plan to improve their health or lose weight. The media has not given much attention to the raw food way of life but the information on the internet, numerous books and personal testimonies have created a new awareness of the raw food lifestyle. Many people think its difficult to change the way they eat, but with a well planned out raw food diet plan, eating well can not only be convenient but affordable. This is especially true when you analyze how much time it takes to cook a traditional cooked meal.

Breakfast with a Raw Food Diet Plan

A quick breakfast can be composed of two cups of green vegetables spinach, broccoli, and lettuce. This is basically a quick salad that has your preferred flavor added by either a salad dressing or yogurt to add flavor. Place them in the blender; possibly you may want to add a squeeze of lemon or lime and a sliced fruit. Mix for twenty seconds, pour and enjoy. This is a delicious smoothie that will give you plenty of energy every day, as well as provide you with plenty important nutrients. This takes about 5 minutes to prepare and drink, if you want more substance to this quick breakfast consider adding soy protein powder or oats.

Lunch with a Raw Food Diet Plan

A raw food lunch could be made of lettuce wraps stuffed with carrot slices, banana and avocado combined with a small bag of mixed unsalted nuts. For your drink, try a carrot or tomato vegetable juice. You could even make the juice yourself in about 10 minutes and this includes clean up. Another great idea is a bag of 3-4 different types of vegetable slices. Choose the ones you like and do not be afraid to venture out a little. The variety will keep things interesting. Personally, I have tried things I have only seen in whole-foods-type grocery stores that I could barely keep down. They had me running for the sink to spit it out, but that is all part of the experience when you try out a raw food diet plan.

Dinner with a Raw Food Diet Plan

Dinner could consist of zucchini pasta together with pesto sauce accompanied by a side dish made of almond flour garlic bread and then for dessert, banana ice cream. For the zucchini pasta, simply peel the zucchini and mix it in with your noodles. This pesto sauce is usually a quick mix of garlic, pine nuts and extra virgin olive oil. An easy way to make banana ice cream is to freeze a couple of bananas then peel them and puree through the blender. This surprisingly gives you very much the same consistency as ice cream; just make sure to eat it while it is still cold.

I love to eat. No doubt about it. So when I made the commitment to switch to a raw food diet plan, I took into consideration all of the things I used to like to eat like, burgers and fries, sandwiches and any kind of chips and dip and some kind of thick pasta sauce with fettuccine noodles. In place of these, through trial and error, I created my own veggie burger recipe and oven baked a potato cut into the shape of fries and sprinkled with a little sea salt. My favorite sandwich now is several kinds of leafy green vegetables, mushrooms, tomatoes, onions, green peppers and whatever other veggie I can fit on two slices of whole wheat bread accompanied with thinly sliced, oven baked and slightly sea salted potato slices that are surprisingly crisp when baked just long enough and I now use vegetable based pasta with a little olive oil and tomatoes in place of the heavier traditional thick sauces.

So be creative and use your imagination. You will be surprised at what raw foods can do for you not only for the health benefits but you will also enjoy the true tastes that Mother Nature intended them to have.

Monday, July 12, 2010

A Simple Raw Food Diet Menu





With all the new dieting trends going around, many people are wondering what is the right diet that will assist them with weight loss, encourage better health, and yet at the same time, still taste good. There is a diet out there that fits all that criteria and is very simple to prepare because it involves no cooking whatsoever. Let's take a look at the raw food diet menu.

The raw food diet consists of food that is essentially raw. People following this diet will eat fresh vegetables, fruits, nuts, beans and in general anything that is organic and unprocessed. While this may sound like a boring diet, there are many simple recipes one can prepare that is tasty and nutritious. Following this diet will help you lose weight, digest your food better, increase your energy and help you to improve the appearance of your skin.

The first rule of the raw food diet is no cooking! None of the food can be heated up because it is believed that cooking will take away from the nutritional value of the food. But there are still many creative ways to prepare food that include dehydrating fruit, or putting your favorite fruits and veggies in a blender to mix them up. The key here is not heating the ingredients because heat destroys some of the enzymes in food.

So far this diet seems like just eating raw salads, snacking on seeds or nuts, and eating grain doesn't it? That is not necessarily the case. Below is a recipe for a treat that will make your mouth water in anticipation, and it involves no cooking at all.

The ingredients needed are: 2 ripe avocados
, 3 tomatoes, half a jalapeno, 3 cloves of garlic, kernels from 1 ear of organic corn, 2 teaspoons of lime juice, a quarter cup fresh cilantro, a quarter of a yellow onion, and 8 large romaine lettuce leaves.

Set the lettuce leaves on the side at first and get a knife and cutting board. Dice the tomatoes, the jalapeno, and the onion. Next, chop the cilantro and mince the garlic cloves. Now get a bowl and mash the avocado. Add all the other ingredients and stir until everything is mixed together.

With a spoon, scoop some of the mixture out and place on a piece of romaine lettuce and wrap. Once you are done, you have just created a great snack to enjoy, without having to cook anything at all.

If you are shopping around for a lifestyle change to lose weight, get more energized or just to try something new, the raw food diet may be just for you. It is easy to follow and one of the easiest diet systems to prepare because you do not even need to have a stove to stay on this diet. Have you ever been too tired to cook, or just wanted to save some money on electricity by not needing a stove or microwave? Well then the raw food diet is just for you! You can eat well, feel great and get back to a much simpler lifestyle where nature provides all you need.

Monday, July 5, 2010

Healthy Foods that Will Keep you Fit

Healthy eating and physical fitness go together, but there are no magic foods that cause you to be one hundred percent healthy by just eating the one food. No, you need a variety of foods from each of these food groups each day. It's also important to watch the portion size so as not to overeat. Make your mealtimes pleasant and relaxed occasions and your healthy foods will work effectively with your healthy emotions to give you a healthy body.

Berries

You may like all types of berries or just one or two favorites, but you can never go wrong by adding a few fresh berries as a quick energy snack or frozen berries made into a luscious smoothie in place of calorie laden desserts. Berries are high in vitamin C across the board, but some are high in other nutrients as well. Choose ripe blueberries for vitamin C and heaps of anti-oxidants for the health of your circulatory system. Gogi berries are less well-known but are wonderfully rich in many of the nutrients your body needs to be nutritionally and physically fit.

Citrus

The foods of the citrus family are widely recognized as a valuable source of vitamin C. Choose fully ripe citrus fruits for the best nutritional value and choose citrus as near to the tree as possible. Tree ripened fruits picked at the peak of perfection and consumed with hours of picking give you the top nutritional rating. Try grapefruit for breakfast. Add a dash of fresh squeezed lime to your salad as a dressing and enjoy slices of orange with coconut in a light honey dressing for dessert.

Vegetables

The variety of vegetables is amazing. For people who are vegetarian or vegan, choosing vegetables to be part of a nutritionally sound diet is a way of life. Your vegetable group provides many of the minerals required in a good diet. For example, you may realize that potassium is necessary for healthy nutrition. Many people claim the benefits of potassium found in a single banana. But did you know, you can also get adequate potassium in your diet by eating a stalk of broccoli? Try a salad of fresh young spinach topped with pine nuts and stirred with lightly cooked penne'. Feta cheese and a light vinaigrette dressing to create the perfect light luncheon meal.

Whole Grains

Like many other of the best foods, choosing only one type of whole grain for your meals doesn't provide all the variety you need to be nutritionally sound. Often, mixing two or more whole grains together will give you complete proteins. For example, brown rice and wheat kernels with a spicy seasoning are a popular dish in many countries.

Salmon

Salmon is lean fish and nutritionally one of the best fish choices. It is rich in Omega-3 oils that are noted as helping improve the functioning of the brain. Salmon baked whole with just lemon or lime as a seasoning makes a fantastic main dish or a hearty luncheon featured menu item. Salmon is also commonly found in chilled seafood dishes.

Legumes

A legume is the name for a variety of fruits with a single dry seed. Legumes are sometimes called pods. Examples of edible legumes are soybeans, peas, dried beans and peanuts, among others. Legumes are rich in iron and high in fiber, making them excellent nutritional choices. Peanuts are a type of legume that have been used to make hundreds of different products some edible and others with various types of helpful uses.

Nuts and seeds

Nature has packed a lot of goodness into small packages. Most everyone has heard of walnuts and pecans which are very good nutritional products, but did you realize that flax seeds are brain food--containing critical non-meat sources of the Omega-3 oil.

Lean proteins

The keyword here is lean. Americans eat far too much protein compared to the rest of the world. Cut down of portion sizes--three ounces will provide all the needed protein needed for your day.  Also, trim all visible fat from your protein source. Alternatively, use non meat substitutes such as the complete proteins found in vegetable dishes like beans and brown rice.

Tea

Depending on the type of tea you prefer, you can get an energy boost from a cup of green tea, or the calming effect of chamomile tea. Get going with mint teas or start your day with Earl Grey Breakfast Tea. Herbal teas are soothing, tasty and good for you. Non herbal teas will help you to stay alert when you need help to function.

Olive oil

Olive oil is probably the healthiest substance you can use to keep fat in your diet. You can use it on your salad, mix it with a little vinegar to create your own, or fry other foods in the hot oil.  Just make sure that the temperature is not too hot so that the oil is broken down.

Healthy Food Choices during Pregnancy

When a woman becomes pregnant, it is always imperative that she will take care of her health in a more careful manner than ever. Because pregnancy involves the phase wherein a baby is prepared for its entry into the world in her mother’s womb, it is important for the baby to obtain the proper amount and kind of nutrients that will ensure a healthy and safe delivery.

Eating Right during Pregnancy

There are various factors that a woman can do to ensure that her health and that of the baby is in good state. For some women, a little exercise will help while others have their own routine that are also beneficial for the baby and for the mother, along with providing a hope for a safe delivery. However, one thing that a pregnant woman should not ignore is to make the healthy choices of foods during pregnancy.

During pregnancy, the baby is totally dependent on its mother for nutrients. This is why a pregnant woman must bear in mind that what she eats is not only for her own health but for the baby as well. Here, a lot of misinterpretations exist. Some pregnant women insist that just because there are now two of them to feed, it means she has to double her regular food intake. This is entirely wrong. She does not necessarily have to double her food intake. She just need to make sure that the proper dose of the needed nutrients is more than enough. She also needs to make the healthy food choices.

Healthy Foods to Eat during Pregnancy
What are the healthy food choices for pregnant women? There may not be a single list of foods that will be good for all pregnant women. This is because each pregnant woman has her own unique needs. Nonetheless, it is possible to list down foods that will be right for all pregnant women regardless of their state:

Lean meat, fish, eggs, and peanut butter. These are rich in protein and they help regulate the protein concentration in a pregnant woman’s body. Inability to regulate protein content in the body, especially in the urine, may cause preeclampsia, which can have fatal consequences. Protein is also vital for cell growth and blood production. These foods are likewise good sources for iron, which is critical in blood cell production.

Bread, cereals, rice, potatoes, fruits, and vegetables. These are rich sources of carbohydrates, which are needed for the body’s energy. Moreover, carbohydrates also help in keeping the body warm.

Milk, cheese, yogurt, and sardines. These are rich in calcium, which is very vital in making sure that bones are strong as well as in maintaining nerve function.

Carrots, sweet potatoes, and leafy green vegetables. These are important for having a healthy skin, for bone growth, and for good eyesight.

Citrus fruit, tomatoes, and fortified fruit juices. These are great sources of vitamin C, which is needed to aid in iron absorption and for healthy gums, bones, and teeth.

Healthy Foods On A Budget


In these days of bank closures, foreclosures and greater than 10% unemployment, it is not easy to buy foods that are healthy for us. Foods that are listed as organic or have some healthy additive are usually priced 2 or more times higher than the same non-healthy items. The paranoid in me wants to say that is the conspiracy - large quantities of cheap unhealthy food that debilitate us and make us sick so we can have expensive procedures in hospitals and buy massive amounts of drugs that don't make us any better and some times sicker. But anyway...

Healthy foods don't always have to be expensive and out of reach of a normal budget. Some easy things to do are buy large quantities of in-season fruits and vegetables and freeze the excess. Frozen fruits and vegetables are nutritionally as good as fresh as long as they are frozen as soon as possible after harvesting. Use them out of season in soups and smoothies when they are more expensive or unavailable.

If you have a sunny window, you can grow herbs in pots and use them as you need them. Herbs like basil and parsley taste much better fresh than dried and are much cheaper. Always be on the look out for product coupons (especially on-line coupon sites) and sales at stores for healthy foods and again preserve (freeze) the excess. If you are unsure how to preserve different items, the Ball and Ball co. (makers of those glass canning jars) sell a book called the Ball Blue Book. This book has instructions on how to preserve almost any food you can think of, using many methods including freezing and drying. Also, you can get some good values at bulk stores, like Costco, Sam's or BJ's.

Here are 5 tips on foods that are healthier for you, improve your holistic wellness but won't break the bank:

1. Grains

Grains like like oatmeal, barley and quinoa (keen-wa) have fiber, protein and other nutrients. The fiber helps to regulate blood sugar and remove fats from your system. The protein helps maintain muscle mass. You can use the oatmeal as a healthy and filling breakfast and barley is good in soups and stews while the quinoa makes a very tasty and high fiber substitute for rice.

2. Beans

Also high in fiber and protein, beans can be a part of lunch and dinner for any household. There are many varieties available, red, black, navy, garbanzo and kidney beans. The most inexpensive are the dried varieties. When cooking them use a healthy oil like olive or canola oil and if you use meat make it low fat and low salt meat.

3. Eggs

A great source of high quality protein, eggs are an inexpensive choice over meat. They also contain antioxidants, lutein and zeaxanthin, which help keep eyes healthy. If you have high cholesterol, keep it down to one or two eggs per day.

4. Fish

Canned fish like tuna, salmon and anchovies are a great source of omega 3 fats which have been shown to improve heart health and arthritis, reduce the risk of dementia and Alzheimer's, reduce depression and lower blood pressure. All three fishes mentioned if packed in olive oil or spring water provide a high amount of protein and omega-3 fats without adding unwanted fats or salt to you diet.

5. Milk

Low fat milk, low fat cottage cheese, and low fat plain yogurt are all high in protein, calcium and vitamins notably vitamin d. New research is showing low levels of vitamin D may be linked to several diseases, such as high blood pressure, cancer, periodontal disease, chronic pain, seasonal affective disorder, elevated VLDL triglycerides, peripheral artery disease, and several autoimmune diseases including type 1 diabetes. Buy the bulk quantities of cottage cheese and yogurt. Make sure you get the plain variety, the flavored types are high in unnecessary and unhealthy sugar and high fructose corn syrup. If the plain flavors aren't tasty to you cut up and add fruits like strawberries or peaches to liven it up and improve your health and wellness.

There are many ways you can eat healthy and still not spend a lot of extra money. The Internet is a great place to do the necessary research for this. There are plenty of blogs out there offering information and ideas to help you, Dr. Weil, Jorge Cruz and Cary Ellis are just a few of the many. Look them up, be healthy and...

Be well.

Sunday, July 4, 2010

Eating Healthy Foods in Life

Everyone wants to stay fit and for that to happen you need two things exercise and good eating. Good and healthy eating is easy and requires enormous amount of patience. Every now and then you will feel the carving for eating the unhealthy and junk food. These foods no doubt are more tasty and enjoyable than the regular healthy foods.
The junk foods are called so because they have all the unhealthy things heaped up on them while preparing. Hamburgers, French fries and all sorts of cheese are examples of unhealthy food. You can eat them every now and then in moderate quantity to satiate your craving for them. But remember the key is unhealthy foods and controlling your craving.

That leads us to the fact of craving which is what we need to control. We all know what unhealthy food is but the craving is what makes it tough for us to ignore those foods.
I have a few tips which can at least help you curb your craving and let you walk away from these foods and start eating healthy foods in life.

Understanding nutrition is the most important information you can have when you are fighting your weight. A little bit of research on the subject of food and nutrition will arm you to fight the battle and succeed.

Maintaining a weight loss plan is not an easy task. You must constantly be vigilant about the foods that you are consuming. It is not enough to simply cut back on your calories, although that is important, but you must also be aware of the nutritional content of your food. You should try to learn as much about nutrition as you can to live a healthy lifestyle. An electronic calorie counter is a great start to begin to keep track of the foods that you are eating and an excellent choice for the weight conscious shopper.

You can find a great deal of information on the nutritional value of your food if you take the time to do some research. There are a variety of books and information available online for you to use when you are planning a diet menu. You should invest in a good electronic calorie counter to get started planning the right menu for weight loss.

Weight management and good health are more than just calories and cutting back. You should also be aware of the foods that you need in your diet every day to keep your health on track. Everyone needs a certain amount of vitamins and minerals in their diet to maintain good health. You will also need the right proportion of protein and carbohydrate to make sure that your diet is the very best it can be. How do you know what is right and how much you should eat?
A nutritionist can answer all of these questions for you and design a diet plan that is right for your weight loss goals. It would be helpful to understand how to design your own diet plan eventually. You are going to have to understand what nutritional requirements you should meet. So, while it can be beneficial to visit a nutritionist to get started you should learn all you can about nutrition in the meantime.

Food and diet are major contributors to a great many illnesses and conditions. If you can get the right nutritional balance in your diet you will be doing a good deal to improving your overall health. A good calorie counter can help you to stay on track. All you need is the right information and you will be on your way to improved health and a great weight loss. Use your calorie counter to total your calories consumed every day and eventually you won't have to, you will just know the right foods.

Saturday, July 3, 2010

Why the Raw Food Diet?




So why the raw food diet? One of the best explanations I've heard for why we should eat raw, living foods is because they are LIVING! They are actually still alive, their nutrients and enzymes are 100% intact.

If you take fruit for example and put it in your fruit bowl and ignore it for a few days, it will continue to ripen until it spoils. If you take that same fruit and stew it with some sugar, will it continue to ripen? Of course not! But why? Because it is dead. Cooking food effectively kills it.

There are plenty of arguments that cooking expresses certain nutrients that would not otherwise be available and that is true. But for every one nutrient that is expressed through cooking, 10 000 are destroyed! I prefer to lose one rather than 10 000, wouldn't you?

Cooking is one of the most nutritionally damaging things we can do to food, and for what? Without artificially spicing and salting it to high heaven, it's pretty bland. Okay I'm sure the arguments will come thick and fast about how delicious various dishes are, but the truth is, you educate your taste buds about what to like.

If you are accustomed to eating salty spicy food, then natural raw foods taste bland. But if you eat lots of whole, raw, natural foods you come to appreciate the natural flavors of the food even more!

If you eat whole, fresh, ripe, raw foods, digestion is quick and easy, which frees your body from the process of complex digestion which then gives YOU more energy. The concept of needing to have a snooze after a meal becomes a distant memory on the raw food diet.

That sluggish feeling you get after a heavy meal occurs because your body needs to focus all its energy on the task at hand; breaking down this complex cooked meal into the amino acids and sugars that it can actually utilize. Raw fruits and plants contain these sugars and amino acids in their simplest form so they require very little work before they can be utilized by the body. They are the perfect ENERGY food.

Beauty is another answer to the question of why the raw food diet. Eating raw food will allow you to sculpt the most beautiful you. Whether you won the genetic lottery or not, your true beauty is likely hiding away under puffiness, blotches, acne, cellulite, excess weight, eye bags, wrinkles, varicose veins, broken blood vessels and bloodshot cloudy eyes. Even if you're still young enough not to have begun to show the degeneration of your body, internally that is exactly what is happening. Wouldn't you prefer to be regenerating?

With the raw food diet you give your body the chance to clear out years of accumulated junk, all those toxins that have been tucked away in your fat cells, in your eye bags, your acne and your blotches. As those toxins clear out, your most beautiful self will be given the chance to shine.

But its not just physical! The physical part is just a happy side effect. Another compelling reason for why the raw food diet is the mental clarity and spiritual connectedness you feel. Your memory will improve, along with your concentration and focus.

Since I have gone raw I have made the most life changing decisions effortlessly. I feel so much more in touch with who I truly am and I can no longer do anything BUT live congruently. I must be who I truly am and I must follow my heart. My intuition is growing stronger by the day and I am beginning to feel so in touch! In touch with myself and in tune with my intuition and my life's purpose. This is the most amazing thing of all.

Ordering Healthy Food For Your self

When you have no time to cook your own food, what do you do? The answer is obvious, of course. You go out to your local fast food outlet (in deference to your kids' preferences), you go out to the food strip at the mall, or you order take out. It is convenient and you can eat your fill at these joints. What's not so obvious, however, is what such a practice is doing to you and your children's health.

Healthy eating habits are crucial to achieving a healthy mind and body. Healthy eating habits refer to eating meals regularly, eating well-balanced meals, and eating only what's necessary. Healthy eating habits do not involve eating burgers and fries for lunch.

The Fast Food Culture

Unfortunately, some people do think that it is healthy to have burgers and fries for lunch. Advertising spiels have a lot to answer for this. In a world filled with fast food and restaurants, it is but natural that the companies serving up this food have to undermine people's preference for home-cooked meals or they will become redundant and not make any profit.

As such, big food corporations put millions of dollars into TV commercials that assert in not so many words that a meal eaten at a fast food is special while eating at home with your family the meal your mother cooked is nothing but ordinary.

Such a reversal of values was helped along by the faster pace of life, where people have no more time to devote to preparing home-cooked meals. People are always driving or commuting to work, attending business meetings, or maybe holding one or two jobs. You cannot expect someone who has already been working 12 hours straight to come home and prepare a lengthy meal. It makes more sense to buy some take-out or bring the family out for a meal.

People are aware that they need to eat healthy food. However, what do you do if you are misled into thinking that restaurant fare and fast food taste better than home-cooked food? Sadly, there's also an underlying effort to make people think that food in restaurant and fast foods are all healthy, that there's really not much difference when you eat in or out. It's all the same, but eating out is more convenient.

As people continue to be bombarded with mass media advertisements advocating the value of fast food and eating out, and as people become even more busy trying to hold on to their jobs, more and more people stop cooking and begin taking these commercials to heart. People have deserted home-cooked and nutritious meals that need hours of preparation for big servings of calorie- and fat-rich food that gets served up within minutes.

The Diseased Nation

The success of the fast food industry in establishing a culture that thrives in fast food and meals eaten out, our people's health has been placed on the balance. Thus, America is now an ailing nation. Incidence of heart disease, diabetes and high blood pressure continues to rise as obesity becomes even more prevalent.

I am not saying that fast food is to be avoided at all costs. What I am saying is that a trip to the fast food should be made only very infrequently, not three times a week as most people now are wont to do. A change should be instituted to bring back the days when there's no doubt about what healthy food is and where to find it. This is all I ask.

Healthy Food Recipes That Taste Great

Some of the most important decisions that we make are in regards to the food that we eat. There are so many things that can cause ill health these days that it is getting frustrating for many to find recipes for healthy food. There are a lot of options that are available if a person looks around.

The internet is a great resource for finding almost anything that you could want in healthy food. There are the good old favourites that have been made for years and years, to the new things that have just been created by people from around the world. No matter what it may be there is bound to be something out there that will appeal to everyone.

The classic shepherd's pie is one I found that is delicious. It is quite similar to the original version except it uses extra lean beef. This reduces the amount of fat intake that peoplke will take in without taking a way from the taste of the meal. I have played around with it a lot and have found that mixing the beef with onion soup mix gives it an amazing bit of a kick. Try this one on your family, they will be sure to love it as well.

Another way that you can modify a recipe and keep the fat content to a minimum is to incorporate non fat yogurt into it as opposed to sour cream. Many people do not realize just how fatty sour cream really is. It would scare you to know. The yogurt does not give any odd taste to the food in any way but keeps the fat levels down which is something of huge importance during the times that we are having with high cholesterol and heart disease.

These are just a couple of ideas that I have used myself and have found to work wonderfully. There are many others that are out there if you take some time to browse the internet. It is loaded with recipes for healthy food, as well as with other things that you can do to modify the everyday foods that you eat but make them more healthy for you and your family.

Some of them even let you put in the ingredients that you have handy and will spit out a selection of recipes that you can make using things that you already have in your kitchen. This is a great way to find some new recipes that could prove to be some of the family's favourites. Being a bit creative in the kitchen can prove to be a lot of fun. Healthy food no longer has to be dull and boring anymore. Look around and you will soon see what I mean!

Friday, July 2, 2010

Switching to the healthy food

Hi, everybody!

I would like to share with you my experience of switching to the healthy food! Everybody talking that it’s possible to prevent a great number of serious diseases just by improving personal health habits. Eating right, staying physically active, and not smoking are a few examples of good habits that can help you stay healthy. Of course, it is not as easy as it seems! We live in a bad habit society, so it’s just hard to stick to the health way of life as there are so many mousetraps around us.

My life was full of struggle with the bad habits and it still goes on. I remember myself being a twelve year old girl visiting different doctors like dentist, cosmetologist, therapist and all of them were trying to push me not to eat sweeties, fat and fried food. I hate them for that! I was thinking it is kind of secret deal they concluded I order to keep candies from me! )))

It was hard to believe then that healthy food could be delicious. I few years later when I put on some extra weight on and I noticed my health and body were getting worse, I had nothing to do, but to agree with the doctors!

The first step I made was talking to my Mom and trying to make her realize that I need help! It was quite difficult I would say! The thing is my parents were quite healthy and didn’t have problems with extra weight till mid thirties! They could allow eating fat unhealthy food and stayed quite slim! It was all about the food when they were young! It was natural then without chemicals, GMO and so on.

It was hard for them to believe I had problems with my nutrition at teen age.

Then I made some rules for myself that would help me to stay healthy and slim.

1) Eating the right foods and the right amounts of foods can help you live a longer, healthier life. Getting the nutrients you need, such as calcium and iron, and keeping your weight under control can help. Try to balance the calories you get from food with the calories you use through physical activity. It is never too late to start eating right.

Here are some tips I tried to stick to:

Eat a variety of foods, especially:

Vegetables. Choose dark-green leafy and deep-yellow vegetables.


Fruits. Choose citrus fruits or juices, melons, and berries.

Whole grains, such as wheat, rice, oats, corn, and barley.

Whole grain breads and cereals.

Eat foods low in fat, saturated fat, and cholesterol, especially:

Fish.

Poultry prepared without skin; lean meat.

Low-fat dairy products.

2) Weighing too much or too little can lead to health problems. After age 45, many people gain too much weight. You can control your weight by eating healthy foods and being physically active. Before choosing the right diet one should consult the nutritionist. It would help to realize what minerals lack in your body and what nutrients are better for you. Keep track of your weight.

3) Research shows that physical activity can help prevent heart disease, high blood pressure, obesity (excess weight), diabetes, osteoporosis, and mental disorders, such as depression. Physical activity also will help you feel better and stay at a healthy weight. It does not have to be some sport trainings just brisk walking can be just as good for you as an activity such as jogging. Try to do a total of 30 minutes of constant physical activity, such as fast walking, most days of the week.

Before you start being physically active:

Talk with your doctor about ways to get started.

Choose something that fits into your daily life, such as walking, gardening, raking leaves, or even washing windows.

Choose an activity you like, such as dancing or swimming.

Try a new activity, like biking.

Ask a friend to start with you, or join a group.

Don't quit:

Make time for physical activity, start slowly, and keep at it.

If the weather is bad, try an exercise show on TV, watch an exercise tape in your home, walk in the mall, or work around the house.

The main to realize is that it is not only about changing the food you eat, it is more about changing your life style. Be active and try to listen to your body: it will show you what is good and what is bad for it. And love yourself, because your body is the main thing after your soul, so try to keep as beautiful and healthy as you keep your soul.

Take care!

Healthy Food Habits for Diabetics

Diabetes is a very serious illness and proper care is essential in remaining healthy. People with diabetes have to beware of what they eat and when they eat it. This particular illness is very sensitive and any little mistake can cause the blood sugar levels to go up tremendously. Very often, people who suffer from this disease are also stricken with high cholesterol, high blood pressure, or obesity. Taking all of these things into consideration, a healthy diet for a diabetic is a must.

One healthy food habit for diabetics is to monitor their intake of carbohydrates. The proper carb intake is as important as the proper sugar intake. Carbs are simply a different type of sugar and they can impact the blood levels just the same as sugar in a cake or in candy. Some foods that should be served in controlled portions include pastas, potatoes, and breads. These foods along with other carb rich products raise blood sugar levels. A good diet for someone suffering from this illness should be low in sugar, fat, and carbohydrates.

Another thing to consider when you are a diabetic is to be consistent with meal times. Try not to let your blood sugars become too low by not eating or too high by eating too often. Also, when making a meal, be sure to understand what is written on the food label. Be aware of the ingredients, serving sizes, and any additives that a product may contain. Certain products may contain ingredients that will unknowingly add to your daily sugar intake. Therefore, it is important to be aware of what you are consuming. And for those people who are overweight and suffer from diabetes, it may be beneficial to consult with a doctor regarding any all natural supplements which aid in weight loss and blood sugar control. Natural supplements, along with all of the other tips presented earlier in this article, may aid in reducing the unpleasant side effects of diabetes.