The #1 Superfood Essential to Your Fat Loss Diet

By By Kardena Pauza
http://bit.ly/3yXmhE

The #1 Superfood Essential to Your Fat Loss Diet

A healthy diet is a vital component to any fat loss program. Fortunately, this superfood can be found at any grocery store or farmer's market at a relatively inexpensive price.

What's more, this superfood supplies a majority of the Recommended Daily Allowance for vitamins and minerals to give you endless amounts of energy, it stabilizes your blood sugar and detoxifies your body, and it provides you with the essential amino acids your body needs to build strong, lean muscles.

So what is it?

None other than the leafy green vegetable.

I hope you aren't disappointed it wasn't something exotic like elixir berry juice.  But, the truth of the matter is, the leafy green vegetable is an underrated, nutrient dense, inexpensive, and readily available superfood.

It does, however, get a little more exciting in that this dark green vegetable has many substitutes, including spinach, kale, romaine lettuce, chard, parsley, cilantro, and many others.

In fact, if you go to a farmer's market I'm sure you'll find plenty to choose from.  And variety is important because each green offers a different composition of minerals and vitamins.

Most leafy greens have a mild flavour, but if you're unsure about one, here's a little tip you can use when doing your shopping.  When you find a green that you think you'd like to try, simply pinch off a small piece of it and give it a try.  If you like the taste, add it to the cart, if not, just hope no one was watching!

Alright, you're home and ready to give the leafy greens a try, but you're unsure how to eat them.  Well, here are some suggestions:

1.   Prepare a salad with a base of greens that you like, while adding in some of the new, unfamiliar greens. You'll find that over time you'll acquire a taste for the new darker greens and begin to really enjoy them.

2.   Add greens to your smoothies. I know it sounds odd, but trust me, you won't taste a thing.  Just start out with a small amount of greens and slowly add more.

3.   Try making fresh fruit and veggie juice with greens in it. Personally, I like cilantro, parsley, and spinach in mine.

4.   Stir fries are a great way to add in veggies and greens.

5.   Also, try making soups with added greens.

So, those are just some of the ways in which you can add one of the best superfoods to your diet.  Try them out for two weeks and I guarantee that you will feel more alert and have more energy.

Kardena Pauza
Author, Easy Veggie Meal Plans For Fat Loss
http://bit.ly/3yXmhE

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05.16 | 0 comments

A Vegetarian Travel Nutrition Tip

By Kardena Pauza
http://bit.ly/3yXmhE

For many of us traveling, it means skipping workouts, eating processed foods, and generally feeling guilty and frustrated because our commitment to a healthy lifestyle has temporarily gone by the wayside.

But with a little effort and following some quick and easy tips I'll share with you, you'll never have to resort to the over-priced, high-calorie food options that are prevalent in airports.

But first, did you know that when you're at the airport you can actually take your own food through the security check?  Most people don't know this, but as long as it isn't liquid, gels, or gooey stuff over 3 oz. then you're in the clear.

Okay, so you know that preparation is the key for anyone looking to lose weight and stay fit.  Well, this is especially the case when a last minute road trip unexpectedly arises.

So, with that in mind, here are some healthy food options suitable as snacks, breakfast, or dinner, that you can easily put together.

1.   Grab all the veggies you have in the refrigerator and combine them to make one big tasty salad.

2.   Pack 2-4 healthy nut bars.  My favourite is the RAW bar.

3.   Cut up fresh celery, carrots, and cucumbers – it's quick and it's easy.

4.   Add a few pieces of fruit to your "lunch pack".

5.   Nuts are another excellent snack option.

6.   Seaweed snacks.  These delicious treats are sure to draw some wandering eyes as people try to figure out just what the heck it is you're eating.

7.   And lastly, pack a bag of flax crackers.

If you can put just 10 minutes into preparing some snacks for your trip, you'll feel so much better later on when everyone else is stuffing their face with high fattening foods and you're sticking to you healthy diet.

Even if it's just some healthy snacks to tie you over while waiting at the airport, this plan with help you eat healthier and avoid the junk you know is bad for you.

Kardena Pauza
Author, Easy Veggie Meal Plans For Fat Loss
http://bit.ly/3yXmhE

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05.16 | 0 comments

Did you know that October is World Vegetarian Month?

And to celebrate, fitness expert Craig Ballantyne is giving away a cool new bonus when you get the complete Turbulence Training for Fat Loss package.

"The Lazy Man's Guide to Vegetarian Eating" ($47 Value)

You'll get inside access to world-famous fitness expert Craig Ballantyne's 55-day diary where he shows you every single meal that he ate while living the Vegetarian Lifestyle. About 90% of his meals are vegan, and this is an amazing look inside the diet plan of a "lazy guy" who doesn't like to cook but still LOVES to eat.

You'll find out how Craig got enough protein to build muscle while at the same time getting more and more variety each week as he stumbled across foods like, "Spelt flour veggie patties", "Kamut pasta", "high-protein quinoa", and his "Lazy Man's Chili".

If you've ever doubted your ability to stick to a Vegetarian Diet, this diary of a former high-protein, meat-eating farm boy-turned-vegetarian will show you just how SIMPLE and EASY it is to live the Vegetarian Lifestyle.

Click here to get this new bonus along with the world's most fun and effective home fat loss workout program: http://turbulencetraining.rxsportz.com

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06.39 | 0 comments

Heart Attack Risk Reduction: The Low-Hanging Fruit

Dr. Yongsoon Park and colleagues recently published a great article in the British Journal of Nutrition titled "Erythrocyte fatty acid profiles can predict acute non-fatal myocardial infarction". Stated simply, the title says that the fat in your red blood cell membranes, which reflects dietary fat composition, can predict your likelihood of having a heart attack*. More accurately than standard measures of heart attack risk such as blood cholesterol.

Let's cut to the data. The investigators examined the fat composition of red blood cells in people who had suffered a heart attack, versus an equal number who had not. Participants who had heart attacks had less omega-3, more long-chain omega-6, and particularly higher trans fat in their red blood cells. In fact, 96% of the heart attack patients had elevated trans fat levels, compared to 34% of those without heart attacks. This is consistent with a number of other studies showing a strong association between blood levels of trans fat and heart attack risk (ref).

92% of heart attack patients were in the lowest category of EPA in their red blood cells, as opposed to 32% of those without heart attacks. EPA is an omega-3 fat that comes from fish, and is also made by the body if there's enough omega-3 alpha-linolenic acid (think flax and greens) around and not too much linoleic acid (industrial vegetable oil) to inhibit its production. 96% of heart attack patients were in the lowest category for alpha-linolenic acid, compared to 34% of the comparison group. 0% of the heart attack patients were in the highest category for alpha-linolenic acid.

62% of heart attack patients were in the highest category of arachidonic acid (AA), compared to 34% of the comparison group. AA is made from linoleic acid, and is also found in animal foods such as eggs and liver. Animal foods from pasture-raised animals are lower in AA than their conventionally-raised counterparts, and also contain more omega-3 fats to balance it.

The investigators found that low omega-3, high AA and high trans fats in red blood cells associate with heart attack risk far better than the Framingham risk score, a traditional and widely-used measure that incorporates age, sex, smoking status, total cholesterol, HDL, hypertension and diabetes.

If the associations in this study represent cause-and-effect, which I believe they do based on their consistency with other observational studies and controlled trials, they imply that we can have a very powerful effect on heart attack risk by taking a few simple steps:

1. Avoid trans fat. It's found in margarine, shortening, refined soy and canola oils, many deep fried foods and processed foods in general.
   
2. Avoid industrial vegetable oils and other sources of excess omega-6. Eating pastured or omega-3 eggs, rather than conventional eggs, can help reduce dietary AA as well.
3. Ensure a regular intake of omega-3 fats from seafood, or small doses of high-vitamin cod liver oil or fish oil. Flax oil is also helpful, but it's an inferior substitute for fish oil.
   

This study was conducted in Korea. It's a striking confirmation that basic nutritional principles span races and cultures, likely affecting disease risk in all humans.

In the future, I hope that most doctors will measure blood fatty acids to predict heart attack risk, with more success than current approaches. Instead of measuring cholesterol and prescribing a statin drug, doctors will prescribe fish oil and easy-to-follow diet advice**. Fortunately, some doctors are beginning to measure red blood cell fatty acid levels in their patients. The forward-thinking cardiologist Dr. William Davis has discussed this on his blog here. Take a good look at the graphs he posted if you get the chance.


*The title of the study is misleading because it implies a prospective design, in which blood fatty acids would be measured and volunteers followed to see who develops heart disease at a later time point. This study was cross-sectional (also called case-control), meaning they found people who had just had a heart attack and measured their blood fatty acids retrospectively. The other study I referenced above was prospective, which is a nice confirmation of the principle.

**"Eat butter on your toast. Ditch the margarine."

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19.00 | 0 comments

Herb Remedies for Depression

By Ian Pennington

Depression is also known as a mood disorder that occurs due to the influence of situations and undesirable circumstances on the environment. All segment of the population in every society, either children, adults or even the elderly could experience mood disorder and get into state of depression. Whenever a person suffer from depression, he will lose his personality as this powerful disease could affect the mind, control the body, behavior, emotional state and even the ability to relate to other person. Depression is best cured by the help of professional psychologists but if you can afford to pay them, it is advantageous to try the so-called "remedies herbs depression".

Shown on current surveys, about ten million Americans suffered depression each year and most of them women because of their weak attitude to battle depression. Just like any other illness, depression should also be given immediate treatment because once it occurs it can increase its frequency and severity. A person with a mood disorder will experience several symptoms like profound sadness, rapid weight loss or gain, insomnia, indecisiveness, constant fatigue, memory loss and the feeling of being worthless. At the first incident of these symptoms, it is proper to make use of the remedies herbs depression to treat or if not at least lessen the effects of this illness.

Immediate attendance should be given to a depressed person because their mood disorder could lead to sudden decisions and dangerous actions such as suicide. Nowadays, you can find some depression pills that are made from little yellow flowers and proteins. The little yellow flower or what we called remedies herb depression has been clinically tested effective in curing depression because of its antidepressant, antibiotic and anti-viral agents. Proteins could also help in curing depression because it could promote mental well being so it is partnered with the antidepressant yellow flower to ensure great and fast treatment of depression at any stage.

The remedies herbs depression and proteins that are made into medicine today are being taken by a good number of depressed people and they all show development and signs of progress. The people around them could see great changes by becoming their real self and getting back their personalities. They have lost the symptoms and the unlikely experiences that they suffered and were able to restart their lives and live them to the fullest. Although this medicine is proven effective, treatment should still be paired with discipline, faith and perseverance to totally achieve your goal of living a normal life, being happy and satisfied with what you got. These three should exist within you because discipline will help you in maintaining control and regularity of taking the medicine, and also faith and persistence to reach your goal and be cured.

Ian Pennington is an accomplished niche website developer and author.
To learn more about herb remedies for depression, please visit Help for Depression for current articles and discussions.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Ian_Pennington

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21.45 | 0 comments

Butter vs. Margarine Showdown

I came across a gem of a study the other day, courtesy of Dr. John Briffa's blog. It's titled "Margarine Intake and Subsequent Coronary Heart Disease in Men", by Dr. William P. Castelli's group. It followed participants of the Framingham Heart study for 20 years, and recorded heart attack incidence*. Keep in mind that 20 years is an unusually long follow-up period.

The really cool thing about this study is they also tracked butter consumption. So it's really a no-holds barred showdown between the two fats. Here's a graph of the overall results, by teaspoons of butter or margarine eaten per day:

Heart attack incidence increased with increasing margarine consumption (statistically significant) and decreased slightly with increasing butter consumption (not statistically significant). That must have been a bitter pill for Castelli to swallow!

It gets better. Let's have a look at some of the participant characteristics, broken down by margarine consumption:

People who ate the least margarine had the highest prevalence of glucose intolerance (pre-diabetes), smoked the most cigarettes, drank the most alcohol, and ate the most saturated fat and butter. These were the people who cared the least about their health. Yet they had the fewest heart attacks. Imagine that. The investigators corrected for the factors listed above in their assessment of the contribution of margarine to disease risk, however, the fact remains that the group eating the least margarine was the least health conscious. This affects disease risk in many ways, measurable or not. I've written about that before, here and here.

Can this study get any better? Yes it can. The investigators broke down the data into two halves: the first ten years, and the second ten. In the first ten years, there was no significant association between margarine intake and heart attack incidence. In the second ten, the group eating the most margarine had 77% more heart attacks than the group eating none:

So it appears that margarine takes a while to work its magic.

They didn't publish a breakdown of heart attack incidence with butter consumption over the two periods. Perhaps they didn't like what they saw when they crunched the numbers. I find it really incredible that we're told to avoid dairy fat with data like these floating around. The Framingham study is first-rate epidemiology. It fits in perfectly with most other observational studies showing that full-fat dairy intake is not associated with heart attack and stroke risk. In fact, several studies have indicated that people who eat the most full-fat dairy have the lowest risk of heart attack and stroke.

It's worth mentioning that this study was conducted from the late 1960s until the late 1980s. Artificial trans fat labeling laws were still decades away in the U.S., and margarine contained more trans fat than it does today. Currently, margarine can contain up to 0.5 grams of trans fat per serving and still be labeled "0 g trans fat" in the U.S. The high trans fat content of the older margarines probably had something to do with the result of this study.

That does not make today's margarine healthy, however. Margarine remains an industrially processed pseudo-food. I'm just waiting for the next study showing that some ingredient in the new margarines (plant sterols? dihydro vitamin K1?) is the new trans fat.

Butter, Margarine and Heart Disease
The Coronary Heart Disease Epidemic


* More precisely, "coronary heart disease events", which includes infarction, sudden cardiac death, angina, and coronary insufficiency.

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19.00 | 0 comments

The Truth and Nothing But the Truth About Vegetarian Foods

By Fred Huyghue Jr

There seems to be a misunderstanding in the world of vegetarian foods, most people have a stigma about these types of foods. Unfortunately this stigma is without merit these days, the days of reality TV and all. Today is a new day a new era and people are doing absolutely amazing things with vegetarian foods today, and the food is mouth watering delicious. The stigma or false belief is...

1. Most people believe that vegetarian foods do not have a taste to them or very little taste at all.

2. The food looks dry and visually unappealing.

3. The food does not look fresh.

4. We do not like what does not look nice or that does not have that certain appeal = no thank you I do not want that.

We all grew up around certain types of foods and this helps to feed the stigma. To put it plain and simple, meat is hard to get away from; this is due to being around it so much to where you just adapt and accept; especially as a full dinner course meal.

In life lots of people want to have and maintain a healthy diet but believe the reason it is so hard to stick to maintaining a healthy vegetarian diet is because most people simply do not crave vegetarian food ' probably because most people do not want to eat what they think is dull food, tasteless salads for the rest of their lives.

In this day and age with all the healthy options we have today you can find delicious vegetarian dishes. By coating your vegetables with a peanut oil will get rid of that dry unappealing not fresh look. We have plenty of great vegetarian dishes available today...

1. Fluffy peach pancakes

2. Different types of breakfast smoothies

3. Several delicious types of crepes

4. Mouth watering spring rolls

Always remember you have one life and one body and one mind so why not take care of your body and adapt a healthy life style. In doing so you will find your mind is less stressed and you feel more comfortable and relaxed and in due time you will also look healthier. There are hundreds of reasons why a vegetarian diet is going to make you a healthier person and hundreds of reasons why meat is bad for you I am sure you probably already know all these reasons and know why becoming a vegetarian or just adding a few healthy dishes to your diet would be good for you. Eat well now and you can be well on your way to becoming a more healthy person. We all make decisions for ourselves in life and it is for us to determine what is good for us. I am just sharing with you the 100% truth from which you can make an intelligent decision; one that will suit you and your life style; as every one knows when it is all said and done you must live and do what you think is right for you and I wish you all the best in your new vegetarian life style.

Fred Huyghue Jr is dedicated to providing the most healthy and delicious vegetarian recipes you can get your hands on and will show you exactly how to prepare them quickly go to
=> http://www.bigleagueplayersclub.com/3clicks/published/21741/334598/index.htm

vegetarian foods

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22.19 | 0 comments

A Little Hiatus

I'm going to a conference next week, followed by a little vacation. I've written two posts that will publish automatically while I'm gone. I may or may not respond to comments for the next two weeks. I probably won't respond to e-mails. I'll resume the malocclusion series when I get back.

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22.37 | 0 comments

Malocclusion: Disease of Civilization, Part IV

There are three periods during the development of the face and jaws that are uniquely sensitive to environmental influences such as nutrition and muscle activity patterns.

1: Prenatal Period

The major structures of the human face and jaws develop during the first trimester of pregnancy. The maxilla (upper jaw) takes form between the 7th and 10th week after conception. The mandible (lower jaw) begins two weeks earlier. The nasal septum, which is the piece of cartilage that forms the structure of the nose and divides the nostrils, appears at week seven and grows most rapidly from weeks 8 to 11. Any disturbance of this developmental window can have major consequences for later occlusion.

2: Early Postnatal Period

The largest postnatal increment in face and jaw growth occurs from birth until age 4. During this period, the deciduous (baby) teeth erupt, and the activity patterns of the jaw and tongue influence the size and shape of the maxilla and the mandible as they grow. The relationship of the jaws to one another is mostly determined during this period, although it can still change later in development.

During this period, the dental arch widens from its center, called the midpalatal suture. This ensures that the jaws are the correct size and shape to eventually accept the permanent teeth without crowding them.

3: Adolescence

The third major developmental period occurs between ages 11 and 16, depending on the gender and individual, and happens roughly at the same time as the growth spurt in height. The dental arch continues to widen, reaching its final size and shape. Under ideal circumstances, at the end of this period the arch should be large enough to accommodate all teeth, including the third molars (wisdom teeth), without crowding. Narrow dental arches cause malocclusion and third molar crowding.

Growth of the Dental Arch Over Time

The following graph shows the widening of the dental arch over time*. The dotted line represents arch growth while the solid line represents growth in body height. You can see that arch development slows down after 6 years old, resumes around 11, and finally ends at about 18 years. This graph represents the average of many children, so not all children will see these changes at the age indicated. The numbers are in millimeters per year, but keep in mind that the difference between a narrow arch and a broad one is only a few millimeters.

In the next few posts, I'll describe the factors that I believe influence jaw and face structure during the three critical periods of development.


* These data represent many years of measurements collected by Dr. Arne Bjork, who used metallic implants in the maxilla to make precise measurements of arch growth over time in Danish youths. The graph is reproduced from the book A Synopsis of Craniofacial Growth, by Dr. Don M. Ranly. Data come from Dr. Bjork's findings published in the book Postnatal Growth and Development of the Maxillary Complex. You can see some of Dr. Bjork's data in the paper "Sutural Growth of the Upper Face Studied by the Implant Method" (free full text).

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20.00 | 0 comments

What Makes These Sugarless Snacks Taste Great?

I have to admit that when I heard about snack recipes which featured no sugar I was a little skeptical about how the end product would taste. After all, sugar makes the world go around, or so you might think after spending most of you life scarfing down an endless supply of snack types made with processed sugar.

But there is an alternative to the use of sugar in snacks. At least, this is what Carolyn Hansen says in her book 100 Healthy Raw Snacks And Treats. Nature has come up with some nifty alternatives that are actually quite healthy for us, and which can be used to impart all the sweetness you might otherwise miss in the absence of a dose of sugar.

Dates turn out to be a good way to naturally sweeten the recipes for snacks and treats that appear in Carolyn's book. Another alternative that most of us are familiar with is honey. Less known is agave nectar, which is also an excellent natural sweetener that appears in many of Carolyn's recipes, including those for tempting cheesecake delights that you can eat without the least pang of guilt. Yes, that recipe for a pink Strawberry Fields Forever cheesecake concoction is sure to become one of your favorites.

All done without sugar. Even without flour or butter. After all, who needs high-cholesterol butter in their diet when almond butter and coconut butter can be used instead?

Go check out Carolyn's site now and tell me that those images of the Strawberry Fields Forever cheesecake and the Carob Fudge don't make your mouth water. The great thing about these recipes is that they are not just put together with ingredients that are good for you, but they are easy to make AND they do not require any cooking on your part. If you know how to use a blender, Carolyn says, you can easily follow her directions and churn out a plate full of yum yums in no time.

If this whole idea sounds like a treat to you (hee hee) then here's where you can go to find out more about how to add 100 Healthy Raw Snacks And Treats to your diet. Trust me, if you like to eat, this is something that is worth your time - especially if you would not mind losing a few pounds by eating stuff that tastes like it was designed to put on the pounds, not take them off!

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05.12 | 0 comments

Thought these snacks would taste like cardboard, but I was wrong

I just finished checking out a book of so called healthy snack recipes. The author, Carolyn Hansen, says that her little book 100 Healthy Raw Snacks And Treats contains only recipes that are prepared with "raw and living" ingredients. Well, that certainly seems to be true. None of the recipes requires any cooking as part of the recipe preparation and the ingredients are almost 100 percent derived from fruits, nuts, honey, and similar food stuffs that she cleverly substitutes for the ingredients she has banned from her kitchen, like sugar, flour, eggs and butter. She calls her book 100 Healthy Raw Snacks And Treats.

Naturally I was suspicious of her claims that the ingredients she uses would produce snacks that are not only healthy for you, but also taste great too. But I was wrong. The other good piece of news is that these recipes are also very simple in design. Mostly they require that you gather a few ingredients together and toss them into the blender. Even I can do that.

I guess if I had stopped and thought about it for a minute or two I would not have been surprised to find that these recipes really do produce snacks that get your mouth watering. After all, if you are going to be combining ingredients like dates, agave oil, nuts, carob and coconut flesh you ought not be too shocked that the final assembled snack might actually taste quite good.

Well, there are literally dozens of different healthy ingredient's that Carolyn uses in imaginative ways to come up with her surprising recipes. If you are a snack lover like I am I recommend you take a moment to check out the web page for her book: http://bit.ly/33UW5n

100 Healthy Raw Snacks And Treats has more than enough recipes in it (like Cherry Choco Cookie, Chocolate Gogi Lemon Bar, and Coconut Fudge Bars) to keep yourself and your family snacking for some time to come, and you won't have to feel the least bit guilty for doing so. These recipes really are good for you - and low carb too!

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05.10 | 0 comments

Green Tea Herbs & Its Black Tea Cousing

By O. Casas

At first glance it will seem to you that the differences between green tea herbs and black tea appear to be numerous, but you will find that there are a number of similarities too that you may never imagined.

For example; maybe you didn't know it, but black and green tea herbs come from the same plant, this is the Camellia Sinensis found in a number of Asian countries such as China, Vietnam, Thailand, etc. However, the final beverage that you take will depend on how the leaves are processed and brewed. This is the reason why green tea has a very high concentration of antioxidants compared to its cousin the black tea, which has a stronger flavor due to its further processing compared to the green one that is never allowed to ferment or oxidize. Thanks to this precaution taken with green tea herbs the phytochemical components known as catechins are not lost.

Though black tea still conserves part of its antioxidant components and will also have beneficial effects for your health, it may be not as great as the green tea but you will not regret having a cup of black tea if that's what there is.

Additionally there are other differences between the two famous teas. That's the flavor. Green tea has a more fresh, light flavor due to its low processing compared with the strong flavor of black tea resulting from the oxidation of its components during the fermentation process. Also black tea, compared to green, will give you an energy boost due to the caffeine found in its fully fermented leaves. Though its effects are much milder and friendly than those of coffee.

Now you know some differences and similarities between the green tea herbs and black tea. One thing is sure. Both will make you good.

If you want to taste the great benefits of Green Tea, specially for your figure, guided by a professional that will open all the secrets of Green Tea to you, don't hesitate and visit my website. I'm sure you will be glad you did. http://www.GreenTeaLoseWeight.info.

Tea herbs

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22.01 | 0 comments

When You Have A Blender, Who Needs A Stove?

I do not remember the last time that I used the stove. But I have a great excuse. The only thing I know how to heat up is a teabag. The downside? I eat out every day and the quality of the nutrition I put into my body is not nearly as good as I know it ought to be.

This is why Carolyn Hansen's book 100 Healthy Raw Snacks And Treats looks so appealing to me. Now the truth is, even though I know I could benefit from eating these amazingly mouth-watering delights, I probably never will. Why? Because I am lazy, and the idea of having to go to the store to get ingredients, put them in a blender, and then simply pour them out onto a tray seems like a lot of work to me. But you might not be as lazy as I am, and you might be prepared to take a couple of steps to eat healthy snacks rather than the store-bought items that are poisoning me.

Well, poisoning might be too strong a word. Still, we all know that the sugar, butter, and other chemical additives that fill traditional snacks are doing none of us any favors. They all contribute in the long run to obesity and other chronic diseases associated with poor nutrition. This is why when someone comes up with a set of healthy food alternatives we should all take notice, rather than continue to be lazy like I am. I am going to suffer the consequences of my actions, I have no doubt. But that does not mean that you need to do the same.

At least I hope you do not. At the very least, do me a favor and go have a look at the recipe book that Carolyn is offering on her site. If you take a glance at that Strawberry Fields Forever cheesecake alternative, or the Carob Fudge, and you still don't bite (ha ha) then I will know that I did my bit to help your ward off the coronary disease or the hypertension that likely will catch up with you one of these days. Assuming you eat as poorly as I do, that is. You don't, do you?

The bottom line: you will want to go check out 100 Healthy Raw Snacks And Treats if you are less than satisfied with the quality of the snacks that typically end up inside you over the course of a day.

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06.01 | 0 comments

Eat These The Next Time You Get The Munchies

I defy anyone who gets a case of the munchies to tell me that their willpower alone will be enough to ensure that they don't reach for the cookie jar or the potato chips when no one else is looking. And if you live alone? Come on. If there is no one else around to see your transgressions then you are going to binge on whatever you can get your hands on. That's just what we are - creatures of comfort food.

Maybe like me you avoid buying the things you love to eat. If I have something tasty and within reach, it is going to get eaten. I might be able to stave off for a day or two the desire to slice open a bag of cookies, but I give in eventually, as I am sure you do. So what are we supposed to do, if this kind of behavior is continually contributing to the number of inches around our waist?

One solution is to replace the "bad" snacks, which is practically every piece of junk food that is sold at your local convenience store, with healthy snack alternatives. But what to those look like? More importantly, what do they TASTE like? I have not-so-fond memories of "healthy" cookies that my mother used to make when the sugar and butter supplies in our household ran low. Thankfully broccoli cookies never appeared on the menu, but nor did anything healthy that also passed as a tasty snack.

Carolyn Hansen, the author of 100 Healthy Raw Snacks And Treats, is quite aware of this problem. But she was determined to find snack recipes that did away with the usual cast of bad characters: sugar, flour, butter, and replace these with healthy substitutes that she could live with as a bodybuilder looking to maintain a healthy diet during her preparations for physique contests. That was some years ago now, and today she is making the recipes she came up with during that period available to anyone who could benefit from being able to grab low-calorie snacks on the run that also taste great.

If you could see some of the photographs of the snacks and treats that she has come up with you would not hesitate to volunteer to be a guinea pig in her kitchen. Would you believe that you can make cheesecake alternatives that use no dairy, but look and taste delicious nonetheless? Apparently you can, and this is just one of the recipe types that litter her book.

For more information on this mouth-watering topic I recommend you get yourself across to her site at 100 Healthy Raw Snacks And Treats, grab yourself a copy of the recipe book and put your blender to work. The nice thing about Carolyn's recipes? You don't even need a stove to prepare them - these are all no cook recipes made from natural ingredients that can go straight to your mouth!

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05.31 | 0 comments

Malocclusion: Disease of Civilization, Part III

Normal Human Occlusion

In 1967, a team of geneticists and anthropologists published an extensive study of a population of Brazilian hunter-gatherers called the Xavante (1). They made a large number of physical measurements, including of the skull and jaws. Of 146 Xavante examined, 95% had "ideal" occlusion, while the 5% with malocclusion had nothing more than mild crowding of the incisors (front teeth). The authors wrote:

Characteristically, the Xavante adults exhibited broad dental arches, almost perfectly aligned teeth, end-to-end bite, and extensive dental attrition [tooth wear].

In the same paper, the author presents occlusion statistics for three other cultures. According to the papers he cites, in Japan, the prevalence of malocclusion was 59%, and in the US (Utah), it was 64%. He also mentions another native group living near the Xavante, part of the Bakairi tribe, living at a government post and presumably eating processed food. The prevalence of malocclusion was 45% in this group.

In 1998, Dr. Brian Palmer (DDS) published a paper describing some of the collections of historical skulls he had examined over the years (2):

...I reviewed an additional twenty prehistoric skulls, some dated at 70,000 years old and stored in the Anthropology Department at the University of Kansas. Those skulls also exhibited positive [good] occlusions, minimal decay, broad hard palates, and "U-shaped" arches.

The final evaluations were of 370 skulls preserved at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. The skulls were those of prehistoric North American plains Indians and more contemporary American skulls dating from the 1920s to 1940s. The prehistoric skulls exhibited the same features as mentioned above, whereas a significant destruction and collapse of the oral cavity were evident in the collection of the more recent skulls. Many of these more recent skulls revealed severe periodontal disease, malocclusions, missing teeth, and some dentures. This was not the case in the skulls from the prehistoric periods...

The arch is the part of the upper jaw inside the "U" formed by the teeth. Narrow dental arches are a characteristic feature of malocclusion-prone societies. The importance of arch development is something that I'll be coming back to repeatedly. Dr. Palmer's paper includes the following example of prehistoric (L) and modern (R) arches:


Dr. Palmer used an extreme example of a modern arch to illustrate his point, however, arches of this width are not uncommon today. Milder forms of this narrowing affect the majority of the population in industrial nations.

In 1962, Dr. D.H. Goose published a study of 403 British skulls from four historical periods: Romano-British, Saxon, medieval and modern (3). He found that the arches of modern skulls were less broad than at any previous time in history. This followed an earlier study showing that modern British skulls had more frequent malocclusion than historical skulls (4). Goose stated that:

Although irregularities of the teeth can occur in earlier populations, for example in the Saxon skulls studied by Smyth (1934), the narrowing of the palate seems to have occurred in too short a period to be an evolutionary change. Hooton (1946) thinks it is a speeding up of an already long standing change under conditions of city life.

Dr. Robert Corruccini published several papers documenting narrowed arches in one generation of dietary change, or in genetically similar populations living rural or urban lifestyles (reviewed in reference #5). One was a study of Caucasians in Kentucky, in which a change from a traditional subsistence diet to modern industrial food habits accompanied a marked narrowing of arches and increase in malocclusion in one generation. Another study examined older and younger generations of Pima Native Americans, which again showed a reduction in arch width in one generation. A third compared rural and urban Indians living in the vicinity of Chandigarh, showing marked differences in arch breadth and the prevalence of malocclusion between the two genetically similar populations. Corruccini states:

In Chandigarh, processed food predominates, while in the country coarse millet and locally grown vegetables are staples. Raw sugar cane is widely chewed for enjoyment rurally [interestingly, the rural group had the lowest incidence of tooth decay], and in the country dental care is lacking, being replaced by chewing on acacia boughs which clean the teeth and are considered medicinal.

Dr. Weston Price came to the same conclusion examining prehistoric skulls from South America, Australia and New Zealand, as well as their living counterparts throughout the world that had adhered to traditional cultures and foodways. From Nutrition and Physical Degeneration:

In a study of several hundred skulls taken from the burial mounds of southern Florida, the incidence of tooth decay was so low as to constitute an immunity of apparently one hundred per cent, since in several hundred skulls not a single tooth was found to have been attacked by tooth decay. Dental arch deformity and the typical change in facial form due to an inadequate nutrition were also completely absent, all dental arches having a form and interdental relationship [occlusion] such as to bring them into the classification of normal.

Price found that the modern descendants of this culture, eating processed food, suffered from malocclusion and narrow arches, while another group from the same culture living traditionally did not. Here's one of Dr. Price's images from Nutrition and Physical Degeneration (p. 212). This skull is from a prehistoric New Zealand Maori hunter-gatherer:


Note the well-formed third molars (wisdom teeth) in both of the prehistoric skulls I've posted. These people had ample room for them in their broad arches. Third molar crowding is a mild form of modern face/jaw deformity, and affects the majority of modern populations. It's the reason people have their wisdom teeth removed. Urban Nigerians in Lagos have 10 times more third molar crowding than rural Nigerians in the same state (10.7% of molars vs. 1.1%, reference #6).

Straight teeth and good occlusion are the human evolutionary norm. They're also accompanied by a wide dental arch and ample room for third molars in many traditionally-living cultures. The combination of narrow arches, malocclusion, third molar crowding, small or absent sinuses, and a characteristic underdevelopment of the middle third of the face, are part of a developmental syndrome that predominantly afflicts industrially living cultures.

(1) Am. J. Hum. Genet. 19(4):543. 1967. (free full text)
(2) J. Hum. Lact. 14(2):93. 1998
(3) Arch. Oral Biol. 7:343. 1962
(4) Brash, J.C.: The Aetiology of Irregularity and Malocclusion of the Teeth. Dental Board of the United Kingdom, London, 1929.
(5) Am J. Orthod. 86(5):419
(6) Odonto-Stomatologie Tropicale. 90:25. (free full text)

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Can Delicious Snacks Actually Be Good For You?

Remember sneaking into the kitchen when you were young to steal a snack when mom was not looking? Well, those days might be over if ex-bodybuilding champion Carolyn Hansen gets her way. She has come up with a set of 100 snack recipes that will have mothers everywhere positively encouraging their children to dig in.

The reason? The ingredients. No sugar, flour, or butter to be found in these recipes - just raw healthy foods that Hansen likes to call living. No cooking either, which makes preparation a snap. All a mom need be proficient with in the kitchen to keep her kids satisfied is a blender. That's the conclusion Carolyn Hansen reaches in her book 100 Healthy Raw Snacks And Treats.

At first glance you might be tempted to think that snacks prepared without sugar and butter might taste like the experimental designs that mom came up with in your youth when she ran low on those items and could not get to the store. If you share the same memories of those bold snack alternatives that I do you might be quick to dismiss the idea of a tasty snack that foregoes the ingredients that we know contribute to chronic disease in later life. Too much sugar and butter in the diet are prime causes of obesity, diabetes, and coronary disease.

Carolyn Hansen knew this when she went into her kitchen years ago to find alternatives to the snacks she found so difficult to remove from her diet. As a competing bodybuilder she was determined to find a way to keep herself from ruining her progress in the gym by binging on unhealthy snacks when her willpower wore down.

At first the going was difficult. It turns out that there are a lot of things to take into account when you begin throwing out the staple ingredients of recipes thousands of years old. There were a lot of missteps along the way. But Carolyn persevered, and in the end she came up with snacks that she could share with her bodybuilder friends. Snacks that you can share with your family and friends and know that you are contributing to the maintenance of their health, not only today but for years to come.

So, if you want to get your hands on recipes for snacks and treats that you will not need to feel guilty about eating the next time you have a craving for something delicious, be sure to check out Carolyn Hansen's book 100 Healthy Raw Snacks And Treats, where she shows you how to take control of your blender and churn out mouth-watering snacks that will have the kids in your neighborhood lined up around the block for a sample.

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05.04 | 0 comments

20 Healthy Raw Snacks And Treats

Do you like easy-to-prepare snacks that are both sweet and delicious and quell the pangs of hunger, but are free of chemical-laden additives and processed sugar? In
short, are you looking for healthy and nutritious raw snacks prepared only from ingredients that you can feel good about putting into your body and the bodies of
your children?

Well, I have twenty brief recipes for you that I feel sure you will enjoy.

http://www.healthybiz2000.com/20-healthy-raw-snacks.pdf

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15.08 | 0 comments

Health Benefits of Pressure Cooking

Do you remember the days when your mom used a pressure cooker to prepare yummy, delicious foods and meals? Perhaps you’ve thought those days are gone, or you thought pressure cookers were only for beans. Well, with today’s modern pressure cookers, your family can enjoy succulent, delicious and nutritious meals in a fraction of the time it would take to boil, bake or slow cook your favorite recipes.

Because pressure cooking uses the steam from the liquids used in your favorite recipes, the vitamins and nutrients are preserved in the food instead of being “cooked out” as they are in traditional boiling, baking or microwaving. And because pressure cooking reduces the amount of cooking time by up to 10 times, pressure cooking is a lot healthier than running out to a fast food joint.

Another way using a pressure cooker to cook our meals is healthier is because the ingredients used are fresh, whole, natural foods, not processed or packaged foods. Not only is using natural foods for all your meals, opposed to processed or packaged, healthier it also saves you money on your grocery bills every month. When you get in the habit of eating natural foods you’ll find you often have more energy, less weight gain, lower sodium and lower cholesterol levels as well. And because you can choose what goes in your pressure cooker you have more control over the amount of salt and other ingredients you are digesting.

Using recipes that are low in fat, salt and carbohydrates are easy to do in a pressure cooker, and they come out tasting delicious, even more delicious than if you baked, boiled or microwave them. Not to mention you will tend to make more vegetables when you use a pressure cooker because it is easy, efficient and pressure cooking makes your vegetable, frozen or raw, come out succulent and melt in your mouth. You may find that you prefer your vegetables without butter or salt once you start cooking them in a pressure cooker! Think of all the health benefits in that alone.

An added health benefit to using a pressure cooking is to make some of your favorite desserts in a pressure cooker. That’s right! You can use your pressure cooker to make desserts like homemade applesauce, cheesecake, pumpkin pie, and cinnamon and apple flan w/maple syrup. You can choose the ingredients that go into your dessert to make them more nutritious for you and your family.

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05.32 | 0 comments

Using Healthy Food Recipes to Have a Healthier Diet

By Lewis Stonham

When you are trying to get your health straightened out, your diet has to play an integral part in the process. You can workout all you want, but if you are putting garbage in, you are still putting yourself at risk for heart diseases, high cholesterol, etc. It is time to stop ordering out all the time and use healthy food recipes to get your health back on track.

Cooking healthy is often confused with bland food. That is far from the case. There are plenty of spices and marinades that you can use to flavor your food and keep it healthy. The key is to have the proper balance in your diet so that you are not consuming too much sugar or carbohydrates and that you are getting enough protein and fiber.

Every meal that you have should contain a certain amount of calories from each characteristic. For example, a typical diet will have about 40% of its calories from carbohydrates. Now if you are living off of pancakes, sandwiches and pasta, you are blowing that right out of the water. Eat a more balanced diet and you will feel better and be healthier. Not to mention the fact that you may notice that spare tire disappearing before you know it.

Here is a sample of a healthy food recipe that is packed with flavor and is good for you at the same time.

Crab Melts

1/2 pound of crabmeat4 asparagus spears (thinly sliced)1 scallion (chopped) 1/2 red bell pepper (chopped) 2 celery stalks (chopped) 1/2 lemon (juice only) 1T low fat mayo1/4t Old Bay 1t Tabasco Hot Sauce 4 English Muffins (toasted) 1/2 cup Swiss Cheese (shredded) Ground pepper to taste

Preheat oven on Broiler mode if you have it. If not make sure you have a rack on the top shelf of the oven and turn to 525 degrees. Blanch asparagus for about 30 seconds. Combine all ingredients in a mixing bowl except for Swiss Cheese. Put an even amount of mixture on each half of toasted English muffin. Top with cheese and place in oven for about 4-5 minutes (until cheese is melted ).

The whole thing will take you about 30 minutes to do and you will have a delicious lunch that will have a mere 250 calories per serving and about 30g carbs. And you thought healthy couldn't be tasty!

Get more ideas for healthy food recipes and check out this healthy urban kitchen review

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Lewis_Stonham

Healthy Food Recipes

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01.06 | 0 comments

Malocclusion: Disease of Civilization, Part II

The Nature of the Problem

In 1973, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) published the results of a National Health Survey in which it examined the dental health of American youths nationwide. The following description was published in a special issue of the journal Pediatric Dentistry (1):

The 1973 National Health Survey reported 75% of children, ages 6 to 11 years, and 89% of youths, ages 12 to 17 years, have some degree of occlusal disharmony [malocclusion]; 8.7% of children and 13% of youth had what was considered a severe handicapping malocclusion for which treatment was highly desirable and 5.5% of children and 16% of youth had a severe handicapping malocclusion that required mandatory treatment.

89% of youths had some degree of malocclusion, and 29% had a severe handicapping malocclusion for which treatment was either highly desirable or mandatory. Fortunately, many of these received orthodontics so the malocclusion didn't persist into adulthood.

This is consistent with another survey conducted in 1977, in which 38% of American youths showed definite or severe malocclusion. 46% had occlusion that the authors deemed "ideal or acceptable" (2).

The trend continues. The CDC National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey III (NHANES III) found in 1988-1991 that approximately three fourths of Americans age 12 to 50 years had some degree of malocclusion (3).

The same holds true for Caucasian-Americans, African-Americans and Native Americans in the US, as well as other industrial nations around the world. Typically, only 1/3 to 1/2 of the population shows good (but not necessarily perfect) occlusion (4- 8).

In the next post, I'll review some of the data from non-industrial and transitioning populations.


Malocclusion: Disease of Civilization


1. Pediatr. Dent. 17(6):1-6. 1995-1996
2. USPHS Vital and Health Statistics Ser. 11, no 162. 1977
3. J. Dent. Res. Special issue. 75:706. 1996. Pubmed link.
4. The Evaluation of Canadian Dental Health. 1959. Describes Canadian occlusion.
5. The Effects of Inbreeding on Japanese Children. 1965. Contains data on Japanese occlusion.
6. J. Dent. Res. 35:115. 1956. Contains data on both industrial and non-industrial cultures (Pukapuka, Fiji, New Guinea, U.S.A. and New Zealand).
7. J. Dent. Res. 44:947. 1965 (free full text). Contains data on Caucasian-Americans and African-Americans living in several U.S. regions, as well as data from two regions of Germany. Only includes data on Angle classifications, not other types of malocclusion such as crossbite and open bite (i.e., the data underestimate the total prevalence of malocclusion).
8. J. Dent. Res. 47:302. 1968 (free full text). Contains data on Chippewa Native Americans in the U.S., whose occlusion was particularly bad, especially when compared to previous generations.

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