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Including more whole grains in your diet is one of the tastiest and most effective ways to reduce your risk of heart disease, stroke, type 2 diabetes, many cancers and obesity. For best results include 3 servings of whole grains every day.
Here are 7 easy ways to get 3 servings a day. (1 serving is 1/2 cup prepared whole grains like oatmeal or brown rice; 1 slice of 100% whole wheat bread; a “serving” (check nutrition label) of any 100% whole grain cereal; 1 oz of 100% whole grain crackers/snacks):
- 1 cup of prepared oatmeal for breakfast; 1/2 cup brown rice at dinner.
- A “serving” of 100% whole wheat/grain cereal for breakfast; a sandwich at lunch made with 100% whole wheat or 100% whole grain bread.
- One 100% whole wheat bagel at breakfast; 1 oz (std serving) of whole grain tortilla chips for a snack.
- 1/2 cup stone ground whole grain grits (not standard grits) at breakfast; 1, 6″ 100% whole wheat tortilla at lunch; 1/2 cup barley at dinner (great in soup and stews).
- 3/4 cup prepared oatmeal at breakfast; 3/4 cup quinoa at dinner.
- 1/2 cup homemade granola (get my recipe) at breakfast; 1 serving (1oz) of 100% whole wheat crackers as a snack (100% whole wheat Wheat Thins, Ak-Mak, Rye Crisps, Triscuits); 1/2 cup brown rice at dinner.
- 1, 100% whole wheat English muffin at breakfast; 3/4 cup Quinoa at dinner.
If you want to be adventurous try the “other” more exotic whole grains – farro, kamut, spelt, amaranth and kasha.
If diabetic, pre-diabetic, overweight or trying to lose weight, physically intact grains are best. In other words, avoid breads and crackers.
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Belly fat is extremely hazardous to your health. Get rid of it once and for all with these tips.
- Exercise as much and as often as possible – If you don’t accumulate at least 30 minutes of moderate aerobic activity most days of the week you are virtually guaranteed to accumulate belly fat. (I can always tell who is active and who is not active enough by looking at their bellies!)
- Eat tons of non-starchy veggies and fruits.
- Avoid the Great White Hazards – white flour, white rice, white potatoes and sugar. These foods are belly fat magnets. Substitute whole grains instead.
- Avoid trans fat and saturated fats – These fats promote belly fat accumulation.
- Include omega 3 fats in your diet regularly. These happy fats help fight belly fat..
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Great as a small meal or a side, this recipe by is sure to be a hit with every member of your family!
Ingredients
Vegetable-oil cooking spray
2 cups chicken broth
1 cup quinoa or brown rice
4 large red bell peppers
1 tbs EVOO
1/2 cup chopped onion
6 oz zucchini, quartered lengthwise then sliced across thinly
6 oz yellow squash, quartered lengthwise then sliced across thinly
3 tbsp basil, chopped
¼ cup chopped parsley
1/2 tsp dried oregano
1 can diced tomatoes
1 lemon, juiced
4 oz crumbled feta cheese (about 1 cup)
salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
Preheat oven to 350°F. Coat a small baking dish with cooking spray. Bring the broth and quinoa to boil in saucepan, cover and reduce to a simmer for 15- 20 minutes. Meanwhile, bring a large pot of water to a boil. Cut the stems and top half inch off the bell peppers and scoop out the seeds. Boil trimmed peppers for 5 minutes; drain. Heat oil in a nonstick skillet. Add onion, zucchini, yellow squash, oregano, and tomatoes; season to taste with salt and pepper. Cook, stirring frequently, until vegetables are softened. Remove from heat and stir in basil, parsley, and lemon. Stir in the crumbled feta and cooked quinoa. Fill peppers with quinoa mixture and place in baking dish. Bake 15 minutes. Serve immediately.
(serves 4)
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Chocolate and dessert lovers rejoice! I have a recipe for a healthy chocolate sundae that will have your mouths watering.
2 scoops of “Purely Decadent” brand coconut milk ice cream (vanilla bean or coconut flavor), smothered with 2 ounces of melted 72% cacao, or higher, dark chocolate (I like Ghiradelli’s “Midnight Reverie”), and topped with 2 tbs raw or toasted walnuts.
“Purely Decadent” brand of coconut milk ice creams are dramatically lower in calories, fat, and sugar compared to other premium ice creams, and taste GREAT! Additionally, the saturated fats in coconut milk tend to boost up levels of good (HDL) cholesterol.
Summer is long gone, fall flew by, and winter is here! As the days get shorter and cooler, here are some simple tips for beating the winter blues.
- Make sure you move. As little as 20 minutes of aerobic activity, like a brisk walk, has been shown to improve mood and reduce stress for up to 12 full hours.
- Go for the right carbs – carbohydrate foods can boost one of our bodies’ feel good neurotransmitters, serotonin. Steer clear of nutritionally defunct sugar and refined carb foods, like white bread and white rice, because they can zap your energy and trigger irritability. Instead, go for the nutrient and fiber rich carbs – whole grains, beans, fruits, and veggies. The right carbs can power both your body and your brain. For even more guidance on the right carbs, buy Dr. Ann’s Healthy Grocery List.
- Celebrate the season – take full advantage of the good things winter has to offer, including the opportunity for snow boarding, skiing, and ice skating.
- Get some sun exposure – exposure to sunlight can boost your mood.
Snacking is as American as Apple Pie – a culturally reinforced behavior that is simply hard wired into our food environment. And while traditional snack choices have largely been nutritional disasters, typically low in the good stuff, like fiber and nutrients, and high in the bad stuff, like excess calories, bad fats, salts, sugar and refined carbs, I’m pleased to report that healthy and tasty options are now widely available too. In fact, if done right, strategic snacking can provide a valuable and delicious means of maximizing nutritional wellness. Here are 7 compelling reasons to engage in healthful snacking:
- It takes less calories to prevent hunger than it does to alleviate it. Well planned between-meal-snacking helps keep hunger at bay, which diminishes the chances of binging, over-consumption at meal time, and other dietary indiscretions. Controlling hunger is one of the most powerful defenses to avoid the battle of the bulge.
- Regular intake of food (i.e.: approximately every 3 hours) maximizes metabolic rate. The higher one’s metabolic rate, the more calories one burns at rest. There is a compensatory decrease in metabolic rate when food is withheld from the body for extended periods of time.
- Snacking helps maintain steady blood sugar levels, which insure that our muscles have a constant supply of readily available fuel. The steadier our sugar levels, the more energy we have, the more we move, and the more calories we burn.
- Smaller, more frequent feedings result in lower and more stable blood insulin levels over the course of the day. This helps reduce the risk of insulin resistance. Insulin resistance is currently epidemic (especially in overweight sedentary people) and turns your fat cells into fat magnets.
- Snacking provides additional opportunities to bring in valuable, essential micronutrients, like folate, vitamin C, and calcium.
- Snacking enhances the variety in one’s diet. The more dietary variety, the greater the chances of consuming the full spectrum of essential nutrients.
- Snacking provides sensory pleasure. Healthful snacking and satisfying our primordial drive to please our taste buds can go hand in hand.
So take control of your nutritional environment and always have a variety of healthy snack options available at your finger tips. Here are some helpful, general guidelines:
- Keep snack calories between 100-250 per serving.
- Space your snacks about 3 hours after mealtime.
- Focus on whole, “real” foods with little to no ingredients list.
- Plate your snack before you eat it and be conscious by savoring each and every bite.
- Avoid snacking in front of distracting influences like the TV and computer.
- Consume packaged snacks from small, single-serving containers/bags.
Here are my top snack picks:
- Nuts/Seeds– any variety, packaged or bulk fresh (limit to 1 small handful, about 1 oz.)
- Cut fresh veggies (carrots, celery, bell peppers, broccoli, cauliflower)—dip in hummus/bean dips, guacamole, or salsa to jack up its flavor and nutrient profile.
- Soy nuts, dried wasabi peas
- Wasa, Ak-mak, Kashi TLC or other 100% whole grain crackers with non-fat cheese, peanut butter, hummus, salsa, guacamole, sardines, smoked salmon
- Stone ground tortilla chips or baked chips dipped in hummus, salsa or guacamole
- Synder’s Oat Bran or Honey Wheat Sticks
- Stacy’s Multigrain Pita Chips
- Low fat plain yogurt (sweeten with a little sugar if you must)
- Part-skim mozzarella or other reduced fat (2% milk) cheeses (try convenient cheese sticks)
- Dried fruit (avoid if overweight, diabetic or insulin resistant)
- Granola bars (Kashi), trail mix, Luna or Pria bars
- Dark chocolate – 60% or more cocoa (limit to ½ -1 oz.)
Study after study after study has linked drinking sugary beverages to a host of modern day ills. And here is another one. In an evaluation involving thousands of adults of various ethnicities, middle-aged women who reported drinking two or more sugary beverages (like soda, fruit drinks, sports drinks, etc) daily were almost four times more likely to develop high triglycerides (a risk factor for heart-disease) along with abnormal blood sugar levels (prediabetes) vs. those drinking less than one a day. The researchers noted these findings occurred even if study subjects did not gain any weight. In other words, sugary beverages appear to have direct toxic effects on the cardiovascular system and on our blood sugar-regulating mechanisms. (AHA Annual Meeting, November 2011, Orlando, FL)
If you drink sugary beverages, STOP! Based on all the nutrition studies I have reviewed in my lifetime (which would be thousands) this is the single most powerful dietary step you could take to improve your health.
According to scientific projections presented at the recent Annual American Heart Association Meeting (AHA Scientific Session November 16, 2011 Orlando, FL), Americans are on the fast track to catastrophic health consequences as a result of unhealthy living. Based on the researcher’s analysis, 83 percent of men and 72 percent women will be overweight or obese in 2020. And 77 percent of men and 53 percent of women will have either pre-diabetes or diabetes.
Make no mistake – such levels of chronic disease are simply unsustainable. We cannot and will not remain a thriving productive society with this much sickness. Reversing these staggering trends will take broad spectrum, systemic, collective action among all facets of our society, but begins with YOU and YOUR FAMILY! This is what YOU can do NOW to help.
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In an intriguing scientific twist that really grabbed my attention, scientists have uncovered new insight on how the “type of calories” we eat – in this case protein vs. carbs – can have totally different effects on special brain cells involved in wakefulness and metabolism. Housed in our brains are specialized neurons called orexin cells. Orexin cells incite wakefulness and calorie burning. Previous research had shown that glucose, which comes from carb foods, can shut off the activity of orexin cells (which may be why we experience after-mealtime sluggishness). In the current study the scientists sought to investigate how amino acids, which come from protein foods, effect the activity of orexin cells. They discovered that amino acids have the opposite effect of glucose and actually stimulate the orexin cells. Additionally, they found that amino acids can also block glucose from quieting the orexin cells. (Neuron, November 2011)
What this supports is that for optimal alertness and calorie burning, it is best to include some protein in all meals and snacks and to avoid those that are carb rich and protein poor.
Real world translation – forget the shot of sugar (think mid-afternoon cookies, candy bars, sodas) as a means of boosting energy. And beware of the standard coffee shop breakfast (think donuts, pastries, muffins). If these study findings are confirmed, to eat these foods is to invite weight gain and sluggishness.
Want to dramatically improve the quality of your sleep and boost your daytime effectiveness? Get up and move! A wonderful new report that carefully and accurately measured study subject’s daily physical activity found a striking relationship between physical activity levels and sound, effective sleep. Specifically, those who engaged in 150 minutes of moderate to vigorous activity weekly reported overall sleep quality 65 percent higher than inactive participants. Other noted benefits included less night time leg cramps (68 percent less) and less daytime fatigue-related poor focus and concentration (45 percent decrease). (Mental Health and Physical Activity, December 2011)
I am 100 percent convinced that good quality sleep and optimal mental health are simply unattainable unless the body gets a certain threshold amount of daily physical activity (I would say that 30 minutes of moderate activity is the bare minimum). In other words if you are not physically fit, you have likely never experienced just how restfully you could be sleeping and just how happy and “alive” you could feel. Click here to see my complete, personal prescription for exercise.
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