Sunday, March 20, 2016

Boost Your Immunity with Natural Remedies

Boost Your Immunity with Natural Remedies

Here are some holistic secrets for boosting energy, strengthening immunity, warding off cancer, fighting heart disease and beating depression.

Secret for Your Brain: Protect Its Memory Bank

The thought of losing one’s memory is frightening. Dr. Weil recommends Huperzine A, otherwise known as Chinese club moss, a natural remedy that may help keep memory sharp and ward off Alzheimer’s.
He also recommends Phosphatidyl serine (PS), a naturally occurring lipid that’s considered a brain cell nutrient. It may have positive effects on memory and concentration to help slow age-related cognitive decline.

In addition, PS may reduce stress by limiting cortisol spikes.
• Huperzine A - 300mcg daily
• Phosphatidyl serine - 200mg daily
Both of these natural remedies are available at health stores and pharmacies.

Pasta Puttanesca With Tuna

Ingredients
2 (28 oz) cans Italian tomatoes, drained and crushed
4 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 tsp dried hot red pepper flakes
2 tbsp capers
1/2 cup black olives, pitted and chopped
3 mashed garlic cloves
2 tbsp fresh basil leaves, minced
1 lb dried pasta
1/4 cup Parmesan cheese, grated
1 package/can of healthy pouch/canned tuna (low-mercury type)

Directions
In a large bowl, combine the tomatoes, olive oil, red pepper flakes, capers, olives, garlic and basil. Let stand at room temperature for 1 hour. Add the tuna to the mix. Cook the pasta in rapidly boiling water until al dente. Drain well. Toss the hot pasta with the tomato mixture. Add the grated Parmesan cheese and serve immediately.

Secret for Your Heart: Keep Arteries Healthy

To keep your arteries healthy, it is recommended that red yeast rice extract is used this is asource of naturally occurring statins, the prescription drugs used to lower LDL levels and control cholesterol. Dr. Weil argues that red yeast rice extract delivers a mix of these statin-like compounds rather than a single type of molecule, so it’s less likely to cause side effects, such as liver dysfunction that can occur with pharmaceutical versions. However, not everyone in the medical community agrees with him on this. If you have blood sugar problems, this is not the right supplement for you.

Niacin (vitamin B3) is less controversial than red yeast rice extract and is shown to raise HDL, the “good” cholesterol. Plus, it’s much cheaper than a prescription drug and has similar effects.
• Red Yeast Rice Extract - 200mg twice daily
• Niacin 500 mg Extended Release - Every night at bedtime
Be sure if you take either of these to do so under your doctor’s direction.

Secret for Your Digestive Tract: Keep It Clean

Fiber plays an important role in maintaining a healthy digestive tract. In fact, countries such as New Zealand that have a low-fiber diet have higher incidences of colon cancer. It is  recommended to consume 40 grams of fiber each day, almost twice the normal recommended amount.

Use this as a rule of thumb to obtain 40 grams of fiber:
• 4 fruits (such as bananas, strawberries, blueberries, apples, peaches)
• 3 veggies (such as kale, sweet potatoes, green beans, peas, asparagus, corn, broccoli)
• 3 whole grains or beans (such as oatmeal, all-bran cereal, shredded wheat, lima beans, black beans)
If you are unable to eat this much fiber, take a supplement such as psyllium husk fiber, available at pharmacies and natural food stores. Be sure to drink it with plenty of water to avoid constipation.

Secret for Your Immunity: Take an Antioxidant Cocktail

By strengthening your immunity, you’ll ward off common colds and reduce your risk of cancer. make sure you get  antioxidants from a multivitamin and you can too. Just be sure you are getting the right doses of each vitamin family.
 Go for a cocktail comprised of a multivitamin and COQ 10.
Mixed Carotenoids - 15mg:
Avoid pre-formed vitamin A, often called retinol, which can be toxic. Instead, you want to take mixed carotenoids, which are the pigments found in orange and yellow vegetables. Look for a combination of beta-carotene, alpha-carotene, lycopene, astaxanthin, lutein and zeaxanthin.
Vitamin C - 200mg:
Too much vitamin C can be pro-oxidant rather than antioxidant, so stick to 100% of your daily value, or 60mg. This important vitamin builds strong connective tissue, maintains arteries, and is great for overall healing. Avoid sweet chewable tablets of vitamin C, which are bad for your teeth.
Vitamin E - 400 IU:

This powerful antioxidant protects many parts of the body, including cell membranes and arteries, from free radical damage. However, it does have blood-thinning properties; beware of taking too much if you are taking any blood-thinning medications or supplements.
Selenium - 200mcg:
This important trace mineral has strong cancer-fighting properties.
COQ10 - 120mg:
Coenzyme Q10 (COQ10) maintains heart health and protects muscles.
Be sure and take your multi and your COQ10
Secret to Keep Your Life Balanced: Gratitude Journal and 4-7-8 Breathing

Gratitude Journal

Gratitude is shown to help ward off depression. So keep a journal and during the day make mental notes of the things you are grateful for – simple things such as friendship, a sunny day, a good cup of coffee, anything at all. At night, jot them down. By doing this for just one week, you can boost your entire mood for up to 6 months.

4-7-8 Breathing: A strong correlation exists between emotions and breathing – the perfect example of mind and body unity. People who are anxious or upset breathe rapid, shallow, noisy and irregular breathes. It’s easier to regulate your breathing than flip a switch on your mood. Try this technique known as 4-7-8

Breathing.
• Place the tip of your tongue against the ridge behind and above your front teeth.
• Exhale through your mouth, making a whooshing sound.
• Close your mouth and inhale deeply through your nose to a silent count of 4.
• Then hold your breath for a count of 7.
• Exhale through the mouth to a count of 8, and make the same whooshing sound.
• Repeat for 4 breath cycles.
Do this twice a day and you’ll be amazed by how easily calm washes over you.
Fiber plays an important role in maintaining blood sugar levels, reducing the risk of heart disease and keeping your digestive tract healthy.

Friday, May 1, 2015

Top Diet and Nutritional Apps



Best Diet and Nutrition Apps for Free

There are so many good apps for your phone now available; here are some of the top free apps for Diet and Nutritional information.

Diet Point Weight Loss (Android, iOS; Free)


Diet Point Weight Loss (Android, iOS) aims to help users pick the weight loss program that's right for them. The app provides details for more than 150 different diets in varied categories, including, the Mediterranean Diet, Paleo Diet, Raw Food Diet, High Fiber Diet, Vegetarian/Vegan Diet and Low Carb/Fat Diets.

 Dieters also have access to the Diet Point community. This app comes complete with detailed shopping lists and meal plans. The app also helpfully notifies you for mealtimes, to help avoid out of control craving and overeating. 

The diets take into account your Basal Metabolic rate to estimate the amount of weight you could potentially lose with each diet. An added feature is the grocery list. You input the foods necessary for a particular diet and print the shopping list.

Fooducate (Android, iOS; Free)

Fooducate (Android, iOS) helps you shop and eat healthy by allowing you to quickly pull up nutritional information about food products from barcodes, as well as by helping you make sense of nutritional labels. It is a food scanner and diet tracker that lets you count calories that helps you to lose those extra unwanted pounds. 

The Foodcate app displays a letter grade from A to D, along with a quick summary of nutrition information in plain language, as well as healthy alternative suggestions. If users cook their own meals or eat out, you can also manually enter a meal's nutritional information. 

Shopwell (Android, iOS; Free)


The first step to eating well is shopping well. At least that's the idea behind Shopwell (Android, iOS), a barcode scanning and shopping assistant app that rates foods and grocery items according to your nutritional needs. 

It’s like having a dietitian in the palm of your hand. ShopWell users create a personalized profile and select from a series of nutritional goals (Heart Disease, Athletic Training, etc), as well as dietary restrictions (Celiac disease, food allergies, vegetarian, etc.). 

The app then takes these into account and uses them to score scanned grocery items, as well as provide layman-friendly nutritional pointers, and healthy suggestions.

MyFitnessPal (Android, iOS, Windows Phone; Free) 

A good exercise regime is nothing without a balanced diet to back it up. MyFitnessPal's Calorie Counter (Android, iOS, Windows Phone) app helps you out on that front, functioning as an easy to use calorie and nutrients counter with a database that boasts more than 2 million foods (and it's growing every day). 
You can easily look up and track the foods you're consuming with the help of a barcode scanner as well as a recipe calculator for inputting custom creations. Track exercises, set diet goals and sync your progress to myfitnesspal.com for free.

Lose It! (Android, iOS; Free) 

Lose It! (Android, iOS) is another excellent nutrition and exercise logging tool targeted at those looking to lose a few pounds. Simply enter a few details about yourself such as weight, height and goal weight, and the app will help you come up with a daily calorie budget. 

The Lose it app keeps tracking your food intake easy, with barcode scanners for grocery items, as well as an extensive database of dishes and restaurant meals. The app also has an exercise tracking feature, and can also sync data with other exercise apps to help log your routine.

These are just a few diet and nutritional apps that are complementary. These are so  many more out there, please let me know which app you like and why?
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Thursday, September 11, 2014

Anti Aging Tips and Tricks



We are always looking for Anti aging tips and tricks that can slow down the aging process, well here are a few home remedies that I have tried in the past.

Everyone of us should be getting 7 – 9 hours sleep every night and get at least 30 minute exercise everyday  and eat  at least 9 servings of fruit and vegetables daily preferably with high levels of antioxidant.

Reduce the appearance of wrinkles


Make your own age-defying exfoliating face mask with honey, cinnamon and apple cider vinegar to get rid of dead skin, moisturize your face and tighten skin so it doesn't sag. As you age, you lose collagen in your skin, which creates wrinkles. 

Exfoliating the skin with this cinnamon paste helps bring in new collagen, leading to fewer wrinkles. The vinegar acts as a toner; keeping skin cells hydrated which prevents wrinkles as well.

Ingredients

1 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1 tablespoon of honey to make a paste.

Apply it to your face and leave on for 30 minutes every night and rinse.

 Then apply white vinegar toner using one part vinegar to one part water.

 Dip a cotton ball into the toner solution and rub all over face to help tighten skin.

Wednesday, March 12, 2014

Healthy Protein Bars



Healthy Protein Bars
There are so many protein bars available today but which ones are the Healthy Protein bars. Depending on whether you are looking for a protein bar for energy or to lose weight or maybe you just want a healthy snack here are some of the Healthy Protein Bars you should be looking at.

For a Snack

Protein bars can be a great on-the-go snack that will tide you over between meals. If you’re looking for a snack, make sure your bar has less than 200 calories and at least 4 grams of fiber. Try these the next time you need something to nibble on:
  1. Dark Chocolate Coconut Bar 15/1.58 oz Bar(S) 
  2. Grab1 Cranberry Almond  
For Weight Loss
If you’re looking to lose weight, choose a protein bar filled with fiber. It’ll fill you up and help keep you regular. Try these if you want to slim down:
  1. Quest Nutrition Protein Bars, Coconut Cashew, 2.12 Oz bar
  2. Fiber One Chocolate Peanut Butter Meal Bar: 9 grams of fiber
For Energy
If you want a burst of energy, reach for a protein bar stocked with healthy carbs. Aim for one with about 20 grams. Try one of these before your next workout:
  1. Vega Sport Protein Bar Chocolate Saviseed
  2. Zing Almond Blueberry.
Protein Bar Ground Rules
Protein bars can be a healthy snack if you know what to look for on the label. When you reach for a bar, read the fine print and make sure it follows these four rules:
  1. It has at least 10 grams of protein.
  2. It has less than 15 grams sugar (the lower, the better!). Look for natural sources of sugar, such as fruit.
  3. It has less than 4 grams of fat – and no trans-fats allowed.
  4. It has less than 350 calories
  1.  


Monday, September 16, 2013

Find of the Week

There is so many great tips and tricks that Dr. Oz reveals daily and here are some of this "Find of the Week".

It's not easy finding where to buy some of these cool gadgets, so to help you here they are in one easy place.



GEFU SPIRAL CUTTERS

This is a great gadget to create your own vegetable stir fries or pasta dishes or even decorate any serving dish. The GEFU Spirelli Spiral Cutter is a quality product with high quality stainless steel and plastic that is dishwasher proof. It is a manual device and I believe it is a little limited in the vegetable you can use. The ideal size vegetable is a Zuchinni's , squash, potatoes, sweet potatoes and cucumbers..

GEFU also make a GEFU Spiral Cutter SPIRALFIX- which is a little
easier to use, just open the folding lid, use the adjusting wheel to set the desired width of cut and place the vegetables in the box. Now close the lid, turn the crank handle (pressing down gently), and the desired vegetable spirals fall into the non-slip holding container. This cuts everything from carrots, cucumbers, potatoes, squash & zucchinis in minutes. An we even peeled an apple first and then spiral cut it too. Really "easy" to use. Just be careful when washing to not touch the blades on the bottom.




CITRUS SPRAYER

You can take an  orange, lemon, lime or grapefruit and cut the top section and attach the Citrus sprayer and then you have the 100 % real citrus smell.


This handy kitchen gadget lets you transform any dish, dressing or even cocktails into something fresh and delicious.

Cranberry Juice

This fruit juice disrupts the formation of plaque and thereby prevents yellowing of teeth.

The flavonoids in cranberry juice also counteract the damaging effects of bacteria that cause tooth decay.

 Be careful that you aren't drinking a sugar-laden cranberry juice cocktail.