A recent government report found that Americans aren't getting enough calcium, fiber, magnesium, potassium, or vitamins A, C, and E. "You're not going to have a major health event as a result," says Alanna Moshfegh, an author of the USDA report What We Eat in America, "but the recommended amounts will help you maintain your health and decrease your risk of chronic diseases." Here are the figures (as they pertain to women) and a little help interpreting them.
Calcium
Recommendation: 1,000 milligrams a day.
Benefits: Bone health.
Sources: Dairy products; fish with bones; dark, leafy greens.
Fiber
Recommendation: 25 grams a day.
Benefits: Protects against coronary heart disease and reduces the risk of diabetes.
Sources: Fruits, vegetables, legumes, nuts, seeds, whole grains.
Magnesium
Recommendation: 310 to 320 milligrams a day.
Benefits: Helps maintain normal muscle and nerve function and develop and maintain bones.
Sources: Nuts, seeds, bran, halibut and other fish.
Potassium
Recommendation: 4,700 milligrams a day.
Benefits: Helps maintain healthy blood pressure and reduce the effects of salt; may reduce the risk of recurrent kidney stones and possibly decrease bone loss.
Sources: Potatoes, tomato paste and puree, white beans, yogurt, soybeans, bananas.
Vitamin A
Recommendation: 2,310 international units a day.
Benefits: Important for vision, red blood cell production, embryonic development, and immune function.
Sources: Organ meats; orange vegetables; green, leafy vegetables.
Vitamin C
Recommendation: 75 milligrams a day.
Benefits: Acts as a disease-fighting antioxidant; may help to maintain a healthy immune system.
Sources: Fruits and vegetables, including citrus fruits, red and green peppers, kiwis, and guavas.
Vitamin E
Recommendation: 15 milligrams a day.
Benefits: Acts as a disease-fighting antioxidant; may support eye health.
Sources: Some ready-to-eat cereals, some oils, almonds, peanut butter.
Monday, June 14, 2010
Do you think you have enough Vitamin D?
It has been all over the news in recent months: Study after study has touted vitamin D’s possible role in preventing everything from multiple sclerosis and certain types of cancer to cardiovascular disease. Plus, it’s known for its role in helping build healthy bones (vitamin D assists your body in absorbing the calcium you consume). But with the promise of this vitamin comes some controversy.
The dilemma: Our bodies make vitamin D when exposed to sunlight, specifically UVB rays. But wearing sunscreen daily filters out those vitamin D–producing rays. And a recent review in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that most Americans are deficient in the vitamin.
According to Lien, all sunscreen users accrue some sun exposure, because even the best shields, applied adequately and often, can’t filter out 100 percent of UV rays. Researchers agree that this exposure is enough for your body to produce some vitamin D.
What doctors and dermatologists can’t quite agree on is the amount of vitamin D you actually need. The traditional recommendation is 200 to 600 international units (I.U.) every day. However, new research suggests that that amount is not enough.
While vitamin D is found in foods such as fatty fish, eggs, and fortified dairy products, it’s nearly impossible to get enough through diet alone. The smartest move, experts say, is daily use of sunscreen and vitamin D supplements. “Take 1,000 I.U. every day, in addition to a multivitamin that contains 400 I.U.,” says Michael Holick, M.D., Ph.D., director of the Vitamin D, Skin, and Bone Research Laboratory at the Boston University Medical Center.
What nutrients does your body need daily? Find out here
The dilemma: Our bodies make vitamin D when exposed to sunlight, specifically UVB rays. But wearing sunscreen daily filters out those vitamin D–producing rays. And a recent review in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that most Americans are deficient in the vitamin.
According to Lien, all sunscreen users accrue some sun exposure, because even the best shields, applied adequately and often, can’t filter out 100 percent of UV rays. Researchers agree that this exposure is enough for your body to produce some vitamin D.
What doctors and dermatologists can’t quite agree on is the amount of vitamin D you actually need. The traditional recommendation is 200 to 600 international units (I.U.) every day. However, new research suggests that that amount is not enough.
While vitamin D is found in foods such as fatty fish, eggs, and fortified dairy products, it’s nearly impossible to get enough through diet alone. The smartest move, experts say, is daily use of sunscreen and vitamin D supplements. “Take 1,000 I.U. every day, in addition to a multivitamin that contains 400 I.U.,” says Michael Holick, M.D., Ph.D., director of the Vitamin D, Skin, and Bone Research Laboratory at the Boston University Medical Center.
What nutrients does your body need daily? Find out here
The Salad Dressing You Should NEVER Eat -- and THE Alternative Super-Healthy Recipe
If you want to eat truly healthy, support your fat loss goals, and avoid some of the nasty additives in processed food, one thing you should eliminate is typical store-bought salad dressing.
I personally NEVER buy pre-made salad dressings from the store anymore, and here's why:
1. Almost all store-bought salad dressings contain fairly large amounts of high fructose corn syrup (HFCS). Unless you're in a health food store, it's almost impossible to find a salad dressing that doesn't contain large amounts of HFCS.
2. Almost all store-bought salad dressings contain heavily refined soybean oil and/or refined canola oil... both of which are VERY unhealthy. Yes, that's correct, canola oil IS unhealthy, despite the marketing propaganda you've been fed claiming that it's healthy. You can read more about why canola oil is NOT healthy here.
Due to the refining process of both soybean or canola oils, the polyunsaturated component of the oils is oxidized and makes these oils very inflammatory inside your body. In addition, soybean oil is WAY too high in omega-6 fatty acids which throws your omega-6 to omega-3 balance out of whack.
We know that olive oil is healthier, but when it comes to store-bought dressings... Even salad dressings that claim to be "made with olive oil" on the FRONT label are deceptive, because if you read the ingredients on the BACK label, they are almost ALWAYS made of mostly refined soybean oil or canola oil as the main oil, with only a very small amount of actual olive oil as a secondary oil.
So here's how to avoid all of these horrendously unhealthy store-bought salad dressings and make your own quick and easy SUPER-healthy dressing...
Quick and Easy Recipe for Super-Healthy Salad Dressing
Geary's Healthy-Fat Blend Balsamic Vinaigrette Dressing
Fill your salad dressing container with these approximate ratios of liquids:
1/3rd of container filled with balsamic vinegar
1/3rd of container filled with apple cider vinegar
fill the remaining 1/3rd of container with equal parts of extra virgin olive oil and "Udo's Choice EFA Oil Blend"
Add just a small touch (approx 1 or 2 teaspoons) of real maple syrup
Add a little bit of onion powder, garlic powder, and black pepper and then shake the container to mix all ingredients well.
This homemade salad dressing mixture is delicious and healthy, and I pretty much never get tired of it!
The reason I choose to blend the extra virgin olive oil half & half with the Udo's Choice Oil is that they make up for what each lacks... Although extra virgin olive oil is healthy and contains important antioxidants, it is mostly monounsaturated, and is low in the essential fatty acids (EFAs). The Udo's Choice Oil is higher in unrefined polyunsaturated oils with a good healthy balance of omega-3 to omega-6 fatty acids.
There are several variations of the Udo's Choice Oil, and one of them (labeled DHA 3-6-9 Blend) even contains a DHA algae oil blended into the mix along with organic flax oil, coconut oil, evening primrose oil, rice bran oil, oat germ and bran oil, and a few others.
Overall, blending Udo's Oil with extra virgin olive oil makes nearly a perfect oil blend for salad dressings with a great taste and maximum health benefits. If you can't find Udo's Choice Oil Blends (you can find Udo's at almost any health food store), there are other EFA oil blends on the market...just make sure that they are COLD-processed to protect the EFAs. You should never heat an EFA oil blend!
Give this homemade super-healthy salad dressing a try! You'll do your body a favor by avoiding the harmful additives in store-bought salad dressings.
Enjoy!
Check more in the Menu...
I personally NEVER buy pre-made salad dressings from the store anymore, and here's why:
1. Almost all store-bought salad dressings contain fairly large amounts of high fructose corn syrup (HFCS). Unless you're in a health food store, it's almost impossible to find a salad dressing that doesn't contain large amounts of HFCS.
2. Almost all store-bought salad dressings contain heavily refined soybean oil and/or refined canola oil... both of which are VERY unhealthy. Yes, that's correct, canola oil IS unhealthy, despite the marketing propaganda you've been fed claiming that it's healthy. You can read more about why canola oil is NOT healthy here.
Due to the refining process of both soybean or canola oils, the polyunsaturated component of the oils is oxidized and makes these oils very inflammatory inside your body. In addition, soybean oil is WAY too high in omega-6 fatty acids which throws your omega-6 to omega-3 balance out of whack.
We know that olive oil is healthier, but when it comes to store-bought dressings... Even salad dressings that claim to be "made with olive oil" on the FRONT label are deceptive, because if you read the ingredients on the BACK label, they are almost ALWAYS made of mostly refined soybean oil or canola oil as the main oil, with only a very small amount of actual olive oil as a secondary oil.
So here's how to avoid all of these horrendously unhealthy store-bought salad dressings and make your own quick and easy SUPER-healthy dressing...
Quick and Easy Recipe for Super-Healthy Salad Dressing
Geary's Healthy-Fat Blend Balsamic Vinaigrette Dressing
Fill your salad dressing container with these approximate ratios of liquids:
1/3rd of container filled with balsamic vinegar
1/3rd of container filled with apple cider vinegar
fill the remaining 1/3rd of container with equal parts of extra virgin olive oil and "Udo's Choice EFA Oil Blend"
Add just a small touch (approx 1 or 2 teaspoons) of real maple syrup
Add a little bit of onion powder, garlic powder, and black pepper and then shake the container to mix all ingredients well.
This homemade salad dressing mixture is delicious and healthy, and I pretty much never get tired of it!
The reason I choose to blend the extra virgin olive oil half & half with the Udo's Choice Oil is that they make up for what each lacks... Although extra virgin olive oil is healthy and contains important antioxidants, it is mostly monounsaturated, and is low in the essential fatty acids (EFAs). The Udo's Choice Oil is higher in unrefined polyunsaturated oils with a good healthy balance of omega-3 to omega-6 fatty acids.
There are several variations of the Udo's Choice Oil, and one of them (labeled DHA 3-6-9 Blend) even contains a DHA algae oil blended into the mix along with organic flax oil, coconut oil, evening primrose oil, rice bran oil, oat germ and bran oil, and a few others.
Overall, blending Udo's Oil with extra virgin olive oil makes nearly a perfect oil blend for salad dressings with a great taste and maximum health benefits. If you can't find Udo's Choice Oil Blends (you can find Udo's at almost any health food store), there are other EFA oil blends on the market...just make sure that they are COLD-processed to protect the EFAs. You should never heat an EFA oil blend!
Give this homemade super-healthy salad dressing a try! You'll do your body a favor by avoiding the harmful additives in store-bought salad dressings.
Enjoy!
Check more in the Menu...
Saturday, June 12, 2010
Your grocery list is sabotaging your fat loss
From Mike Geary's http://TruthAboutAbs.com
I was at the grocery store today picking up some ingredients for a black bean & brown rice with seasoned venison strips dish I was planning to make, when an interesting thing happened... I had gone straight to the grocery store after training a couple clients at the gym. Well, as I was grabbing some frozen veggies, a friendly lady (who must have seen that I was a fitness coach from my shirt), asked me my advice on a couple frozen prepared box meals she was picking out (by the way, those prepared frozen meals are usually highly processed crap loaded with sodium and other chemicals).
Now I will say that this woman was VERY overweight, and she mentioned that she has "tried everything" to get rid of all of the excess body fat and always failed. Keep in mind I hear about 50 people a day tell me they've "tried everything" to get in shape. The problem that they don't realize is that they're trying all of the wrong things...they're trying all of the gimmicks and fads that are out there instead of just adopting a TRUE healthy active lifestyle.
Back to the woman in the store... So we started chatting about her struggles with getting in shape, and I began scanning her grocery cart. If I can remember, these were some of the contents she thought were healthy:
*Slim fast shakes (far from healthy...they're actually loaded with high fructose corn syrup, hydrogenated oils, and a bunch of other chemicals)
*Fat Free Rice Cakes (ok...despite so many people believing these pieces of crap are healthy...they really are nothing but pure refined starch with zero fiber, which basically breaks down immediately into sugar in your body, spiking insulin and promoting fat storage...doesn't sound so good anymore, huh)
*Protein bars "Scientifically Slim Body Engineered" or some BS statement like that (I took a gander at the ingredient list of these so called "healthy" protein bars and sure enough... hydrogenated oils, high fructose corn syrup, and enough sugar alcohols to give you diarrhea for a week!)
*Canned fruit in syrup (I guess she could do worse here...but still, why not just eat fresh whole fruit which still contains the skins, fiber, active enzymes, etc, instead of resorting to processed, canned fruit that's been cooked and loaded with syrup)
*Reduced Sugar Dessert Cakes (ok, so these are loaded with artificial sweeteners, sugar alcohols, preservatives, and a chemical ingredient list about 15 lines long) Do you see what's going on here? This is the same scenario that I see all the time. Most people are fooled by what the FRONT OF THE BOX says, leading them to believe what they are buying is healthy. On all of these items, the FRONT of the packages had all kinds of great sounding things like "fat free", "reduced sugar", "high protein", "low cholesterol", "low carb", etc.
However, the TRUTH is on the BACK OF THE BOX! Ah yes, the ingredient list and nutrition info is where the real truth is. However, I've realized that most of the general public doesn't know how to fully understand the ingredient list and nutrition info, so they rely on the advertising claims on the front of the package to guide them. BIG MISTAKE!
If you notice, this woman thought she was doing great with her grocery shopping and buying all kinds of healthy stuff for her and her family. In reality, EVERYTHING she was buying was highly processed and full of chemicals and industrially refined ingredients. No wonder "nothing has worked" for her to get in shape and lose the body fat... she actually hasn't been doing anything right.
She's been mislead by all of the confusing marketing, labeling and conflicting nutrition info in the mass media. If you want to discover the TRUTH about what it really takes to eat a truly healthy diet that maximizes your metabolism, brings your hormonal balance back to normal, reduces cravings, and strips off body fat faster than you'd believe is possible... it's all found in my Truth about Six Pack Abs program at http://TruthAboutAbs.com
I was at the grocery store today picking up some ingredients for a black bean & brown rice with seasoned venison strips dish I was planning to make, when an interesting thing happened... I had gone straight to the grocery store after training a couple clients at the gym. Well, as I was grabbing some frozen veggies, a friendly lady (who must have seen that I was a fitness coach from my shirt), asked me my advice on a couple frozen prepared box meals she was picking out (by the way, those prepared frozen meals are usually highly processed crap loaded with sodium and other chemicals).
Now I will say that this woman was VERY overweight, and she mentioned that she has "tried everything" to get rid of all of the excess body fat and always failed. Keep in mind I hear about 50 people a day tell me they've "tried everything" to get in shape. The problem that they don't realize is that they're trying all of the wrong things...they're trying all of the gimmicks and fads that are out there instead of just adopting a TRUE healthy active lifestyle.
Back to the woman in the store... So we started chatting about her struggles with getting in shape, and I began scanning her grocery cart. If I can remember, these were some of the contents she thought were healthy:
*Slim fast shakes (far from healthy...they're actually loaded with high fructose corn syrup, hydrogenated oils, and a bunch of other chemicals)
*Fat Free Rice Cakes (ok...despite so many people believing these pieces of crap are healthy...they really are nothing but pure refined starch with zero fiber, which basically breaks down immediately into sugar in your body, spiking insulin and promoting fat storage...doesn't sound so good anymore, huh)
*Protein bars "Scientifically Slim Body Engineered" or some BS statement like that (I took a gander at the ingredient list of these so called "healthy" protein bars and sure enough... hydrogenated oils, high fructose corn syrup, and enough sugar alcohols to give you diarrhea for a week!)
*Canned fruit in syrup (I guess she could do worse here...but still, why not just eat fresh whole fruit which still contains the skins, fiber, active enzymes, etc, instead of resorting to processed, canned fruit that's been cooked and loaded with syrup)
*Reduced Sugar Dessert Cakes (ok, so these are loaded with artificial sweeteners, sugar alcohols, preservatives, and a chemical ingredient list about 15 lines long) Do you see what's going on here? This is the same scenario that I see all the time. Most people are fooled by what the FRONT OF THE BOX says, leading them to believe what they are buying is healthy. On all of these items, the FRONT of the packages had all kinds of great sounding things like "fat free", "reduced sugar", "high protein", "low cholesterol", "low carb", etc.
However, the TRUTH is on the BACK OF THE BOX! Ah yes, the ingredient list and nutrition info is where the real truth is. However, I've realized that most of the general public doesn't know how to fully understand the ingredient list and nutrition info, so they rely on the advertising claims on the front of the package to guide them. BIG MISTAKE!
If you notice, this woman thought she was doing great with her grocery shopping and buying all kinds of healthy stuff for her and her family. In reality, EVERYTHING she was buying was highly processed and full of chemicals and industrially refined ingredients. No wonder "nothing has worked" for her to get in shape and lose the body fat... she actually hasn't been doing anything right.
She's been mislead by all of the confusing marketing, labeling and conflicting nutrition info in the mass media. If you want to discover the TRUTH about what it really takes to eat a truly healthy diet that maximizes your metabolism, brings your hormonal balance back to normal, reduces cravings, and strips off body fat faster than you'd believe is possible... it's all found in my Truth about Six Pack Abs program at http://TruthAboutAbs.com
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