Archive for the ‘Healthy Eating’ Category

Could the Obese and diabetic population be suffering from Malnutrition

Wednesday, September 8th, 2010

Malnutrition and obesity go together? how can this be if you are suffering from malnutrition then you would be skinny.

Well this is a misconception that if you are not getting enough nutrition that you would look like the staving people you see on the TV in some remote third world country.

These people are definitely suffering from malnutrition but that is because they are staving. But you can be eating plenty of food and still be suffering malnutrition.

The word nutrition is the key, nutrition is the nutrients that are found in FOOD.

Not all food is created equal. The whole food that is fresh fruits and vegetables nuts seeds and whole grains, legumes etc. are very nutrient rich.

Man-made food on the other hand is nutrient poor, in fact it also toxic.

Our forebears did very well on a whole food diet rich in the nutrients needed to build healthy strong people that worked hard on the land or in industry.

But about 100 years ago the food industry started to add chemicals, preservatives and additives to give  shelf life to food and this revolutionized the industry. In recent years we now have machines to cook our food in record time.

Unfortunately the food is also over processed and the nutrient value is almost lost completely. Now the food that you find in the supermarket is not real food at all it is a chemical substitute.

I remember when I was a kid there was a television cartoon called the Jetsons and they had food dispensers in there houses that produced the food which was all man made.

We now live in this reality. Maybe it isn’t quite the same as on the Jetsons but the concept is essentially the same, we buy a packet at the shop and put it into the microwave and in 2 minutes we sit down and eat a meal.

We live in such a fast track world now where both parents are often working and it is hard to put a good meal on the table after working all day. So this type of food is very appealing to the over busy mum. What could she be doing to the health of her family.

This food has no nutrition and people eat like this 5-7 days a week  and then you add some takeaway’s, they are nutrient starved just like the person in the third world country.

But hang on a minute we don’t look like them so we can’t be starved. The food that I just described is nutrient poor but is full of fat, sodium and sugar.

When our bodies are deprived of the nutrition it requires it will store everything it can get as fat for future use to be converted into energy.

This store is put away for a rainy day in the adipose tissue (fat cells).

If an obese person stops eating processed foods and starts to eat a nutrient rich (Whole food) diet then the body starts to release the stores for use. Weight loss is the result. It is now getting nutrition and no longer need to store fats.

Have you ever noticed when you go on a diet to loose weight and you cut down on your portions and eat less, you go well for the first couple of weeks and loose a couple of kg or pounds then the body plateau’s and you stop or even start to gain more weight. Why is this?

You are starving the body more and it is going into storing mode. Not only is the food nutrient poor it doesn’t satisfy your hunger so you are constantly hungry, it is toxic with all the chemicals and additives the the body doesn’t know how to deal with and they are also deposited in the adipose tissue.

I know this is a doom and gloom story but this is how it is.

Solution to the problem.

Eat a nutrient rich diet of whole foods fresh fruits and vegetables, nuts, seeds, whole grains and legumes. These foods should be in there natural state and wherever possible RAW.

I say to people wanting to make change in there life need to shift there thinking on what they put in there mouth and life will change for the better. There is no magic pill to cure obesity or diabetes it is the way we eat and nothing more.

We are what we eat!!!!!!

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Cleansing by Fasting

Saturday, May 15th, 2010

I fast at least once a year as I enjoy the cleansing  feeling that it gives me, not only my body but also my mind. I feel de-cluttered mind wise after a fast. This passed week I have been on a fast with some friends of mine.

I wish to share some of our experiences during this time. It’s not exceptionally radical, it consist of 3 lead in days then the fasting days,  3 lead out days.

The 4 others that came on the fast with me had never fasted before, so it was great to hear all there positive experiences as we progressed through.

We got together on the first evening (Friday)and spent some time  sharing our reasons for doing the cleanse.

We all had different goals and expectations. TW was give up smoking, GF wanted to detoxify in order to lose weight, SF was wanting to kick start a new rawfood lifestyle and RC wanted to do a detox,  I needed to cleanse.

We met again on the Sunday to make a big pot of Broth which everyone contributed some vegetables too. This being the third day, we had our last solid meal at lunch time on that day.

We all got around the island in my kitchen and chopped up 5 onions, 2 cabbages, 6 capsicums, 3 chillies, a large bag of spinach and 18 potatoes. Fitting all these vegetable into my 2 large pots was a challenge, then GF chomped into his thumb instead of the potato.

In between trying to stop the bleeding finger I added lots of herbs and spices to the broth.

The broth took another hour or so to cook and we settled down to a game of Rummy O, which some of us had never played before. I won the game even though I was flitting from game to stirring soup and tasting.

To everyones horror I stained off the vegetables to be discarded (feed to my chickens) and divided all the liquid broth among the 5 of us, we ended up with 2 litres each.

The fast lasted for three days, then we had our lead out days.

It was amazing how everyone had similar  and some individuals experiences.

Most of us did some kind of cleaning I cleaned out all my draws in my bedroom and in the kitchen.

RC dragged out all her stuff she had stored, she sorted and discarded what was no longer wanted, she did this until 3 am then proceeded to continue the next day to de-clutter her life of all the things that she had been holding on to for unwarranted reasons.

SF cleaned out her office, TW who gave up smoking wanted to wash everything mainly to remove the stale smoke smells that were lingering.

This is often a common occurrence when you clean on the inside you have the desire to clean on the outside.

Most of us were waking early and feeling energy to burn, I went with GF for a 35 km ride on the Saturday and for 52 km on Sunday, I was a bit shattered after that though.

SF wanted to get out and exercise, due to lack of motivation she had not been doing any for several months.

RC and I had been attending Buddhist meditation classes, we found more clarity in our meditation. I found everything was easier to understand, it all made sense all of a sudden.

TW had the desire to curl up and keep warm with a good book, she found it better to hibernate.

GF had the most interesting experience of all, he discovered he had gallstones when he had a gallbladder attack. This was very painful and unfortunate for him. However on a positive note he can now remove them from his body.

This just goes to show how powerful a fast can be. The idea of fasting is to give the digestive system a break and allow the body to do some healing. This is exactly what happened with GF his body decided it was time to cleanse the gallbladder.

Some of us felt a bit cold near the end of the fast. We all lost weight, some as much as 3.7 kg, but most of us around 3 kg.

We all had a lightness and feeling of well being. Everyone found that they were not hungry at all, some reported to have missed the chewing process.

So the fast had a positive result for everyone, we are all happy with the results.

This is the cheapest detox you can do. You don’t need to spend money on detox kits.

You just use the best organic fruits and vegetables available and you can cleanse your body and mind over an 8 day period and feel great.

Best results when you plan the process, do it with others as then you aren’t feeling isolated.

If you want to do a fast, then email me and I will send you the fasting protocol, it isn’t hard but important you follow the instructions. Should you suffer from chronic illness you should consult  a naturopath before fasting.

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Is It a Fruit Or Vegetable?

Thursday, April 15th, 2010

Combining fruits and vegetables is it a No No or Ok?

Well this is a good question and I get it all the time, people say but aren’t you not supposed to combine fruit with vegetables. You read in the books that it is not good to combine these two.

The next question comes to mind is, what is a vegetable and what is a fruit? Could we be confusing fruits with vegetables.

When I thought about this for a while, I came up with a fruit grows on a tree or a vine.

Vegetables grow in the ground and are tubers like a carrot or parsnip.

But then you have the green leafy vegetable like cabbage and spinach as well as flower type like broccoli and artichokes etc.

So what is a fruit?  Are tomatoes a fruit, I say yes.
Capsicums and chillies are they fruits, I also say yes.
What about cucumbers, zucchini and pumpkin they all grow on a vine are they fruits? Well maybe they are fruits not vegetables.

Broccoli and cauliflower are flowers and so are artichokes, they are a category all of there own, are they fruits or vegetables?
I think they may come under fruits. What do you think?

Spinach, Kale, lettuce are all green leaf vegetables and are another category, I think of these as foliage.

Then there is the root vegetables that are the tubers or rhizomes, like potatoes, kumura, swede, beetroot etc. These are definitely vegetables.

I put into my  smoothies both raw fruits and vegetables, I don’t have trouble digesting them.

The foliage works very well with the fruit, even monkeys will wrap a piece of fruit in a leaf and eat it. If they do it by instinct then it must be Ok. Our digestive systems are the closet to primates.

Green smoothies contain fruits and green foliage and they are digested very easily to create an abundance of energy.

Apple carrot and ginger make a very nice juice and here we have 2 root vegetables and one fruit.

Avocado goes very well with broccoli and cauliflower as well as green leafy salad.

I think that putting fresh raw fruits and vegetables together is fine.

If you are having trouble digesting any combination then you should look at the gut integrity to determine whether this could be compromised, or that some intolerance’s may have been developed due to this compromise. Eating these foods raw will help to correct any gut issues.

Is it important as to whether it is fruit or a vegetable, I think not really, if it works together for flavor and digestion what is the problem.

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How Dumb am I ?

Monday, April 5th, 2010

On Good Friday I met up with my brother at the bottom of the Puketapu hill in Taradale for a training ride. Both of us are keen amateur riders and we are in training for a ride in May  from Rotorua to Whakatane which is 90 km with a lot of hills.

I am also riding in the Hawkes Bay ” Girls on Bikes” 65 km Ride on the 11 April. Getting out and doing lots of hill work is our main goal.

The ride we did was 38 km with approximately 20 of them being hills. My brother is carrying some extra kilos and is a bit slower on the hills than I am and I usually leave him far behind.  I had a raw soaked muesli for breakfast and it was only about 20 minutes before I started the ride.

What a big mistake that was, I was only a couple of metres a head of him on the first hill and was struggling, this is when I realized that I should have had a green smoothie instead of the muesli.

About 20 minutes later I was heading up the big big hill on Puketitiri Rd and I had finally digested the oats, I got the energy I needed to get up this hill.

This isn’t rocket science but it took me this experience to learn that you don’t eat too soon before exercise and food choice is paramount. Raw oats are great for giving sustained energy but the digestive system needs time to process them for that energy release, where a green smoothie will hit the blood stream in five minutes.

Now if I had a cooked breakfast then I would’ve been in bigger trouble as 84% of nutrition would be lost during the cooking or processing of the food. Raw food is definitely better.

I usually go for my ride very early in the morning and don’t eat before I exercise, so this occasion was different. We headed out at 9 am and I needed to eat before we left.

Although I had a raw breakfast it just wasn’t the best choice before a ride.

As I was climbing up the second even bigger hill on that road I was thinking about how I was going to tell everyone on my blog “how dumb am I” by my choice of breakfast.

I also was thinking about the high I get at the top and feel the adrenaline rush going down the other side. This motivates me to keep going even though you feel that it is never going to end.

I definitely get a natural high from the exertion required to cycle up steep hills. I’m sure that my success at achieving my fitness goals is due to the living foods that I eat and the anti-oxidants that I take.

I’m not a fan of synthetic supplements and I don’t take too many as a rule but the ones I take are always natural and only when I am unable to get what I need in my diet.

On that day I had taken 5 capsules of Lifestream Recovery, in my water bottles I had Concentrated mineral drops and Elite electrolytes. I don’t like sports drinks that contain enormous amounts for sugar and no magnesium for muscle recovery. Just pure electrolytes and minerals are the best way to go.

I don’t normally promote products on my blog but I just have to sing the praise of the Lifestream Recovery. It contains Spirulina, Astaxanthin and Blackcurrant. It is a completely natural product and is fantastic for muscle recovery as well as giving you sustained energy.

With this product you can train day after day and not suffer muscle fatigue.

This was a hard ride and took me 1 hour 50 minutes on Friday which is 5 minutes better than the last time. My brother was ten minutes behind me. Once I got my energy levels back I left him far behind.

I am encouraging my brother to get into more green smoothies to help him loose the extra few kilos, when he gets this off I had better look out he will be powering past me.

Basic Green Smoothie (for one)

1 apple

1 kiwifruit

1 banana

200 ml of water

1 ½ cups of fresh well washed spinach (or any other dark leafy green vegetable)

2 pitted dates (optional)

Peel and chop kiwifruit, banana and apple, place with the rest of the ingredients into a blender and blend until smooth. Enjoy.

Canadian Oats

¾ cup whole oats (rolled oats have been heat treated)

chopped raw nuts of your choice

raisins and or dried apricots chopped.

sunflower seeds.

½ cup liquid (water, orange or any fresh fruit juice)

The night before take a 3/4 cup of oats and place in a container.  Add chopped nuts of your choice, raisins and or dried apricots, and sunflower seeds.  Mix together, then add liquid, about half a cup should be enough so that it is moist and the liquid is visible place a lunch plate on top.  Then put it in the fridge overnight, eat with yoghurt and fresh fruit or on its own. Single serve.

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Juicing or Smoothie Which is Better?

Sunday, March 28th, 2010

Juicing raw fresh fruits and vegetables is a great way to up the nutrition in your diet. But what is best, juicing or smoothies?

There are two types of juicing machines, centrifugal and the extractor. The centrifugal juicing machine spins at high speed forcing the pulp and the juice to separate. There is heat produced by the high speed in this method that can cause slight degradation of the nutrients. The higher speed the machine can reach equates to the faster the juice is produced. The theory  is that the less time required the less heat produced.

These machines produce instant juice and easy to clean.

The extractor machine uses a slower grinding method which doesn’t produce any heat so the nutrient value is retained. This method is much, much slower and the food must be cut up quite small to go into the shoot, as well as manually pushed into the machine.

These machines are quite substantially more expensive, slower and require a more extensive clean up job.

Both methods can produce good raw nutrient rich juice, which is great way to get a natural daily vitamin and mineral dose.

A smoothie is produced in a Blender. You just cut up the raw fruits or vegetables and put in the blender, add water and blend until smooth. Depending on the power of the blending machine, the time taken to make this will vary. Heat can also be produced it the blending process is to long.

Blending hard root type vegetables like carrots and beetroot will require a powerful blender like the Vita Mix which rotates at up to  37,000 RPM or a machine of similar power. These machines can be rather costly in New Zealand. But well worth the cost.

The difference between the juicing method and the smoothie method is the fibre.

Juicing  separates juice from fibre, and the fibre is thrown away, we consume the nutrient rich juice.

Smoothie retains the fibre, the whole raw fruit or vegetable are used.

Fibre is a very important part of the vegetable and fruit; it keeps it together. It is a very important part of our diet as well; fibre is what gathers up and sweeps out the waste and toxic substances in the bowel that is not absorbed by the body during the digestion process.

Fibre helps the body to balance the blood sugars and keep the body’s insulin levels stable. It stops the blood sugar spiking and is very helpful in hypoglycemia and diabetes.

Many people with health issues  like hypoglycemia and diabetes are advised not to eat fruits as they are high in sugar, but in fact a green fruit smoothie is actually going to be much better for them than the cookie or any other snack food.

Removing the fibre from your food can lead to the malfunction of the bowel. Natural plant fibre is often both water and fat soluble, and the best fibre for the bowel.

Nutrients can be either water or fat soluble so the fibre plays a role in the absorption of some nutrients as well.

Back to the question of whether it is better to be Juicing or making Smoothies. I think that the smoothie has more merit due to the retention of the fibre. However, both are great sources of nutrition.

I suggest that if you are juicing that you add some of the pulp fibre back into the juice before you drink it. Or you can add psyllium hulls as a substitute fibre.

Basic Green Smoothie (for one)

1 apple

1 kiwifruit

200 ml of water

1 ½ cups of fresh well washed spinach ( or any other dark leafy green vegetable)

2 pitted dates (optional)

Peel and chop kiwifruit and apple, place with the rest of the ingredients into a blender and blend until smooth. Enjoy.

Berry Fruity Smoothie

2 persimmons peeled and chopped

1 cup fresh orange juice or water

1/2 cup of fresh or frozen blueberries or cranberries

1 heaped tbsp Yoghurt (Optional)

Instructions:

Place all ingredients into the Blender and Blend until smooth and serve.

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Why I mainly eat raw food and I don’t like eating meat.

Monday, November 9th, 2009

I have been gradually becoming a vegetarian, I only eat about one piece of meat a month lately although I do still eat some fish. I haven’t missed it and I feel that my body is much better for it.

I’m not in any way suggesting that everyone become vegetarians as it isn’t for everyone and it is a personal choice. But the raw energy of the living food is such a powerful thing that If you eat a variation of plenty of fresh RAW fruits, vegetables, nuts seeds, and sprouts you will have no need for animal protein.

I want to share a theory of mine with you and please don’t get me wrong this is just my opinion. When a sheep or cattle beast is sold to the abatoire it is herded along with it peers into the yard then up the shoot into a truck, then it is transported to the meat works. When I think about how it must be for this creature I imagine that it would be terrified. It can smell the fear of all the other creatures in the truck this intensifies its terror.

When you are terrified your adrenal glands that is situated above you kidney sends out a flood of adrenal hormones (cortico-steroids). These hormones are flowing free in the blood, this blood is pumped around the body and back to the heart in less than a minute. It is flowing to all of your muscles and tissues of the entire body and puts them on red alert, every muscle is tense. This is called the fear or flight  situation also known as the  sabre-tooth tiger syndrome. This happens naturally so that you will have the superhuman strength to run from the tiger.

Once the beast arrives at the abatoire it can smell blood this sends it into a frenzy and more fear, more hormones.

These animals are just like us and are very capable of the same kind of fear as we are and if you just think about it for a few seconds you will get the picture.

At the moment of death these animals have possibly had hours of this state the hormones have flooded every muscle of this beast. The meat that will be a product of this process, will have those fear endorsed hormones right throughout it.

Now for my theory!

We live in a world full of fear, hatred, paranoia and depression all  these emotions fuel the wars and physical, mental, sexual and drug abuse. Eating meat that is full of all that fear and terror has to have some impact on us.

I believe that this is one of the reasons that we have so much of Fear Hatred and Paranoia in our world.

Where eating raw lush leafy green living food that is full of nutrients and live energy gives us the life force of the plant that the fruit, vegetable or seed came from.

This can only give us health and energy, filling us with love and giving emotions, compared to fear and paranoia depression emotions.

If you wish to eat animal products then I would suggest that you only eat Farm killed as this is a totally different picture as well and free range eggs.

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12 months on Raw Food

Monday, June 8th, 2009

I’m celebrating 12 months of eating a raw diet. Last Saturday  the 6th of June I have been eating predominately raw food for a year I can’t believe this has gone so fast. Yes 12 month ago I decided it was time to become outrageously healthy and shed some unwanted excess weight, and I haven’t looked back.

I feel fantastic and I tell myself every day “it is Ok for me to be outrageously healthy” even if some of my friends think I’m nuts.

I have decided to share an old photo of myself because most of you have only known me as I am now.

15 months ago I looked like this

I am still partial to a nice cold beer on a hot day

And this is me today 8 June 09

I think that this is worth celebrating. It wasn’t until I looked for photos of myself a year ago that i realized the difference. I didn’t know that I was that big.

I would get comment when I saw friends that I hadn’t  seen for some time like “Where is your other half” and “you are fading away” that I started to understand there was a big difference.

The rawlistic lifestyle program is not a weight loss program but this just shows the difference that a nutritious diet can make.

So if you are like I was and somewhat over weight and since you can’t be outrageously healthy if you are over weight then keep eating more raw food and you will experience the reshaping of your body as well.

I lost 12 kg in six months and I have been a stable weight  of 58 kg for the last 6 months. I used to be 68 kg.

I hope this has inspired you to become outrageously healthy.

Have a great week.

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Dealing with emotional eating and cravings for bad food

Tuesday, January 27th, 2009

We are all capable of using food to make us feel better when the chips are down, whether it is from hormones raging out of control or from episodes of depression to just having a bad day and needing something to make us feel better about ourselves.

When this happens we also tend to over eat and then you feel the guilt and you don’t feel better at all in fact you feel worse about yourself and this can lead to more emotional eating. It all can become an emotional nightmare. When things start to go bad there seems to be a ripple effect one thing after another and before you know it you’re a mess.

Sometimes we just get a craving for fatty or unhealthy foods, it just happens and why is this. You could be following a raw diet and feeling great and for no apparent reason want to eat the bad stuff. A small indulgence is fine but if it becomes a habit then you have to start all over again trying to break the habit.

If this is a picture that resonates with you then an action plan to avoid this scenario repeating itself will help. If you have a plan that you can put into practice to identify the triggers and avoid them this is a start, then have an action plan to follow should you be triggered and a prevention plan to work towards eliminating the problem altogether.

When you are trying to change your lifestyle it takes time and dedication for the new habits to set in, so having a plan of action with workable steps to follow is always going to make it achievable. Identifying your triggers is the first step, what is it that starts you wanting to eat unhealthy or comfort food.

We are all individuals and have our own triggers. Take action to identify them, make a list, be honest with yourself, identify everyone you are aware of and be prepared to update this list as you become aware of new triggers.

Make a Trigger Sheet

Write a list on the left side of your sheet leaving several lines between each item. On the right of each item on your list write down all the situations that could be a catalyst to this particular trigger, leaving plenty of room for this section to be added to as more come to mind.

Now that we have identified the triggers and scenario’s/situation that could lead to falling in to the trap of emotional eating all we have to do is avoid them. Well this all sounds well and good but life isn’t quite like that.

Although awareness is always good as a warning it isn’t going to stop it happening altogether on its own. This is a good start though, so we now need to have a plan to deal with the situation after you have been triggered.

What to do once you have been triggered

This plan will need to be designed to suit the individual. First you need to find a way that works for you.

It is important to understand that it is connected to the way we feel about our selves and if we don’t like ourselves then we are more prone to being triggered. You need to make a plan for how to deal with the situation, only you can do this, I can only make suggestions but at the end of the day you need to work this out.

Some suggestions for this plan are:

Have a list of the things that makes you feel good about yourself, make this short and concise so you can resite this to yourself easily. This will automatically lift the mood. You need to be grateful for all those things and express your gratitude to yourself.

Being prepared is always helpful, so have you favourite healthy snack on hand, or know how you can get it very quickly.

Menu Plans are always a good way to stick to your program develop one for the times that you know that you are at risk of being triggered. i.e. PMT. Mother in-law is coming to visit.Work out what you are going to eat for that day in advance and get into a habit of sticking to your plan.

Make your life easy not complicated healthy eating is fun, green smoothes are the best way to get rid of cravings for unhealthy foods.

Put yummy things in like blueberries or pineapple to make it a taste sensation, you then have a healthy guilt free comfort food that you can indulge in on the down days.

Clear the pantry of all the unhealthy food and replace with yummy foods that you want to eat, like dried apricots and nuts and seeds that you like to snack on, and things that can be whipped up in a flash to make a yummy healthy treat. Smoothes are always yummy and filling.

Now on the back of the Triggers Sheet make your Once Triggered Plan.

You can design this any way you want, but make it achievable and realistic. It may help to outline individual situations and the steps you will take to in still new habits. Also don’t forget to build in a reward system but it should not be in the form of food, there are many other reward one can give oneself. This needs to be kept on you for reference when needed.

Now old habits die-hard so it is best not to put in your desk or draw and forget about it, because that is to easy. You need to have it handy where you can pull it out and read it several times a day.

Remember this is an action plan it will get no action if you hide it away. The next stage is in the future and we will cover that at a later date when you have developed this strategy and are ready to move to the next step.

Watch this space.

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