Category: diet foods

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Weight Loss – How to Save Money on Diet Foods

Want lose weight but think that you can’t afford expensive weight loss foods? Dieting doesn’t need to have an impact on your wallet. In fact, you can save money, and feel great too. Let’s look at some ways you can get started.

Firstly, here’s an important tip. Low carb dieting is all the rage, and while it may not be right for you, you can take one important point from it: eat more protein, and fewer carbohydrates. Eating protein fills you up, and keeps you satisfied for longer.

To get more protein, forget expensive cuts of meat. Think beans, cheese, and tofu — all are packed with protein. Sardines are high in protein too, and are inexpensive: they’re also full of Omega-3 oils, which are very good for you.

1. Buy in Bulk: Share With a Friend

The secret to saving on food shopping in general, is to buy in bulk. Get together with some friends, and go to outlets where you can buy what you need. Look for low-fat versions of your favorite foods, as well as meat, and fruits and vegetables.

You’ll be able to save on food staples like olive oil too, when you buy in quantity.

2. Eat Vegetables and Fruit in Season

When it comes to fruits and vegetables, eat what’s in season. Go to markets and stock up. Buy sufficient for the week. If you have cooking skills, buy sufficient so that you can cook for your freezer. Fresh food tastes better when it’s in season too.

Make a big pot of vegetable soup on the weekend, and freeze it in single-serve quantities. Soup is ideal for a quick snack, or for lunch.

3. Get a Garden, Even if It’s Only on Your Window Sill

For the ultimate in fresh food, start a garden. You don’t need much space, and you can do it even if you live in an apartment: you can grow herbs and strawberries in pots.

Losing weight is just a matter of eating healthily: buy in bulk, eat in season, and get a garden, and before you know it you’ll look and feel great.

You can lose weight fast – Visit 30 Day Slimmer for more information on fast, healthy diets and easy weight loss. Subscribe to our ezine and receive a free vegetarian cookery book.

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Top Five Foods to Reduce Stomach Bloat on a Weight Loss Diet

Many people start up on a weight loss diet program and are at first seeing good success; the pounds are coming off, they’re looking thinner in the mirror, and their energy levels are staying strong.

But a few weeks later, after making the full switch over to more weight loss friendly foods, they start noticing their stomach appears to be getting larger. What’s going on?

In two words, stomach bloat.

It’s the downside to many diets as they tend to be a bit higher in fiber, which is something the body isn’t used to. Because of this, it causes stomach distention and you’re left with that bloated, puffy feeling in your lower abdomen.

Luckily, if you make an extra effort to eat certain foods, you can help keep this bloat down while on your weight loss diet.

Here are the foods to consider.

Asparagus

Not only is asparagus a great, low-calorie side-dish for your meals, it also works well to stop the bloat. There are certain compounds in the vegetable that promote the growth of certain bacteria in the intestines, which will then serve to increase the movement of food through the colon. Good ways to cook this vegetable include grilling or boiling it.

Papaya

While you might commonly reach for an apple when on a diet, a better fruit to consider is papaya. Loaded with plenty of antioxidants and low in calories as well, it has a digestive enzyme called papain in it, which aids with the digestion and breakdown of protein by the body. Since excess protein does tend to cause gas and bloat, eating a bit more papaya when you boost your protein intake on a diet is a terrific idea.

Pineapple

Many people will be avoiding this fruit as it is typically a bit higher in calories but if you make room to have even half a cup it can help you out (and half a cup only has about 40-50 calories anyway). Pineapple contains a digestive enzyme that helps to promote proper digestion and will help to relive stomach upset and heartburn. In addition to this, the sweet taste of it may just help fend off any other cravings you may be experiencing while on your weight loss diet.

Water With Mint Leaves

Another great way to put a stop to the bloated feeling is eater drink water that contains peppermint or drink some peppermint tea. This will help to relieve any gas you presently have in the stomach, which will make the entire weight loss process more comfortable for not only yourself, but for those around you as well.

Celery

Finally, the last food that you should consider that will help to prevent the bloated feeling you get while on a weight loss diet is celery. Most diets will contain celery already since it is such a low cal option, but for those who don’t, try and add it in. Even a small amount can really help to flush out the system and remove unwanted water weight.

Tired of the endless loop of Yo-Yo diets? Click here to know why your last diet didn’t work.

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Diet For Menopause? 6 Foods That Should Make You Wary

Eating these six foods during menopause could be causing you more trouble than they are worth – avoiding them can help you feel better. If you’re searching for menopause treatments, and you think you’d like to try a diet for menopause, here is a list of foods to avoid.

And before we begin, let us recognize that there is a cosmic injustice here. Our hormone levels are dropping, our heads are aching, and we’re barely living through hot flashes and night sweats. Oh, and I forgot to mention that we’re also gaining weight, and we’ve lost our libido. What calamity could possibly befall menopausal women next?

Well, let’s begin with a heavy sigh because this list of foods to avoid invariably contains some foods that you adore.
You’re only consolation is knowing that avoiding them may help to ease some of those uncomfortable symptoms.

1. Caffeine: You probably guessed this one. Although our morning cup of coffee has helped us get out of bed in the mornings, and our afternoon Diet Coke has helped us get through the day, consuming too much caffeine can lead to migraines and vaginal atrophy (the thinning and swelling of vaginal tissue).

This does not necessarily mean that you have to cut out all caffeine. What it does mean is that you should be aware of how it affects your body and act accordingly.

Try avoiding caffeine altogether for two weeks and see if your symptoms get better. If not, have a cup of coffee.

2. Chocolate: Our beloved chocolate contains sugar and caffeine that can irritate migraine headaches — a common symptom of menopause.

3. Alcohol: While drinking a nice glass of champagne or wine can put you in the mood, help to reduce your stress, and give you some antioxidants, it can also bring on migraine headaches and irritate vaginal atrophy. Monitor the relationship between your drinking and your symptoms to decide if your body is affected, and act accordingly.

4. Simple Sugar: Cookies, candy, and nearly ever other deliciously sugary treat can cause hot flashes and night sweats.

5. Refined Carbohydrates: These are most likely the culprit behind our weight gain as well as a contributing factor in hot flashes and night sweats.

Eating refined carbohydrates, which are carbs that have a high glycemic index level, causes your blood sugar level to immediately soar, which causes your body to create too much insulin, which causes your blood sugar levels to quickly drop. This leaves you feeling icky and hungry, so you eat some more refined carbohydrates — it’s a bad, bad cycle.

6. Spicy Foods: Spicy foods can induce night sweats. Like the other foods listed above, monitor this relationship for your body.

Bonus: How can I make a list of things to avoid during menopause and not include the mother of all symptom irritators, stress. Although this is not really a part of a diet for menopause, it’s so important that I just had to fit it in here!

Stress has a hand in nearly every negative health experience that you’ve had not only in menopause, but in every stage of your life.

Try not to stress that you are getting too much stress (another bad, bad cycle). Reflect on your life. Try to shift your responsibilities so that you are able to do more of what you like and less of what you don’t like.

That is, of course, just as long as the “more of what you like” does not consist of eating chocolates, alcohol, spicy foods, and caffeine.

Elizabeth A. O’Brien invites you to visit her website http://www.estrogensource.com to learn more about naturally balancing your menopausal hormones.

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How to Work Foods That Lower Blood Pressure Into Your Diet

Why take expensive prescription drugs when there are plenty of foods that lower blood pressure that you can add directly to your diet with no added expense or dangerous side effects. Another great thing about them is that they will be a good source of nutrition, vitamins, and minerals, as they tend to be foods that are particularly healthy to consume, even if you don’t need to use them to lower blood pressure. They are also extremely easy to add to your diet.

Garlic

Garlic is one of the most powerful foods that lower blood pressure on this list, and also easily the most versatile. Garlic acts like a natural blood thinner, and can also be useful in preventing blood clots. Garlic can be added to just about any savory recipe for a bit of added zing, or it can be roasted to the point where it becomes sweet and spreadable.

Spinach

Spinach is a great source of magnesium and folate, two nutrients that are known to be beneficial in combating hypertension. Spinach is amazingly easy to add into the diet. Raw spinach or baby spinach can be eaten simply as a salad, or it can be sauteed with a little garlic for a double punch for better health. Cooked spinach can be added to any number of healthy recipes, from quesadillas to lasagna.

Fish

When searching for foods that lower blood pressure, fats cannot be ignored. The body needs fats in order to process certain nutrients, and a certain amount of fat is required for survival. Fresh fish is best to get the maximum benefit of the omega 3 fatty acids they contain. Sushi and sashimi are great sources, but tuna salad made with low sodium pickles and a little olive oil is also simple and much more accessible.

Tomatoes

Tomatoes are full of calcium, potassium, vitamins, and antioxidants. These fruits are wonderfully healthy, very nutritious, and delicious. They can be sliced and added to sandwiches, wraps, and salads. Cherry and grape tomatoes can simply be eaten whole as a snack or added to other dishes. Tomato juice can be an easy way to add a bit of nutrition to your breakfast. The possibilities are endless.

These are not the only foods that lower blood pressure out there, but they are a good place to start when examining your dietary choices and working out all the little things you can do in your life to control your hypertension and improve your health in general.

I spent quite a bit of time and money on prescription hypertension treatments before I finally discovered a natural alternative that not only saved me money by allowing me to discontinue those drugs, but also helped me greatly improve my health in general, ending the risk of premature death that I was running. If you are really serious about curing your high blood pressure forever like I did, do yourself a favor and visit HighBloodPressureCures.info to find out how.

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Hypertension Sufferer’s Diet – What Are the Processed Foods to Avoid

Unknown to many, unprocessed, or natural foods already contain sodium chloride sufficient enough for our body’s needs, hence, obtaining salt through natural food is not a problem. It is with the intake of processed foods that our body gets to encounter sodium chloride content that causes high blood pressure problems.

Returning to natural diets is one of the effective solutions in treating or preventing high blood pressure attacks. Accordingly, natural foods would mean anything derived from natural food sources grown from the soil, from trees, or derived from animals without need to add sauces or coatings.

In purchasing food supplies from supermarkets, reading the labels of low-sodium foods can help us determine the processed foods to avoid. An example would be a low-sodium salad dressing that contains 2 milligrams (mg) of sodium and 32 mg of potassium.

If this were to be analyzed further regarding the balance of sodium to potassium content, or in determining its K-factor, the resulting proportion would be 1 mg of salt for every 16 mg of potassium. The prescribed ideal K-factor ratio is 1 mg salt for every 3 mg potassium.

Experts suggest that rather than buy foods with potassium chloride, check the labels for other substitutes like potassium gluconate and potassium bitartrate. Better yet, you can opt for natural or unprocessed foods and use salt substitutes like seasonings from spices and herbs.

Here are some of the processed foods to avoid and why they should be avoided:

1. Cooked cereals with added salt content.

2. Ready-to-eat cereals may have some moderation in sodium but are low in potassium content, hence, the addition of milk, increases the sodium level resulting to further disparity between their ratio. Occasionally, this type of food can be a part of a hypertension sufferer’s diet but other low sodium, high potassium foods should be eaten in order to compensate.

3. Juice drinks that have minimal content as far real juice is concerned. Check the label for artificial flavors and colors as well as its sugary ingredients.

4. Processed meats use high proportions of salt in their preparation. Specifically, avoid processed beef foods like corned beef, beef burgundy, breakfast strips, frozen meatloaf, and frozen or canned sliced beef, Salisbury steak and chipped beef.

Processed pork to avoid includes cured bacon and ham, bacon bits, ham loaf, bacon bits, sweet and sour pork, ham steaks and sausages. Special preparations like frozen veal parmigiana should also be avoided. You should also consider excluding spreads, luncheon meats, franks, bologna, corned beef loaf, barbecue loaf, salami, mortadella, sandwich spreads, Vienna sausage and turkey ham.

5. Seafood are too high in sodium content although some may be eaten occasionally and with caution. Processed seafood however are best avoided since their preparation uses additional salt for processing.

Examples of these processed seafood are deviled crab, crab cakes, crab imperial, canned crab, fish fillets, fillet almondine, fish sticks, canned fish, lobster paste, Newburg lobster, oysters, mussels, clams, sardines and shrimps whether breaded or French fried.

6. Canned soups are definitely processed foods to avoid since most of them contain more than one gram of sodium chloride and less than the desirable level of potassium content. Do not be misled by such information as “no salt content” or “homemade”; such information does not relieve them of their high level of sodium ingredient.

7. Food flavorings with salt. Contain mostly salt blended with other ingredients.

As part of dietary measures that can prevent high blood pressure, it is recommended that the hypertension sufferer’s diet should take into consideration these processed foods to avoid.

Alvin Hopkinson is a leading health researcher in the area of natural remedies and high blood pressure treatment. Discover how you can get rid of your high blood pressure for good using proven and effective home remedies, all without using harmful medications or drugs. Visit his site now at http://www.minusbloodpressure.com

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Infertility Diet – Which Foods to Avoid and Which Will Help You Get Pregnant

Having a well balanced and nutritional meal plan has a great effect on not just your ability to conceive but also your overall health. With infertility, diet can play a major role, which is why it’s important to understand what foods to avoid, and where you should be looking for essential nutrients.

Zinc:
Zinc is a very good nutrient to look at for both men and women. In men, it helps sperm production and raises a man’s sperm count. In women, it’s an essential nutrient needed for egg production during ovulation.

Foods That Contain A Lot Of Zinc:
Oysters, shellfish, wheat bran, pine nuts, pecan nuts, eggs, cashew nuts, fish, and liver.

Iron:
Low iron levels in women can lower a woman’s chances of producing a healthy egg. In addition, while pregnant, iron is very important to have as it creates hemoglobin which is a protein in your red blood cells that carries oxygen and other nutrients to your organs and tissues.

Foods That Contain A Lot Of Iron:
Bread (Both White and Whole Wheat), green peas, broccoli, almonds, ham, peaches, and tomato juice.

Vitamin E:
Studies have shown that vitamin E can increase fertility among men and women. It’s believed that the antioxidant effect of this vitamin makes sperm more fertile.

Foods That Contain A Lot Of Vitamin E:
Avacados, eggs, peanuts, sweet potatoes, apples and corn oil.

Foods To Avoid:
While having a good nutrition plays an important factor to conceiving and infertility, there are also foods that are bad and will hinder your progress.

Caffeine and Alcohol:
This constricts blood vessels which can stop the right amount of blood from reaching the uterus. This can make egg implantation difficult.

Meat:
It’s recommended that couples avoid having too much meat, as it can raise ammonia levels in the body. This can also make it difficult for a fertilized egg to attach to the uterus.

When treating infertility, diet can very much affect how hard it is to conceive. But getting pregnant doesn’t have to be difficult!

Are you have problems conceiving? Then it’s time to take a look at some all natural approaches like the ones found at http://www.get-pregnant-fast.info that will help you to overcome infertility issues and get pregnant quickly using completely safe, and holistic methods.

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Candidiasis Diet – Foods to Avoid and Include

It is a well-known fact that candidiasis diet is not the easiest of diets to follow. But on the other hand, it needs to be said that the health benefits and improvement in general health and wellbeing that people suffering from candidiasis can obtain from this diet are really significant. If you follow this diet and the other recommendations as outlined in the 5-step plan you will reap the benefits – you can be assured of that.

Always remember to cure candidiasis or yeast overgrowth as it is also known, you will have to follow a holistic approach as outlined in the 5-step plan. You will not be able to cure candidiasis with diet alone. I will provide you with a link to the plan at the bottom of this article.

Let us have a look at the diet component of this process.

When it comes to food it is very important to understand that candidiasis is caused by yeast like bacteria called Candida albicans and that this yeast thrives on certain foods, which it uses as food and fuel to grow and multiply. So it must be obvious then if you can deprive it of its food it will stop growing.

3 Groups of Foods to Avoid

Sugar in all its forms and in this case you must remember that sugar is not just the normal sugar in food but also the sugar in fruit such as dried fruit and fresh fruit. So don’t have more than one fresh fruit a day. 
Yeast this includes baker’s yeast as you will find in bread, pastries etc, but also don’t forget that Vegemite, Promite, Marmite and those types of spreads all have yeast  in the. It is best to always read the labels very carefully.
Refined Carbohydrates such as baked breads, pastas, cookies, potatoes, etc. : These foods turn very quickly into sugar.

4 Groups Foods to Include in Your Diet

Wholefoods which include fish, brown rice, one fruit a day and veggies and legumes, (especially mung beans) and other whole grains. All sprouts are very helpful here. Green leafy vegetables such as parsley, watercress, cabbage, wheatgrass, etc will all promote a healthy intestinal flora. 
Add as much garlic to your food as you (and your family) can tolerate. It reduces infection and fights bacteria
Add flaxseed oil and olive oil to your diet it protects your cells from damage
Add seaweeds the iodine will help to fight the yeasts

To read more and get a better and full understanding of the candidiasis diet and the 5-step treatment plan to cure candidiasis please visit the links provided.

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The Atkins Diet Plan – Induction Phase, Foods to Eat

The first phase of the Atkins Diet Plan, the Induction Phase, is undoubtedly the hardest for most people to follow. In this phase you really cut the carbs. The objective is transforming the body’s energy source from burning carbs to burning fat. Simply put, you are allowed 20 grams of net carbs per day. Net carbs are the total carbohydrate intake minus the carbs contained in fiber, sugar alcohol, and glycerine. Because those carbs aren’t digested they don’t count. If your vegetable serving contains 5 grams of carbs but 2 of those grams come from fiber, then only 3 grams of carbs actually count.

So what can you eat during this stage of the Atkins Diet Plan? First come the proteins. Most protein food is in. For example, this means you can load up on eggs, meat, and seafood. But there are exceptions. You can’t eat breaded meats such as veal schnitzel or meat loaf. I don’t usually think of bacon and eggs as a diet food, but this combination is sort of OK. You must hold the toast and jelly, perhaps the coffee, the orange juice, and the hash browns (the onions are OK but not the potatoes). Can we still call such a breakfast bacon and eggs?

Some vegetables are OK; others are not. Be careful to count your vegetable carbohydrates as most of your carbs come from the veggies. Here is a list of permitted vegetables in approximate order of carbohydrate contents, starting with the lowest: Bean or alfalfa sprouts, greens such as lettuce, spinach, radicchio, and endives, herbs, celery, radishes, cabbage (or sauerkraut), mushrooms, avocado, cucumbers, asparagus, green and wax beans, broccoli, cauliflower, green, red, and jalapeno peppers, summer squash (including zucchini), green onions, leeks, brussels sprouts, snow peas, tomatoes, eggplant, artichoke hearts, onions, okra, spaghetti squash, carrots, turnips, water chestnuts, and pumpkins.

Most cheeses have less than a gram of carbohydrate per ounce, but make sure to check the labels. You are allowed 3 to 4 ounces of low-carb cheese but no cottage cheese or other fresh cheese except for cream cheese.

The Atkins Diet is low-carb. Don’t try to make it low-fat as well. Make sure to eat lots of cold-water fish such as salmon, sardines, herring, and mackerel in part because of their Omega-3 fatty acids. You may go for eggs that also contain high amounts of Omega-3 fatty acids. Virgin and extra-virgin olive oil are fine. Stir-fry those permitted vegetables in canola, grapeseed, or peanut oil, especially if they are cold-pressed. High-oleic sunflower and safflower oils are OK; otherwise avoid these oils. Use full-fat mayonnaise, preferably based on the oils. Butter is OK as is trans-fat free margarine. You may even have two or three tablespoons of heavy cream or an ounce of sour cream per day. For a real treat have a dozen olives. You may also use Metamucil or flax seed meal to increase your fiber intake.

Drink lots of water. The recommended amount is 8 8-ounce glasses a day. You may drink soda water or carbonated water provided that it doesn’t include any sugar. Diet sodas with sucralose (Splenda) are OK. No sugar means no fruit juices. Herbal teas are in as are decaffeinated coffee or tea. Can you drink real coffee or other caffeine beverages? That depends on you; it may slow your weight loss.

Levi Reiss has authored or co-authored ten books on computers and the Internet, but to be honest, he would rather just drink fine Italian, French, or other wine, accompanied by the right foods and spend time with his wife and family. He teaches classes in computers at an Ontario French-language community college. Visit his site devoted to the weight-management, nutritional, and health aspects of wine at http://www.wineinyourdiet.com. Check out his global wine website at http://www.theworldwidewine.com with his new weekly column reviewing wines.

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Diet Plan to Lower HBP – Foods That Help Lower High Blood Pressure

All things must be done in moderation. This must be the best rule when you want to maintain and live a healthy life. Sometimes due to the good taste that that many sumptuous foods are offering to us, we have a propensity to forget that the effect of those unhealthy ingredients contained in those mouth-watering foods can get back to us in an unexpected manner bringing in unfriendly maladies that include high blood pressure.

Be Friendly to Yourself, Eat a Healthy Diet 

Ignoring and getting rid of those unhealthy foods from your daily eating routines did not mean depriving yourself of those “delicious” foods that you really love. When you understand what those unhealthy ingredients could bring to your body, you will really reward yourself by doing so. For one to turn his back on the foods he loved most is like being sliced through the heart with the slowest manner possible so that he could really feel the pain. Turning your back on your favorite foods to save yourself from a life-threatening disease is not sacrifice at all. It is just a sort of putting your self one step away from real danger.

What is a Healthy Diet 

Staying healthy is the key to living a favorable and happy life. Being healthy is to be free from the bondage of sickness and other forms of life-threatening diseases and the key to this is through a healthy diet. Healthy diet coupled with other health-promoting cardio-vascular exercises can have a tremendous positive effect on our body, go and get some.

Aside from trimming down your low density or “bad cholesterol” if it has already passed beyond the healthy limit, cutting down of sodium or salt consumption, accumulating vitamin D, potassium, calcium and magnesium in your daily diet, here are some healthy suggestions: 

Skim Milk. This is a number one source of vitamin D as well as calcium. These two essential nutrients have been proven to have a very significant effect in lowering blood pressures.
Sunflower seeds (unsalted), beans (kidney, black and navy, pinto, white) as well as spinach are all excellent sources of magnesium. Magnesium is a superb suppressant of high blood pressure. Make eating this helpful seeds as a habit.
Dark chocolate. This is great a reward for those who love this sweet stuff! Having half ounce of this tasty confection every day is not as bad as not having it at all. It is equivalent to 30 calories and this amount of calorie is linked to the lowering an abnormal blood pressure without having the danger of gaining weight.

By introducing these elements on your diet everyday, you are not only enjoying some of the foods that you like but you are also promoting a healthy body. High blood pressure can be life-threatening but you can virtually avoid it by living a healthy life.

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Diet For Severe Gerd – What Are Good Foods To Eat With Acid Reflux

A proper diet for severe gerd should obviously be designed to reduce the amount of acid built up in our stomachs. The basic definition of gerd is that acid rises up from your stomach into the oesophagus. Unlike the stomach your oesophagus does not have an appropriate lining to be able to withstand these powerful acids and thus, sometimes excruciating pain and discomfort. The issue is that it is not simply a case of eating the correct foods. It is about combining the correct types of foods with the correct type of eating.

 

Apart from the awful pain caused by gerd is the frustration of feeling like you can’t eat anything that you like and that you have to stick to bland and boring food unless you are prepared to sit up all night taking Tums, Pepto-Bismol, Zantac, Alka-Seltzer, Pepcid or any of the over the counter ant acids while grimacing and holding your chest. These medications are a quick fix and do not get to the root of the problem.

 

The truth is that it is actually quite simple to find a diet for severe gerd. What I’ve found is that you can pretty much eat all of your favourite foods as long as you do not combine the wrong ones in the same meal. There are three types of foods as far as our digestive system goes. Foods which go through our system without needing any digestive juices. Foods which require stomach acids to digest and foods that require alkaline digestive enzymes to process them properly.

 

When you combine foods that require both alkaline and acid digestive processes, what happens is that the different digestive juices neutralise each other and we do not digest the food properly. Sometimes it can take hours and hours and this is where problems start to occur.

 

Your correct diet for severe gerd can include most of your favourite foods. The secret to curing diverticulitis is not simply about eating the right foods but about eating them in the right combinations that allow your body to digest the food properly and reduce the amount of acid building up. Find out more. Get Great Taste No Pain NOW at http://www.achievebetterhealth.info and do what it tells you to do. You can do it. It is simple.

Eoin McDonnell is an engineer who has suffered from severe digestive problems for the past 10 years. After several colonoscopies, 2 barium enemas, 3 specialist consultants, reflexology, acupuncture allergy tests and lots of frustration he has built up quite a knowledge of the disease and wants to impart that information to hopefully help somebody else with the complaint.