Dad's Health Tip of the Week - Heart Healthy Supplements

We have all heard about ways to keep your heart healthy by exercise and diet. Basically mixing aerobic with weight training 3 times per week and eating a balanced diet will do it for most people. 

The confusion comes in when we talk about supplements. There are thousands of articles out there that recommend different supplements and if you listen to every recommendation you will have a cabinet filled with nothing but supplements. Here is what I recommend taking in conjunction with a proper diet and exercise. 

#1. Get on a good quality multi vitamin that is potent in B vitamins and contains Resveratrol and plant based minerals. Resveratrol has been shown to be very beneficial to the heart and plant based minerals are more easily absorbed then the hard minerals found in most vitamin supplements.

#2. Take fish oil. Fish oil has many benefits including elevating your HDL (good cholesterol). 

#3. Take a good natural cholesterol formula. I highly recommend a product called Heart Savior. This product has a combination of ingredients that has shown to reduce LDL and raise HDL. I personally know people who have had great results taking this product and a local doctor sends his patients into my store to buy it. These patients are the ones that will not take cholesterol medications due to the side effects.

As with all supplements I don’t recommend taking them every day. I am a strong believer in not letting your body get used to the same thing day in and day out. What I recommend is taking them every other day or third day and then 2 days in a row then skip a day…..you get the idea - just mix it up. If you have a day where your diet is off, take them that day.  Alternatively, skip the supplements if you followed your diet that day.

Here are the brands and supplements I recommend:

#1. Incredible Life liquid multi vitamin

#2. Krill oil by Now

#3. Heart Savior

All these products can be purchased at www.physicaladdictions.com 

Fiber Series: Soluble Fiber

We started this series because everyone knows we all need to eat more fiber, but we wanted to understand why it is so good for you and what the difference is between the fibers we see on food labels. This is what we found out about soluble fiber...

Soluble fiber can not be digested by the body.  Instead, soluble fibers dissolve in water in your stomach, forming a gel that passes through your body virtually intact. 
(This gel that is formed is the best medicine for the prevention and relief of diarrhea and constipation.)

Some health benefits:
Soluable fiber slows down the digestion process and delays the emptying of your stomach making you feel fuller, longer.  This delay effects blood sugar levels, having a beneficial effect on insulin sensitivity, which may help control diabetes. Soluble fibers can also help lower your bad cholesterol by interfering with the absorption of dietary cholesterol.

Sources of soluble fiber: oat cereal, oatmeal, apples, oranges, pears, oat bran, strawberries, nuts, lentils, flaxseeds, beans, dried peas, blueberries, psyllium husk, cucumbers, celery, and carrots.

Happy Thanksgiving!

We hope everyone had a safe and happy Thanksgiving! 

Here are some pictures of the great food my mom made for our family...

Hummus with Roasted Red Peppers

If you are a snacker, here's an easy recipe to follow to make home-made hummus.  Enjoy with raw vegetables and/or whole wheat pita chips or crackers. 

Hummus a healthy alternative to late night snacks and also great to bring to work to hold you over between lunch and dinner.  This weekend, we went to Boston and took the train.  We brought our home-made hummus with us for the train ride to make sure we had something healthy to eat and to save some money!

 

How roast red peppers:

All you need is one red pepper for the hummus.

1. Place red peppers directly on stove burner over a medium flame.
2. Once the side of the pepper is charred, continue to turn the pepper until all sides are charred. 
3. The pepper will be hot so be careful - use tongs. 
4. Place the charred pepper in a metal bowl and cover with plastic wrap. 
5. Leave covered for approximately 20 minutes.
6. Remove the pepper from the bowl and the skin should slide right off of the pepper. 
7. Cut as desired and remove seeds. 

      

                  

Hummus

Ingredients

1 Roasted red pepper

1 15 oz can garbanzo beans, drained

1/3 cup tahini
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 clove of garlic, chopped
salt and pepper, to taste

Directions
Place all ingredients in a food processor and mix until well blended. 

Thank you Nancy for sharing!

Tips on How to Change your Eating Habits

It has only been about two years now since Tom and I have completely changed eating habits.  I used to eat cereal and doritos for dinner regularly.  We're not exactly sure what made us want to make the change - but we are so happy we did. 

Everyday we learn something new, and writing this blog pushes us to continually try out new foods and recipes - we love it! 


We wanted to share with you some of things that helped us successfully change our eating habits - we hope these tips help you out..

1.  Start Slow
You can't change your lifestyle overnight. 

In the beginning, commit to eating two or three healthy meals a week.  Do small trips to the grocery store and only buy what you need for the meal you are making.  Don't make it overwhelming either - pick some easy recipes that do not take much time to prepare (the last thing you want to do is discourage yourself and think that this is something you can't do).  Have the leftovers for lunch. 

Then, begin to do the same with breakfast and lunch.  You will start to notice the days you are eating healthy you feel so much better than the days you go out for lunch and / or order take out for dinner.  It will motivate you to eat healthier more often. 

Here are a couple super-easy recipes we suggest you start out with:
Baked Chicken & Vegetables
Salmon & Baked Vegetables
Yam Fries
Quinoa

For more recipe ideas, be sure to read through our blog archieve - located on the right side of our blog - for a listing of all recipes we have posted.  Or just click the "Recipe" label and all our previous posts will recipes will come up. 

2.  Meal Plan
We have found this to be so helpful.  Starting your week off with a plan and all the food you'll need already in the house will most certainly set you up for success. 

Read our post about meal planning and send us an email at melicipes@gmail.com if you would like our meal planning file. 

3. Incorporate Vegetables into your Diet

If your not already in love with vegetables, it may take some time to get used to their taste and/or consistency. But if you keep trying new veggies and new ways of cooking them, you will start to love their taste as well as how good they make you feel.

We encourage you during the spring, summer, and fall to go to Farmer's Markets and Co-ops and buy locally grown vegetables.  In the winter time, most Farmer's Markets shut down and you may be forced to go to the grocery store.  We buy our vegetables once a week and we make sure we eat everything we've bought by the end of the week. 

4. Prepare Foods on the Weekends (or your "free" day of the week)
Because of our busy work schedules during the week, we try our best to prepare as much as we can for the week on the weekends.  Our meal plan is completed on Fridays, and we go grocery shopping on Saturday or Sundays.  (I do not like food shopping, at all, so sometimes we order through http://www.peapod.com/ and our groceries are delivered! So convienent!) Sunday is usually reserved for food preparation. 

For example, Tom is great at making sure we are preparing our lunch for the coming week on Sundays.  He will always make a kale salad and then a "main course" for lunch.  Sometimes he makes chicken soup, other times chicken, quinoa and vegetables.  All we have to do in the morning before work is put a bit in a zip-loc container and heat it up at lunch time for a healthy and cost-effective lunch. 

We also will cut up the vegetables so all we have to do at dinner time is take out two portion sizes and cook according to the recipe we are following.  Preparing your vegetables ahead of time works any way you want to cook them - sauteeing, baking, roasting - it just cuts down the time in preparing your dinner. 

5. Read our Blog!
Our blog posts provide information we've learned over the past two years on different types of food / ingredients you may never heard of, recipes, and interesting food facts and nutrition information. 
 
We hope that once you are on the right path to changing your eating habits, our blog will inspire you to continue to try new recipes and maintain a healthy way of life for you and your families. 
 
 
Do you have any tips on changing your eating habits and lifestyle?

Honey and Ginger Chicken

If you love chicken and are looking for something new, this is a great recipe to try out with your family.  It's easy to make and the marinade is very tasty! For more flavorful chicken, be sure to prepare the sauce a day in advance and marinate overnight. 

Add roasted vegetables and yam fries as side dishes for a well-balanced, healthy, and completely homemade meal!








Ingredients
1 whole chicken (~3 lbs), quartered (or you can use bone-in chicken breasts or legs and thighs)

Marinade

1 cup of honey (we recommend local, organic honey)

3/4 cup soy sauce (look for naturally fermented soy sauces)

1/2 cup minced ginger
10 cloves of minced garlic

          

Directions

1. In a medium-sized saucepan, cook the honey, soy sauce, ginger and garlic over low heat until the honey has melted. 
2. Let marinade cool.
3. Using a gallon sized zip-loc bag, pour in cooled marinade and add chicken parts. 
4. Make sure chicken is completed covered by marinade and put in the refrigerator over night. 
5. The next day, preheat oven to 350 degrees.
6. Place chicken in baking pan, pour marinade over chicken and cover with foil.
7. Bake for ~30 minutes, remove foil and turn each piece of chicken. 
8. Raise oven temperature to 375 degrees and continue to bake for another 30 minutes or when chicken reaches a temperature of at least 165 degrees. 

Dad's Health Tip of the Week: Happy Healthy Thanksgiving

I would like to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving and give you a few tips on how to survive the onslaught of food you are about to consume.
First let’s start out the morning with a big glass of water. Have your normal cup of coffee or favorite beverage to help you wake up. For breakfast try to eat some high fiber foods such as whole grain cereal and add some fiber to it such as psylium. With breakfast you should take an enzyme supplement to help with digestion right off the bat.

Wait 2 hours and depending on what time it is choose your second small meal. This meal should include your protein such as eggs if it’s still breakfast time or maybe a protein smoothie if it’s closer to lunch.

Remember to drink a glass of water between meals as this helps to control appetite.

When it’s time for dinner make sure you take your enzyme tablet right before you eat. You should try to eat a small portion of everything you like. If you feel full after one plate just stop and let that digest for at least one hour before you go back for seconds.

Try not to drink too much of anything while eating as this will dilute the acids in your stomach and make it harder to digest your food.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!