Wonderful Watercress

This is a superstar for sure! Watercress is an aquatic, leafy vegetable that is high in vitamins A, K, C, calcium, iron and zinc, which helps your body heal and also is key in keeping your skin, hair and nails healthy. Besides healing, zinc also stimulates protein and collagen so this is definitely a beautifying green!

Watercress also contains isothiocyanates which are compounds that boost your body’s natural detoxifying capabilities.

Also, very exciting, is a recent study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. The study found that eating 85 grams (about the amount that would fill a cereal bowl) of watercress a day significantly reduced cancer damage to white blood cells and increased the body's levels of cancer-fighting antioxidants.

The study showed among those with cancer, damage to their white blood cells decreased by 22.9%. Researchers are beginning to understanding the potential health benefits of this leafy green. Studies indicate it may interfere with a pathway that has already been tightly linked to cancer development.

Tests involving breast cancer survivors showed that the function of the protein HIF, which causes new blood vessels to grow providing the cancer with oxygen and nutrition, was affected and "turned off" in the blood cells of the women who had eaten the watercress. The results of this research provide new insight and hope that simply eating watercress regularly may protect against and perhaps help treat cancer.

That is not to say that simply eating watercress daily will cure cancer – that’s not the case. However, it is a great food to include in your meal plans that can possibly help prevent its development.

Take a Step:

I actually throw some in the blender when I have it in the house and make it part of my protein smoothie. You can also make an interesting and tasty pesto by combining it with olive oil, garlic, parmesan cheese and pine nuts or walnuts! You can also just include it in your salad greens.

Until next week I wish you vibrant health!

Ann

Ugli Fruit and Vinegar

I realize this is one you may be totally unfamiliar with, but it pays to be adventurous and try new foods!

Ugli Fruit

You’ve probably seen this one in your supermarket but being unfamiliar with it, you may be avoiding it. I want to encourage you to step out of your comfort zone and give this one a try – you won’t be sorry!

It gets its name from its odd, misshapen appearance. It looks, well, ugly! But looks can definitely be deceiving and here’s a time when you should not judge a book by it’s cover! It has an extremely sweet, citrus flavor, can be peeled very easily and is seedless. It’s believed to be a combination of the best features of grapefruit, Seville oranges and tangerines. Like other citrus fruits it’s low in calories, high in vitamin C, as well as flavonoids, folic acid and fiber. Even though it is related to the grapefruit, it doesn’t contain furanocoumarins, which are the components in grapefruit that can interfere with certain drugs. It has been proven to improve, heal and help promote gastrointestinal health and maintain bowel integrity.

Vinegar

Vinegar is a natural product that’s been around for thousands of years and has been used as a health tonic by many. In fact, Hippocrates is said to have used apple cider vinegar (my favorite!) as an antibiotic. Here are some of the more interesting health benefits of vinegar in general:

Vinegar helps the body absorb calcium. Salad greens are full of calcium.
It appears to increase insulin sensitivity in those who are insulin resistant.
Is an effective, natural produce cleaner.

I prefer cold pressed, raw, organic apple cider vinegar and this is why:

It is a completely natural product, resulting from the fermentation of apple juice to hard apple cider followed by a second fermentation to apple cider vinegar. It retains all the nutritional goodness of the apples from which it was made plus it is fortified with the extra acids and enzymes produced during the two fermentation steps.

Apple cider vinegar is rich in vitamins C, E, A, P, B1, B2 and B6 as well as minerals like manganese, iron, calcium, sodium, magnesium, sulfur, copper, phosphorus, silicon, chlorine and fluorine. Studies have shown it helps reduce blood sugar, is extremely alkalizing and those two things make it an excellent food to include if you are trying to lose weight.

Take a Step:

While Ugli fruit is not suitable for cooking, it makes it an excellent snack or add-on to salads. Pick fruits which are heavy with no drying at the ends and there should be a little give if you apply a little pressure. Don’t worry about minor dents and marks – that’s just how they look! They can be kept at room temperature for approximately 4-5 days, or in the fridge for as long as 2 weeks.

To help remove potentially harmful residues on your produce you can mix a solution of water and vinegar in a ratio of 1 to 9, for example, mix one cup of white vinegar in nine cups of water. Briefly soak your produce in the vinegar solution, then swish it around and finally, rinse it thoroughly. One caution – don’t soak very delicate fruits like berries – they can soak up too much vinegar.

Until next month – I wish you vibrant health!

Ann

Idaho Potatoes and Iceberg Lettuce! Really?

Foods made with white flour like breads and pasta, white rice and sugar are on the healthy eating “hit list” and for good reason. Those foods convert quickly to sugar in your body and spike insulin levels. However, ALL white foods are not nutritional villains. While brightly colored vegetables are loaded with nutrients and antioxidants and I recommend you focus your meals on them, you don’t have to ban Idaho potatoes from your diet completely.

While I recommend practicing moderation with all starchy carbs – even the healthiest whole grains – moderation doesn’t mean total elimination. The pride of Idaho actually has much to boast about. Potatoes are filling, moderate in calories, nutrient-dense and non-fattening, and loaded with vitamins, minerals, flavanoids and fiber! They actually contain both soluble and insoluble fiber, which keep you regular, lower cholesterol and keep you full longer by slowing down digestion.

They contain just about every nutrient except vitamin A (go to sweet potatoes for that!), provide almost 20% of your daily requirement of vitamin B6 which is critical for heart health and like all vegetables, they’re loaded with potassium, which helps regulate blood pressure.

What makes the humble potato “bad” is how it is prepared and the toppings used on it. That’s what morphs a healthy vegetable into a diet disaster. One large (3-4”) baked potato with the skin on only has 278 calories, 1 gram of fat, no cholesterol, 6grams of fiber and 6 grams of protein, as well as a whopping 1,627 milligrams of potassium.

Iceberg Lettuce
The other nutritional “pariah” I want to address is iceberg lettuce. While I agree, other lettuces like romaine and leafy greens like spinach, kale and chard have more nutritional value and for the most part are better choices. However, iceberg lettuce is still a green, leafy vegetable with zero fat, zero cholesterol, and only 15 calories per serving. It actually contains 6% of our daily vitamin C requirement, 2% each of iron and calcium, 4% of vitamin A, and one gram of protein per serving. It’s also high in fiber and has traces of omega fatty acids. All in all, not exactly a total nutritional slouch.

The other thing it has is a juicy crispness other leafy greens don’t have and that many people really enjoy.

Take a Step: Don’t feel you have to shun Idaho potatoes totally! As long as you limit the amount of carbohydrates in your daily meals, you can enjoy a delicious baked potato. And instead of slathering on butter and sour cream – why not try a couple of tablespoons of salsa (my favorite topping) or a tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil (a much healthier fat) and some healthy seasoning like Mrs. Dash Lemon Pepper or even a chili lime seasoning? Instead of sour cream - try lowfat, plain Greek yogurt.

Instead of totally avoiding iceberg lettuce why not mix your greens to get the best of all? A salad of half iceberg and half romaine or leaf lettuce gives you the juicy crispness without sacrificing the high nutrition of the darker greens! That's what I call the best of both worlds!

Until next time I wish you vibrant health! Ann

My Top 10 Supplement Tips

Over the past few weeks I have talked about vitamins, minerals and the importance of using whole food, natural supplements to boost your nutrition and improve your overall health. This week I would like to share just a few “tips” for getting the most benefit from those supplements.

So here are my top 10:

1. Take your vitamins with your meals to increase your body’s ability to fully digest and absorb them.

2. Fat soluble vitamins (A, E, D, K) should be taken with the meal containing the most (healthy!) fat.

3. Vitamin D is best absorbed when taken with protein (a protein meal or in a protein shake).

4. Divide calcium into 500 mg. doses with your meals as your body cannot process more than that at one time. If you take a food based calcium you only need about 100 mg.

5. Always take a B-complex that contains all the B vitamins, rather than one or two. Taking B-complex with a mineral supplement that contains magnesium will enhance the function of both.

6. Do not take fiber supplements or fiber rich meal with oil supplements (fish oil, etc.) or minerals. Take those supplements separately from fiber.

7. If you take an iron supplement, it’s best assimilated when taken with vitamin C and apart from vitamin E. *Very few people need to supplement with iron and unless your doctor says you do, I would not. People, and particularly men, over 40 should never take iron as it is stored in vital organs and can cause serious harm.

8. Calcium must be balanced with magnesium and needs vitamin D to be absorbed.

9. When you take protease, the enzyme that digests protein, with your protein meal, it will help you digest your food. If you take it on an empty stomach, between meals, it will scavenge and digest proteins (bacteria, fungi) in the blood!

10. Taking your minerals at night will help mineralize your bones more effectively.

Take a Step:

Walking into a health food store and looking at the shelves of supplements can be overwhelming and cause you to throw up your hands and say, “Forget it!”

Don’t do that – it doesn’t have to be complicated or expensive. Choosing some high quality foundational supplements is much better than buying armloads of inferior ones.
Concentrate on a quality green food to cover vitamins and minerals, fish oil and fiber source like flax seed and you have a great foundation.
Until next time I wish you vibrant health!

Ann

Vitamins 101

I wanted to begin a series of articles that will build step-by-step on the foundations of what I call the “3-D Living Program." I won’t go into great detail, but I’ll give you an overview. So, let’s begin with vitamins.

Vitamins are micronutrients (you only need small amounts compared to the macronutrients – protein, fat and carbohydrates). Although you don’t need huge amounts, they are essential to life! They help regulate your metabolism and cause the release of energy from the food you digest.

Some vitamins are water soluble and some are fat soluble. The water soluble vitamins, like the B vitamins, cannot be stored in your body. So once they do their job they pass through, usually within one day. Fat soluble vitamins can be stored in your body’s fatty tissue and in the liver for longer periods of time. Fat soluble vitamins are A, D, E and K. Both water and fat soluble vitamins are essential in order for your body to function properly.

The proper balance of vitamins and minerals is very important. Too much of a particular vitamin can actually produce the same symptoms a deficiency would. This is why mega-doses are not recommended unless supervised by a health professional. Also, vitamins work synergistically - in concert with each other. For example, just taking one of the B vitamins can deplete the others. It’s always best to take a whole food B complex that has all the B vitamins.

In a perfect world our foods would provide all the vitamins and minerals we need for optimal health. But we don’t live in a perfect world (anymore!) and our foods are grown in depleted soils so they are nutrient-depleted as well. Therefore, using high quality supplements wisely is a very important part of good health.

I always recommend using the highest quality, whole food supplements you can afford. The reason for that is your body recognizes natural, food source supplements as food and absorbs, uses and retains them better than synthetic ones. Synthetic supplements are just that - synthetic! They are chemicals created in labs. Here’s an example: Synthetic vitamin E was used in some studies that “proved” vitamin E did not improve heart health. That study just proved they used the wrong type of vitamin!

Natural vitamin E always has a “d” before the particular form, such as d-alpha, d-beta, d-delta and d-gamma Tocopherol. The synthetic version is always listed as “dl.” Despite the results of that flawed study, natural vitamin E is very important for cardiovascular health among many other things!

There are some supplements that are best taken on an empty stomach, some should be taken with a meal containing fat and certain ones are best taken separately from others. However, in general, taking your vitamins with your meals increases the absorption and you avoid upsetting your stomach as well.

The bottom line is this: we can all benefit from wise supplementation. However, remember that the word “supplement” means “in addition to.” They are to supplement a nutrient-dense, whole food diet. If you need help deciding what supplements might be best for you, I would be honored to help you with that. Next time we will discuss minerals.

Take a Step:

If you want to begin taking supplements, but don’t know what you need or where to begin, the first step is to find a knowledgeable nutritionist or coach. Feel free to contact me – I would be happy to work with you.

The next important step is to find high quality, whole food supplements. I work with some extremely reputable companies. I suggest you read label information very carefully before you spend your hard-earned dollars.

Once you know what to take and find the best quality supplements, create a habit. Taking them consistently will make the difference in your health. A small pill box with compartments works well, especially if you divide them up over each meal.

Until next time I wish you vibrant health!

Ann