Sunday, January 27, 2008

Apple Crisp

About 10 apples
½ cup water
½ cup milled flax seed (optional, but it adds extra fiber)
½ cup brown sugar
½ cup of pure maple syrup or honey
6 packs of stevia*
½ cup butter (1 stick) softened
1½ cups oatmeal
½ cup whole grain flour
1 tsp. cinnamon

Preheat oven to 375 degrees
Peel and slice the apples.
Place in the bottom of a 9” by 13” casserole dish.
Pour the water over the top of the apples.
Next just combine the rest of the ingredients and crumble over the top of the apples.
Bake for about 40 minutes until the top is crisp.

* Stevia can be found at any health food store. I like it because; it does nothing to your blood sugar level. It is natural and has no negative side effects. I use this to sweeten tea and lemonade, also. If you do not have or want to try the stevia, you can use a whole cup of maple syrup or honey instead of the ½ cup, if you do this also add maybe 1/3 cup of flour to get the right consistency.
Hope you like it!

Wednesday, January 16, 2008

I know I should drink water, but why?

Water accounts for 60% of our total body weight. EVERY biological process depends on water. EVERY body cell needs water to carry out its functions. Water helps carry away waste. Water helps lubricate joints. Water gives you more energy. Water supplies oxygen and nutrients to cells and removes the cellular waste through the blood and lymphatic systems. Water is depended on to control your body temperature, blood pressure, and respiration. Wow! Water is essential to good health and feeling great.

You might be thinking, “But what about tea, soda, or my coffee, they are all made with water so they must count.” Well, I am truly sorry, but they do not count because they contain DEhydrating agents like caffeine and acids.

There can be no detectable symptom of dehydration, or you can experience fatigue and/or headaches which are the top symptoms of dehydration. The main problem is what is going on inside your cells. If you a constipated, tired, experiencing joint pain, headaches, problems with your sinuses, frequent colds, premature aging (wrinkles), acne, dry skin, blood pressure problems, or just not feel your best. Try water!

Drink at least 8 glasses per day. I would not recommend tap water. I would recommend drinking water purified by using reverse osmosis.

Warning, when you first start drinking water you will urinate a lot. Just know that this is only temporary while your body is getting use to the change, and balancing itself out.

If you have any questions or would like to set up a consultation, email me at askmichelleabouthealth@yahoo.com

Monday, January 7, 2008

How would you like to avoid the winter time colds and flu while improving your allergies?

Vitamin C is well known for its ability to strengthen the immune system. It is a very powerful antioxidant which means it can prevent disease and slow down the aging process. I want to talk to you about taking large doses of Vitamin C over a short period of time to super charge your immune system. This is called a Vitamin C Flush. I have done this myself and have recommended it to others with great success. It has helped people to overcome allergies that they had suffered with for years.

This is easy, simple, and affordable. This is a four day therapy based on a 1,000 milligrams per tablet, time released, with bioflavonoids, good quality vitamin C supplement. All you do is take a double dose of vitamin C the first day. Then each day after, add 2 more tablets. Do this for at least 4 days. Stop adding more when or if you develop diarrhea (I know, I hate that word, too). If you get to day 3 at 6 tablets, and you experience diarrhea, just continue on to day 4 at the same amount (6 tablets) without adding more. Your 4 day therapy should look like this:

Day 1: 2 tablets

Day 2: 4

Day 3: 6

Day 4: 8

This can be done once or twice during the cold and flu season to keep your immune system super charged. You could do this once a month at first, then seasonal to improve allergies. This really helped me to overcome a lot of the allergies that I use to have. Vitamin C is safe and will not become toxic, because it is a water soluble vitamin. This means your body will flush out what it doesn’t need.

Here is a good quality vitamin C, this is what I take.


Peanut Butter and Chocolate Balls

This is one of those recipes that you just eye ball the ingredients then adjust if needed. These measurements are estimates. You want to end up with a play-dough like consistency, in fact you could use this as an edible play dough. It is a good source of fiber and protein.

1 cup of whole grain flour

1 cup of oatmeal

½ cup of peanut butter

¼ to ½ cup of honey or pure maple syrup

¼ to ½ of crushed chocolate chips

¼ cup of milled flax seed (opt.) adds more fiber

Mix together. Roll into balls. Eat right away or stick them in the freezer for a few minutes to get them cold. You can use crushed nuts or coconut instead of the chocolate chips.

Enjoy!

How can we help our kids learn through nutrition? Part 3

I'm back again. Okay we have covered the importance of protein and whole grains. Now we are going to talk about the "v" word; it is the most important and the hardest to condense so bare with me. At the end of this series I'm going to write a summary, meal suggestions, and how to combine these foods.

Vegetables provide many of the vitamins and minerals ours kids need for good health, and they provide fiber to get rid of the toxins that we have talked about. Vegetables also contain many antioxidants which are extremely important but to explain how they are important, I first need to explain what free radicals are.

Free radicals are a natural by-product of the body's process of turning food into energy. Excess free radicals are a problem because they attack the body itself, damaging key cellular molecules such as DNA. Cells with damaged DNA may be more prone to developing cancer. Free radical activity has also been linked to premature aging, heart disease, arthritis, chronic fatigue syndrome, and more. An excess of free radicals can be caused by stress, infections, eating fried foods, environmental pollutants, and more. It is impossible to avoid many of these things, so most of us are producing far too many free radicals for the normal body processes to cope with. This is where antioxidants come into to play; they help the body to get rid of the extra free radicals and protect our cells.

You might be thinking, "...but what does this have to do with helping my child learn". I'm almost there. The brain is very vulnerable to free radical damage because its turn over rate of cells (die-off and replacement) is almost zero, unlike that of our other organs. So, we really need these cells to be protected because they aren't replaced. Remember, antioxidants help the body get rid of the extra free radicals and protect our cells.

Fruits and vegetables are our best source of antioxidants. Our children need three servings of vegetables daily. To get three servings in, we just have 1 serving at lunch, and 2 servings at dinner. Lunch is usually a raw vegetable like carrots, broccoli, celery, sugar snap peas, belle peppers, or salad. At dinnertime we usually just have a double serving of one veggie like sweet potatoes, salad, cooked broccoli, asparagus, or squash. I know it's not easy, but teaching them to eat vegetables while they're young, will have a lasting impact on their lives. What we teach them now not only benefits them now, but might just be what prevents them from suffering with disease later in life.

One way that will help get our children to eat vegetables is eating them ourselves. They can follow our example. Think of creative ways to get them to eat vegetables. Educate them on the importance of eating their veggies. If this is new to your children, I wouldn't be afraid to offer incentives like stickers, extra time doing this or that, etc... I know some may disagree, but I have tried this, and it works. I also have my kids eat at least half of their veggies before the rest of their food that way I don't hear, "I'm too full". I grind up veggies in my chopper and then "sneak" them into other foods like any tomato based sauce, meatloaf, hamburgers, soups or anywhere else you feel it would work.

Check out this statistic: "People who consumed two or more vegetables per day had a 35 to 40 percent decrease in the decline in thinking ability over six years. That's the equivalent of being five years younger in age."

If you have any questions or would like to set up a consultation, email me at askmichelleabouthealth@yahoo.com