All Easy Food Recipes

Recently I’ve been going through the Golden Rules of Eating Healthy, just to help you kick start the new year with some healthy ideas and information.  This is the fourth and final golden rule of healthy eating – eating with awareness.

How To Eat With Awareness

In this fast-paced world you may often feel that there’s not enough time for you to pay attention to your diet, but eating with awareness is vital to your body’s ability to digest the foods you eat.  This doesn’t mean you have to be a slave to meal times, but here are some tips that will help your body to digest the food you eat much more easily.

• Eat in a calm and quiet atmosphere.  How we feel when we eat can actually affect how well we digest it.  Don’t eat when you are upset or angry; instead just hold off for a few minutes to give your body time to settle down a bit.
• Always sit down to eat, even if it’s just a snack.  Taking time to pay attention to what you’re doing will help to prepare your digestion and allow you time to check in on your true hunger level.
• Avoid ice cold foods and drinks as they tend to freeze the digestive ‘fires’ that you need to help with the healthy breakdown of foods.  It may take a little time to break the habit, but you’ll find after time you won’t miss cold drinks.
• Don’t talk while chewing (your mum probably already told you this when you were younger!) – instead focus inward, enjoying the taste, sight and smell of the food you’re eating.
• Eat slowly to give your body a chance to digest food properly. Put your fork or spoon down in between mouthfuls to help you to slow down if you have to.
• Sit quietly for a few minutes after your meal to allow digestion to begin.

Beware Of Quick Health Fixes

Many people struggling to shed unwanted weight often seek quick and effortless solutions, usually bouncing from one weight loss diet to another.  Sadly, quick-fix diets just don’t produce lasting benefits and are often not very nutritionally balanced.

Avoid crash diets.  Although you might see quick results at first, study after study has shown that the benefits are not long term.  You’ll have much better long term results if you drop ‘diets’ altogether and take up a healthy eating program today that will serve you throughout your entire life.

Alcohol As Part Of A Healthy Lifestyle

Red Wine

Studies have shown that there are natural health-promoting chemicals in wine that may have a protective effect against heart disease and cancer.  These natural disease-fighting substances have been shown to have powerful antioxidant properties that are most concentrated in the skins of grapes (red wine has the highest concentration).

If taking an occasional glass of wine as part of a delicious meal adds richness to your life, then by all means enjoy!  However it’s important to remember that too much alcohol can also have damaging effects on almost every system and cell in the body and can contribute to serious illnesses affecting the nervous system, so always remember – everything in moderation.

How To Have A Happier, Healthier Mind And Body

I’ve been concentrating mostly on what to eat, as well as how and when, but a healthy lifestyle for the long term requires a ‘whole body’ approach which also includes a sensible amount of exercise…

Exercise

Regular exercise will help you to burn fat and feel better within yourself.  You will benefit more from regular, light exercise than occasional bursts of intense exercise.  Walking around the block once each day with longer walks added in every so often can also have a positive effect on your metabolism.

Studies have shown that short bursts of activity burn carbohydrates, while longer, ongoing exercise burns fat.  Like eating, exercising your body should be enjoyable.  If you overdo it or force yourself to exercise then you risk causing yourself injuries or emotional stress – which is exactly what you’re trying to avoid!

It’s best to exercise between 6-10am and 6-10pm, when your body is stronger and more tolerant.

That’s it for my current series of healthy eating (and living) tips, I hope this helps you to enjoy a far more healthy lifestyle for a long time to come!

Now I will be getting back to sharing with you a whole range of easy food recipes for you to enjoy making at home!

Mick Reade

All Easy Food Recipes

January 20th, 2011 | Tags: better health, diet, easy food recipes, eating healthy, healthy eating, healthy lifestyle, weight loss, weight loss diet | Category: Easy Healthy Recipes | Comments (2)

Fresh foods are full of nutrients and energy, so first of all remember that fresh foods are always best for your body.

I’m sure you’ve seen the difference between a lettuce picked fresh out of the garden and one that has been sitting in the bottom of your fridge for a couple of weeks.  Frozen, canned, processed, reheated and leftover foods have much less ‘life’ than fresh foods – and organic food is free of chemicals.

As you begin to appreciate the food you put in your body you might even feel inspired to grow your own herbs, fruits and vegetables in the garden!

The Best Way To Satisfy Your Food Cravings

Giving in to unhealthy cravings can sabotage your efforts.  If you experience cravings, it’s usually for sweet foods, and it shouldn’t be ignored.

However you can make healthy choices from the ‘sweet’ family to satisfy your food cravings with more wholesome, healthy foods such as sweet fruits, whole grains and nuts.

Eating well is a long-term healthy life choice, and there are some foods that can particularly help you to be a healthy weight and feel good about yourself.  Choose…

• Foods that are light, dry and warm; spicy, bitter and astringent (see the sense of taste chart for your health).
• Lighter fruits such as apples, pears, pomegranates, cranberries and persimmons.
• Honey is excellent (don’t heat the honey though).
• All beans.
• Light grains like barley, corn, millet, buckwheat and rye.
• All spices except salt.
• All vegetables, especially radishes, asparagus, eggplant, green leafy vegetables, beets, broccoli, potatoes, cabbage, carrots, cauliflower, pumpkin, lettuce, celery and sprouts.
• If you do eat meat, try to choose cold-water (oily) fish and white meat such as pork, free-range chicken and turkey.

In the next post I’m going to run through the fourth and final golden rule of healthy eating, how to eat with awareness…

Mick Reade

All Easy Food Recipes

January 15th, 2011 | Tags: easy food recipes, easy healthy recipes, food cravings, fresh foods, healthy eating, healthy food, organic food, satisfy your cravings | Category: Easy Healthy Recipes | Comments (1)

This is of course the new year period, and many people make New Year’s resolutions around this time, usually revolving around losing weight and getting fitter.

In the previous post I talked a bit about Ayurveda’s 6 essential tastes of life, and how they can help you improve your health in everyday life, and today I just want to elaborate a little bit on that with a helpful chart of some specific healthy foods that you should be looking to incorporate into your everyday meals.

It’s important that you don’t make choosing what to eat hard work.  Don’t worry if you get to the end of the day and realise you’ve missed out on one or more of the foods in a particular sense of taste – it will be a long-term lifestyle change that will balance out over time.

You’ll feel so much better when you incorporate food from each sense of taste that you’ll actually find it easy and fun to adjust your diet to include them!

Sense Of Taste Foods – Sweet

• Milk
• Butter
• Cream
• Wheat
• Ghee (clarified butter)
• Rice
• Maple Syrup
• Sesame Oil
• Apple Juice
• Coconut Milk
• Honey
• Raw Sugar
• Fresh Fruit
• Rolled Oats
• Raisins
• Cranberries
• Soy Milk
• Vanilla Extract

Sense Of Taste – Salty

• Salt
• Pickles
• Salty Pretzels
• Tamari Soy Sauce
• Seaweed

Sense Of Taste – Pungent (Hot And Spicy)

• Chilli Pepper
• Ginger
• Black Pepper
• Clove
• Mustard
• Radish
• Daikon
• Onions
• Thyme
• Oregano
• Salsa
• Asparagus
• Tomatoes
• Fresh Chillies
• Garlic
• Cinnamon
• Basil
• Rosemary

Sense Of Taste – Sour

• Limes
• Lemon
• Citrus Fruit
• Yoghurt
• Mango Powder
• Many Immature Fruits
• Tamarind
• Plums
• Blueberries
• Raspberries

Sense Of Taste – Bitter

• Green Vegetables
• Kale
• Broccoli
• Spinach
• Lettuce
• Turmeric
• Fenugreek
• Endive
• Chicory

Sense Of Taste – Astringent (Dry And Light)

• Apples
• Apricots
• Beans
• Berries
• Cabbage
• Cauliflower
• Cherries
• Coriander
• Figs (dry)
• Grapes
• Green Tea
• Lentils
• Peaches
• Persimmons
• Pomegranates
• Prunes
• Strawberries

Your Sense Of Taste Needs Variety Every Day

There are foods that taste delicious to us, and those that don’t.  There is enough variety from this sense of taste chart for your health to provide options in a daily eating program that will not only taste good, but also be healthy for you.

You will always feel satisfied and you will start to crave healthy food that makes you feel good when you eat it… and that’s what you really want, isn’t it?!

In the next post, I’m going to share the 3rd golden rule of healthy eating – how to choose food that nourishes your body and emotions…

Mick Reade

All Easy Food Recipes

January 14th, 2011 | Tags: easy food recipes, easy healthy recipes, getting fitter, health, healthy eating, healthy foods, losing weight, sense of taste, sense of taste chart | Category: Easy Healthy Recipes | Comments (1)

Healthy food doesn’t have to avoid your sense of taste and be bland – far from it.  Nature can provide all our dietary requirements when eaten in the correct way at the right time.

Food In Ayurveda

In Ayurveda all foods are placed into six categories according to their taste and the effect they have on the body.  We always need a wide variety of foods in our daily diet.  Instead of checking off charts or counting grams of fat like most other diets, you can make sure you’re getting all the health benefits food offers by including each of the 6 flavours that make up your sense of taste in your daily meals.

Also, having a balanced diet with all 6 tastes is very helpful in satisfying food cravings.

Sense Of Taste – The 6 Essentials

• Sweet
• Sour
• Salty
• Pungent
• Bitter
• Stringent

Sense Of Taste – Sweet

Most carbohydrates are considered part of this ‘sweet’ group.  Most sweet foods are high in fibre, but of course we know that eating lots of refined sugar and starch (which also tastes sweet) isn’t healthy for us.  It’s important to eat something sweet each day, and if you choose the healthy options then in time your body won’t crave sweets in a form that is not so healthy (like chocolate bars, cakes and fast foods).

Sweet Foods:

Sugar, honey, wholegrain rice, pasta, milk, cream, butter, whole grains, cereals.

Fresh fruit such as mangoes, melons, bananas, peaches.  Fresh vegetables such as corn and avocado.

Consider reducing cholesterol-rich foods and avoid foods containing hydrogenated oils.  Meat is also considered part of the ‘sweet’ family.  Consider replacing red meat with fish or free-range chicken and turkey.

Sense Of Taste – Sour

Oranges, lemons, pineapples, plums, blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, yoghurt and tomatoes all belong to the ‘sour’ family, and so does cheese and vinegar.  Their slightly sour taste adds a little acidic sense of taste to your meals.

They can also bring wonderful health benefits, so be sure to experience this sense of taste each day.  Cut down on pickled foods, green olives, alcohol and vinegar.

Sense Of Taste – Salty

In the right doses, salt adds flavour and stimulates digestion, but you need to choose the salt you use carefully and use it sparingly for the best health benefits, especially if you have high blood pressure or fluid retention.

Be aware that salt is also found in soy sauce, many tinned and processed foods, as well as salted meats.  There are many organic salts that are full of flavour and minerals, and it might surprise you but seaweed is a tasty, natural form of salt!

Sense Of Taste – Pungent

Pungent Sense Of Taste

Think of the kick of pepper, the bite of chilli, the tang of ginger and the heat-producing effects that they all have – these are ‘pungent’ foods.  This sense of taste helps digestion and has been known to stimulate your metabolism.

Garlic and onions have been shown to help lower cholesterol and blood pressure.  The delicious sense of tastes and smells offered by pungent foods add a lovely touch to every meal.

Pungent foods include peppers, fresh and dry ginger, horseradish, onions, garlic, leeks, mustard, cloves, cinnamon, peppermint, thyme, cumin, cardamom, basil, oregano and rosemary.

Sense Of Taste – Bitter

Foods in the ‘bitter’ group include dark green and yellow vegetables such as broccoli, kale, spinach, cauliflower, endive, chicory, asparagus and lettuce – all foods that are rich in nutrients that have been known to fight infections and have been useful for detoxifying and strengthening the immune system.

Sense Of Taste – Astringent

Think of the slightly tart sense of taste you get from a fresh green apple and you can imagine the ‘astringent’ family.  There are also cranberries, beans, lentils, peas, cabbage, pomegranates, pears and green tea among the astringent group, as well as purple and red vegetables such as eggplant.

Astringent foods provide a contrast to the sweet family, help to keep your taste buds clear and sensitive, and have been known to assist in cell renewal.

In the next post I’ll go into some more detail about which are the healthier options to choose from in each sense of taste group…

Mick Reade

All Easy Food Recipes

January 11th, 2011 | Tags: ayurveda diet, easy food recipes, easy healthy recipes, food in ayurveda, health benefits, healthy food, sense of taste, tastes | Category: Easy Healthy Recipes | Comments (2)