Gluten Free: Nutritional Information on Gluten Intolerance

What is Gluten?

Gluten is the generic name for certain types of proteins found in common cereal grains – mainly wheat, barley, rye, spelt, and kamut (versions of wheat), triticale (a grain crossbred from wheat and rye), and their derivatives.

Whom It Affects

Current estimates suggest that 1 in every 133 Americans suffers a reaction to ingesting gluten, which is present in many products.

The Gluten Sensitivity Spectrum

Gluten is found in many foods otherwise considered wholesome, making the supermarket- for those who have an intolerance for gluten or those with celiac disease- a minefield.

The sensistivity to wheat and associated glutens range from mildly annoying to very serious.:

Conditions and Symptoms

Allergy

• If you have a wheat allergy, you probably realize it. Allergic symptoms- itchy, watery eyes; runny nose; wheezing; skin rash; or diarrhea- appear very quickly after ingesting this grain. Eliminating wheat may be enough to relieve your symptoms. And you may still be able to eat oat or rye products.

Intolerance

• Digestive distress, such as stomachache, bloating , diarrhea
• Skin complaints like itching, eczema, hives
• Joint and muscle pain
• Fatigue
• Malabsorption of nutrients
•  Headaches, including migraines
• Antibody screenings are used to diagnose gluten intolerance

Celiac Disease

• If you have celias disease (symptoms include those listed above), which up to 3 million Americans are estimated to have, you must avoid gluten totally to avoid destroying your small intestine and possibly leading to more serious diseases, including cancer.

 

Living Gluten Free

You don’t have to give up all foods to live gluten-free: dietitians recommend that patients eat a variety of good things people should eat anyway, such as fresh meats, fruits, vegetables, milk, and legumes. All are naturally gluten free.

But you must become more vigilant about you diet, especially when it comes to:

• Eliminating foods that contain gluten: wheat, rye, barley, spelt, kamut, and triticale.
• Discovering that wheat-free; a product may have some other gluten-containing grain.
• Reading labels of all bakery and packaged foods carefully.
• Knowing that gluten-containing grains are used as both basic ingredients and additives during processing or preparation.
• Being aware that ingredients may need to be clarified by the manufacturer. Example: Hydrolyzed vegetable protein on an  ingredient list may be made from wheat, soy, corn, or a mix of grains.

Shop Attentively

If you or someone in your family is gulten-intolerant, read the labels of foods every time you buy them, as ingredients may change at any time. To make sure you’re clear about contents, get in touch with manufacturers and ask them questions. It’s vitally improtantn that you know for certain a good is gluten-free. Always remember: If in doubt, go without.

Allowed Foods: Rice, corn, potato, tapioca, beans, garfava, sorghum, quinoa, millet, arrowroot, amaranth, teff, Montina, nut flours, distilled vinegars, distilled alcoholic beverages, wine, brand-name packaged yeast, caramel color made from corn citric acid, pure spices or bottled spices containing silicon dioxide, vanilla and vanilla extract.

Not Allowed Foods: Wheat (durum, graham, kamut, semolina, spelt), rye, barley, triticale, or products containing these items. Malt or malt flavoring, malt vinegar, beers, ales, lagers (are made from gluten-containging grains), brewer;s yeast that is a byproduct of beer, caramel color made from barly malt, dextrin made from wheat, wheat maltodextrin or maltodextrin (wheat), and starch or modified food starch made from wheat.

For more information about gluten intolerance and living gluten-free, visit:

Celiac Disease Foundation: celiac.org

Gluten Intolerance Group: gluten.net

Source: National Digestive Disease, Celiac Disease Foundation, Gluten Intolerance

 

Food Storage Guidelines

		Refrigerator		Freezer
Fresh Meat:		(35⁰-40⁰)		(0⁰ or lower)
Beef roasts & steaks		3 – 4 days		6 – 12 months
Beef, ground		1- 2 days		3 – 4 months
Veal		1- 2 days		4 – 6 months
Pork chops		2 -3 days		4 – 6 months
Pork roasts		3- 5 days		4 – 8 months
Pork sauage		1 -2 days		1 – 2 months
Bacon		2 weeks		3 months
Ham, whole		1 week		1 – 2 months
Lamb chops		3 – 5 days		6 – 8 months
Chicken & turkey		1 – 2 days		12 months
Duck & goose		1 – 2 days		9 months
Fish		1 – 2 days		3 – 6 months
Eggs:
In shell		4 – 5 days
Hard-boiled		5 days
Dairy:		(35⁰-40⁰)		(0⁰ or lower)
Cottage Cheese		1 week		2 weeks
Sour cream		2 weeks
Yogurt		2 weeks
Hard cheese		3 – 4 months		6 months
Processed cheese		1 month		6 months
Ice cream				2 months
Margarine & butter		2 – 4 weeks		9 months
Milk		8 – 20 days
Other:
Mustard		6 – 8 months		12 months
Mayonnaise		12 months
Bread		1 – 2 weeks		3 months
Frozen vegetables				8 months
Frozen fruit				1 year
Fruit juice concentrate		6 days		1 year

Reasons To Cut Back On Meats

1. Better Health

Animal foods, especially red meat, are among the largest sources of saturated fats in our diet. Eliminating meat―beef, pork, lamb, poultry―one day a week can reduce your risk of dying from heart disease and some cancers. What’s more, “cutting down on meat encourages people to eat more vegetables,” says Marion Nestle, a professor of nutrition, food studies, and public health at New York University, in New York City. Adding a serving of produce to your diet each day (say, ½ cup of melon or broccoli) may lower your risk of heart disease by 4 percent and your risk of stroke by 6 percent.

2. More Money in Your Pocket

Consuming less meat boosts your bottom line. The average cost of a pound of sirloin is $6.20, compared with 90 cents for a 15-ounce can of beans, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. If a family of four replaces a steak dinner ($9.30 for 1½ pounds) with a fresh bean and vegetable salad ($1.80 for two cans of beans) once a week, they will save $7.50. After a year, that’s an extra $390.

3. A Greener Planet

The livestock industry creates almost a fifth of all greenhouse gases and takes up 30 percent of the earth’s usable land, according to a United Nations report. (Vegetables and other produce don’t even come close.) Eliminate 1½ pounds of meat (about what a family of four eats for dinner) once a week, says Gidon Eshel, a professor of physics at Bard College, in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York, “and you’ll get almost the same benefits as trading in a standard sedan for an ultra-efficient Prius hybrid.”

Souce: Dailyrecnews

You Are What You Eat. So Who’s Your Farmer?

Time and time again we always hear how there is no nutritional difference between organic and conventional foods. Why is one called organic and the other conventional? There MUST be some kind of difference, isn’t there?

Let us ask you question, “Who’s your farmer”? Do you know where his or her farm is located? Around the block? 15 miles from your job? Or maybe 5,000 miles from your home? Now let us ask you do you know if your farmer is using pesticides, steroids, or any other chemicals? And if so are any of these chemicals possibly harmful? Well to be quite frank with you, the food that your eating is likely killing right now and you don’t even know it!!

Finding out where your food comes from and what is use to produce it is one of the most important decisions you can make towards living a healthier life. Because our daily schedules are full with work, kids, family, school, and other activities we rarely stop to think about where our food comes from and it’s production. One of the best ways to find out where your food comes from is by taking a trip with your family to your local farm or farmers market. There you can get all the right information about the food that is being grown. Information such as is the food being grown organic, how long has the land been certified organic, if not what types of pesticides or, steroids, if any are being used.

“Methyl bromide is a fumigant gas used nationally to protect crops from pests in the soil and to fumigate grain bins and other agricultural storage areas. Methyl bromide was linked to the risk of prostate cancer in the entire group, while exposure to six other pesticides was associated with an increased risk of prostate cancer only among men with a family history of the disease.” National Cancer Institute

“Six chemicals in all, including two fungicides (Benomyl and Maneb/mancozeb) and two insecticides (Carbaryl and methyl/ethyl parathion) were found to double the risk of developing skin cancer with repeated exposure of more than 50 lifetime days. The incidence of cutaneous melanoma, the most deadly form of skin cancer, tripled from 1975 to 2006 in the United States, and it has been estimated that there will be 68,720 new cases of melanoma and 8,650 melanoma deaths in 2009.” Environmental Health Perspective

“The chemical has been banned in the European Union since 2004 but is still one of the most widely used herbicides in the U.S. with 77 million pounds applied in 2003.  It has infiltrated its way into the drinking water of an estimated 33 million Americans, and the article explains that there have been breakdowns in regulation and oversight of atrazine levels in public water.” Eileen Mericle Ames in a Des Moines Register newspaper article titled, “Pesticides Lead to Much Destruction.”

It is generally accepted that one contributing factor to the fall of Rome was excess lead poisoning (or plumbism) which disproportionately affected the aristocratic class.  It would probably be unfair to chalk this up to hubris since the ancient Romans lacked sophisticated knowledge about the neurotoxic effects of lead.

Our culture, however, has no excuse.  We have information at our finger tips and technology advancing at the speed of light (at least to us it seems like it). So take initiative and find out where your local farms are located. Be proactive in always asking questions. Don’t always assume that just because you might be eating your fruits and vegetables that they are always safe for you. Food for thought. You are what you eat!!

Time-Saving Fitness for Real-World Females!

Let’s get real shall we? Every celebrity on TV has 5 Personal Trainers and 3 chefs (Plugin: they have us on speed dial!) and a fitness dog that runs on the treadmill beside them to keep them company. This is NOT a realistic health and fitness plan for women in the real-world who don’t have the time to workout all day and have massages and take their dog to the puppy salon.

If you don’t have time to cook 6-gourmet, no-fat, elegant 5-star meals a day, keep reading. If Thor the Trainer doesn’t sweetly puff your eyes open in the morning as you rise for your 2-hour jog and massage, keep reading. If you don’t want to read a 600-page book on weight loss that spends 30 pages explaining concepts you understand on the very first page on every chapter, keep reading.

The above examples of how to get in shape just aren’t realistic for today’s 21st century woman. What is realistic is what is about to follow.

Here are 3 great time saving tips for all the wonderful women living and prospering in the real world! Enjoy!

Tip #1: Fast workouts: If you can’t go longer, go a bit harder. This doesn’t mean you’ve got to scare people at the gym with blinding speed, it just means perhaps pairing up exercises and doing one set of one exercise in between a set of another. Just go back and forth between two exercises and right there, you’ve cut your time in half! Take a break whenever you need to when you’re trying this new format but trust me, you’ll not only save time with this format, you’ll get in better shape fast too!

Tip #2: Stand up and multitask! Whenever you sit while doing an exercise, you shut off a huge amount of muscle. Whether you’re working at your desk or doing a workout or watching TV or sitting right now, stand up! That’ll get all that muscle that can be supporting you doing the work instead of that bench or chair robbing you of fat burning time. Try holding a lunge or half squat while you do your bicep curls or while you make a meal or while you work on the computer. You’ll feel a great burn, save time, keep your metabolism flying and multitask like never before! And yes, this one’s only for women because we all know men can’t multitask chuckle, chuckle.

Tip #3: Up the weight. Not a lot, just a little. The heavier the weights my female clients lift, the better shape they get in and the shorter the workouts get! You don’t have to up the weights by much, just up them enough to cut your sets back by 2-3 reps or so. It’ll save you time, tighten and tone your body quicker and boost your energy and metabolism. You can’t go wrong! Make sure you can still maintain proper form and go for a slightly heavier weight and a few less reps for each set and you’ll be a stronger, leaner, slenderer you before you know it!

These tips should save you time to do all else that you need to do and then some! Put them to use and you’ll have this and everything done and a body the celebrities wish they had in no time at all! Now where’s Thor for that massage…

Best of Health,

Byron Collyer

Women’s Weight Loss Specialist

www.lightenyourlifestyle.com

Byron Collyer is a Certified Personal Trainer that specializes in women’s weight loss and other health and fitness training programs. Byron’s women’s fitness products can be viewed at: www.lightenyourlifestyle.com

Article from articlesbase.com

Holistic All Natural Remedies for Common Issues

APPLE CIDER VINEGAR FOR SINUS INFECTIONS AND MUSCLE ACHES

We pulled the plug on conventional medical “wisdom” and are treating ourselves naturally. Try taking 1 tsp ACV twice a day and your own your way to get some relief.

BEETS AND HIGH BLOOD PRESSURE

Drink beet juice to control high blood pressure.

BAKING SODA FOR COLDS

Do you have all the early signs of a cold / flu coming on- achy, runny nose, sore throat, and cough? Start by taking 1/2 tsp of baking soda in a glass of cold water every 2 hours, and cut back to every 4 hours for that day. In a little over 24 hours, you will be feeling FINE. We KNOW you were exposed, We KNOW you were getting sick… now, your fine!  Absolutely worth trying if you are coming down with a cold or flu!

APPLE CIDER VINEGAR, BAKING SODA FOR IRRITABLE BOWEL SYNDROME

Diagnosed with IBS? Are you suffering from awful bloating, trouble breathing, and awful pain? Is your doctor prescribing a number of meds that’s not helping? Start by taking two tablespoons of apple cider vinegar and 1/2 teaspoon of baking soda. You will have almost immediate results. Take it in morning before breakfast and before going bed at night.

GARLIC FOR CURES

There has been report that feet swelling starts along with blood pressure spiking to very high levels. I do not have high blood pressure so I could not understand what was going on. By day three I figured out I had a tooth infection that was probably starting to seep into my blood causing the swelling, blood pressure spikes, tingling in head, legs, and feet. After speaking with a dentist who felt they were unrelated and would not give me any advice on whether I should go to the ER, I decided to use garlic infused with our Famous Mango Mousse Parfait (helps it go down easier). I took about 1 T. of crushed garlic and 1 T. of mousse. Within 5 minutes the swelling in my feet went away and I felt my blood pressure had gone down. I took my blood pressure and it had dropped over 50 points! Obviously, the blood pressure spikes were brought on by the tooth infection, unbeknownst to the young dentist!!!

We cook with garlic all of the time, but RAW GARLIC is terrific for blood pressure and infections!!!

CAYENNE FOR NOSE BLEEDS

Almost every now and then I would get awful nosebleeds, and they were very difficult to stop. Sometimes they would stop only to start again within a few minutes. After reading about cayenne and its healing abilities I experimented. These days I use 1/2 tsp of cayenne in warm water to make a tea. It’s easier on my stomach and I feel its effects faster. The nosebleeds never returned.

PICKLE JUICE FOR ACID REFLUX

For those who are on nexium, here is your chance to kick them to the curb! Just take a few gulps of the pickle juice and about 5 minutes later we’ll be on your way to reflux freedom.

TURMERIC FOR BEAUTIFUL SKIN

Use it by mixing 1 tbsp. in a small bowl with some milk and a bit of sugar (as a mild exfoliant). Then rub the face and any other problem areas with this and leave it on for as long as possible before showering, usually for about 15-20 mins.

Try using 1 tbsp. tumeric in some honey with a tiny splash of apple cider vinegar and sugar, which worked fantastically, even better than the milk.

HYDROGEN PEROXIDE FOR GUM DISEASE

Rinsing and swishing with hydrogen peroxide daily. You won’t be used to the froth and the after-smell (for lack of a better term) so just start off by taking a capful. After you get used to it, you can start taking a full swig. We found this to be better because it didn’t foam up as fast and you can get more parts of your mouth.

A Small Tip of Dangers in Processed Foods

But before we start we must first give you this quote of the day to help aid us through the process of change:

“If you resist change, you will face challenges on a daily basis. If you consciously refocus your attitude to see the benefits of change, your outlook becomes positive and life becomes easier.” Catherine Pulsifier

For the past week a friend of ours, Willie, has been a little under the weather (more like in the middle of a 300 mile/hr super tornado). First started off with strep throat, dislocated left shoulder which ended up with torn ligaments (MRI then surgery doctor says), and at the end of the week finished off with an ear infection!! Not bad of a week huh? Oh did we forget to add that some of those days he had to work? Just wanted to give a little insight of how busy our lives can be on a daily basis with expected and unexpected events. That alone can and will cause a ripple effect on the rest of our lives like for example the choices of foods we consume.

For your information Americans spend a good portion of their food budget on processed foods or like we call them “plastic catch up” foods!! Why you ask? Convenience, convenience, convenience!!

Most of you know these scenarios; rushing out the door in the morning to beat traffic, dropping the kids off at school, stopping by Kinkos to make copies for company presentation, oh yeah can’t forget have to stop by and grab that coffee!! That’s the busy lifestyles that forces our health down this ever seemingly bottomless pit of a path. And we ask ourselves why is obesity at an all time high?

There are several reasons why you should avoid processed foods but for today we wanted to home in on only three. We do want to overload you with too much information.

1. Trans -Fats.

Trans fats are the real fat substitute in our modern diet and are in ALL fast food and processed foods. Trans fat has been linked to heart disease, cancer, digestive disorders and degeneration of joints and tendons. Consumption is also linked to skin issues, learning disabilities, stunted growth in children and auto immune disease.

2. High Fructose Corn Syrup.

This has become a controversial ingredient recently. The corn and processed food industry has begun an aggressive marketing campaign trying to undo the damage that has been done to this prevalent processed food ingredient.

Essentially, High Fructose Corn Syrup increase your triglyceride levels and your LDL (the bad cholesterol) within 60 minutes of ingestion. It’s also the cheapest and most prominent ingredient in the American food chain. The average person in the U.S. consumes 68 pounds of HFCS per year!!! In 2005, if one looks at the actuarial curve on cardiovascular disease, obesity, hypoglycemia and diabetes, they all parallel HFCS increase in the food chain. But the corn and processed food industry will continue to argue that there is no difference in HFCS and natural sugars.

3. Monosodium Glutamate or MSG. MSG is essentially concentrated salt and is an excito-toxin, which means that is overexcites your cells to the point of damage, acting as a poison.

MSG can also be hidden in food labels under names like broth, casein, hydrolyzed, autolyzed, gelatin, hyrdolyzed vegetable protein (HVP), yeast extract, malted barley, rice syrup or brown rice syrup. Monosodium Glutamate has also been linked to vision loss and causing nerve damage.

The next time your running through your busy, crazy, hectic, planned filled day remember to stop and ask yourself “Is this really good for me?” One of the hardest things to learn in life is which bridge to cross and which to burn. Together let’s cross the bridge to a healthy lifestyle

The Principles of Holistic Medicine

1. Optimal Health is the primary goal of holistic medical practice. It is the conscious pursuit of the highest level of functioning and balance of the physical, environmental, mental, emotional, social and spiritual aspects of human experience, resulting in a dynamic state of being fully alive. This creates a condition of well-being regardless of the presence or absence of disease.
2. The Healing Power of Love. Holistic health care practitioners strive to meet the patient with grace, kindness, acceptance, and spirit without condition, as love is life’s most powerful healer.
3. Whole Person. Holistic health care practitioners view people as the unity of body, mind, spirit and the systems in which they live.
4. Prevention and Treatment. Holistic health care practitioners promote health, prevent illness and help raise awareness of dis-ease in our lives rather than merely managing symptoms. A holistic approach relieves symptoms, modifies contributing factors, and enhances the patient’s life system to optimize future well-being.
5. Innate Healing Power. All people have innate powers of healing in their bodies, minds and spirits. Holistic health care practitioners evoke and help pati ents utilize these powers to affect the healing process.
6. Integration of Healing Systems. Holistic health care practitioners embrace a lifetime of learning about all safe and effective options in diagnosis and treatment. These options come from a variety of traditions, and are selected in order to best meet the unique needs of the patient. The realm of choices may include lifestyle modification and complementary approaches as well as conventional drugs and surgery.
7. Relationship-centered Care. The ideal practitioner-patient relationship is a partnership which encourages patient autonomy, and values the needs and insights of both parties. The quality of this relationship is an essential contributor to the healing process.
8. Individuality. Holistic health care practitioners focus patient care on the unique needs and nature of the person who has an illness rather than the illness that has the person.
9. Teaching by Example. Holistic health care practitioners continually work toward the personal incorporation of the principles of holistic health, which then profoundly influence the quality of the healing relationship.
10. Learning Opportunities. All life experiences including birth, joy, suffering and the dying process are profound learning opportunities for both patie nts and health care practitioners.

Please visit our official new website at www.beorganiccatering.com for all your catering needs and purchasing any of our organic line of products. We dare to be organic, do you?

Colorful, Meaningful, and Tasteful Plate!

Deep Red or Bright Pink
Choices like tomatoes, grapefruit, watermelon, papaya and guava are a great source of the powerful antioxidant lycopene, and may fight heart disease and some cancers.

Green
Spinach, collards, kale, and broccoli contain the carotenoids lutein and zeaxanthin, which are known to have antioxidant properties. Cruciferous vegetables such as cabbage, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower and turnips are loaded with vitamins, minerals and fiber. The phytochemicals in these foods go a long way to keeping you in good health. Not only are these foods being studied for their role in fighting cancer, but for their ability to protect your eyes by keeping your retina strong.

Orange and Yellow
Sweet potatoes, mangos, carrots, apricots, pineapples, corn and pears are great sources of beta-carotene, as well as being another rich source of vitamins, minerals and fiber. It is believed these choices do much to enhance your immune system.

Blue and Purple
Grapes and blueberries add the health-enhancing benefits of flavonoids, phytochemicals, and antioxidants to your daily diet. The pigment anthocyanin is a phytochemical responsible for the blue color in vegetables and fruits, and is being studied for its role in your body’s defense against harmful carcinogens.

White
Onions, garlic, chives, scallions and leeks contain allicin, which may help to lower cholesterol and blood pressure, while increasing the body’s ability to fight infections.

Source: O Dream Board

What’s in Season? Your Fresh Fruit and Veggie Guide of Course.

Now we know how tough it can be to go grocery shopping let alone trying to read labels to decide whats good for you. But one thing we do like for you to keep in mind is; are you buying the freshest fruits and veggies that are is season? We wouldn’t want you to be buying quote unquote “fresh” green beans in the winter when they’re not even in season. Because that would mean that those green beans traveled far far away from where they are from to get to you, took a lot of energy to get it to you, and it isn’t fresh as it could be because of the time it took to get to you. Furthermore, the produces might even be from another county where the standards of growing produce aren’t as strong as the standards in the great U.S. of A.

Today we have  a list of fruits and vegetables to look for when in season to make sure your getting the fresh and best tasting produce for your next meal. And remember what will a meal be without one of our great line of Finishing Sauces to finish it; it would be ludicrous of course! Don’t forget to order yours and remember to be organic and be local.

Summer Fruits	Summer Vegetables
Apples Apricots Avocados Blackberries Blueberries Boysenberries Cactus pears Cherries Figs Melons Mulberries Nectarines Peaches Plums Raspberries Tomatoes Tomatillos Watermelon	Asparagus Basil Beets Broccoli Corn Cucumbers Eggplant Green beans Okra Peas Radishes Rhubarb Spinach Summer squash Zucchini

Fall Fruits	Fall Vegetables
Apples Avocados Bananas Clementines Cranberries Dates Figs Grapefruit Grapes Kiwi Kumquats Mandarin oranges Melons Oranges Pears Persimmons Pomegranates Raspberries	Beans Beets Bok choy Broccoli Broccoli rabe Brussels sprouts Cabbage Carrots Cauliflower Celery root Collard greens Garlic Jerusalem artichokes Kale Leeks Lettuce Parsnips Pumpkin Rhubarb Rutabaga Snow peas Spinach Sweet potatoes Swiss chard Turnips Watercress Winter squash

Winter Fruits	Winter Vegetables
Avocados Bananas Blood oranges Clementines Cranberries Grapefruit Grapes Guavas Kiwi Kumquats Limes Oranges Passion fruit Pears Persimmons Pomegranates Tangelos Tangerines	Artichokes Bok choy Broccoli Broccoli rabe Brussels sprouts Cabbage Cauliflower Celery root Jerusalem artichokes Kale Lettuce Parsnips Radishes Rhubarb Rutabaga Snow peas Sweet potatoes Turnips Watercress Winter squash

Spring Fruits	Spring Vegetables
Apricots Avocados Carrots Cherries Grapefruit Kiwis Kumquats Lemons Mango Pineapple Navel oranges Strawberries	Artichokes Arugula Asparagus Beets Fava beans Fennel Fiddleheads Greens Leeks Lettuce Morels Nettles Spring onions Parsley Peas Radishes Rhubarb Scallions Spinach Sweet onions Swiss chard Turnips

Next Page »