Showing posts with label diet. Show all posts
Showing posts with label diet. Show all posts

Sunday, December 13, 2009

Good Food Health Vitamin Intake

It is essential that a person is aware of what constitutes good food health vitamin intake. The federal drug administration produces a recommended daily allowance for the majority of vitamins which it regards as a good food health vitamin intake. These figures vary according to a person’s age, sex and some other factors so that the good food health vitamin intake for a young woman is going to be different to that of a man in his seventies.

The food health vitamin intake amounts of certain foods are included in the nutritional labelling. This labelling is important for a person to consider and helps ensure that they are receiving the correct food health vitamin intake from the foods that they eat. The nutritional information is often represented as a percentage of the recommended daily allowance of each vitamin and mineral and can help assess the value of the foods in the quest for good food health vitamin intake.

There are also a number of items that a person may want to restrict in their diet as part of their good food health vitamin intake. Again, the nutritional labelling of certain foods can help a person to see how high a product is in these undesirable contents. Salt and fat, for example, may be items that a person wants to consider limiting as part of their good food health vitamin intake even though they are not strictly vitamins. The majority of people actually refer to nutrients when they use the word vitamin and food manufacturers are aware that a person is looking at minerals and other items when they are considering their good food health vitamin intake. Fiber is another element that many people are more aware of as forming an essential part of a balanced diet and is necessary for good food health vitamin intake.

If a person is on a restricted diet for any reason then they need to pay even more attention to their good food health vitamin intake. Obviously, some foods contain different nutrients to others and this is applicable to vitamins as well and it may be more difficult for a person to achieve their good food health vitamin intake if they are unable to eat certain foods. Vitamin supplements can form an essential part of a good food health vitamin intake for people who are unable to obtain their vitamins from their normal diet. It is also worth remembering that the good food health vitamin intake for a person varies throughout their life depending on their general health.

The Wondrous Benefits of Soy Protein

Soy protein is emerging as one of the great alternative protein sources for human consumption. Health experts are all excited about how soy protein can change the face of nutrition. What’s all the rage? Here are some great reasons to get with soy protein.

Soy Protein is Plant Protein
Soy beans contain complete protein and have one of the best protein digestibilities among all protein sources. Soy beans also contain little or no fat and have virtually no cholesterol. Lactose intolerant ones will be pleased to know that soy beans contain no lactose.

Being a plant protein, soy is free from steroids and antibiotics animal protein contains. It is also free from the parasites that contaminate some of these products. They also contain none of the diseases one can contract from mean sources such as Mad Cow Disease, and Foot and Mouth Disease.

Vegetarians love this bean as it provides a comparable – if not better – source of protein as compared to its animal counterpart. It provides a protein that is better and easier to digest and is comparable to most protein supplements.

Soy Beans are Very Versatile
Soy beans are very versatile. Various cuisines, especially Asian ones recognize the value of the humble soy bean. A variety of naturally yummy delicacies are all soy based: tofu, soy pudding, Soya milk, and meat substitutes – not to mention condiments such as soy sauce, and hoi sin sauce.

To counter the problem of world hunger, the growing of soybeans has been suggested. Not only are soybeans easy to grow and harvest, they will grow pretty much anywhere and produces much in a little time. There have been farmers reported to have replaced their entire crop line with soy bean plants. These hardy little plants produce much per harvest, and, as said earlier, can grow in even the most trying terrain.

The Great Substitute
Soy is low in fat and can be used to substitute most protein sources. When cooking, you may use soy substitutes instead of flour for a low fat alternative. This makes it a great protein source for those that are looking to lose weight without compromising their protein requirements.

Bodybuilders are considering how this can make their jobs a lot easier. Without the fat and with all the protein goodness – easily digestible at that – bodybuilding has just received a great blessing of a food.

Although these bodybuilders are currently debating how soy can be a help to bodybuilders, it doesn’t take away anything from what soy can contribute to the overall health of a person.

It is very advisable to stick to natural protein rather than processes protein if possible, as processed foods typically have some risk attached to them. The best use of this food can be attributed to how it perfectly fits into anyone’s low-fat, high-protein diet.

Soy products can be incorporated into shakes and drinks. And being lactose-free, lactose intolerant people will still be able to get their milkshake fix without having to suffer so.

Soy products are also a great source of other nutrients such as saponins, isoflavones, and phytosterol. Saponins help support a healthy immune system. It also combines with cholesterol to avoid increased absorption of cholesterol in the body. Phytosterols also help reduce the absorption of cholesterol in the body in the same way saponins do.

Isoflavones are powerful antioxidants and prevent the effects of free radicals in the body. They prevent many of the signs of aging and have been known to help prevent cancer. This alone makes soy a miracle protein source in its own right.

Isoflavones, along with vitamins A,C, and E are among the front liners in the fight against such disease – they also counter the effects of pollution, and stress.

How Much is Too Much
Unlike other protein sources, it is pretty safe to consume a wide amount of soy products. While allergies to soy products exist, cases are few and far between. When changing to a soy diet, however, it would be best to consult your physician or your nutritionist. Ask specifically if the soy interferes with any prescription drugs you are taking.

Soy can be great blessing for people who are looking for a great source of protein that does not entail the side effects of most of the other sources. It would be advisable for one to explore how it can improve one’s diet.

7 Diet Secrets of the Stars

Celebrities always look fabulous. Whether appearing in television or films or strutting down the red carpet during movie premiers and awards, they never cease to fascinate us with their larger than life presence. The truth is, it takes a lot of effort to look the way they do, and being the public figures that they are, they cannot afford to slack off when it comes to taking care of their physical appearances. Their livelihood largely depends on how they look. Aside from the clothes, the hair and the makeup, celebrities have to take good care of their bodies.

So it is no surprise that these stars have their own secrets when it comes to staying fit and gorgeous. Their health agenda can range from extreme workouts to well-planned meals. Who doesn't want to know their secrets in staying absolutely sexy? Here are some of the diet secrets of seven women celebrities.

1. Jennifer Aniston
The star of the phenomenal television show Friends not only mesmerized audiences with her adorable comic sense and her famous hairstyle, she was also known for having one of the sexiest bodies in Hollywood, as she appeared in countless magazine covers. To stay trim, Jennifer follows the 40:30:30 diet method. The diet consists of:

40% Low glycemic carbohydrates
-Foods such as beans, fruits and vegetables, legumes

30% lean proteins
-Tofu, fish, chicken, turkey, beef and low fat dairy products

30% essential fats
-nuts and seeds, fish and olive oils

It is essential that every meal should contain macronutrients to attain the balance of hormones and maximum weight loss.

2. Kate Hudson
The gorgeous daughter of actress Goldie Hawn gained 60 pounds during her pregnancy, which she needed to shed quickly before commencing on her next film. From her previous eating plan, she switched to a higher protein diet. She consumed high protein meals in smaller portions, and she combined this diet with an exercise program that includes weight training and cardiovascular workouts. After getting a lot of flak because of her post-pregnancy figure, Kate removed all that baby weight in only four months and has gained abdominal muscles that gained the envy of many in Hollywood.

3. Oprah Winfrey
As one of the most successful talk-show hosts in the world, there is no question that Oprah needs to maintain her physical appearance for her millions of audiences. Known as one of those celebrities who are constantly battling weight gain, she has recently toned up her figure and has never looked figure in age 50 by combining a regular exercise regime and diet plan. Oprah works out five days a week, spending 30 minutes on the threadmill and doing free weights. Her eating plan consists of legumes, fish, nuts, fruits and vegetables, chicken and dairy products that are lowfat. She limits her consumption of white sugar and flour. Oprah also credits her trim figure to her habit of not eating anything after seven in the evening.

4. Gwyneth Paltrow
A lot of people may find it hard to believe that the perpetually slim Academy award-winning actress actually needs to diet. Gwyneth actually follows a healthy eating plan that resembles Oprah's, avoiding sugar and white flour. She usually follows a macrobiotic diet, eating foods like vegetables, brown rice, and lean meat. She also eliminated dairy from her diet, and does yoga everyday.

5. Madonna
The pop star known as the Material Girl has always flaunted a body that is to die for, and has become a true fitness paragon over the years. She keeps herself in tip-top shape by having Ashtanga Yoga, and follows a strict diet that mostly shuns junk foods. She adopted a macrobiotic eating plan that includes organic foods rich in lean protein.

6. Claudia Schiffer
The bodacious German supermodel eats salad and steamed vegetables for dinner and eats only fruits before the afternoon. While on locations, she prefers to eat black grapes and drinks tomato juice and herbal tea.

7. Christie Brinkley
Long-time supermodel maintains her all-American good looks by being a vegetarian. She does not keep junk foods of any kind inside her home to make sure that she does not eat them when cravings occur. She snacks on sweet potatoes in place of candy bars, and she adopts a liquid juice diet when she needs to slim down fast.

Celebrities are just like ordinary people. They need to maintain their figures just like anyone else, and there is more pressure on their part since they are constantly in the public eye. Ordinary folks can have celebrity-like bodies, too, and by following these diet and fitness plans, they can also look like red-carpet worthy.

Friday, December 11, 2009

Atkins Diet Basics

The Atkins diet is not a new phenomenon. The diet first appeared in the late 1970s and has grown popularity in recent years in response to the low-fat diet craze. As dieters had trouble with low-fat plans, they searched for a new solution and Dr. Atkins’ New Diet Revolution book found a new audience.

A lot of people have jumped on the Atkins bandwagon and there has been a lot of hype as a result. But what are the basic principles of the Atkins diet?

The Atkins diet is based on a theory of why we get fat. According to Dr. Atkins, the over-consumption of carbohydrates and simple sugars leads to weight gain. The way your body processes the carbohydrates you eat have more to do with your waistline than the amount of fat or calories that you consume. In his book, Atkins outlines a phenomenon called “insulin resistance.” He theorizes that many overweight people have cells that do not work correctly.

When you eat excess carbohydrates and sugar, your body notices that sugar levels are elevated. Insulin is released from the pancreas in order to store sugar as glycogen in the liver and muscle cells for extra energy later on. However, your body can only store so much glycogen at once. As soon as your body reaches its limit for glycogen storage, the excess carbohydrates are stored as fat. This happens to everyone who eats too many carbohydrates.

However, insulin resistant individuals have an even harder time of using and storing excess carbohydrates. The more insulin that your body is exposed to, the more resistant it becomes. Overtime, the pancreas releases more insulin and cells become insulin resistant. The cells are trying to protect themselves from the toxic effects of high insulin. They create less glycogen and more fat.

As a result, insulin resistant individuals gain extra weight. The carbohydrates get converted into fat instead of energy. Other side effects include fatigue, brain “fog” (the inability to focus, poor memory, loss of creativity), low blood sugar (which can leads to hypoglycemia), intestinal bloating, sleepiness, depression and increased blood sugar. There is much more than weight at stake when you are insulin resistant.

The remedy for people who are insulin resistant is a diet restricted in carbohydrates. The crux of the Atkins diet is a limitation of carbohydrates in all of its forms. The foods restricted on the Atkins plan include simple sugars (like cookies, sodas and sweets) and complex carbohydrates (like bread, rice and grains). Even carbohydrates that are considered healthy, such as oatmeal, brown rice and whole wheat bread, are restricted on the program.

The diet has you restrict your carbohydrate intake to less than 40 grams a day. This will put your body in a state of ketosis. While in ketosis, your body will burn fat as fuel. According to Dr. Atkins’ research, the ketosis state will also affect insulin production and it will prevent more fat from being formed. Your body will begin using your stored fat as an efficient form of fuel, and you’ll lose weight.
Another benefit of the Atkins plan is that ketosis will end your cravings for carbohydrates. If you’ve been living on a carb-heavy diet, you may have found that you simply cannot get enough carbohydrates. With carbohydrate restriction and ketosis comes a reduction in carbohydrate cravings. People who have been on the Atkins diet for some time report that they do not crave carbohydrates as they once did.

Although the initial phases of the Atkins diet are rather strict, the program teaches you to restore balance to your diet in the long run. People who use the diet slowly reintroduce minimal amounts of carbohydrate into their eating until they find a comfortable balance between their health and carbohydrate use.

The basic principles of the Atkins diet have been adapted to many other low-carb diet plans. However, Atkins popularity still remains strong as one of the most effective low-carbohydrate solutions for those who are insulin resistant.

The “Quick Weight Loss Diet” Trend Disadvantage

If you wear a size 14 and you blow a bundle on designer size 8 dresses as motivation, you will probably end up feeling guilty, frustrated, and angry if you are not slinking around in it a month later.

In reality, you will do much better setting smaller, achievable targets for yourself. If you must try the new-clothes strategy, go down a size at a time, and do not buy anything you have to take out a second mortgage to pay for.

Because, if you continue to remorse on losing weight fast, you will end up incorporating fad diets or those that offer quick weight loss.

For most people who are not aware of this fact, there are no such things as quick weight loss diets and there is no nippy weight loss for people who want to be slimmer than what their body can provide.

The problem with most people is that they tend to opt for nippy fixes wherein fact these things are not effective at all.

What Does Not Work

Today, there are plenty of weight-loss strategies that are guaranteed to backfire. This is because these nippy fixes instilled on certain diet plans are, in reality, not efficient because it does not employ the right principle and the right attitude in losing weight.

These quick weight loss diet plans are known as fad diets because that is exactly what they are, just a fad. In time, when fashion is over and popularity wanes down, people will realize that the diet they have depended on is not reliable at all.

To know more about these fad diets that are selling like hotcakes in the market today, here is a list of some telltale signs that would tell you not to try it even once.

Here they are:

1. Skipping meals

Does your diet plan require you to skip meals? If it does, then, it is a fad diet.

Abstain from food completely is not a healthy habit. It may even cause some serious complications or problems especially for people who are sick with diabetes.

Skipping meals will only cause a hypoglycemia, or the condition wherein your blood sugar is really low, and will probably only be effective in making you eat twice as much at the next meal.

2. Dieting without exercise, or vice versa

Exercise is crucial to the human body. It is important in the proper blood circulation and other activities of the human body system.

Therefore, diet plans that do not require you to exercise are nuisances. People are born to move.

But then again, exercise alone is not sufficient. Hence, it would be better if diet and exercise will go hand-in-hand.

3. Continuous dawdling

There is no better time to start losing weight. If you want to really lose those excess fats, you have to lose weight now.

Delaying tactics will not get you anywhere and will only make the problem worse. So, if your diet plan suggests a certain timeframe for you start losing weight, chances are, you are following the trend of fad diets.

Boiled down, it is best to rely more on the way you feel than the tale of the tape. This means that if the weighing scale tells you that you are losing weight even if it is slower than you would like, but you are feeling energetic and positive about your weight-loss efforts, then, you are just doing fine.

As mentioned and is worth mentioning all over again, weight loss is not a quick process.

How To Master Nutrient Timing For Faster Muscle Growth!

It's true that the grueling workout you've invested at the local "iron jungle" will stimulate your muscles to grow bigger and stronger. But ultimately it's your diet that will provide the "building blocks" for this new growth.

However, there's more to a bodybuilder's diet than mountains of canned tuna and protein powder. Timing your meals just right will provide you with a competitive edge that will allow you to build muscle faster and help burn those extra layers of fat covering up your hard work.

Here's how...

Early Morning

When you wake up, you're at the end of a 7-9 hour fast and your muscles are screaming for nutrition. Start off with a potent protein drink for fast absorption mixed with some complex carbs for fueling your day.

(For my "top secret recipe" of the world's best mass building breakfast, check out my “top tip” at the end of this article!)

1-2 Hours Before Your Workout

You're about to send your muscles into the "combat zone" so shouldn't you provide them with the ammunition they need to "take the hill"?

Load up on some complex carbs that will provide the long lasting fuel you'll need to power through your intense workout. Add a full dose of protein to provide a ready source of amino acids and give your muscles a head start on the growth process as you stress the muscle cells during your workout.

Immediately After Your Workout

You've used up the glycogen (stored carbohydrates) in your muscle cells as fuel for your workout and if you don't replenish them fast, you're bound to short circuit your growth.

Within 45 minutes to an hour after your workout you need to down a high-glycemic, high protein drink while your body is primed for fast absorption. Take in between 75 - 100 grams of sugar and about 25% of your day's total protein requirement along with a healthy dose of monounsaturated fats to help stimulate testosterone production.

This is actually a key time to really pack on mass so don't be afraid to get a little crazy here! In my "Optimum Anabolics" program (http://tinyurl.com/yzw5gj7), I actually include a potent post-workout regimen of around 200 grams of high glycemic carbs and 20-30 grams of health fats to kickstart a mass-building hormone release. It works!

Before Bed

You're about to enter another long period of fasting at bedtime, but it's also a prime time for your body to repair and build muscle. The problem is that your metabolism slows way down when you sleep so a large meal before turning in has the potential to trigger fat storage.

To provide the building blocks your body needs for growth while minimizing fat storage, eat a light meal consisting of slow-digesting protein and some easily digestible carbs. A bowl of cottage cheese with some fruit is ideal or mix a scoop of protein powder (one with casein in it is best) into some milk or water. Be sure to avoid high carbs and fat calories at this time.

* * * TOP DIET TIP * * *

Ok, it's time for my promised “Top Secret” Pre-Workout Power Potion Recipe that will give you everything you need to turbo-charge your workouts while providing a ready source of amino acids to avoid muscle loss and begin the growth process.

Follow the directions on the next page and consume this mixture about 1-2 hours before your workout …

The “Muscle Nerd's” Top Secret Pre-Workout Power Potion

Ingredient 1: 1.5 cups Skim Milk

Milk is probably one of the most overlooked supplements there is! It's loaded with both fast-digesting (whey) and slow-digesting (casein) proteins for a steady supply of amino acids...and it's been proven in research to be a powerful growth hormone releaser!

Ingredient 2: ½ Frozen "Slightly Green" Banana

Ripe bananas have more sugar content than bananas that are still slightly green and will result in more of a quick "sugar rush" instead of supplying long term energy to power through your workout. Grab a bunch of "slightly green" bananas at your local supermarket, peel them all, and place them in a plastic bag in your freezer to break up and add to your protein blender drinks as desired.

Ingredient 3: 2 Tbsp Natural Peanut Butter

"Natural" peanut butter ( NOT the commercial hydrogenated garbage!) is loaded with mono-unsaturated fats…perfect for helping you raise your body's testosterone levels for increased muscle mass and rapid fat burning. Look for a product that ONLY lists " Peanuts " and " Salt " on the list of ingredients.

Ingredient 4: ½ Cup Raw Oat Bran or Uncooked Oatmeal

Raw oat bran, like oatmeal, is a complex carbohydrate that is ideal for supplying tons of sustained energy for your workouts… AND the rest of the day.

Its finer texture makes is a better option for blender drinks, but if you only have access to oatmeal, make sure you put the dry oatmeal alone in the blender first and give it a few seconds on "high" to break it up a bit more.

Ingredient 5: ½ Scoop Vanilla Whey Protein

In addition to the casein protein from the milk, whey protein will provide you with additional, ready-to-deliver amino acids that will provide your muscles with a "jump start" on the recovery process.

Vanilla flavored powder seems to go best with this drink but chocolate flavored is another great option!

Directions: Ok…this is pretty self-explanatory, but here goes…

Add the first 4 ingredients in the order listed and blend on "High" for about 15 seconds. While it's still blending, open the top and add the protein powder . Blend for another 5 seconds…stop… drink…wipe the "smoothie mustache" off your face...and enjoy your workout!