Pomegranate juice
Pomegranate juice is great for reducing belly fat and also helps lower blood pressure! Just 500ml daily could make a difference.
Turkey good mood enhancer
Chicken and turkey contain a valuable amino acid called Tryptophan, which converts into serotonin. This is a well-known mood enhancer and works well to battle depression and seasonal affective disorder (SAD). So don’t be sad, get eating that lean meat!
Fight the Flu!
Cardiovascular training is vital to maintaining overall fitness and well-being. However, an unfortunate occurrence for many regular exercisers is the dreaded cold and upper-tract infections. Fight the flu by taking 3mg of Vitamin C in divided doses through the day (you can buy it in powder form). Also, suck on zinc lozengers and take a vitamin B6 supplement. If you’re ill – take a break! Don’t stress your body out by exercising through it. Taking a couple of days off will be better for you in the long run.
Bagel - a pre-workout snack
The last thing you want to do after a taxing workout is starve yourself. So here are some nutritious snacks that will replenish your energy levels without increasing your waistline:
- Banana sandwich
- Oatmeal biscuits
- Rice cakes with fruit spread
- Grapes and oranges
- Muesli
- A baked or boiled potato
- Maltodextrin drink (250ml)
- Fruit squash/soft drink
Want to snack BEFORE your workout? Try these 45 minutes to an hour before you hit the gym:
- Banana
- Apple
- Bagel with low-fat cream cheese
- Rice cake with fruit spread
daily nutrition stats
Many people like to use the 1g per kilogram of bodyweight rule when calculating how much carbohydrate and/or protein to consume for a healthy diet. For a rough guideline, however, these are the daily vital stats for an average 2,000 calorie diet (slightly higher for men):
Carbohydrate: 250g
Protein: 50g
Fat: 70g (of which no more than 20g saturated)
Fibre: 18g
Sugar: 50g
Salt: 6g (for men and women)
Water: 2-3.75 litres (for men and women)
You will need to increase all of the above if your day is very active.
Dairy ain't all bad!
Slimming shakes? Bad choice!
If you’re one of the many dieters that uses shakes to replace meals, please think again! Losing weight by eating less does work, but you have to do it safely.
Firstly, on the days that you work out, it’s important you’re getting enough calories from carbohydrate, to provide enough energy for your workout. Refrain from restricting your calorie intake on these days. It is generally not advisable to restrict your calories more than twice a week.
If you are embarking on a taxing resistance session, whey protein shakes are useful for supplementing your diet and ensuring you get enough protein to repair the muscle fibres post workout. Just remember, they are supplementary – not food replacements!
Slimming shakes, on the other hand, are designed to replace meals. Unfortunately, they are not very effective in facilitating weight loss. By restricting your calorie intake so drastically, your body ends up reacting by going into starvation mode. At this time, it holds onto fat as it doesn’t know when the next source of energy is expected. Cave man style! For more effective ways to lose weight, read my ‘Weight Loss’ posts under ‘Categories’.
Sports drinks - which one and when?
Sports drinks play an important role in keeping you hydrated during your exercise sessions. Now, I’m not talking Red Bull here! Energy drinks are NOT the same as sports drinks! In fact, if anything, the caffeine in energy drinks will dehydrate you.
As well as replacing fluids lost through sweating, sports drinks also maintain the right balance of electrolytes (minerals such as sodium, potassium and magnesium) in your body. If this balance is adversely affected, you will dehydrate or, in extreme cases, suffer heat-stroke.
So which type is best, and when? If your cardio sessions tend to be 45 minutes or less, drinking water is sufficient. Sports drinks are not necessary for shorter exercise sessions. However, if you exercise for longer than 45 minutes, then consider keeping yourself hydrated with an ISOTONIC sports drink. Your body will need approximately 30g of carbohydrate for an hour of exercise. If you are a long distance runner, consider drinking an isotonic drink combined with another sugar source like wine gums. To boost energy levels just before your workout, sip on a HYPERTONIC drink. After your session, a HYPOTONIC drink will aid recovery.
Are E numbers actually safe?
Food programmes are nothing new on television – we’re spoilt for choice when it comes to bake-offs, reality TV shows involving restaurants and famous chefs on various escapades. But lately, there have been two very different series that have silently crept onto our TV schedules. Their aim is different to most other food shows; they want to educate not entertain.
The BBC’s E Numbers: An Edible Adventure may have just finished, but it’s still available on the BBC iPlayer. Its aim is to make us aware of the functions of E numbers in food. Food writer Stefan Gates explains their uses via a number of interesting experiments. They are designed to show the viewer that E numbers, despite their bad reputation, are actually essential to our food. Without preservatives, we would not be able to store our food in cupboards for months on end. Meat would be dangerous to eat after a couple of days. Without stabilisers and colourings, our food wouldn’t look as uniform and appealing as they do now. Their natural colouring would probably just put us off. Who would want to eat beige-coloured mushy peas?
This week, Channel 4 also launched an educational series, simply entitled Food. The content is a bit random and unconnected, but each week it aims to educate us about different aspects of food. The first episode addressed such issues as which parts of pork are best to eat, which fruit juices contain the most sugar and which supermarket is best value for money.
Both programmes are essential viewing for anyone that is interested in what they’re putting in their mouths. That should be all of us! Unlike other shows, where food and cooking comes secondary to entertainment and drama, these two hidden gems provide useful and interesting information to a viewing public who probably don’t know as much as they should about the basics of healthy eating. In an age where obesity levels are rising and junk food is becoming the norm, programmes like these are an invaluable and much-needed source of information.
“Start with one family, that’s how you start a revolution,” declares Jamie Oliver. Channel 4’s Jamie’s American Food Revolution sees him on his latest quest – to revolutionise the way Americans eat. The chef travels to Huntington, West Virginia – a city officially recognised as having the highest number of obese people in America. His mission: to persuade the population to change their diets for the better.
You get an idea of how difficult this mission is going to be when Jamie goes to a local radio station to promote his campaign. “We don’t want to sit around and eat lettuce all day,” quips the sour-faced DJ. Jamie quite rightly points out that he is not here to cook them lettuce. Things go rapidly downhill from there, when he attempts to overhaul the lunch menu at a local school. The dinner ladies are anything but receptive to his suggestion for change. They serve pizza for breakfast and chicken nuggets for lunch. The ample oven space in the kitchens is used solely for heating up frozen food. This is the way they run things because this is what they believe works. Cooking from fresh is too much effort.
With such a dire diet regime already in place and small-minded people who are resistant to change, it is no wonder the town is home to the fattest people in the country. Huntington has the highest obesity levels in America and America has the highest obesity levels in the world. It doesn’t get any worse than this. Jamie has his work cut out for him. Not only are the locals weary of his proposed overhaul, but they’ve also heard about a radio interview he did back home where he allegedly called them ‘ignorant’. Of course, Jamie was completely misquoted, but this hasn’t set things off on the right note.
Jamie is reduced to tears as his frustrations surface. Can Jamie continue on his mission and make it work? The adults don’t seem to understand that this is a case of life or death for their children. He decides to start with one drastically overweight family, in the hope that their example will inspire others. He buries their deep fat fryer and hands them a list of healthy recipes. Will this be the beginning of a revolution? Let’s hope so because Jamie’s intentions are worthy. It’s clear America needs to learn from what he has to say. Change needs to happen and it needs to filter out from the small towns. Next week, Jamie is resorting to shock tactics. He’s armed with a loudspeaker and an alarming truck full of fat. Will he get his point across? I can’t wait to find out!
