The Food Transtion: From Junk to Heatlh

Last night I enjoyed another evening of wonderful healthy natural foods. A bed of alfalfa sprouts top with balsamic vinaigrette, served up with steamed Basmati rice and a baked fillet of salmon. Meals this healthy were not always my mainstay, now they are. For me it was fairly easy to make the transition to a healthy living lifestyle because I live in an area where the general population is predominantly health conscious. Thusly, health stores and co-ops are on every side of town. Because being health conscious is such a big part of the market trends in the area, consumers can find organic foods and other healthy options in most of the major grocery stores as well. This may not be the case in you town. So how can you make the switch to a more healthy lifestyle?

Food is the first step in the transition into a more natural lifestyle. Starting with food is a good because it dose not require you to go to far out of your way of your daily routine to do it. So you say that you don’t have any health food stores, co-opts or farmers markets in your area. How are you supposed to eat all natural foods? Start by looking at the ingredients of the item. Make sure that are no harsh preservatives in it such as sodium benzoate and Benzoic Acid. Both of these chemicals acidify the food which in turn acidifies the pH of your body. Another thing to watch out for is flavor enhancers such as monosoduim gultimate (MSG). Federal Food Administration (FDA) announced in 1995 that MSG leads to short term and long term health issues such as heart palpitations and Alzheimer’s disease. Also, watch out for food colorings such as Red No. 2, 4 and 32 as well as many others. Studies suggest synthetic preservatives and artificial coloring may be aggravating ADD & ADHD symptoms. By making sure these chemical additives are not in your foods, you have stated down the path of healthier lifestyle. Finally another to look for when buying conventional foods from your local major chain grocer is to make sure you know what the ingredients are, the simpler the better. For example, carrots, water and salt in a can of carrots would a safe bet. I like to say that if you can read it and understand it it’s probably not full of chemical.

A finally tip on making the transition from junk foods to health food is find healthy menus with organic recipes good recipes that include different essentials for daily nutrition. There are recipes all over the net you can find. Here is one I found just the other day:

Turkey Pot Pie
Ingredients:

4 tablespoons Organic Valley Cultured Butter
6 tablespoons flour
3 cups turkey or chicken broth
2-3 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley or 1-2 teaspoons dried parsley flakes
1-2 teaspoons dried basil
1/2 cup Organic Valley Heavy Cream
Salt and pepper
3 medium carrots
1 medium onion
1 celery rib
2 cups cooked, cubed Organic Prairie Turkey (or more as desired)
2/3 cup peas
1 recipe baking powder dough, such as Rosemary Buttermilk Biscuits

Instructions:

1. To make sauce: Melt butter in a large, heavy saucepan over medium-low flame. Stir in flour until smooth; cook over low flame, stirring often, about 10 minutes. Whisk in the warm broth, parsley and basil. Let it simmer slowly, stirring often, about 10 minutes. The mixture will thicken into a sauce. Stir in cream and season to taste with salt and pepper. Keep sauce warm.

2. To make vegetable-turkey mixture: Add water to a depth of 2 to 3 inches to a medium saucepan; bring to boil. Meanwhile, dice the carrots, onion and celery. Add them to the boiling water; cook at a strong simmer until vegetables are crisp-tender, about 5 minutes. Drain and stir cooked vegetables, turkey and peas into sauce. Simmer 2-3 minutes, then lower heat to lowest flame and keep mixture hot.

3. To make biscuits: Heat oven to 350 degrees. Butter a 9-by-13-inch dish, one that is at least 3 inches deep. Prepare biscuit dough according to recipe directions. Cut biscuits into 10 or 12 three-inch rounds with a sharp knife and a cup, or with a round cookie cutter.

4. To bake: Spread hot turkey-vegetable in the baking dish; top with biscuits and bake until sauce is bubbly and biscuits are high and golden, about 20 minutes. Serve hot from the oven.

Healthy Foods for Healthy Children

Sometimes in our busy workaday life it’s hard to make sure we are keeping our family and children healthy and supplying them with all the nutrition they need to grow into healthy, well balanced adults. With so much going on in our day to day lives, the temptation to rely on prepackaged quick meals, lunch cafeteria choices, and other less wholesome lunches is hard to resist. However, there are so many good reasons to make sure kids eat fresh, all natural foods as often as possible.

These days it seems like there are new health risks facing our children every day. More and more young people are being prescribed medications for all sorts of illnesses from physical to mental to emotional. These powerful medications are not always 100% successful, and often come with a hefty price tag of dangerous side effects. Yet we neglect the basic building blocks of life…the foods we eat.

It is well known that healthy foods such as whole grains, fresh organic vegetables, all natural foods and unprocessed ingredients are much better in every way. They keep the body clean and in proper working order, prevent illness and disease, extend life expectancy and combat the symptoms of old age, promote healing and recovery faster and more thoroughly and a whole range of other benefits.

Maintaining a healthy diet and good nutrition is especially important for children. Kids are still growing and developing, and the body uses a lot of fuel during these stages. Young people tend to be more active as well, and require the proper kind of fuel to maintain the constant on-the-go lifestyle of many youngsters. A lot of energy is burned by a child out playing in the woods, running in the yard, riding a bicycle and playing all the sports and activities that kids do

Children are also students, and in this span of years they do a lot of learning and emulating and also at this time habits are formed that may stay with them for the rest of their lives. All natural menus and organic recipes are one way to help your kids maintain the energy and attention span needed to achieve the most they can in academics. It seems that many children today live on diets that are full of things such as artificial ingredients, highly processed refined sugars and ingredients such as high fructose corn syrup. Then we wonder why they can’t sit still and concentrate in class.

Middle schools and high schools around the country have also taken to the strange practice of allowing fast food chains that serve meals devoid of nutritious value to our young people to occupy space on campuses or in the schools themselves. Fast food chains such as these offer breakfast, lunch and dinner foods, and many young people are relying on these places for two and sometimes three of their meals a day. Ice cream, candy, soda and other types of snacks and junk food are often made available to students in the stores of the school itself. How can we expect to make the right choice when it comes to nutrition with such temptations available to them?

Teaching children to respect good nutrition from the start is one way to ensure that your children will appreciate the benefits of a healthy diet and natural lifestyle. When a young person learns about the value of organic foods, all natural recipes and healthy diets, they have a chance to get excited about it and carry on the habits into adulthood.

Health Foods as Medicine

What is medicine to you? Oftentimes the word medicine will conjur up images of pill bottles, icky syrups or syringes. The word has developed a negative connotation for many, especially since a particular medicine is often associated with the unfortunate malaise it is intended to treat. However, to view medicine as something to be taken only after one is already sick is to do a disservice to ourselves. Medicine can be a substance, or a practice of using substances that prevent disease in the first place, such as an all natural diet and healthy lifestyle. The foods we eat can be medicine too.

Sometimes it seems that the entire “western” medical profession is based around treating illness after it already arises. We are constantly chasing symptoms, and trying to undo damage we create by our day to day living. Invasive surgeries and powerful chemicals are used to combat years of disregard for the body. Doesn’t it make more sense, however, to avoid getting sick in the first place?

The most direct control we have over our own health is our diet and consumption habits. Of course eliminating harmful toxins such as cigarette smoking or environmental factors are a huge help as well, but our diet is crucial. We eat multiple times every day. Each meal is a choice between healing our bodies with natural menus and organic foods, or doing more harm to our bodies with processed junk foods and take out dinners. Simple changes in the ingredients, the menus and the way we eat can drastically change the quality of life for the better.

We hear a lot about “health care” these days. In the political arena, in the workplace and at home it is a hot topic, and everyone seems to have an opinion about it. It is a topic that affects everybody at every age. Once again, however, when we think of this term, it still seems to refer to what we do after we get sick. When we really look at the phrase, it too should refer to our lifestyle. Medicine and health care can be more than drugs, surgeries and treatments. It can be a way that we live our life; the way we care for our health.

Creating organic menus and switching to an all natural lifestyle is easier than one might think, and benefits every aspect of our lives. Eating whole foods and avoiding chemical filled, over processed ingredients is one way to avoid having to see the doctor so often. These foods are medicine for sure, as they do the job of fighting off disease and keeping the body healthy and energized. Adopting an organic lifestyle will help to make sure you stay active later into life as well.

Spending time outdoors, walking or exercising and adopting an attitude of health will go a long way to helping you transition into a more sustainable lifestyle. Activities such as these are a great way to compliment natural menus and organic recipes. In this way, medicine becomes the way we live our whole life. Health care becomes something we do every day, all the time, instead of the program you have set up with you insurance agency.

A walk through the library or search on the web will reveal many resources for living a more natural lifestyle. Web sites such as www.gnliving.com have tips, stories, recipes and menus all designed to help folks make a smooth and enjoyable transition to a healthy lifestyle.

Healthy Eating in a Busy World

These days staying healthy and eating nutritious, healthy foods can be challenging. We wake up with barely enough time to get dressed and head to work, and a healthy menu is often replaced with a cup of coffee and a quick snack from a convenience store. Lunch time rolls around and we find ourselves replacing a balanced meal with some take-out from whichever fast food chain happens to be closest to our work place. By the time we get home from work, cooking a proper meal seems to be the furthest thing from our minds, so we order from our favorite delivery restaurant, and we all know the places that deliver tend to have that yummy junk food we should save as an occasional treat.

It may seem like a daunting task for some, but transitioning to a healthy diet even when faced with a busy schedule is not difficult. As a matter of fact, it can be very fun and is virtually guaranteed to improve the quality of every aspect of your life. It simply requires a little bit of planning and a little bit of discipline. Bringing lunches to work, and having a list of easy to prepare wholesome dinners simply requires a small amount of forethought. The ultimate result is that you will be healthier, happier and more capable doing the things you want to do for a much longer period of time.

Start by making a budget for your shopping, and trying to stick to a good shopping list when you go to the grocery store. Try to choose all natural foods and organic foods and vegetables. Buy enough ingredients to make healthy meals that will leave you with leftovers to take in a container for lunch at work throughout the week. Grab sweets and snacks that will satisfy your cravings, but make sure they are all natural, organic and free of refined sugars and artificial ingredients.

Try leaving yourself a little more time in the morning to make a decent meal. Breakfast is crucial and all too often we find ourselves needing to skip it. Keep fresh fruit on hand, perhaps in a bowl on the table. This is a great way to start your day. Try drinking a glass of water before you drink that first cup of coffee, and save that java for your first meal. Cereal with a little fruit takes just moments to prepare, and if you choose whole grain cereals and fresh organic fruits, you will start your day off with a well balanced meal. Simple organic recipes are available all over the internet to get you started.

Dinners don’t have to be complicated if you do a little prep work ahead of time. Take one day to prepare ingredients and keep them in the fridge so you can still make a healthy meal, even when you come home late or have plans for the evening. Soaking beans ahead of time, or keeping some extra chopped vegetables in a bowl for a day or two will make cooking a meal faster and more appealing. Healthy living becomes easier and easier the more you do it

There are plenty of resources available for folks who want to make a transition to healthier living. Plenty of books and videos are available with great tips and encouraging anecdotes. Web sites like Go Natural Living are specifically designed to assist people who are new to the wonderful world of healthy eating and living. At gnliving.com you will actually find explanations, tips, pre-designed organic menus and lots of other great information on making your lifestyle more healthy and sustainable.

An Introduction to Organic foods.

An Introduction to Organic Foods

By: Jack Moe

When it comes to foods, the term “organic” is becoming more and more common. Organic foods are foods that were grown without the use of artificial fertilizers, chemical pesticides, and genetically altered seeds or sprouts. Foods that do use artificial fertilizers, chemical pesticides, and genetically altered seeds or sprouts are generally referred to as “conventional” items.

As the popularity of natural lifestyles has grown, various organizations have been created to set up standards to distinguish between what is an organically grown item and what is not. Foods that adhere to the standards of that particular agency and arrange to be inspected by representatives of those agencies will usually display a label of some kind to inform the consumer of this additional standard. The most common label of this kind is the green “USDA organic label”

There are many reasons eating all natural foods and organic food has become important to people. The largest and most obvious reason for switching to organic recipes is that many people believe the pesticides and fertilizers used to grow and protect the vegetables can never be completely washed away and eventually makes its way into our system when we eat those foods.

The argument continues that even if we do get all the chemicals off of our produce, those chemicals are no less dangerous being introduced into the waste and water systems. The mere fact that they are spread across acres and acres of land means that eventually those chemical will find their way into our bodies and cause great harm over time.

Proponents of organic foods also believe that because the seeds and vegetables are processed less and grow using all natural fertilizers, they retain far more flavor and many, many times the nutritional value of conventional produce. This is partially due to that fact that because certified organic produce can not use artificial preservatives, it makes its way to the grocery store that much faster. According to advocates, using organic ingredients helps to create fresh and healthy menus that are full of nutrition.

Another reason why organic ingredients are thought to be superior to conventional foods is the fact that they are by their very nature a stronger genetic breed. Plants that have been manipulated genetically over generations or sprayed season after season with strong pesticides will inherently be weaker on their own, with less developed natural defenses. This is thought to further compromise the nutritional value of the end product.

Detriment to the environment is another major concern of proponents of organic foods. As these pesticides run off into the surrounding ecosystem, a huge array of problems can result, from contamination of the nearby lakes and streams to the poisoning of the local water table. Using fertilizers and pest repellents that are also organic ensures that the excess materials will bio-degrade harmlessly into the environment.

Organic foods are often the first step many people take when transitioning to a healthier way of eating and a healthy lifestyle in general. Organic clothes, furniture and many other household goods are now available to the general consumer, but organic foods are still the most important, because those are the things that most directly affect our health.

Making the switch to organic foods can be fun and educational. With the huge increase in the number of health food stores, and also the number of organic sections in “conventional” grocery stores, finding organic ingredients is becoming far easier and more cost effective.

A wealth of information can be found online as well, from websites such as www.gnliving.com. Go Natural Living is dedicated to helping people make the transition to healthy eating as easy and fun as possible.