If you look at people who are in the health profession, many of them are very unhealthy. They [...]]]> When living a healthy lifestyle I’ve noticed that it is one thing to study it, another to actually live it. Living a truly healthy lifestyle is not easy. You find that you cannot make food the center of your celebrations, you cannot dine out as easily as before, you need to prepare some dishes you used to buy in boxes from scratch, etc.

If you look at people who are in the health profession, many of them are very unhealthy. They have studied health, but they have not lived it. A very wise person once said to me that you have to have the intellectual knowledge, but you also have to have practical experience. Unfortunately, most health professionals only obtained the intellectual part of the equation.

Back 30+ years ago when my husband became a vegetarian he was told, point blank, that he would be dead in six months if he didn’t eat some meat. Well, that didn’t happen and now science is actually saying a plant-based diet is the healthiest there is. This, of course, didn’t help my husband way back when, as he struggled to fix meals that were tasty and meatless. He found a lot of help in the East Indian foods, since Hindus have been vegetarian for time immemorial.

When living a healthy lifestyle, you need to look at what works for you. For some people they will find that yoga is a great exercise for them, others will like swimming, others tennis. In all aspects of your life you need to look at how you are responding to it. If you feel energized, joyful, creative, clear minded, feeling refreshed with minimal sleep, etc., you are on the right track.

In everything that you eat, do, think, or believe you need to be willing to look at it and say, “This works.” “ This doesn’t.” “This will work if I tweak it this way.” You need to look at the long-term effects of certain things and then be willing, and even embrace, the changes that need to be made to create the life you really want.

Doctors have a very short lifespan. Most die in their 50s. They are so “busy” taking care of others that they don’t apply the same recommendations to their own life. I’ve seen many obese dieticians. Also, people who seemingly have it right suddenly die of a heart attack or cancer, because they lived healthy physically, but forgot the components of emotions, mental constructs, and consciousness, thus creating illness from their negative patterns, rather than negative physical practices.

I’ve had people in their 20s wonder how I can have so much energy. I had a man ask me my age when he found out my husband is a senior citizen. He was shocked. He thought I was 36. I’m over 50.

A very good book to look at is “Biology of Belief” by Bruce Lipton. We are not only what we eat, but what we think, believe, do, and feel. Only when a person lives a holistic life, will they truly know peak health. That peak health also supports creating the life of your dreams, because you’ll have the energy, clarity, and creativity needed to make them a reality.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

This past weekend I needed to cook two meals a day for eight people. I have to admit that I had a terrible time getting the proportions right. The first day I made way too many grains, the second not enough.

Also, because there was no kitchen where I had to serve I had to make all the food in crock pots. It was tasty, but the vegetables were more of [...]]]>

How do you feed a crowd healthy, nutritious, delicious food?

This past weekend I needed to cook two meals a day for eight people. I have to admit that I had a terrible time getting the proportions right. The first day I made way too many grains, the second not enough.

Also, because there was no kitchen where I had to serve I had to make all the food in crock pots. It was tasty, but the vegetables were more of a soup than a dish and the grains got overcooked and mushy.

Another problem I had was just how much salt, herbs, and spices I needed to put in. It is very frustrating to be an excellent cook and feel like you fed a group of people a very mediocre meal. They all raved about it, but still, I know that it could have been so much better.

The things that worked well were the bread and the salad. Other than that I felt like people were OK with what was served, but not really excited about it.

So, what is your best tip for cooking for crowds from 8 to 30? I know that I’m going to need to be preparing large scale meals again. Also, what do you serve for snacks? Remember it needs to be healthy. No white sugar or flour, something prepared fresh that will feed a small army of munchers. I had fruit and freshly made popcorn that went over fairly well, but I want to get away from chips and overly sweet treats. Please leave a comment below. I’d be interested and I’m sure others would to. We’ve all come up against this bugger at one time or another.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Opening a bakery can be a lot of fun, but there are challenges in anything you do.

My mom and I decided to become business partners once I got really sick of staying home with the kids. I had always dreamed of opening a bakery and I finally had enough capital to do it so mom said she would come in and help and be my right-hand man which was a real relief because I didn’t want [...]]]> This guest post from Edgardo Rosa

Opening a bakery can be a lot of fun, but there are challenges in anything you do.

My mom and I decided to become business partners once I got really sick of staying home with the kids. I had always dreamed of opening a bakery and I finally had enough capital to do it so mom said she would come in and help and be my right-hand man which was a real relief because I didn’t want to have to do it on my own. Mom helped with all the logistical things like setting up a website for us, getting me wireless internet packages for the office is talking to our creditors about what are interest rates would be. I focus on things like recipes and decorating the store as well as getting marketing organized for the first year of business and we’ve been open now for about two months. Things are actually going much better than I even expected it to go and mom and I have been working together really well. I can’t wait to see where the next few years takes us and our fledgling little business!

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Was shocked to find that cheese is one [...]]]> One of the things I like to keep my readers up to date on is what diet research is showing. Well, this past week I was perusing Dr. Oz’s site and he had an article on the four most addictive foods. I figured sugar would be there, but the other three surprised me. The dastardly four are sugar (no surprise), chocolate (a little surprise), meat (big surprise), and cheese (the biggest surprise).

Was shocked to find that cheese is one of the most addictive foods.

What research is showing is that these four foods either directly have dopamine in them or they combine with chemicals in your body to create dopamine. Dopamine is a highly addictive drug. I can now have a little more empathy for people who say they absolutely cannot imagine becoming a vegetarian. They’ve become addicted to meat. I myself was addicted to sugar, but went on a 21-day sugar fast and that has totally cleared up. I can eat something with sugar or not. Makes no difference to me. I do eat some chocolate, but again not on a regular basis, and cheese I like and eat about twice a week, but was a vegan for nearly 3 years.

So now not only do we have high fructose corn syrup sucker punching our liver to create fat and making us feel like we’ve not eaten enough, so we overeat. We have toxins that are polluting our bodies and making us hold onto fat to keep ourselves from poisoning ourselves with the toxins. Now we have to look at whether we’re actually addicted to foods that have been touted as necessities for life (there are healthy, vibrant societies that don’t eat any of the dastardly four).

It also helps me to understand when someone tries to become a vegetarian and they say that they just felt horrible about three days in. They were having withdrawal symptoms. I was fortunate I didn’t have any of that with any of the dietary changes I made. I made them because I was ready for a new level of health and understood that the changes would help me reach that.

So, remember, what’s in your cupboard or fridge can hurt you. It’s time to arm yourself with knowledge of how to care for your body. We tend to pay more attention to our car than our own personal vehicle, the miraculous body. So, maybe you ought to take a peek under the hood and see how your “engine” is running.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Finally [...]]]> When I became a vegetarian there weren’t a lot of good vegetarian cookbooks, plus most of them were for ovo-lacto vegetarians and I don’t eat eggs. For years I pined away, wishing I could make good muffins, cakes, pancakes, and the like. I tried all the egg replacers and found them to really be lacking. I did manage some decent treat using things like applesauce and yogurt, but sometimes I didn’t want their distinct flavors in what I was preparing.

Finally I began to play around with it myself and found that it is incredibly easy to make everything from cookies to pancakes from one basic recipe. How you make it into each different treat is through how much water you add to the dough, as well as what extras you put in. For instance you will put a lot less water into a cookie dough, than a pancake batter. You’ll add more sugar to cookies, too. In muffins you might want to add dried fruit, nuts, etc. Cookies may have peanut butter or things like that added to it, which all affect the level of water needed.

One of the nice things I found is that, even when I messed up I turned out something edible. Oh, maybe the muffins were a little gooey on the inside or the cookies didn’t flatten out the way I wanted, but they were all edible.

So, here’s my very basic recipe:

Basic Flour Mix

1 cup whole wheat flour

• 1 cup white whole wheat flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp salt

Enough water to make batter/dough the consistency you need.

That being said here are a few variations I do for different recipes.

1. If I want my cookies to flatten out some I add about ¼ cup sunflower or safflower oil.
2. If using peanut butter you’ll need a bit more water.
3. When making a sweet treat I use Sucanat, a whole sugar. Not too sweet add ½ cup, really sweet add 1 cup.
4. To know how much of a spice to put in, for cookies or muffins, just refer to a recipe in a book and use their recommendation. Just remember spices you use less of, herbs you can use more of. Don’t be tempted to add a bunch more of the spices as it can be very overpowering. If you really want it to be especially cinnamony, then add about ¼ to ½ tsp more.

For cake I have a wonderful recipe that you can mix up right in the 9×13 pan.

Now you can enjoy your treats and have them healthy, too.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

I developed this cookie recipe after becoming vegetarian and dropping eating eggs, as well. I don’t miss [...]]]> Of course all cookies are a treat, but if you make them as healthy as possible you can give them out more freely. Whole sugars, such as Sucanat, have all the nutrients and minerals still intact. It’s still a sugar, but it is used by the body differently and doesn’t cause a loss of nutrients and minerals to process it, like white sugar does.

I developed this cookie recipe after becoming vegetarian and dropping eating eggs, as well. I don’t miss them, as this is a really nice soft cookie. I’ve made awesome double carob cookies (with both powder and chips), oatmeal raisin, and various combinations of different dried fruits and nuts. I think I even turned it into a peanut butter cookie, by adding some peanut butter and cutting back on the oil. All were delicious.

Basic Cookie Recipe

Making Cookies with your kids is a great way to connect. Make them healthy, too.

Makes: 2 dozen cookies

Oven: 325˚

Cooking Time: 12 minutes

• 2 cups whole-wheat pastry flour
• 1 cup Sucanat
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 2 tsp. baking power
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• ¼  cup sunflower oil
• ¾  cup water (approximately)

Preheat oven to 325˚. Put dry ingredients in a bowl and mix. Add wet ingredients and mix into dry ingredients. Add water slowly as some flours may need less water to form a stiff mixture. Drop mixture by teaspoonfuls onto a nonstick cookie sheet. Bake for 12 minutes. Remove from sheet, cool until just warm and then store in airtight container (if you haven’t eaten them all by now).

Variations can be made by adding any of your favorite treats. You can add carob chips, raisins, oatmeal, nuts, sunflower seeds, dried fruits, etc. Add them before you add the wet ingredients and mix them into the flour mixture. You can also change flavorings if you want. Adding 3-4 tablespoons of carob powder will give you a “chocolaty” cookie. Just remember when adding water that you want a fairly stiff dough. Other types of sweeteners can be used, but you may need to adjust the amount of water you add.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

In this day and age you can find information about just about anything on the Internet. Unfortunately you’re at the will of the site owner as to whether the information on the site is truthful or not. One thing I’ve found really helpful is when a site that sells products has customer reviews. Also, bloggers often have good reviews about products that they themselves use. However, if it [...]]]>

Tired of dehydrating food. Try your hand at an apple head doll.

In this day and age you can find information about just about anything on the Internet. Unfortunately you’re at the will of the site owner as to whether the information on the site is truthful or not. One thing I’ve found really helpful is when a site that sells products has customer reviews. Also, bloggers often have good reviews about products that they themselves use. However, if it is a blog you need to check and see if they have paid entries. Take a minute to read their disclosure. Most will have a statement that they will only review products that they know and have used, plus they will only make true statements about products. If they haven’t used it, they can talk about it, but they can’t say it’s a great product or things like that. Once you’ve read that then you can have at least some confidence that their review is real. So, over time you can build up a selection of site to use as a resource library.

In searching around the web I found interesting information on the Best dehydrators to buy. I was pleased to see that my Excalibur is still considered the best large dehydrator around. It was interesting reading the reviews by people. Everyone that I read found the Excalibur to be excellent at drying and very easy to use.

One thing I found interesting was that there were companies I had not heard of before. L’Equip food dehydrators and Nesco were two of the companies that I wasn’t familiar with. Nesco is an inexpensive dehydrator. The one nit that I had with it, was I didn’t see a way to control the temperature, so if you’re concerned about drying “live” foods, then you’ll need to put up a little more money to get one with a temperature dial. The L’Equip dehydrator looked really interesting, but didn’t get as positive reviews as the others. However, it can expand to 20 racks, which would be great if you’ve got a big garden that overproduces most years. I’ve not had that problem, yet.

I enjoyed reading through the food dehydrator recipes. I’ve enjoyed making my own banana chips in the past and the recipes reminded me of how much I enjoy them. I’ll need to check for overripe bananas the next time I shop. I’ve been working on coming up with snacks and foods I can take with me when I go into town to do my weekly shopping. I became aware that I was choosing to munch on a lot of unhealthy foods, because they were quick and portable. However, over the past few months my waistline is showing the effects, plus I never feel very good the day after shopping. Being one to always look at the cause of low energy or a draggy feeling I found that it was always after shopping. It was easy for me to figure out it was my choice of foods. However, there isn’t much out there that a vegetarian that doesn’t eat onions, garlic, green chilis or mushrooms can buy and munch on other than candy bars and potato chips (and only the salted ones, any that have flavorings have onions and garlic in them, even the ones labeled salt and pepper, as do almost all dressings, so salads are out). Anyway, it renewed my interest in looking at things I can dehydrate and eat straightaway. Dehydrated foods are easy to pack and can’t be damaged by cold or heat, either. I think my dehydrator is in store for another workout.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

When I was in college I had a point in my life that was very traumatic; my parent’s were in the middle of a divorce; my senior recital was coming up; finals were coming up soon, etc. I had a very wonderful professor, Dr. Martin Behnke, who saw that I was really struggling to keep things together. He talked to me about seeing his wife, because she was a [...]]]>

Did you know that many foods can help you fall asleep!?

When I was in college I had a point in my life that was very traumatic; my parent’s were in the middle of a divorce; my senior recital was coming up; finals were coming up soon, etc. I had a very wonderful professor, Dr. Martin Behnke, who saw that I was really struggling to keep things together. He talked to me about seeing his wife, because she was a counselor.

One thing I wasn’t doing was sleeping well. I had to move into a school owned apartment with three other people I didn’t know at all. This was a strain, because they were all close friends and didn’t include me in anything. Not only that they were up at all kinds of strange hours, as were all the neighbors. I had moved from a duplex where I had one roommate who I got along with very well and an elderly old lady living downstairs.

The first thing Gay did was give me a list of foods that could help me sleep, and they worked. So, if you find you’re having a hard time sleeping for whatever reason here are some great sleep aids.

Of course there’s the famous warm milk, which does actually help you sleep. Just a few ounces can really do the job. Then there’s peanut butter. Just one ounce can help you relax enough to sleep. Same thing with cheese, especially hard cheeses. Last, but not least there’s beans, such as pinto, black turtle, etc. the dried beans, again just one ounce is all that’s needed, cooked of course.

So, if you find yourself especially sleepy after that Mexican meal of bean burritos, now you know why, between the beans and the cheese you’ve got a natural sleep inducer.

All these foods have tryptophen, which is the precursor to melatonin, which we all know is the sleep-aid that is often sold. Save your money and just eat a little of any of these foods and you’ll drift off to sleep like a baby.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Every year tens of thousands of people resolve to lose weight, but do they? Not many lose anything significant and keep it off. I saw a poll on CNN this morning asking people if they planned to lose weight in 2012. Wow, I just went back to check the figure and it is already down, however, it was either 73 or 76% [...]]]>

A good healthy diet is just one of the keys to permanent weight loss and better overall health.

Every year tens of thousands of people resolve to lose weight, but do they? Not many lose anything significant and keep it off. I saw a poll on CNN this morning asking people if they planned to lose weight in 2012. Wow, I just went back to check the figure and it is already down, however, it was either 73 or 76% of people replied in the affirmative. That means that approximately 75% of the public should lose weight this year. But will they, that is the question.

Statistically most people who lose any weight gain it back within 5 years. They also usually gain back more weight than they originally lost. What are the factors that lead to this yo-yo cycle?

My personal belief is that the individual losing weight does not see it as a lifestyle change. They have in mind to diet for a period of time and then return to their original lifestyle. How do they expect to keep a lean healthy body by going back to the lifestyle that created the weight gain problem in the first place?

This has always been puzzling to me.

Finding an exercise program that works for you is another key.

Just so you don’t think that I’m someone who’s always been trim, when I was 10 years old I was put on a diet, because my mother was afraid I was following in the footsteps of my grossly obese father. If she hadn’t done that I just might have. I absolutely hated being on the diet and decided in that moment I was never going to allow myself to be fat ever again, because I NEVER wanted anyone to tell me what I could and couldn’t eat, ever again. That was a profound and instant lifestyle change.

I’ve only been a little overweight twice in my adult life. First, when I went through a divorce. I gained 20 pounds. Second time was when my hormones started to shift for menopause. Again I gained 20 pounds. In both instances I lost the weight by permanent lifestyle and dietary changes. The emphasis is on the permanent part of it.

In order to have a healthy lifestyle you have to be willing to make permanent changes. Obviously if you have any health issues the way you’re living is a major problem and it needs to be addressed. It’s not just your diet either. It’s your whole lifestyle. It’s what you eat, what you do, what you think, your emotions, your stress level, everything.

A happy outlook on life and ways to reduce stress is key, too.

In order to live a healthy life you need to do a major makeover in your lifestyle. However, it doesn’t have to be done in a day. It has to be done in manageable steps. Only if you’re in a life threatening state does it have to be immediate and dramatic. Otherwise you can do it over time and you’ll see the results accumulate and build as you make more and more changes.

For most people, making a dramatic permanent change is very difficult, but if it is broken down into a number of smaller steps that are easily assimilated in a very short period of time you will have made a lot of changes without feeling like you’ve put a lot of effort into it.

I’m reminded of my friend who ran her first marathon last year. She started with walking to the corner and back, from there she added more and more distance, made changes to her diet to help get her excess weight off and then stunned herself by entering and finishing a marathon.

What I help people do is make those baby steps in the right order, so they don’t fall down or trip over themselves. Each person needs to know what’s right for them. For some people it’s as gentle as a hug, for others, you have to shake them vigorously several times. So, whether you need a hug or a shake, I can help you develop a lifestyle that you enjoy and that restores your weight and health on all levels. However, unless you’re willing to change, permanently, there’s nothing that will work permanently for you.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

My husband is definitely the technology guru of our house. He is great with gadgets and computers, and can really repair anything. It’s awesome to have someone like him around since we increasingly use technology to get though our everyday lives. We use a ton of electronic appliances in our kitchen, so whenever one of those starts acting up, it gets fixed immediately. Last time my phone was acting weird, it was my [...]]]> Thanks for the guest post by Jo Levy

My husband is definitely the technology guru of our house. He is great with gadgets and computers, and can really repair anything. It’s awesome to have someone like him around since we increasingly use technology to get though our everyday lives. We use a ton of electronic appliances in our kitchen, so whenever one of those starts acting up, it gets fixed immediately. Last time my phone was acting weird, it was my husband who fixed it. Then when our computer started going crazy, he came to the rescue again. Sometimes I just wish I could fix things myself! That is why I was so excited when I searched St. Paul wireless internet and found Clear Wireless. My husband was really impressed that I found a service that not only provided wireless internet service for our home, but I got him a mobile hotspot too. It felt really good to finally be the one in the family to fix one of our problems! From now on my husband can keep on fixing things and messing with all of our gadgets, but I’m officially in charge of finding great internet deals!

Bookmark It

Hide Sites