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Chocolate Monkey Protein Shake
1 cup So Nice Unsweetened Organic Soy Milk / skim milk
1 scoop of your favourite Chocolate Whey Protein
3 Ice Cubes
Half a frozen Banana
1 tablespoon Natural Peanut Butter
1 teaspoon ground flax seed
Put all ingredients in a blender. Mix and enjoy.
The Truth About Bottled Water
Imagine you’ve just been given a choice: You have to drink from one of two containers. One container is a cup from your own kitchen, and it contains a product that has passed strict state, federal and local guidelines for cleanliness and quality. Oh, and it’s free. The second container comes from a manufacturing plant somewhere, and its contents—while seemingly identical to your first choice—have not been subjected to the same strict national and local standards. It costs approximately four times more than gasoline. These products both look and taste nearly identical.
Which do you choose?
If you chose beverage A, congratulations: You just saved yourself a whole lot of money, and, perhaps, even contaminants, too. But if you picked beverage B, then you’ll be spending hundreds of unnecessary dollars on bottled water this year. Sure, bottled water is convenient, trendy, and may well be just as pure as what comes out of your tap. But it’s hardly a smart investment for your pocketbook, your body or our planet. Eat This, Not That! decided to take a closer look at what’s behind the pristine images and elegant-sounding names printed on those bottles.
Is Your Energy Bar a Healthy Snack?
5 Energy Bars That Are Loaded with Sugar
Grabbing a granola or energy bar may seem like a sensible choice for a healthy snack, but be wary. Many of these seemingly healthy choices have no more nutritional value than a candy bar. Here are five of the worst offenders.
Alternatively, you can make your own bars – with my Homemade Protein Bars recipe.
Eat More Food, Lose More Fat
Some things are sadly predictable. Extra winter poundage, for instance. Or holiday binges. Or the 3 o’clock slump, which sags before you like a hammock every afternoon.
Here’s a happier prediction: Eat more often and you’ll avoid all of those problems. Spreading six smaller meals across your day operates on the simple principle of satisfaction. Frequent meals tame the slavering beast of hunger.
The secret? Each mini meal should blend protein and fiber-rich complex carbohydrates. “Protein and fiber give you that feeling of satiety and keep you from feeling hungry,” says Tara Geise, R.D., a nutritionist in private practice in Orlando and a spokeswoman for the American Dietetic Association (ADA).
Controlling hunger shrinks your gut. In a study published in the International Journal of Obesity, one group of overweight men was given five small meals, then was free to choose a sixth meal. A second group ate a single meal containing the same number of calories as the total of the other group’s first five meals, then later had a free-choice second meal. The six-meal men ate 27 percent less food at their last meal than the two-meal men did at their second.
Consistent eating will also keep your protein levels high, helping you build muscle. “Your body can metabolize only so much protein at one time,” says Katherine Tallmadge, R.D., author of Diet Simple. “Protein is metabolized better when it’s divided evenly.”
The challenge is keeping the mini meals mini. “It’s critical that at the end of the day, the calorie content of your mini meals does not exceed what you would eat in three larger meals,” says Jeannie Moloo, Ph.D., R.D., an ADA spokeswoman in Roseville, California. If you already know your calorie count, start eating.
With a suggested calorie count in hand, you can mix and match from the list of meals shown here. Yes, you can take two items from one meal list—if they’re small. Looking to lose? Choose lower-calorie options. Regular Joe? Be as flexible as you please. Building muscle? Double up on a couple of the items—have an extra slice of pizza or two containers of yogurt.
6 Mistakes That Keep You Fat
We’re not suggesting “The Situation” as a role model. But there is one hard-body lesson you can take from MTV’s Jersey Shore loudmouth: The less body fat you carry, the better your abs will show.
Start by performing triage on the six eating habits listed here. But don’t try to banish them all at once. “Target just one or two behaviors at first—ones that you can make the most difference by changing,” says Jennifer McDaniel, R.D., of St. Louis University.
The reason: Recent studies show that we have only so much willpower. That’s why trying to break several bad habits at once can be overwhelming. But if you follow the slow and steady approach, you’ll increase your odds of sculpting a thinner, fitter physique—and keeping it for life.
Homemade Protein Bars
1 1/2 cup dry oatmeal
2 scoops whey protein powder of choice
2 tbsp ground flax seed
1 cup nonfat powdered milk
1/4 cup natural almond butter or natural peanut butter
1/2 cup water (more or less depending on the protein powder)
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup dried cranberries
Mix oatmeal, whey powder, flax seeds and non fat dry milk together in a large bowl
In a separate bowl mix almond butter, water and vanilla.
Combine both mixtures
Measure 2.5 ounces – freeze for 1 hour or leave in fridge for several hours until it’s firm.
Makes 7 bars
Eggs are Egg-cellent
Having fallen in and out of favor with nutrition experts, you’d think the fragile egg would be broken and beaten by now. Luckily, its ego isn’t nearly as vulnerable as its shell. Oblivious to the attempts to separate the egg from its well-deserved title of “best source of complete protein on the planet,” the egg has managed to remain a nutritious, inexpensive, and popular food.
For awhile, nutrition experts hypothesized that the high cholesterol content of eggs raised blood cholesterol levels, which can increase a person’s risk of heart disease. But this hypothesis was never proven. In fact, several studies have shown that the consumption of eggs is not associated with higher cholesterol levels but is associated with higher nutrient intake.
In 2000, researchers set out to assess the nutritional significance of eggs in the American diet and to estimate the degree of association between egg consumption and cholesterol levels. Their straightforward results were published in the Journal of the American College of Nutrition: Eggs make important nutritional contributions to the American diet and their consumption is not associated with high cholesterol levels. Specifically, the study showed that egg consumers had a higher intake of important nutrients like vitamins B12, A, E, and C than non-egg eaters, and that people who reported eating four or more eggs per week actually had significantly lower average cholesterol levels than those who reported eating zero to one eggs per week.
Here are four more ways eggs can enhance your health:
Continue reading
The Truth About Protein
If you are what you eat, what does that make a vegan? A string-bean, milquetoast kind of a guy? Of course not—and renowned strength coach Robert dos Remedios, a vegan, is strong evidence to the contrary. Really strong.
But most men eat animal products. And we really do become what we eat. Our skin, bones, hair, and nails are composed mostly of protein. Plus, animal products fuel the muscle-growing process called protein synthesis. That’s why Rocky chugged eggs before his a.m. runs. Since those days, nutrition scientists have done plenty of research. Read up before you chow down.
Hot Dogs, Bacon Put Your Heart At Risk
WASHINGTON (AFP) – Eating hot dogs, bacon, sausage or deli meats increases the chance of heart disease by 42 percent, US researchers said in a report out Monday.
Eating processed meat is also linked to a 19 percent higher risk of Type 2 diabetes, said the study, which appeared in the journal Circulation.
However researchers found no higher risk of heart disease or diabetes among people that ate unprocessed red meat such as from beef, pork, or lamb.
Most healthy eating guidelines already recommended limited meat consumption, but until now “studies have shown mixed results for relationships between meat consumption and cardiovascular diseases and diabetes,” said Renata Micha, the lead author of the study.
“Most prior studies also did not separately consider the health effects of eating unprocessed red versus processed meats,” said Micha, a research fellow in the department of epidemiology at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH).
The team reached their conclusions by studying information from 1,600 reports from around the world involving some 1.2 million people.
On average, each 50 gram (1.8 ounce) daily serving of processed meat (about one to two slices of deli meats, or one hot dog) was associated with the higher heart disease and diabetes risk, the researchers said.
Lifestyle factors associated with eating unprocessed red meats and processed meats “were similar, but only processed meats were linked to higher risk,” said report co-author Dariush Mozaffarian, assistant professor in the department of epidemiology at HSPH.
While unprocessed red and processed meats eaten in the United States contained similar average amounts of saturated fat and cholesterol, researches found that processed meats “contained, on average, four times more sodium and 50 percent more nitrate preservatives,” said Micha.
“This suggests that differences in salt and preservatives, rather than fats, might explain the higher risk of heart disease and diabetes seen with processed meats, but not with unprocessed red meats,” she said.
In order to decrease heart attack and diabetes risk, it would be best to avoid processed meats such as bacon, salami, sausages, hot dogs and processed deli meats.
“Based on our findings, eating one serving per week or less would be associated with relatively small risk,” said Micha.
