Posts Tagged ‘Eating’

The Hazards Of Eating Sushi

Article by trish smith

Nigiri. Maki. Sashimi. If you’re one of the millions of Americans who have jumped on the sushi bandwagon, then you know exactly what these Japanese delicacies are.

Sushi has quickly become one of the most convenient, hip and healthy ways to grab lunch or dinner, and everyone from college students to business professionals can’t get enough of it.

Even though it’s recommended that we eat fish at least twice a week because it’s rich in omega-3 fatty acids (which helps blood circulate in our bodies and reduces blood pressure), there’s definitely a dark side to eating fish that is far more harmful to our health.

What is Sushi?

Sushi was originally created in Japan as a way to preserve fish, but it later spilled over to the Western world as an exotic and artistic way to prepare seafood.

Its main ingredients include vinegared rice, raw fish or shellfish and vegetables rolled up in seaweed. Even though most of the fish is raw, it can also be cooked and marinated in different sauces.

There are literally hundreds of different types of ingredients you can get in sushi, from eel and avocado to shrimp and cucumber, but by far the two most popular raw fish items to get are tuna and salmon.

You can find an alphabetical listing of sushi items at Nibble.com’s Sushi Glossary page.

How Can It Harm You?

It’s true that the omega-3 fatty acids found in fish can have a positive impact on asthma, cancer and kidney disease, but there are also many toxic elements found in raw fish that can greatly damage your body.

Here are some dangers of eating raw fish or shellfish:

Mercury

Mercury is the most dangerous element found in uncooked fish. It is naturally found in small amounts in rocks and soil, but due to human activities such as burning fossil fuels and dumping pollutants into our waters, it has become increasingly damaging to the environment.

When factories dump harmful pesticides and other toxins into our waters, they are absorbed by the marine life in the water, and that includes fish. So, when we eat raw fish, we consume the mercury and it absorbs into our bloodstream.

Some harmful effects of ingesting mercury are:

Damages the central nervous system, DNA and the brain
Allergic reactions
Headaches
Sperm damage
Birth defects

Even though the amount of mercury you can ingest from a piece of sushi is very small, if you eat sushi on a regular basis this can be a cause of concern for you.

You can read more about mercury here.

Hepatitis A

Hepatitis A is caused by a virus that can inflame your liver and damage its functionality. Your liver is basically what fights infections and removes harmful poisons from your body, so if you contract Hepatitis A, it can greatly weaken your body’s natural ability to fight off germs.

Hepatitis A can be contracted by eating the raw shellfish, such as crab and shrimp. Symptoms include fever, nausea and loss of appetite.

However, it is treatable. You can get a Hepatitis A vaccine shot to help prevent the virus from attacking your body. Or, if you do contract the virus, by taking proper medication and resting, you can fully recover.

You can read more about Hepatitis A at the eMedicineHealth.com glossary page.

Worms and Parasites

Even though sushi chefs are trained to identify worms and worm eggs in raw fish, they can still slip by the preparation process.

Most fish have some type of worm or parasite in the, but they are killed when the fish is cooked. So eating raw fish offers an opportunity for worms and other parasites to travel into our digestive tract and attack our intestines. This can cause abdominal discomfort, weakness of the limbs and fatigue.

But don’t’ worry, the probability of contracting worms and parasites from raw fish is often slim to none. Mercury is still the larger concern.

High Calories

Yes, sushi has fish and vegetables in it, which are healthy by our standards, but when combined with other fancy ingredients, they can add up to an unhealthy amount of calories.

A California Roll, which has imitation crab stick, avocado and cucumber in it, has about 350 calories in it, whereas the popular Spicy Tuna roll, which includes tuna, hot paste and red pepper flakes blended with mayonnaise, has a whopping 450 calories! Not exactly a light lunch.

You can see a list of popular sushi dishes with their corresponding calories, fat and carbohydrates at the CalorieKing.com Food Database page.

This information is not meant to scare avid sushi lovers from eating their favorite meal. In fact, sushi’s popularity will only continue to grow because it’s such a tasty and convenient food to eat, and we’re all about convenience here in America.

For everything sushi, go to SushiFaq.com.

The purpose of pointing out these hazards is to show people that everything that we put into our bodies, especially the food that we eat, can have a dramatic effect on our eco-lifestyle.

In order to live greener, we need to take care of our environment so that whatever we get from it can keep us pure and healthy.

About the Author

Trish Smith is a copywriter for Green Student U, Student Finance Domain and Study Abroad Domain, websites that are devoted to providing college students with helpful environmental, financial and study abroad advice.

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What Is Really Making You Fat? The Truth About What You Are Eating and Your Weight Loss

You may have considered going on a diet to lose weight.  And more likely than not, you were told that you needed to change what you were eating. You needed a new diet.  Skip the sugar.  Skip processed foods. Give up the sodas, juice, cookies and cake. This is all true. You need to curb your intake of junk foods and sugary foods. But, there is something else that you may have not considered.  Despite how great a diet of leafy greens and whole fruits sounds, it may contribute to weight gain as well.

How? Well, when you eat certain foods you may get more than just the food itself.  And this can be dangerous for your body and affect your weight loss results.

The Standard American Diet (SAD) is just like its acronym, SAD.  Today the average Americans diet includes all sorts of chemicals, pesticides, growth hormones, antibiotics, plastic pollutants, and dioxin residues.  Not only is this detrimental to our overall health, but to our actual metabolism and weight loss goals. You can get fatter and eat less calories.  It’s not fair! Especially for those who already are dealing with health issues that limit their mobility. 

Pick Your Poison:  Eating Healthy Just Got Harder
Toxins in your food can contribute to weight issues and obesity. The chemicals disrupt the function of our hormonal system.  These toxins have been dubbed as obesogens. Obesogens can contribute to obesity, heart problems, diabetes, high blood pressure, fast weight gain, and high cholesterol.   What’s worse is that the dangerous obesogens are found in some of our most loved, healthy, weight loss certified foods.  You will find them in soy weight loss products. They have infiltrated poultry and meat treated with artificial hormones and “natural flavors,”  plastic pollutants in a lot of our food packaging, chemicals in processed, packaged and microwaveable foods, and pesticides sprayed directly on our “healthy” fruits and veggies .

It is important to have 2 – 5  servings of vegetables and fruit per day for weight loss. Vegetables and fruits are a great source of nutrients, especially vegetables like kale, chard, spinach and broccoli.  However, it is important that you know something about the source and farming of your fruit and vegetables. Many fruits and vegetables are treated with pesticides, or are potentially lab derived fruit and vegetables, not created through natural selection.  These things can have adverse effects on the body, specifically on the endocrine system and your body’s fat burning potential. And, unfortunately, this system when disrupted gain result in rapid weight gain and have a dramatic impact on you weight loss. If you have been exercising everyday and the weight refuses to fall off then you endocrine system is probably having issues. 

How can this be?  Well, the pesticides on your vegetables and fruit can wreck your metabolism which controls your rate of fat burning and hormonal balances that effect weight loss neurological signals. They are not just rinsed away and many plants are grown with chemical and pesticide feed. When you take them home, you take home everything that comes with them. And, even if the chemicals are on the rind or outer shell and you peel them, you lose the important nutrients. Additionally, many foods may come from countries that still allow DDT, like Mexico. DDT has been shown to be hazardous, so much that it was banned in the US. Unfortunately, many of our grocery stores are filled with foods from non USA countries.

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Some pesticides like tributyltin, may trigger obesity, On golf courses, workers who handled the pesticide tricholorfon had an 85% – 250% greater risk of developing diabetes, depending on how frequently they handled the chemical. Children born to mothers with higher levels of the pesticide hexachlorobenzene in were more likely to be overweight or obese by the age of 6. Lastly, in a recent study, where  rats were fed water laced with atrazine, a weed killer commonly used on U.S. corn crops, but banned in much of the world, gained 5%-10% more weight than rats that weren’t exposed to the chemical. Those fed the chemical and a high-fat diet gained even more weight, but even rats that ate a healthy diet ended up about 5% fatter if they drank the tainted water. You have to stop eating genetically modified foods if you do not want to keep getting bigger and encountering difficulties with weight loss. For many it is a relief to know that all the extra weight they have gained over the past few years is not their fault. It is a combination of chemicals used on the foods they willing ate and that were approved by their government. If you want to lose weight you cannot count on the government. You are going to have to protect yourself. Eating organic is fine, but organic fruit from Mexico farms that formerly had DDT is bad.

What to do to lose weight and eat healthy? Inspect your food. Don’t just create a diet based on a deluge of salads without knowing about the salad greens. Before you start your diet, check your fridge.  If possible, buy organic and buy local when it comes to peaches, apples, bell peppers, celery, nectarines; strawberries, cherries, kale, lettuce, grapes, carrots and pears.  Avoid farm raised seafood and corn and soy feed beef and chicken.

Take a daily supplement that flushes your body and restores hormonal balance, while also assisting your metabolism. Weight loss experts recommend a natural Bioneferin Fat Flush supplement. Bioneferin Fat Flush is a weight loss that you take weekly to detox your body and it produces weight loss by removing excess water weight and bulk mass from the intestines. Overweight adults report losing between 28.5lbs to 74lbs in a 9 month period on Bioneferin. Supplements allow you to burn fat naturally without strenuous exercise.  Also, consider substituting your vegetables for an organic green food shake. You will get twice the nutrients and less exposure to chemicals. Vitamin Shoppe carries some great ones. Veggies and fruits can add great benefit to your overall diet and health. However, if the vegetables and fruits are tainted so to speak, they can actually disrupt your body or worse, cause you to be fatter.

Bottoms Up: Watch What You Drink

Love that bottled water? Carry it on the go during your weight loss crusade? Think again. BPA and phthalates are plastic softeners and bottle that mimic estrogen. They’re found in the lining of canned foods and beverages, sports drink bottles, and pesticides. They are in abundance and leach easily into our body. So, what can you do? Get a stainless steel canteen and drink distilled, pure water. Avoid canned goods and canned drinks. You might see a great difference in crossing over that weight loss plateau.

Don’t Give Up on Meat: But Watch What You Eat

Before you begin to binge on low fat snacks and curse food in your diet or go strictly to a carnivore no vegetable lifestyle, this is not necessarily the answer.

A study in the International Journal of Obesity, including Yale University School of Medicine and Johns Hopkins University, found that the use of hormones in dairy, poultry and meat production could be a possible contributor to the obesity epidemic.

Remember the facts from earlier regarding the consumption of meat and poultry treated with hormones. Naturally occurring hormones, such as estrogen, progesterone and testosterone are pumped into cattle. In addition, trenbolone acetate or TBA is also given to cattle to add more beefiness.  And, what’s worse, these chemicals can are fat soluble. They store in your fat tissues and cause to become fatter, bigger, and increase in overall weight.  So, what to do about gaining weight from the foods you eat. Check the labels. Yep. Look out for natural solutions and natural flavors. Read what percentage of water is added and what is in the water of your beef and poultry.  Read your milk ingredients before buying or even avoid milk.

Reinforce your body with hormonal balancing foods and supplements. Amp up on your healthy fats. They might actually help your weight loss. Yep, it’s true.  Good fats like Omega 3, Omega 6, CLA, Omega 9 and others actually contribute fat loss and body balance. Grass fed, organic beef will have CLA. Flax and Hemp Meal will also have pure protein and Omega Fatty Acids.

There is no magic bullet for weight loss.  But, be patient.  Watch what you eat and stay confident.

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5 Popular Eating Plans for Fat Loss

The increasing rise of obesity has prompted a lot of people to take one long look at their lifestyles and eating habits. The prospect of dying isn’t something that anyone normally relishes, especially when you are young and have just started to enjoy the freedom that having your own job and staying at your own place brings. As studies continue to strengthen the link between excessive food intake, obesity and heart disease, more and more people are now more conscious about what they eat and drink.

To respond to this need for weight control and improvement of overall health, the fitness industry continually churns out dietary regimens and meal plans that seek to lower your caloric intake so you can burn the fats away. From fad diets to crash diets to healthy diets that really work, there are popular diets observed by many weight loss enthusiasts today.

This is not a recommendation on the meal plan that you should follow nor is it a guarantee that these popular diets work. These popular diets are presented simply because they have garnered the interest of a lot of people in their quest to lose weight. They are simply a general introduction as to what the diet is about and the philosophy behind it. If you wish to go on a particular diet, make sure that you research extensively about it beforehand. More importantly, consult your doctor to make sure that it is the right diet for you.

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1. Mediterranean Diet. This is a diet that seeks to replicate the eating habits of the people in Greece, Crete and its neighboring countries located in the vicinity of the Mediterranean Sea. In this dietary plan, plant-based foods such as fresh fruits, beans nuts and seeds are the main food sources. Red meat is taken only in very small amounts while healthy fats such as those that derived from olive oils and other plant-based oils are used in the preparation of their recipes. Other important components of this diet are eggs and yogurt and moderate amounts of wine at every meal.

2. The Zone. This diet focuses on giving the body the calories it needs to function from the different macronutrients at varying percentages. 40 percent comes from carbohydrates, 30 percent from fats and another 30 percent from protein. The Zone focuses on keeping the insulin levels under control so excess weight is lost and maintained.

3. Vegetarian Diets. This is not only a diet regimen but a way of life as well. While there are many types of vegetarians, the common threat that runs in all of them is the consumption of plant-based foods. Meat, except for meat byproducts like eggs, dairy and cheese (for lacto-ovo vegetarians), is off limits in this diet. Vegetarians generally have longer life expectancies compared to meat eaters, studies reveal.

4. The Atkins Diet. This is another diet that controls the insulin levels in order to lose weight. This diet shuns refined carbohydrates and allows individuals to consume more protein for weight loss.

5. Raw Food Diet. This is a diet that promotes the consumption of plant-based foods and drinks that have undergone little or no processing at all. According to this philosophy, consuming food in its most natural, raw state, benefits the body because the “life-giving enzymes” found in raw food still remain intact.

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Eating for Weight Loss, Good Health, Long Life and Beauty

Article by Festus Kofe

The foods we eat every day are of critical importance because they either create or prevent weight loss, good health, long life and beauty. We may be slowly killing ourselves just from the food we eat right now. Our diet can either be working for us or working against us as we grow older every day. What should we do to reverse the aging process, lose weight, stay well and strong and look beautiful? Eating for weight loss is the best way to go.

In my quiet studies, I have found several ways we can delay (and prevent) the onset of the undesirable effects of aging and weight gain. One simple way is the food we eat. There is in fact a proven, easy way to live and eat that will eliminate our frequent weight loss, wrinkled skin, health and aging struggles in just a matter of days. We can begin from today to slow down the aging process by simply losing weight to a healthy weight and derive immense benefit from the foods we allow into our mouth.

Most of us prefer to eat sweets and junk foods like doughnuts all in the name of enjoyment instead of fresh fruits and vegetables. We do not care to know that fresh fruits and vegetables are antioxidants which are critical in delaying the onset of old age because they act as powerful, natural protection against cell damage. If we eat more of junk foods, we may be using our hands to invite problems such as Parkinson?s and Alzheimer diseases and dementia.The diet solution will help you to formulate a healthy meal plan that is right for you.

We could also be damaging our internal organs, igniting the early onset of diabetes and with each passing year it will manifest in very visible damage to skin, resulting in the thinning of the skin, wrinkles, deep lines, sagging of the breast in women, and loss of tone, texture and radiance.

It is very exciting that scientific breakthroughs and discoveries have shown us that our diet can be either damaging to our body or beneficial to our body. We can literally cure diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, obesity by a simple change in the foods we eat. Click here to see proof

It is a fact that if we all lose a few pounds, we will be able to eliminate or bring down high blood pressure and high blood sugar. You can lose weight quickly and cheaply by eating right and exercising more.

The following 6 categories of foods will help you lose weight, remain beautiful, healthy and younger – protein, carbohydrates, omega-3 fatty acids, carotenoids, flavonoids and young green cereals.

Now, without adequate protein, our bodies will go into an accelerated aging mode. Our muscles, skin, organs, bones, cartilage and the antibodies that protect us from getting sick are all made of protein. Since our body cannot store protein, we must always eat quality protein at each meal.

We can protect our bodies from an incredible array of diseases including cancer through the foods we eat.

We can also influence our ability to lose weight and prevent unwanted weight gain with the foods we eat. The simple way to lose weight is to eat less. The best way to eat less is to find a way to suppress your appetite. An excellent way to start is to eat protein. A protein-rich diet can help to decrease appetite. A simple meal of fish and fresh vegetables will make you feel full without making you to overeat.

Engaging in exercises can help to lower blood pressure, tone the muscles, shed excess pounds and reduce stress to a manageable level. Weight lifting and resistance training coupled with aerobic exercise like brisk walking, running and biking are beneficial to the overall health and beauty of the body.

The best food you must eat all the time and in the right proportion include avocado, olives, coconut, acai, apples, berries, grapefruit, pears, peaches, onion, garlic, chilli pepper, cayenne, almonds, walnuts, pumpkin seeds, yoghurt made from goat or sheep milk, beans, lentils, oats, barley, cinnamon, cloves, fenugreek, spinach, kale, broccoli, olive oil, sunflower oil, coconut oil, etc.

Always learn to enjoy a cup of green tea after every meal.

If you are looking older than your actual age, this is the time to start eating for weight loss. Once you begin to lose weight in a healthy way, you will become younger than your age, free of wrinkles, look younger and healthier and be able to reverse the aging process.

The greatest challenge right now is to learn the best way to combine your foods to achieve the perfect body you desire. Click here to learn about the healthy meal plans and health-giving foods you must begin to incorporate into your every day eating habit. Do not just learn it. You must do it now.

About the Author

What should we do to reverse the aging process, lose weight, stay well and strong and look beautiful? Eating for weight loss is the best way to go.

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Stop Cravings and Stop Binge Eating: Advice from a Pizza Man

Article by Mayor A Mayor

In a surprising comment made during a popular UK radio show, the founder of one of the largest Pizza chains in the United States and United Kingdom told listeners not to eat too much pizza!

In an interview with host Adam Shaw on BBC’s Radio Four program, John Schnatter, the founder of Papa John’s pizza, was asked whether he was concerned about the British government’s recent actions in the fast food restaurant business to help put the brakes on obesity.

Schnatter said, “Pizza is actually healthy for you if you don’t eat too much of it. You can’t eat five or six slices but if you eat one or two slices it’s very nutritious.”

Laughing, Shaw replied, “I’m not sure your investors would want to hear you tell people, ‘don’t eat too much of our pizzas!”‘

Across the web, bloggers and tweeters have been putting in their two cents. Some say he was a little TOO honest. Others say this was either the worst PR screw up ever… or the best PR move ever (you know what they say about “bad” publicity).

Although I wouldn’t call pizza health food, I think his advice to eat pizza, but only in moderation was the responsible thing for a fast food owner to do at a time where obesity is reaching epidemic proportions, not just in the United States but in the U.K. and other countries as well.

Moreover, it was just plain good diet advice! One reason people are failing to control their weight is because of all-or-none thinking, i.e, “I can’t eat ANY pizza EVER again!” or, “I have to follow my diet 100% or not at all.”

In my experience, all or none thinking is one of the biggest causes of diet failure. It’s far better from a psychological perspective to eat your pizza; simply enjoy it infrequently and in small quantities.

Think of you on a diet like a pressure cooker on a burner. The longer you keep that pot on the heat, the more the steam pressure builds up inside. If there’s no outlet or release valve on that thing, eventually the pressure builds up so much that even if it’s made of steel and the lid is bolted down, she’s going to blow, sooner or later.

Well, in the beginning, you might think your willpower is made of steel and that you’re bolted tighter than a submarine hatch, but the longer you’re on a diet with no relief, the greater the pressure builds up until YOU blow your top… and that means massive binge eating.

But if you let off a little steam in the form of a “free meal” (or two) and enjoy that slice of pizza (or whatever is your favorite ‘poison’) on occasion, that relieves the pressure. Alas, you never even feel the urge to binge… because you HAD your pizza and the urge was satisfied. Since the meal was planned and you kept the calories under control, it had little or no effect on your fat loss results.

This topic of conversation was prompted on the BBC radio show during a discussion about how the Pizza business was doing during the recession and about efforts to stem the growing obesity crisis in the UK.

Earlier last month, The Food Standards Agency in the UK started negotiating with UK food, pub and sandwich chains to display calories on their menus to try to provide education about healthier options for consumers who eat out frequently.

The move is similar to one made in New York City last year, where restaurant chains that have more than 15 locations must print calories on the menus. According to an article in the British Medical Journal, this has resulted in an average reduction of 50-100 calories for each food order. Not much, but at least it’s something.

In the case of pizza, a 2.2 ounce thin-crusted slice of cheese pizza could have as little as 190 calories. One slice of “meat lover’s” pizza, on the other hand, could set you back almost 500 calories! If you knew the difference, would it change what kind and how much you ate?

I’m totally in favor of posting calories on menus, despite the critics who say it won’t make a difference. I think anything that raises calorie awareness is going to affect behavior in a positive way and help make for better food decisions. Whether it should be mandatory by law is debatable. I say, let the restaurants decide and then let the marketplace sort itself out.

I would be more likely to recommend or support the restaurants that opted to post calories, increase their range of healthy choices… and on that rare occasion, have a CEO who actually says, “Eat my food, but not too much!!”

Now, if we can only get those McDonalds’s execs to say the same thing!

Train hard and expect success,

About the Author

Are you looking for the best way to loss weight? Checkhere for the best way to burn the fat in your body and loss weight the easier way.

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