Is Salt Good for You?

 Salt is important to good nutritional status. Too little can cause disturbances in tissue-water and acid-base balance, which is important to good nutrition.

A sodium deficiency is a health condition where a body fails to receive an adequate supply of sodium. Sodium deficiency can become extremely prevalent in excessive temperatures, which cause the body to perspire heavily and patterns of dehydration will set in. Sodium deficiency can lead to shock if the blood pressure is decreased too severely.

 Check out why:

Sodium is a mineral that your body must have in order to function properly. The primary source of dietary sodium is sodium chloride, or salt, more than three-quarters of which comes from processed foods. Although sodium is vital to a number of routine body functions, too much can have adverse effects, particularly for people who are sensitive to sodium. Excessive sodium can cause hypertension, which in turn can lead to other health problems.

Sodium is a mineral that carries an electrical charge, known as an electrolyte. Electrolytes facilitate muscle contraction and nerve cell transmission. Ions of sodium, potassium and chloride trigger muscle contractions and nerve impulses when they shift places across cell membranes. A nerve cell at rest has positively charged potassium ions inside the cell and is surrounded outside the cell by positively charged sodium ions and negatively charged chloride ions. When stimulated, potassium ions rush out of the cell as sodium ions rush in, creating an electrical signal or nerve impulse. A similar scenario occurs during the contraction of muscles.

Sodium also works in concert with potassium to maintain normal water balance in the body. Each of the minerals chemically attracts water to itself, thus assuring that optimal levels of hydration are maintained both inside human cells and outside the cells, in the extracellular spaces that surround them. In healthy people the body has a built-in mechanism to guard against the effects of occasional excess levels of sodium, but continued intake of high amounts of sodium can eventually override this safety valve and lead to hypertension.

Remember, diets too high in sodium can lead to high water retention and hypertension. Overall, salt is generally nontoxic to adults, provided it is excreted properly. The maximum amount of sodium that should be incorporated into a healthy diet should range from 2,400-3,000 mg/day.

WARNING: CHECK YOUR BLOOD PRESSURE REGULARLY!!

Source: www.healthyeating.com

Women and Sugarless Foods

You probably eat more sugar than you need or is good for you. Reducing the intake will make you feel and look better. 

Of all the major components of our diet, sugar has the least to recommend it. It has less nutritional value than most other foods and can contribute to obesity and tooth decay. Therefore, it is worth thinking about the amount of sugar in your diet and how you can go about reducing it. 

If you want to reduce the amount of sugar in your diet, you have two options: to use sugar substitutes and to wean yourself off. For those who cannot face tea of coffee without a sweet taste, you can substitute artificial sweeteners. It can also be used as an effective slimming aid as part of a calorie controlled diet. For cooking, some health food cookbooks suggest fructose, which has similar calorie value to refined sugar, but can be used in smaller quantities because it is sweeter. 

Alternatively, you can reduce your sugar intake by being very careful about the foods you eat. This is particularly important with respect to bottled, packaged, and tinned foods – many of which have a high sugar content not just for sweetness, but because sugar acts as a preservative. For instance, jams and preserves contain a great deal of sugar. A good substance is the sugarless jam, made only from fruit. 

Many breakfast cereals contain refined sugar, either in the cereal itself or as a coating. People who eat breakfast cereals can try to make up their own by mixing dried fruit and nuts with a muesli base.

Tinned fruits, tinned and packaged soups and tinned vegetables like peas and baked beans all use refined sugar as a preservative, so check the labels carefully before you buy them. Instead of tinned food, you can eat frozen fruits and vegetables as these are less likely to have added sugar.

Finally, drinks, fruit squashes, and cordials have high sugar content. You can substitute instead one-calorie drinks, mineral water and freshly squeezed fruit juices or the packaged varieties without added sugar. 

If you use sugar in cooking, then you can try some substitutes. Unsalted, unroasted nuts such as cashews and almonds are naturally sweet; they are a good alternative to sugar heavy condiments for flavoring meat and fish dishes. Alternatively, you can try fresh fruit as garnish. Choose fruit that are in season as these are often sweet and do not need sugar adding to them.    

Do not worry that a reduced refined sugar intake will harm you: sugar is present naturally in many foods, and starches convert into sugars as part of the digestive process.   

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Commit yourself to long term commitments

It is a proven fact that all diets have a temporary effect! The secret to losing weight is to make permanent choices in what we do. Here are some simple and easy long term commitments:

 

•   Commit yourself to whole-wheat bread

•   Drink fruit juices instead of soft drinks

•   Always select fruit as a dessert

•   When possible, start your meal with a fresh salad

•   Always opt for whole grain pasta, bread and rice

•   Take your time to eat; it takes time for your body to send its satisfaction signal

•   Always park your car far rather than near to enable you to get some walking exercise

•   Use the stairs in buildings

Be  positive about all of the choices above.

Forming good habits is the answer to long term health!

Some Wise Words

Listening 

Listening and hearing are two different things. When a person is truly listening they not only hear the words, but they feel the emotion behind these words. True communication occurs when someone truly listens and not just hears the words.

Women and a Balanced Diet

So what is this balanced diet? It is taking food from as many different sources as possible and eating food in its natural state - that is fresh, unprocessed and , where possible, raw. The problem is that our diets normally centre on our concentration on foods, which narrow down the spectrum of our diet and contain many foods that are unhealthy. Too many processed foods, preplaced, precooked, junk food, fast food –whatever they are, they contain too much animal fat, salt, additives and too little fibre. The food companies are now coming under pressure to reduce to salt sugar and additives in their products. This is easier to monitor with improvements in labeling.

Our methods of cooking are also hazardous to health. Frying is a common method of preparing food, adding butter to vegetables is almost a ritual, sauces are progressively richer, and creamier. So, changing to grilling food instead of frying, limiting butter on vegetables and reducing sauces instead of thickening them with butter, cream of flour would lead immediately to healthier eating. If you feel that you need the discipline of a diet programme, look at it carefully: is it too expensive? Will it fit in with your family catering? There is no point in preparing two meals and watching the others eat your favourite foods. Is the diet balanced nutritionally? Stay clear of diets that confine you to one or two foods. Nobody is meant to survive on a limited number of foodstuffs and it could throw your metabolism awry. Do you like the foods that are permitted in the diet? Are there any indulgences? You know yourself. Do you want to stretch indulgences? You know yourself. Do you want to stretch your willpower to the limit of adopt a more flexible attitude?  Your responses to these questions should help you organize a plan for reducing weight by yourself.

The Importance of Protein for the Body

Women and Vegetarianism

Many women are turning to vegetarian diets; some exclude all animal products, even dairy products, and eggs. A vegetarian diet of any kind is a healthy option but requires eating a wide variety of foods. The vital factor is to combine the vegetables with grains so that the complete protein is made up. (Animal protein contains the correct number of essential amino acids to make a complete protein; vegetable protein does not.)

Milk is a major source of vitamins and minerals so everyone on a vegetarian diet should include skimmed milk (all the goodness with none of the fat) and a great variety of plant foods - nuts, lentils, pulses, and grains. If you are a vegan and therefore taking in no animal products at all, you should supplement your diet with Vitamin B 12, which is not found in great quantity in vegetable products. In addition, calcium, iron, and Vitamin C might be in short supply. One good sensible rule is that there is no such thing as an essential food- there is always an alternative.

Delicious Egg Recipes