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Monday, March 24, 2008

Do you know that men need to eat more fruits and vegetables than women?

The National 5 A Day program is encouraging men, who have greater health risks than women for some diseases, to shoot for nine servings of fruits and vegetables each day and women to aim for seven servings a day.

Fruits and vegetables contain many powerful and important nutrients such as;

vitamins ,minerals, fiber and disease-fighting phytochemicals, and that helps reduce the risk of many cancers, heart disease, high blood pressure and diabetes.


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Saturday, March 08, 2008

5 ways to create healthy recipes

Techniques to make your recipes — including your time-honored family favorites — healthier.

1. Change the method of preparationHealthy cooking techniques — such as braising, broiling, grilling and steaming — can capture the flavor and nutrients of your food without adding excessive amounts of fat, oil or sodium. If your recipe calls for frying the ingredients in oil or butter, try baking, broiling or poaching the food instead. If the directions say to baste the meat or vegetables in oil or drippings, use wine, fruit juice, vegetable juice or fat-free vegetable broth instead. Using nonstick pans or spraying pans with nonstick cooking spray will further reduce the amount of fat and calories added to your meals.

2. Change the portion size.
No matter how much you reduce, switch or omit ingredients, some recipes may still be high in sugar, fat or salt. In these cases, reduce the amount of that food you eat. Smaller portions have less fat, calories and sodium and allow you to eat a wider variety of foods during a meal. Eating a variety of foods will ensure that you get all the energy, protein, vitamins, minerals and fiber you need.

3.Reduce the amount of fat, sugar and sodium
With most recipes, you can reduce the amount of fat, sugar and sodium without losing the flavor. By cutting fat and sugar, you also cut calories. How much can you leave out without affecting the flavor and consistency of the food? Apply the following general guidelines:

* Fat. For baked goods, use half the butter, shortening or oil and replace the other half with unsweetened applesauce, mashed banana or prune puree. You can also use commercially prepared fruit-based fat replacers found in the baking aisle of your local grocery store.

* Sugar. Reduce the amount of sugar by one-third to one-half. When you use less sugar, add spices such as cinnamon, cloves, allspice and nutmeg or flavorings such as vanilla extract or almond flavoring to enhance the sweetness of the food.

* Sodium. Reduce salt by one-half in baked goods that don't require yeast. For foods that require yeast, don't reduce the amount of salt, which is necessary for leavening. Without salt, the foods may become dense and flat. For most main dishes, salads, soups and other foods, however, you can reduce the salt by one-half or eliminate it completely.
Other ingredients may contain sugar, fat and sodium, and you can decrease them as well. For example, if the recipe calls for 1 cup shredded cheddar cheese, use 1/2 cup instead. Or use less soy sauce than is indicated to decrease the amount of sodium in the food.

4.Make a healthy substitution
Healthy substitutions not only reduce the amount of fat, calories and sodium in your recipes, but also can boost the nutritional content. For example, use whole-wheat pasta in place of enriched pasta. You'll triple the fiber and reduce the number of calories. Prepare a dessert with fat-free milk instead of whole milk to save 63 calories and almost 8 grams of fat per cup.

5. Delete an ingredient
In some recipes, you can delete an ingredient altogether; likely candidates include items you add out of habit or for appearance, such as frosting, coconut or nuts, which are high in fat and calories. Other possibilities include optional condiments, such as pickles, olives, butter, mayonnaise, syrup, jelly and mustard, which can have large amounts of sodium, sugar, fat and calories.


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Thursday, December 20, 2007

Healthy Hotpot


Stay safe while enjoying good food

Hotpot dining, the popular pastime of eating meals such as seafood or meat soup from a shared pot, is a fun way of socialising. But the Hong Kong Department of Health warns that if precautions are not taken, it can lead to serious illness such as food poisoning. The department has a few suggestion to keep everyone dipping into the hotpot healthy.
  • Make sure the seafood in your hotpot is fresh, thoroughly cooked and doesn't have a strange smell.
  • Never use raw egg yolk as a dipping sauce. Uncooked eggs can be contaminated with salmonella bacteria.
  • Meat should be cut into thin slices and cooked thoroughly in the hotpot.
  • Fresh vegetables should be washed thoroughly to remove any pesticides.
  • Use different sets of chopsticks to handle raw and cooked meat in order to avoid cross

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Monday, December 03, 2007

Fact

People who say they cut carbs eat about 128g of carbs daily. Many low-carb diets suggest 20 to 50g total carbs.
source; NPD Group

Women are more likely than men to eat food that has fallen on the floor
source; Department of Food Science, University of lllinois

66% of women aged 35 to 74 say that they aren't afraid of ageing; 50% say they look forward to getting older and wiser.
From the Ageing Redefined survey

In 2002, 56% of women on HRT tried to quit when it was found to raise heart disease risk. 26% of them are back on it.
source; Obstetrics and Gynaecology

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Monday, October 29, 2007

Food And Family

Want your child to eat well? Set a good example..

If you'd like your kids to eat healthy, start with your own diet. The more fruit and vegetables Mum and Dad eat, the more Junior is likely to consume, according to a study of two-to six-years-old at London's University College. And youngsters who were introduced to these foods earlier tended to reach for them more often. Those who had been breastfed ate fruit and vegetables more frequently than bottle-fed kids.

Speaking of milk, researchers from Baylor College of Medicine and Penn State University found that girls who met calcium requirements had mums who drank more milk.

Moreover, those who got the minimum recommended amount of calcium at age five (800 mg daily) were nearly five times as likely to do so at age nine (1300 mg daily)

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