Chocolate milkshake and calcium

Chocolate milkshake and calcium

Are your kids fussy about drinking milk……..so you add chocolate based powders and syrup to make it yummy right! .…….chocolate based product hinder calcium absorption to some extent due to oxalic acid and also caffeine tends to promote calcium excretion in urine so try to add fruits, make a milkshake, you can also add rose syrup, kesar pista, vanilla flavours……try it......think over its upto you which taste you want them to get use to.

Why does the metabolic rate drop as you age?

 Why does the metabolic rate drop as you age?

Your basal metabolic rate - the number of calories your body burns each day just to stay alive - tends to drop as you age.
According to conventional wisdom, this is because you lose a small amount of muscle each year.
However, many people don't realize that muscle mass is not the only thing that affects your basal metabolic rate.

The age-related decline in metabolic rate - even when muscle mass is taken into account - is because of two reasons.

•Firstly is exercise, the more exercise you do, the higher your metabolic rate. The fact that people tend to exercise less as they age is partly responsible for the drop in metabolic rate.

• Second, metabolic rate is also linked to total calorie intake. This means that the more you eat, the higher your metabolic rate. A reduced metabolic rate in older physically active men could be due to the fact they eat less than their younger counterparts.
The bottom line is that a drop in your metabolic rate is not an inevitable consequence of aging, and has a lot more to do with the way you live your life.

You can minimize the age-related drop in metabolic rate by maintaining a high energy flux - balancing a nutrient-dense diet with regular exercise.

Not only will this help you stay lean, it's a great way to provide your body with more of the vitamins, minerals and other nutrients it needs to stay healthy.

our lifestyle

Environmental Factors: 
Bigger food packages and larger portions
Bigger size= cheaper....Supersize”
All-you-can-eat buffets

Less Physical Activity:
Escalators/elevators, moving sidewalks,intercoms, tele-commuting Cable movies,computer games, cellular phones.

Til and Calcium

 Til and Calcium

Eating sweets like til revri, gajjak, laddu, chikki (candy) and patti., along with other good source of calcium like milk and its products can help you in reducing your dosage of calcium supplements for the time being (keeping any medical problem in mind if any) as til is an important source of calcium.

Reusing cooking oil

Reusing cooking oil

Reusing cooking oil has been done for ages

When oil is overused, the color darkens, it develops a stale odor and taste which attach to the product. If foods darken too quickly (before they are cooked), it's a sign the oil needs to be changed. With each use, the oil's smoke point drops (the smoke point of an oil is the temperature at which the oil begins to decompose and visible fumes (smoke) are given off) these oil produces some very unhealthy compounds at normal cooking temperatures and becomes rancid. Rancid oils also contain free radicals that are potentially carcinogenic.

consume different kinds of oils

 Consume different kinds of oils

In order to derive maximum benefits from oil, it is beneficial to consume different kinds of oils, especially so that you get a variety of fatty acids.

For eg:-You could have two or more different kinds of oils in your kitchen that you could use for different purposes. For example, you could use olive oil for salads, groundnut oil for frying and soyabean oil for other cooking purposes. This will let you take advantage of the health benefits offered by each oil.

Or for a month you can use groundnut oil/ mustard/rice bran and the next month use soya bean/ sunflower.

Gudi Padwa - Puran poli - Healthy??? Or Unhealthy???

Gudi Padwa - Puran poli - Healthy??? Or Unhealthy???

Gudi Padwa is around the corner, this festive season is incomplete without puran poli right. Puran poli is a classic Maharashtrian delicacy. It is a pan-griddled sweet bread stuffed with split yellow gram(channa dal) or red gram (toovar/arhar dal). 

It has various regional names like paruppu poli in Tamil, Holige or obbattu in Kannada, ubbati in Konkani. The taste also varies from region to region. It is sweet and is circular like a parantha. It is a festive dessert. The stuffing is called puran and the parantha-like bread is called as poli.


But..hold on if you think puran poli is bad think again every food has its merit and demerits, the key is to maintain moderation. 

Puran poli is supposed to be a high cal food, right... it is upto you to make it healthy, use whole wheat flour instead of maida, use ghee sparingly.

Lets look at its merit

Puran poli made with whole wheat flour is rich in complex carbs, fibre, gives B complex vitamins, certain minerals. Dals as we all know gives give good amount of protein, what you all will be surprised to know is that this combination of cereal ie wheat flour and protein from dals will provide you with good quality protein, which can be compared to egg which is considered as high biological value with almost 100% bioavailability i.e of excellent quality.This combination provides all the required amino acids which are building blocks of protein.

Futher it has lot of jaggery which contains iron, cacium, potassium, phosphorus, it is releases energy slowly, as it is digested slower than sugar. Further Jaggery also aids in digestion, as jaggery breaks and becomes alkaline in the digestive system.

Addition of Green cardamom powder , saffron, nutmeg powder, mace (javantri) powder which have essential volatile oils,boosts digestion and are antispasmodic, carminative, anti-inflammatory and anti-microbial.

  

Go ahead and enjoy this festive delicacy…but keep it as festive delicacy and do not gorge on it, it is to be enjoyed only during festival season.

            ENJOY GUDI PADWA WITH PURAN POLI

Checklist to analyse your health status!!!

Checklist to analyse your Health status !!!

"Good health adds life to years", here is a checklist which will help you in analysizing how healthy you are!!!

1.Climb up to the 2^nd floor of your building and then check your rate of heart beat. 

If your beat is high and you are unable to catch your breath even after 2 minutes of deep breathing, your level of cardiovascular fitness is low.

2. Ask yourself when was the last time you ate a fruit.

  

3. Are potatoes the only vegetables in your house???

4. How much alcohol do you drink? Keep an eye on the amount and have a regular kidney check up.

5. If  you have a family history of diabetes, a annual blood sugar and insulin check is a must after the age of 26yrs.

6. If you lead a sedentary life regular blood pressure and lipid profile check up is needed.

7. If you are a frequent(>2 times a week) non-veg eater annual uric acid and lipid profile is a must.

8. Menopausal women, make sure you have an annual pap test (for cancer), mammography & bone density test for osteoporosis.

9. For young mother haemoglobin and calcium check ups will help control health problems after delivery.

10. Maintain a food dairy. Check things like how much sugar you consume in a day, how often you eat fried foods.

11. If you are unable to get enough sleep for more than a month, your body will be less able to regenerate itself and you will be more likely to suffer from breakdown

The best way to manage your health is to have a full annual check up done and also pay attention to signals your body sends.

World Health Day 7th april 2014 - The Mantra to a Healthy life

World Health Day 7th april 2014

The Mantra to a Healthy life

The Mantra to a Healthy life 

Eat healthy

Be active

Maintain a healthy weight

Manage stress.

WHITE JAMUN (WAX JAMBU) FRUIT

WHITE JAMUN (WAX JAMBU) FRUIT

Have been seeing this fruit on and off lately everywhere quite in abundance......thats white jamun,have you heard of it, its a variant of the black jamun, the tree produces white coloured fruit,commonly known as white jamun.

White jamun  is grown especially for its cooling nature that can be very refreshing and slaking on a hot day. They are pear-shaped structure, skin is smooth, waxy and thin that comes in varying colors ranging from white, pale green color, green, pink, rose red and crimson color. The fruit’s pith is snow white like.The fruit is crisp, almost crunchy and juicy in taste with a mild scented flavor, tasting mildly sweet. Often seedless fruit, you can eat these fruits out-of-hand, without any need to peel the skin.

Common names of the fruit include wax apple, love apple, java apple, chomphu, wax jambu, rose apple, bell fruit, makopa.

Uses Of wax apple

Fruits can be added in salad and the unripe fruits can be eaten with salt or dipped in a sweetish-spicy sauce.

It also tastes best when the fruits are soaked in salt water for 30 minutes. 

Raw fruits are used for for making wine and vinegar. 

The juice of ripe fruit is used for preparing jams, jelly, sauces and other beverages.

Health benefits 

Stops diarrhea & dysentery.

Relieves throat affections and other respiratory diseases.

  

Removes worms.

Vinegar made from the fruit gives relief in colitis,indigestion,stomach diseases. It relieves gas and improves digestion.

Many members of the Wax Jambu family have volatile oils which help in medicinal applications. The medicinal oil is present throughout the living tissue most of the Wax  Jambu species.

A 2008 study published in “Advances in Biological Research” also indicate the fruit’s phytochemicals have mild antibiotic and antifungal properties against staphylococcus, candida aureus and mycrobacter smegmatis.

Go ahead Njoy the fruit especially now when its in season

Happy easter

 Happy Easter

Easter is a time for joy and happiness epitomising new beginnings as devotees recall the resurrection of Christ.

Churches throughout the world celebrate Easter as a major feast ranking with Christmas. On Easter Sunday, most Christians attend church in the morning and upon returning home, the younger members of the family receive easter eggs. The type of Easter egg can vary from a simple hard-boiled egg with its shell painted in brillient hues, to the more exqusite confection with an outer shell made from marzipan or chocolate. Upon breaking them one is often delighted to find a delectable assortment of toffees and bon bons.

Easter Eggs can have health benefits – just go for dark chocolate which contains high cocoa content. Dark chocolate is made with a high proportion of cocoa and also contains large amounts of flavonoids, which act as powerful antioxidants and lower blood pressure.
Try to find plain dark chocolate with the highest cocoa content possible, preferably more than 70 per cent. This means they don't have too much sugar and saturated fat.

Wishing you all a very happy and healthy ester