ANTIOXIDANTS

                                 


Check out this video with some great antioxidant containing foods to boost your health.

WHAT ARE TRANS FATS?

Really informative video about trans fats in our diet. Let us know what you think.

POLYPHENOLS? WHAT ARE THEY AND WHAT ARE THE BEST FOODS TO EAT.

Polyphenols might be one of those intriguing buzzwords you frequently read on health food labels. You add them to cart because they sound like something you should be incorporating into your diet but you’re not quite sure why. But...what exactly do they do for you?

Karen Ansel, R.D.N., author of Healing Superfoods for Anti-Aging: Stay Younger, Live Longer, says polyphenols, which are powerful antioxidant chemicals found naturally in many plants, are instrumental in protecting our cells from free radical damage, which are often attributed to chronic illnesses like cancer, heart disease and dementia. They’re linked to longevity, too: A 2013 study published in the Journal of Nutrition found a link between high polyphenol consumption and a 30 percent decrease in mortality in elderly adults.

Want to live long and prosper? Simply eat a plant-heavy diet, which ups your polyphenol ante significantly. You know you should be getting your five to 10 servings of fruits and vegetables a day, but Ansel suggests distributing your plant consumption evenly across every meal, rather than having a green juice for breakfast and calling it a day. “Keep in mind that some polyphenols don’t survive all that long in the body. Eating polyphenol-rich foods at every meal and snack provides the biggest bang by delivering a steady stream to your body all throughout the day,” she says.

But because polyphenols aren’t as essential to survival as, say, minerals, there’s no prescribed daily recommended intake. Lifestyle factors, however, can act as a guide. If you smoke or live in a heavily polluted area, Ansel says you need them even more “to help your body quash and protect against the additional free radicals that are attacking your cells.”

6 Inflammation Causing Foods You May Not Have Thought About.

There’s a five-alarm fire sounding these days about inflammation, and with good reason. Heart disease, cancer, Alzheimer’s, and acne are just some of the possible consequences of too much inflammation in the body.

According to Nicholas Perricone, M.D., the pioneering nutritionist and dermatologist (who wrote the book on anti-inflammation eating), our bodies actually depend on temporary inflammation to help fight off sudden injuries or infection. But when that inflammation becomes chronic, “the immune system mistakenly attacks normal cells, and the process that ordinarily heals becomes destructive.”

9 Spices That Boost Your Immune System.

How Herbs and Spices Impact Your Health

It's time to replace your medicine cabinet with your spice rack, according to 16 research papers published in Nutrition Today summarizing a Science Summit held by the McCormick Science institute and the American Society for Nutrition in Washington, DC. They named four major areas where herbs and spices can impact your health:

1: Spicing Up "Bland" Health Food So You Keep Eating Healthy
Health food has a reputation for being rather boring since it's not loaded up with fat and sugar (two things that taste really good). However, research from the University of Colorado found that adding spices to healthy dishes could make them just as appealing as full-fat versions. This means that "diet" food can be incorporated into a long-term plan for healthy eating.

10 Health Benefits of Coconut Oil.

Coconut oil is one of the few foods that can be classified as a “superfood.”

Its benefits include weight loss, better brain function, skin health and many more.

Here are 10 impressive health benefits of coconut oil.

1. Coconut Oil Contains Fatty Acids With Powerful Medicinal Properties

Coconut oil has been demonized in the past because it contains saturated fat.

In fact, coconut oil is one of the richest sources of saturated fat known to man, with almost 90% of the fatty acids in it being saturated .

However, new data is showing that saturated fats are mostly harmless. Many studies with hundreds of thousands of people have found no link to heart disease .

Additionally, coconut oil doesn’t contain your average saturated fats, like the ones you would find in cheese or steak.

They contain Medium Chain Triglycerides (MCTs) – which are fatty acids of a medium length.

Most of the fatty acids in the diet are long-chain fatty acids, but the medium-chain fatty acids in coconut oil are metabolized differently.

They go straight to the liver from the digestive tract, where they are used as a quick source of energy or turned into so-called ketones, which can have therapeutic effects on brain disorders like epilepsy and Alzheimer’s.

Bottom Line: Coconut oil contains a lot of medium chain triglycerides, which are metabolized differently and can have therapeutic effects on several brain disorders.