Healthy Treats and Eats

Monday, June 13, 2011

Lupus Hope: My Holistic Nutrition- based Lupus Research Blog

Click Here www.lupushope.blogspot.com

Thursday, February 10, 2011

Gluten Free Cooking and Baking

Gluten is a protein found in rye, wheat, barley and sometimes oats (oats can come from cross contamination with wheat as wheat and oat grains look very much alike).

The most common reason people choose to be on a gluten free diet is they get a diagnosis of Celiac Disease. Celiac Disease is an autoimmune disease that doesn't allow the gluten to be digested properly in the intestines. A whole host of health challenges and disease can be caused by the inability of the body to digest the gluten. Many people feel tremendously better after going gluten free. Intestinal pain can vanish, joint pains can lessen or vanish and headaches/migraines/sinus issues can also become a thing of the past!

Gluten free flours can be made from non gluten grains (rice, buckwheat, millet, amaranth, quinoa, teff and gluten free oats) as well as beans, nuts and seeds.

In class we will create meals, breads and desserts such as pizza, pasta, waffles, muffins and more. All recipes will be gluten free and dairy free, most will be egg free also.

Celiac Disease is only one of the diseases that is associated with gluten intolerance, there are many others that have been implicated such as Lupus, MS, Autism, Crohn's Disease, Irritable Bowel, Diabetes, and more.

What Are the Raw Foods Diet and Macrobiotic Diet

The Raw Foods Diet contains foods that are not heated over 115 degrees. Raw Food advocates say that cooking destroys the natural nutrition and enzymes that naturally occur in fresh foods. These foods include all raw nuts, raw nut butters, raw seeds, raw sprouted grains/seeds/beans, raw vegetables and fruits, dried fruits (dried under 115 degrees), raw sea vegetables, raw honey (some vegans omit raw honey).

Eating a raw food diet can help alkalyze your blood which leads to better health. Some people choose to eat all raw foods and some eat "high raw" mostly raw foods with other foods added. Anyway you slice it more vegetables are always a healthy addition to a Standard American Diet.

This diet can be as easy as eating a salad or a carrot or a piece of fruit right out of the garden or produce aisle. But foods can also be combined to make incredibly delicious gourmet meals and desserts. In class we will focus on wonderfully delicious and easy raw food recipes.

Macrobiotic Diet and Lifestyle

Macro means "great" and Bios means "life". So this diet was named the Great Life Diet. Based on Oriental medicine and founded in Japan, Macrobiotics focuses on continued wellness through lifestyle, attitude and diet changes. Macrobiotics focuses on our connection to nature and the earth and also the coming and going of the seasons. This lifestyle practices the idea of yin and yang (expansion and contraction) and this diet can be tailored to health issues by a macrobiotic counsellor.

This diet features low fat, high complex carbohydrate eating in the form of many types of cooked whole grains as the center of the meal, many vegetables (cooked and raw), cooked beans, miso, soups, tempeh, tofu, fish, fermented foods and pickles, and sea vegetables. Making sure one eats locally grown and foods in season is paramount. In class we will focus on creating meals and desserts that are not only delicious but fall under the principles of the Macrobiotic Diet.