Archive for the “Nutrition” Category

I just had my snack today for the first time and it was a light Yoplait yogurt in the lemon creme pie flavor. It was so good!!! I had that and a half banana to get me through my ab workout and to last me until dinner. I swear I was eating a piece of pie and even my son wanted some and kept asking for more, lol. If you are just starting to work on the weight loss thing and are bored with your snacks try these. They are available in a lot of flavors:

Apple Turnover
Apricot Mango
Banana Cream Pie
Berries ‘N Cream
Blackberry
Blueberry Patch
Boston Cream Pie
Harvest Peach
Key Lime Pie
Lemon Cream Pie
Orange Crème
Red Raspberry
Strawberries ‘N Bananas
Strawberry
Strawberry Orange Sunrise
Very Cherry
Very Vanilla
White Chocolate Strawberry

My favorites so far are the White Chocolate Strawberry, strawberries and banana, lemon creme pie, and very vanilla.

Well, in a bit I will work out my chest and back with weights and before the biggest loser comes on I will does step aerobics with christi Taylor’s step sensational DVD.

Tags: nutrition, weight loss, yoplait yogurt

Okay, one more thing then I will get exercising. I know, I just had to share this nutrition tip with you especially for you newbies out there looking to lose weight now or in the new year. I was at foodnetwork.com and they gave great visual pictures of what a portion size of certain foods would be equivalent too. for example : A serving of chicken is equivalent to a deck of cards. See below. Here is the link to the site.

They will show this picture then underneath the will have a link to more examples of other food items for you to view. I just thought this was fabulous and it was also a great refresher for me too. Check this out and you will be on the right track for weight loss this holiday and into the new year.

Enjoy!!

Tags: weight loss, portion sizes, nutrition, food network, healthy eating

I just opened up an awesome e-mail from Calorie Count.com and I was look I have got to share this with you all that are losing weight and getting healthy. They say “Imagine you’re in a fast food restaurant and are forced into choosing a meal from a menu of terrible choices. Fear not! Just whip out your cell phone, enter ccm.about.com into the mobile browser, and you’ll have the entire food database of this site at your fingertips!” This new site is specifically designed to meet the requirements of almost all WAP or web-enabled phones sold in the United States. This includes MOTORAZRs, Qs, Blackberries, and hundreds of other handhelds.

Regardless of which phone you use, just open its browser and point it to ccm.about.com. Please share that link with your friends and family. The easiest way is to send them a text message mentioning http://ccm.about.com - when you append “http://”, most phones recognize this is a web address and will convert it to a clickable link inside of your text message.

Isn’t that cool/ No more fretting over how many calories your are eating when you are enjoy a night out with friends. You can make smart choices right from your cell phone. I am definitely going to use this for Christmas and New Years Eve Celebrating and you should too. Check this out!!!

Tags: calories counting, weight loss, cell phones

  I was finding myself browsing the other day in my oxygen magazine and online for some nutritional supplements or a multi-vitaman that I can take on a daily basis as recommend by my doctor. I came across this site called choice nutritionals as I was browsing today. I found that they are a retailer that offer quality vitamins, minerals, nutritional supplements & nutritional supplement from Garden of Life, Mt. Capra, Sovereign Silver and Natural Calm. This includes products for the Makers Diet; primal defense, goatein, omegazyme, perfect food, air filters and water filters. They also offer organic skin & personal care items from Miessence, and organic essential oils from Oshadhi as well as high quality blenders from Ktec and dehydrators from Excalibur.

I have never heard of this company until today and they seem to have very good pricing for their line of products that is not outrageously expensive. The website is very simple and basic, so in essence it is easy to navigate. The don’t the popular brands that I know of, but it is a start. Have any of you heard of this company? Also have you used any of the supplements or vitamins? If so what is your favorite?

Tags: health, vitamins, supplements, weight loss

I just had to share this article I found today because a lot of being have been asking me why is protein so important for weight loss and building muscles. So people say that protein will make you fat or they say I don’t have time to cook all of the protein suggested on a daily basis. So this article was great in explaining the importance of protein and if you are unable to prepare it how protein supplements can be a great way to replace a few meals.

Enjoy!

Protein And Your Fitness Goals
By Angie Schumacher

Why do we need protein?

Protein is the building block of our whole body - muscles, tissues, hair, nails, etc - all made up of protein. The body needs to break protein down to amino acids to build muscles. If you do not have enough protein in your body you can NOT build muscle mass. You want to make sure that your body is burning fat, not muscle and you can ensure this by ingesting .9 grams of protein per pound of body weight. If you want to build muscle, you will need to ingest 1 to 1.5 grams of protein.

Most protein foods of animal origin such as meat, poultry, fish, eggs, cheese, and milk, contain all of the essential amino acids and are called complete proteins. Proteins found in vegetables are usually lacking one or more of the essential amino acids, so they are called incomplete proteins. However, you can combine 2 incomplete vegetable proteins to make a very high quality complete protein. These are the foods are where most of your protein grams should come from first.

Will taking in protein make me fat?

Amino acids in protein help keep your blood sugar levels stable, so if you are trying to lose weight, the protein will aide in your weight loss. Protein helps keep stop your cravings for food that occurs when blood sugar level drops. When your diet is too high in carbohydrates, you go from a burst of energy and being full to being tired and hungry. That is why you must always have a protein and a carbohydrate at each meal.

Why should I supplement with whey protein? Can’t I get enough protein from eating regular foods?

Yes, you can get enough protein, but there are times when it can be very hard. In todays world, people just don’t have enough time. Running here and there, always on the go. This is where protein shakes can come in very handy. They literally take 2-3 minutes to prepare. Scoop the powder into a shaker or blender with some form of liquid (milk, fruit juice or water). Supplementing with whey protein shakes will help you to build muscle mass, speed recovery time, reduce injuries related to working out, help you to maintain a healthy and fit body and help you to feel better during your workouts.

When are the best times to use a protein supplement?

You should try to get most of your daily protein from regular foods, but there are times when having a protein shake are more beneficial. First thing in the morning, when your body has not had any food for the past 8 hours or so, shakes are digested much faster than an actual meal. Immediately following a workout is also an ideal time for a protein shake. This is probably the most important time to have a shake because after your workout, your muscles need to rebuild and repair themselves.

Can too much protein hurt my body?

If you take in too much protein, your body will not be able to process all the protein into amino acids. What your body can not use will have to be excreted as a waste product. This means your kidney and liver will be doing a lot of work just to get the excess protein out of your body. While this will not cause any major problems over a short period of time - you would not want to be overworking your kidney and liver over the course of several years. That being said - protein supplementation is very safe if you stay within the dosage guidelines.

Which protein supplement is best?

Whey protein is the best form of protein to take when using a supplement as it does not contain fat or lactose sugar. Whey is one of two major sources of protein in milk (casein protein being the other). When milk is turned into cheese, the whey protein is filtered out. The result is a high quality protein.

So as you can see, protein is the most important part of your diet, whether your goals are to increase muscle and get bigger and stronger, or lose weight and lose fat and get/stay lean.

Angie Schumacher is a successful fitness entrepreneur both in online and offline areas. She is a Certified Personal Trainer and diet and fitness website manager.

For more great diet and fitness tips, visit her websites: http://www.womensdietandfitness.com and http://www.buildingabetteru.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Angie_Schumacher
http://EzineArticles.com/?Protein-And-Your-Fitness-Goals&id=833026

Tags: Protein, Nutrition, weight loss, building muscle, bodybuilding

  I know that there is a lot of buzz about what foods people can eat to effectively lose weight and keep healthy, right? Well I am always curious and came across a page on Foodnetwork.com that displays the power foods that one should include in their diet. Once you click on the food group they explains the benefit they have for your body. I am not too surprised about this, but someone starting off on a diet for the first time may appreciate this information.

Now speaking of healthy foods I am curious to know what is your favorite healthy food? Okay…. my favorite would be a nice lean piece of beef tenderloin and… with a side of sweet potatoes. Gosh, I am making myself hunger already. hee hee

tags: healthy foods, nutrition, diet, food network, weight loss

As you know, I am in the process of burning more fat off this body and building more muscle to achieve an overall lean firm physique for this coming summer. Lately I have been researching many products out there on the market that claim to help burn fat and build muscle through a variety of protein shakes, supplements, and pills. Now, I am one not to try pills, but I will definitely try protein shakes.

I recently joined Bodybuilding.com in hopes finding the right shake out there to try since there are so many out there in the market from Myoplex to Whey Gourmet and many more. Many of the professional figure competitors and athletes that came across have recommended me to try CytoSport’s Muscle Milk. So I was like okay!! I was a little reluctant, however intrigued because I have been seeing this product in Oxygen Magazine and other fitness periodicals. Many people have raved that when they use this product they have noticed that their muscle grows faster than gainers, whey or even creatine.

Muscle milk is very easy to use too! I will be using it as a protein substitute for 1 or 2 of my meals during the day in addition to my starchy carb, simple or Fibrous carb for convenience. The flavor I purchased was the strawberry milkshake, however if strawberry is not your thing Muscle Milk comes in many other flavors. Today is my first day trying this and I can not wait to see my progress with it on November 21st.

Chat later!

.

Tags: Muscle Milk, CytoSport Muscle Milk, Bodybuilding, fitness, CytoSport Muscle Milk review

Usually I would have posted this yesterday, but I was a bit busy and did not get a chance to logo back on. Anyway, I found this article that will help many people that are just starting there weight loss journey is hopes to have success. I believe success is key if you have the right tools to educate yourself as you lose the weight and this article hit home. How can someone begin to lose weight if they have no clue of how much food that are consuming on a daily basis? Do you agree with me on that one? I believe a start is the track what you are eating to get an idea if you are eating too much for weight loss or too little. One tool that has helped me through my weight loss journey and even to this day is Calorieking.com. They have a abundant of food in there data base, even foods from your favorite restaurants to look at. So, check out this article and I hope this helps anyone beginning a journey to a new and healthier you.

Keep Track Of What You Eat!
By Don Carlin

It is very well known that in order to lose weight, you must burn more calories than you consume. So how many calories do you consume each day? How do you know how many? Do you simply guesstimate? If so, then that is simply not adequate. When you take the first step to lose weight, you must get a handle on your eating, period. It is impossible for most people to keep track of all this in their head. Therefore you must have a journal of what you eat. One of the earliest things I did was create an Excel spreadsheet that I used to track what I ate on a daily basis. Why would I do this? First, I needed to get an idea of how much I was eating currently. Without knowing, I had no basis to cut calories. But once I started, I learned quickly how much I ate. I had always thought I was doing an okay job, but seeing the daily caloric values, I was shocked how much calories I consumed each day. On the flipside, I was able to see where I could cut back without adversely affecting my health.

Now that you decided to keep a log, how do you go about doing it? I know of people who use a notebook, and they write down what they ate and kept track that way. Others bought software that has huge databases of all foods - including meals from popular restaurants. You simply select what you ate, and the program calculates not only your calories, some programs even provide you nutritional information as well. There are web-based tools that do the same. I simply decided to use a spreadsheet.

Using the food labels, I would enter what I ate, how much calories it contained, and since I wanted to track protein, I entered the grams of protein contained. Using Excel’s auto sum feature, I would total the amount of calories and protein. Whenever I ate at a restaurant, I used http://www.dietfacts.com/ It contains entrees for many, many restaurants. In the, rare, cases I could not find the restaurant, I used this rule of thumb to estimate my calories.

Carbohydrates and proteins have 4 calories per gram; fats have nine calories per gram. I simply made rough estimates and since this situation did not happen enough, I was not overly concerned. Once I started tracking, I discovered this was an excellent accountability tool. Because I was very strict about putting everything I ate, I always had the log in the back of my mind. I would hesitate to sneak, because I had to place it in my log and see the daily caloric intake rise.

I did allow myself once a week to enjoy my favorite foods - I called it my “free day”, a day I did not track what I ate. You know, in spite of eating very liberally on my free day, and I mean extremely liberally, I still ended up losing six pounds a week. Because I ramped my water consumption to about 96 to 120 ounces a day, it clearly was not water weight I was losing. As time progressed, I used this log to also track my weight, and eventually I would track my waist size, body fat composition, my basal metabolic rate, and my estimated calories I burned from my physical training.

Tracking what I eat was instrumental in my weight loss, and my spreadsheet remains a valuable tool to this day. Take control over your weight - begin by taking control of your eating. You will be surprised and pleased by the outcome!

A runaway weight loss success story. Lost over 80 pounds in four months (36 of those pounds in just six weeks)- went from 240 to 160, kept all of it off for nearly a year, so far. I am sharing with others my research that led to my success so they too may control their weight.

Because I monitored so carefully how much I ate, I lost 80 pounds in four months, and 36 of those pounds in just six weeks. Find out more about my successful story at: http://www.squidoo.com/fromobesetoathletic/

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Don_Carlin
http://EzineArticles.com/?Keep-Track-Of-What-You-Eat!&id=794006

Tags: Nutrition, weight loss, calorie counting, health, diet

I love browsing for new recipes, because I don’t know about you but I easily get bored of eating the same thing over and over again. No, chicken is a staple in my diet and I have been look for ways to spice it up a bit without adding to many calories and fat to it. So I was browsing Allrecipes.com and they had a yummy Jerk Chicken recipe that I am going to try tomorrow night!! New stuff, Yeah! Give it a try and see if this is a good one to keep in the menu plan.

A Jerky Chicken

A great Jamaican style dish. A spicy blend of herbs, vinegar, and a habanero pepper make this chicken dish unforgettable. Serve with rice, yum!”

NUTRITION INFORMATION

Servings Per Recipe: 4 Amount Per Serving

Calories: 197
Total Fat: 2.7g
Cholesterol: 68mg  Sodium: 996mg

Total Carbs: 13.5g

Dietary Fiber: 0.4g

Protein: 28.3g

Tags: nutrition, recipes, healthy living, weight loss,

Hey Everyone! I found an great article for those who are struggling with their diets and think that skipping breakfast will do them justice in losing weight. I have always disagreed with skipping breakfast because your body needs that fuel to keep your engine running through out the morning. Take a read and tell me what you think?
Importance of Breakfast in Your Diet
By Deborah Carraro

    Many people make the mistake of skipping or skimping on breakfast in their daily diet. This may be due to any number of reasons…rushing off to work, jumping into household chores, getting caught up with child care or just plain poor eating habits. Breakfast is an important element in one’s daily diet, whatever type of diet you may prefer.

I used to skip breakfast all the time. I would often fill up on water and head out the door for the daily 1.5 hour commute to work. Of course, the first stop after getting off the train would be a coffee - simply to keep me going, not for the caffeine fix! When I worked in the Corporate World, I counted myself among the many who would skip their morning meal. Breakfast was a luxury time didn’t permit.

Some who are very weight loss conscious, or just wish to control weight through diet, erroneously think that skipping breakfast is a good way to eliminate calories. This is a mistake in terms of overall health, calorie control and good diet habits. Because the food we eat in our diet, the times when we eat and the particular type of food intake (protein, starch, sugar) all affect blood sugar levels and appetite. We need to control food intake in our diet in order to keep energy and blood sugar at appropriate levels.

I started back at the gym two months ago after a five year hiatus. One of the first things I did, even before setting foot in the door of the gym, was incorporate a breakfast and a morning snack into my daily routine. It’s made the world of difference. In fact, the days that I don’t eat a full meal or skip my snack, I feel it in my energy levels when I hit the gym.

In essence when we awake in the morning our body has been through a period of “fasting”, with no food intake for a number of hours. This results in relatively low blood sugar. If one skips breakfast in one’s diet, the blood sugar level continues to dip and a sudden craving can develop for food, especially for sugar in the diet, which again causes a quick rise in blood sugar. When the diet includes sudden intake of sugar, the sugar level jumps, which develops a roller coaster effect and leads to a poor diet which includes “quick fixes”. Typically a quick response to low blood sugar is a sweet, a soft drink or alcohol…none of which are a good diet supplement.

A diet which maintains appropriate levels of blood sugar and energy will include a healthy breakfast. Blood sugar levels will be maintained with a diet that includes a balanced breakfast combining whole grain, some source of protein and fruit. Protein in particular in the diet, including breakfast, will maintain blood sugar levels, avoiding the dips which lead to snacking.

If you’re pressed for time, consider a smoothie. You can chop your fruits and vegetables the night before and load them into your blender glass. Refrigerate overnight (or not if you prefer room temperature smoothies) and whirl away in the blender in the morning along with your favorite liquid. Five minutes is all you’ll need to whip up a nutritious and substantial breakfast. You can even pour it into a travel mug or neoprene jug and tote it with you on your commute.

A healthy breakfast is an essential part of a healthy diet. Beginning your day with a good, nourishing meal is the first step toward maintaining a balanced diet and a sensible approach to good eating habits. Don’t skip breakfast in your daily diet.

Your body will thank you.

Deborah Carraro is an avid nutrition, health & fitness enthusiast. If you’re tired of feeling tired and drained all day and often fall victim to the 3 PM lows, then you’re in for some surprises once you learn to make delicious and nutritious smoothies. Visit http://www.smoothiesforhealth.com for more information.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Deborah_Carraro
http://EzineArticles.com/?Importance-of-Breakfast-in-Your-Diet&id=784645

Tags: nutrition, weight loss, weight loss tips, health