While I do not promote a rampant, snack-culture (hearty, satisfying meals are always best), here are the snacks I would recommend for mid-morning or afternoon:
1. Nuts. Two billion squirrels can't be wrong! An ounce of almonds, walnuts, peanuts, or pistachios provides about 8 grams of protein, the same as a glass of milk. Nuts contain unsaturated fat too, a good fat, which reduces LDL (bad) cholesterol and keeps your body sated.
2. Dried Fruit. Cranberries, raisins, pineapple, papaya, banana, or my favorite: organic, dried mango slices. Make sure you buy ulsulphured and unsweetened dried fruit to avoid unnecessary sugar or preservatives. You'll find that your jaw tells you when you've had enough and your belly will agree.
3. Avocado - seriously, cut it in half and eat it with a spoon, sprinkled with a little sea salt or hot sauce and lime. Delish. Avocados have beneficial monounsaturated fat, 60% more potassium than a banana, and are rich in Vitamins E, B, and K. Buy a whole bunch and add them to everything you eat. I am convinced anything with a sliced avocado on it looks gourmet. Indeed, most restaurants jack up the price of anything with a few, precious slices of this green guy.
4. Plain, full fat yogurt parfait. Don't worry about the fat. It's natural. The sugar content is what you need to worry about. Add your own sweetness (maple syrup, agave, honey) as well as fresh, shredded coconut, nuts, fresh fruit--whatever your heart desires. Don't buy yogurt that has the gooey, mystery fruit in it. It is highly processed and full of sugar and preservatives. Try to wean yourself off of sugary yogurt and slowly accustom your body to plain jane yogurt with 12g of sugar or less per serving. My favorite brands are Trader Joes, Wallaby and Brown Cow.
5. Lara Bars - these are the only "bars" I will eat, simply because they only have 2-3 ingredients on the label, like banana, date for example. They are vegan, organic and the least processed bars around.
6. Banana with Almond Butter. Get baby bananas (my favorite) and smear a little almond butter on top and enjoy.
7. Tea and a cookie. Because sometimes that's what you really want. A tea can be like a liquid hug. And if you do have a cookie, get the prettiest, most lovely cookie you can find and eat it slowly and only have one. Pretend you're writing a poem about it that's how special it is. Savor your tea and close your eyes. Then get back to work with a smile, you lazy bum.
Friday, January 29, 2010
Thursday, January 28, 2010
Weight Loss and Will Power--An Impossible Pair
I was eating kale salad, quinoa, chicken soup and an avocado at Whole Foods on 14th Street the other day before yoga when I saw that someone had left a Men's Health Magazine out on the counter. I flipped through it to an article by Augusten Burroughs where he relates a story on how he personally lost holiday weight by "eating like a girl." In the article, he consults his good friend who has been on a perma-diet since birth (the expert?) for weight loss advice. She advises him to guzzle water before any party and to fill his plate with all the food he wants in the world, BUT only take one small bite and leave the rest. This sounds like the diet of a woman with very disordered eating habits. Her advice is like handing an alcoholic a bottle of wine and telling him/her to have one sip a day only and you'll be fine. For a person who is overweight, eating a standard American diet of refined carbs, sugars, meat, caffeine, and limited vegetables and fruit, advising this person to go through the day trying to "trick" the body with water and small bites of the same bad foods is not health: this is self-torture, not to mention obscenely wasteful. In fact, eating tiny bird bites of foods and carrying around bottles of water, diet soda are exactly the habits many anorexic/bulimic girls I knew in a treatment center in Utah spoke about in our group therapy sessions as toxic coping mechanisms that when taken to extreme took over their lives, away from their families, careers and into an obsessive-compulsive relationship with food.
Controlling food intake with willpower is a temporary, quick-fix for a gaping hole in the multidimensional, intensely personal portrait of human wellness. Coming up with a health plan that works for you involves many complex factors (and thank god for that! Human nature itself is very complex!) Here are just a few factors that go into devising a sustainable, flexible, nurturing health plan that feeds all aspects of a person: body type, metabolism, blood type, your job, if you have children, if you are single, if you are an athlete, if you work at a desk, if you have allergies, personality type, what your ancestors ate, gender. I could go on and on.
The point is that food and will-power don't mix. The will is the ego trying to control biology. It breeds imbalance. I personally eat more than any girl I know (or guy for that matter) and because I exercise, work hard, understand my hunger, my cravings, my body-type's needs, my emotional needs, do not eat artificial, chemicalized junk, but food instead, real, whole foods, I NEVER gain weight...simple as that. My body and I are friends, not foes. Everyone on earth is capable of this relationship too. It's my personal mission to advocate the important paradigm shift our culture needs to embrace in order to change how we view food, health, happiness, and success.
Controlling food intake with willpower is a temporary, quick-fix for a gaping hole in the multidimensional, intensely personal portrait of human wellness. Coming up with a health plan that works for you involves many complex factors (and thank god for that! Human nature itself is very complex!) Here are just a few factors that go into devising a sustainable, flexible, nurturing health plan that feeds all aspects of a person: body type, metabolism, blood type, your job, if you have children, if you are single, if you are an athlete, if you work at a desk, if you have allergies, personality type, what your ancestors ate, gender. I could go on and on.
The point is that food and will-power don't mix. The will is the ego trying to control biology. It breeds imbalance. I personally eat more than any girl I know (or guy for that matter) and because I exercise, work hard, understand my hunger, my cravings, my body-type's needs, my emotional needs, do not eat artificial, chemicalized junk, but food instead, real, whole foods, I NEVER gain weight...simple as that. My body and I are friends, not foes. Everyone on earth is capable of this relationship too. It's my personal mission to advocate the important paradigm shift our culture needs to embrace in order to change how we view food, health, happiness, and success.
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Cravings are Not the Problem. They are the Solution.
The 8 Causes of Cravings
© 2009 Integrative Nutrition 1/09
The body is amazing. It knows when to go to sleep, wake up, go to the bathroom, maintain 98.6 degrees and tighten the eyes when the light gets bright. It knows the miracle of pregnancy and childbirth. Your heart never misses a beat. Your lungs are always breathing. The body is a super-computer, and it never makes mistakes.
Look at the foods, deficits and behaviors in your life that are the underlying causes of your cravings. Many people view cravings as weakness, but really they are important messages meant to assist you in maintaining balance. When you experience a craving, deconstruct it. Ask yourself, what does my body want and why?
The eight primary causes of cravings are:
1. Lack of primary food. Being dissatisfied with a relationship or having an inappropriate exercise routine (too much, too little or the wrong type), being bored, stressed, uninspired by a job, or lacking a spiritual practice may all cause emotional eating. Eating can be used as a substitute for entertainment or to fill the void of primary food.
2. Water. Lack of water can send the message that you are thirsty and on the verge of dehydration. Dehydration can manifest as a mild hunger, so the first thing to do when you get a craving is drink a full glass of water. Excess water can also cause cravings, so be sure that your water intake is well balanced.
3. Yin/yang imbalance. Certain foods have more yin qualities (expansive) while other foods have more yang qualities (contractive). Eating foods that are either extremely yin or extremely yang causes cravings in order to maintain balance. For example, eating a diet too rich in sugar (yin) may cause a craving for meat (yang). Eating too many raw foods (yin) may cause cravings for extremely cooked (dehydrated) foods or vise versa.
4. Inside coming out. Often times, cravings come from foods that we have recently eaten, foods eaten by our ancestors, or foods from our childhood. A clever way to satisfy these cravings is to eat a healthier version of one’s ancestral or childhood foods.
5. Seasonal. Often the body craves foods that balance the elements of the season. In the spring, people crave detoxifying foods like leafy greens or citrus foods. In the summer, people crave cooling foods like fruit, raw foods and ice cream, and in the fall people crave grounding foods like squash, onions and nuts. During winter, many crave hot and heat-producing foods like meat, oil and fat. Cravings can also be associated with the holidays, for foods like turkey, eggnog or sweets, etc.
6. Lack of nutrients. If the body has inadequate nutrients, it will produce odd cravings. For example, inadequate mineral levels produce salt cravings, and overall inadequate nutrition produces cravings for non-nutritional forms of energy, like caffeine.
7. Hormonal. When women experience menstruation, pregnancy or menopause, fluctuating testosterone and estrogen levels may cause unique cravings.
8. De-evolution. When things are going extremely well, sometimes a self-sabotage syndrome happens. We crave foods that throw us off, thus creating more cravings to balance ourselves. This often happens from low blood sugar and may result in strong mood swings.
© 2009 Integrative Nutrition 1/09
The body is amazing. It knows when to go to sleep, wake up, go to the bathroom, maintain 98.6 degrees and tighten the eyes when the light gets bright. It knows the miracle of pregnancy and childbirth. Your heart never misses a beat. Your lungs are always breathing. The body is a super-computer, and it never makes mistakes.
Look at the foods, deficits and behaviors in your life that are the underlying causes of your cravings. Many people view cravings as weakness, but really they are important messages meant to assist you in maintaining balance. When you experience a craving, deconstruct it. Ask yourself, what does my body want and why?
The eight primary causes of cravings are:
1. Lack of primary food. Being dissatisfied with a relationship or having an inappropriate exercise routine (too much, too little or the wrong type), being bored, stressed, uninspired by a job, or lacking a spiritual practice may all cause emotional eating. Eating can be used as a substitute for entertainment or to fill the void of primary food.
2. Water. Lack of water can send the message that you are thirsty and on the verge of dehydration. Dehydration can manifest as a mild hunger, so the first thing to do when you get a craving is drink a full glass of water. Excess water can also cause cravings, so be sure that your water intake is well balanced.
3. Yin/yang imbalance. Certain foods have more yin qualities (expansive) while other foods have more yang qualities (contractive). Eating foods that are either extremely yin or extremely yang causes cravings in order to maintain balance. For example, eating a diet too rich in sugar (yin) may cause a craving for meat (yang). Eating too many raw foods (yin) may cause cravings for extremely cooked (dehydrated) foods or vise versa.
4. Inside coming out. Often times, cravings come from foods that we have recently eaten, foods eaten by our ancestors, or foods from our childhood. A clever way to satisfy these cravings is to eat a healthier version of one’s ancestral or childhood foods.
5. Seasonal. Often the body craves foods that balance the elements of the season. In the spring, people crave detoxifying foods like leafy greens or citrus foods. In the summer, people crave cooling foods like fruit, raw foods and ice cream, and in the fall people crave grounding foods like squash, onions and nuts. During winter, many crave hot and heat-producing foods like meat, oil and fat. Cravings can also be associated with the holidays, for foods like turkey, eggnog or sweets, etc.
6. Lack of nutrients. If the body has inadequate nutrients, it will produce odd cravings. For example, inadequate mineral levels produce salt cravings, and overall inadequate nutrition produces cravings for non-nutritional forms of energy, like caffeine.
7. Hormonal. When women experience menstruation, pregnancy or menopause, fluctuating testosterone and estrogen levels may cause unique cravings.
8. De-evolution. When things are going extremely well, sometimes a self-sabotage syndrome happens. We crave foods that throw us off, thus creating more cravings to balance ourselves. This often happens from low blood sugar and may result in strong mood swings.
The 7 Foods Health Experts Won't Eat
From an article by Liz Vaccariello, Editor-in-Chief, PREVENTION. 11/09
1. Canned Tomatoes - The resin linings of tin cans contain bisphenol-A, a synthetic estrogen that has been linked to ailments ranging from reproductive problems, to heart disease, diabetes, and obesity.
2. Corn-fed Beef - Cattle evolved to eat grass, not grains. But farmers feed their animals corn and soybeans to fatten them up faster for slaughter.
3. Microwave Popcorn - chemicals, including perfluoroctanoic acid, in the lining of the bag, are part of a class of compounds that may be linked to infertility
4. Nonorganic Potatoes - root vegetables absorb herbicides, pesticides, and fungicides that wind up in the soil and traditional potatoes are loaded with these harmful chemicals.
5. Farmed Salmon - Farmeds salmon are crammed into pens, fed soy, poultry litter, and hydrolyzed chicken feathers.
6. Milk Produced with Artificial Hormones - rBGH, the recombinant bovine growth hormone increase udder infections and even pus in the milk. Gross. And sad.
7. Conventional Apples - voted the most doused in pesticides of all the fruits/veggies with an edible peel in the produce section. Apples are more resistant to pests so they are sprayed even more than other fruits. Yikes.
click here for the full article:
http://shine.yahoo.com/channel/health/the-7-foods-experts-wont-eat-547963/
1. Canned Tomatoes - The resin linings of tin cans contain bisphenol-A, a synthetic estrogen that has been linked to ailments ranging from reproductive problems, to heart disease, diabetes, and obesity.
2. Corn-fed Beef - Cattle evolved to eat grass, not grains. But farmers feed their animals corn and soybeans to fatten them up faster for slaughter.
3. Microwave Popcorn - chemicals, including perfluoroctanoic acid, in the lining of the bag, are part of a class of compounds that may be linked to infertility
4. Nonorganic Potatoes - root vegetables absorb herbicides, pesticides, and fungicides that wind up in the soil and traditional potatoes are loaded with these harmful chemicals.
5. Farmed Salmon - Farmeds salmon are crammed into pens, fed soy, poultry litter, and hydrolyzed chicken feathers.
6. Milk Produced with Artificial Hormones - rBGH, the recombinant bovine growth hormone increase udder infections and even pus in the milk. Gross. And sad.
7. Conventional Apples - voted the most doused in pesticides of all the fruits/veggies with an edible peel in the produce section. Apples are more resistant to pests so they are sprayed even more than other fruits. Yikes.
click here for the full article:
http://shine.yahoo.com/channel/health/the-7-foods-experts-wont-eat-547963/
Thursday, January 7, 2010
Turn your New Years Health Resolutions into Forever!
My name is Cassie Spreitzer and I am a holistic health counselor in Manhattan. I specialize in fast-track, 3 and 6 month wellness programs for busy, hardworking, creative, energetic people who have found themselves in a health rut. My clients are intelligent people looking for sound health advice and support from someone who understands the challenges and rewards of taking the time to get healthy for real.
My goal as your personal health counselor is to create a nutrition program tailored to fit your lifestyle. Together we will address your main health concern and the many dimensions of your life until we come up with a plan and pace that feels comfortable for you, inspires change and creates balance. You will learn about vegetables, grains, protein, dairy, sugar, eating according to your body type, blood type, personality type, and all the different dietary theories from around the world that have nourished populations for centuries. As we work together, you will never diet or feel deprived; instead you will be nourished, have more energy at work, spend more quality time with people you love and who inspire you, your mood will improve, you will develop an exercise routine that is realistic, challenging and exciting, and at the next big party you attend friends will flock to you, asking how on earth you look so fantastic these days.
Finding a real-life program for health and happiness in times of stress can feel as overwhelming and unpleasant as knocking shoulders and umbrellas on the bustling avenues of New York City during 42nd Street rush hour. I am here to help. As a holistic health counselor, consider me a friendly person standing on the corner to help keep you motivated and moving in the right direction. As someone who has found health and balance in the city that never sleeps, I am here to help you succeed in the Times Square of your own life. When stress hits, don't pick the drink, the cigarette, the brownie, the chips, the guy who sucks, the girl you don't really like anyway, choose me, choose yourself, choose health!
Call or e-mail me today!
My goal as your personal health counselor is to create a nutrition program tailored to fit your lifestyle. Together we will address your main health concern and the many dimensions of your life until we come up with a plan and pace that feels comfortable for you, inspires change and creates balance. You will learn about vegetables, grains, protein, dairy, sugar, eating according to your body type, blood type, personality type, and all the different dietary theories from around the world that have nourished populations for centuries. As we work together, you will never diet or feel deprived; instead you will be nourished, have more energy at work, spend more quality time with people you love and who inspire you, your mood will improve, you will develop an exercise routine that is realistic, challenging and exciting, and at the next big party you attend friends will flock to you, asking how on earth you look so fantastic these days.
Finding a real-life program for health and happiness in times of stress can feel as overwhelming and unpleasant as knocking shoulders and umbrellas on the bustling avenues of New York City during 42nd Street rush hour. I am here to help. As a holistic health counselor, consider me a friendly person standing on the corner to help keep you motivated and moving in the right direction. As someone who has found health and balance in the city that never sleeps, I am here to help you succeed in the Times Square of your own life. When stress hits, don't pick the drink, the cigarette, the brownie, the chips, the guy who sucks, the girl you don't really like anyway, choose me, choose yourself, choose health!
Call or e-mail me today!
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