Summer Friday Tips, Tricks and Inspiration

Happy summer Friday! I hope your long summer days have been filled with fun! Now that I've adjusted to school being out, I am buckling down to focus on (all of our) health and fitness.

Tips - Get in Your Potassium

Even healthy eaters can have a deficiency. Recently I was suffering from night-time leg cramps and thought potassium might be the culprit.  Just in time, Fooducate posted this article on the topic:  Potassium: You're Not Getting Enough.

The article lists several good sources for potassium -- and yes, it includes more than bananas. In fact, several foods offer twice as much potassium as bananas. Check it out.

Top Tricks for Restaurant Dining

This week delivered some shocking  news on how quickly restaurant calories add up from the Center for Science in the Public Interest.

But you certainly can be successful eating out. Your best bets? Check out these restaurant tricks:

Ordering Tricks

• Start with a brothy --not cream -- soup, eaten slowly. Research shows this single action can greatly reduce the number of calories you consume in your meal.
• Avoid anything with these words: breaded, fried, cream sauce, creamy, buttery, buttered or gravy.
• Ask for sauces and dressings on the side.
• Have your meats and seafood broiled or grilled and,
• Let your server know you are watching your waistline.
• Share an entree with a friend; you can always order an extra salad or soup.
• Order a to-go box WITH your entree and put half your meal in the box; you'll never miss it.

Cocktails, Anyone?

• If you won't enjoy your outing without alcohol,by all means have a drink! But take a minute to Google the company's nutritional info and know the cost in sugars and calories before you order.
• Easier: order wine or beer instead of a cocktail.
• Order a bottle of sparkling water with wine and dilute it 50/50. It is still delicious(!) and you get twice the beverage for the same calories. 

Mealtime tricks:

• Push the breadbasket to the far end of the table. 
• Eat slowly, beginning with all the vegetables on your plate. 
• Try your baked potato plain! They are surprisingly flavorful
• Dress your salad sparingly at first and only add more dressing as needed. 2 tablespoons of dressing is a serving.
• Drink a full glass (or two) of plain water with your meal.  
• If it's a special occasion and you want dessert, split it with a friend or better still, the whole table. 
• Finally the best eating out tip of all: If it isn't delicious, don't eat it! 

Inspiration from an Unlikely Source: Fast Food!  

Good news for fast food lovers: Amy's Kitchen is opening a quick-serve restaurant  Amy's is well known amongst vegetarians, gluten-free eaters, and healthy eaters nation-wide. Their organic, vegetarian frozen meals have been around for over 25 years and were the standard-bearer for a heathy, organic, non-GMO  frozen food. Amy's Kitchen's labels read like recipes; to wit, the ingredient label onn their famous black bean burritos: Ingredients: (Vegan) Organic wheat & whole wheat flour, filtered water, organic black and kidney beans, organic onions, organic potatoes, organic broccoli, organic corn, organic bell peppers, expeller pressed high oleic safflower and/sunflower oil, organic tomato puree, organic sweet rice flour, spices, sea salt, organic garlic, cilantro, organic tapioca starch, organic green chiles, organic jalapeño peppers. Contains wheat. 

Amy's Kitchen was a dream come true for vegan eaters, those avoiding gluten, and other folks just trying to eat with awareness. Now there are other contenders in this specialty frozen food market but Amy's Kitchen has found a new way to make waves with a quick-serve restaurant.   Fooducate reports that the restaurant will serve fresh cooked, affordable, high quality foods and will feature a drive-through. This outlet, an antithesis of fast food (healthy, local, and vegetarian), will open this year in northern California, near the companies headquarters.

I am pulling for the success of this venture and hoping it leads to a chain!. Busy parents and professionals could use a fast food restaurant with a whole foods, healthy eating mindset! Yay Amy's!

Those are your Tips, Tricks and Inspiration for this week. Next time look out for "Nerd Fitness," an android game that is encouraging exercise and some great news from the FDA.  Cheers!

Fab Friday -- Tips, Tricks and Inspiration

Yes, I've been undercover lately.  Isn't that how the weight loss journey goes?  In my case, two events coincided:  I sprained my ankle and my parents arrived with their motor home for several weeks visit.  The two things combined have really impacted my motivation.  All that said, though, it sounds like just plain excuses so guess I will go back to taking care of myself, find a work-around for exercise with my injury and stop whining!

Now --to the Friday news!

Your tip of the week is one you already know but if you are human, like me, it never hurts to be reminded.  Don't eat fast food or if you really love it, it really must be only an occasional treat.  It's not just about lifestyle, folks.  Fast food in itself may be dangerous.  A very interesting study on Chinese adults showed a 27% increase in heart related illness and type 2 diabetes amongst individuals who had western style fast food twice a week.  Twice a week!   The study (linked just above in blue) is fascinating but -- let's face it -- we already knew this, didn't we?

My trick of the week is about ginger.  We eat so much Asian food and I love me some ginger, people, but it is really a pain to peel, mince, etc.  Recently I told you about frozen ginger cubes (I do love them) and how to peel ginger with a spoon. Now I have another ginger convenience to share - ginger in a tube!  I find it in the produce department refrigerator near the tofu; you can also buy pesto in a tube.  I think the frozen stuff tastes a little fresher but this is super convenient too, and a little less expensive. 

I was inspired by re-reading this 2006 study that shows mothers do have a strong influence over their kids' eating habits.  I'm mostly a healthy influence but there are a few ways I can clean up my act.  Sometimes it seems like a lot of work to feed the family healthy homemade food, but this study reminds me that my efforts are worth it!

And We're Back! - Friday Tips, Tricks and Inspiration

Does ginger root scare you?  I have had some epic battles with this yummy fibrous root in the past, but no more.  Here are a couple of amazing tips to make this fab ingredient easy to use.  I tried this "spoon peeling" technique and it worked great!  That said, my number 1 trick for ginger-root is to look in your grocer's freezer section. You can buy ginger peeled and minced in convenient 1 tsp. cubes.  It thaws very quickly so just pop out a cube and wait a couple of minutes.  I love this super simple method.

Does organic food add enough value to justify the added expense?  This decision can seem a little tricky.  Here's a summary of recent research on the topic.

I think there are a few things missing in the equation.  The review doesn't address using a mixed approach, for example, to avoid the most pesticide laden foods (an approach that helps both my conscience and my pocketbook).

Eating locally is generally a good idea. It makes sense to me that the foods that grow in a season are the ones our bodies need in that season. As well, the faster you can get to fresh produce the more nutrients it contains. We address this by buying a "farm box" each week from a local organic farmer.  We get fresh, seasonal produce and more variety than we would buy from the grocery.  We supplement with kid friendly fruits from the grocery like bananas and grapes.  To me, it's a conservative approach to healthy eating.

This week's inspiration comes from an unusual source, Wired Magazine. Read about a fast food executive who believes we really can have it all.  He is proffering fast food that is also fresh and healthy.

For some more inspiration and -- ahem-- food for thought,  here is a thought-starter on how, as a society, we are focusing on the wrong thing when it comes to nutrition.

This article says what so many don't.  As a nation, we have to learn to control our appetites.  I would rather have an ounce a week of delicious, high quality, flavorful cheese than an ounce a day of flavorless "fake" stuff.  Ditto chocolate.  Manufacturing is not the answer to our eating problem!