Benefits of Cherry And Its Side Effects

Eating healthy is very helpful for your mental as well as your physical well-being. Your mind requires nutrients just like your heart, muscles and lungs do. These can be derived from the following ingredients:

1. Berries: Berries, particularly dark ones, such as cherries, blackberries and blueberries, are a great source of anthocyanins and different flavonoids that can boost your memory. Try to consume these in small portions at least twice a day. You can enjoy a handful in the form of snacks, add them in your cereal or bake them into a dessert like muffins or pancakes. Fresh, frozen or dried berries and cherries can reap you a lot of benefits other than memory boost as well.
2. Avocados: Avocados are the powerhouse which are stuffed with mono-saturated fats containing both vitamin K and folate. Avocados prevent blood clots in the brain, protect you against strokes and enhance the cognitive capacity of the brain, both in terms of memory as well as concentration.
3. Broccoli: Broccoli contains large amounts of vitamin K and choline. It tends to help keep your memory sharp. It is also filled with vitamin C where just one glass provides you with 150% of your recommended every day consumption.
4. Coconut oil: Coconut oil fills in as a naturally calming, anti-inflammatory agent. It stiffens the cells in charge of inflammation and aggravation. It can help with memory loss as you age and will kill awful microscopic organisms that are present in your gut.
5. Salmon: Salmon is a well-known ingredient amongst the most nutritious and healthy food items recommended for the brain. It is highly rich in Omega-3 unsaturated fats which keep the brain running, help you get rid of brain fog and improve your power of remembering things.
6. Pumpkin seeds: Highly rich in zinc than most seeds, pumpkin seeds supply this highly valuable mineral which is very important for improving memory and thinking abilities. These little seeds are also loaded with stress-busting magnesium, B vitamins and tryptophan that is a precursor to the good mood substance called serotonin.
7. Walnuts: Walnuts are very well known for a positive impact on the heart’s health. Walnuts may likewise enhance the working memory and boost it further. One can take them as a snack at any point in the day, be it to fulfill late morning hunger or add them to cereal or serving of mixed vegetables for crunch. You can also blend them into a vegetable panfry for additional protein.

Different kinds of food products have different effects on the body as well as the brain. To have a healthy body, one definitely needs to have a sound and healthy mind. Eating junk food blocks certain functions of the brain over the years whereas, a healthy diet may help in keeping you physically, mentally and psychologically healthy.

In case you have a concern or query you can always consult an expert & get answers to your questions!

Are you looking for an effective way to managing your diabetes? Yoga is considered to be an ideal remedy. Regular yoga helps in reducing the sugar levels in your blood, and also lowers your blood pressure. It helps to keep your weight in check and relieves and reduces the symptoms of diabetes, thereby, slowing down the progression of the condition. Moreover, yoga helps in increasing the production of glucagon, which is a hormone responsible for increasing glucose levels in your blood. There are several yoga poses or asanas, which assist in reducing stress from your mind. This reduces the glucagon amount and improves insulin action.

Here are some important yoga poses and asanas, which help in stress reduction, and in turn work on your diabetic symptoms.

1. Pranayama: This breathing exercise involves breathing in and breathing out. It helps in oxygenating your blood, thereby improving blood circulation. Your mind calms down and your nerves get relaxed.
2. Setubandhasana: This yoga pose is ideal for blood pressure management, and also provides relaxation to your mind. It helps in improving several other conditions, and functions of your body.
3. Balasana: This asana is referred to as the pose of a child. It is an ideal stress buster. It stretches your thighs, hips, and ankles, calms your mind and provides effective stress relief. It eliminates fatigue and cures lower back pain.
4. Vajrasana: This is another simple yoga pose, which is ideal for providing relaxation to your mind. It is an important yoga asana, according to Ayurvedic beliefs.
5. Sarvangasana: This yoga pose is renowned for its function of regulating the working of your thyroid glands. The thyroid glands control the functioning of your entire body, which includes your nervous, reproductive, and respiratory system. It also controls your body’s metabolism. This yoga pose nourishes your spine, supplying large amounts of oxygen and blood. This enables you to keep away from nervous system disorders, and improves your overall health. In short, it is an ideal overall stress buster.
6. Halasana: This yoga asana is ideal for people who are stressed because of a bad posture, owing to long hours of sitting in a place. The pose stimulates your thyroid glands, lungs, parathyroid glands, and the organs in your abdomen. It helps the rush of blood to your face and head, keeping your hormone levels under supervision. It is effective for diabetic patients.
7. Dhanurasana: It is another effective yoga pose that strengthens your backbone and back. It stimulates your reproductive organs, and works great in beating stress and fatigue. It is highly recommended to be practiced for diabetic patients.

Here is a list of food items you should include/cut down in your diet in case you have type 2 diabetes:

1. Vegetables: You must have fresh or frozen vegetables and avoid using sauces, dips, fats or salts. Intake non-starchy vegetables like cucumber, spinach, broccoli, cabbage, lettuce and vegetables, which are dark green or yellow in color. Also have starchy vegetables such as corn, green peas, beans, carrots and yams. Avoid potatoes as they are pure starch.
2. Fresh Fruits: You should include fresh fruits in your regular diet. Have apples, bananas, berries, papaya, cherries, grapes, melons, oranges, peaches, pineapples and raisins. Have whole fruits regularly, which do not contain added chemical sweeteners.
3. Grains: Include grains in your diet and consume whole grains more. Whole grains are not processed and consist of the whole-grain kernel. Grains contain starch, which is a source of carbohydrates. Carbohydrates are bad for blood sugar. Hence, whole grains, which are rich in fiber are recommended. Fiber controls the blood-sugar level from shooting up. Fiber should be included in the form of bran of oat and wheat.
4. Proteins: Coming to protein food items, you should consume fish and poultry items often. Always remove the skin from chicken or turkey properly before cooking. Buy lean meat and trim all the fat from meat. Avoid frying and use methods such as baking, roasting, grilling or boiling. Also use healthy oils for frying purpose.
5. Dairy Products: In case of type 2 diabetes, always use dairy products, which are low in fat. Do not add sugar to milk, curd or yoghurt as they contain natural sugar. Do not consume more than three cups of milk a day.
6. Oils and Fats: Cut down the intake of excessive oily and fatty foods. Avoid food items that contain high saturated fats such as bacon, hams, sausages and butter. Consume food with polyunsaturated or monounsaturated fats. Oil raises blood-sugar level and is high in calorie and should be used in lesser amounts.

A type 2 diabetes patient needs to undergo several changes in his/her diet to keep a check on the rising blood sugar levels and for living as healthy as possible. 

In case you have a concern or query you can always consult an expert & get answers to your questions!

Christmas is a challenging time to embrace healthy foods when you see all the tempting food advertised and marketed throughout the week. Christmas is recognised as a celebratory affair – it certainly shouldn’t be a time to feel guilty about enjoying yummy Christmas food! Well, a walk on such food during Christmas wouldn’t do any harm to burn off those calories.

However, it is still possible to cook Christmas treats that are healthy as well delicious. It is just the way they are being prepared, cooked and served - often loaded with fats such as salt and butter. And this is where the nutritional value can be depleted. Consider adopting the following healthy food recipes and party tips this festive season.

1. Spinach Balls
This appetizer allows you to incorporate some vegetables into your Christmas feast. Made using spinach, eggs, grated cheese, panko crumbs, fresh herbs and garlic salt rolled into balls kept in a freezer for a while before baking and serving them as an appetizer for your meal.

Ingredients

• 1 Bowl of spinach
• 1 egg
• 3/4 cup breadcrumbs
• 1/2 cup grated parmesan cheese
• 2 tbsp melted butter
• 2 tbsp plain yogurt
• 2 tbsp green onion, thinly sliced
• 1/2 tsp pepper
• 1/2 tsp paprika

Preparation

• Chop the dried spinach leaves.
• Add all the ingredients together in a large bowl and mix well.
• Form it into balls, squeezing tightly.
• Bake at 350 degrees for 13-15 minutes, turning once.

2. Vegetable platter with dip

Ingredients for the dip 

• 1 cup plain non-fat yogurt.
• 2 tbsp chopped fresh dill leaves.
• 1 tsp garlic powder.
• 1 tsp sugar, ½ tsp salt, ½ tsp ground white pepper.
• 4 tsp white vinegar.

Ingredients for vegetable platter 

• 8 cups broccoli 
• 3 cups sprouts
• 2 cups green beans
• 1 cup cauliflower
• 1 cup peas
• 2 cups cauliflower
• 9 cherry tomatoes

Preparation 

• Boil water in a saucepan and keep a separate large bowl of cold water aside.
• Blanch broccoli, beans, sprouts peas and cauliflower for 1 to 2 minutes and drain well.
• Transfer only broccoli to cold water, to retain its crunchiness and drain well.

For the dip 

• Whisk yogurt, dill, vinegar, garlic powder, sugar, salt and pepper in a bowl.
• You can replace dill leaves with fresh coriander or cilantro.
• Garnish it with herbs of your choice.

Serve

In a larger serving tray arrange the dip in the center and arrange the blanched vegetables around it and garnish it with cherry tomatoes.

Apart from these two easy to cook dishes there a number of other healthy dishes one can easily prepare for Christmas, such as:

1. Quinoa Stuffing
2. Roasted Lamb with blackberry chutney
3. Rosemary garlic marinated vegetables 
4. Lemon and fennel rubbed turkey or chicken
5. Lemony brussels sprout salad
6. 20 Minute Cauliflower soup 

Reduce your holiday stress while pleasing your Christmas party guests with the following baking tips and tricks.

• Use mistletoe and snowflakes stamps and add a sophisticated design to the Christmas sugar cookies.
• Use cookie cutters to mold fudge into festive shapes like Christmas trees and snowmen.
• Create chocolate curls using a potato peeler making pretty garnish for cakes and cupcakes.
• Use frozen cranberries to add flavor to your drinks while adding a pop of festive color to your table decor.

In case you have a concern or query you can always consult an expert & get answers to your questions!

The terms dry fruits and dried fruits seem synonymous, but there is a very thin line difference between the two. To put it in simple terms nuts are also known as dry fruits. Dry fruits can be further categorized as dehiscent and indehiscent. The former refers to seeds contained in a pod and the latter refers to those that are not found in a seedpod. This includes pistachios, cashew nuts, walnuts and almonds. On the other hand, natural fleshy fruits that have been naturally or synthetically dried are called dried fruits. For example, dehydrated figs, raisins, dried cherries, apricots, etc. are considered dried fruits. Dehydrated apples, bananas, kiwis, etc. are also called dried fruits.

Which is the healthier choice?

Dry fruits and dried fruits both have a number of health benefits.

• Dry fruits are rich in proteins, vitamins, minerals and healthy fats. However, they also contain a high amount of saturated fats and have a high calorific value. Hence, they should be consumed in moderation. Dry fruit consumption, on the other hand, should also be limited for people trying to lose weight and those suffering from heart problems.
• To make dry fruits like nuts healthier, you could soak them in water overnight and skin them the next morning before eating them, this helps in reducing the level of saturated fats in them.
• As compared to dry fruits, dried fruits have a much higher sugar level. Thus, their intake should be limited for weight watchers, diabetics, heart patients as well as those suffering from gallstones, high blood pressure and water retention.
• However, dried fruits can be beneficial for anemic patients and athletes. Dried fruits have the same vitamin and minerals as the fresh fruits and the only thing missing is the water content. Dried fruits are also rich in antioxidants and hence help boost immunity.

Tips to buy dry fruits and dried fruits

• With both dry fruits and dried fruits, you must take a look at the ingredients in the case of packaged dry/dried fruits.
• Avoid nuts that have been artificially sweetened, salted or fried.
• Also, do not buy dried fruits that have sugar listed as an ingredient.
• Dried fruits are naturally sweet and artificial sweeteners only add calories without any added nutrition.
• For fruits that tend to be bitter when dried such as cranberries, look for dried cranberries that have been sweetened with 100% natural fruit juice.

In case you have a concern or query you can always consult an expert & get answers to your questions!

PCOS (Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome), a medical condition that mainly affects women of reproductive age makes it difficult for them to conceive. In PCOS, there is an elevated production of androgen (especially testosterone) by the ovary. This hormonal imbalance often interferes with the ovulation process (the eggs either don't mature or are not released from the ovary) triggering infertility in the affected woman. While lifestyle changes and timely medical assistance can bring about improvement, switching to a healthy diet is often known to produce fruitful results. In this article, we will discuss the healthy dietary options to deal with PCOS and infertility.

Healthy Diet for PCOS and Infertility

There can be a host of factors that trigger the hormonal imbalance, one being your choice of foods.

Low Glycemic Foods: Foods that come with a high glycemic Index (a glycemic index is a number that determines how rapidly the carbohydrates in our foods are broken down triggering a rise in the blood sugar level) of 70 or more can be extremely harmful. The higher the glycemic index, more will be the blood sugar and level of insulin in the body. The elevated insulin level can wreak havoc, disrupting the hormonal balance to a great extent. Thus, women with PCOS and fertility problems should consume foods that come with a low glycemic index (55 or less). Some of the healthy low glycemic foods include apples, cherries, plums, dried apricots, oranges, grapefruits, pear, almonds, yogurt (low-fat), non-starchy vegetables, whole grains, sesame seeds, flax seeds, pumpkin seeds, oats, brown rice, and quinoa, to name a few.

Maintaining a healthy body weight can go a long way to improve the symptoms and complications associated with PCOS. Overeating should be strictly avoided. Instead, opt for smaller meals at regular time intervals. Include high-fiber foods (broccoli, cauliflower) in the diet. Foods rich in minerals (potassium, calcium, magnesium, iron, zinc, selenium) and vitamins (Vitamin B, C, E, and K), folic acid, can work wonders to alleviate the symptoms of PCOS. Enrich your diet with green leafy vegetables and foods that are rich in antioxidants and omega-3 fatty acids.

While consuming carbohydrates, make sure your diet also contains protein. Carbohydrates, when taken along with proteins, can avert a sudden rise in the blood sugar level.

Foods to avoid

• In women with PCOS, the testosterone level is relatively higher. Drinking milk will only elevate the testosterone level further with deleterious consequences and is best left avoided.
• Foods that are rich in saturated and Trans fats (BAD FATS) such as meat, processed foods, margarine, doughnuts, dairy products (cream, cheese, butter), cooking oil (coconut oil, palm oil), aerated drinks and beverages, can aggravate the condition of PCOS and should be avoided.
• Soy milk is another unhealthy dietary option for women suffering from PCOS and infertility. Soy milk is known to cause a delay in the ovulation affecting the fertility.

In case you have a concern or query you can always consult an expert & get answers to your questions!