Top Ten Superfoods for Weight Loss

Superfoods are considered to be superior to ordinary foods because of their high nutritional content and low fat content. These are the foods that have numerous phytonutrients and special compounds that can help promote weight loss.  However, as is true with all foods recommended to you for any purpose, make sure that it is on your allowed foods list in the Healthy & Active Metabolism program.  

1. Blue Green Algae

Blue Green Algae is a freeze-dried vegan product that is sold in capsules or a vial. It is harvested mostly from alpine lakes.

Blue Green Algae is a whole food. It contains the amino acid-profile of a complete protein and yet it is a vegan source. It balances blood sugar, lowers blood sugar and promotes intestinal regularity. This makes it ideal for dieters because they get all of the nutritional support that they need to sustain them for hours simply by taking a few capsules or drops.

2.   Eggs

Eggs are an amazing superfood for dieters. Each one has only 70 calories and is filled with nutrients such as vitamin E, calcium, B vitamins, zinc, iron, selenium, phosphorus, and iodine. In combination, these vitamins and mineral work together in your body to build a robust immune system, powerful bones, and strong muscles, while improving brain function and the health of your eyes. They also thyroid gland, which helps regulate metabolism and affects weight, needs iodine in order to function properly.

By providing the protein your body needs, people who eat them and then increase their activity through passive or active methods of exercising will boost their metabolic rate. In this way, eggs can help you lose weight in more than one way as well as provide building blocks for more muscle.

3.  Turkey

sliced roast turkey

Although 2 ounces of turkey contains only 110 calories, it is packed with phosphorus, selenium, B vitamins (including B6 and niacin), and zinc. Iron is important in red blood cell formation. Having low levels of iron can lower your energy levels and make you less likely to exercise. Selenium can improve the way your thyroid works and also works as an antioxidant. In addition to vitamins and minerals, turkey also contains omega-3 fatty acids, which are good fats.

You can eat turkey hot, cold or in a curry made with health enhancing vegetables and turmeric based curry.

4. Chilies

Chili is actually a term for any pepper that contains the compound capsaicin. Peppers, such as the cayenne, the jalapeno, and the habanero, all taste hot because of the capsaicin in them. However, it is also the reason chilies have weight loss and medicinal benefits.

Chilies reduce appetite, balance blood sugar and reduce the muscle and joint pain that could interfere with exercising.

Eating ½ - 1 teaspoon of cayenne pepper each day can help you lose weight. For a kick to get you awake in the morning, mix together 2 cups tomato juice, ¼ cup lime juice, 1 cup orange juice, 4 dashes Tabasco sauce, and 2 level teaspoons of cayenne pepper. Pour in a glass and store the extra in the refrigerator.

5. Cinnamon

Cinnamon contains 11 vitamins and minerals. One teaspoon is a significant source of manganese and calcium. It can decrease the amount of LDL and triglycerides in the blood stream, which leads to a reduction in the overall blood stream cholesterol levels. It also will help you lower your blood pressure and decrease your risk heart problems.

Cinnamon can also help with regulating blood glucose levels by increasing muscle mass. Muscle tissue helps prevent the ups and downs during times of fasting and the times right after eating. Although this is beneficial for people with diabetes, it is also good for those who want to lose weight. It prevents cravings and decreases feelings of hunger.

In the morning, prepare your plain oatmeal and add ½ teaspoon cinnamon and 1 teaspoon vanilla extract to it. Chop an apple or a banana and stir into it. Or add cinnamon and a sprinkle of sugar on top of your waffles instead of syrup. You can also add it to yogurt.

6. Dragon Fruit

Dragon Fruit is the fruit of a cactus and it is grown in Southeast Asia, Mexico, Central and South America, and Israel. Dragon Fruit is a beautiful large round rose-hip shaped fruit with a pink to red body and green and yellow tendrils on its side. When opened it reveals flesh studded with hundreds of very small seeds.  It is crunchy and tastes like a cross between a kiwi and a pear.

Dragon fruit is low in calories and offers numerous nutrients, including Vitamin C, phosphorus, calcium, and iron. fiber and antioxidants. The average Dragon Fruit contains about 15 grams of protein and 1 gram of fat. This makes it a very sustainable choice of dinner for dieters.

It is best cut in cubes and unearthed from the shell and served raw.

7. Rambutan

Rambutan comes from Indonesia and are like a large, apple-sized lychee covered with a skin with sharp brown spikes. They taste like a cross between a strawberry or a kiwi.

Rambutan is a vegan source of iron, supplying 40% of your daily needs as well as magnesium, manganese, potassium, zinc, vitamin A, riboflavin and thiamin. I tis excellent for weight loss as it is so rich in vitamin and minerals and yet so low in calories.  It is high in niacin which also good for increasing circulation and boosting the body’s ability to detoxify itself.

The Rambutan is best eaten raw and quickly as it does not keep for more than a week.

8. Watermelon

Watermelon contains about 92 percent water making it ideal for hydration. At the same time it is a diuretic that cleanses the body of fats and toxins. Watermelon is an excellent source of Vitamin C, A and betal-carotene.  It is also a concentrated source of lycopene, which has antioxidant properties.  It also helps relieve rheumatic pain that might be keeping you from exercising.

Watermelon can be eaten raw, frozen as a slush or as part of a smoothie.

9. Asparagus

Asparagus only has 4 calories per piece and is devoid of fat and cholesterol. It tastes salty but has almost no sodium. Asparagus spears are rich potassium, calcium, iron, fiber, folic acid (needed for healthy blood cells), thiamine, glutathione, vitamins A, C and K.  It is an excellent diuretic that can help you eliminate toxins from your body.

 It is tasty and you can eat a lot of it without gaining weight. You can eat it steamed, baked or broiled and you can serve it hot or cold.

10.  Cantaloupe

Cantaloupe is one of the best foods you can eat if you are insulin resistant. Women who eat cantaloupe have lower insulin resistance and thus are less likely to gain weight. This is also a hydrating fruit with plant of Vitamin C, Vitamin A and carotene.

Cantaloupe is best served raw and also delicious served up as a smoothie.

For more information about the Healthy & Active Program please visit our website at www.healthy-active.com. You may also call us in Toronto at (41) 440-2217 and ask for Adrienne Wright Bulow or Dr. Michael Rahman or email us at adrienne@healthy-active.com.

The HAP Acid/Alkaline Principle

An essential tenet of the Healthy & Active Program is that the best way to detoxify your body and prevent illness is to balance the pH in your body using the acid/alkaline pH balance to eating. Whether you are well, or unwell, balancing the pH of your diet is one big major step, that is completely within your control, towards restoring health or achieving optimum wellness. 

Understanding the pH scale

To understand the basic premise behind the Acid/Alkaline principle it is important to understand how the pH scale works.

The pH scale is from  

0 - 14 0 1 2  3  4  5  6  7 healthy  8 9 10 11 12 13 14

Human blood pH should be slightly alkaline (7.35 - 7.45).  Below or above this range means that you are setting yourself up to contract warning symptoms or a disease.  A pH of 7.0 is neutral.  A pH below 7.0 is acidic.  A pH above 7.0 is alkaline. You want to maintain a blood pH rating that is as close to 7.0 as possible. Your body is healthiest when it is in a slightly alkaline pH balanced state that is above 7.0.

An acidic pH state happens in the body when you eat foods that acid forming, experience too much emotional stress, work out your adrenalin glands too much to produce cortisol and or experience a major immune reaction.  The minute that anything happens that deprives your cells of oxygen, the more acidic your blood becomes.  If you are eating a diet that is acidic, your body will store and build up and accumulation acids.  Often the body will try to create balance and compensate for the acidic pH levels by leaching alkaline minerals from your tissues and bones. This is a desperate attempt on the part of your biochemistry to keep your system in balance.

Negative Effects of Acidity 

A consistent acidic pH level in the body will: 

      

·      reduce the body's ability to absorb oxygen, vitamins, minerals and other nutrients that we have not even discovered yet

·      decrease the energy production in the cells and therefore decrease our overall available energy

·      diminish a cell’s ability to repair itself and fight off invaders

·      decrease it's ability to detoxify itself of heavy metals

·      feed tumor cells

   

Maintaining a Healthy pH Balance

To maintain health, the diet should consist of 60% alkaline forming foods and 40% acid forming foods.  To restore health, the diet should consist of 80% alkaline forming foods and 20% acid forming foods.  The more alkaline your diet is, the more able your body will be able to go through its cleansing and repairing cycles.

Alkaline foods include: most fruits, green vegetables, peas, beans, lentils, spices, herbs and seasonings, and seeds and nuts.

Acidic foods include: meat, fish, poultry, eggs, grains, and legumes.

People are most addicted to eating the foods that they like with little consideration of whether or not the food is good for them. One of the goals of the Healthy and Active Program is to get you to recognize when your body is descending into an acidic state. " Continued imbalance of the acid-alkaline state can lead to health problems from inflammation, chronic fatigue, ulcers, back pain and many other illnesses.

For more information about the Healthy & Active Program please visit our website at www.healthy-active.com. You may also call us in Toronto at (41) 440-2217 and ask for Adrienne Wright Bulow or Dr. Michael Rahman or email us at adrienne@healthy-active.com.

Why A Tailored Diet and Lifestyle Plan is Best

Often we are asked what makes the Healthy and Active program different from other fitness plan or lifestyle overhaul strategies. The answer is very simple.  The results of your blood chemistry profile and your in person evaluation create a profile of what exactly it is that you need to optimize your health.

The Latest Fad Diet Is Not For Everyone

For years nutritional experts have been prescribing “one size fits all “ type diets, whether they be high protein, low fat or low carbohydrate.  Advocates of these diets promised that everybody would lose weight if they would just stick to these regimens, however the truth is that these diets appeared to only work sporadically for some people. Also it is hard not to note the failure of many of these diets, which left some people with rebound weight gain and victims of the ever-growing epidemic in diabetes. 

Of course all of these fad diet failures have left many people wondering, “What’s the right diet for me?”

One important aspect of the Happy and Active program that it is tailored to suit the needs of each individual as it is partly based on identifying your metabolic type (in reality a combination of sub-types) and then prescribing dietary changes and lifestyle choices according to that.

The Right Diet For You Is In Your Genetics

HUMAN DNA

Part of your Healthy and Active evaluation is having your blood is analyzed for 42 different components by your Healthy and Active Practitioner, who will be able to tell, from looking at this profile, what types of genetic predisposition you have towards certain problems and what sorts of foods you should eat to practice preventative medicine and maintain weight loss.  The diet that is then prescribed for you is based on your personal biochemistry and not on second-guessing whether or not you should go gluten-free, dairy-free, low-carb or otherwise. 

In other words the vegetarian diet that is high in fruits and vegetables but low in protein might be right for your neighbour but completely wrong for you.  You might do better with a high protein, low carb diet that includes a bit of dairy.  That is because the same nutrients can have different biochemical effects in different people.

In this program there are no generally right foods or wrong foods. The only diet that is right for you is the one that meets your inherited dietary requirements.

How Eating The Wrong Foods Leads to Starvation

It may not the fat, carbs or protein that is making you fat. It is the fact that your body is unable to metabolize or convert certain foods into energy that is the real problem.  If you have a metabolism that works well, then you can eat quite a bit of fat or carbs because your body will utilize it efficiently.  If your metabolism is slow, then those foods will be converted to fat.  Eating right for your metabolic type prompts your body to metabolize foods properly.

Also, if you are consuming the wrong types of foods for your metabolic type, then you may not be absorbing the nutrients that you need to feel whole and healthy.  You may suffer from constant cravings as your body produces hormones that counteract the effects of the foods that you just consumed.

The point of a HAP assessment is to guide you to fuel your body with the right kind of energy so you do not have to worry about feeling fatigued, hungry or packing on the pounds.  Eating right for you type will also reduce food cravings, binge eating, ups and downs in energies, sleeplessness and mood swings.

For more information about the Healthy & Active Program please visit our website at www.healthy-active.com. You may also call us in Toronto at (41) 440-2217 and ask for Adrienne Wright Bulow or Dr. Michael Raman or email us at adrienne@healthy-active.com.