Healthy Eating Plate

Water For Health, Healing, & Life

RECIPE: Cucumber Water

I first had this in the spa at the Ritz Carlton in Hawaii.

I large pitcher

1 cucumber

filtered water

Wash and slice the cucumber in to 1 inch pieces. Drop the slices in to the filtered water of a pitcher. This will last in your refrigerator for about 4-5 days.

 

Water is the basis of all life and that includes your body. Your muscles that move your body are 75% water; your blood that transports nutrients is 82% water; your lungs that provide your oxygen is 90% water, your brain that is the control center of your body is 76% water and your bones are 25% water. Our health is truly dependent on the quality and quantity of the water we drink.

Throughout our day we lose fluid continuously, from skin evaporation, breathing, urine, and stool, and these losses must be replaced daily for good health. When your water intake does not equal your output, you can become dehydrated. Fluid losses are accentuated in warmer climates, during strenuous exercise, in high altitudes, and in older adults, whose sense of thirst may not be as sharp.

Here are six reasons to make sure you're drinking enough water or other fluids every day:

1. Drinking Water Helps Maintain the Balance of Body Fluids.

2. Water Can Help Control Calories.

What works with weight loss is if you choose water or a non-caloric beverage over a caloric beverage and/or eat a diet higher in water-rich foods that are healthier, more filling, and help you trim calorie intake.Food with high water content tends to look larger, its higher volume requires more chewing, and it is absorbed more slowly by the body, which helps you feel full. Water-rich foods include fruits, vegetables, broth-based soups, oatmeal, and beans.

3. Water Helps Energize Muscles. Cells that don't maintain their balance of fluids and electrolytes shrivel, which can result in muscle fatigue . When muscle cells don't have adequate fluids, they don't work as well and performance can suffer.

Drinking enough fluids is important when exercising. Follow the American College of Sports Medicine guidelines for fluid intake before and during physical activity. These guidelines recommend that people drink about 17 ounces of fluid about two hours before exercise. During exercise, they recommend that people start drinking fluids early, and drink them at regular intervals to replace fluids lost by sweating.

4. Water Helps Keep Skin Looking Good. Your skin contains plenty of water, and functions as a protective barrier to prevent excess fluid loss.

You can also help "lock" moisture into your skin by using moisturizer, which creates a physical barrier to keep moisture in.

5. Water Helps Your Kidneys. Body fluids transport waste products in and out of cells.  Your kidneys do an amazing job of cleansing and ridding your body of toxins as long as your intake of fluids is adequate.

When you're getting enough fluids, urine flows freely, is light in color and free of odor. When your body is not getting enough fluids, urine concentration, color, and odor increases because the kidneys trap extra fluid for bodily functions.

If you chronically drink too little, you may be at higher risk for kidney stones especially in warmer temperatures.

6. Water Helps Maintain Normal Bowel Function. Adequate hydration keeps things flowing along your gastrointestinal tract and prevents constipations. When you don't get enough fluid, the colon pulls water from stools to maintain hydration -- and the result is constipation.

Adequate fluid and fiber is the perfect combination, because the fluid pumps up the fiber and acts like a broom to keep your bowel functioning properly.

Support Your Local Farmer's

At Cooking Lessons from Home we joyously embrace the benefits of organic living by adopting it as a personal practice, and adhering to it as a professional one. I have a personal commitment to organic agriculture, because of my grandparents. My grandparents from both my mom and dads side were organic farmers. Grandma and Grandpa Walker farmed for a living, everything that was put on our family table came from my grandparents farm or the farmers down the road. To this day I remember the taste of my Grandma Walkers' Sour Cherry Pie, my grandfather said we were lucky to get those cherries because they let the cherries stay on the tree just until they are ready to burst with juice, but somehow the crows know that too, so they had to lay a net over the tree to keep the birds from eating the cherries, its challenging being an organic farmer.

I believe that when it comes to health and the well being of our communities, organics should be the first and only choice. The benefits of supporting the organic movement and incorporating an organic lifestyle are immeasurable and I have outlined what I believe to be the most crucial issues facing us today. For food, family, and future, I encourage you to be passionately organic and I guarantee it will make you feel good all over.

 

Farmer's Markets open across the USA in the month of May. Please support our Farmer's who support our Health.

 

Why French Women Don't Get Fat... #5

It's not just favorable genetics, the French may be more slender than Americans because they're more in tune with their appetites than we are. They don't rush through  a meal they enjoy their food and their conversation around a table. Parisians reported using internal cues like whether they felt hungry to tell them when to stop eating. It can be tough at first to pay attention to the signals your stomach and brain are sending but doing so can help you take in fewer calories.

Back from Paris!

For those of you who did not know, ( I thought I told everyone!) Jonathan and I went to Paris for the past couple weeks and besides enjoying the sites, the food and the shopping, I wanted to hang out with the locals to  see for myself if it is true that French Women Don't Get Fat. We really made some wonderful discoveries that I think will help all of us here in the U.S.!

I want to share our observations with you each day this week, so our first observation was: It does seem to be true that French women don't get fat, but...they are not necessarily skinny either. So for us Americans ... my first piece of advice is to change our mindset that if you are not fat, you must be skinny...not true...for each one of us, kids included there is a "healthy weight" a weight that keeps our blood pressure normal levels, cholesterol levels low, our glucose levels in check and energy levels high.  Rule #1 Determine what is a healthy weight for you and each family member.

A healthy weight is one that is right for your body type and height and is based on your body mass index, or BMI and the size of your waist circumference. You can learn more about your BMI on line at www.cdc.gov/healthyweight, or check with your doctor.  Your doctor may want to take another measurement, called a waist-to-hip ratio. This measurement is a comparison of your waist size to your hip size. A higher waist-to-hip ratio means that you are more apple shaped than pear shaped and therefore at a higher risk for weight-related disease. Body fat testing is sometimes used to help find out if a person has a healthy percentage of body fat. But it can be inaccurate. It also costs more than measuring BMI or waist size. So it's rarely used to measure a person's risk for weight-related diseases.  I always fall back on the old "if my favorite pair of jeans are too tight, then I know I have gained weight!"



 

So...au revoir!