But theres also a lot of pressure on dinner. Its the last meal of the day and if you are lacking important nutrients in your diet that day, you have an opportunity to make up those nutrients in your evening meal. But you dont want your meal too heavy or you might not sleep well. Conversely, eating too little will not only likely leave you lacking in nutrients, but could also leave you ravenous for breakfast 12 hours later.

So how do you make sure dinner is a balanced, nutrient-packed meal? Plan, and plan some more. Although we are more likely to spent time preparing dinner versus other daily meals, its also a meal that can easily get derailed. You plan to grill chicken breasts and vegetables, but then belatedly remember your son has a baseball game or its open house at school. So its chicken nuggets all around.

Planning keeps you in synch with your schedule. If you plan a weeks worth of meals, you can think about the various obstacles you might find that week in actually bringing your plans to fruition. You can plan a quick pasta salad on open house night, and healthy, veggie-packed sandwiches on baseball night. This keeps you out of the fast food lane.

What are some other tips for planning healthy dinners?

*Dont cook separate meals for picky children. If you know that your salmon and sauted spinach will also result in you making mini hot dogs and fries for the kids, you might rethink it, not having the time or energy to make two completely separate meals. Then you suffer, and they do as well. Its important to expose your children to a variety of foods, so make the salmon and spinach. Be sure to offer applesauce, whole wheat bread and some fruit. Then everyone gets a healthy meal and your children just might surprise you by actually eating some of the adult meal.

*On weeknights, stay away from involved meals. Think of things that can be prepared in less than 45 minutes, though its ideal to keep your meal prep to 30 minutes whenever possible.

*Do as much prep as you can ahead of time. If youre planning grilled chicken and vegetables for dinner, say, then you can clean and slice your vegetables in the morning before you head out for the day. Marinate the chicken. In the evening, all thats left is tossing a quick bag salad and grilling your meat and vegetables. This saves on clean-up time as well.

*If you must eat out, apply the golden rules for restaurant eating: Stay away from white or heavy sauces, order oil and vinegar to dress your salad, and eat only half the entre, pack the rest and enjoy it for lunch the next day.

Eating A Healthy Dinner: A Simple Matter Of Planning is a post from: Men's Health - Men's Guide to Fitness, Health, Weight Loss, Nutrition

How true? Ask yourself and do a goggle search (or a PUB Med or any advanced search of scientific articles) about how many times you see a study–any study–on a particular fruit or vegetable that comes out proving some health improvement. Not a group, but a particular fruit or vegetable. And proof of health, not disease (this is an important distinction).

We are talking about real science here not just made up stuff from some science nut or health nut. And we are talking about real fruits and vegetables like a particular apple or broccoli as opposed to a group of fruits or vegetables. In other words we are talking about something very concrete and not at all abstract–this is where real scientific study comes in very handy: such study is not abstract or it is not science. And, importantly, if I can prove it and you cannot, it is not scientifically provable. Period.

How many? Which vegetable? Which fruit?

There are plenty of promoters of eating fresh fruits and vegetables and many of them provide solid credentials like the Harvard, Tufts, Eat 5 a day, and so on (for a really good goggle search try vegetables and health or fruits and health).

For example, the Harvard site cites the latest dietary guidelines that, “call for five to thirteen servings of fruits and vegetables a day, depending on one’s caloric intake. For a person who needs 2,000 calories a day to maintain weight and health, this translates into nine servings, or 4 cups per day.” The citation for this is The USDA, the U.S. Department of Agriculture. It is a helpful abstraction but not a particular guide to particular fruits and vegetables and how they can promote your health.

But most of what these prestigious institutions promote is air–no scientific studies demonstrating the health effects of a single fruit or vegetable could be found on the Harvard site, not one. True, it’s nice air, but air nevertheless.

Now we are not talking about the genuine research on fruits and vegetables like this one listed in Pub Med, “Electron beam and gamma irradiation effectively reduce Listeria monocytogenes populations on chopped romaine lettuce”, (J Food Prot. 2006 Mar;69(3):570-4, for those who need to know) . This kind of research is not after the health promoting effects of eating, in this case, romaine lettuce. And it does not pretend to be anything other than what it is.

Of course sites promoting the health benefits of eating of fruits and vegetables could be hiding the scientific studies and don’t want to bother their visitors with all those numbers and scientific names for turnips or plums. Or farmers who grow the really good stuff and how to buy them.

I remember a study concerning folate and green leafy vegetables and some kids on an island in the South Pacific. The study, a genuine scientific study, had to be halted because the scientists found that the children in the study could not get enough folate for their diets from the fresh vegetables because the vegetables themselves were deficient. So the study stopped because, ethically, depriving the children’s diet of this essential ingredient could hurt them–especially when the science proved the children would be deficient on a natural diet. So much for the health promoting benefits of this entire group of vegetables–and I have not seen another study to refute this single isolated, particular controlled scientific study on green leafy vegetable and exactly how they promote health in humans.

So how do you know if the fruits or vegetables you eat can really promote better health? Simple answer is you don’t. But then again, if you stopped eating fruits and vegetables what would happen? Could be all those diseases they write about in Pub Med and cited by the Tufts nutritionists and become the cover story about our fat nation for Time Magazine: eat your fruits and veggies and stay healthy or until we know, for sure, something different.

Eat More Veggies. Eat More Fruit. Get Healthy–Really? is a post from: Men's Health - Men's Guide to Fitness, Health, Weight Loss, Nutrition

So why, if there are foods that will heal many of our common ailments, have we not heard more about them? Maybe it’s because, just as we’ve become a fast food society, we’ve also become a fast cure society. We’re always looking for the easy way to cure and prevent diseases by just popping a pill.

Just look at the increasing number of ads on TV and in magazines for drugs. Often the side effects are worse than the disease they’re meant to prevent or cure!

Wouldn’t it be better to use natural remedies? Remedies with no side effects, to cure and prevent diseases? Of course it would! That’s why I decided to write this article. Here’s to a healthier life!.

Perhaps as a child you were told by your mom to eat all your carrots because they were good for your eyes? As you grew up, you may have cynically been told by others that this was just an “old wives tale”. Guess what, recent studies have shown that Mom was right! Foods can prevent eye disease, heart disease, arthritis and much more.

Some Basic Science:

In recent years scientists have discovered that foods contain “phytochemicals”, which is a fancy name for naturally occurring chemicals. This is not the same as nutrients, which we all know are the substances necessary for sustaining life.

Phytochemicals have properties that can aid in disease prevention and cures. Scientists have identified thousands of these chemicals in the foods we eat and a single serving of fruit or vegetables can contain as many as one hundred different phytochemicals.

The most commonly known phytochemicals are the antioxidants. Antioxidants protect our cells from damage by toxic substances and free radicals (a by-product produced by our bodies which converts oxygen into energy). Free radicals can damage cells in our bodies which can lead to disease. Antioxidants protect the body from oxidation and reduce the risk of acquiring many common ailments.

The full article is a big one and covers:

Fruits and Vegetables
Healing Properties Of Fruits
Healing Properties Of Vegetables
Seeds, Nuts, Oils and Fish
Healing Properties Of Seeds, Nuts, Oils and Fish
Grains
Healing Properties Of Grains
Healing Properties Of Beans and Lentils
Healing Properties Of Herbs and Spices
Healing Teas
Other Healing Foods

Hit the link below to continue reading it.

Eat healthy Foods – It Makes Sense! is a post from: Men's Health - Men's Guide to Fitness, Health, Weight Loss, Nutrition

When you take into account how much a serving really is, it is actually quite easy to get five to nine servings of fruits and vegetables per day. For instance, the recommended daily amount actually equates to a quite reasonable two cups of fruit and two and a half cups of vegetables every day. When you consider how many fruits and vegetables are available, and how low the prices usually are, it is easy to see how easy to reach this daily goal really is.

One great way to get the nutrients you need from fruits and vegetables every day is to take full advantage of the variety of these foods available. Eating the same thing every day quickly becomes boring, so why not pick a variety of fruits and vegetables, in every color of the rainbow and in every conceivable shape, size and texture, to give yourself a varied diet every day.

When shopping for fruits and vegetables, it is important to choose a variety of different colors. This is for more than purely artistic reasons. Different color fruits and vegetables have different types of nutrients, and choosing a variety of colors will help ensure you get all the vitamins and minerals you need each and every day.

Finding new recipes is another great way to ensure you get those five to nine servings of fruits and vegetables every day. Everyone likes to try out new recipes, and these new recipes may just provide the impetus you need to eat all those fruits and veggies.

New recipes can also provide you the important opportunity to try out some fruits and vegetables you have never tried before. For instance, everyone has eaten oranges, but have you tried kiwi fruit or mangoes? How about spinach or kale? Trying new things is a great way to find new favorites while getting the best nutrition available.

Many people mistakenly think that they do not need to eat five to nine servings of fruits and vegetables every day if they just take a vitamin supplement. Actually, nothing could be further from the truth. That is because fruits and vegetables contain far more than the micronutrients identified by science and synthesized in vitamin pills. While these micronutrients, such as vitamin C, vitamin A and vitamin E are important to good health, so too are the hundreds of other elements that are contained in healthy foods like fruits and vegetables. These elements are not available in any pill, they must be ingested through a healthy, balanced diet that contains plenty of fruits and vegetables.

In addition, fruits and vegetables are much less costly than vitamin pills. Fruits and vegetables are very inexpensive, especially when purchased in season and grown locally. In the long run, getting the nutrition you need from the food you eat is much less expensive, and much better for you, than popping those vitamin pills every day.

So dont forget to get your five to nine servings of fruits and vegetables every day. It may seem like a lot, but you can meet this quite reasonable goal simply by including fruits and vegetables as snacks, as garnishes, as side dishes and as meals.

Eat a variety of veggies for a healthier you is a post from: Men's Health - Men's Guide to Fitness, Health, Weight Loss, Nutrition

Most Americans get plenty of fluids, according to a report by the Institute of Medicine (IOM), the scientific body that establishes nutrition recommendations for Americans. In fact, aiming toward a goal of eight daily glasses of water in addition to other fluids in your diet probably is not necessary.

The IOM recommends a total of about nine daily cups of fluid for women and about 13 cups for men. Keep in mind, however, that everything that we drink counts-water, milk, coffee and tea, juice and soft drinks-as do water-rich foods like fruits and vegetables. Of course, water is calorie-free, which makes it an attractive option.

“Use thirst as your guide,” advises Jo Ann Hattner, R.D., a nutrition consultant in San Francisco, Calif. “Drink when you’re thirsty and you probably will get enough fluids over the course of the day.” Hattner points out that older adults are the exception. “Older adults often don’t have a good thirst mechanism so they won’t feel thirsty even though their body needs fluids.” Be sure to drink a lot if you are physically active, live in a hot climate, or are taking a vacation to a warm and/or dry climate.

Include foods that are high in liquid to help keep your body hydrated. Start the day off with Whole Grain Total topped with milk and fresh fruit. Enjoy soup or a large salad with your lunch. Include vegetables at dinner, along with fruit for dessert. Hattner suggests being aware of the color of your urine to determine whether you’ve had enough fluids. “If it’s light in color, you’re fine. If the color is dark, then your urine may be too concentrated and you need to drink up!”

Ask Mindy

Q: Do coffee and tea count? I am a coffee drinker and was told to drink extra water since coffee makes the body lose extra fluid.

A: Coffee and tea do count. Contrary to popular belief, coffee, tea and other caffeinated beverages are not dehydrating, though they may have a temporary diuretic effect, and do not cause the body to lose extra fluids.

Drink Up is a post from: Men's Health - Men's Guide to Fitness, Health, Weight Loss, Nutrition

Water is the single most important nutrient you will give your body apart from oxygen. Water rejuvenates us and carries vital nutrients all round the body where it’s needed. Water picks up all the leftovers, wastes and debris that the cells throw off into the lymph system and transport them out of the body via the channels of elimination.

So when you drink more water it has the double combination of feeding your body and clearing you of all the waste products that were built up in your system.

Your brain needs water, and plenty of it. Without water, your brain will operate worn out, tired and sluggish. Water is the ultimate gift to give yourself to think with clarity. In addition, water acts as a kind of healthy lubricant moistening tissues and joints.

When you drink, you want to avoid tap water. Tap water is more like a dazzling mix of chemicals. It contains fluoride, chlorine, and many others. The amount of chemicals in water will fill up books – it’s more like a chemical soup. The evidence that fluoride is poisonous is so overwhelming that it’s being pushed to be banned in many countries by action groups.

The thirst mechanism when having been turned off for a prolonged period is often mistaken for hunger. As you drink more water your thirst mechanism will return to its natural state. Not only will you begin to feel thirsty when you need water again, but your appetite will decrease.

This brings us to the next big thing you need to understand about water. If I asked you the difference between inorganic and organic minerals, chances are you couldn’t tell me, right? Well lets briefly explain the difference. It’s a simple difference. Organic minerals come from plants; inorganic minerals come from rocks and volcanic sources. Organic minerals can be broken down by the body. Inorganic minerals are not used by the body and are stored until suitable water can come and carry them out. Organic minerals can be broken down by the body, while inorganic cannot. One is derived from natural plant life; one is derived from rocks,filings and small pieces of grit. Which one makes more sense to use?

Its better to get your plant minerals through the food you eat rather than the inorganic form in water. Bottled water is often taken, tested and found to have bacteria and very often isn’t rated much better than tap water.

Do you know the best water to use? The best water to use is the same water you use in your iron. The purest water in the world is distilled water. It’s as pure as rainwater should be if our atmosphere wasnt polluted.

If you haven’t yet heard that 70% of the world’s population is dehydrated – you will soon, as the UN push to get proper water supply to people in the third world.

The second best method of filtering is a type of filtering called “reverse osmosis”. Unfortunately the standard bench top filter isnt enough.

Most of the nasty contaminants in our water simply don’t have a taste. Some people feel it’s a case of out of sight out of mind. This may work for things people think, yet when it comes to your body, the life of your children, the health of those you care about and the line between getting cancer and surviving it’s far short of acceptable.

The opportunity for energy, for vitality, for a quality of life is only known to a select few who choose to raise their standards and take action to apply what they know. New discoveries are being made all the time as new research comes out of the United States, out of Germany, and out of Australia and other countries. How does this apply to me you may ask? Well, these contaminants can kill you. Is this a reason to get upset? No, its simply an action signal to act smarter.

The best bit is when youre drinking absolutely pure distilled water it is so much easier to drink. It’s so easy to refreshingly flood your body with purity that will flush out chemicals, clear out the lymph system and contribute to expelling excess weight in the body. Distilled water is so easy to drink and be absorbed by your body without having to flush out the other nasties first that many people report who were struggling to drink half a litre of water a day, are now drinking 4 litres a day and up, with ease! If you cant get distilled water, reverse osmosis filtered or table water is the next best option.

Many people in third world countries don’t have access to a clean water supply. We in developed countries have currently almost unlimited access to clean water. My suggestion to you is to use it!

Drink More Water For More Energy is a post from: Men's Health - Men's Guide to Fitness, Health, Weight Loss, Nutrition

Unfortunately, people don’t always grow out of this negative attitude toward fruits and vegetables. Studies show that the average American consumer eats only three servings of fruits and vegetables a day. When compared to the recommended five to nine servings a day, it’s apparent that many of us have a long way to go.

The effort is worth it, though. Studies by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, U.S. Department of Agriculture and the National Academy of Sciences suggest that the nutritional goodness of fruits and vegetables, along with a diet that is low in fat, saturated fat and cholesterol, may decrease the risk of developing certain diseases.

To help their patients get the necessary nutrients, some doctors recommend “green drinks.” These powdered drink mixes are a natural source of vitamins and minerals. To many people, however, the drinks also have a strong, unbearable taste and an unpalatable texture.

Would you stick with a nutritious drink if you had to hold your nose while consuming it?

To get the health benefits found in green drinks without the unappetizing taste and texture, I recommend Earth’s Promise from Enzymatic Therapy. With a combination of 20 vitamin-rich ingredients, one glass of Earth’s Promise provides the essential nutrients your body needs to enhance energy, support digestion and boost the immune system. It also is high in fiber. In fact, drinking one glass provides you with more fiber than you would get from eating a bowl of oatmeal.

Earth’s Promise comes in three flavors – Strawberry-Kiwi, Elderberry and Peppermint-Tea – making it easier to support a healthy lifestyle. In addition, it is laboratory-tested for purity, safety and performance and meets the highest manufacturing standards.

Don’t Forget to Drink Your Fruits and Veggies is a post from: Men's Health - Men's Guide to Fitness, Health, Weight Loss, Nutrition

The most famous diet lately has been the Atkins diet and its many copycats: the South Beach diet, GI, and the rest. These are basically high-protein diets that tell you carbohydrate (carbs) are evil, and you should cut right down on them or even cut them out of your diet completely. While nutritionists are incredulous that anyone would seriously consider cutting an entire food group out of their diets, the books have sold in the millions.

The dirty little secret of protein diets is that they do help you lose weight, but only in the short term. They do this by causing you to give yourself a disease called ketosis, caused by lack of carbohydrate, that makes you lose weight, feel bad and have terrible breath. As soon as you go off the diet and back to your old ways, however, you will simply put all your weight back on again.

It is a similar situation with many other diets, including weight loss milkshakes, which rarely contain anything resembling a balanced meal. Instead, they flood your body with protein and little else, forcing it to burn fat but again, the effect quickly wears off if you stop using the shakes.

A cynic might say that theyre not really trying to help you lose weight or eat healthily, so much as they are trying to keep you on their dodgy diets forever. If you want to eat healthily, stick to balance no matter what anyone tells you, thats never going to change.

Does the protien diet work? is a post from: Men's Health - Men's Guide to Fitness, Health, Weight Loss, Nutrition

The immune system is made up of cells, proteins, organs and tissues. All the cells initially, come from the bone marrow which also produces red blood cells and platelets. The cells that are a part of your defending system are white cells and they are stored in many places around the body, including the spleen, thymus, lymph nodes and of course in bone marrow.

The white cells circulate around the organs and lymph nodes, by what is called the lymphatic system, they also travel along the blood circulatory system, so you can see that they are well organised for visiting every part of your body. This is the reason why they are so important and essential for good health.

These cells comunicate with each other all the time, when two cells meet, plainly speaking, they eye each other up and down, to see if the other has a problem, if one has something wrong then help is called to repair the cell, if it is beyond repair, it is eliminated completely from the system. this is called cellular communication.

There are millions of these cells throughout your body, working all the time to keep you in good health, day and night. If they are looked after properly, they will work efficiently, and fight all the invaders, but if they are starved of the right nutrition through poor quality food, like takeaways, alcohol abuse, smoking or drug abuse, then they start falling over, and you start picking up illnesses, or diseases, or they become confused and start working on the wrong things, this is when you can start to develop autoimmune deseases like diabetes, they attack the insulin producing cells or any of the other complaints like arthritis, multiple sclerosis and perhaps even age related happenings.

The cells of the immune system must be kept in a balanced state, called immune system modulation, this means that the cells must be fed so that they work efficiently, without becoming confused in what they are doing. They must repel all invaders that can harm the body, but they also must not attack any of your own body systems, so things have to be balanced.

Ther is only one way to ensure that the immune is functioning efficiently and properly and that is by ensuring that it gets the correct natural nutrition needed to make this happen. The poor old immune system has to fight all the pollution, pesticides, chemicals, gasses and poisons that were never in existance when humans were first created, so the first and most important necessity is natural nutrition.

The two best natural nutrition supplements available today is the Goji Berry, which is grown naturally in the Himalayas for over 3000, years and is now available as a delicious tasting fruit juice. The second one is Glyconutrients, the eight natural essential sugars that heal.

If you want to achieve or maintain good health, the immune system is the first thing you should be checking out, as soon as possible.

Do You Think That You Should Help To Improve Your Immune System? is a post from: Men's Health - Men's Guide to Fitness, Health, Weight Loss, Nutrition

Yet many nutritionists, weight-loss experts and general health gurus claim we must drink that much every day.

I certainly tried to do it. I would drink coffee in the morning, then maybe force down a glass of water. By the time I had sweet tea with lunch, I was not thirsty but would try to choke down two more glasses of water in the afternoon.

By the time I had a glass of wine and more tea for supper, I was full – and facing five more glasses of water! I just could not do it day in and day out.

I know many of you can, and I’m proud of you. But for the rest of us who wallow in guilt, there is good news.

Before I get to that, let me reinforce the necessity of good hydration. Drinking water in adequate amounts is necessary for maintaining the organ systems. In a resting state, this is easy and can be done in many ways. But in times of vigorous physical activity or in high temperatures, consumption must be increased and maintained to keep the body’s core temperature from rising dangerously and to prevent dehydration.

Yet research has shown recently that there is no supporting evidence to back the popular notion that eight glasses of water a day is essential to good health. Studies have been duplicated where normal adults of both genders were compared, showing no difference in hydration status.

We are not walking around in a dehydrated state as some would have us believe.

We should drink water when thirsty. It’s still the best indicator, and this signal is delivered from our brains when we have lost between 1 percent and 2 percent of our body’s water. This amount is not dangerous.

Scientific studies also prove that there is no extra benefit to the skin by drinking more water. Nor is there supporting evidence that it significantly curbs appetite.

Nature intended for us to obtain much of our water from the food we eat. Fruits and vegetables are 80 percent to 90 percent water. Meat contains a fair amount, and even dry bread and cheese are about 35 percent water.

Caffeinated beverages such as coffee, tea and soda do not necessarily contribute to dehydration. Caffeine does cause a loss of water, but only a fraction of what you are adding by drinking the beverage itself.

If you like to drink eight glass of water a day, that’s fine. But don’t feel guilty if you choose not to walk around with a bottle like everyone else. Instead, eat balanced meals and follow your thirst mechanism.

Dr. W. David Varner Jr. is a general surgeon and medical consultant for Aflac. – NU

Do We Need Eight Glasses of Water a Day? is a post from: Men's Health - Men's Guide to Fitness, Health, Weight Loss, Nutrition