Monday, January 31, 2011

Top Tips for Students on Eating Well and Staying Fit While Saving Money

Student life can make eating well difficult. The combination of study, work, and social commitments are overwhelming. It is no wonder that many students, living away from home for the first time, neglect their health during this time in their lives. For those undertaking study in Australia and unfamiliar with produce and the lifestyle in Australia, the following list will offer valuable tips for maintaining your health while keeping to a budget. Eating well and keeping fit enhance your mental concentration and improve the effectiveness of your study sessions.

Student eating
Photo: analytik


Health Basics

  • Eat a large variety of foods. Make sure you incorporate foods from different food groups. Keep fats and oils to a minimum and eat plenty of fruit and vegetables.
  • Limit the bad foods. Junk foods are best consumed occasionally. Try and avoid consuming large amounts of salt, sugar, and alcohol.
  • Stay hydrated. Drink lots of water.
  • Get fit. Walk everywhere if you can and have a strenuous exercise session at least three times a week.


Managing Your Food

  • Plan your meals with a basic meal plan that you can alternate at short notice. Keep a ready supply of the main ingredients in your pantry, fridge, and freezer. Frozen soups, frozen pasta sauces, pasta, rice, canned fish and lentils are all great ingredients for a simple and easy meal.
  • Make use of the internet to find easy recipes. There are many blogs and sites with ready recipes and handy suggestions.
  • Buy in bulk with housemates and friends where possible. Remember that generic brand items, bought in bulk, work out to be much cheaper.
  • Cook and eat with friends. This means you can buy in bulk and enjoy the cooking process as a social activity at the same time.
  • Cook in bulk and freeze. Soups, pasta sauces, burger patties, and lentil curries are some foods that store very well in the freezer. Having a complete meal ready to be heated up means you'll be more motivated to eat healthfully at home. Vegetables can be washed, bagged in serving sizes, and frozen.
  • Develop your own fast food. Fast food is expensive for what it is, and will often leave you hungry an hour after the meal due to lack of nutrients. You can develop your own nutritious fast foods. Consider quick and healthy menu items such as wholemeal noodles, fresh cereal, muesli, rolled oats, fruit, wholemeal sandwiches and wraps, and quick salads made from canned fish.
  • Keep an eye out for discounts. Clearance fruit, vegetables and meat and supermarket specials are excellent purchases.
  • One pot dishes are fantastic for those short on time. Keep a collection of recipes for one pot dishes. They are also great for freezing.
  • Make use of the cafeteria. Australian universities and schools usually have very reasonably priced food in their cafeterias, suitable for student budgets.
  • Buy fruit and vegetables in season. In season fruit and vegetables mean lower prices, and they tend to be more nutritious than those out of season.
  • Buy at markets when you can. The prices at markets are usually much cheaper, especially for fruits and vegetables.
  • Buy at discount supermarkets. There are quite a few discount supermarkets in Australia that offer generic brand or end of cycle products. You can find excellent deals at these supermarkets.
  • Grow your own. You can grow you own vegetables and herbs in very small spaces, with very little maintenance required.
  • Scour the internet for coupons. Seek and you will find. There are many excellent deals on the internet, such as group coupons, promotional discount cnupons, and other special deals on fresh and packaged food.

Monday, January 24, 2011

Your favourite pub fare, lighter and healthier

To me, pub food is a treat that I indulge in only rarely. Even with the better gastro pub food offered in more expensive bars, you are still sure to ingest a lot of calories, especially from carbs and fat. And as I watch my diet pretty closely, I usually get a bit disheartened at the fact that my entire week has been messed up by a single meal. But if you’re like me and enjoy pub food (and sometimes crave it!), then you’ll be happy to know these few tips to enjoy the pub food you love, at home, with better-for-you alternatives.

Fish and Chips Pub
Photo: wikimedia.org

Fish and chips
Fries and fried fish are a classic pub fare, especially in British pubs all around the world. The light batter and the golden fries are hard to beat. But have you looked closely at the freezer section of your grocery lately? They have thick and wide-cut fries that are just like those chips at the pub. If you cook them in the oven instead of the fryer, you save a lot of calories. Same goes for the fish: there are some excellent frozen fish in batter, or you can even make your own by using bread crumb and spices, dredging the fish through milk and coating it with the crumbs. Again, use the oven instead of the fryer. This will save you a lot of fat calories, and it will satisfy your craving for this classic.

Hamburger and fries
Fries come with everything in pubs, so again, follow the direction for the oven instead of the fryer. You can even cut your own fries from fresh potatoes, which saves you all the chemical additives and most importantly the sodium present in bagged frozen fries. As for the hamburger, choose a lighter alternative: chicken or turkey patties, or even a vegetarian patty. There are plenty of recipes on the web about how to make a burger patty with brown rice and black beans; I have tried a few, and there are some excellent recipes out there. You can choose your spices and even mix in a bit of homemade barbecue sauce. Try it, it’s delicious!

Irish stew
Popular in Irish pubs, the classic Irish stew hides a lot of fat, especially in the sauce. There are many, many variations of this recipe, some healthier than others. Avoid those that use a lot of oil, lard, or butter. Cut the portion of fat and add in another thickener such as corn starch; for flavour, a good homemade chicken stock will do the trick. Choose a lean cut of beef, and use sweet potatoes instead of white ones: their glycemic index is much better.

So, next time you have an irresistible urge to go to the sports bar for some fatty, caloric pub fare, just head to the grocery store and grad a few wholesome ingredients. Invite friends over and watch the game on TV, comfortable in your home: you’ll save money, calories, and cultivate your relationship with your friends and your family. Give it a try! You won’t want to spend another dollar on pub fare after that.

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

The Benefits Of Apple Juice

The following are some of the great health and vitality rewards you may get from drinking this wonderful juice:


Photo: topnews.in

Vitamins and Antioxidants
Apples contain 172% of the recommended daily allowance of vitamin C per serving. In addition it contains vitamin A and some B vitamins. Chemicals called polyphenols, which are found in apple juice, are antioxidants and thus apple juice is a good source if disease fighting anti-oxidant nutrition. Another group of chemicals found in apples, called flavinoids, are also anti-oxidants.


Liver Cleansing
One of the biggest nutritional benefits of apples is its ability to cleanse the liver. It does this thanks to its concentrations of vitamins and alkalines. A chemical called pectin, found in the skin of apples, is known to help get toxins out of the liver and the digestive system.


Heart Health
The polyphenols in apple juice promote cardio health. This is due to their antioxidant activity. The flavinoids in apples also benefit the heart.

Asthma Prevention
A flavinoid called phloridzin that is found in apple juice is associated with lung health and has even been shown to be capable of preventing asthma attacks. There are also studies which show that children who drink apple juice regularly have healthier lungs than those who do not.

Cholesterol Reduction
Apples contain no cholesterol and eating them daily can reduce cholesterol. Elevated levels of cholesterol can be a cause of heart problems, skin disease, and a variety of other ailments. Reducing cholesterol is thus an important and nutritional goal and apples and apple juice can help with it.

Immune System Benefits
The vitamin C in apples helps to strengthen the immune systems. A strong immune system helps is essential in fighting off diseases and infection. Vitamin C also works against premature aging, primarily by helping to produce a compound called collagen.

Bone Health
Another nutrient in apples called Phloridzin, along with the high vitamin C content, help protect the bones by helping the body to absorb iron. Boron, which is also found in apples, is another bone strengthening agent.

Cancer Prevention
Apples and apple juice help to prevent cancer through their high anti-oxidant content, namely polyphenols and flavinoids mentioned above.

Memory Enhancement
Believe it or not, drinking apple juice may even improve your memory. The reason for this is that there is evidence that suggests that apple juice may increase the amount of acetylcholine, a neurotransmitter, in the brain. Acetylcholine has been found to be connected with memory processes and an increased amount of it can thus augment recall.

As you can see, whether you eat apples or drink apple juice, you’re getting a high dose of very healthy nutrition each time you partake. Try to find unsweetened apple juice, rather than juice that has had sugar added, if you want to reap the highest rewards from the juice. Apple juice is naturally high in fructose and carbohydrates, and these are some of the few slightly undesirable traits it possesses. While the fructose found in apples is preferable to refined sugar, it is still advisable to avoid in exaggerated amounts. You certainly don’t need juice that has extra sugar added.

Enjoy apples and apple juice any time the mood strikes you. As long as you don’t overdo it, you can expect to enjoy its great nutritional benefits and to savor its delicious flavor and texture at the same time.
Copellafruitjuices.co.uk

About the Author
The nutritional and health benefits of apple juice are many. So if you like apple juice, by all means go on drinking it

Thursday, January 6, 2011

Good Diet For Better Health

In today's world consumption of food having high calories has increased because of the busy lifestyle of humans. They are in a hurry to go to workplace, and they will have to consume baked foods and snack, which have high calorific values. It is very difficult to find a healthy diet in this fast world. All food items like meat and vegetables are equally fried and covered with slat. All these have high calorific value and increase blood pressure and cause various diseases. There was no measure for banning the fast food culture and the thing is affecting every one like a chain.

Broccoli
Photo: Яick Harris

So if you want to have a better health and life you should change to healthy cook recipes. Otherwise you will get affected by the diseases of obesity. Here are some healthy cook recipes that you can try at home.


Grilled broccoli

To prepare this you will have to mix pepper, salt, lemon juice and oil together. It is to be placed in the grill after thirty minutes of mixing the recipients. Use cooking spray to brush the grill. Now you can place it on a plastic bag and pour some cheese and shake them well. Make sure that it is covered with cheese completely. Place it on the grill with medium heat. After some time, the healthy cook recipes will be ready.

Chicken fry in Thai style

Chicken is the best meat that contains fewer amounts of fat. Although it contains some amount of fat, by taking specific areas of the meat you can avoid that fat content. You can select thigh part because of less fat content. Place the pan and heat it to some minutes. When the pan is heated, pour oil it to it. After that, add the components one by one into the pan. Add ginger, garlic and chicken. Then stir the components. After the chicken gets well cooked to add onion and ginger, green and red pepper, and sugar if required. Keep the healthy cook recipes until it is completely cooked. You can use it with adding oyster sauce and peanuts. Before eating, mix the components well.

Adding beans of all types are not good. Some of the beans will have large protein content such that it can be dangerous to diet. So that should be avoided in daily consumption. Thus by preparing meat in the above manner, your diet will change completely safe. You can eat it without any worries. Dieting alone will not make the difference. So you should make control of the diets to reduce the fat content and have healthy cook recipes.

The main factors which make the food items unhealthy to consume are the fryers. Frying food materials with oil will make the natural vitamins to get lost and make it harmful to the body. Instead of frying, you can make use of grilled mat items so that grilling can retain all the natural features of the meat and will not add anything harmful to the body. So it’s better to avoid fried meat and snacks.

This is a full article which also published at article directories. Read more articles please visit ezinearticle.com.