Fact: More than anything else, what you eat is related to your health. The link between diet and disease is staggering and The China Study is the most conclusive research to date that shows how diet and sickness are related.
Fact: Many vegetables get more than 50 of their calories from protein. For those that eat a vegetarian or raw diet you may get the question, "But where do you get your protein from?" What many don't realize is that there is lots of protein in vegetables. For instance, spinach gets about 55% of its calories from protein. Protein malnutrition is not a problem for those that eat a healthy, raw diet.
Fact: Cooking vegetable and fruits over 118 degrees destroys many important nutritional ingredients. The most nutritious food on the planet is living food when it is first picked from the garden. This is one of the most important nutrition facts you may ever learn. When veggies and fruits are heated they lose their life giving enzymes and much of their vitamins, phytonutrients and fiber content. An apple picked right from the tree will always be more nutritious than applesauce in a jar regardless of what the label may say.
Fact: Milk and dairy foods are not the answer to osteoporosis. The United States has one of the highest calcium intakes in the world per person, yet it also has one of the highest incidents of hip fractures in the world. The truth is, is that milk does not do a body good. Women in the United States drink more than 30 times the milk that women in New Guinea do, yet they get more than 40 times the number of hip fractures that New Guinean women do.
Joel Furhman's Eat To Live goes into great detail on the link between osteoporosis and calcium intake. It is a must read for healthy dieters.
Fact: There are no secret ingredients in nutritional supplements. The vitamin and supplement industry is a booming business and part of their business is to convincing consumers that certain ingredients will help you lose weight, think clearer, make men more virile, enhance certain parts of your body, make you see better or assist in healing some other multitude of ailments.
The problem with using an isolated ingredient is that it is taken out of foods and plants that contain ingredients that assist in the functionality of so called secret supplements. While we don't discount all supplements, you have to be aware of the foods that these ingredients come from and many times the food is much better than the isolated ingredient. If you must take supplements, make sure you look for those that contain co-factors, whole food vitamins or whole plant herbs to get the most powerful source of the vitamin you seek.
The best thing you can do to improve your diet is to eat fresh fruits and vegetables as much as you can. Think of food as the fuel for your body. If you owned an top of the line sports car you wouldn't put cheap fuel in it, so why would you put junk in your body when it is much more valuable? Stick with these simple nutrition facts and you'll never go wrong.
Visit our Healthy Recipes section for some nutritious and great tasting recipes.
