Spring Cleanse - My Key Recipe

By webmaster ( May 26, 2007 at 6:35 am) · Filed under Cleanse & Detox, Food & Cooking

This year I hit on a quick and easy recipe that did the trick for me. Through my 2-week cleanse this spring I had at least one of these Asian slaw-salads most every day. It’s rekindled my love of cabbage – which, being in the brassica family (with broccoli and onions), is a phytochemical-packed cleansing powerhouse.

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What you’ll need:

  • A good chef’s knife
  • A clean cutting board
  • 5 minutes

Ingredients:

  • ½ c Savoy cabbage sliced thin
  • ½ c Red cabbage sliced thin
  • 1 slice fresh ginger, diced with skin trimmed
  • ¼ c diced red pepper
  • 1 medium carrot, diced
  • 1 Tbsp fresh cilantro if available
  • 2 Tbsp Asian salad dressing or
  • 2 tsp sesame oil
  • 2 tsp rice wine vinegar

Putting it together:

Toss everything together and eat.

I got into the ritual of making this in a beautiful bowl that I love to eat out of. This slaw-salad has been a mainstay of my 3pm-give-me-carbs attack. It usually worked, and when I still craved something starchier, a few crackers didn’t turn into a box of crackers after having a bowl of slaw. Sometimes I double the recipe, and sometime I have two. It’s very low in calories and nutritionally dense, and has lots of fiber, the secret weapon of the weight-conscious.

Let me know how you like it.

Annie

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You mean cheese won’t help me lose weight?

By webmaster ( May 13, 2007 at 5:28 pm) · Filed under For Nutrition Pros, For Yoga Pros, Weight

Kudos to the Physician’s Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM), who were the driving force behind the Federal Trade Commission (FTC)’s new ban on the touting of dairy products as weight-loss foods. The FTC decision was based on the overwhelming lack of scientific evidence to support the claim. The dairy industry’s huge-budget, celebrity-starred campaign around milk and dairy for weight loss was based on a tiny study funded by the industry. Most health researchers clearly agree that most dairy products are more closely linked to weight gain than loss. Dairy fat is one of the most highly saturated fats in all the foods we eat.

Unfortunately, I think the damage is done. That was a huge campaign, and targeted nutritionists as well as women via beautiful big print and TV ads over several years. They were convincing, and I’m sure that most Americans would say that dairy products will help them lose weight.

If only we got the message that it’s the fat in dairy that’s the culprit. But unfortunately, since the dairy industry didn’t want to speak badly of the bulk of its products, we never fully got that message. In the end, I’m afraid; dieters are more confused than ever.

Can dairy fit into a healthy diet? Sure, if you look for low fat and fat free options, and are conscious of your overall caloric intake. The PCRM doesn’t agree with me on that, though – they prescribe to a vegan diet, no dairy or animal products at all. A vegan diet, featuring lots of fruits and vegetables, whole grains and vegetable proteins, is likely the healthiest one we can eat. (What other type of vegan diet is there? I know many teens that are vegans but don’t like fruit or vegetables and eat pure junk food.) A nutrition nightmare and part of the reason that teen girls have the worst diets of any age or gender group (they average something close to 30% of their needs for calcium, this during their prime bone-building years). But anyway, I personally and professionally feel that if someone is not interested or able to go vegan, that organic low fat dairy can certainly be part of a very healthy diet.

Anyway, the message is: dairy fat, found in dairy foods, is not part of a winning weight-loss (or maintenance) strategy.

Read the PCRM’s May 11th announcement on the issue here.

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Spring Cleanse, Part 1: Why Cleanse?

By webmaster ( May 8, 2007 at 7:54 am) · Filed under Cleanse & Detox, Datasource

Spring is the season to open up the house, empty out the closets, and clear out the clutter and cobwebs. It’s also the time when those in northern climes might wince as they uncover their bodies (winter is such a great time to cover-up, burrow in and just forget about it, right?). I wish you just a momentary wince or none at all.

As a dietitian and yoga teacher, the idea of nutritional cleansing fascinates me. Each time I cleanse (I don’t fast and I only do very gentle cleanses, by the way. I think fasting and harsher cleansing can do more harm than good – more on this later) I reaffirm my everyday cleansing diet – that is, cleaning up my diet as a way of life. My spring cleanse this year was more about being strong in my own wellness than about nutritional goals per se. I have a tendency to allow stress from others’ poor lifestyle habits influence how I take care of myself. Since my fruit & vegetable cleanse with herbal support (I used Yerba Prima support products this time), I’ve worked harder to resist being swayed by well-meaning loved ones gifting me treats.

For the next couple months, I’ll tease this topic of nutritional cleansing and detox, let you what I’m thinking about it, and the resources that I have found helpful.

So first, why even do it?

Our environment has changed for the worse in the past 100 years. The EPA estimates a grand total of 4.3 billion pounds of the 650 toxic chemicals they follow were released into the environment in 2005. Other groups estimate that 1,000 newly synthesized compounds are introduced each year.

Toxic chemicals enter into our bodies through the air we breathe, the food we eat and the water we drink. While our bodies have an elegant system of removing toxic chemicals from the body (via the work of the liver, kidneys, lungs, skin and digestive system), there has been an increase of toxins in the environment, and at the same time a decrease in the nutritional quality of the average American’s diet. The deterioration of our diet (through eating large amounts of processed foods, chemicals and hormones, and not enough healthy fruits, vegetables and unadulterated whole grains and clean proteins) impairs the ability of our body to effectively detox. That’s the basic rationale for learning a little about detoxing and occasionally focusing on it as a means of maintaining overall health.

Here is the EPA’s brochure from their Toxic Release Inventory (TCI), and a more detailed report. You can find loads more information at www.epa.gov.

EPA 2005 Toxic Chemical Inventory (TCI) - overview brochure

You can find the full eReport on the EPA website.

In future postings, we’ll review the basics of nutritional cleansing, the mental aspects of cleansing, safe vs. not-so-safe cleansing, resources available to you, products I know of, and some non-nutritional cleansings.

May you be happy

May you be healthy

And may you stand in the light of your own truest self

Annie

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The Veggie Queen and other Inspirations for Great Vegan Cooking

By webmaster ( April 27, 2007 at 10:15 am) · Filed under Food & Cooking, Inspiration, Wellness

I’ve been fortunate to have experienced lots of great vegetarian cookbooks this winter. The raw-foods movement has fascinated me, and there are flurry of beautiful books that inspire. I also love books by dietitians. RDs, in my opinion are well-educated and underappreciated, and while our professional organization tends to sell our collective souls too easily to the processed food industry and big pharma, please don’t let that detract from the wisdom you’ll often find among this crew - like anything, you need to find the good eggs. With RDs, they’re are lots of them.

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One good egg I’ve been blessed with connecting with this winter is Jill Nussinow, MS RD, “The Veggie Queen”. She’s a California-based nutritionist, and I’ve found her cookbook an inspiring one for the everyday cook (which, for the most part, I am). Jill is a fan of mushrooms, as am I, and she’s into her pressure-cooker. The appeal of a 12-minute soup, or 5-minute mashed potatoes tell me that last year when someone left this cute little pressure-cooker in our house (long story) that I was right to keep it. Now I have some coaching about how to use it and why to pull it out from the back of that bottom kitchen drawer. Her cookbooks is lovely to hold, and features culinary tips as well as a view into her Farmer’s market lifestyle. Jill illustrates, I think, the degree to which sustainable eating really is a lifestyle.

Find out more about Jill and her book The Veggie Queen, at www.theveggiequeen.com.

Another recent entree in the vegan cookbook genre that I’ve been having a good time with this winter is Blossoming Lotus’ World Fusion Cookbook. This is another beautiful book - this one in full Technicolor, high production value loveliness. Healthy cats in Kauai know Blossoming Lotus well - and if you ever make it to the north shore here, a meal at the restaurant is a must. It’s a great place to bring your non-veggie friends to see just how delicious and refined vegan cuisine can be.

So I’ve been cooking from this book through the winter, and the one drawback for really wide appeal is that it’s very Hawaii-centric. Many ingredients just aren’t available or as good off-island. And, the secret to many BL dishes is pureed macadamia nuts! Heavy cream it isn’t, and I suppose if you are living the vegan lifestyle you can boost the healthy fat a bit, but for those who must be weight conscious, just know that you’ll need to be conscious of how much of those fab rich sauces you slather on you veggies.
Another small detraction is the cutesy recipe names. Now, just being in Hawaii tends to make the most hard-nosed Easterner a little whimsical. But I think the book would be stronger if it settled down in that area a bit.

Overall, it’s an inspiration. A beautiful book to hold, and some great ideas that really could be modified to accommodate the possibility that not everyone can live in paradise.

Find out more about the book and their very cool scene at www.blossominglotus.com/about_book.htm
Happy healthy eating.


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Every Bite Is Divine: a Nautilus Book Awards Finalist

By webmaster ( April 18, 2007 at 10:51 am) · Filed under Inspiration, Wellness

I’m happy to share that Every Bite Is Divine was selected as a finalist for the 2007 Nautilus Book Awards! I’m particularly excited about this one, because the Nautilus honors books that help people live consciously and promote positive social change. Since my mission is to help those struggling with weight and eating to release some of their suffering around these issues, I’m jazzed.

The winners will be announced on June 2, 2007 at Book Expo America, the annual extravaganza for the book industry, held this year in New York City.


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New Discussion Forums on www.anniebkay.com

By webmaster ( March 8, 2007 at 2:36 pm) · Filed under Share Your Story

Check out our brand-new discussion forum on the website. I am hoping that the forum becomes a lively resource for all of us looking for ideas and inspiration in our life journey, and in our journey to health and wholeness.

All the best,

Annie

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Therapeutic Yoga’s Organic Evolutions

By webmaster ( February 4, 2007 at 1:58 pm) · Filed under For Yoga Pros, Wellness

[SYTARLogo.gif]

The first Symposium on Yoga Therapy and Research (SYTAR), organized by the International Association of Yoga Therapy (IAYT), was held January 18-21 in Los Angeles. It was a gathering of yogis and yoginis, medical professionals, researchers, and those who develop and sell products to the aforementioned groups.

First off, by any measure, this conference was a great success. It sold out very quickly - I spoke to many yogis who’d wanted to go but hadn’t acted quickly enough. I believe that many yoga teachers across the country are witnessing the therapeutic possibilities of yoga in their own clientele. So the topic is ripe for discussion. And, I believe the organizers of the conference approached the frankly impossible task of finding common ground between the scientific community (the quantifiers), and the yogic spiritual practitioners and teachers (the revelers in the unknowable).

I love yoga conferences. I love to be around dedicated yoga teacher-practitioners. They put out a great vibe - as one woman said to me in the bathroom “who ARE you people? - it feels so good to be around you!” (she was attending a community college meeting in the same hotel). I was moved and ticked to attend scientific sessions that were launched with the chanting of ohm. Somehow, that both made the information presented resonate, and reminded me not to take it too seriously.

Many of the presenters provided outlines of their talks, and some of these may be helpful to yoga practitioners who were not able to attend. You can find a range of download able pdf-outlines of sessions and of breakouts at the IAYT website. You can find additional information from some of the presenters websites - those I attended who’s website info was helpful to me include Matthew Taylor PhD, PT, Amy Weintraub, Leslie Kaminoff who’s an impressively active blogger and Larry Payne PhD. Another blog that would be of interest to those of you thinking about the integrative therapies like yoga is The Integrator, John Week’s blog. I’ll do more features on some of these and other excellent practitioners I met at SYTAR.

I’ve been back from the conference for a couple weeks now, and the initial impressions have ruminated a bit. There has also been some rumblings and feedback from other attendees of the conference. A feast for thought came out of this meeting. A natural topic for this group was the development of standards for yoga therapists, and moving toward reimbursement and licensure. There were a number of warnings from clinicians (Chiropractors, PTs, RNs) that moving in that way will definitely result in more oversight, less creativity and time per client, and probably a reduction in pay scale for the yoga provider. Even as a clinician myself (I’m a Registered Dietitian), I came away thinking that perhaps moving toward licensure and reimbursement was not a good idea for the yoga community.

Feedback from the conference which I found fascinating was Megan McDonough’s observation that while most of the attendees were female, most of the presenters were male. The Kripalu Yoga Teacher’s Association listserv had a richer discussion, but you can get the cliffnotes on eSutra. It was a very male-dominated meeting, which I at first thought was indicative of more linear scientific nature of the topic. But then I thought perhaps it was because of the clique of PdD male yoga teachers who seem to have dominated the conversation - there are definitely master level, PhD-level yoga teacher/researchers out there, so yep, this should change next year. And it seems that feedback has been received by the organizers too.

All in all, a great effort, a beautiful dialogue. I’ll go to SYTAR next year.

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Environmental Transitioning

By webmaster ( January 11, 2007 at 2:49 pm) · Filed under Inspiration


This isn’t a nutrition post, or a health post really. Each winter, my husband and I are lucky enough to spend a few months on Kauai, HI. He’s a surfer, so our lives at times (most of the time, really) mold to that.

What strikes me is how much easier it is to follow a healthy lifestyle here than on the East Coast. There’s just so much more fresh organic produce. Daily life is just more physical here - opportunities to be active are just everywhere, and are more fun. On Nantucket, I have to drag myself to a class, run down the road, or do a cable-TV workout. Sorry to whine, but there’s just less zing to those activities, and they seem more isolated there. Here, our eyes, for some reason, are opened a little wider. Anyway, coming here saves my life on an annual basis.

This year, my 79-on-Saturday mom is here. (It was us, our cat, our surfboards, and my mom flying out here - like modern-day Beverly Hillbillies.) It’s been great and I cherish every day we get to spend with her - and she’s having a ball.

But it has kept me from work, and writing much that you’d actually want to read on this blog. So, hang in there. She heads back to the snow (which there is, finally) on the 15th, and I’m off to LA a few days later. Will blog from there hopefully, or at least when I get back.

I’ll never voluntarily give up coming here!

Happy travels. And, as my husband says, vacations are for those who take them.

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Survive the Merriment with Body & Soul Intact

By webmaster ( December 15, 2006 at 7:37 am) · Filed under Inspiration, Weight

Here it is. The holiday season. Party time, candy and cookie time, rich food time. Estimates for how much Americans gain during this season range from 5 to 15 pounds, depending on who’s doing the reporting. I suspect that the weight gain phenomenon is more prevalent in New England and the northern climes, but I’d love to hear stories and strategies from those in warmer places as to their strategies for maintaining a healthy weight (and healthy habits) through this time.
Here are few survival tips:

Accept the fact that you won’t be losing weight this month. Regardless if you are a party momma or a stay-at-homer, there is just more high-calorie food around. Just maintaining is a feat this time of year.

Keep on moving. Practice stress management. Tie them together. Keep physical activity top-of-mind this month, and squeeze in extra workouts, try some of the TV workouts on cable (if you have comcast on demand, check out the fitness TV - there are yoga, Pilate’s, walking and many other workouts - that’s what’s kept me moving through the last month or two when the weather has been less reliable here on Nantucket). Physical activity is great stress management, so if you didn’t get your packages in the mail on time, didn’t get to cards this year, or whatever, move a little to release the emotion that sits in your body as a result of not being perfect.

Focus on the peeps, not the table. Food traditions this time of year carry deep resonance and a strong pull. For me, it’s my mom’s cookies, and anything resembling eggnog. It’s not always easy to remember that the reason for the season is really love, hope and connectedness. I know that many family relationships can be challenging, and that can drive us to seek comfort from seasonal goodies in unhealthy quantities. There’s a Buddhist practice that may be helpful in working with relationships this season. The Dali Lama describes a practice of bowing down to the difficult people in your life, and thanking them for the opportunity they have provided to help you to experience spiritual growth. Love and honor them! For me, this practice a) cracks me up a little, and b) opens me up to another way to seeing things beyond the way my conditioned judgemental mind does. Somehow, it makes it easier for me to step back and see the people who challenge me differently, and to forgive them for the pain they cause me.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely or difficult your life is, the world opens itself to you this season. My wish for you is to feel that magic. My wish for you is that someone does the Buddhist practice of loving you when you cause them pain. And I wish you peace.

Namaste
Annie

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Peace, Please: New Reports Blame Obese Individuals for All that Ails Us (and what that says about us)

By webmaster ( December 5, 2006 at 1:05 pm) · Filed under Obesity, Stigmatization, Weight

The New York Times has been covering the social stigmatization of weight recently. Gina Kolata reported in an October Week in Review (their weekly OpEd section), that there is an ever- louder beat of the drum from researchers (and of course amplified by the media), blaming obese individuals for everything from higher gas prices to global warming. There was another piece more recently on the growth of fat-discrimination as a college study topic.

In essence, Kolata’s piece notes that social stigmatization of overweight is at an all-time high. But, while the great tide of disapproval helped stem other unhealthy behaviors like smoking or drinking, unfortunately it doesn’t work that way with our most ubiquitous coping mechanisms: comfort food and inactivity. All that self-loathing and fear of weight just makes us gain more.

Evidence mounts that it’s the healthy behaviors (being physically active and following a healthy diet) that determine health to a greater extent than the number on the scale. Remember that CDC report that noted that people slightly overweight lived longer? So, a thin person who under eats or overexercises is less healthy than an overweight individual following a healthy lifestyle.

But does that help us to exhale around accepting our body size? No! Why?

I think that food and fashion industries have just been wildly successful at sending messages to shape the culture and ensure our insecurity. An unhappy person is a great consumer, after all. Want to see what I mean? take a look at some of the ads on www.about-face.org. To learn more about this topic and connect with others around it, check out the International Association of Size Acceptance. The have lots of downloads, reviews of the science around size acceptance, pod casts and links. Just tons of great information.

I think the way out of the hatred and stigmatization of weight is simple education. Kids now really need media literacy in order to become conscious of what they can do to live healthy lives today. And for adults, I think there is more support to renounce the unhealthy aspects of our culture - look at the popularity of yoga! Yoga, of course, is a wonderful way of doing the mental work around releasing some of the underlying issues that cause all the suffering around poor body image, and waking up to the truth that each and everyone of us is perfect, and is divine.

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