Since I don’t eat ice-cream, it’s vital for my own sake to find good alternatives to it, especially during the warmer months.
Frozen yogurt and fruit sherbets are pretty good alternatives but never as satisfying as the real deal (do you know what I mean?)
Fortunately that’s when this semifreddo comes into play: much better than frozen yogurt and much much better than fruit sherbet.
This recipe has been in my family for decades, it’s the easiest thing you can think of. Only three ingredients: meringues, strawberries and Greek yogurt. A blender and a freezer. That’s it.
You’ll need to find good tasting organic strawberries: that’s the X-Factor of this semifreddo.
I like to make my own meringues because it’s something I really like doing when I have some time to waste. But those you can buy at Whole Foods or any other grocer will do the trick just fine.
It’s fat free, low calories and with good protein content. In other words, the perfect Ironman dessert!
Oh yes, almost forgot, “semifreddo” is Italian for “half-cold” and typically indicates desserts in which gelato or ice-cream is used as the primary ingredient...well, not in this case!
A study conducted by a team of researchers of the Cardiovascular Genomic Research Center at Wayne State University School of Medicine in Detroit, MI (presented on March 25 at the American College of Cardiology's 61st Annual Scientific Session) has found out that beginning to lowering your “bad cholesterol” (LDL) early in life results in a three-fold greater reduction in the risk of coronary atherosclerosis than treatment with a statin later in life.
Coronary atherosclerosis (CHD) is a hardening of the arteries due to build-up fat and cholesterol that can lead to heart attacks and other forms of coronary heart disease.
In other words, the researchers found out that the sooner you’re starting checking your LDL levels - and address issues related to it, if any - the better you’ll be off at a later stage in your life.
Now, I’ve never thought of getting my cholesterol checked. I thought it was something that I should start doing in 15 maybe 20 years from now...how foolish of me.
Nowadays there is a label for all possible diet practices. Until not long ago it was all about being either omnivore or vegetarian. Then the macrobiotic diet became very popular (also thanks to Ms Ciccone), and also the vegan diet became part of mainstream food movements.
More recently the rawism is acquiring an important spot (just here in New York raw restaurants are popping out in every neighborhood). But that’s not it, there are flexitarians, pescatarians, pollotarians not to mention paleos and so on...
However, there’s no “official” definition for those (like me) that believe only in healthy eating: healtharian I like to define myself.
I actually randomly searched such term on Google and I found only a couple of websites that talk about it and in very marginal way (sigh!).
This means that time has come to claim our spot in the food movements.
First of all, I really like how healtharian sounds.
I can’t wait to be at the next time dinner party and when somebody will ask me “Are you vegetarian?vegan?” and I will be able to proudly reply “No, I’m an healtharian!”. How cool will it be? I’m already savoring the moment when I’ll start explaining what be an healtharian means (ha!)
And then you know it, once the word is out, it will start circulating and in a heartbeat we will rule the world!
Ok, that might be a bit of a stretch, but I know for a fact that there are many of us that just can’t wait to proudly walk under the healtharian banner.
But let’s move one step at the time...
I love this pudding for a bunch of reasons:
1) It’s uber-easy to make
2) It’s raw
3) It's vegan
4) Tastes great
5) Packed with nutrients
6) If you add protein powder makes for a perfect post-workout food
I'm positive that after reading this list you’ll be convinced to give it a try. You honestly should, because it’s really worth it.
Just five ingredients: bananas, unsweetened cocoa powder, chia seeds, vegan milk and protein powder (if you feel like).
It takes less than five minutes to "assemble". I like to make it before going to training so that it’s ready by the time I got back home. It’s a great substitute for the post-workout protein smoothie but can also be served to your guests as a sweet treat. And believe me no one would be able to guess that this awesome pudding is also so healthy!
More than 20 years ago a book entitled “Stop Dieting! Dieting Makes You Fat” was published in the UK. The authors, Geoffrey Cannon and Hetty Einzig, explained in detail why calorie counting and unbalanced diets were most of the time unsuccessful, and often led to fatigue, depression, and malnutrition.
Similarly, a 2004 study published in the British Journal of Nutrition confirmed that dietary restraint has also been implicated in the development and persistence of binge eating resulting in a tendency of gaining weight instead of losing it.
Furthermore in 2007, in an article released on the American Psychologist researchers reviewed studies of the long-term outcomes of diets to assess whether dieting was an effective treatment for obesity and concluded that there was little support for the notion that diets lead to lasting weight loss or health benefits.
Thus, there is ample clinical data accumulated through the years confirming that most dieters rapidly regain any achieved weight loss. All researches confirmed that weight control efforts have predicted future weight gain even after adjustment for potential confounders such as age, body mass index, smoking, alcohol use and social status.
In other words, the long-term result of dieting thus may paradoxically be the opposite of the desired goal.
More recently, a study published in the last issue of the International Journal of Obesity conducted by a team of researchers of the University of Helsinki, in Finland, went a little bit further and investigated whether the paradoxical weight gain associated with dieting is better related to genetic propensity to weight gain than to the weight loss episodes themselves.
Not surprisingly, the results confirmed that dieting itself may induce a subsequent mild weight gain and that, in most instances, is independent of genetic factors.
If you think that you’re going to be stuck with your DNA for the rest of your life, think again, because DNA is not immutable as many believe.
A recent study, published in the March issue of Cell Metabolism (a Cell Press publication) has discovered that when healthy but inactive men and women exercise for a matter of minutes, their DNA changes immediately.
One might think: is this a good or a bad thing? General consensus among scientists is that this is a very good thing.
Which means that altering our genomes for better health might be only a jog away.
I discovered kelp one day while I was having lunch with my friend Agata at Earth Matters in the LES, NYC. She grabbed a box from the fridge that contained what appeared to be noodles served with pesto. The didn’t looked exactly like regular noodles, more of a squishy version of them. I was a bit skeptical, but she made me try them and I must admit, they were awesome.
They were noodles made of kelp, an algae. Now, I know in general that algaes are a pretty amazing food, but what I didn’t know to what extent kelps are truly awesome.
Truth to be told we should all try to integrate more kelp in our eating regimens.
Not only because it’s a healthy thing to do, but also as growing algae is cheap and sustainable; hence a good thing for our beloved Earth!
This banana bread is amazing, I’m not kidding, it’s truly amazing. No sugar added, almost fat-free but with lots of good proteins and other precious nutrients: soft, moist and simply amazing.
It’s made with a good amount of whole wheat flour, rolled oats and protein powder.
Its core is bananas. I used organic ones that I found at the local grocery store, and I was very careful to pick the most riped ones from the stack.
This is crucial because the recipe calls for no added sugars. This means that all of the sweetness comes from the banana: that’s why they should be very ripe and delicious.
Also, don’t cheap out on blueberries: they contribute dramatically to this bread.
The end result is...amazing. I know I’m repeating myself but I can’t find any other word to better describe it.
It’s the best thing for breakfast. And if you’re on a diet, check the nutrition facts below, I’m sure you’ll be surprised!
Child obesity is plague wide-spreading at an uncontrollable rate.
Recent data shows that child obesity has more than tripled in the past 30 years. With the percentage of children aged between 6 and 11 years in the US who were obese increased from 7% in 1980 to nearly 20% in 2008; and the percentage obese adolescents increased from 5% to 18% in the same period of time. This means that 1 out of 5 kids in the US is obese.
If you add to these figures also overweight kids it goes above 30%; in other words 1 every 3 kids (or between four and five millions).
The risks associated with child obesity are numerous: higher risk factors for cardiovascular diseases, likelyhood of pre-diabetes, greater risk for bone and joint problems, not to mention the social and psychological problems such as stigmatization and poor self-esteem.
Over the last couple of years I spoke with several parents of obese/overweight kids that struggled to help their kids losing weight.
They asked me for friendly advice on nutrition, exercising ideas, etc. for their kids. One common denominator was that they were pretty desperate because they couldn’t find a way to be really helpful as kids are often are unresponsive to their parents solicitations.
Truth is, they were ready to give up because they couldn’t cope with it.
In few cases, especially when I already knew the kids pretty well (i.e., daughters/sons of my parents’ friends) I took them under my wing, acted as their older brother, and ultimately succeeded in helping them lose significant amount of weight (actually two of those kids are now pretty good triathletes).
However during those experiences I realized one thing: that the kids were willing to lose weight because they took me as an example and wanted to “be like me”. Without knowing it I led them by example. That was really the key to success.
And that precisely what a study, just published in the advanced online edition of the journal Obesity, found out: the key contributor to the success of a child's weight loss in family-based treatment of childhood obesity is a parent's weight change.
Yesterday we talked about how losing belly fat is beneficial to the circulatory system according to a study conducted at John Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, MD.
The same researchers. during their study also discovered that:
1) Low-carb diets work better that low-fat ones when it comes to losing weight.
2) Low-carb diets (that imply eating more fat) have no harmful effects on cardiovascular health, as some speculate.
This simply means that diets for weight loss should focus more on cutting carbs rather than fats.
If you think that losing belly fat only serves only to give you a six-pack, think again because a recent study just found out that it will make your arteries stronger.
I don’t want to give a lecture on the importance of having healthy arteries; let’s just remind ourselves that arteries are a crucial part of the circulatory system; which proper functioning is responsible for the delivery of oxygen and nutrients to all cells, as well as the removal of carbon dioxide and waste products, maintenance of optimum pH, etc.
In developed countries the two leading causes of death are heart attack and stroke, and each may directly result from an arterial system deterioration.
In other words, getting a six-pack will most likely make you live longer...not only do a show-off at the beach!
One of the golden rules for keeping your weight under control and being healthier is to never leave the house in the morning without having a plan for lunch, afternoon snack, and dinner.
If you’re on a diet you probably don’t have to worry about this because you’re likely to be provided with a daily nutrition plan. If you’re not (or you just finished one) you better start thinking ahead and learn to keep in check what you’re going to eat throughout the day.
Over time I discovered that planning meals is really a necessary component in being healthier.
Why? Because there’s nothing worst than spontaneous eating: 9 times out of 10 you’ll make poorer food choices. As it’s always easier to head to a fast food joint or to order-in rather than to create a nutritious and healthy meal at home.
Menu planning doesn't have be complicated: it just requires a small investment of time and some thinking.
I had some leftover pumpkin puree and thought to make some healthy muffins that I could enjoy in the morning for breakfast.
Making these muffins is a cinch. You can mix by hand which allows to incorporate all the ingredients quickly without overdoing it, a little touch for decorating them and that’s about it.
Depending on the sweetness of the pumpkin puree you’re using you can cut on the sugar. You can always replace it with Splenda sweetener to make them sugar free. Also feel free indulge on spices. I really enjoy the flavor combination of pumpkin and cinnamon; next time I’m going to add a little more than what the recipe calls for. So feel free to adjust those things to taste.
What came out of the oven were some pretty good muffins, worthy of your palate. Packed with protein, fibers and all the nutrients pumpkin brings along!
A recent research published in the current issue of the International Journal of Sport Nutrition and Exercise Metabolism confirmed that almost all weight loss (or weight control) supplements, currently on the market, don’t work. Yes, you heard it right, THEY DO NOT WORK!
The study, conducted at the Oregon State University by Dr. Melinda Monroe and her research team, reviewed the evidence surrounding hundreds of weight loss supplements (a $2.4 billion industry in the United States alone) and concluded that no research evidence exists that any single product results in significant weight loss.
But that’s not it, a lot of such supplements have side effects that can be detrimental to our health: what about that???
A few days ago, the NYTimes health blog reported a pretty interesting news: the FDA acknowledged that cholesterol-lowering statins carry a risk of cognitive side effects.
If you’re not familiar with this drug, statins help people at high risk of cardiovascular problems, lowering cholesterol, risk of heart attack and stroke. They are one of the most prescribed drugs in the world.
For years doctors have been fielding reports from patients that the drugs leave them feeling “fuzzy,” and have been experiencing big memory problems. Finally the FDA has officially acknowledged that.
This news has raised concern because 21 million patients only in the US were prescribed statins during 2011. It's difficult to assess how many of them have experienced cognitive side effects.
So what’s the solution? Lowering cholesterol through a healthy diet and exercising, easy as that. You can get off statins and no more fear of “losing the mind”.
Among food that help with cholesterol issues one might be particulalry helpful: grapefruit!
A study conducted in Israel demonstrated that eating one ruby red grapefruit a day was as effective as taking statin drugs in the lowering of cholesterol. But beware, you cannot use the two together!
This is my favorite green smoothie recipe. I’ve tried several flavors combinations over the years and found this to be pretty awesome. It’s basically banana, spinach or kale, pineapple juice and vanilla protein blended together. The greens slight bitterness almost disappears in the mixture, but still gives a bit of flavor-kick that blends well with the sweetness of the other ingredients.
I like to add chia seeds and bee pollen to make it “complete” from a nutritional standpoint. If you have spirulina add some: this smoothie will get even more awesome!
Choosing to eat brown rice over white rice differentiate a good diet from a great diet. Why? Because brown rice is so much better than white rice that if you look at it from a nutritional standpoint they are separated light years apart.
For instance, if you eat just two servings of brown rice a week, you can reduce the risk of type 2 diabetes, while eating white rice on a regular basis increases the chances of type 2 diabetes by 20%.
Also, The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition conducted a study that confirms brown rice is the hands-down healthier choice for your dinner grain.
Not enough to convince you? Then read this and weep!
After a kick-ass workout, a long run, an intense swimming routine or superhot Bikram class it’s ok to feel tired and even exhausted: you’ve spend a lot of energy and asked a lot from your body.
Now, we all know that one must get proper recovery, but if we’re in a hard-core training period we need to get back on track faster than the recommended 36/48 hours waiting time.
That’s the norm for me and here is what I do to be sure to get a full recovery within 24 hours.
Omega-3s are a hot topic, everybody keeps talking about how they’re a magic wonder for our brain, heart, skin, joints, and eyes. The consensus is that fish is the greatest source for Omega-3s hence, we should eat it at least twice a week. If not, we should supplement such deficiency with fish oil capsules.
However, most of the people don’t know that Omega-3s are not just a single nutrient. The term refers to a family of compounds that has a wide chemical variety. With each type of Omega-3 playing a different role.
The sources for each Omega-3s are different and sometime fish oil supplementation may not be enough.
Let’s discover some more about this.
People ask me all the time how, after so many years of triathlon, I don’t get bored of running for endless miles.
My answer is always the same: I love to run. I love the feeling of my body moving through space. I love to run because when I’m doing it all my troubles vanish. My mind is free, all I can feel is my breath and my legs moving one step after the other.
I love to run because it brings me mental clarity. Whenever I found myself at a cross path in life, I go for a run knowing that at the end I will have found the right decision to make.
I love to run because, for me, it’s much healthier and cheaper than therapy!
The Iron You
With spring just around the corner we can finally start exercising outdoor with the best music playing on our iPods!
“Jamba Juice is for heroes, and that’s what we’re going to be!” that’s what Sheldon tells to Howard, Raj and Leonard in episode 1, season 5 of The Big Bang Theory, before committing a suicidal move in a paintball game against the opposite team.
I’m a big fan of this show and I couldn’t agree more with Sheldon: Jamba Juice is indeed for heroes!
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