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Thursday, July 14, 2011 at 5:03PM One of my favourite TED talks of all time, very inspiring
food, home, lifestyle tagged family, food, ted Saturday, July 2, 2011 at 1:32PM Waistlines in people, glucose levels in mice hint at sweeteners' effects: Related studies point to the illusion of the artificial
ScienceDaily (2011-06-28) -- In the constant battle to lose inches or at least stay the same, we reach for the diet soda. Two studies suggest this might be self-defeating behavior. ... > read full article
It is no surprise to me that the weight loss benefits of diet soda are being challenged by a new study.
This exact issue came up during a Psychology lecture in University back in 1997. The professor explained that the body could be confused when drinking diet sodas. Basically, the body expects a certain amount of calories from a sweetened drink, and when it fails to register the calories, it signals the brain to eat more to compensate for the loss.
This explanation stayed with me, and when I put myself on a sugar reduced diet, I made a concerted effort to move from regular soda to water and not to artificially sweetened drinks. In two months, I had loss 15 pounds, all of it from the replacement of soda and juice with water.
In a perfect world everyone would drink water, but some people can’t get over water’s blandness. Not a hard thing to accept when you consider the amount of effort that has been put into artificially flavouring or sweetening our drinks.
This is a lesson for people to remain diligent and not to take corporate or societal claims at face value. Do your own research and judge from the specific results you have from eating, drinking or using specific products.
The following linked article goes into more detail about the effect of artificial sweeteners on the brain.
Wednesday, June 22, 2011 at 10:55PM My family has fallen into a dietary rut. We try our best to cook nutritious meals at home; but lately we are eating more and more processed meals and ordering fast food. We buy vegetables and fruits, but much of the time they go to waste. It is a cycle I have experienced before and promised myself to avoid.
I was overweight in my 20′s, I ate too much sugar, not enough vegetables, no whole grains and everything I ingested was processed. I did not want to pass on these lifestyle traits to my son.
With this in mind, my family is trying to institute some lifestyle changes to promote healthier eating.
1. Create a fixed food budget, and keep it on the low side.
Pay extra for quality ingredients and avoid the cheaper processed meals.
High budget shopping usually ends up with large amounts of groceries that are unhealthy and never get used. Pre-cooked foods and processed meals are convenient, unhealthy, and expensive.
