Babies Know: A Little Dirt is Good For You

Yes, Mr Clean, it is a normal situation to share our bodies with 90 trillion microbes...maybe we don't always know what is good for us.

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Two Sides of the Detox Story

I'm kind of somewhere in the middle when it comes to the idea of detoxing and cleansing the body. I certainly have done my share of it but feel better now that I'm just eating good food and exercising on a regular basis (stuff I can manage in any given day). Anyhow, this article may provide some interesting insights into the pros and cons of helping our bodies get rid of toxins.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/22/fashion/22skin.html?pagewanted=all

Spaworld Grand Opening at the Station Mall

If you have some time on Saturday afternoon come check out a new wellness centre opening in the Station Mall. Here's part of the press release from Sootoday:

Guests are invited to join Spaworld to celebrate the opening of their first location at the Station Mall in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario.

Spaworld's grand opening event happens on Saturday, January 24 from noon to store closing!

Guests are welcome to enjoy a day of wellness and beauty with complimentary mini-services, hors d’oeuvres, entertainment, prizes and 10 percent off on all in-store products.

Spaworld is a combination retail store and day spa and aims to become the source of health and wellness lifestyle information, services and products.

read full article here

soonews story

Food Matters

My two favorite gurus when it comes to health and eating don't offer any detailed diet plans or detox magic, they point the finger at us as individuals to act responsibly by making simple choices to benefit our health and the environment.

Mark Bittman and Micheal Pollan are on the forefront of the movement to make sense of what and how we eat; that's why they can keep their messages so short; eat food, not too much, mostly plants.

The books they have written, including Mark Bittman's latest, Food Matters, elaborate on this theme. In case you are not to sure exactly what they mean by plants and what real food is. Here's Mark Bittman's interpretation:

"Eat less meat, and fewer animal products in general. Eat fewer refined carbohydrates, like white bread, cookies, white rice, and pretzels. Eat way less junk food: soda, chips, snack food, candy, and so on. And eat far more vegetables, legumes, fruits, and whole grains—as much as you can."

This is how he did it for himself; "At first, I simply eliminated as much junk food and overrefined carbs as I could, along with a sizable percentage of animal products. All this turned out to be easy enough, for a couple of reasons. One, when I did allow myself to eat meat, or dairy, eggs, sugar, or bread made from white flour (usually at dinner), I ate whatever I wanted, and as much of it as I wanted. And two, I started to lose weight, quite quickly—a big boost of positive reinforcement."

And the results of his experiment were that he lost weight and saw his cholesterol and blood sugar improve dramatically.

Now there is one catch, Mark Bittman is a world renowned chef and probably likes to cook.. a lot. But if you don't then you will be happy to know that these are the principles and philosophy that Personal Fit Meal Catering adheres to. Just including our meals into your work week and supplementing with your personal favorites (if any of its junk food, I guarantee you'll be eating less of it) whenever you see fit, will have an impact on your health and well-being. Plus it's easy; less grocery shopping, less cooking and more life.

Read more on Mark Bittman here

Seedy Saturday, 2009

Seedy Saturday
Sault College-Native Centre-G Wing
Saturday February 28, 2009 10:00-3:00

Co-hosted by Clean North, Sault College and Seeds of Diversity Canada. Come swap or purchase heritage, open-pollinated and/or unusual seeds from local gardeners. Visit local environmental, food security and gardening organizations and vendors. Speaker presentations run from 11 am to 2 pm. on a variety of topics such as seed saving, germinating seeds and guerrilla gardening. Don't miss Kate Green from USC's Seeds of Survival program who will be showing 'Hijacked Future' and speaking about food sovereignty and international seed saving efforts. Those participants wishing to participate in the swapping of seeds can register from 10 am to 12 noon for the exchange that will take place between 12:30 - 3 pm. Refreshments, children's activities and lots of handouts. Fully accessible site. Admission by donation. As an added bonus, Cinema Politica will be hosting the viewing of 'King Corn', a feature documentary about two friends, one acre of corn, and the subsidized crop that drives our fast-food nation at 7 pm in the Multimedia Centre located in the B Wing of Sault College. A panel discussion will follow.

Contact: Suzanne Hanna at (705) 759-2893 wildgardener@shaw.ca or Laura Wyper at (705) 253-1951 laurawyper@yahoo.ca

Tips on Winter Eating

The last thing I want to eat when it's -25 is a salad...especially not as a meal. Soups and stews with fresh baked bread are what keeps me going at this time of year. It is a challenge to balance diet and lifestyle after the holidays when the cravings kick in, not only for sugar and fat but also warmth and sunshine. There are ways to keep up your energy even if a stay in a warmer climate is not a possibility. In today's Globe, Leslie Beck has some good advice about keeping this winter a healthy and happy one.

read more here

File under interesting...

Some half a million people in the United States experience seasonal affective disorder (SAD), according to the American Academy of Family Physicians. Symptoms of the condition, also known as winter-onset depression, include anxiety, fatigue, and irritability, and the problems may keep coming back every winter.

The disorder is thought to be caused by the lack of sunlight that some people experience during the winter. It also may be an evolutionary remnant of hibernation according to columnist Carol Venolia in Utne Reader’s sister publication, Natural Home magazine. As recently as the early 20^th century, Venolia writes that peasants in both Russia and France would shut themselves in for the cold months, huddling around the stove and barely moving until the spring thaw.

Venolia advocates giving into our hibernation tendencies, at least a little bit. If we did, “We’d sleep more and demand less from ourselves. We’d be more inward and reflective.”

Bye Bye Banana

The modern banana, one of the world’s most popular and troubled fruits, may be on the brink of extinction. Though its shape is evocative of sex, the banana is “a sterile, seedless mutant—and therein lies a problem,” Fred Pearce writes for Conservation.

In the wild, bananas are basically inedible due to their hard seeds. Most bananas found in grocery stores are “mutant plants” and “sterile freaks,” Pearce writes. They're almost all of just one variety, the Cavendish, after its predecessor, the Gros Michel, was ravaged by disease. Today a new disease is stalking the Cavendish, and experts believe it could be just a matter of time before the modern banana goes virtually extinct.

While resistance could be bred in other types of fruits, Pearce reports that “Because all edible varieties of bananas are sterile, introducing new genetic traits to help cope with pests and diseases is nearly impossible.”

For the time being, the disease is kept at bay by massive chemical sprays. “Forty sprayings of fungicide a year is typical,” Pearce writes, “making the Cavendish the most heavily sprayed food crop in the world.” This has led to a variety of health problems in banana workers, including sterility and alarmingly high rates of leukemia and birth defects.

Some are looking to genetic modifications as a last effort to save the troubled banana, but that raises a host of other ethical and environmental problems. And whether or not the general public would eat a genetically modified banana remains to be seen.

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The Eat Healthy Rebate

Some forward-thinking Wisconsin HMOs (health maintenance organizations) are encouraging their members to eat healthy with financial incentives. Four Madison-based HMOs have teamed up with the Madison Area Community Supported Agriculture Coalition to offer rebates to insurance policy holders who purchase shares in CSA farms,which supply members with fresh produce all summer long.

Like HMO-sponsored discounts on gym memberships, the Eat Healthy Rebate recognizes that it costs insurance companies less money when policy holders make healthful lifestyle choices. (The rebate applies only to produce shares, not meat or dairy). In the programs first year, more than 970 people applied for the rebate, and nearly half of them had never joined a CSA farm before.

1. Start with exercise. A healthy diet is built on a base of regular exercise, which keeps calories in balance and weight in check.

2. Focus on food, not grams. The Healthy Eating Pyramid doesn’t worry about specific servings or grams of food, so neither should you. It’s a simple, general guide to how you should eat when you eat.

3. Go with plants. Eating a plant-based diet is healthiest. Choose plenty of vegetables, fruits, whole grains and healthy fats like olive and canola oil.

4. Cut way back on American staples. Red meat, refined grains, potatoes, sugary drinks, and salty snacks are part of American culture, but they’re also really unhealthy. Go for a plant-based diet rich in non-starchy vegetables, fruits, and whole grains. And if you eat meat, fish and poultry are the best choices.

5. Take a multivitamin, and maybe have a drink. Taking a multivitamin can be a good nutrition insurance policy. Moderate drinking for many people can have real health benefits, but it's not for everyone. Those who don’t drink shouldn’t feel that they need to start.

source: read more here