The Food Remedy, Health benefits of Cucumber

Cucumber 

Cucumbers are one of the most cultivated vegetables in the world and known to be one of the best foods for your body's overall health.  They have many benefits from assisting you digestive system, to easing acid reflux and research also suggests that it may help prevent some types of cancers.

Digestive Health

Cucumber skins contain insoluble fiber, which helps add bulk to your stool and helps food to move through your digestive tract more quickly for healthy elimination.

Cancers 

Cucumber contain three lignans - lariciresinol, pinoresinol, and secoisolariciresinol. These three lignans have a strong history of research in connection with reduced risk of several cancer types, including breast cancer, ovarian cancer, uterine cancer and prostate cancer. They also contain phytonutrients called cucurbitacins, which research has found could possess anti-cancer properties

Diabetes

Cucumber juice contains a hormone which is needed by the cells of the pancreas for producing insulin which is believed to be beneficial to diabetic patients.

Heart health

Cucumber contain plant sterols which are well documented for there ability in helping reduce cholesterol levels. They also contain a lot of potassium, magnesium and fibre, that work together to help regulating blood pressure. This makes cucumbers good for treating both low blood pressure and high blood pressure.

Stress

Cucumbers contain multiple B vitamins, are known to help ease feelings of anxiety and helping ease some of the damaging effects of stress.

Cucumbers are great in salad, in stir fries or eaten with dips as a nutritious snack.

Hazels Raw Fudge

If you are looking for a delicious clean tasty desert, then Hazel aka The Food Medic has created this delicious clean treat for you! For more treats like these you can buy Hazels 'clean eats and protein treats'  here

http://thefoodmedic.co.uk/2014/05/22/the-food-medic-clean-eats-and-protein-treats/

Hazel’s Raw Fudge

Ingredients 

(Makes 20 pieces)

2/3 Cup of Nut butter

¼ cup of raw cacao powder

¼ cup of Lucy Bee’s coconut oil

1 tbsp of Organic Burst Maca

2 tsp of vanilla essence

1/3 cup of agave nectar/organic honey

Extras: raw cacao nibs, roasted hazelnuts and goji berries

Method

1. Bring a saucepan of shallow water to boil and then turn the heat down to simmering. Add the ingredients, apart from the ‘extras’, to a mixing bowl and place over the saucepan of hot water.
2. Stir constantly for approximately 1-2 minutes until the mixture is completely combined. Be careful not to overheat the mixture as this will disturb the texture of the fudge.
3. Line a baking tray (I used a bread tin!) with cling film and pour the mixture into the tray.
4.  4. Cover with cling film and pat down the mixture so the top layer is even.
5. Chill in the fridge for approximately 1hr, or until the mixture is solid, and remove from the cling film. Chop into bite sized pieces and store in a jar in the fridge.

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Vietnamese Noodle Style Chicken Noodle Soup

  Ingredients

4 Chicken breast

(preferably from organic free-range, chicken)

3 litres of chicken stock

1 tsp pink Himalayan sea salt.

6 tbsp of fish sauce

For the soup:

280g dry rice noodles (find these in Asian super markets many are gluten free)

280g of broccoli

Fresh coriander, roughly chopped

2 spring onions  thinly sliced

Pinch of freshly ground pepper

4 wedges of lemon

1 Fresh red chillie chopped (remove the seeds)

 method

In a large saucepan, poach the chicken breast in the stock, salt and fish sauce. Put the broccoli in a steamer over the saucepan for the last 6 minutes.

Whilst the chicken is poaching, Fill a chef’s glass bowl with boiling water and immerse the rice noodles in water. Cover the bowl and leave for a few minutes until the noodles are soft. Drain and rinse with warm water to get rid excess starch. Place the cooked rice noodles into soup bowls.

Remove the chicken from the stock after 10 minutes or until cooked through, make sure the juices run clear. Chop the chicken into bite size pieces. Place one breast per portion onto the noodles.

Divide the sliced spring onions and coriander between the four bowls

Share the stock between the four bowls and garnish with the chopped red chilli and ground black pepper.

Health Benefits

Great meal for those wanting to build muscle, lose weight or boost immunity.

Research has also found that a compound found in chicken soup – carnosine – could really helped the body’s immune system to fight the early stages of flu! 

Almond Pancakes with blueberries

Almond pancakes with blueberries

• 1 cup ground almonds (also called almond meal/almond flour)
• 2 eggs (organic and free range preferably)
• 1/4 cup water
• 2  Teaspoons of coconut butter we used Lucy bees (http://www.lucybee.co )
• 2 cups of blueberries (fresh or frozen will work)
• cinnamon
• vanilla essence

Mix almonds, eggs water and oil together  to make a batter

Grease a frying pan with coconut butter get the pan really hot, then turn the heat down to medium

 It should take a few minutes or so to cook; you can lift the edge with a palette knife to see if it's tinged gold as it should be. Flip the pancake over with a pan slice or palette knife - the other side will need a few seconds only - then simply slide it out of the pan onto a plate.

Put Blueberries into a saucepan with enough water to cover them, add cinnamon and vanilla essence and poach for about 5 minutes until most of the water has evaporated and the blueberries are soft.

layer pancake and blueberries and you could serve with Greek/live natural yogurt for added protein.Makes about Six mini pancakes and serves two

Is your new years resolution to lose weight? If so Read on!

It’s that time of year again, when we look back at the past year and re-evaluate our life - what we have done or not done, we resolve to make changes and set goals for the coming year. Today I’m going to be talking to those of you who have weight loss related goals. So many people start of the new year full of excitement and anticipation of how fast they can get rid of the unwanted weight they have been carrying or maybe have recently gained. January is the time when gym memberships go up, health DVD can seem to fly off shop shelves and new diets seem to pop out of everywhere. How many times have you heard people say “Have you tried this 9 day detox? Sugar detox? Meal replacements? No carbs? No fat”? And so on and on I’m sure that when people set their resolution to lose weight, its not really truly about weight, what they really want is to be happy in their body, to feel full of energy to be able to eat tasty food and not food that seem like it’s punishment. I’m here today to tell you that is entirely possible.

You don’t need to live on juices for a month or stop eating carbohydrates or even cut fat from your diet, what you need is healthy sustainable advice based on REAL FOOD!! Yes you can have a bacon sandwich in the morning and lose weight you can even have a slice of pizza and a chocolate now and again too, food is a pleasure and should be enjoyed. Healthy food that is nourishing for the body will get you to your goal and the most importantly help remain that faster than any ‘weight loss diet’ will, be it meal replacements, juicing, patches, pill, potions. I only wish I could teach you all just simply HOW to eat for good health and pleasure, as it seems we have all lost the knowledge. We need to stop dieting and learn how to eat to be healthy and very often the side effect of being healthy is a healthy weight. By this I mean if you are over weight you will naturally find that the excess pounds fall off and if you are under weight, when you adopt a nourishing healthy diet your body will steadily increase to a healthy level. Now please do not interpret what I am saying as all those over or under weight aren’t healthy that is not my opinion at all. All I am saying is health should be the focus of any change in diet not weight. I could go on about why we don’t need special detox diets. I think sometimes we get so caught up in what we weigh we forget that weight really isn’t the most important factor at all.

So if your new years resolution is to lose weight, why not rephrase it to gain health instead? Weight loss isn’t a true reflection of all that much to be honest, as you can weigh less from muscle wastage, dehydration, carb depletion and fasting/starving. If your goal is to lose unwanted body fat that weight shouldn’t be your focal point. So many clients I see come to me and fixated on weight when how you feel how you look and your health is the true indication of health. I have a client who lost two dress sizes before Christmas she was seeing me once a week and a personal trainer three times a week, after the second week I had to stop weighing her because she was becoming very disheartened. Her weight you see didn’t change in the whole six weeks I saw her, and had she been focusing only on her weight she may have become disheartened and stopped. Yet at the end of the six weeks she was a comfortable size 12 not an uncomfortable size 16 and her body fat was now a healthy level. Instead of focusing on weight we focused on cravings, energy levels, skin and mood. So if fat loss is you aim, don’t fall pray to the marketing gimmicks - the fast quick fix ‘diets’ that don’t put your health first. Focus on eating REAL FOOD!! DON’T GIVE UP FAT – just eat them from nutritious sources, and yes that even includes a little bit of butter! Don’t shun carbohydrates – just pick slow releasing natural unrefined sources such as:- oats, sweet potatoes, basmarti rice, vegetables in abundance and low glycemic load fruit. Eat adequate protein with every meal. Go organic if money allows and buy grass fed beef as opposed to grain fed. If you would like a months diet plan to get you of to a good start for 7 days only you can have a one to one consultation and a one months diet plan for the reduce price of £50. Normal price is £75 for a consultation and a one week plan! Call 07780007361 to book your appointment or email Kirsten@thefoodremedy.co.uk