Showing posts with label food. Show all posts
Showing posts with label food. Show all posts
Brain Foods That Make You Super Smart
Saturday, November 8, 2008
Everything that you consume influences your brain's performance. When you consume food, it's broken down into energy that's circulated throughout the body, and the brain picks up a large portion of it. Despite just weighing only 2 percent of a human's body weight, the brain calls for about 20 percent of energy taken in to keep running.That energy arrives to the brain via blood vessel transport, which means that diets that are fine for the heart are also fine for the brain. A diet that keeps the heart pumping and the arteries clear, blended with exercise, will enable that vital life force to arrive at the brain. Keeping up a flow of nutrients to the brain will also avoid brain disorders such as depression and dementia. That means you can multitask when it come to mealtimes; diets low in cholesterin and high in fiber profit many parts of the body.
What kinds of brain foods are really a kick-starter for our smarts and improve our intelligence?
To operate at its very best, the brain calls for fat and sugar. That may sound surprising, given how often we're discouraged away from those two substances. However, the brain is the lone organ that draws nearly all its energy from glucose. It's also the body's second-highest bank of fat, after fatty tissue itself (such as the butt and the gut)
Your brain cells thirst for polyunsaturated fatty acids, which you may know by the names omega-6 and omega-3. We typically get enough omega-6 acids throughout the day thanks to their presence in soy and corn oils, but most people need to eat more omega-3 fatty acids.
In an Australian study, children who drank in a drink with omega-3 fatty acids received higher scores on tests of intelligence and retention compared to children who didn't have the drink; results were apparent after just six months.
Omega-3 fatty acids are found in some nuts, such as walnuts and hazelnuts, flaxseed, kiwi and most importantly, fish.
Your brain also demands glucose to function properly. The glucose supply should be regular, so that means no skipping meals. It also means you should avoid a cheesy source of glucose, like a candy bar. Candy will give you a quick high and a plumping low in terms of glucose levels, and if you've ever felt a sugar crash, you know what that can do to your body. To furnish a steady stream of glucose, you should look for food that slowly discharges carbohydrates into the bloodstream, which include most fruits and vegetables, milk and breads with lots of grains. Foods such as candy and white bread just give you the sugar surge.
Glucose is crucial for keeping the neurotransmitters in the brain at peak levels. Yogurt also aids the yield of neurotransmitters thanks to its amino acids. Choline, a nutrient found in eggs and soybeans, creates a neurotransmitter called acetylcholine; abnormally low levels of acetylcholine have been detected in people with Alzheimer's disease, so you know you want to keep yours up. Folic acid, necessary for brain function, can be found in spinach and orange juice. And don't be afraid of zesting it up a bit; curcumin, a spice used in curries, may be one cause why India has such a low incidence of Alzheimer's.
But don't go too crazy with all these brain foods. When you devour too many calories, you can undo the positive brain effects. In the process of changing glucose to energy, extra oxygen is produced as unstable molecules called free radicals. Free radicals in turn cause oxidative stress by destructing brain cells they come in contact with. Not only does this oxidative stress force the brain's synapses to work heavier, it's also a major factor in many diseases, which is why you so often hear about the gains of antioxidants.
Fruits and vegetables are full of the antioxidants that can combat those free radicals. Load up on a salad of spinach, broccoli, carrots and onions, and don't forget to throw some berries on top.
Keeping your brain campaigning smoothly by means of refueling it with the right brain food is just one step to increasing your intelligence, though. Eating the right brain food will clear the footpaths for knowledge to zoom around the brain, but you'll have to put it there. Click here to read more...
Posted byParvez Ahmed at 10:03 PM 5 comments
Roasted Pumpkin Seeds Recipes
Sunday, October 19, 2008
The things you would need for the roasted pumpkin seeds are:
• 1 1/2 cups raw whole pumpkin seeds
• 2 teaspoons butter, melted
• 1 pinch salt
Direction:
1. Preheat oven to 300 degrees F (150 degrees C).
2. Toss seeds in a bowl with the melted butter and salt. Spread the seeds in a single layer on a baking sheet and bake for about 45 minutes or until golden brown; stir occasionally.
Here is a roasted pumpkin seeds tip. When you carve your pumpkins scoop the seeds into a colander and the guts onto newspaper. Inevitably, some of the guts will be mixed in with the seeds but when you run water over them it's separated out easily. After you drain the rinsed seeds, pour them onto a large, dry cookie sheet and let them sit for 24 hours or so to dry out. Now you can pick out the remaining pieces of pumpkin stuff that didn't get pulled out earlier and they will roast better if they are not wet when they go in the oven. You can season them with garlic salt in place of regular salt but you can use whatever suits your taste.
Another roasted pumpkin seeds recipe:
1. Boil the seeds in salted water for 20 minutes (it really does clean the seeds well)
2. Then lay them out on a cookie sheet overnight to dry,
3. The next morning mix them with 1 tablespoon salt, 1 tablespoon melted butter and 1 tablespoon olive oil and
4. Spread the coated seeds on a cookie sheet and bake them for 30 minutes at 300 degrees. Click here to read more...
Posted byParvez Ahmed at 7:33 PM 0 comments
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
