Dr. Oz’s 100 Weight Loss Tips

1. Automate your eating by planning your meals ahead of time. That way you’re less likely to make an unhealthy last-minute food choice.
2. Oats are your friends! Eating a cup of oatmeal in the morning will prevent you from gorging in the afternoon.
3. Foods with healthy fats such as olives, salmon and walnuts help you feel satisfied.
4. Skipping meals can cause your body to go into a fat-storing starvation mode, making it harder to burn calories.
5. Got nuts with nuts. Eating a handful of nuts will help you stay full. Try soaking them in water for a different texture.
6. Use meditation to help you cope with chronic stress, which can lead you to crave feel-good carbs.
7. You may be used to fried foods but there are other, sometimes healthier, ways to cook including: roasting, steaming, poaching, baking, braising and broiling.
8. Do your grocery shopping with a list and a time limit; that way, you’re less likely to stray into the processed foods section.
9. Don’t confuse thirst with hunger. Drink a glass of water when you feel hungry to see if that’s what you’re really craving.
10. When out at a restaurant, ask the server to hold the bread, snack mix or chips and salsa that might come before the meal. If you’re hungry, you’ll be tempted.
11. Tired of eating your salad on a plate? Fill a whole wheat pita with salad and a splash of lemon for a twist.
12. You might do better to replace an occasional dinner with a nice roll in the hay. Healthy sex may help control the amount of food you eat and it’s great exercise.
13. Create emergency packs filled with healthy foods such as nuts, fruits or sliced vegetables to help you avoid unhealthy temptations.
14. Add red pepper flakes to your pantry. When eaten early in the day, red pepper lowers the amount of food you’ll eat later.
15. Odds are you’re eating too fast. Try holding a conversation while having a meal so you’re not gulping down more than you need to feel full.
16. Take a brisk walk before lunch or dinner. Not only will you get in some exercise, you’re less likely to choose something unhealthy after a little movement.
17. Looking for the benefits of salmon but you don’t feel comfortable cooking fish? Try canned salmon as a simple and affordable alternative.
18. Are your dishes too big? A healthy dinner should fit on a 9-inch plate. You may find that kid-sized plates are more appropriately sized to feed an adult!
19. Never eat any snack food out of the box, carton or bag it came in. You’re less likely to overeat if you separate snacks into appropriate fist-sized servings.
20. Boost your metabolism with some green tea or chili peppers.
21. Get your Zzzzzs. Sleep deprivation alters levels of hormones in the body that regulate hunger, causing an increase in appetite.
22. Muscle burns at least four times as many calories as fat does, so try twenty minutes of strength straining two to three times a week.
23. Decaf coffee is a great low-calorie fluid when you’re having cravings (and a great source of antioxidants).
24. Eating liquid-based foods such as natural smoothies and low-sodium soup can help you cut back on calories yet feel full.
25. A pedometer can help keep track of your steps. If you’re not getting 10,000 steps a day, you’re not moving enough.
26. Natural applesauce is an excellent dip for fruits such as bananas and melons.
27. Take every opportunity to move around, even in small ways. Studies show fidgety people tend to be skinnier.
28. Identify the emotional triggers that lead you to seek unhealthy comfort food. Picture your goal weight the next time a trigger strikes to help you resist temptation.
29. Use a vegetable bean dip such as hummus instead of ranch dressing or a fatty cream-based dip.
30. People who regularly weigh themselves and keep track of their progress in a journal are more likely to lose weight.
31. Use a dash of cinnamon to give fruits such as bananas and melons a richer dessert feel without the sugar.
32. Give your protein extra low-calorie flavor by adding a salsa or chutney instead of a gooey cream sauce.
33. Distracted dining will get you in trouble. Avoid eating in front of a television or in a movie theater, as you’re bound to consume more calories.
34. Pass on pop. You’ll be amazed by how much weight you drop by simply switching to water.
35. Beware of “fat-free” or “zero trans fats” foods as you could be trading fats for huge amounts of sugar or sodium.
36. Try drinking skim milk at breakfast instead of juice. Overweight people who drank skim milk for breakfast ate fewer calories
37. Sugarless chewing gum can suppress your appetite in a pinch.
38. Snack attack! Puree peaches, berries or pears for a sweet spread to go on pita chips.
39. If you’re having trouble getting started, make a small move such as starting an eating log or buying walking shoes. You’re three times more likely to follow through if you start with small gestures such as these.
40. Always have vegetables on hand. Saute a big bag of frozen mixed vegetables in olive oil and garlic. Add some red pepper or turmeric for additional flavor and separate into portion-sized containers for the fridge.
41. Edamame (soy beans) are a great low-cost snack. Look for them in the frozen foods section.
42. Soups can be both filling and comforting. Try making a garden or bean soup with low-salt broth and store in portion-sized cups for later.
43. Save time and money during the week by buying lean protein such as chicken breasts in bulk and cooking a week’s worth on Sunday night.
44. Save the kitchen and the dining room table for cooking and eating. Try not to use it as a place to do work or other activities, or you may be tempted to eat more.
45. If food was your only source of pleasure, make sure to reconnect with other things you enjoy — music, sports, volunteer work or movies, for example.
46. Try to have a little lean protein with each meal, as protein tends to be more satisfying than carbs or fats.
47. Think ahead to how you’ll eat and exercise on the weekends. It’s easy to get too relaxed on Saturdays and Sundays, but healthy living is a 7-day-a-week endeavor.
48. Dump the junk food. If you want to avoid temptation, make sure you clean out the fridge and the pantry
49. When you eat calorie-friendly fruits and vegetables that are in season, they tend to taste better and you’re more likely to enjoy them.
50. People who eat breakfast have a better shot at losing and maintaining weight loss.
51. Replace your scale with a tape measure. Aim for 32 1/2 inches or less for women and 35 inches or less for men.
52. Make sure you check food labels and avoid anything with more than 4 grams of sugar, especially high-fructose corn syrup, per serving.
53. Eat a fiber-filled apple before a meal to help you feel full faster.
54. Opt for peanut butter or almond butter spreads instead of cream cheese or butter.
55. Remember these five essential smoothie ingredients: frozen berries, a banana, skim milk, a teaspoon of honey and a teaspoon of psyllium seed husks.
56. Researchers found that dieters who ate eggs in the morning were less hungry than those who ate carb-heavy meals.
57. The omega-3 fatty acids in salmon may dial up your body’s ability to burn fat, especially if you add some exercise.
58. A Mediterranean diet not only comes with heart benefits, studies show it leads to more weight loss than low-fat diets.
59. Replace your regular pasta noodles with whole wheat pasta for a more filling meal.
60. When eating out, ask your server to point out the healthiest options on the menu.
61. You don’t have to make a three-digit number your weight loss goal. Aim for a certain dress size or waist measurement.
62. Go lean with bean protein. Beans are an affordable and healthy alternative to meats and are wonderfully filling.
63. Energize plain-tasting proteins such as eggs or chicken with metabolism-boosting chili pepper sauce.
64. Try a plain Greek yogurt with frozen berries for a pre-workout boost.
65. Turn dinner into a healthy lunch the next day by wrapping your lean leftovers in a whole wheat wrap. Add a little Dijon mustard or curry powder for added flavor.
66. Eat a rainbow of colors. Have at least one brightly colored fruit or vegetable in each meal, and, if appropriate, eat the skins — that’s where you’ll find a powerhouse of antioxidants.
67. Make an office snack box of your own so you’re not tempted by your colleague’s candy bowl. Fill it with small individually packaged portions of soy chips, almonds and dried fruit.
68. For a thicker, creamier texture, choose low-fat, unsweetened Greek yogurt. Loaded with protein, calcium and natural probiotics, it makes for a tasty snack any time.
69. If you’re ‘cooking’ food in the microwave, chances are you’re eating unhealthy packaged foods. If you must microwave, consider soy chicken patties, veggie burgers or steamer vegetables and brown rice.
70. Make your wardrobe match your goals. As you lose weight donate the clothes that no longer fit you as an incentive to stay on track.
71. Pick up a 5- or 10-pound weight at the gym and visualize that weight coming off. Holding the weight in your hands helps bring home just how heavy even 5 pounds of extra fat can be.
72. If you find yourself at a weight loss plateau, up the duration of your exercise routine by five minutes.
73. Pounding out your meat will help healthier portions go a longer way visually, and it’s good stress relief.
74. Silken tofu makes a wonderful replacement for cream in some recipes.
75. Save 85 calories just by swapping mustard for mayonnaise in a sandwich.
76. Do your best to ensure you’re not eating after 7 o’clock at night. You’re more likely to make unhealthy choices and less likely to sleep as well after a late meal.
77. Try a pasta-less spaghetti by mixing shredded zucchini, veggie meatballs and raw tomato sauce seasoned with a dash of zesty oregano.
78. Fresh herbs can really zing up a healthy meal. Try growing some in the kitchen using a strawberry pot. Preserve the flavor by adding fresh herbs at the end of the cooking process
79. Fast food is salty food. If you cut back on the salt, in a few weeks you’ll be able to better taste the natural salts in food and may not crave the junk as much as you used to.
80. The rub on ground turkey is that it’s dry. Add some olive oil and finely blended onions to a turkey burger or turkey meatball to enhance its juiciness.
81. If you’re trying to lose weight with your significant other, pack each other’s lunches. The lunchbox surprises will keep the both of you motivated.
82. If you’re eating out, make salad the appetizer. Most starters are fried and come with unhealthy dips or sauces.
83. Savory ‘umami’ ingredients such as mushrooms, low-sodium soy, asparagus and olives can help you feel full and add an earthy, home-y quality to your healthy-dishes.
84. Make it a point to use the steps whenever possible. Use the bathroom on a different floor at work, take the stairs at the bus station, the airport or the mall.
85. Try baking apple slices as a healthy alternative to potato chips.
86. Eating water-rich foods such as melons, tomatoes and celery can help fill you up without adding too many calories to your day.
87. Avocados can be your secret weight loss partners. They’re high in fiber and healthy fats, giving you a meaty-tasting meat alternative.
88. A handful of unsalted pumpkin seeds make for a healthy mid-day snack. They’re rich in magnesium, which helps lower blood pressure.
89. Keeping good posture will not only strengthen your core, but will also add a small extra-calorie burn, because you’re working slightly harder to maintain the position.
90. Cravings can sneak up on you when you’re tired. Try taking a nap if you feel yourself wanting some junk food.
91. Share your weight loss goals with your friends and family. Make it a positive life change and ask for their encouragement.
92. Take a photo of yourself each week so you can see your physical transformation.
93. Store-bought salad dressings can be packed with calories. Make your own vinaigrette and store it in a small spray bottle to coat your greens without over-dressing them.
94. Yoga may be relaxing but you can also get a good workout. An hour of yoga can burn up to 350 calories.
95. Get familiar with quinoa — a wonderful grain that’s easy to cook and goes great with sautéed vegetables or mushrooms.
96. Ditch the mayo, cheese and top bun if you want to scrape off 250 calories from a restaurant sandwich.
97. Resistance bands are a comfortable and affordable at-home exercise option for strength straining.
98. Use the freezer to add some extra oomph to summer foods. Freeze grapes for some bite-sized delights. Or get a popsicle mold and freeze some Greek yogurt with berries.
99. Wrap up any extra food you’ve cooked before you sit down to a meal so you’re not tempted to get seconds.
100. Take a 30-second break in the middle of your meal. Evaluate just how hungry you still are before getting back to your food.

Source : http://www.doctoroz.com/videos/dr-ozs-100-weight-loss-tips

Healthy Dinners and Weight loss

For most people, dinner is the meal in which they consume the most calories or kilojoules each day. This being the case, dinner is a logical place to start making changes if your goal is to lose weight.

In this article, we provide some tips to help you make these changes, including how to incorporate more healthy dinner recipes into your diet.

The Basics

Let’s start with the basics.

Whether you lose weight or put on weight depends upon how much energy you consume versus how many calories your body burns each day.

According to many health authorities around the world, including America and Australia, the average person should consume around 8700kJ (2,081 calories) per day in order to maintain a healthy weight.

Of course, we’re not all average, so if you want to know how many kilojoules or calories you need to consume to maintain your current weight, visit our free Energy Needs Calculator and plug in your details.

If your goal is to lose weight, simply work out what your body needs to maintain your current weight and reduce the kilojoules or calorie amount by 10%. As you lose weight, you’ll need to revisit the Energy Needs Calculator and plug in your new information to recalculate your energy needs.

How you split your energy consumption up between breakfast, lunch, dinner and snacks is a personal thing, but to maintain a constant energy levels throughout the day, it make sense to ensure that there isn’t too much difference between the main three meals of the day.

For example, it’s better if breakfast, lunch and dinner each represent around 30% of your daily energy consumption with 10% for snacks than say, 10% of your energy consumed at breakfast, 10% at lunch and 80% at dinner.

Healthy Dinner Tips

Here are ten proven tips to help you include more healthy dinners in your diet:

1. Find healthy dinner recipes the whole family will enjoy.
2. Cut your normal dinner portions in half and put the other half in the fridge – if you’re still hungry after dinner, you can always go back for more, but will be less likely to.
3. Find healthy dinner recipes that incorporate healthier ingredients, like fruit and vegetables, low fat sources of protein, etc.
4. Share healthy dinner recipes with friends, and encourage them to do the same.
5. Try at least one new healthy dinner recipe per week, and don’t afraid to be more adventurous, you never know what you might find.
6. Incorporate as many fresh ingredients as you can in your healthy dinners.
7. Look for healthy dinner recipes that help you to get as many different ingredients into your diet as possible (it is suggested that we should eat between 30 – 50 different foods/ingredients per day).
8. Use a food diary to track your daily energy consumption. There’s a free food diary download on this website.
9. Plan your meals. Most of us are time poor, so the key to eating healthier dinners is in the planning.
10. Try using some of the free Diet Plans / Healthy Eating Plans we’ve created for you and publish on this website.

Conclusion

For most people, dinner is the meal in which they consume the most calories or kilojoules each day. This being the case, dinner is a logical place to start making changes if your goal is to lose weight.

In this article, we provided you with ten proven weight loss tips to help you make these changes, including how to incorporate more healthy dinner recipes into your diet.

Good luck with your weight loss and thanks for visiting weightloss.com.au.
© Copyright Ultimate Weightloss.

 

This article is monitored by Copyscape© – any unauthorised copy of this material will be detected.

 

Reproduction of this article is permitted free of charge provided that it is reproduced unchanged and in its entirety, it is accompanied by a website link back to http://www.weightloss.com.au and is properly credited to Weightloss.com.au.

 

Source : http://weightloss.com.au/diet/diet-articles/healthy-dinners-and-weight-loss.html

Related articles

• Diet Doc Hormone Diets & Weight Loss Plans Reveal New Weight Loss… (prweb.com)
• The Pillars to Healthy Weight Loss (healthy-weight-loss-made-easy.com)
• Effective Weight Loss Advice That Works (aerobicssteps.net)

Pork Roasted with Apples, Pears and Parsnips

Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow… Our December Issue Is Almost Here!

Arizona Highways

View original post

How To Pacify Your Man: New York Strip Steak!

Patrons of the Pit

Nothing is quite so fine on a brisk Autumn’s eve, than the primal sizzle of two, portly New York Strip steaks over a beautiful bed of coals.  By golly it sets a man straight it does, this the protein-rich pacifier that is called steak. We love it. In point of fact, if you ever want to shut a man up, slap a steak in front of him, and watch how he instantly transforms, suckling up to the beast in kind affection, whilst the rest of his worldly cares are at once erased. Oh it’s true. Reminiscent of those Hollywood scenarios, where felons or good guys alike are on the run, chased by ravaging canines, darting through city streets and over back yard fences. Then they stop, hark, they have a raw steak in their knapsack don’t you know, of which they promptly toss in the path of their fanged…

View original post 592 more words

Interview with Alan Friedman from Good Cause Wellness about Antioxidants, Agave Nectar and Chia Seeds

This is an exclusive interview with Good Cause Wellness founder Alan Friedman, who talks about antioxidants, superfood powders, agave nectar, chia seeds and his personal passion for health. Following the interview, I negotiated a discount for NaturalNews readers on one of Friedman’s top-selling products. See the bottom of this article for details on that exclusive coupon code. Note: As always, I earn nothing from this promotion, and I have absolutely no financial arrangements with Good Cause Wellness or any nutritional product company. Enjoy the interview!

Mike: This is Mike Adams here joined by Alan Friedman today. He is the founder of Good Cause Wellness (www.GoodCauseWellness.com), a unique nutritional supplements company that has some exciting products and an exciting philosophy that Alan will share with all of you. Thanks for joining me today Alan.

Alan: Thank you Mike.

Mike: Now Good Cause Wellness, this is a brand new company, correct?

Alan: Yes, we are just starting up. We saw an opportunity to supply some high quality nutrients and we are going to be donating 10% of all sales, not of profits but of the sales, top line sales to Good Cause organizations. Those are organizations that we have identified as doing good things to promote healthy lifestyles and consumerism. They assist to make consumers more intelligent about their choices not only for supplements but also for the whole food supply.

Mike: Many supplement companies do donate some percentage to good causes but usually it is maybe 1% of sales or 5% of profits for example. You are saying 10% of net sales.

Alan: There is a big difference too.

Mike: That seems like a big number. How are you going to demonstrate that? Are you going to post this and make it public? What is the plan?

Alan: absolutely, we will link from our site to these sites. We will post the monies donated on a quarterly basis to these organizations and we will be having certificates from these organizations that will proclaim that we have made these donations. Therefore, everything that we do will be certainly very public.

Not so much to publicize or to promote ourselves but public to let people know that these organizations are being supported. We hope that not only will people buy products from us to support these organizations but by gaining education about these good causes, they will also make separate donations beyond what is donated through the product purchase.

Superfood powders: Antioxidant Defense System

Mike: Okay, we will talk about some of these organizations perhaps a little bit later but I would like to get to the bigger question that people have, which is the products that you have available. No matter how high your donation pledge it does not really matter if your products are not high quality and the cutting edge in delivering what you promise to deliver. What is your product philosophy and can you give us maybe two or three of your key products that you are launching?

Alan: The philosophy sounds almost silly in that we wanted to select products that we ourselves like. It is what we were looking for in the marketplace. It was not available to a great extent and products that offer consumers many benefits in a simple way so that they are not taking 50 or 60 different pills each morning. A good example of that are the two products that we have in a line called the “Antioxidant Defense System.”

We have a product that is a red product and a purple product. The way to think about them is that red fruits and vegetables go into the red product and a lot of the purple are darker colored fruits and vegetables go into the purple product. I have tried a lot of nutritional supplements and mixes like this that are out there and this is by far the best tasting product that I have sampled.

It is good enough that you can just mix it with water, it tastes good, which is unusual and then throw it into a smoothie as I had this morning, and it is wonderful. It gives you a tremendous amount of the antioxidant nutrients in a wonderful range of solid ingredients that you would like to have every day in your diet but it is a lot of work to eat that level of fruits and vegetables to have them fresh and available to you. This is just a simple way of doing it.

Mike: Well you were kind of enough to give me an early sample of the purple… the Antioxidant Defense System purple product. I agree with you. It tastes very genuine and pleasant. It does not have the greens in it like a lot of… barley grass powders that are a little difficult to stomach at first.

Alan: Sure, yes.

Mike: This is a delightful taste right from the beginning but even more importantly when you look at what is in it, I see for example Goji berry powder. I see a pomegranate extract and we have all heard the extraordinary good news about pomegranate seeds and their impact on prostate health. I see purple carrots, eggplant, purple cabbage. This is a source of anthocyanadins, which are known to have anti-cancer effects right there. In addition, there is Camu Camu powder, Acai fruit powder.

Alan: That is all great stuff.

Maintaining nutritional density

Mike: There are many impressive ingredients in here like elderberries and blueberry. Black cherries wow. Here is a question. What is the density of these powders? I mean there are other ingredients like strawberry and raspberry. How is this formulated to balance potency with taste?

Alan: Well, one way to look at it is what is not in there. Many competing products have many types of filler in them — many inert ingredients that are designed to either bulk up the volume or mask the taste. Sugar is a very common one so it is important to note that there is no sugar in here. There is a small amount of Stevia, only 35 milligrams in that.

Some of the sweetness comes from there but otherwise the largest single ingredient is a fruit powder blend, which includes a lot of the fruits that you mentioned, blueberries, blackberries, black cherries, raspberries and there is also a vegetable blend too that has the eggplant.

Again, these are purple colored fruits and vegetables like purple carrots, purple cabbage, and beets. They are wonderful things to eat but again very tough to get into your diet on a regular basis. It is a wonderful way to get these nutrients, these antioxidants, and many of these valuable ingredients into your daily diet supplements. The reaction I have gotten from people who have tried supplements before. I said there is no sugar in here because they just assume that something that tastes this good would be filled with a lot of sugar or other corn syrup or fructose or similar things.

Mike: When you say sugar of course, you mean refined sugar. There are, of course, natural fruit sugars.

Alan: Right.

Mike: Even that is relatively low. I see in one scoop, which is about 11 grams there is essentially zero grams of sugar. It is probably something less than .5 then.

Alan: Exactly, yes and the calories are also very low as well. You are getting all these nutrients with only 34 calories per serving, which is quite impressive.

Mike: That is an excellent point Alan because our nutritional requirements are so high today. Due to our high stress environment, nutritional depletion of the soils, and the depletion of the food supply, you would have to eat your way through about 10,000 calories of grocery food just to meet basic nutritional requirements.

Alan: Yes and good luck finding purple cabbage at your local store too.

Boosting intake of fruits and vegetables in sixty seconds

Mike: Exactly, so to have all this in one place is outstanding. It is high-density nutrition. Who do you think… there are many foods in here that have specific benefits for men but they also have similar benefits for women. Is there any particular group to which this is targeted?

Alan: Mike I have to go back to what I said at the beginning, we are looking for products that we like first and foremost that are products we would like to have in our lifestyle that we are missing. I think the perfect consumer or ideal consumer for this is someone who is aware of the needs to get these types of nutrients and antioxidants into their diets. They do a good job with the fruits and vegetables they eat but are looking for something above that or in addition to that.

Someone with an active lifestyle and to get all that and not to throw in a bunch of calories is great and to make it easy to consume too. As I said, you can throw this into a glass of water. It tastes great. You can also throw it into juice. It is even better. Blend it into a smoothie and you will not even know it is there.

Mike: I have been blending it in the mornings with cucumber, celery, just water, and this. That is it.

Alan: That is a great drink. Yes, I will have to try that tomorrow.

Mike: Yes, it tastes like watermelon drink.

Alan: Yes, it has a good… even though there are vegetables in there it has a good fruit taste to it and add that to any kind of fresh juice… or like I had this morning with some yogurt and some frozen fruit into a smoothie. You will not know it is there, which is probably the greatest benefit that you can get all these great nutrients and not any funky taste. It is a good deal.

Why selling direct provides more value for consumers

Mike: Now I would like to talk about your sales and distribution model because many consumers are very interested in this. They want to know how it works behind the scenes. In the marketplace, there are a few different types of distribution models. The most common is where a nutritional supplement company sells into the retail channel and then consumers can buy the products at retail.

The drawback to that is that the products have to be marked up considerably. The retail price is then inflated simply because of all the costs of inventory and transportation to local health food stores. Then there is also the multi-level marketing model that some companies use, which has its own advantages and drawbacks as well. What model have you chosen to go with?

Alan: Well you know all those are tempting but to deliver the highest quality product at the best price we are going to direct consumers so they are ordering this off our website. We do not go through intermediaries or through distributors so we are able to satisfy two things, to offer high quality products. Again, products that we like that we feel good about that you already had a chance to sample and know the quality but not to make them exorbitantly priced.

Mike: For example, this product it is 328 grams. That’s 30 services. What’s the price for that?

Alan: It is $35.49 for that.

Mike: Okay so that is a great price compared to the ounce per ounce price of some of the other similar competing products that I have seen out there.

Alan: Yes, it is about $1 a serving so you think about adding something that is incredibly healthy and give you just about every antioxidant nutrient that you need for $1 a day and make it easy to do. You can incorporate it into a number of different drinks that you are already having each morning or each afternoon. That is affordable health.

Mike: Absolutely, absolutely. In addition to this product, can you give us a brief description of some of the other products that you have for sale?

Alan: There is a complementary product to that. The Antioxidant Defense System Red, which has many of the similar features. Again, it is a powdered mix. It includes a lot of important fruits and vegetables you may be consuming but find it hard to get on a regular basis into your diet. That product has a lot of the red fruits and vegetables like strawberries, cherries, raspberries, pomegranates. These are all great for your health.

It includes even some that are not red such as blackberries and blueberries, which no one really can get enough of, and also plums and peaches, pears and mangos and all kinds of good stuff. The red product is designed to strengthen the immune system, keep your liver healthy, which is important. It is also great fuel for the brain.

I have been having a glass of that in the afternoon around the 2:00 point where things start to lag a little bit in mental and physical activity. It is a nice drink to have. You can throw it in the water just like the other products. There are many good ingredients in this. In addition, it is very low in calories. It contains only 36 calories per serving. It is very low in sugar. There is virtually no natural sugar in the product at all, and no refined sugars whatsoever. Again, it is a great product and designed for people who want to get all these good elements into their diet but find it hard to grab the recommended servings of fruit and vegetables they need to get every day.

Mike: Yes, you would have to go to the grocery store and buy about 40 different pieces of produce and blend them altogether.

Alan: That is right. It is a wonderful product and again easy way to get it into your system, into your daily routine and an affordable way to do that as well. Again, for all these products we donate 10% off the top. Ten percent of sales for all these products will be donated to these good cause organizations.

Chia seeds are rich in omega-3 oils

Mike: Now I also saw that you are going to be offering Chia seeds, correct.

Alan: Yes, that is a wonderful product. The Chia seeds… if you talk about your bang for the buck for nutrition, chia seeds are just an incredible product that I think are just starting to get into ingredients and other food products, which is good. It is far from mainstream, but when you read about the nutritional profile of Chia seeds, I can see why some consider it one of the most nutrient dense whole foods that are available. A great product and you would not think of a seed being high in omega-3 fatty acids but it is one of the best sources for omega-3s of any food out there.

Mike: I am certainly a long time fan of Chia seeds. So many people out there are eating flax seeds to get those omega 3’s but I think Chia is far superior to flax personally for a couple of reasons. For one, it tastes better.

Alan: It does, yes.

Mike: Two, it does not go rancid.

Alan: That is a big drawback to flax seeds, no question yes. This has great shelf life.

Mike: Chia seeds also have an excellent nutritional profile with calcium and magnesium in addition to the Omega-3 oils. I do not know if this is on your website or not but Chia seeds are great for smoothies because they automatically function as a kind of thickener.

Alan: Right, right, they are very good for hydration because they retain moisture.

Mike: Oh yes that is a good point. I was just thinking of how they are mucilaginous when they get wet. They sort of gel up like a natural thickener. As a result they are also very good for diabetics because they slow the absorption of dietary sugars and they slow the conversion of sugars into blood sugar. For those you out there who are dealing with blood sugar sensitivity issues whether you are diabetic, pre-diabetic, or hypoglycemic, hyperinsulinemic, or syndrome X sufferers… we have a hundred different names for these diseases but if you take some Chia seeds before you eat carbohydrates you will slow the carbohydrate curve and you will find it much easier to manage your blood sugar. How do you offer the Chia seeds? Is it by the pound?

Alan: Well one of the advantages we have of being here in southern Arizona is that we are close to the source of the product availability where the product is grown. The supply is fresh. We packaged it in 1.5 lbs. and 3 lb. bags, which is a good supply of product. Again, I cannot say it is fresher than other Chia seeds out there but I know how fresh ours is because of the shortened transit time from where it is grown in Mexico and South America.

Mike: Is it organic or is it conventional Chia?

Alan: This is conventional Chia.

Mike: Is organic something that you are looking at down the road?

Alan: Absolutely, we had a hard time finding a supplier who could provide to us on a regular basis for the organic Chia but we will get there and ultimately it is our goal to have all of our products to be organic.

Mike: Outstanding. I think that is a very wise move. Consumers are increasingly concerned about finding organic foods and superfoods.

Alan: Absolutely. One of the good things too about Chia much like the mixes that I mentioned earlier is that this is another product that is fairly neutral in taste in the sense that you can blend it into what you are currently drinking or even into pancake mixes for example. It does not alter the taste at all and does wonderful things to increase the nutritional profile. Imagine eating pancakes and getting omega-3 fatty acids from eating pancakes!

Mike: Yes, that is amazing.

Alan: Yes, they can really make anything incredibly healthy.

Mike: They also offer an interesting texture to foods. For those who may not be familiar with Chia seeds they look a lot like poppy seeds. If you have ever eaten poppy seed muffins then you know what Chia seeds look like. They are slightly larger and a lot more nutritious I think.

Alan: Oh definitely.

Mike: You can use them in breads, in as you said breakfast mixes. I sprinkle them on cereal. You can sprinkle them on yogurt if you eat yogurt. I put them in smoothies quite frequently.

Alan: Again, it goes back to our philosophy of having products that are simple to incorporate into what you are already doing and offer a very strong nutritional profile. These products deliver important things that your body needs in a very easy way.

Mike: Well it also… it is worth mentioning the children’s health here too because parents are often struggling with how to get this nutritious food into the mouths of their children. Well, Chia seeds are something that you can sneak into recipes without causing a fuss.

Alan: Sure, exactly. As with the other products as well you can… products that have fairly neutral in taste can be blended in and what they do not know will not hurt them.

Agave nectar

Mike: Absolutely, are there any other products that you would like to cover briefly?

Alan: Well the other product that we offer is the organic Agave nectar. This is a wonderful product. I know that you have touted for a long time on your website. The benefits of this product are as simple as this. Use this and you use a lot less sugar… up to 75% less sugar when you are doing any baking or cooking. You will not notice the difference in the taste.

It is something that I have been using when baking for my children in the past couple of months and they have never said what is different about this recipe. The fact that it is organic is great. The glycemic value of this is so far below what white sugar is so it is a great product for adults but a really, really solid product if you are doing any kind of baking and serving to children.

Mike: Yes, I am a big fan of Agave nectar as well. There are not many recipes that I use it in because I tend to keep things not so much on the sweet side. I just tend to use the natural fruit sweetness like from your powders for example.

Alan: Right.

Mike: When I need sweetener it is always a combination of Stevia and Agave nectar.

Alan: Even in iced tea for example. If you are having a drink like that instead of adding a package of sweetener in there, this dissolves very easily into liquid so it can be used in drinks. It is especially good if you are, as I mentioned, if you are doing any kind of baking for children and you want to get some of that white sugar out of their diets.

Mike: Yes, and you need a lot less Agave nectar than typical syrups too because the sweetness is stronger.

Alan: That is exactly right.

Mike: I had a guest over at my house not too long ago who asked for some sugar.

Alan: They were at the wrong house.

Mike: Yes, good luck finding sugar around here but I was able to introduce them to Agave nectar. That is a nice tip for those who want to share the good news about healthy products is you can clean out your cupboards. You can get rid of all the harmful stuff and just replace it with this good stuff and you will not only be enhancing the health of yourself and your family but you will also be introducing others to these natural sources of nutrition that can benefit everyone’s health.

Alan: That is so right. As I mentioned it is very easy to use. It comes in either an eight-ounce squeeze bottle or a 32-ounce bottle depending on the level of how much you need. It pours very easily. It lasts a long time. It does not crystallize as honey does. It is a convenient way to get a lot of that sugar out of your diet.

Quality differences among Agave Nectar products

Mike: I want to mention too the brand that you are selling is really what I consider to be the highest quality brand in the marketplace and that is Sweet Cactus Farms Agave nectar. Now it is not the least expensive.

Alan: We could not find anyone better than that. That is the only product that we are selling that does not have our name on it, the Good Cause Wellness name because we felt that after sampling a number of products that they by far had the best one out there. For the price and for the quality it is an outstanding product.

Mike: I actually spoke with the Sweet Cactus Farms people at a trade show before. They use only 100% Blue Weber plants and one thing that many consumers may not know about Agave nectar is that some of the cheaper brands tend to source other Agave plants, not the Blue Weber variety.

Alan: That is right, yes.

Mike: As a result the glycemic index of those products can be higher. As I have mentioned before I have seen GI numbers on Agave nectar as high as like 30 but this one is significantly lower. You are sort of paying for improved taste, purity and lower on the glycemic index.

Alan: That is exactly right. One cannot assume that all Agave nectars are the same and the highest quality ones are the ones that use 100% Blue Weber Agave plants. This product is of the highest quality.

Mike: People who are not familiar with Agave nectar sometimes ask about the color. They wonder should they buy light or dark nectar. What is your take on that and do you offer both of those or just one?

Alan: We are offering the light right now. If the demand is there we will offer the dark as well. The light is just a little more versatile, a better entry-level product for consumers that are first trying Agave nectar. It is very neutral in taste. The dark is also a wonderful product. It has a little bit stronger taste. A little bit more similar to molasses so the light is a little more versatile. Certainly the dark is still a much better alternative than throwing cups of sugar into everything that you bake or eat.

Alan Friedman talks about his passion for personal health

Mike: Let me ask you a few questions about yourself because today’s savvy health consumer is not only interested in the ethics of the company and the quality and nutritional density of the products but they want to know the philosophy behind the founders of the company. Now I do not know that much about your personal history. I know you are into fitness and cycling but what is that drives you to… what do you find passion in doing this?

Alan: I think the passion comes from the fact that the awareness that I have; even though you can eat well and eliminate a lot of the items that you talk about eliminating from your diet there is still a lot more that you can do to improve your health. In researching these products, tasting these products and using them I realize that there is a wide range of important nutrients that even a very conscious and healthy consumer is not getting into their diet.

That was the basis for founding this company and for developing these products. Like many of the readers, I have a family. I have to have products that are also convenient and easy to use and do not require formulas and multiple products. It was designed for people like me that want to get these products into their regular routine and supplement the other things I do to try to take care of my health, which is exercising four or five times a week and enjoying the sunshine here in Tucson as well.

Mike: If I could go back to that, before you got into this concept, you probably thought you were pretty healthy.

Alan: Absolutely, yes.

Mike: Are you saying that now you realize that you were not getting everything that you needed?

Alan: Exactly, yes. I felt I was healthy because I exercised. I felt I was healthy because I avoided a lot of the known dangerous foods and dangerous ingredients but I really was not aware of all that I was missing, all the antioxidants that I was missing and the different minerals and acids that are essential to a healthy body. All these products supply in some ways those important things that are missing because it is not enough just to avoid hydrogenated foods or to avoid sodium nitrate.

That is to my view just the bare minimum what you have to do but there is a whole other level of supplementation. All these products then supply that in a very easy way. Then to do all that and to be able to give back 10% of our sales to great organizations is a great combination. We can get healthy people, get potent organizations out there educating more people and hopefully there is a good snowball effect to all that.

Mike: Your company is one that I would consider right now to be a grassroots type of health company. I mean you did not come to this from an education in nutrition or medicine. That is not your background rather you have this passion as a consumer and you wanted to make products that you could use and that you could share with your children for example.

Actually, we see that a lot now. For example a lot of the raw food bars, which I just did an article on, were founded on the same kind of philosophy. Someone was hiking a trail and said gee I wish I had real food I could eat on this trail and they went home and created a company.

Alan: Right, yes.

Mike: All you really need is passion.

Alan: It is as simple as identifying products that… something that you want that is not out there. Being a lifelong entrepreneur I have used that philosophy with other businesses that I have had. This is just another opportunity to not only supply quality products but also the belief that I have how important it is to give back to organizations and to educate more people… these are goals and passions that I know are very strong with you as well.

Meeting quality standards for nutritional supplements

Mike: Then one challenge as a small company is quality control and nutrient sourcing. What do you do to make sure that you are meeting quality standards? How do you manage that?

Alan: Well, we start with good quality reputable firms that manufacture the products and doing our research on that. Then secondarily the products are all tested, independently tested, and analyzed by independent labs to verify organic standards if there is an organic claim in the ingredient profile to verify all that.

That is certainly above and beyond what most other companies do but we want to have the assurance for ourselves and for our consumers that what they are paying for is what they get. We certainly recognize that taking supplements is something new to a lot of people. They get nervous if they see the fact that these have not been reviewed by the FDA, when they really should not be nervous in a lot of cases. We want to give them every assurance that these are quality products and that they deliver what we say they deliver.

Mike: Well I second that opinion and I think readers know that I do not cover companies that I do not believe to be doing good work, important work and adhering to quality standards. Yours certainly does but just the fact that you are doing the outside testing is comforting.

Alan: We will post those results on the website. They are not available yet but they will be available once we get the full battery of tests done and the certifications.

Mike: The website again is www.GoodCauseWellness.com

What is your turn around time on orders currently?

Alan: This is something else that we are going to do because it is how we like to be treated is to get product out. If an order comes in we will get it out if not the same day but the next day. We do not play games with shipping costs. Whatever it costs us to ship out the product is what the consumer will pay. We do not pad those costs. We will get out it quick. You will not pay a lot extra or any kind of huge mark-ups for shipping. We try to keep the products reasonably priced for being high quality products. Again, treat people as we like to be treated.

Mike: Exactly, it is nice to hear that.

Alan: Well that is what we do as well, yes.

Mike: You are a health consumer as well. You know how you would like to be treated by other companies.

Alan: I have to admit it is easy for someone to open up on the Internet a supplement store and you can buy products from a lot of different places and probably not be treated as well and have questions about the quality of the products and pay a lot for shipping and be delayed in shipping. Finding the good ones is challenging.

Honesty with ingredient labels

Mike: Along those lines I want to mention too that there are a lot of fruit-based powders out there now but many of them that I see are just loaded with filler. Lecithin is very common filler. I have seen some products contain 50% Lecithin, which is of course derived from soy.

Now there is nothing wrong with Lecithin. It does have acetylcholine, which is important for brain nutrition. You do not need half of your powder to be soy lecithin. That is in there just to take up space. The other thing that I have seen is… well actually there was another company’s product that I was considering reviewing that is based on red fruits and vegetables and I contacted them to find out the percentage of ingredients in their product.

They would not give me any details. They said it is just a proprietary list and it contains everything from Goji berries to strawberries but there was no indication at all of how much. Now I cannot recommend a product like that because consumers want to know that it is not 95% strawberry powder and 5% Goji and pomegranate. Your product tells us what is in it. There is a small section that is a blend but then we know how much of the other. We know how much Goji. We know how much pomegranate, Acai, Camu and so on. It is spelled out.

Alan: Exactly, yes.

Mike: That is the level of honesty that I like to see in these types of products.

Alan: That is something that is spelled out in the label and it is also… the identical information is available on the website at www.GoodCauseWellness.com. You can go onto the site for each one of these products and see a complete breakdown of the ingredients in the product. You can then get a good idea before you buy what you are getting and certainly with the understanding that you are not getting 50% of some ingredient that again you probably do not need that much in your regular diet. Since there is no filler in these products you are getting a lot more active ingredient.

How nutrients can prevent (and reverse!) degenerative disease

Mike: Absolutely, we are going to wrap this up but for all those reading I would like to include a couple of quick comments here that are my own opinion. If you read NaturalNews.com and you scan the headlines every day it seems there is another headline about some amazing healing power of a fruit or a vegetable that has just been discovered by science. Today it was mandarin oranges halting liver cancer. Last week it was pomegranates stopping prostate cancer and green tea stopping breast cancer. It seems like every day there is some other discovery.

Well if you imagine over the next five years there are going to be hundreds if not thousands more discoveries about the amazing healing power of fruits and vegetables but you do not have to wait five years to benefit from them. You can eat these products today and you can have all the benefits that scientists will not even discover until the future. They are in the food right now and they are in this product, the Antioxidant Defense System.

Even with what we know right now these fruits and vegetables have astounding healing capabilities but imagine how much more we are going to learn and how much better you are going to feel in five years knowing that you have been engaged in good nutrition for all that time. That makes a huge difference.

Alan: That is right and it is a level of nutrition that as hard as you may try may not be in your current diet so to get all those benefits and to make it easy as mixing this into your drink could not be simpler.

Mike: Oh, by the way, does this actually mix without a blender? Does it mix with a spoon?

Alan: Yes.

Mike: I have never tried that.

Alan: It mixes very easily with a spoon. That is another wonderful thing. It does not clump up or half of it does not sit in the bottom of glass like some other supplements or leave some kind of… it is just a wonderful product and solves so many of the problems that we saw in other products or other mixes like the bad taste, the aftertaste and the clumping.

Mike: This brings to mind another point. I am sorry to keep talking so much.

Alan: It is your website, it’s okay.

Defend your body against the ravages of unhealthful foods

Mike: I got to mention that for those of you who occasionally consume unhealthful foods maybe you are at a restaurant and you eat some fried foods or you are eating something with hydrogenated oils in it or you are eating more animal products than you know you should. This Antioxidant Defense System is an outstanding drink to take with that meal because it offers protective effects against the harmful ingredients found in processed foods, fried foods, foods cooked at high temperatures and so on.

Let me give you some clear examples on this. When you eat bacon you are eating sodium nitrite or nitrate. We know that it promotes cancer in a very aggressive way but in your product there is Camu Camu fruit, which is the highest natural source of vitamin C in the plant world. Well vitamin C blocks the formation of the cancer-causing nitrosamines that come from sodium nitrate. If you are eating these harmful additives you can help defend yourself to some extent by taking good nutrition products like this Antioxidant Defense System. It does not mean that it is an excuse to go out and stuff yourself with processed foods but it can help defend you against them.

There is another one. All cooked carbohydrates have (inaudible 0:43:31.7). French fries are the highest source of acrylamides, and these are cancer-causing chemicals that are formed during high heat cooking of carbohydrates.

Once again, these antioxidants from these fruits and vegetables help neutralize the acrylamides. A lot of people say well I cannot change everything I eat. I still need my French fries or even my pancakes and my bowl of cereal or whatever. Cereal has acrylamides too if it has been cooked. Like Cheerios for example are cooked. It is not raw oats. It is cooked oats.

There are acrylamides in Cheerios and all the other breakfast cereals. If you take a glass of this super food powder blended in water with breakfast then you can defend yourself against those harmful chemicals that are found in virtually everyone’s breakfast.

Alan: That is why we named the product “Defense System.” They provide healthy defense system to all the free radical elements that are out there. Just in your diet if you are not being as careful as you would like to be with what you eat it helps defend your body’s important functioning systems against some of those elements.

Mike: A lot of those elements we do not even yet know what they are. I mean acrylamides were really only brought to attention maybe a year ago in terms of the mass media. Imagine what other chemicals will be discovered in the processed foods that we do not yet know about.

Alan: It is bound to happen. It is bound to happen.

Mike: Yes, sure enough. Well sorry to take so much time here but I tend to get excited about these products and I want to share with people how to use them. Any last thoughts Alan that you would like to add?

Alan: No, I appreciate the fact that you can talk about the products that we are offering from your own personal experience in knowing that your belief in them does not come from anything more than trying and liking these products. We hope that everyone will have a chance to do is to try the products and to believe us when we say that we are offering high quality products.

Mike: Oh yes that is good to mention. I mention this when I remember to in other interviews. We have no financial compensation from you of any kind. I am not being paid to do this although I did get a sample of your product, which is normal. I accept one sample from any company that wants to let me try something. I am doing this because I believe in the product. I want to share the good news with people about your product line. I also want to share the good news about what your company is doing with the revenues.

Alan: Well thank you Mike and we hope that we will have a lot of the readers go to our website at www.GoodCauseWellness.com and try our products, and learn more about what our missions and passions are.

Mike: Okay, well that is the website again, www.GoodCauseWellness.com and Alan I hope you will post the donation amounts as soon as you can because I think that is an important credibility issue with readers. They want to know that you are keeping your promise on the donations. I know I will be looking for that to do an update on your company and hopefully a few months down the road we can see your progress and sort of see whom you have been able to make donations to at the same time that you are introducing these products to consumers.

Alan: Well thank you very much Mike, thank you.

Mike: Thank you.

Editor’s Note: After this interview was conducted, Good Cause Wellness also released a new product called Aloe Vera 100. It’s a super concentrated dried form of 100% aloe vera gel with absolutely no additional ingredients (no sweeteners, no fillers, no excipients, etc.) I’ve been using Aloe Vera 100 now as my primary source of aloe vera gel (except when I fillet live aloe vera plants myself, of course), and I strongly recommend it to readers. It’s the very best you’ll find in the industry, and I know because I’ve walked the trade shows for many years and have never found a better source of Aloe Vera gel. Read my full review of this product at http://www.naturalnews.com/022016.html

I spoke with Alan Friedman today and negotiated a fantastic discount on this Aloe Vera 100 product: 25% off for NaturalNews readers! Just use discount code AV25 and order Aloe Vera 100. The product seems expensive at first, but once you realize how much it expands and absorbs water when you mix it, you see that this is very competitive with liquid aloe vera products (yet without the sodium benzoate or other chemical preservatives!).

Discount code: AV25
25% off Aloe Vera 100
www.GoodCauseWellness.com
Exclusive discount for NaturalNews readers only!

I do not earn anything on the sales of this product, and I have not been paid to promote this company. I pay for Aloe Vera 100 from Good Cause Wellness just like everybody else. (I also love this product because it’s easy to carry when traveling, since it’s so light and compact. Just add water and you have high-quality aloe vera juice, made from the inner gel and NOT the skin sap which you don’t want.)

Here’s another article I wrote about aloe vera that’s worth reading: http://www.naturalnews.com/021858.html

I personally believe aloe vera is one of the top ten herbs of all time, right up there with garlic and ginger. It is outstanding for digestive health, blood health, the stomach and colon, and even athletic performance!

Source : http://www.naturalnews.com/022916_chia_seeds_Good_Cause_Wellness.html#ixzz2j6GbK9wk