Archives for January 2019

January 22, 2019 By Trupti Hingad 3 Comments

RIGHT WAY TO DRINK WATER

a gallon of water a day

Hydrate! Hydrate! Hydrate should be the slogan. The India Fit Report 2019 study indicates that overall the average water consumption has increased since 2017 from 1.5 lit to 2.17 lit in 2018.

But, the question often asked is are you drinking 8-10 glasses of water per day? Not having sufficient water has many side effects but, it is also important to be mindful of the way and “how” we drink water.

Water is chemical energy which means it is a universal solvent. Water exists in the body as plasma, cytoplasm, serum, saliva, nasal secretion, cerebrospinal fluid, urine and sweat.

Considering how essential water is to human life, here are some handy yet important tips to drink water.

It is always better to sit down and drink water rather than standing: When you stand and drink water you upset the balance of fluids in the body and this may lead to more accumulation of fluids in the joints. When you sit and drink your muscles and nervous system is much relaxed and thus you absorb it nicely. Also, kidney pace of filtration is good when you sit and drink

Avoid consuming a large volume of water at once: When you gulp too much amount of water at one go. Air is blocked from going into our lungs which can lead to heart and lung issues.

Avoid ice chilled water; drink room temperature or warm water: Ice chilled water disturbs the ongoing process of digestion and puts off the fire. Cold water decreases the blood supply to various organs of the body further leading to constipation. Drinking tepid water can help in proper digestion and metabolism that promotes weight loss, relieves bloating and pain. Whereas warm water helps to keeps fire in the stomach on leading to good digestion and also control cholesterol levels keeping arteries clean.

Keep a tab on indicators your body gives when you are thirsty: When you are dehydrated, the colour of urine changes to dark yellow, whereas clear urine is a sign of a hydrated body. Dry lips and tongue are indicators of dehydrated body

Start your day with a glass of water: Drinking water in the morning helps in flushing all the toxins in the body and cleanses your intestines. It helps to ward off many diseases.

It is good to use water stored in silver or copper vessels: As water stored in these vessels has the ability to balance all three doshas in the body and it does by positively charging the water. Copper has numerous antioxidants and anti-bacterial properties that help boost the immune system of the body. It also has anti-cancer properties. Water in the silver vessel has the power to remove free radicals from the body and gives a cooling effect in the intestines and smoothens the process of digestion.

Drinking water is not just to quench thirst. We have to remind ourselves that drinking water is a habit of replenishing and recovery process. It helps to replenish the essential salts and minerals lost when we sweat. It hydrates our muscles and tissues for proper usage. It maintains the fluid balance of our body that controls acidity levels.

So Drink slowly and drink enough!

January 21, 2019 By Anusha Subramanian 3 Comments

Why is it difficult to make a lifestyle change? – 6 tips to follow

In a user story I recently wrote, the player said, “Making a lifestyle change is easy what is difficult is the commitment to follow through with determination”.

Rightly so, it’s indeed considered a tall order and hence many give it up mid-way. Most consider it forced, rather than a positive change to bring about within themselves.

This very attitude and constant cribbing of people around me prompted me to write this piece on why is it so difficult to make a lifestyle change?

Many of us have tried it sometime or the other in our life. Some of us have succeeded while many have found it extremely taxing. Making a lifestyle change is challenging, especially when you want to transform many things at once. Lifestyle changes are a process that take time and require support and lots of patience.

Here are a few tips that you could follow from my personal experience

** Start small. After you’ve identified a realistic short-term and long-term goals, break them down further into small steps that are well defined and can be managed and measured. If your long term goal (6-8 months) is to lose 20 kilos then a good monthly goal would be to reduce about 2 kilos a month in a healthy way. Physiologically too smaller goals gives you sense that it’s achievable and keep you motivated for the long term goal. Look at healthy eating options, eat smaller meals at regular intervals and balanced meals, and replace a dessert with a healthier option, like yogurt. At the end of the month, you’ll feel successful knowing you met your goal.

** Change one behavior at a time. It is said that old habits die hard. That is because behaviors develop over the course of time and replacing then will take a while. Focus on one goal at a time. If need be, get professional help to understand what changes you need to bring about within yourself to become healthy and fit. The problem arises when you try to change things really fast.

** Have a buddy or a personal coach or trainer: It can be anyone from a friend, to a family member, a co-worker or your personal trainer who you want to walk with you in your path to a healthy lifestyle. It works well for both the buddies. Your buddy and you can go for a walk, cycle or run together and keep each other motivated and charged. You can challenge each other to create some excitement in your training and make sure that it is not boring. Having someone with whom you can share your struggles and successes makes the work easier and the mission less intimidating.

** Make a plan that you will stick to. You have to plan in such a way that it will be your guide on this journey of change. Think out of the box and have things in your plan which you have never done before like an adventure or going for sport climbing (artificial wall climbing). But, don’t go haywire and be specific. Time manage well. Detail the time of day when you want to exercise, how long you want to exercise or when you can take walks and how long you’ll walk. Maintain a dairy in which all of these task are jotted down and ask yourself if these activities and goals are realistic for you. If not then start with baby steps.

** Have support around you: Having people around you to support you while you are on your journey towards health will help you to not slack. Don’t feel shy to ask for support wherever and whenever needed if you feel you are unable to meet your goals on your own.

Making the changes that you want takes time and commitment, but you can do it. Just remember that no one is perfect. You will have occasional lapses. Be kind to yourself. When you eat a brownie or skip the gym, don’t give up. Minor bumps on the road to your goals are normal and okay. Resolve to recover and get back on track.

** Self -Motivation: All the above points will help you in your journey to change your lifestyle but, the biggest factor of all and one of the most important factor is being self-motivated. No matter how many buddies you have, no matter what support your dear and near ones will give, no matter how good a plan you make yourself …but none of this will be effective till the time you are self-motivated and want to make the change.

Do it for yourself, do it on your own and feel good at the end of it all. Remember it is not about proving to anyone but yourself.

January 20, 2019 By Ranveer Allahbadia 3 Comments

The first step to a flat stomach & a new you

Long before candy crush, iPads & McDonalds came into existence there was a time when apes had just evolved into an intelligent, NEW species. Apes evolved to become the apex predator. This new species could “out run” any other animal and was known to hunt down its prey by doing exactly that – Chasing it till it gives up. That’s precisely what human bodies are meant to do. In our most natural form we are built to run gigantic distances, hunt mammoths and throw weapons to kill our prey.

A child born in 10,000BC grew up hunting and climbing trees. Humans born any time after World War II are spoilt by technology, luxuries and wrong food. Fortunately for us, a sudden wave has come our way. People all over the world are embracing ‘BEING FIT’. And “being fit” is all about drifting towards our more primal selves.

Being fit isn’t as hard as people think it is. The only thing people need help with is a road map.

On BeerBiceps, my Youtube channel, there is one idea that I promote more than any other. The one single substance keeping us away from attaining our maximum potential is sugar.

Sugar is a substance that activates the same parts of your brain that get activated by consuming addictive drugs like cocaine. But, unlike addictive drugs, you don’t buy sugar in shady lanes, you buy it in general stores. Any 10 year old can walk up to his local general store and purchase what is essentially a drug. This is why sugar is the single most dangerous food out there. It is a legal substance that can do as much harm as cigarettes or cocaine.

If you were wondering where YOUR journey in fitness should start – It should begin with Sugar. Eliminate this ENEMY and embrace a new you. Eliminating sugar from your diet can do wonders in the long term. With just this one change, I guarantee that you will drop those extra kilos and move towards that flat stomach you’ve always wanted.

When you eliminate all kinds of sugar, there are two main villains you are eliminating. Firstly liquid sugars in the form of fizzy (aerated) drinks. Secondly and more importantly – all desserts. Desserts are made of the 3 devil foods – sugar, refined carbs and unhealthy fats. And all these 3 ingredients destroy your body in different ways.

There is literally nothing worse you can put into your system than that simple dessert after dinner. In fact, for anyone who is overweight, I guarantee you it’s not the snacks between meals, the alcohol or the excess meat consumption – it’s the dessert that’s keeping them fat.

How you look depends primarily on what you eat. The kind of exercise you do will just hasten and enhance the process towards getting fit. And, for anyone with a sedentary lifestyle, remember these 5 words – ‘something is better than nothing’.

As I’ve always maintained – Fitness isn’t deadlifting a 100 kg or running marathons. Fitness is doing the smallest things to ensure that your body is better today than it was yesterday.

Do the minimal – walk around for 20 minutes every day, take the stairs instead of the lift, if you have the time then try your hand at free body movements like push-ups and sit-ups. But, above all just keep your body active.

The combination of a zero sugar diet and an active lifestyle is the key to long term health. This is the bare minimum you owe to your body. It’s about time we make our bodies do what they were created to do.

Take that first step!

January 19, 2019 By Azra Faizan Leave a Comment

Your Favorite Recipes – Made healthy!

chicken-nuggets (2)

I’m a Foodie, Can’t do without good food.

I also love to cook! And keep trying out yummy Recipes at home.

My close friends and family mock and complain,” you’re a ‘dietician’ and you keep feeding us Fattening food”.

Little do they know, how I prepare my ‘fattening dishes’

Before I share a list of healthy versions of a few rich or ’fattening ‘recipes, let me share a story.

The first time I tried out a whole wheat pizza crust, I might have been 17 or 18, and all excited! And announced it to the whole house that the pizza we are eating today is healthy pizza with whole wheat crust.

Result – A lot of complaints about the crust being too dry and chewy, No-taste etc. And, I was asked to stick to the old recipe with refined flour, for the next time we have pizza. When that next time arrived and I made a Pizza, I just informed all that I stuck to the old refined flour recipe, the way everyone likes it. I didn’t get any complaints and everyone enjoyed the yummy pizza (the fact, however, was that it was made with whole wheat).

Moral of the Story – If you tell your audience, you have cut the cream, or fat or used healthier ingredients, more often than not, they already have a mindset that we are going to have tasteless food today.

On the other hand, promote your dish like you’ve gone all out to prepare it ‘restaurant style’ (without mentioning the healthy part) and it will make it tastier with no added effort

Here are few healthy recipes

** Biryani:–

healthy-Vegetable-Biryani (2)

Starting with the finest, let’s start with identifying what’s healthy and what’s not in the recipe.

I personally consider biryani a healthy dish to start with. An excellent combination of proteins (paneer/chicken/mutton) with rice. Hence, balancing out your only rice dish.

Seasoned with the best spices in your pantry, each with its unique benefits helping in the digestion of your meal apart from adding flavour.

And usually combined with a good quantity of curd based salad, so you do not have to worry about your fibre and veggie intake either.

So what’s wrong? Except for the oil content, I cannot think of much.

Next question – where is the oil?

Answer- In the fried onions!!

Every biryani recipe has fried onions amounting to the same quantity as the chicken/mutton.

So if you are making biryani with 1 kg chicken you have to add 1KG FRIED ONIONS.

How then do you make this healthy? – take 1 kg onions, slice and fry 3 onions from this and grind the rest to a pulp.

Heat 2 tbsp of oil and cook your onion paste – this requires patience and can be done a day ahead.

Keep cooking and stirring your onion paste till the water is dry and it starts turning brown.

Keep a handful of your fried onions aside for garnishing and grind the rest to a paste. Add the fried onion paste to the rest of your browned onion paste. And voila!! You have 1 kg of fried onion paste to add to your chicken, cooked in less than the oil you would otherwise require.

This tip can be used for gravies requiring fried onion paste too, such as kormas.

** Chicken Nuggets:-

Who doesn’t like nuggets? Especially kids, serve them a plate of nuggets and you are their best friend forever!! So what’s wrong?? My answer nothing and everything.

Buy a pack of frozen nuggets or an order of McNuggets. And, you are feeding your kids questionable meat fried in questionable oil and seasoned with a variety of chemicals and preservatives.

Prepare a plate of chicken nuggets from scratch, with fresh meat and love and you are offering your kids a healthy, high protein snack!

Ingredients:

Chicken breasts, cut into slices.

Seasoning of your choice

Corn flour

Breadcrumbs

Flatten your chicken breast a bit with a meat hammer. Cut into nugget sized pieces.

Season with salt and whatever other spices you like, I like to season mine with herbs and garlic.

Add 2 tbsp. of Corn flour to the chicken, coat each nugget with bread crumbs.

These can then be stored in your freezer or fried right away.

They just need to be shallow fried in a skillet and don’t need any deep frying.

** Butter Chicken: –

Another hot favourite in my kitchen, yummy North Indian gravies, are usually made with cashew/almond paste and a lot of cream

Butter chicken has an added generous dollop of butter on top.

How to make it healthy – My recipe calls for 2 tbsp of oil initially for sautéing the onions, plus a generous dollop of butter in the end. Instead, I add 1 tbsp of butter and 1 tbsp of oil for sautéing the onions, and minus the butter in the end…

My recipe called for frying marinated chicken and then shredding it. I just grill/broil the chicken in the oven instead.

My Recipe calls for 50 g of cashews -While making the cashew paste, I add a tbsp of melon seeds while reducing the cashew quantity a bit. And grind it with milk instead of water to make a thick and creamy paste (thereby avoiding the cream in the end)

My recipe calls for 150 g of fresh cream, which I substitute with either milk or thick buttermilk. If I’m in a festive mood, I add 1 tbsp of fresh cream to 150 ml of milk (Small indulgences are always allowed).

Make sure to remove your gravy from the flame after 30 seconds of adding the milk/buttermilk, as this will otherwise curdle in the gravy.

** Pizza: –

Healthy-Pizza (2)

Let’s end with where it all started. My healthy whole wheat Pizza base!!!

Ingredients:

2 cups whole wheat flour

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 cup ground oats

1 tbsp yeast

1 tsp salt

1 cup lukewarm water

½ cup milk

2 tbsp sugar

3 Tbsp. olive oil

1/2 Tsp pepper powder

1 tsp oregano (optional)

1 Tsp. dried basil (optional)

Dissolve the sugar in the lukewarm water. Mix the yeast in it and keep for 15 – 20 minutes in a warm place.

Mix all the dry ingredients. Add the wet ingredients, including the yeast mixture, mix with a spoon, and bring together with your hands, you may have to wet your hands a bit.

Keep it for proving in a warm and dry place, for 2 hours. The dough will have expanded to double or more volume at this time. Punch it down once and shape into balls. Roll each ball and flatten to make a thin pizza base.

If you want to pre-bake the base, bake at 200°C for 8 minutes.in a preheated oven. If you are making the pizza directly, then add the desired toppings and bake at 200°C for 10 – 15 minute.

The same recipe for bread can also be used for other recipes like rolls and buns.

What are you waiting for? Rush to the kitchen to try your hand at these delicious yet healthy recipes.