Watch that ''sweetness''...

Selecting good sugar

For baking and to scatter over bitter food and drinks choose dark sugars: brown sugar contains molasses, a good source of iron, and is so flavorful a little goes a long way when stirred into deserts, oatmeal, and drinks. By adding the sugar yourself, you can monitor how much you are taking on board. Buy organic and fair-trade if desired. Honey is a sweetener and an antioxidant with fantastic health-giving properties, used in hospitals for wound healing. Studies suggest it may help prevent heart disease and offer anticavity protection for teeth.

Avoid artificial sweeteners

Many popular artificial sweeteners contain ingredients that may be harmful to your health. Check for aspartame (E951), which produces the toxin methanol, which the body can process only in small amounts, and has been associated with headaches and menstrual problems. Saccharin (E954) has been linked with bladder cancer. Acesulfame K (E950) has also been linked with cancer, while sorbitol (E420) and mannitol (E421) are associated with bloating.

Discovering hidden sugar

It’s difficult to keep to the World Health Organization’s recommended daily limit for sugar (no more than 10 percent of your daily food intake) when it appears in so many forms in packaged, processed foods. If any of the following come near the top of an ingredients list or the product contains more than one in addition to sugar, leave that breakfast cereal, ketchup, or diet food on the shelf:

• dextrose

• glucose

• corn syrup

• sucrose

• fructose

• HFCS (high fructose corn syrup)

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Be Fit

Eating food in as close to its natural state as possible helps ensure maximum exposure to youth-enhancing nutrients, many of which are lost during storage, processing, and cooking. It also reduces your exposure to artificial additives used to enhance the flavor, texture, color, and shelf-life of processed foods, from pre-prepared meals to diet dishes.

Five a day

Keep looking and feeling young and help ward off diseases of aging, from Alzheimer’s to stroke and heart disease, by eating more fruit and vegetables. They are rich in antioxidants, and the biologically active ingredients of plant pigments and flavorings have anti-aging properties, too. Aim to eat a minimum of five portions of fruit and vegetables daily—and up to nine if you can.

Fitting in fruit

To boost the number of fruit servings you eat each day, slice fresh fruit or spoon soaked dried fruit onto morning muesli. Snack on grapes, dried fruit and berries, and eat an apple or banana midmorning or afternoon. Follow meals with a fruit salad, baked or poached fruit, or treat yourself to pieces of fruit dipped in fine dark melted chocolate.

Color combos

A rainbow of colors on the plate ensures you are getting a good intake of plant chemicals. Naturally deep green, yellow, and red foods contain antioxidant carotenoids that boost immunity and offer protection against heart disease, cancer, DNA damage, and age-related sight problems. Include peppers, broccoli, spinach, sweet potatoes, carrots, and pumpkin in your diet, plus extra virgin olive oil to aid absorption.

Fresh is best

Choose ripe, seasonal fruit and vegetables and grains in their whole form to ensure maximum flavour while retaining vitamins and minerals, antioxidant compounds, and other plant nutrients that are destroyed by processing.

Grow your own

The best way to ensure the freshest, most flavorful organic fruit and vegetables is to grow them yourself. Even a city balcony can provide a good supply of tomatoes, salad leaves, herbs, and soft fruit.

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Where cholesterol comes from

Yes, you get some cholesterol from food, but the curious fact is that most of the cholesterol in your blood and body tissues is produced right in your very own liver. Your liver uses the proteins, fats, and carbohydrates in food to manufacture and churn out about 1 gram (1,000 milligrams) of cholesterol a day.

How cholesterol travels around your body

Whether your cholesterol comes from food or your liver, it travels through your bloodstream in particles called lipoproteins, a name derived from lipos (the Greek word for “fat”) and protos (Greek for “first” or “most important”).The fatty substances in lipoproteins include cholesterol and triglycerides, the most common fatty substance in the human body (more about triglycerides in the section “Focusing on Other Blood Baddies”). The proteins that combine with fats to produce lipoproteins are called apolipoproteins, often abbreviated as apo.

Lipoproteins develop through five distinct phases as they mature into the particles that carry cholesterol around your body:

·         Phase 1: Chylomicrons

·         Phase 2: Very low-density lipoproteins (VLDLs)

·         Phase 3: Intermediate-density lipoproteins (IDLs)

·         Phase 4: Low-density lipoproteins (LDLs)

·         Phase 5: High-density lipoproteins (HDLs)

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Believe It or Not, You Need Cholesterol

Your healthy body needs cholesterol, but I haven’t told you the reasons why. Let me list them now:

·  Cholesterol directs the development of some cells in the growing fetus.

· Cholesterol is part of the membrane that surrounds and protects each cell in your body.

· Cholesterol comprises a major portion of your brain, which is composed of mostly fatty tissue.

· Cholesterol contributes to the construction of synapses, structures through which nerve cells transmit messages.

· Cholesterol is a building block for hormones, including the male sex hormone testosterone and the vital adrenal hormone cortisone.

·  Cholesterol is an ingredient in digestive juices, such as bile.

· Cholesterol is used as a building block for vitamin D, which is made when sunlight hits the fatty tissue just under your skin.

·  And, oh yes, cholesterol is part of body fat.

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