FFF Diva Article Research: 7 Sleep-Stealing Foods to Stay Away From

7 Sleep-Stealing Foods to Stay Away
by RealBeauty.com, on Tue Sep 7, 2010

If you find yourself tossing and turning at night, your dinner could be to blame. Our esteemed panel of nutritionists and dieticians list out seven foods that keep you up past your bedtime.

Caffeine
You've known this guy for years. He's gotten you through countless all-nighters and pepped you up for that 8 a.m. Monday morning presentation. But did you know that caffeine isn't actually giving your body any energy? "Though caffeine does provide us with that feeling of alertness, it's just a stimulant," says Michelle Dudash, registered dietician, chef, and freelancer writer. Related: 10 Products to Bring You to a Happy Place

Aged Cheese
If a nap is in your future, steer clear of Parmesan, Romano, Asiago, and other hard cheeses (basically, all the yummy smelly ones!). The high levels of the amino acid tyramine are known to keep you up. Related: 33 Healthy Foods to Fight Off Aging

Spicy Foods
Hot tamale! Those hot wings may taste damn good during the football game, but they aren't going to feel so great come bedtime — especially if you're prone to heartburn, since lying down only amps up its side. Make sure you eat your favorite hot foods early enough in the day to prevent a sleepless night later.

Processed or Smoked Meats
Leave this one on the deli counter. Cynthia Pasquella, CCN, CHLC, CWC, says processed meats contain high levels of tyramine and makes the brain release a chemical that makes us feel alert. These meats also aren't the healthiest ones to munch on either, sleep patterns aside.

Which Celeb Do You Sleep Like?

Alcohol
Even though it's a depressant, alcohol will, oddly enough, keep you up at night. "Many people use alcohol to help them relax, but it actually prevents your body from entering the deep stages of sleep," says Pasquella. Although you may fall asleep, you won't feel very well-rested in the morning.

Milk Chocolate
The average milk chocolate bar contains tyrosine, which is converted into dopamine — a stimulant, says Pasquella. This causes alertness and restlessness, which can keep you up at night. Related: Answers from Our Chill Out Expert

Ginseng Tea
Herbal teas are great for sleeping, but steer clear of ginseng. It's been shown to act as a stimulant, and though some tea drinkers don't feel any effects from the tea, others experience insomnia and hypertension. If you might fall in this category, avoid drinking it several hours before bed, recommends Pasquella.

Caffeine
You've known this guy for years. He's gotten you through countless all-nighters and pepped you up for that 8 a.m. Monday morning presentation. But did you know that caffeine isn't actually giving your body any energy? "Though caffeine does provide us with that feeling of alertness, it's just a stimulant," says Michelle Dudash, registered dietician, chef, and freelancer writer. Related: 10 Products to Bring You to a Happy Place

Aged Cheese
If a nap is in your future, steer clear of Parmesan, Romano, Asiago, and other hard cheeses (basically, all the yummy smelly ones!). The high levels of the amino acid tyramine are known to keep you up. Related: 33 Healthy Foods to Fight Off Aging

Spicy Foods
Hot tamale! Those hot wings may taste damn good during the football game, but they aren't going to feel so great come bedtime — especially if you're prone to heartburn, since lying down only amps up its side. Make sure you eat your favorite hot foods early enough in the day to prevent a sleepless night later.

Processed or Smoked Meats
Leave this one on the deli counter. Cynthia Pasquella, CCN, CHLC, CWC, says processed meats contain high levels of tyramine and makes the brain release a chemical that makes us feel alert. These meats also aren't the healthiest ones to munch on either, sleep patterns aside.

Alcohol
Even though it's a depressant, alcohol will, oddly enough, keep you up at night. "Many people use alcohol to help them relax, but it actually prevents your body from entering the deep stages of sleep," says Pasquella. Although you may fall asleep, you won't feel very well-rested in the morning.

Milk Chocolate
The average milk chocolate bar contains tyrosine, which is converted into dopamine — a stimulant, says Pasquella. This causes alertness and restlessness, which can keep you up at night. Related: Answers from Our Chill Out Expert

Ginseng Tea
Herbal teas are great for sleeping, but steer clear of ginseng. It's been shown to act as a stimulant, and though some tea drinkers don't feel any effects from the tea, others experience insomnia and hypertension. If you might fall in this category, avoid drinking it several hours before bed, recommends Pasquella.

FFF Diva Useful Advice: Fast & Healthy Home Cooking

The Diet Detective: Fast and Healthy Home Cooking
By Charles Stuart Platkin
For Active.com

Eating out is certainly convenient, especially with our busy lives. But there are ways to make cooking at home less time-consuming and more feasible for even the busiest people. Here are a few tips for making faster food at home.

Batch Cooking and Other Ideas

Cook and Freeze: One of the most effective ways to ensure that you always have a healthy meal on hand at home is to cook several meals at once. For instance, "Cook pork chops or chicken in huge batches, freeze on cookie sheets and then store in the freezer in a sealed container with waxed paper between the pieces. Take out only as many pieces as you need, spray both sides with no-stick spray, place them in a cold oven, set it to 425 degrees, and bake for 20 to 25 minutes, turning 10 minutes before done," says Antoinette Kuritz, a San Diego-based home cooking expert and mom.

Minimize Cleanup: Do all your major cooking the day before your regular housecleaning day. That way, you won't have to clean the kitchen twice, adds Kuritz.

Here are a few more ideas to help you get started.

Form a Cooking Co-op: "Ask three friends if they'd like to form a cooking co-op. Each person prepares dinner one night a week for all four families. You get four great meals and only one night in the kitchen," says Janet Peterson, author of Family Dinners: Easy Ways to Feed Your Kids and Get Them Talking at the Table (Gibbs Smith, 2006).

Have a Food Party: To make batch cooking a fun event and to share recipes to keep meals interesting, invite a friend or two over to cook batch meals together, or cook in your own kitchens and swap vacuum-sealed meals later, says Alicia Ross, co-author of Cheap. Fast. Good! (Workman 2005).

Make Theme Meals: To take the effort out of deciding what's for dinner, create a theme for each night of the week. For example, Monday can be soup night; Tuesday, taco night; Wednesday, salad bar, etc., suggests Carrie Hanna, the author of Florida's Backyard (Authorhouse, 2002).

Make Extra: As an alternative to cooking entire meals ahead, just double or triple up on some basic building blocks that will speed you through future meals. Browning batches of ground beef and onions, poaching or grilling chicken and baking potatoes ahead of time are easy ways to cut down on meal prep time, says Ross.

Post the Menu: Plan weeknight meals in advance and post them (so there is no, "What's for dinner?" when you get home). That way you shop once a week and get everyone on board, says Peggy Katalinich, food director for Family Circle magazine.

Cooking Out/Dining In: They're springing up all over the country, with names such as Dinner by Design (www.dinnerbydesignkitchen.com), Dream Dinners (www.dreamdinners.com) and Dinners Ready (www.dinnersready.com).

These are basically storefront kitchens where you can prepare an entire week's worth of meals in one session. They do the planning, shopping and chopping and provide everything you need to prepare healthy, delicious meals. Dinners Ready even has a chef and nutritionist on staff. People assemble their meals in the store, which is set up like a home economics class, then take them home, freeze and cook as needed. That way you know you have all the ingredients, your meals are portion-controlled, you can pick what's healthiest--and there isn't any cleanup.

Cookbooks

There are so many quick-and-easy cookbooks available that you would think nobody eats dinner out. Just take a peak on Amazon.com and you'll find a host of books, including:

•Rachael Ray's 30-Minute Get Real Meals: Eat Healthy Without Going to Extremes by Rachael Ray (Paperback, Clarkson Potter 2005)
•Weight Watchers Make It in Minutes: Easy Recipes in 15, 20, and 30 Minutes by Weight Watchers (Paperback, Wiley 2001)
•American Heart Association Quick & Easy Cookbook: More Than 200 Healthful Recipes You Can Make in Minutes by American Heart Association (Paperback, Clarkson Potter, 2001)
•Cooking Light Superfast Suppers: Speedy Solutions for Dinner Dilemmas, by Cooking Light magazine, Anne C. Cain and Anne C. Chappell, editors. (Hardcover, Oxmoor 2003)
•Weight Watchers New Complete Cookbook by Weight Watchers (Ring-bound, Wiley 2006)
Store It

"Oxygen is not a friend to food," says Chef Kirk Bachmann, vice president of education for Le Cordon Bleu Schools North America, "and freezing food that is not protected from oxygen will cause it to dry out." Refrigerators and freezers are actually cold dehumidifiers. One of the easiest ways to protect your food is to put it in a plastic bag with a zipper closing. They come in a variety of sizes you can use for different quantities.

You'll need storage containers in different sizes. Or, if you want to get fancy, you could invest in a sealing machine.

"I use a vacuum sealer to freeze my food, but plastic wrap works just fine. A vacuum sealer removes air and traps moisture in the product, avoiding freezer burn. When you're wrapping food to be frozen, do it tightly and avoid air pockets. Chicken, pork and shrimp freeze well, but I avoid freezing fish, although there are some exceptions to the rule," says Chef John Greeley of the famed 21 Club in New York.

Which foods don't freeze well? "Foods with low moisture content, such as baked goods, tend to get stale or become dry and brittle when they freeze," says Cordon Blue's Bachmann. "For example, frozen bread has a much shorter shelf life when it's defrosted. You can, however, freeze solid foods in broths or sauces relatively easily and still maintain the texture of the food."

"Stews, soups, chili and spaghetti sauce freeze extremely well. Starchy foods like potatoes, turnips, pasta, dumplings and rice tend to become mushy when frozen because the water crystals expand during the freezing process and tear apart the delicate, papery walls of the grains," says Bachmann.

"Make sure to organize your freezer and keep a list of what's in there. A full freezer is a wonderful thing--but not if you forget what you've prepared and leave it until it gets freezer burned," says Kuritz.

"Also, keep in mind that the faster food freezes, the better chance you have of maintaining quality," adds Bachmann. And allow space between frozen items so that cold air can circulate around them.

CHARLES STUART PLATKIN is a nutrition and public health advocate, author of the bestseller Breaking the Pattern (Plume, 2005), The Diet Detective's Count Down (Simon & Schuster, 2007) and founder of Integrated Wellness Solutions. Sign up for the free Diet Detective newsletter at www.dietdetective.com.

Copyright 2007 by Charles Stuart Platkin

FFF Diva Video Research: "The Mouth Revolution"

To Get the Facts & Take Action, go to:
http://www.markberger.com/movie/mouth/mouthifesto.html

Again another reminder why it's important to KNOW what's in your food and what's going into YOUR mouth! QUALITY REAL FOOD NOW!

Viva Mouth-ulicion!,
FFF Diva Mo

The little things...

The little things. Man I miss the little things such as a diverse food diet, but I will explain more about that next blog. Let's just say I am suffering from "low caloric intake" as my youth intern says at our office. Every time he notices I am a little out of it he offers me water, a bar, or a shake---sometimes all three. However like I stated before, I will detail it out next round.

I hope everyone had a fabulous Labor Day Weekend! I know I did while I was in Las Vegas for a family reunion I strayed away as much as I could from the two sinful things: alcohol & buffets. I think I did pretty well AND got a lot of dancing done! Pictures soon to follow in an upcoming blog. : )

To close---for inspiration, since I can't eat regulary for awhile, I would like to share an email I received from my Operation Boot Camp staff this morning:

Greetings Everyone,

Todays Mission: Go on YouTube and do a search on ways to "rehab" or "stretch" the muscle group / area of your body that is sore or achy. Learn to troubleshoot your body! Whether it be shin splints, calf tightness, knee pain, shoulder pain, or something else- use YouTube as a resource!! ;)

Did you know it is the little changes you make that make the most difference in your eating habits and in your life? Little things, like 2% milk in coffee rather than cream or Splenda instead of sugar. It is the small things that add up to be big numbers at the end of the day.

Let’s put this into perspective, shall we?

The USDA recommends 65 grams of fat per day. 65 grams is quite low if you think about it. Some meals we eat sometimes have 65 grams of fat in them alone. Which means if you have one meal that has contains 65 grams of fat you will have to eat light for the rest of the day or only eat that one meal which we do not recommend.

The little things add up, so if you begin to change the little things, they will add up to big gains in the long run.

Let's take a glance on how fat adds up.

Part of your daily intake might include the following foods:

(2) Cups of Coffee with Cream (cream has 3 grams per oz) = 6 grams

(1) Sandwich with (1) Slice of cheese (American Cheese, 1 slice) = 8 grams

(1) Same Sandwich with mayonnaise (2 tablespoons) = 8 grams

(1) Roll with (1) pat of butter = 4 grams

(1) Salad with Caesar dressing (2 tablespoons of dressing) = 16 grams

Just adding up the small things (not even the meat on the sandwich or the contents of the salad) you have 42 grams of fat that could easily be reduced. Remember you are only recommended to have 65 per day, so you could be already more than half way there with 2 cups of coffee, a sandwich, a salad and a dinner roll.

My suggestions:

(1) cup of coffee with 2% milk = 2 grams

(1) Sandwich with no cheese and mustard = 0 grams from cheese or mayo

(1) Roll no butter, maybe a little olive oil = 0 grams from butter

(1) Salad with Vinaigrette dressing = 4 grams from the dressing

With substitutions you are at 6 grams with the coffee, the sandwich, the roll and the salad. I would say you are doing pretty well without having to alter every meal you eat - you just have to change the little things to see a big difference. Skimping on the small things means you do not have to give up the big things! You can also do this exercise with carbs and protein to make sure you are getting the correct amounts. Choosing good fats also makes a huge difference. For instance, the fat in an avocado is much better source of unsaturated fat than the saturated fat in french fries!

Keep this in mind the next time you are ordering or making food. Eating habits have to change subtly in order for you to stick to them. If you make drastic changes and cut out all the things you like, you will hate that you cannot have this or that and will return to the same eating habits you have always been accustomed to. This is called “fad dieting” and we want you to eat for life, not for the moment.

Go forth in good food choices.

The Boot Camp Staff

--
Ronny Varghese
Director of Operations
Operation Boot Camp - San Jose
1-888-7-FIT NOW (734-8669)
Ronny.Varghese@operationbootcamp.com
OperationBootCamp.com