Enhance Your Health
Health Tip of the Week: Is Yogurt Actually Good for You?
I remember watching television commercials as a child. One commercial that stands out was for yogurt. Very, very old, old people were eating yogurt in the Asian countries. The tag line was that they were able to become so old because they ate yogurt every day (which they actually did).
Yogurt is classified as a superfood. “Yogurt can be incredibly healthy, rich in high-quality protein, beneficial probiotics, calcium, B vitamins and, even cancer-fighting conjugated linoleic acid (CLA).”
The problem with yogurt is that the big food corporations got a hold of it and dumbed up the ingredients to make it more palatable, i.e, more marketable to consumers. In reality, the majority of yogurts are not as healthy as we are led to believe. When you are shopping for yogurt and deciding on a brand to purchase, please realize that most yogurts sold in the grocery store are loaded with added sugar, artificial flavors, colors and artificial sweeteners.
According to the Yogurt Report (a recent study performed on yogurt in the USA), "What is most egregious about our findings is the marketing employed by many of the largest agribusinesses selling junk food masquerading as health food, mostly aimed at moms, who are hoping to provide their children an alternative, a more nutritious snack. In some cases, they might as well be serving their children soda pop or a candy bar with a glass of milk on the side."
The only way around this unhealthy yogurt issue and to benefit from all of the awesome qualities of yogurt is to purchase organic plain yogurt. That’s right. Yogurt with absolutely no flavorings or sugar added.
The awesome thing about yogurt is that spices, herbs or fruits added to the yogurt allow the yogurt to absorb and take on the flavor what you have added. So, if you add healthy flavorings, you have healthy yogurt. The beauty of this idea is that if you start to think out of the box, your yogurt can now be used as a snack dip (dried onion and other spices), a cream for gravies and sauces, mixed with avocado for guacamole and for its “normal” use with added fruits and nuts.
I eat one cup of yogurt for breakfast at least 5 days a week. My yogurt is a little extreme, as I make a super yogurt breakfast by adding a scoop of whey protein powder, cinnamon, pomegranate concentrate, a few tablespoons of fish or yogurt oil and a ½ cup of raw whole oatmeal to the mixture. I like it.
The beauty of yogurt is you can use your imagination and be creative. Now, it’s your turn, be creative and maybe you will live to 150 years old eating a daily cup of yogurt!!
Thought for the Week
Hey yogurt, if you're so cultured, how come I never see you at the opera? ~ Attributed to Stephen Colbert
Chiropractic Thought for the Week
Speaking of living for over 100 years, there is a New York Times Best Selling book that you can find on Amazon, called The 100 Year Life Style. This book talks about all the things you can do in your life to improve the quality of your life and live to over 100 years old.
Naturally, the book discusses nutrition, exercise and other healthy topics, but one of the major chapters is on chiropractic and how chiropractic care attributes to the 100 year life style. Chiropractic care removes spinal nerve stress. Spinal adjustments performed by a chiropractor on a regular basis allows the body to function at a healthier level by improving nerve flow to all of the body’s internal systems and organs.
In addition, the effect chiropractic has the musculoskeletal system is of a huge benefit to living a longer and quality filled life. When the chiropractor adjusts the spine not only are they balancing and relaxing muscles along the spine, the spinal adjustment is also removing friction on the spinal bones. This helps to prevent arthritis.
So, as you can see, the chiropractor can be an important part of your anti-aging team and an important part of anyone’s health care plan regardless of their age!