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Finally Quit Your Sugar Addiction With These Top Tips

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Finally Quit Your Sugar Addiction With These Top Tips

Do you feel like sugar rules your life? Is it all you can think about? Do you just get finished eating one meal and you can’t stop craving something sweet to finish off the meal?  Some call it a sweet tooth, others call it a sugar addiction. 

Luckily, there are ways to eliminate sugar from your diet and get the addiction under control before it wreaks havoc on your health and weight.

So why do sugar cravings tend to kick in just after a meal? The balance of sugar and fat in the body intricately impacts your cravings. Think back to the last heavy meal that you ate. Maybe it was a greasy burger or a steak and potatoes, or a high-fat, creamy pasta dish. Almost immediately upon finishing the meal, did the sugar cravings kick into high gear? But why is that? Well, consuming meals that are high in fat tend to create an immediate craving for sugar. In comparison, a healthy salad, or lower fat content meal usually doesn’t create the same wicked sugar cravings.

Eating frequent high sugar meals or snacks can also create a cycle of sugar cravings that recur throughout the day. For instance, you eat a sugary cereal for breakfast, and then mid morning, your energy crashes and you are craving something sweet, so you eat a granola bar or donut, or drink a high-sugar beverage. Then, again mid-afternoon, your energy crashes, so you reach for a chocolate bar. Breaking this cycle is key to getting a sugar addiction under control.

Break the Sugar Addiction

The best way to get your cravings under control is to break up with sugar. Easier said than done, I know. But with these tips, you’ll be on your way to getting a handle on the sugar addiction.

  1. Identify what food sources your sugar consumption comes from. Beverages can be one of the worst culprits of sugar.  Focus on drinking lots of water and eliminating (or at least limiting) the consumption of coffee, specialty coffee drinks, tea, pop, juice, alcohol, milk and energy drinks.
  2. Stop buying sugar laden foods. Things like cereal, granola bars, yogurt, processed foods, and baked goods are all extremely high in added sugar. Although many of these foods are touted as healthy options, the added sugar content dictates otherwise.
  3. Substitute with fruits and vegetables. Although fruits and vegetables naturally contain sugar, they are much more easily assimilated by the body and utilized for energy.
  4. Change your routine. If you tend to move right from dinner to dessert without a breather in between, it may be time to change up your routine. Take a walk, do the dishes, prepare your lunch for the following day, meditate, or sit outside and enjoy the fresh air. Give yourself a minimum of thirty minutes between dinner and dessert. Usually during that time, the sugar cravings will have subsided.
  5. Identify why you gravitate towards sugar. Is it a coping method that you use to combat stressful situations? Do you use it as a reward after a long hard day at the office? Changing your relationship with food will allow you to mentally distance yourself from it.

The Most Decadent and Healthy Dessert You Can Make for Mom this Weekend

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Decadent Healthy Dessert Mothers Day

It is common to end the meal with a rich, chocolatey dessert, or fudge, cookies or brownies.

This decadent and healthy raw vegan cheesecake will absolutely change the way you think about healthy desserts.

You don’t need to have processed sugar, gluten, flour, milk, eggs or fake frosting to make a dessert taste spectacular. Actually, quite the opposite!! When you create a recipe with real food, real ingredients and keep it as raw, organic and natural as possible, the flavours combine to create a magical, decadent dessert that will knock your socks off! And Mom’s too!

Jo’s Raw Vegan Cheesecake Recipe

Ahead of time:

  1. Take frozen blueberries, cherries and strawberries out of the freezer and let thaw separately in small bowls. You can use fresh berries, but when the frozen option thaws, it creates a nice juice that adds to the flavour of the cheesecakes.
  2. Begin soaking 1.5 cups of raw cashews in water

For the Crust:

1 cup packed pitted dates
1 cup raw walnuts

Decadent DessertAdd dates and walnuts to a food processor and chop until small bits remain and it forms into a ball. Pour into a bowl. If too wet, add a few more walnuts, or if too dry, add a few more dates.

Put 12-15 muffin cups into a muffin tin and press the mixture almost 2cm deep into each muffin cup. Set in freezer while creating the next steps.

For the Cheesecake:

1.5 cups raw, soaked cashews (for a few minutes while making the crust)
juice of 1 lemon
1/2 cup of coconut milk (if you can separate the solidified cream from the milk in the can, the thicker consistency is much better) or use coconut cream
1/2 cup real maple syrup (or less to taste)

Decadent DessertAdd all ingredients to high speed blender and blend on high until creamy and smooth. Adjust to taste with a bit more or less maple syrup. Pour into bowl and then spoon on top of the walnut-date crust (that was hardened in the freezer).

For the Topping:

Spoon the defrosted fruit onto the cashew cheesecake and press some of the berries into the cheesecake so they don’t roll off. Add a little juice on top. Use your favourite fruits for the topping – I used blueberries, strawberries and black cherries.

Freeze the muffin trays for an hour or so until the cheesecake is firm. Move to the fridge until you serve. They soften quickly and this is the best time to serve them to your special guests.

Decadent Dessert

Enjoy!

How To Throw A Sugar Free Kids Birthday Party

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Sugar Free Kids Birthday Party

What do you get when you mix a group of children with too much cake, junk food, candy and party games? A recipe for overtired, cranky, and overstimulated children.

The excitement of a birthday party can be enough to trigger emotional behaviour in children. The tradition of eating pizza and cake, followed by presents and games just doesn’t make sense anymore.

Children are sensitive to what they eat, and because they don’t have the same emotion regulation that adults have developed, hosting a birthday party for your child could be more than you had bargained for.

Below are some tips to host a kid-friendly party, that considers their health. Trust me, other parents are going to thank you!

The Cake

Food colouring and dyes that are used in cake icing have been linked to hyperactivity and allergic reactions. Ultimately, cake icing is a mixture of sugar, unhealthy fats, and chemicals. The cake itself is not much healthier being high in sugar, gluten and is likely high in fat as well. Opt for a homemade cake that is lower in sugar and fat and free of harmful food dyes. To avoid the traditional cake altogether, there are plenty of ideas on the internet to make a beautiful cake out of fruit. The base is a large watermelon and other fruits are used to decorate the “cake.” 

The Drinks

Avoid high-sugar drinks like pop and juice that can cause children to be on a sugar-high. Create a buffet of chopped strawberries, raspberries, orange slices, lemon slices, and cucumber slices to add to water. Children will be excited to make their own flavoured drinks and they can experiment with different combinations.

The Food

Serving a group of children a meal that they all like can be the largest obstacle of any birthday party. It’s pretty safe to say that most children like pizza and chicken nuggets and French fries. So, rather than buying these highly processed options at the grocery store, make your own at home so you have control of the ingredients. Make individual pizzas on pita bread so each child can select the ingredients they want on their pizza. Homemade chicken fingers and baked French fries are also a fast and convenient solution.

The Goodie Bag

Most parents can agree that the junk that comes home in a goodie bag from a child’s birthday party is ready for the garbage. Candy, chocolates, and little plastic toys do not offer any health benefit for the child. Instead, opt for activities like painting a picture or a craft that children can take home with them in place of a goodie bag. Alternatively, have children decorate a picture frame and take a group photo and print a copy for each child to put in their picture frame.

The Activities

The key to a fun birthday party is to be prepared with more activities than you think you might need to fill the time of the birthday party. Create a dance party and have kids be creative in making a music video. Have a scavenger hunt where children have to work together to find clues and a prize.

Top Items to Buy in Bulk

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Bulk Foods Discount

Feeding a growing family can seem like a never ending marathon sometimes.

Just as one meal clean up is complete, the next meal is on the horizon. It can be exhausting to maintain a steady stream of healthy, nutrient dense meals to nourish your family. 

It can also be a financial challenge to purchase high quality ingredients. That’s why buying certain items in bulk can add up to huge savings and will keep your fridge and pantry stocked for easy meal prep.

1. Organic greens are one of the most important staples that you can have in your fridge. Salads are perfect for work and school lunches or they can be turned into a quick week night meal by adding a protein like chicken, fish, nuts, or beans. Be sure to purchase the bag or container of fresh greens with the furthest expiry date to ensure freshness.

2. Small bags of frozen fruit are expensive and they just don’t last long enough in our households. A morning smoothie is a fantastic way to get the day started so be sure your freezer is always stocked with extra large bags of frozen pineapple, strawberries and blueberries. This can also the most economical way of buying organic fruit when it is not in season.

Expert tip: Buy pineapples when they are on sale, and chop them up yourself and freeze them in medium sized freezer bags. You can find pineapples on sale for $2 each some weeks, so stock up! That is a lot of fruit to receive for just $2. This way is cheaper than if you were buying already frozen pineapple in the frozen fruit department.

3. Raw nuts and seeds like almonds, walnuts, hemp hearts, chia have a long shelf life and can be stored in the freezer to keep them fresh even longer. A small bag of hemp hearts or chia seeds at the health food store can cost almost as much as a bag double the size at Costco.  Add chia and hemp to smoothies and salads. Almonds and walnuts are a great snack to carry in your purse or car.

4. Quinoa and brown rice can help to add substance and protein to meals and add variety to the menu. Both have a long shelf life and are perfect to buy in bulk to keep the price point down.

5. Purchasing oils such as organic extra virgin olive oil, coconut oil and avocado oil in bulk allows for a significant cost savings. Be sure to store oils in a dark, cool location.

Avocado oil is best stored in the fridge and is a great oil to use to make homemade salad dressings.

Coconut oil can be used for sautéing and in homemade baked goods.

Extra virgin olive oil can be used for cooking at low temperature but is best used as a salad dressing or drizzled over vegetables.

Tips to stay on budget:

  1. Determine what your budget is, make a list that complies with the budget and stick to it. No exceptions.
  2. Know your family’s eating habits and only purchase foods in bulk that you know will be eaten before the expiry date.

3.  Stay focused on your shopping list and don’t get drawn in by displays or seasonal items.

4.  Eat before you shop. Shopping on an empty stomach can cause you to have less self-control   

     and you may end up with a huge box of chocolates or a giant bag of potato chips in your 

     cart.

I Just Spent $150 on Groceries and Then Ordered Take Out

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$150 groceries

“I just bought $150 worth of groceries and then ordered takeout because I couldn’t be bothered with the hassle of deciding what to cook.”

Having just heard this from a dear friend, I am wondering, has this ever happened to you?

Don’t fall victim to ordering high calorie takeout while you have a fridge full of perfectly good food!

Planning is the key to staying on track with your chosen lifestyle of eating a diet rich in whole foods. In a world full of fast food options and busy schedules, it is easy to get distracted from eating well. I have outlined some tips and tricks to stick to help us all stick to a healthy diet.

Half the battle of making nutritious meals is having all of the ingredients stocked in your pantry or refrigerator. Before you do your weekly grocery shop, sit down and make a meal plan for the week. At the same time, create your shopping list to reflect the ingredients that you will need for your week’s meals.

Remember that flyers are your friend. Not only are flyers meant to point out the weekly sales, but they can also act as an inspiration for your meal planning. Flyers generally feature fruits and vegetables that are in season or are at least readily available and cost effective. Use the flyers to choose a star ingredient for each meal and then develop your meal plan around those star ingredients.

Leftovers are a time saver. Batch cooking is an easy way to ensure that you have leftovers on hand, so that on nights that time doesn’t allow you to be in the kitchen to prepare a meal from scratch, you have something to easily heat up and have on the table in minutes. Try making a large pot of soup, stew or chilli to have in the fridge or freezer for quick, easy meals.

Try adding the following recipe to your meal plan next week.

loaded sweet potatoes

Loaded sweet potatoes

2 large sweet potatoes
1 small sweet onion, diced
1 jalapeño pepper (remove seeds for less spice)
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tsp garlic powder
sea salt

Guacamole Topping

1 avocado
1 roma tomato
1/4 sweet onion, diced
1 jalapeño pepper, finely chopped (optional)
sea salt
juice of one lime

Preheat oven to 375ªF. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Cut sweet potatoes lengthwise and then thinly slice. Dice onion and jalapeño pepper. Add sweet potatoes, onion and jalapeño pepper to a bowl. Toss with olive oil, garlic powder and sea salt to taste. Bake sweet potatoes until tender.

While sweet potatoes are baking, prepare guacamole topping. Cut avocado in half and remove the large seed. Using a spoon, scoop out the flesh of the avocado into a bowl and chop into small pieces. Dice tomato, onion and jalapeño and add to the bowl. Add a pinch of sea salt to the avocado mixture and add the juice of one lime.  Mix well.

Serve the sweet potatoes and top with guacamole.

Serve the loaded sweet potatoes with a garden salad, and a protein of your choice (free-range chicken, wild-caught cold water fish, grass fed beef). Enjoy!

5 Hacks to Upgrade Your Paleo Diet

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5 Hacks to Upgrade Your Paleo DIet

There are so many diet plans that you can choose from to follow, but it really comes down to how your body functions best. You know your body and how you function, and how your body feels after eating certain foods.

That’s not to say that you can proclaim “my body feels best on bread and chips” just because your taste buds like it.

This is a real observation about how your body feels after eating meat, or dairy or starches.

It’s time to listen to your body because it’s easier to hear it when it whispers, than when it has to start shouting.

So if you have listened to your body and chosen to follow a Paleo diet, there are a few ways to make it even better.

But first of all, let’s break the Paleo diet down.

A Paleo diet consists of foods that mimic what our pre-agricultural, hunter-gatherer ancestors may have hunted, gathered or foraged for in the wild. Such as a variety of meats and vegetables and a small amount of fruits and nuts. No grains or processed sugar.

Hacks to Upgrade Your Diet:

1. Buy Organic!

Organic foods that are not treated with pesticides and heavy metal toxins contain more accessible vitamins and minerals that conventionally grown produce. They may cost a bit more, but they are definitely worth it. To learn more about the value of organic, check out our previous blog on The Dirty Dozen and Clean 15 here.

2. What Meat are You Eating?

Think back a few million years. Were there abundant sources or added growth hormones, antibiotics or vaccines added to the animals’ feed? I doubt it. So steer clear now!! Choose organic, grass-fed beef, buffalo, free-range chicken, wild caught salmon, elk, venison, etc.

3. Focus on Veggies

Choose a variety of leafy and cruciferous veggies to go with every meal! That means kale, lettuce, spinach, Bok Choy, Celery, Brocoli, Cauliflower, and Brussels Sprouts. Also add in low-sugar fruit, like raspberries, strawberries, blackberries, blueberries, cranberries and Granny Smith apples. These fruits will not spike your blood sugar. Raw nuts and seeds and avocados are great sources of healthy fats.

4. What else are you eating?

Food marketing companies are very tricky – they can put Paleo on just about anything and get away with it! I don’t think that cookies, bread and chips were available in the wild a million years ago, but somehow they have found their way to the Paleo aisle at the grocer. They tend to have excessive amounts of sugar, sweeteners, preservatives and varying degrees of unhealthy additives but fly off the shelves because they are “Paleo”.

I also don’t think that our ancestors had a deli they strolled up to and ordered salami, pastrami or any other nitrate-filled preserved deli meat. Eat real food!!

5. Mix it Up

Who says you have to be purely Paleo every day? Agricultural developments and transportation advancements have allowed for nutrient, vitamin and fibre-rich foods to come along. If your body likes legumes as they are significantly lighter to digest than meat, give it legumes! Or if you like freshly squeezed orange juice in the morning, have at it! Listen to your body and hear what it has to say.

Is Eating Healthy More Expensive Than Junk Food?

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Many people think that eating healthy is more expensive than eating junk food.

While this argument could be proven true by eating very inexpensive, very bad for you junk foods, there are several tricks that you can use to eat healthy on a budget.

If you have perused the junk food aisle at the grocery store lately, a bag of potato chips can run upwards of three or four dollars. Just imagine reallocating those three dollars to the produce department to buy a bag of oranges, grapes, or even a full pineapple. Now that is a healthy (and inexpensive) snack!

If you’ve turned on the TV lately, then it’s probably safe to say that you’ve seen Tim Horton’s latest commercial introducing their “Perfect Pairings” menu which allows consumers to pick and choose what “convenience” they are craving for a quick meal.  While this concept is probably enticing to many customers with a price of only $5.99 for a lunch on the go, by the time you add a beverage and tax you are likely breaking the eight dollar mark for ‘fast food’ that is not going to fuel your body for greatness.

I’m going to show you how you can spend less than $25 at the grocery store and make five healthy and delicious lunches for the entire week.

WHICH IS DEFINITELY CHEAPER THAN SWINGING INTO TIM HORTON’S EVERY DAY!

Packing a lunch doesn’t have to be time consuming or exhausting. It is as easy as adding a few items to your weekly shopping list to have fresh vegetables and fruit on hand. If you find that you run short on time in the mornings, you could prepare your lunch the night before or even on Sunday afternoon so lunches are ready in the fridge to grab and go in the morning.

Shopping List

1 large container of organic mixed lettuce $5.99
1 bag of 5 avocados               $2.49
2 bell peppers                        $2.00
1 cucumber                            $1.49
1 sweet onion                         $0.75
1 bag of carrots                      $1.99
4 limes                                  $1.00
3 bananas                              $1.00
3 apples                                 $2.00
1 bag of clementines               $3.00
1 bag of raw sunflower seeds   $3.00

  $24.71

Using the lettuce, bell peppers, cucumber and onion, prepare 5 garden salads.
For a very basic dressing, place half a lime in your salad container to squeeze over your salad when you are ready to eat it.

Or a homemade salad dressing could also be made using extra virgin olive oil, balsamic vinegar, garlic, and your favourite herbs and spices. Just mix up the dressing at home and store it in your fridge at work. Add one avocado to each salad when you are ready to eat it (otherwise it will turn brown if exposed to the air).

Cut up carrots into carrot sticks for an afternoon snack.  Grab two pieces of fruit each day and carry the bag of sunflower seeds for snacking if you feel like your energy is dropping or you are having a craving for something crunchy.

There you have it! Five quick and easy lunches that are so easy you won’t even have to think about it! There are a plethora of healthy lunch options out there that are easy on the wallet, but more importantly, they will provide you with the nutrients and energy that you need to fuel your day.