vegetables

The Mindset Game – Set yourself up to Win

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mindset

We’re almost 4 months into the year. How is it going so far? Are you accomplishing some of the tasks you had thought of around the new year that you would love to complete by now?

Do you even remember what your resolutions were? Or if you think resolutions are ridiculous because they only last 2 days, did you make goals instead? Or did you forget about your goals 2 weeks later?

Where is your mindset? What do you want? What are you doing every single day to move toward what it is that you want?

In the blink of an eye, it will be 6 months into the year and unless you start now to really decide what you want and begin implementing a plan to reach your goals, it will soon be December and you won’t have anything to show for it.

So what do you want?

Do you want to quit your corporate job that is sucking the life out of you to start your dream business? If so, have you taken a course in business? Or taken some online marketing classes? Or laid out your business plan? Started saving like it’s your full time job so that you can fund your project and your life while it gets going?

Every single day you need to take the next right step toward what you want to achieve. It is the accumulation of these small steps that will lead you toward brilliant success.

So think about it… what do YOU want?

Do you want to lose weight? Get your health back? Start buying more fruit and vegetables. And actually eat them before they go bad! Simply let fruit and vegetables crowd out everything else. And move that body! You are meant to enjoy movement, so find something you love to do and do it often. You don’t have to go to the gym and spend hours like a hamster on a treadmill. You can do high intensity interval training for just a few minutes per day – which allows your body to kick itself into a high-fat-burning-machine and burn fat for hours after you are finished exercising.

Are you still thinking about it…..what do you WANT???

Do you want a better relationship with your spouse? Carve out specific times during the week that are yours – that have no distractions, no phones, no tv, no computers. And just be together and enjoy each other’s company.

Marianne Williamson has an amazing book that will completely transform the way you stay in love – called Enchanted Love. Basically she says that as we’re falling in love, we see our new partner as perfection, through rose coloured glasses. Everything they do is absolutely perfect, and we are so smitten that it creates joyful expression throughout the other facets of our life. But over time, we begin to take the rose-coloured glasses off and begin to see your significant other as they are – imperfect, messy and usually late for dinner.

But Marianne says that the true state of someone is actually perfection – and it’s during the first moments of a relationship when you are wearing the rose-coloured glasses – that this is actually reality!! That is the truth of each person, and for a moment in time you are able to see their true soul perfection. But then society and our generational conditioning causes our true sight to become blurred – and the glasses fall off.

So let’s start to put those rose coloured glasses on more often and see our significant others for what they are – perfection! And make sure they have theirs on when they’re looking at you!!

Soooo… what do you want?

Make a list of the things you want to accomplish and create an action plan to start making them happen!! Create a vision board and this will also help to keep you on track, with the universe conspiring to help you make it happen!

How To Read Labels Like a Pro and Cut Grocery Shopping Time In Half

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How To Read Labels Like a Pro and Cut Grocery Shopping Time In Half

Are you confident in your ability to read food labels?

Maybe you haven’t really taken the time to ever read a label properly before, or you are so overwhelmed by the information presented on the label that you just don’t bother.

It is time to get on the label reading train so you can be properly educated on what you are feeding your family and you can get in and out of the grocery store in half the time. No more staring at a label for 5 minutes trying to decipher if you should put it in your cart or not.

First off, it is critical to note that you won’t find a label on anything in the produce section of the grocery store – and this is where the majority of your food should be found!

The reason for that is that those foods haven’t been processed. The focus of your grocery shopping trip should be concentrated to the produce department, filling your cart full of wonderfully nutrient rich fruits and vegetables. It is important to be mindful on what produce should be purchased organically if funds and availability allow for it.

Leafy greens, strawberries, grapes, celery, and apples are some of the most highly sprayed crops and therefore should be purchased organically if possible.

As you move into the packaged food section of the grocery store, you will want to focus on the following tips to ensure you are reading labels properly.

1. Check the serving size first, and consider what a realistic serving size is for your family. In the case of most packaged products, the serving size is an unrealistic estimate of what a typical person would eat and therefore causes the caloric values, fat and sugar content to appear more acceptable.

2. Most people only focus on the top half of the label where you will find the caloric content and nutritional breakdown. While this information is important to know, the list of ingredients will be more helpful in determining just what additives might be present. Remember that the ingredients are listed in descending order based on their volume, so if a harmful item is listed as one of the first five ingredients then you may want to reconsider what you are buying.

3. Choose products with the fewest number of ingredients. But, also make sure that you know and feel comfortable eating what all the ingredients are.

4. Purchase frozen vegetables and fruit instead of canned to eliminate exposure to preservatives that are used in the canning process.

5. Beware of endorsements on products and clever marketing campaigns that make any special product claims. Just because a label claims it is sugar-free, diet, all natural or trans fat free doesn’t mean that it is healthy. 

6. Finally, avoid ingredients like monosodium glutamate (MSG), artificial sweeteners (Splenda or aspartame), sodium nitrate, food dyes, high-fructose corn syrup, trans fats, refined grains, and any other items on the label that are almost impossible to pronounce.

By following these tips, a trip to the grocery store should be a lot less confusing and time consuming. Remember that life isn’t perfect, and neither will your grocery shopping experience be. 

Select products that are as close to natural as you can and always keep your eyes open for higher quality alternatives.

Save the Bees! Without Them, Humanity Can’t Survive

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bees and dandelions

Stop. And. Listen. Do you hear bees buzzing in your yard, hard at work? If we aren’t careful, that could soon be a sound of the past.

Whatever you do this spring, don’t pull out the dandelions that pop up in your yard or garden. Yes, I know that we have all been convinced by yard maintenance companies and marketing that dandelions are not aesthetically pleasing and therefore they should be sprayed or pulled out. But, dandelions are the first source of food in the spring to feed our precious, hard-working bees (and other insects).

Bees are responsible for the pollination of approximately 35% of our food supply and it is our job to protect them.

With the widespread use of pesticides and chemicals on crops we are killing off the bee population at an alarming rate.

While the world stopped to listen to the story of Kim Kardashian’s Paris robbery last year, we missed noting that bees have been put on the endangered list.

Without bees, we can expect to see a significant impact on the agricultural industry.  Although bees are not necessary for the pollination of all crops, they do play an integral role in the pollination of melons, squash, nuts such as cashews, brazil nuts and almonds, apples, berries (raspberries, blueberries, blackberries, and strawberries), and stone fruits.

As the bee population continues to be affected, the concern is that these fruits and vegetables will be available in lower yields, which would drive the cost of these up as availability is reduced. Understanding that these are the staple foods of a whole food diet, it is concerning that a diet consisting of whole foods is likely to become less accessible and therefore could have a negative impact on the health of our communities moving forward. 

Spread the word about the bee population. Talk to your neighbours, friends, family and whoever else you come into contact with. Start a conversation in your community about what can be done to reduce the use of chemicals and pesticides. Starting a community gardening program is an excellent way to educate the community on the importance of the bee population while growing organic produce. If that isn’t an option in your community, starting a small backyard garden is easy and extremely rewarding. Bees love flowers, fruits and vegetables, so pick your favourites and start growing!

Finally, by purchasing local, raw honey you are supporting a local farmer who is working hard to maintain the bee population. The nutritional benefits of eating raw, locally sourced honey include providing anti-viral, anti-fungal, and anti-bacterial properties. Raw honey is also rich in vitamins, minerals and enzymes. Most honey that we buy in the grocery store has been processed at high temperatures and has additives, which radically reduces the effectiveness of the honey in your diet.

We encourage you to do whatever you can to help save the bee population. It could be as simple as planting a patch of wild flowers, eliminating the use of chemicals on your lawn or letting your dandelions thrive this spring!

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!

Stop Throwing Away Juice Pulp! Do This Instead

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Stop Throwing Away Juice Pulp! Do This Instead

If you are anything like me when it comes to making homemade juices, it absolutely kills me to fill up my green bin and throw away the pulp leftover from juicing. It feels like I’m throwing away vegetables or fruit that still have nutritional potential, not to mention hard earned money.

The reason we want to take the pulp out of the vegetables when we are juicing is to give the digestive system a break from having to do any work, while the nutrients in the juice are absorbed directly into the bloodstream and go to work feeding our cells.

But the pulp is by no means devoid of nutritional value simply by removing the liquid from it. It has a ton of fibre and other nutrients that are not extracted during the juicing process. Use the following ideas in your own kitchen to get the full benefit of your fruits and vegetables.

Top 7 Ways to Use Juice Pulp and the Best Fruits/Vegetables to Use for Each

  1. Freeze It – Pulp can be stored in freezer bags or glass containers in the fridge or freezer for use later in any of the below ideas. If you don’t have plans of using the pulp within 48 hours then it is best to freeze it immediately.
  2. Crackers – The best pulps to use for crackers are the naturally drier pulps like celery, zucchini, carrot, and sweet potato. Crackers can be made in a dehydrator or in a low temperature oven.  Simply mix the pulp with ground flax seeds and spices and dehydrate until crackers are crunchy and dry.
  3. Soups/Stews – Pulp is great to add to soups and stews as a thickening agent and to give your meal extra fibre. The best options are carrots, celery, parsley, kale or spinach, zucchini, and sweet potatoes.
  4. Homemade burgers/veggie burgers/falafels – This might be my favourite option, because the pulp can be so easily hidden in these patties. It also adds a binding factor to keep the burgers intact as they are cooked. Try using carrot, zucchini, and celery pulp.
  5. Add to muffins – Zucchini or carrot pulp can easily be added to traditional zucchini muffins or carrot cake recipes. For healthier baking look for recipes that are lower in refined sugar, flour and lower in saturated fats.
  6. Smoothies for extra fibre – Fruit or vegetable pulp can easily be hidden in your favourite smoothie recipe. My favourites are zucchini, pineapple, apple and cucumber pulp due to their mild flavours and textures.
  7. Homemade vegetable broth – Just like you would use leftover carrots or celery and onion to make a homemade vegetable broth, do the same with leftover juice pulp. Add a variety of herbs and spices to add an extra kick of flavour to your broth and simmer on low heat. Once cool, strain broth for use. Extra broth can be frozen for use later.

So, before you throw your next batch of juice pulp in the green bin or compost pile, consider the above options to get the full benefit of your produce. 

Are Toxins Making You Fat?

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Are Toxins Making You Fat?

Every day we are bombarded by thousands of chemicals in our environments and lifestyles that have the potential to accumulate in our bodies.

From the cosmetics that are loaded with chemicals that you use on a daily basis, to the pesticides on our produce, various preservatives and lab created additives in any processed food you consume, toxins you are exposed to at work, environmental smog and car fumes on your way to work, cleaning chemicals used at your office or you choose to use at home, the laundry detergent residue touching you all day, and finally the smelly candle you light in the evening to relax after a hectic toxin-filled day can all contribute to weight gain.

How on earth can toxins affect your weight?

Our bodies are brilliant. Every single thing about them is designed to survive. No matter what we put in or on our bodies, the stress we put them under and the activities we motor through in a day, our bodies are continually evolving and adapting to keep us alive.

When toxins find their way into our bodies, we deal with them very systematically. We process them through our liver, kidneys and intestines and move them out! But those that can not be moved out so easily, or if there is a back up in our detox systems, these toxins can be swiftly moved to the outer regions of our body, simply to protect our organs. And these toxins are stored in fat cells.

So, in a way, we can thank our bodies for moving these potentially life-threatening toxins to our hips instead of letting them build up in our hearts. However, those toxins shouldn’t be allowed to stay there forever, so we have to safely move them out, without detoxifying and recycling the toxins through our bodies.

How do we safely detoxify?

1. The first thing to start to detoxify is to stop toxifying yourself in the first place!
• buy organic produce
• swap your cosmetics for natural options from health food store
use vinegar and baking soda to clean (no more harsh chemicals! Really, how dirty can we be?)
• avoid processed foods
• stop using products with lots of fragrance

2. Drink warm water with lemon every morning when you wake up.
This helps to gently stimulate your detox organs and start the detox process of the toxins that built up overnight.

3. Drink more water throughout the day. This loosens up the cells and moves digestion through – a major detox system.

4. Exercise daily! Movement helps everything move. Especially your lymph system which can not move by itself. It needs gravity and our movement to help things run.

5. Eat more fresh fruits and vegetables – as organically as possible
These foods contain immense quantities of antioxidants to help fight against free radicals and other toxins that build up.

6. Talk to your natural health practitioner about herbs, tinctures and essential oils that would be helpful for your personal situation. There are wonderful, natural options to help to gently support your detoxification protocols without releasing all of the toxins at once and causing a RE-toxification situation.

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.

How to Grow a Simple Organic Garden

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How to Grow a Simple Organic Garden

Can you imagine heading into your backyard and picking a ripe, juicy strawberry?

What about digging in the dirt and pulling up and enjoying the sweet, explosive flavour of of a freshly dug carrot?

What if you could go into your garden and pick romaine lettuce leaves or spinach leaves and make a fresh salad?

How would this transform you life?! It sure has transformed mine. I can’t tell you the joy I have been able to experience while growing up on a large commercial produce farm. We grew strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, rhubarb, carrots, lettuce, beets, spinach, tomatoes, onions, potatoes, kale, Bok Choy, cucumbers, zucchini, Brussels sprouts, squash, pumpkins and so many more.

Now, I have a much smaller garden than when we were helping to feed our community, but my joy is still the same. My favourite thing is to go out into the garden and enjoy a freshly picked treat from my own backyard and share the bounty with friends and family.

The best part is that starting a small organic garden is SO easy! You can definitely plan to have a garden this summer and enjoy fresh produce from your very own backyard!!

Step 1:

Choose a sunny place to locate your garden. The more sun, the better! Dig off the top layer of sod and remove it or reuse it in a location that needs fresh grass. Use as much or as little space as you’d like – try to keep things rectangular or square so your planting lines will be straight. Dig the dirt up and loosen it as much as possible with your garden tools.

Step 2:

Hit your local greenhouse or garden supply store and score some compost or decomposed manure. This will add lots of nutrients to the soil so that your veggies can grow efficiently.

Step 3:

Decide which fruits and vegetables you’d like to grow. For your first season, the easiest choices to grow are:
• carrots
• lettuce
• spinach
• kale
• tomatoes (buy the plants that are already developed)
• cucumbers
• basil, dill, cilantro, etc

Step 4:

Check the seed packages for timing to plant, but it’s important to wait until you are basically clear of the risk of frost, which can damage or kill small plants that are just starting.

Follow the directions on the seed packages for depth, but dig a small (usually approximately 1”) trench to drop the seeds into and cover them up with a bit of dirt and pack it lightly. Water each row you plant and sit tight!!

Water your garden regularly and be sure to pull out any weeds. Weeds interfere with the plants’ ability to pull water from the soil, absorption or nutrients and take up room that they need to spread their roots.

But be sure that you are actually pulling out the weeds, not your plants that are too small to identify yet!

Master Tips:

• Make sure you leave enough space both between each seed for the item to grow, as well as enough room between the rows that your produce isn’t choking each other out

• Imagine how large a head of romaine lettuce gets – so leave a few inches between the seeds if you want the lettuce to have room to form full heads. Otherwise you will just have a lot of leaves growing every which-way because they don’t have enough space. (either way, it’s still delicious! And if one of the seeds doesn’t come up, you haven’t wasted a lot of space in the row)

• Cucumber plants spread for several feet, so plant them toward the edges of your garden and train their plants to spread out onto the grass. Just move them before the lawn mower drives by!

• Imagine the size of carrots and leave an inch of room in between seeds to they have room to grow and develop. Same for beets, radishes, onions, etc.

• Tomato plants can grow quite large and also need some sort of support system to stake them up so they don’t fall over. Even an old broom handle can be driven into the dirt and you can tie up the plants with old panty hose – it’s soft and won’t damage the tomato branches

I hope your garden brings you as much joy as it does for me! It’s also a great way for children to learn where their food comes from, how it grows and how to take care of it. It is such a great survival tool that they can use for their entire lives.

Recipes Volume 2 – Hearty and Healthy

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Recipes Volume 2 - Hearty and Healthy

It’s time for another volume of recipes! We always focus on finding ways to eat higher quantities of fruits and vegetables. There are thousands of phytonutrients in just one piece of fruit or one vegetable, and the best part is that we haven’t even scientifically identified them all yet, nor do we fully understand how they work synergistically together! But we do know that they are the foods with the densest quantities of vitamins, nutrients and antioxidants, so we try to eat as many servings of F+V as we can every day!

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DINNER:

Easy Slow Cooker Sweet Potato Black Bean Quinoa Soup

It’s still winter up here in the northern hemisphere, so we’ll share a delicious, hearty slow cooker soup that you can start in the morning and enjoy at dinner!

3 large sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into 1/2 inch cubes
1 large sweet onion, diced
3 cups diced tomatoes
2 cups chopped carrots
1 cup chopped apple (remove skins)
3 tablespoons tomato paste
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
2 tsp cumin
1 tsp chili flakes
1 cup finely chopped kale
1 cup finely chopped spinach
3/4 tsp salt and pepper
5 cups water
1.5 cups cooked quinoa
1.5 cups cooked black beans

Place sweet potatoes, onion, tomatoes, carrots, tomato paste, apple, garlic, cumin, chill flakes, kale, spinach and salt and pepper into slow cooker with water. Cook on high for 4 hours and then add cooked quinoa and black beans and cook for 1 more hour. Enjoy!

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LUNCH:

Jo-Anne’s Amazing (almost) Raw Pad Thai

This is one of my most favourite raw lunch options. It’s so easy to throw everything into the blender, and mandolin/chop up your veggies! (Be careful with the mandolin, those things are dangerous!)

To make the sauce, In a high speed blender, add:
4 pitted dates
3 basil leaves
1 roma tomato
1/2 tsp red pepper flakes
1 tsp sesame seeds
1 tbsp coconut aminos (or soy sauce if you don’t have aminos)
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
2 tbsp lemon juice
2 shakes ginger powder
5 shakes Himalayan sea salt
1 tbsp maple syrup
1/2 tsp garlic powder

For the Noodles:

Chop 6-7 large leaves of romaine or leaf lettuce
Mandolin slice 1-2 carrots into match sticks
Mandolin slice 1/2 a cucumber into match sticks
Mandolin slice 1 stalk celery into match sticks
Mandolin slice 2 peppers into slices (choose yellow, orange or red!)

(or you can use your spiralizer for the carrots and cucumber)

Drizzle the sauce over your veggies and enjoy!

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BREAKFAST:

Cherry Berry Smoothie

This is a delicious smoothie to kick start your morning! You’ll love the bursts of flavour to awaken your taste buds and rev up your day! Filled with healthy fats and antioxidants, this one is a keeper!

To your high speed blender, add:

1/2 cup frozen cherries
1/2 cup frozen blueberries
1 frozen banana
1 handful spinach
2 tbsp raw cacao powder
2 tbsp chia seeds
5 ice cubes
1.5 cups unsweetened almond milk

Blend until smooth and enjoy!! Recipe can easily be doubled to feed the rest of your family!

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Could Your Boy Belly Cause a Heart Attack?

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Could Your Boy Belly Cause a Heart Attack?

Do you carry extra weight around your abdominal area? Research is telling us that people of normal weight who have extra central body fat are at an elevated risk of dying of heart disease.

Central obesity it extra fat around your midsection, and there is an easy way to calculate if you may fall into this category.

1. Measure your waist at your belly button.
2. Measure your hips at the widest part of your buttocks.
3. Divide the first number by the second number.

For men, your waist-to-hip ratio should be no greater than 1.0 and for women it should be no greater than 0.9.

If your numbers are higher than the suggested ratio, there are simple changes that you can implement to reduce your ratio and improve your health.

The first thing that you need to do is to add more fresh fruit and vegetables to your diet. It’s very difficult to make a massive diet and lifestyle change all at once and be able to sustain it long term. So the most important thing you can do is eat more fruit and veggies and these foods will begin to crowd out the bad foods.

I also want you to moderate your meat intake. A serving of meat is the size of a card deck. Which does not mean 8 decks stacked on top of each other!! When was the last time you ate a steak that fit in your hand? I bet it’s been awhile.

Over the years, our portion sizes have grown and grown into rather ridiculous quantities of food. Our bodies don’t need that much food and literally can not digest that much protein in one sitting. This extra protein ends up being stored as fat and can contribute to central obesity, putting you at risk for heart disease.

Avoid fast food, processed food and packaged food.

Eat real food!! Learn to make a few delicious recipes that you enjoy. Check out our blog of recipe ideas here.

And of course, move your body more often. Add some gentle cardio to your routine, go for a power walk at lunch, hit the gym and sweat it out.

The very first sign of heart disease is erectile dysfunction. Your arteries and capillaries are very active and sensitive in that area, and can be the first to indicate that there is hardening of the arteries or plaque building up in your blood vessels.

Obviously not a topic that you want on your radar, but heading to the doctor for a prescription to help in this area is one of the worst things you can do. It puts added stress on your cardiovascular system and masks an important symptom that is telling you that your body is in distress.

This is the time to make healthy diet and lifestyle changes to let your body naturally heal and return to abundant health.

With Sources from:
http://www.health.harvard.edu/heart-health/research-were-watching-belly-fat-boosts-risk-of-dying-of-heart-disease