You’ve watched all the documentaries, listened to the interviews and have read the articles, but you’re still not convinced on the raw food movement.

The reason for this is probably because going raw means cutting out dairy, meat, and cooking! Three things that have become quite habitual in a modern person’s diet and routine. The trick to going raw and staying raw is to know which fresh foods you adore and to make sure they are always on hand.
In Summary, Going Raw Involves…

The basis of the raw food diet is all about eating mostly or all unprocessed and uncooked foods in an attempt to provide your body with all of the nutrients without the dangerous additives commonly found in our modern food.

To thoroughly enjoy going raw food, we encourage creativity in the kitchen and being open to experiment with new flavors. This will ensure you aren’t dining on a plate of raw carrots for dinner.
Why Go Raw?

The goal of eating more raw foods is to obtain plenty of nutrients in an easy-to-digest manner; one that our bodies are naturally suited for.

You may also be surprised to hear that cooked foods are usually harder to digest than raw foods; plus cooking nutrient-dense foods tends to destabilize some of their valuable enzymes and destroy certain antioxidants and vitamins. Raw foods also help alkalize the body, reduce acidity, and have less of a chance of fermenting in the gut and causing inflammation/autoimmune reactions.

Let’s take a look at the key principles and guidelines to going raw.
The Guidelines For Going Raw

You can eat raw fruit, raw vegetables, raw nuts & seeds, fresh herbs, and spices.
Drinking lots of filtered, alkaline, or distilled water is key!
You can only drink water, herbal teas (no green, black, or white teas), freshly made juices, or homemade smoothies.
No meat, meat products, dairy products, processed foods, wheat, refined sugar, alcohol, soda, coffee, grains, eggs, or anything with a shelf life.
You can have extra virgin olive oil, virgin coconut oil, or raw apple cider vinegar, as well

Evidence Suggests…

Raw foodism has been around since the 1800’s, and both studies and anecdotal evidence show the benefits of a raw food diet include:

Lowering inflammation
Improving digestion
Providing more dietary fiber
Improving heart health
Helping with optimal liver function
Preventing cancer
Preventing or treating constipation
Giving you more energy
Clearing up your skin
Preventing nutrient deficiencies
Lowering the amount of antinutrients and carcinogens in your diet
Helping you maintain a healthy body weight

So are you ready to take part in the raw food revolution?

Keep Reading:

#healthy-swaps #weight-loss #beauty #organic #health-tips #diabetes #lifestyle #detox #films #healing

by Dr. Edward Group DC, NP, DACBN, DCBCN, DABFM
Cayenne pepper is a potent weight loss aid that can help curb your appetite, heat up your metabolism, and even help burn extra fat. With these significant benefits, it should be no surprise that cayenne is an integral part of popular weight loss plans like the Master Cleanse. Cayenne peppers can be grown at home or purchased at almost any grocery store. If you are looking for a safe, reliable strategy to fortify your efforts to support a healthy body weight, cayenne is an option you should consider.

Cayenne Helps Put a Stop to Cravings

Many people who are looking to lose a few pounds are trying to consume fewer calories throughout the day. Cayenne pepper can help you suppress your hunger and eat less food.^[1] Consume enough cayenne, and you may stop craving fatty, salty, and sweet foods—the same foods dieters want to avoid the most.^[2] Depending on when you eat this spicy red pepper, you may experience different results. Eating cayenne before your meal will help satisfy your appetite as you eat. While dining on cayenne throughout the meal might help you feel fuller and more satisfied after you’ve finished eating.^{[3, 4, 5]}

Ignite Your Metabolism

A sluggish metabolism could be what’s preventing you from shedding extra pounds. If you want a natural way to speed up your body’s metabolic processes, cayenne may be just what you need. When added to a high-fat diet, cayenne increases diet-induced thermogenesis, which means your body uses more energy to break down the food you’re eating, helping you burn a few extra calories.^[6] Metabolic improvements from consuming capsaicin-rich foods, like cayenne, can start almost immediately and may last up to 30 minutes after a meal.^[7]

Burn Extra Fat

It might not surprise you that cayenne supports a normal body weight, but how it accomplishes this feat is astonishing. The same compound in cayenne that burns your taste buds may help soothe your gut. This connection is critical as researchers find mounting evidence that suggests a link between your gut health and your weight. One animal study suggests that an unhealthy gut microbiota contributes to an unhealthy weight.^[8] Capsaicin may help rebalance the gut by reducing some forms of systemic irritation that are common in overweight individuals.^[9]

Promote Healthy Digestion

For sustained weight loss, you must have a properly functioning digestive system. Cayenne is packed full of beneficial vitamins and nutrients, including some B vitamins that your digestive system needs to work properly.^[10] Additionally, cayenne can help stimulate saliva production in your mouth and along your gastrointestinal tract. Saliva is among the first steps of healthy digestion and helps break down the food you eat.^[11]

Adding Cayenne to Your Routine

If you are looking to add cayenne to your weight loss plan, there are several ways to do it. One option is adding it to your meals. Dried and crushed cayenne pepper is readily available in almost any grocery store. It’s a quick and straightforward way to turn up the heat on your go-to recipes. Try sprinkling some on your eggs at breakfast, or on your soup or salad at dinner time. Some dieters also love adding it to their water with a squeeze of lemon.
If you don’t like the taste or heat that cayenne adds to your food, then encapsulated cayenne pepper might be your best option. There are some advantages to taking cayenne in a pill, tablet, or capsule. For starters, you get a more accurate and consistent measurement of your intake. Cayenne supplements typically include capsaicin content and Scoville heat unit measurements. Unlike their cooking counterpart, this provides a measured, concentrated serving. Cayenne supplements also give you more flexibility during the day when eating cayenne might not be as appealing or convenient, such as in the early morning or late evening.

How to Choose the Right Cayenne for Weight Loss

Cayenne is one of the world’s most loved spices, there are countless options and varieties to choose from. This abundance of choice can make selecting the right cayenne challenging for some. However, when you follow these three simple guidelines, picking the right cayenne for weight loss will be a breeze.

1. Quality Over Quantity

How the peppers start out matters. Selecting a GMO-free, organic cayenne pepper is a must. Large industrial farms usually spray their commercial peppers with agricultural chemicals and pesticides. It’s practically impossible to wash these pollutants from the plants, and these toxic compounds can cause unintended health concerns for your endocrine system and gut.^[12]

2. Turn Up the Heat

The Scoville scale is a measuring system used to indicate the hotness of any given pepper. The scale is also a good reference for the ratio of capsaicin contained in a cayenne supplement. The higher the number of Scoville heat units (SHU), the more capsaicin that is present. Capsaicin is what causes something to be hot to the taste, but is also the reason for many of cayenne’s health benefits.^[13]

3. Buy From Someone You Trust

Where you buy your cayenne can make a big difference in quality. There are many factors and variables that can affect how the cayenne pepper is grown, harvested, dried, and packaged. If the farmer or supplier cuts corners, then the final product suffers. Only buy your cayenne, and other supplements, from a trusted brand that aligns with your values and health goals.
Have you used cayenne to help lose weight? What was your experience? Leave a comment below and share your insight.
 
 

“No, I’m not pregnant. I’m just bloated.” Has this ever happened to you?

If you have IBS or experience bloating, you may relate to the awkwardness of having a distended, uncomfortable stomach on show for the world to see.
Worse yet, bloating usually strikes when we really don’t want it. Often it’s during social occasions where we can’t control our normal food intake and our belly’s fluttering with nervous excitement.
Thankfully, there’s really no need to trade in your favorite LBD for a muumuu next time you head out! Check out these 10 handy tricks to keep bloating in check.

1. PEPPERMINT

This wonderful herb is naturally anti-spasmodic and can settle the stomach cramping that usually precedes bloating. Take it as a tea or in food-grade capsule form; even a little pure essential oil mixed in a carrier lotion can effectively drop tummy bloat.

2. CHARCOAL CAPSULES

Carry a little tub discreetly in your handbag for a natural, emergency remedy once you feel the bloating build. Charcoal effectively captures the gas and can also help with embarrassing flatulence. Just be careful not to use with certain medications (it can block absorption) or rely on charcoal for long-term use. It will also make your poop turn temporarily black!

3. KNEEL A WHILE

According to ancient Chinese acupuncture, we have powerful energy meridian lines which run along our shins and support digestion. If your knees and hips are okay, try kneeling with your shins folded under you for a while. The ground will naturally apply pressure to these digestive acupuncture points.

4. RUB YOUR BELLY CLOCKWISE

All day long, our digestive tract is making smooth, muscular movements called ‘peristalsis’. This propels food along our gut for digestion and ultimately, expulsion! You can, therefore, speed up the movement of gas through your gut by massaging your tummy in the same direction as peristalsis. Simply look down at your belly and use the flat of your hand to massage your belly in large, smooth, clockwise circles.

5. IF YOU CAN, EXERCISE GENTLY

Just like the trick above can support peristalsis, so do

es gentle exercise. Moving your abdomen and heightening your breath rate gently massages your internal organs and moves gas along. A kind word of warning – don’t engage in anything too extreme, as higher intensity exercise will temporarily divert energy away from digestion. Aim for something more gentle like walking or yoga.

6. GINGER

Juice it, chew it or drink it in a tea! Ginger is a powerful digestive aid and can provide relief from a wide range of gastrointestinal issues such as nausea, vomiting and bloating. You can carry powdered ginger capsules or crystallized ginger in your handbag as an on-the-go solution.

7. IBEROGAST

This herbal remedy is now even recognized by mainstream science for its efficacy in treating IBS! Comprised of nine medicinal herbal extracts, Iberogast can provide quick relief from bloating and other uncomfortable digestive complaints.

8. LIMIT FERMENTABLE SUGARS

If you are prone to bloating, it may be helpful to temporarily reduce your intake of foods that are naturally high in fermentable sugars. While this fermentation process is good for the gut under normal circumstances, it can produce excessive bloating if we are nervous, excited, out of our normal dietary routine or leaving longer periods of time between eating. You could experiment with limiting dried fruit, stone fruit, apples, garlic, onion, legumes and wheat before a big event and see if that makes a difference!

9. SKIP FATTY MEALS

Have you ever wondered why fatty meals make us feel so full? One reason is that fat sends delicious, “feel-good” and satiating messages to our brain after we eat it. Another reason is that fat delays gastric emptying or in other words, it slows down the speed at which food can leave the stomach and enter the small intestine. In fact, the stomach can take up to six hours to empty after a fatty meal! This plays havoc with digestion, so best to skip deep-fried or fatty offerings if you’re wanting to beat the bloat!

10. PROBIOTICS

Ultimately, you can thank the friendly little bugs in our gut for gas. These guys are little gas-pumping, fart-producing factories! All the fermentable sugars and dietary fiber that our bodies can’t digest form a buffet for the flora in our gut, and as these bacteria munch away they produce gas as a by-product. This in and of itself is a normal, healthy process that supports gut health. It’s just embarrassing or downright uncomfortable when excessive!

Many people find relief from bloating by restoring more ‘good’ bacteria to their gut with a good quality probiotic. However, a small minority find that probiotics actually make their gas worse – it all depends on your unique gut flora to start with. Therefore, this tip is probably best trialed before you head out for a hot date!