BENEFITS OF GREEN TEA

I just had a cup of green tea and honey, and I felt so inspired that I just had to write about it.

 

 

Tea drinking has been an active part of many Asian cultures for centuries, and whilst it was reputed to possess health benefits, the health benefits of Green tea are yet to be fully uncovered. Studies have found an association between consuming green tea and a reduced risk for several cancers, including, skin, breast, lung, colon, esophageal, and bladder. This is because Green tea is the best food source of a group called catechins. In test tubes, catechins are more powerful than vitamins C and E in halting oxidative damage to cells and appear to have other disease-fighting properties.

 

 

Drinking a cup of tea a few times a day absorbs antioxidants and other healthful plant compounds, boosting your metabolism and promoting weight management. In green-tea drinking cultures, the usual amount is three cups per day. Allow tea to steep for three to five minutes to bring out its catechins.

 

The best way to get the catechins and other flavonoids in tea is to drink it freshly brewed. Decaffeinated, bottled ready-to-drink tea preparations, and instant teas have less of these compounds. Tea can impede the absorption of iron from fruits and vegetables. Adding lemon or milk or drinking tea between meals will counteract this problem.

 

 

 

 



COUNTING CALORIES MAY BE A WASTE OF YOUR TIME

Science is great, but sometimes it makes things a little more complicated than it really needs to be. For years, I've been hearing lots of rubbish about calorie counting (especially from the ladies). 

 

Calories are important. They give us energy to live and move. But if counting calories makes you so worried about not eating more than 1500 or 2000 calories per day that you lose sight of what you’re actually eating, then you need to make some serious changes to your mindset.

 

 

Your focus should be more on the quality of food than the amount of calories are in the food. That is what really matters for optimal health. Do you think the first olympians in Greece counted calories? Or the Native Americans? Or paleolithic people? Not a chance! They didn’t even know what a calorie was. They just at a natural diet, moved around, lifted things up, threw things, etc. However, these people were some of the fittest in the world.

 

 

The only thing that gives a calorie value is the amount of nutrition that it brings to your body. Period!

If you’re a beginner, just starting out on your fitness journey, trying to count everything will be so frustrating that you’ll want to quit. In these cases it’s beneficial to keep a diet journal that doesn’t attempt to keep track of the exact amount of calories. It just makes you more aware of your food choices and when you’re eating.

 

So stop counting and just enjoy your food.