Beef Stew with Carrots and Potatoes

The recipe below is a classic French beef stew, otherwise known as Beef Bourguignon with a healthy twist to it. When the meat is seared in olive oil first, then slowly braised with garlic and onions in a wine-based broth.  After a few hours in the oven, the meat becomes tender and enveloped in a rich, deeply flavored sauce.It does take some time to make (about an hour of active cooking), but I promise you it is well worth the effort. Aside from being delicious, it’s a one healthy pot meal that feeds a whole family.

The most important thing is to start with the right cut of meat. You want to buy chuck roast that is well-marbled. Stay away from meat generically packaged as "stew meat". I can guarantee you it will not get tender; no matter how long you cook it.

Ingredients:

·         3 pounds boneless beef chuck (well-marbled), cut into 1½-inch pieces

·         2 teaspoons salt

·         1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

·         3 tablespoons olive oil

·         2 medium yellow onions, cut into 1-inch chunks

·         7 cloves garlic, peeled and smashed

·         2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar

·         1½ tablespoons tomato paste

·         ¼ cup all-purpose flour

·         2 cups dry red wine, such as Burgundy or Pinot Noir

·         2 cups beef broth (I like the Pacific organic brand)

·         2 cups water

·         1 bay leaf

·         ½ teaspoon dried thyme

·         1½ teaspoons sugar

·         4 large carrots, peeled and cut into one-inch chunks on a diagonal

·         1 pound small baby yukons potatoes, cut in half

·         Fresh chopped parsley (optional for garnish)

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 325°F with rack in middle.

2. Pat beef dry and season salt and pepper. In a large heavy pot, heat 1 tablespoon olive oil over medium-high heat until hot and shimmering. Brown meat in 3 batches, turning with tongs, about 5-8 minutes per batch, adding one tablespoon more oil for each batch. (To sear meat properly, do not crowd the pan and let meat develop brown crust before turning with tongs.) Transfer meat to a large plate and set aside.

3. Add onions, garlic and balsamic vinegar; cook, stirring with a wooden spoon to scrape brown bits from bottom of pan, about 5 minutes. Add tomato paste and cook a few minutes more.

4. Add beef with juices back to pan and sprinkle with flour; stir with wooden spoon until flour is dissolved, 1-2 minutes. Add wine, beef broth, water, bay leaf, thyme, and sugar; stir with wooden spoon to loosen any brown bits from bottom of pan and bring to a boil. Cover pot with lid, transfer to preheated oven and braise for 2 hours. 

5. Remove pot from oven and add carrots and potatoes. Cover and place back in oven for 50-60 minutes more, or until vegetables are cooked and meat is very tender. Taste and adjust seasoning if necessary (freshly ground black pepper and a pinch of sugar go a long way). Garnish with fresh parsley if desired.

On a cold night, we look for soul-satisfying comfort food, choose this healthy recipe and let me know how it turns out. Enjoy!

Fast and Healthy Pico De Gallo Recipe

Here is a fresh Pico De Gallo recipe. Some people like theirs hot and some, well, mild. Here is one a recipe and some healthy modification to make it as hot and spicy as you please.

Fresh Tomato Salsa has been a lot of people’s treat when they go out to eat at a Mexican food restaurant. The kids enjoy the taste and that is a thumb up for parents. This quick Salsa is even healthy for the body because you are going more than 3 serving of vegetables in your daily servings. So, think of it like this; it’s both fun to eat. And it’s healthy!

Ingredients:

·         1 medium tomato, dice

·          1 onion, finely chopped

·         1/2 fresh jalapeno pepper, seeded and chopped

·         2 sprigs fresh cilantro, finely chopped

·         1 green onion, finely chopped

·         1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

·         1/8 teaspoon salt

·         1/8 teaspoon pepper

Directions:

·        In a medium bowl, combine tomato, onion, jalapeno pepper (to taste,) cilantro and green onion.

·        Season with garlic powder, salt and pepper. Stir until evenly distributed.

·        Refrigerate for 30 minutes.

Nutritional Information: Calories: 21 | Total Fat: 0.1g | Cholesterol: 0mg | Sodium: 76mg

Peanut Butter vs Almond Butter: The Difference, The Benefits

Let’s take a look at two of the most popular healthy nut butters - peanut and almond butters. They are both a great source of protein with healthy fat, but does one have a better benefit over the other doesn't?

When buying either peanut butter or almond butter, you want to be sure you are getting the most naturalform of it you can. The ingredient list on either should only include the nut (peanut or almond) and maybe some salt. There should not be any added oils or other fillers. 

When you compare the nutrition facts for peanut and almond butter you won't see any big differences. In a 2 tablespoon serving, you get 190-200 calories, 16-17 grams of fat, 1.5 grams of saturated fat (which means 14-15 grams of HEALTHY unsaturated fat), 7-8 grams of protein and 2 grams of naturally occurring sugar.

The difference in these nut butters comes in the micronutrients! Almond butter provides 40% your daily need for Vitamin E, 25% your magnesium and 8% of both your calcium and iron needs. Vitamin E is thought to be beneficial in preventing heart disease and unwanted platelet clotting. It's an antioxidant which might prevent the formation of carcinogenic nitroamines in the stomach (formed from eating nitrites). It's also thought to aid in healthy immune function. Other potential benefits include preventing degenerative eye disease and cognitive decline. Magnesium is equally as important to your body. It's involved in hundreds of reactions that occur inside of you. Specifically it's known to maintain normal muscle and nerve function, support a healthy immune system, and keep bones strong. It also helps regulate blood sugar and blood pressure. For "micro" nutrients they are pretty powerful!

Conclusion: Go for the almond butter! Its micronutrients are all about helping your body function better and prevent disease. Peanut butter is still a great choice, but almond gives you a little more bang for your buck.

Tips to Keep in Mind for Halloween

Halloween is a once a year chance to dress up in costume and stock up on sweets. But for parents who encourage healthy choices and minimal junk food, this day can be a struggle with your little monsters. Kids in America consume an average 60-100 grams of sugar a day, and our nation’s childhood diabetes and obesity rates are scarier than any ghoulish costume.

Just 15% of parents said that they offered trick-or-treaters healthy non-candy alternatives, ranging from bags of pretzels to small toys like yo-yos and temporary tattoos. About 37% said that they offered toys and candy. Nearly half of all parents just gave out candy.

On the one hand, you want to let kids indulge and enjoy the holiday. On the other, you don't want to undermine all the work you do the rest of the year maintaining a balanced diet and a healthy lifestyle, not to mention the harm candy can do to kids’ dental health. And you don't want to confuse kids with mixed messages.

Try keeping the candy indulgence down to one night, on Halloween. Then take the rest of the candy and find a way to diminish the supply. You can let your kids pick a handful of their favorite treats to keep, and to keep it somewhere so they can have one piece a day until it’s gone.

Halloween often signals the start of Halloween season, but Halloween is only one day. Keep the indulgence down to only one day, not the week or month of October (as many stores would have you believe it should be). This way if you indulge, you still do so minimally. It also helps to look for products that are sweetened naturally, with fruit juice or another organic sweetener.

Another helpful tip is to make sure to take a walk on Halloween! Instead of driving from place to place, make sure you do your trick-or-treating or Halloween visits by foot or on bike. A healthy activitycan help to counteract the candy indulgence and to teach good habits every day. If you host a Halloween party yourself, look up some extra healthy snacks to cook up to balance out the less healthy choices.

Parents can also set up the leftover candy as a payment system. Kids can trade in their candy for a small toy or some extra allowance. This way the treats are gone, and replaced with something more useful or healthy.

Lastly, hand out alternatives to Halloween candies, such as stickers, temporary tattoos, plastic Halloween jewelry, dried fruit, crayons or mini bags of pretzels.

I hope your Halloween is a fun-filled, healthy and happy good time!

It's National Seafood Month! Find Out why Seafood is so Healthy for You!!

Research has shown time and again that eating more fish prevents heart disease. Below are some quick tips regarding our favorite seafoods.

Shrimp are quick, easy and delicious. It does contain a lot of cholesterol but it's very low in fat(especially saturated fat) and the single most important thing in a healthydiet is not eating less cholesterol, but limiting the amount of saturated fat. Most of the shrimp that you find in the grocery has been frozen so it's not a bad idea to look for a good quality frozen shrimp and keep some on hand. Only purchase thawed shrimp if you are going to use it that day.

Sea scallops are sweet, succulent, meaty and satisfying. A 4-ounce serving of scallops has only 100 calories and less than a gram of fat. Sea scallops are widely available fresh these days. They should be a translucent creamy color (some are slightly pink). Look for scallops labeled chemical free," because treated scallops tend to have a bitter taste.

Mussels are quick and easy to cook. They are inexpensive and you can use them in almost any recipe that you might use clams. Mussels are low in fat, calories and cholesterol and oh, so tasty. One pound of mussels in the shell is about 3.5 ounces of edible fish and there's less than 100 calories with under 2 grams of fat (so eat a couple pounds if you like). Most mussels that you will find in the grocery are grown on farms. They are cultivated on long ropes along coastlines and in tidal pools or bays. The most common variety is the blue mussel has a dark blue to almost black shell. Mussels, like all live shellfish need to be kept ice cold. Buy mussels only at fish counters where the other fish looks fresh. Look for clean mussels with tightly closed shells--open shells indicate that the mussel might be dead.

Clams are also a great choice. Like mussels, they are low in fat and calories and are widely available. They are great simply steamed but also wonderful in any fish soup, chowder or fish stew. Also like mussels you want to purchase clams as close to the time that you are going to cook them as possible. Keeping them sitting on top of a bed of ice will keep them fresh a lot longer.

If you love crab but don't much like fighting with your food (as with whole crabs or crab legs), purchase crab meat and let someone else do the work. You'll find it sold in a variety of forms, but crab meat will keep for only a few days in your refrigerator. Crabs do have a moderate amount of cholesterol but they are very low in calories and saturated fat. The key is to pair crabs in recipes with good fats like olive oil.

Fin fish is pretty simple. It's great for you, eat more of it. Buy it as fresh as you can and if you can't buy really fresh fish, frozen is a good choice. That's it. There's not much more that you need to know. First and foremost, buy what you like and quite simply get what's fresh. You are far better off going to the grocery, choosing a great piece of fish and THEN coming home and picking a recipe than you would be if you said "I am going to have salmon tonight." If the salmon doesn't look great, choose another fish that does and then choose the recipe. If you are not used to eating fish, review this list. Most all of these fish are easy to find in the grocery store and are so good for you. The following fish are more fatty, high in Omega-3 fats, so choose these more often: halibut, grouper, sea bass, salmon and tuna.  Less fatty fish include: redfish, trout, catfish, perch and sole.

Even if you don't have the time to cook an elaborate recipe, fish is one of the quickest and easiest meals that you can make. Simply preheat the oven to 375 degrees F and place a pan inside. While the oven is heating sprinkle each 4-ounce fish fillet with about 1/8 teaspoon salt and then pepper if you like. Sprinkle about 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon of your favorite herb over the top. When the oven is hot, spray the pan lightly with olive oil and then place the fish inside. After it has cooked for about 4 minutes on one side turn the fish and drizzle about a teaspoon of olive oil over the top. In another 4 minutes or so your fish is done. Squeeze a little lemon over the top and you are ready to eat. That's less time than it takes to make a frozen pizza in the microwave.

Men vs Women During Weight Loss

You may have heard and realized that it's more difficult for women to lose fat than men. Immediately most people think it must be estrogen or some hormonal issues. But perhaps the biggest factor is NOT hormones, but the simple fact that women are usually smaller and lighter than men.

When you have a smaller body, you have lower calorie needs. When you have lower calorie needs, your relative deficit (20%, 30% etc) gives you a smaller absolute deficit and therefore you lose fat more slowly than someone who is larger and can create a large deficit more easily.

For example, a male’s total caloric needs is 3300 calories a day (5' 8" and moderately to very active), then a 20% deficit is 660 calories, which brings the total to 2640 calories a day. On paper, that will give about 1.3 lbs of wt loss per week. If he bumped his calorie burn up or decreased his intake by another 340 a day, that's enough to gives him a 2 lbs per week wt loss.

For smaller women, the math equation is very different.

If your total daily energy expenditure is only 1970 calories, even at a VERY high exerciselevel, then a 20% deficit for you is only 394 calories which would put you at 1576 calories a day for (on paper) only 8/10th of a lb of fat loss/wk.

If you pursued your plan to take a more aggressive calorie deficit of 30%, that puts you at a 591 calorie deficit which would now drop you down to only 1382 calories/day.

That's starting to get fairly low in calories. However, you would still have a fairly small calorie deficit. 

What this all means is that women who are petite or have a small body size are going to lose fat more slowly than larger women and much more slowly than men, so you cannot compare yourself to them.

It's great to be inspired by our success stories,but if you're looking for someone to model yourself after, choose one of our success stories of someone your body size and wt, rather than the folks who started 100 lbs overweight and were therefore easily dropping 3 lbs a week.

One pound a week of fat loss is much more in line with a realistic goal for someone of a smaller body size. Overweight people can lose it faster. The best thing you can do is to be extremely consistent with your nutrition over time.

Suggestion #1: Weigh and measure all your food any time you feel you are stuck at a plateau, just to be sure. When your calorieexpenditure is on the low side, you don't have much margin for error.

Suggestion #2:  Take your body comp measurementswith a grain of salt, especially if you are using a good scale and remember that body comp testing is seldom perfect. Pay attention to your circumference measurements, how your clothes fit and how you look in the mirror and in photos as well.

Suggestion #3: You may want to take 2 or 3 of your long cardio sessions on the treadmill and switch them to intense intervals or ANY other type of activity that has potential to burn more than 362 calories for an hour's investment of time, or perhaps that equivalent calorie burn in less time. No need to add more days of cardio or more time - get the most out of the time you are already spending.

Suggestion #4: If you do intervals, don't make the workout too brief (ignore the advertisements for those "4 minute miracle" workouts, etc.), or you may burn fewer calories than you were before! In fact, you might even try the method where you do HIIT for 15-20 min, then continue for another 30-40 at slow to medium intensity. Increasing total calories burned should be your focus.

Understand the calorie math I explained above and be patient, watching for slow and steady progress, and paying special attention to the trend over time on your progress chart.

Keep after it - the persistence will pay, I promise!

--Jessy